Hullabaloo

Wednesday, September 05, 2007

 
Did The Escalation Work?

by tristero

UPDATED

No, of course not. But the Bush administration, with the collusion of the msm, is doing its level best to create the impression that maybe We Don't Really Know. The strategy worked when Bush got us into this mess. Hey, y'never can tell!

Here's Katie Couric:

Many more Iraqis have joined the Iraqi Security Forces in the overwhelmingly Sunni Anbar province. Despite mutual distrust, stemming from the power shift after Saddam Hussein's Baathist government fell, Sunnis and Shiites are working together in the ISF to fight al Qaeda in Iraq.

While Hussein was in power, Sunnis were in positions of authority over the Shiites, and now are fearful that the majority of Shiites will seek revenge. Iraqi Shiites fear a return of Sunni power in Iraq.

However, Sunnis in Anbar continue to join the ISF.

"The spike in police has really been significant," Couric said. "The incidents in Iraq have gone down dramatically."

Security and stability have improved in Iraq, but basic services remain in disrepair.

Sounds good, dunnit? Hands across the Great Islamic Divide - banding together to fight a common enemy. And it's working, Katie Couric says so.

Well, maybe not. The Independent Commission on Security Forces in Iraq:

Iraq's Interior Ministry is regarded as "dysfunctional" and sectarian" and the National Police should be "disbanded and reorganized," according to an independent report obtained by CNN.

The report, authored by the Independent Commission on Security Forces in Iraq, fires stinging criticism at Iraqi security forces but also includes promising words for the country's military...

The Interior Ministry and the National Police force it operates have long been regarded by observers as being infiltrated by sectarian Shiite militias.

"Such fundamental flaws present a serious obstacle to achieving the levels of readiness, capability, and effectiveness in police and border security forces that are essential for internal security and stability in Iraq."

"Sectarianism in its units undermines its ability to provide security; the force is not viable in its current form. The National Police should be disbanded and reorganized..."

The report says the Iraqi Police Service "is incapable today of providing security at a level sufficient to protect Iraqi neighborhoods from insurgents and sectarian violence."

But what accounts for such profoundly discrepant conclusions? It's obvious, or should be:

The Pentagon said Wednesday it does not agree with the report's recommendation that the Iraqi National Police be disbanded.

Get it? Couric, of course, wouldn't be able to move anywhere in Iraq without the active participation of US armed forces. A newcomer to Iraq, Couric and crew simply were shown what they wanted her to see.

Need some convincing? Then see, for example, Lara Logan's report from Basra. Logan, of course, has spent a good deal of time in Iraq, and needn't depend upon US Army escorts to do her job:

British troops were handing over their base at Basra Palace the very next morning to the Iraqi Army's 10th Division and withdrawing to a British air base on the outskirts of the city.

While on the way to see the local governor, Logan reports that their lives were in the hands of his uncle and personal security force - the only men Gov. Mohammed al-Waili trusts in a city that's become a battleground for rival militias that have infiltrated the police force and tried repeatedly to kill him.

"Those policemen outside the front of your building, do you trust them" asked Logan.

"Not all of them," al-Waili replied. [Emphasis added]

Even in this short excerpt, the complexity of the situation is apparent. No simplistic conflation of "the enemy" into Al Qaeda. The vertigo-inducing situation includes withdrawing British troops, an Iraqi governor - aka, warlord - with a private army and a police force infiltrated by "rival militias." Note the plural.

Let's face it. The only incontrovertibly genuine outcome of Bush's escalation is that additional people have died or been mutilated at rates near the highest since Bush's invasion. Iraqis and Americans alike. (And by the way, not even Bill "The Gambler" Bennett would bet much on the Iraqi army's increasing effectivenesss.)

Short version: It's more chaotic in Iraq than you can possibly imagine. It's a civil war, not between two sides, but dozens. It is far beyond the control of the American forces there, let alone the Maliki I-use-the-term-loosely government. And that things look marginally - and temporarily- better where Couric was permitted to venture merely highlights the deterioration elsewhere.

[Update: Juan Cole on Anbar province, where Couric reported progress.]

tristero 9/05/2007 01:16:00 PM |