Draft Iraq-Nam Deal Calls for US Withdrawal in 3 Years

The British papers yesterday reported that the US and Green Zone governments were close to a deal on the future of US troops in Iraq-Nam, the Status of Forces Agreement [SOFA]. According to reports in both The Times and The Telegraph, part of the deal would call for the US to quit Iraq-Nam in 3 years’ time. Moreover, US forces wouldn’t be able to act unilaterally effective next year. This is almost an acceptable situation.

The Iraq-Namese foreign minister, Hoshyar Zebari, said that the terms of the deal include the complete evacuation of US forces by 2011 if the violence in the country remains low. “We are talking about combat troops, maybe in 2010-11, there could be drawdowns.” Moreover, US forces might be headed out of the cities and into their “not-permanent” bases; Mr. Zebari said, “The idea is really to keep these forces outside the main cities, the population centers.”

Naturally, the Pentagon had no comment, and that is as it should be. Floating the possibility of an agreement during an election campaign would be to endanger the chance of getting the deal done. Moreover, it would be a political football as the US enters the political party convention fortnight that the military doesn't want or need. Get the deal done first, then debate it as is required.

And there’s a lot the agreement must go through before it is set in stone. Because of the nature of politics and constitutionality in the Green Zone, President Jalal Talabani, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, and various factional leaders need to sign off on the deal. If that happens, the entire Green Zone parliament would have to vote on it. On the American end, Mr. Bush will declare it an executive agreement, so constitutionally it needn’t be ratified by the Senate. He hates taking anything to Congress, and the Democrats won’t fuss, because if President Obama were to take a dislike to it, he can unilaterally drop it.

There is a time issue here. Currently, the US is operating in Iraq-Nam under a UN mandate. That expires on December 31. If there is no SOFA in place by then, the situation becomes quite murky from a legal standpoint. To what extent this matters on the ground is uncertain, but Washington would like it done before then for diplomatic reasons. That gives the Green Zone government a bit of leverage if it wants to use it.

© Copyright 2008 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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