Wednesday, May 03, 2006
Joe Biden: Imperialist running dog
Joe Biden has proposed the confederation -- that would be constitutionalese for "division" -- of Iraq along ethnic lines. This is not a new idea -- I believe it was discussed at least in passing at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919 -- but it is the first time I am aware of that a leading Democratic presidential contender has suggested it. Indeed, it is virtually the first time that a leading Democratic presidential contender has proposed anything concrete with regard to Iraq, and for that alone we should applaud Biden.
Here's what Biden and co-author Leslie Gelb proposed:
Now the Bush administration, despite its profound strategic misjudgments in Iraq, has a similar opportunity. To seize it, however, America must get beyond the present false choice between "staying the course" and "bringing the troops home now" and choose a third way that would wind down our military presence responsibly while preventing chaos and preserving our key security goals.
The idea, as in Bosnia, is to maintain a united Iraq by decentralizing it, giving each ethno-religious group — Kurd, Sunni Arab and Shiite Arab — room to run its own affairs, while leaving the central government in charge of common interests. We could drive this in place with irresistible sweeteners for the Sunnis to join in, a plan designed by the military for withdrawing and redeploying American forces, and a regional nonaggression pact.
Now, I have no idea whether or not it is a good idea -- Biden's essay is interesting, and strikes me as a sensible suggestion -- but isn't the internal organization of Iraq a fundamental question for Iraqis? Yes, there is the meritorious point that they are waging their petty internal struggles with the blank check we have written, and we need to do something about that (and, it seems that the Bush administration is). But isn't the point of American policy that these decisions are for Iraqis to make? Yes, we have done our damnedest to prevent one faction or another from dominating Iraq, and perhaps that has contributed to some of the present internal strife (after all, we know that total domination of Iraq by one ethnicity is at least superficially stable, even if brutal), but that is a far cry from Biden's proposal that the United States coerce the Iraqis into accepting a particular arrangement for the sharing of power. Indeed, it sounds very much like something that would have been discussed in 1919. In Paris.
Who knew that Joseph Biden was an imperialist running dog? Do you suppose the Democratic primary voters have figured it out?
7 Comments:
By 
Cardinalpark, at
Wed May 03, 02:51:00 PM:
SJ - you left out another "bad choice" -- which was to leave Iraq in a permanent state of Saddamist tyranny. Another one still was to foster a revolution against Saddam -- a successful one would certainy have given rise to civil war, and a failed one mass slaughter.
Having said that, the question of what best serves American strategic and moral interests today is a good one, and Biden's raising it, a form of changing the subject, is not unwise. As a practical matter, the US cannot propose to dissolve Iraq. If it happens, it will happen because the locals have chosen it. The next question is, would that be so bad for the US?
I don't have a clear answer, but I sense it would be ugly, especially for the Iraqi sunnis. The Kurds might be happy. The Shiites might be happy. But in the Iraqi sunnis, you could wind up with a whole new cast of "Palestinian refugees", who would destabilize Jordan, perhaps Syria (hmmm) and other surrounding states. They would be some angry displaced folks. In large numbers. Not pretty. Certainly not for them.
By 
, at
Wed May 03, 03:27:00 PM:
Lets put the poor Sunni people to rest. It is my understanding that the only reason no oil wells are in the Sunni areas is because no one has bothered to drill. The geology is supposed to be the same.
By , at
Wed May 03, 04:43:00 PM:
Biden's plan, with all due respect is lunacy. The Kurds will only retain semi-sovereignty in the current situation that they have now. Turkey and Iran will not tolerate an truly independent Kurdistan on their borders, as they themselves possess large Kurdish minorities. Sunnis and Shia are both Arabs. Their histories are intertwined, and their blood lines cross through years of intermarriage. There are no clear lines or boundaries for religious groups in Iraq, unless Biden is prepared for religious cleansing of areas in order to create quasi-autonomous regions based on religious lines. For the Iraq nay-sayers, I would like them to quantify why Iraq, in its current state of a fledging democracy, is an abject failure and how staying the current course of institutional development in Iraq will lead to failure. The British fought a communist insurgency in Malaysia from 1948-1960, the result of which was successful. The current situation with al-Maliki is a definite blow to Iran and al-Sadr. Time will tell. The bottom line is that the current course is effective, but it will never be effective enough for those who did not support regime change or cannot stomach the thought of attributing success to the Bush administration. It's simply too easy to cherry-pick news, tie the info together in a somewhat scholarly way, and say Iraq is a failure. What will make Iraq successful is peace, and then prosperity. Iraqis will defeat the internal threats to their government with 2-3 years. I base this on the fact that I've seen the success, read about it, studied it, in spite of the focus on Zarqawi and sectarian strife. We'll guarantee their external security for the next 20 years at least.
By , at
Wed May 03, 05:18:00 PM:
Billy and the Clintonistas don't want you to know what happened/did not happen during their 8 years in office.
But this may be close to signing a confession that the Clinton Administration has a lot to hide:
GatewayPundit: Mary O MaCarthy's March 2006 donations join other Clintonistas:Sandy Berger/Podesto/Albright/Lake/Hillary to Weldon's Dem opponent - STOP ABLE DANGER HEARINGS
McCarthy, who worked at the National Security Council when Sestak worked there in the 1990s, donated $100 to Sestak on March 1 and $250 on March 11, according to a campaign finance report the Seventh Congressional District candidate filed with the Federal Election Commission.
Weldon, through a campaign spokesman, said he had joined other Republicans in Congress asking for an investigation into what classified information McCarthy may have disclosed to reporters. Agency officials linked her late last week to reports in the Washington Post disclosing the existence of classified CIA prisons in Eastern Europe and elsewhere
Please cover this breaking news on Dana's big mouthed buddy and the gag that the Clintonistas are trying to implement by stopping Weldon's hearings on Able Danger.
Hope someone is going over all the contributions to this DEM candidate with a fine tooth comb.
Hope that they will look for all the VIPS members names on those lists to see how
much Ray McGovern, Lary Johnson and that rogue gang pitched in.
Who else signed this confession that they do not want the public/congress to find out a lot of the truth about those 8 years?????
http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2006/05/clinton-targets-curt-weldon-for.html#comments
Click here: Gateway Pundit: Clinton Targets Curt Weldon for Exposing Able Danger Scandal
Posted 3 "links" as I do not know what works on this site and this is extremely important information that must get out!
By Dawnfire82, at
Wed May 03, 07:45:00 PM:
The reason Iraw has not split apart already is because the nation has existed for long enough (four generations now?) to establish a sense of nationalism in its people. They consider themselves Iraqis, not Sunnis. So why should they separate? Recall that they were initially hesitant to even entertain the idea of federalism because they didn't want to split up the nation. It took a lot of explaining and probably a few readins of The Federalist Papers to convince them otherwise.
By Assistant Village Idiot, at
Wed May 03, 11:26:00 PM:
It might have been a good idea three years ago. Seeing that we have won in Iraq doing it a different way, why should we risk losing that by going back and starting again?
By , at
Thu Nov 06, 07:45:00 AM:
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
