General Petraeus, Ambassador Crocker Buy More Time for Iraq-Nam War

Achieving objectives by deploying resources and engaging in action is not a bad definition of strategic success. Monday and yesterday, General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker testified before Congress that the Iraq-Nam war was going well enough to justify continuing the operation. Since not enough of the legislators seem willing to argue the point, the men have secured a strategic success. President Bush will be allowed to keep American troops in Iraq-Nam fighting for a pro-Iranian government until the end of his term.

General Petraeus is the man who literally wrote the book on counter-insurgency for the US Army. This is his chance to prove his ability as a military scientist. He said before he took the job that the Iraq-Nam situation would take years to fix. He was given only a few months. If he is going to prove that he knows this stuff, he’s got to buy the time to implement things. Unlike Moveon.org, this journal doesn’t believe that he needs to cook the books to prove that more troops on the ground results in more control of a theatre of operations. It is a fact of military history.

Yet, the general has also said on more than one occasion that there is no military solution to the Iraq-Nam problem. The surge is meant to improve security enough for the leaders in the Green Zone Government to sort out the political issues that divide the people of the country. To address this, Ambassador Crocker gave as upbeat an assessment as he could given the bounds of fact. All the same, he confessed, “The process will not be quick. It will be uneven, punctuated by setbacks as well as achievements, and it will require substantial US resolve and commitment. There will be no single moment at which we can claim victory; any turning point will likely only be recognized in retrospect.” Put another way, “Just another six months and we’ll know for sure,” repeat ad infinitum.

The main issue is as the general stated, “the fundamental source of the conflict in Iraq is competition among ethnic and sectarian communities for power and resources.” The competition will take place, he said, and the only question is whether that competition will be peaceful or not. Under the Saddamites, that competition was peaceful and the game was rigged in favor of the Sunnis, and especially those from Tikrit.

Now, there are no rules; it is up to the Iraq-Namese to write them, and everyone wants to rig the games in favor of his own ethnic group. What one gains, another loses; they believe it is a zero sum game, and therefore, that’s what they’ll create. Add in some religious intolerance and there is little reason for compromise. In a heavily armed area lacking a central government that doesn’t cower in its bunkers, one has to believe peaceful competition isn’t going to happen. And for that reason, the surge is merely buying time for the Green Zone Government that is immediately wasted. The surge, therefore, isn’t even wrong. It’s irrelevant.

© 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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