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Kerry Blows Smoke on Saving Iraq
by John M. Curtis
(310) 204-8700
Copyright
May 24, 2014
All Rights Reserved.
Meeting in Iraq’s Northern Kurdish city
of Erbil, 70-year-old Secretary of State John Kerry met with president of the
Kurdistan Regional Government Massoud Barzani in a futile attempt to save the
Baghdad government. Faced with a
runaway Sunni insurgency threatening to topple the Shiite-dominated regime of
63-year-old Nouri al-Maliki, Kerry tried to persuade Barzani to join a coalition
government to save Iraq. Barzani
has his own problems with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant taking over
Kurdish territory in oil-rich Mosul.
Instead of discussing a realistic approach to Iraq’s crisis, Kerry talked
pie-in-the-sky about al-Maliki expanding Sunni and Kurdish involvement in the
central government. Kerry and
Barzani know it’s already too late to save the U.S.-backed government that
doesn’t even enjoy popular support even with Iraq’s Shiite Iraqi community.
While not reported in the press, the real discussion between Kerry and
Barzani was about how to rid Mosul of ISIS, carving out an independent
Kurdistan, something strongly opposed by al-Maliki, Iran’s Ayatolllah Ali
Khamenei and Turkey’s Recep Yayyip Erdogan, who’ve all had their problems with
the Kurds. Whatever the objections
from Baghdad, Tehran and Ankara, U.S. national security would be greatly
enhanced ridding Mosul of ISIS and backing an independent Kurdish state. Without admitting to backing and
sovereign Kurdistan, Barzani admitted Kerry came at a “very important time.” To Barzani and the Kurds the timing
for a sovereign Kurdistan couldn’t come at a better time. While Kerry has not publicly given
up on a sovereign Iraq, Barzan know that Iran has split along Sunni, Shiite and
Kurdish lines. Barzani wants “a
solution to the crisis,” but no the one envisioned by Kerry.
Kerry’s hope for a multiethnic Iraq has long since passed, something
tried and failed by the former Bush administration. Since taking office Jan. 20, 2009,
the U.S. spent over eight years, $1 trillion and lost over 4,800 troops trying
but failing to create functional federal Iraq.
Failures of Iraq’s security services directly relate to the fact that
even the army can’t buy into a multiethnic Iraq.
When then Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.) proposed in 2006 splitting Iraq into
Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish states, it was considered blasphemous. “With these changes we are facing a
new reality and new Iraq,” said Barzani, hinting at Iraq’s impending doom. Neither Kerry nor Obama admit that
Iraq’s already lost to ISIS, despite Barzani hinting strongly at a new Iraq
splits in Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish territories.
In order to stop the fall of Baghdad, the U.S. would have to restart the
Iraq War.
ISIS not only controls most of Anbar province it controls Iraq’s biggest
oil refinery at Baiji North of Baghdad.
Kerry insists U.S. support “will be intense, sustained and if Iraq’s
leaders take the necessary steps to bring the country together, it will be
effective,” doing nothing other than sending 300 “advisors” to help evacuate the
U.S. embassy in Baghdad. With ISIS
bearing down on Baghdad, Kerry won’t stop the ISIS insurgency by inviting Iraq’s
ethnic groups to join the Baghdad government.
ISIS seeks to install a Sunni fundamentalist state in Iraq first, then
push to take over all of the Middle East or the so-called Levant. “After the recent events in Iraq, it has been proven that the Kurdish people could seize
the opportunity now,” Barzani told CNN, announcing that the Kurds aren’t
concerned about Baghdad but controlling its destiny in already Kurdish occupied
territory.
To stop ISIS’s advance on Baghdad, Obama would have to order thousands of
U.S. infantry troops back to Baghdad for what’s shaping up as what Saddam
Hussein once called the “mother of all battles.”
With 300 Green Berets on site to evacuate U.S. personnel and protect the
embassy, the U.S. is in no position to stop ISIS imminent assault on Baghdad. Barzani sees clearly that Iraq’s
future isn’t one of a multiethnic power-sharing arrangement. Sharing power with Sunni groups has nothing to do with ISIS’s advance on Bagdad. ISIS has its own agenda of taking
Iraq then picking off other Mideast countries until they complete the Levant. “Ever since ISIL started its advance
into Iraq, the idea that Kurdistan could become a separate entity has gained
more strength,” said Theodore Karasik, director of the Institute for Near East
and Gulf Military Analysis in Dubai.
Taking over Traibil crossing post with Jordan and the Al-Waleed entry
into Syria, ISIS shows ISIS’s dominance at strategic supply lines, eventually
moving into Baghdad for the final battle.
“The U.S. wants a united Iraq because partitions will complicate regional
relations immensely,” said Karasik, realizing it’s going in a different
direction. Whatever happens in
Baghdad, Obama should commit U.S. forces to help the Kurds evict ISIS from
Mosul. Strengthening the Kurds
helps U.S. national security by creating another ally in the heart of the Middle
East. Trying save Baghdad would
require Obama to restart the Iraq War, something the American public strongly
opposes. No matter what the
pressure from conservatives on Capitol Hill, Obama should size up the situation
and throw his support to the Kurds, not defend al-Maliki’s Shiite regime that
shows signs of crumbling by the day.
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