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Iraq at Critical Fork with U.S. Holding the Cards
by John M. Curtis
(310) 204-8700
Copyright
June 21, 2014
All Rights Reserved.
Faced with an ominous terrorist threat now
approaching Baghdad, 63-year-old U.S.-backed Iraqi President Nouri al-Malki
formally asked President Barack Obama for military strikes against the Islamic
State of Iraq and [Syria] the Levant [ISIS], the al-Qaeda affiliated group
formed by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
Before killed by U.S. forces June 7, 2006, the Syrian-born Zarqawi tormented
U.S. and Iraq forces, routinely blowing up mosques, beheading foreigners and
stringing up U.S. soldiers on bridges during the bloody battles of Fallujah. Letting Baghdad fall to al-Zarqawi’s
terror group would be an insult to every Iraq War dead or veteran now battling
disabling injuries and psychological scars.
Whatever went right or wrong with the Iraq War before Obama ended it Dec.
15, 2011, former Iraq Commander David Petraeus urged the White House to resume
targeted air strikes on key ISIS targets.
Ending the Iraq War Dec. 15 almost three years after taking office, Obama
understood the hopeless situation which pitted Iraq’s dominant Shiite population
against Sunis and Kurds. Back in
2006, former Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.) urged former President George W. Bush to
consider cleaving Iraq in Southern, Central and Northern zones, roughly
corresponding to Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish populations. No one took Biden seriously then but
their singing his praises now.
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in a major policy pivot, expressed
for the first time openness to splitting Iraq along ethnic lines. Once strongly opposed to any
divisions in Iraq to prevent the Kurds from declaring an independent Kurdistan,
Erdogan has come 180 degrees, now seeing Iraq as hopelessly embroiled in a
sectarian war with Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds unable to live under one roof.
U.S. officials blamed the al-Maliki Shiite government for offering Kurds
and Sunnis no reason to back the Baghdad government. State Department officials have
begged al-Malki to make more concessions to Sunnis and Kurds. While it’s easy to point fingers,
the latest ISIS insurgency that heads toward Baghdad couldn’t have been stopped,
no matter how many Sunnis or Kurds in al-Maliki’s government. “The federal state [in Iraq] has not
brought stability, so we have to discus a new system, either confederation or
division,” said Veysel Ayhan, director of the Ankara-based think than
International Middle East Peace Research Center. Since the U.S. Iraq War toppled
Saddam Hussein April 12, 2003, Turkey reluctantly accepted the Shiite-dominated
U.S.-backed government of Nour al-Malki installed May 30, 2006. Biden had strong reservations about
Saddam’s Sunni Baathists supporting the government.
Since the new wave of Islamic extremism threatened Iraq’s central
government, conservatives on Capitol Hill have pointed fingers at President
Barack Obama for ending the war prematurely Dec. 15, 2011. Speaking on Fox News June 19 to
Megyn Kelly, former Vice President Dick Cheney and his conservative pundit
daughter Elizabeth ripped Obama for ending the war prematurely and letting ISIS
get out of hand. Cheney and Liz blasted Obama June 18 in an Wall Street Journal oped, saying his foreign
policy could not be any more wrong.
Kelly snapped back telling Cheney maybe he got the policy wrong on Iraq. Cheney and other conservatives
on Capitol Hill know that no terrorism existed in Iraq under Saddam. Once toppled, the Bush
administration had no plan for the power vacuum that opened up the floodgate
into Iraq of Islamic extremism other than an open-ended war.
After nearly nine years, Obama fulfilled a campaign promise three years
after the fact ending the Iraq War Dec. 15, 2011. No one other than Cheney and a few
diehard necons believe that the Iraq War did anything good for U.S. national
security or Mideast stability. “It
has been clear for us that Iraq has practically become divided into three
parts,” said Huseyin Celik, a spokesman for Erdogan’s ruling Justice and
Development Party [AKP], referring to Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish areas. With ISIS taking over oil rich Mosul
in the Kurdish North, even the most dovish voices on Capitol Hill can’t back an
Islamic takeover in Iraq. Despite Erdogan’s reluctance to ceded any semi-autonomy to Iraq’s Kurds, his recognition
of Biden’s once farfetched fix sounds more practical and doable. It took years before all the warring
factions signed onto the Dayton Agreement Dec. 14, 1996 ending the Bosnian war.
While there are differences between
Bosnia-Herzegovina and Iraq, former President Bill Clinton helped broker an
almost impossible end to the three-year long Bosnian War [1992-1995],
culminating in the Dayton power-sharing agreement. Whatever happens now in Iraq, the
U.S. and NATO partners must beat back the current ISIS insurgency, handing
control of Mosul back to the Kurds and rid Tikrit and Baqubah of ISIS influence. Once contained, an international
force can maintain the peace while a new power-sharing government can be put
into place. “We must realize that ISIS poses a threat not only to Iraq but to the UK and other
countries as well,” said Petraeus, backing White House and Pentagon plans to
neutralize ISIS. Once ISIS has been
neutralized, the U.N. needs to convene a conference on Iraq to figure out the
right power-sharing arrangement that works.
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