At least he seemed honest in his assessment of the challenges ahead.
Quote:
When I addressed you just over a year ago, nearly 12 million Iraqis had cast their ballots for a unified and democratic nation... We thought that these elections would bring the Iraqis together – and that as we trained Iraqi security forces, we could accomplish our mission with fewer American troops.
But in 2006, the opposite happened. The violence in Iraq – particularly in Baghdad – overwhelmed the political gains the Iraqis had made. Al Qaeda terrorists and Sunni insurgents recognized the mortal danger that Iraq’s elections posed for their cause. And they responded with outrageous acts of murder aimed at innocent Iraqis. They blew up one of the holiest shrines in Shia Islam – the Golden Mosque of Samarra – in a calculated effort to provoke Iraq’s Shia population to retaliate. Their strategy worked. Radical Shia elements, some supported by Iran, formed death squads. And the result was a vicious cycle of sectarian violence that continues today.
The situation in Iraq is unacceptable to the American people – and it is unacceptable to me. |
The troop surge seems to me like too little too late. I remember reading a Washington Post article 2 years ago, stating that an additional 20K troops was the minimum needed to secure the eastern borders from the foreign fighters. Yet, the reinforcement will be used to secure Bagdad alone, while the rest of the country will continue to drift into civil war. I'm pretty damn skeptical of the whole plan.
And can anyone explain to me the logic behind the deployment of Patriot missles? This is clearly intended for Iran, yes, but because of the mess in Irak, putting military pressure on Iran does not make sense. Yet.
And did anyone saw the actual speech on TV? What are the odds his teleprompter is written entirely in phonetics? And how does it feel to have your leader looking as if his face is about to explode in teary saltwater?
All in all, it seems to me that nothing will be achieved unless the americans manage to bring in other interested powers, maisnly the Europeans. But I believe that this cannot be achieved. Broadly speaking, the cost of staying idle and waiting to see how Irak unfold and eventually adjusting to the mostly negative consequences is probably lesser than the cost of helping right away with very incertain results in the future. Of course, this depends of which state your talking about, but I'd say that this is true for most Western countries, and perhapes even for the rest of the world. Its not profitable to get involved in Irak for anyone right now, so its better to sit back and watch and wait.
This is why I believe that the americans will be alone in this for the foreseeable future, until the theatre of war eventually degenerate and expand to include Iran, Israel, or some other oil-rich states which will then threaten the interest of other powers and thus get their attention. Think about it; its better to deal with the mess in Middle-east when the Americans are on the brink of disaster, which would allow you to drive an advantageous bargain against them on some issues, than to join the "Coalition of the Willing" under american leadership at the beggining and get mostly nothing out of it but sociale disapprobation at home, like in Tony Blair's case.
But until then, it will be more of the same until the americans give up and succumb to the insurgency.
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