Article is here.

“If eventually the Iraqi government and the various sects and groups do not come to some sort of agreement on how to share power, on how to divide resources and on how to reconcile and stop the violence, then the assumption on which the surge strategy was based is invalid, and we would have to re-look the strategy,” Colonel [Peter] Mansoor [the executive officer to General Petraeus] added.
…
While the plan seeks to achieve stability, several officials said it anticipates that less will be accomplished in terms of national reconciliation by the end of 2009 than did the plan developed by General Casey.
…
“You are not out there trying to defeat your enemies wholesale,” said one military official who is knowledgeable about the plan. “You are out there trying to draw them into a negotiated power-sharing agreement where they decide to quit fighting you.
…
“We are going to try a dozen different things,” said one senior officer. “Maybe one of them will flatline. One of them will do this much. One of them will do this much more. After a while, we believe there is chance you will head into success. I am not saying that we are absolutely headed for success.”

So if Iraqis do not “eventually” reconcile, the surge will have been foolhardy. But given its realism, the plan does not anticipate much reconciliation by the end of 2009. Still, the military believes there’s a chance that “after a while”–that is, a while after 2009–we’ll be headed into success. I think what we have here is a declaration by implication that the surge was foolhardy. Of course, that is what the brass was telling Bush in January, before he fired them.

(Edited for grammar–mine, not NYT’s)

Anyone else see this crap:

Obama Echoes Clinton on Iraq War, to a Different End

By Anne E. Kornblut
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, July 11, 2007; A05

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has long said she will not apologize for her vote to authorize the war in Iraq because there are no “do-overs” in life.

Now she and her chief rival for the Democratic nomination, Sen. Barack Obama, agree on that truism.

“When I opposed this war before it began in 2002, I was about to run for the United States Senate, and I knew it wasn’t the politically popular position,” Obama said during a town hall meeting in Des Moines on Tuesday.

Tune in next week, when the WaPo online reveals, at 11:59:59pm, that Iraq War to End, for the Day.

I don’t seem to recall any such headline in 2003. But according to Sgt. John Bruhns, who served in Baghdad and Abu Ghraib with the Third Brigade, First Armor Division, First Battalion:

I invaded Iraq on day one, March 19th of 2003…And at that point in time I had a lot of reservations, because I was looking around, and I saw 150,000 troops making their way to Baghdad in the open desert, and here’s President Bush, and he’s accusing Saddam Hussein of having a massive stockpile of weapons of mass destruction, possibly a nuclear weapon, saying that he’s a homicidal dictator addicted to these weapons and we have to stop him now. And I was thinking to myself, I said, you know, what would be a better time for Saddam Hussein to use these weapons? He has 150,000 troops in the southern Iraqi desert, and he could launch these weapons on us directly and kill nobody but us.

So it was very frightening, especially because our military commanders were telling us that he has these weapons, this is his last stand, we’re coming to kill him, to take over his government, and he will use these weapons. And we were anticipating at least 50,000 casualties that day. That’s what we were being told. So it was very frightening.

Anyone else recall hearing such things reported in the press? Anyone think the public would have permitted invasion if it had been?

Remember this:

[In Fallujah] The U.S. military turned back fleeing males [who had tested negative for explosive residue on their hands (NYT 11/13/04)] into a war zone ; it used chemical weapons (phosphorus) in the fighting; it preceded the invasion with weeks of fairly indiscriminate heavy bombing in civilian areas; and so on.

Well, here we go again. Meet “Operation Arrowhead Ripper”. From today’s NYT:

By the time dawn broke on Tuesday, the insurgent sanctuary in western Baquba had been cordoned off. Then, the American forces established footholds on the periphery of the section and slowly pressed in. �Rather than let the problem export to some other place and then have to fight them again, my goal is to isolate this thing and cordon it off,� said Col. Steve Townsend, the commander of the Third Stryker Brigade Combat Team, Second Infantry Division.
…
Unlike Falluja, where most of the population fled in advance of the battle, thousands of civilians remain in the western section of the city.

American helicopters dropped leaflets last night urging the residents to stay in their homes. The hope was to keep civilians off the streets while American forces began to close in on the insurgents. The appeal appeared to have little effect, though, as large groups of civilians mingled on the streets Tuesday and some students even sought to go to the local university.

The presence of so many civilians on an urban battlefield affords the operatives from Al Qaeda another possible means to elude their American pursuers. If the insurgents do not manage to sneak out, some may hide their weapons and try to blend with the city�s residents.

To frustrate such plans, the Americans intend to take fingerprints and other biometric data from every resident who seems to be a potential fighter after they and Iraqi forces have gained control of the western side of the city. The Americans will also test for the presence of explosive material on suspects� hands.

Officers are hoping that local residents and even former insurgents who have split with Al Qaeda may quietly help the American troops pick out insurgents. American troops have already begun to work with more than 100 Iraqis on the eastern side of the city � a group American soldiers have nicknamed the �Kit Carson scouts.� To try to prevent insurgents from escaping, American commanders are also stepping up their reconnaissance efforts.

With the little media scrutiny that the atrocious Fallujah offensive garnered, and with US generals and political elites eager to have something to hang their hat on come September, you can bet that Operation Arrowhead Ripper is not going to be a pretty sight. Still, September will be an extremely important time for anti-war arguments. Powerful arguments will be made on the basis of the indiscriminate excesses of what was “necessary” in Fallujah in 2004, and still “necessary” in Baquba in 2007. Let’s hope the reporting makes such arguments possible. We know the US Military will do their part.

Very interesting. (Previous posts on this subject: 1, 2, 3.)

John, you ignorant slut . . .

Let me just point out, once again, that supporters of the occupation who argue that the U.S. should stay to prevent a worse state of affairs want to contradict the will of the vast majority of Iraqis for their own good.

I think it’s important to be very clear about this point when we’re debating the issue of withdrawal. By itself, I don’t think it’s decisive: I wouldn’t want to categorically deny that there could be cases in which we would choose to thwart the nearly unanimous will of a large group of people for their own good. But it surely puts the burden of argument squarely on anyone arguing for continued involvement in Iraq, even if we grant them their optimism about the effects of that involvement. That’s because when we’re dealing with adults, we tend to be very suspicious of paternalism, and when we’re not bigots, we tend to be very suspicious of paternalism displayed towards large groups of foreign adults. So we ought to take Iraqi opinion very seriously, even setting aside the possibility that Iraqis understand what is happening to their society better than we do – a possibility that would give us yet another reason to dismiss optimism about the effects of continuing to defy Iraqis on the occupation of their country.

At any rate, I think chewing on this one also really brings out the neo-colonialist flavour of the whole undertaking. The poor, lost souls need our help, and they’re so backwards they don’t even know it.

For no reason I can think of, I suddenly wondered this morning what the hell was up with Tariq Aziz these days. There wasn’t a lot I could find in 30 seconds of googling, but this piece says he’s being held without charge, and this piece says that he faces the death penalty. Both compatible, I suppose, but I wonder if I’ve misunderstood something here. Both pieces agree that Aziz (a Christian) has appealed to the Vatican for help, through his lawyer.

At any rate, I’m very curious what his debriefing was like. It’s not as if Saddam Hussein trusted Aziz a lot – if I recall, he used to throw Aziz’s son in prison when Aziz was out of the country, just to be safe. Still, Aziz must know an awful lot about the Ba’ath regime. Indeed, he must also know a lot about U.S.-Iraqi relations, which I suppose is one reason he’s not giving a lot of interviews these days.

Jamie, on the surge:

As I understand it, the latest plan for Baghdad is to split troops into small units and place them in platoon house style setups across the city with Iraqi troops, many of whom are also members of Shi’ite militias. On today’s menu, the US army, disarticulated into tasty bite-sized morsels and spread lovingly on a bed of Baghdad.

That’s coming right up. Peering a bit further into the future, what I’d like to know is: What the hell happens if/when the Iraqi government asks the U.S. to leave? Increasingly, I suspect that a willingness to give the U.S. a really hard time will become a test of credibility, with anyone failing the test accused of being a pro-Yankee stooge. Once the U.S. has been publicly asked to leave, however, it has to choose between backing a coup to ensure a more favourable reception (which loops us back to the credibility issue), getting the hell out semi-voluntarily (still humiliating!), or actually getting forced out, with all that that involves (extra humiliating – supply lines cut, significant casualties, lots of equipment lost, etc. etc. etc.).

These days I’m increasingly leaning toward the view that we may see the last of those scenarios played out, around the time that the U.S. stops being more useful than not to the project of consolidating Shiite power in Iraq. I’m not yet ready, however, to make that an official Explananda prediction.

I’ve noted before that the U.S. debate about leaving Iraq is typified by a remarkable lack of interest in Iraqi opinion polling (though I do recall being wrong about this). A related feature of the Western debate is lack of attention to the fact that the decision to leave Iraq is not entirely up to the U.S. If things aren’t managed properly the U.S. really will have to fight it’s way out. I do hope that it doesn’t come to this.

What she says she’d do:

“If we in Congress don’t end this war before January 2009, as President, I will.”

So how would she do it, if she were president?:

As I’ve said before, I’ve long been for beginning a phased redeployment from Iraq as soon as possible, and I have cosponsored legislation to that effect last year. I think we should begin to get U.S. troops out of Iraq as soon as we can and would urge the administration to do so as expeditiously as possible. I think it is the responsibility of this president to resolve our presence in Iraq before he leaves office. I’ve also, as I said last week, introduced legislation to cap the number of troops in Iraq at pre-escalation levels as of Jan. 1 and require both the Iraqis to meet certain conditions in order to continue funding the Iraqi security forces and to require that the administration meet additional conditions or require a new authorization resolution in order to keep our troops in Iraq. And I believe that that approach, keeping the pressure on both our government and the Iraqi government, trying to cap the troops, trying to get more leverage on the Iraqis to perform the way they have promised, is a comprehensive approach that, if it were pursued in addition to a diplomatic offensive, would be the best way to end our involvement in Iraq in the right fashion.

“Trying to get…the Iraqis to perform the way they have promised”? Are you kidding me? You’re going to place more American lives in the balance in order to get the Iraqis to do what they’ve promised? With both a civil war and a war on the occupiers standing in the way? As Al Gore said to Bill Bradley in a 2000 debate concerning a different issue, That’s not a plan, it’s a magic wand. And it dun’t work that way.

UPDATE: More at Booman Tribune.

Paul Wolfowitz visits mosque, respectfully removes shoes, is revealed to have holes in his socks. Lack of foresight, is what I’m saying here. Certain problems are foreseeable, and if you plan properly you can avoid them, is what I’m saying.

I should make more predictions: they’re good at forcing me to think through an issue, and they’re nice and testable, which gives me a chance to look back later on and weep or cheer, as the case may be. On the soon-to-come second incarnation of this blog, I will have a wildly expanded list of categories, including one for predictions, which will make it that much easier for my friends and foes to weep or cheer, as the case may be.

Anyway, let me make a prediction about Iraq’s newly drafted oil law. The proposed law might make it through Iraq’s political process to become the law of the land, but it hardly matters: Renationalizing the Iraqi oil industry will become a test of will and credibility for Iraqi politicians for as long as it takes to renationalize the oil industry. If I was an oil exec, I would be very reluctant to bet on this law. It doesn’t have a chance.

Then and now.

via

1. Dude, if you can fuck up the trial of Saddam Hussein — Saddam Hussein, the butcher of Baghdad, whose crimes are legion, and very well-documented — then there is really nothing on God’s green earth that you can’t fuck up.

2. While disappointed with many features of the trial, I applaud the Bush administration’s vigorous defence of the principle that heads of state are legally responsible for actions they, and their underlings, take while in power. Let’s see where that one takes us, shall we?

The short format of this little forum really doesn’t allow much room for the contributors to develop their ideas. I gather, however, from what little they do say that a more expansive format wouldn’t have helped much. For me, it’s useful mainly as a way of documenting a) how bad a job the NYT opinion page does of representing a real range of foreign policy opinion; b) how truly fucked Iraq and the U.S.’s Iraq policy is now.

I’ve been too busy to take a close look at events or much commentary recently, but in the last week or so I’ve been coming to terms with the likelihood that the U.S. really is going to be forced out of Iraq, in a bloody, chaotic, and humiliating retreat. I hadn’t been able to accept that before. I could see a civil war coming a long way off, but not that the U.S. would be forced into a large-scale retreat. But consider: Any progress will lead to a renewal of larger ambition; any setback will be considered a further reason to dig in and stay. And so it will go until a mass uprising basically blows the whole thing to shit and the U.S. has to fight its way out of the country.