Baghdad Conference Was Successful First Step

The one-day conference in Baghdad on Saturday among representatives of the Green Zone government in Baghdad, Iran, Syria and the US was a success. It was a success because no one stormed out, and because there is another conference scheduled next month in Istanbul, Turkey, and that conference hasn’t been canceled. Diplomacy, regrettably, doesn’t sort everything out once and for all in a single afternoon. The interested parties have a long way to go before any of their common concerns gets resolved. By the same token, they are all one step closer than they were on Friday.

The real triumph for Saturday’s meeting was the Iranian and US representatives actually addressing one another in the same room. Since the fall of the Shah and the kidnapping of American diplomats by the theocrats who took over in 1979, the US and Iran haven’t been on direct speaking terms except for the odd attack on Afghanistan. Indeed, the US armed Saddam Hussein who then attacked the mullahs in the 1980s. And Iran has spent money right, left and center to ensure a steady supply of armed hotheads prepared to attack America and its allies over the last quarter century.

Once they got in the same room, the language and tone was probably heated. US envoy David Satterfield is said to have turned up with a briefcase full of documents he said proved the Iranians were arming Iraq-Nam’s Shi’ite militias. Iran’s chief envoy Abbas Araghchi is said to have replied, “Your accusations are merely a cover for your failures in Iraq[-Nam].” Naturally, one must point out that the documents in the briefcase come from the same people who promised the world that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. Of course, Mr. Araghchi’s statement never ever denied Mr. Satterfield’s accusation, merely deflected the conversation.

As for the Syrians, they aren’t quite members of the Axis of Evil (perhaps they count as alternates – in the event one of the members cannot live up to its responsibilities as an Axis of Evil member, Syria could take up the job). Their discussions with the Yanks didn’t appear to have the same historical significance. Nonetheless, with so many thousands of refugees from Iraq-Nam living in Syria, Damascus is also part of the final settlement and the Americans need to talk to the Assad regime whether it likes it or not. On Saturday, they did.

President Bush, uncharacteristically, got it right when he said, “People are now committed publicly to helping Iraq which was I thought very positive. I think the other benefit from the conference is the [Iraq-Namese] government gained some confidence.” Unable to leave well enough alone, he then switched from statesman mode to Texas hack saying, “Words are easy to say in politics and international diplomacy. If they really want to help stabilize Iraq there are things for them to do, such as cutting off weapons flows and/or the flow of suicide bombers into Iraq.” Syria and Iran maintain withdrawing American troops would have a similar beneficial effect. And therein lies a possible solution.

© Copyright 2007 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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