|
Obama Must Fish or Cut Bait on Iraq
by John M. Curtis
(310) 204-8700
Copyright
July 6, 2014
All Rights Reserved.
President Barack Obama must get over the
I-told-you-so’s about Iraq and recognize the Islamic State of Iraq and the
Levant is now his problem. Spending
most of his young political career ripping former President George W. Bush’s
Iraq War, Obama now has his own problem dealing with the growing Islamic
insurgency that promises to upend the entire Middle East—and beyond. Killing Osama bin Laden May 1, 2011
didn’t stop the ambitions of a new kid on the Islamic terrorism block
42-year-old Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi claiming his pedigree as a direct descendant of
the Prophet Mohammed. Bin Laden’s successor, 64-year-old Ayman al-Zawahri couldn’t carry the baton, leaving
al-Qaeda scrambling for relevance. Seizing the Dec. 15, 2011 end to the Iraq War, al-Baghdadi jumped on the growing Syrian
civil war and power vacuum since U.S. forces pulled out.
Conservatives on Capitol Hill, like Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Sen.
Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) need to stop blaming Obama and get on the same page how
the U.S. must respond to stop al-Baghdadi’s blizkrieg, gobbling up large chunks
of Iraq, Syria and Jordan. Today’s
terrorist menace threatens the destabilize the Middle East is Obama’s problem,
whether or not an artifact of Bush’s Iraq War.
Mass executions, torture, displacing thousands of people, al-Baghdad’s
got Allah on his side as he bulldozes the Middle East, laying claim to
sovereignty of a new Islamic super-state.
What Bin Laden only preached and dreamed of, al-Baghdadi’s growing
Islamic army has realized by seizing sovereign lands in Iraq, Syria and Jordan. Egypt’s new president Abdel Fattah
al-Sisi sees al-Baghdadi’s eyes trained on Egypt, as ISIL tries to build bridges
with Egypt’s now outlawed Muslim Brotherhood.
Mired in his own twilight struggle against the Islamic Brotherhood in
Egypt, al-Sisi can’t see that an independent Kurdish state helps stability in
the region. Keeping the Kurds on
Iraq’s yoke presents too much uncertainty to the region’s only stable political
group. While the Sunnis and Shiite
slug it out in an endless sectarian battle, the Kurds live peacefully in
Northern Iraq, bothering no one other than occasional skirmishes with Turkey and
Iraq. Once Kurdistan establishes
clear boundaries, they’ll provide Turkey, Iraq and Iran a reliable buffer zone
against the kind of radical insurgency now destabilizing Iraq. “The referendum that the Kurds are
asking for now is in reality no more than the star of a catastrophic division of
Iraq in to smaller rival states,” said al-Sisi.
Al-Sisi doesn’t yet accept that Iraq’s already split along ethnic lines,
leaving only the Kurds stable in the North.
Al-Sisi needs to get up to speed that what threatens Egypt and the rest
of the Middle East are not the Kurds but a growing Islamic insurgency turning
back the clock to a more primitive and backward regime than the Ottomans. Like the Taliban in Afghanistan and
Pakistan, al-Baghdadi’s ISIL preaches a more conservative Wahhabi brand of Islam
seeking to turn back the clock to the Golden Age of Islam during the medieval
days of Saladin. Al-Baghdadi’s
Islam rewrites the script on religious theocracy, robbing women of all rights,
turning them into slaves and indentured servants. Whatever atrocities in the name of Islam occurred in Afghanistan with the Taliban,
al-Baghdadi promises more mass executions, forced conversions, torture and
public mutilations. Al-Sisi warned
the U.S. and Europe that al-Baghdadi’s group presented a growing threat to Egypt
and the region.
Time is not on Obama’s side to continue dithering on Iraq. Sending a few hundred advisors to
Iraq doesn’t begin to deal with al-Baghdadi’s blitzkrieg that conquered Mosul in
Iraq’s oil-rich Kurdish region.
Evicting ISIL from Mosul should be Obama’s highest priority before coordinating
a wider strategy with Russian President Vladimir Putin. With all the vilifications since
Putin annexed Crimea March 1, it’s high time Obama and Putin got on the same
page. Focusing on more sanctions
against Moscow doesn’t begin to deal with the ominous Islamic insurgency that
threatens the entire Middle East. “ISIL had a plan to take over Egypt,” said al-Sisi, underscoring al-Baghdadi’s growing
threat to the region. Al-Sisi urged
Obama to stop supporting Islamic insurgents in Syria and recognize that—no
matter how distasteful—Bashar al-Assad is the lesser of the evils.
Dredging up the past and pointing fingers at the past administration is
no substitute for Obama having a real strategy for dealing with the biggest
threat to U.S. national security since Sept. 11.
Showing signs that he’s coming around, Obama must use Iraq and Syria as
the perfect opportunity to mend fences with Moscow. When Putin extended an olive branch to Barack July 4th, he asked Obama to start a new era
of cooperation on important world events.
None is more pressing to the U.S. and Russia that booting al-Bagdadi out
of Iraq, Syria and Jordan. If
Baghdadi retreats to Somalia, Yemen
or some remote part of Africa, the U.S. will have succeeded in keeping radical
Islam from taking over the Middle East.
No sovereign power can allow al-Baghdadi to seize land with impunity and
claim a new Islamic state.
Superpowers like the U.S. and Russia must stop the madness.
|
