Fantasyland Iraq

In his Wednesday speech, president Bush characterized the situation Iraq as a conflict between, “extremists who kill” and “those who believe in freedom and moderation.” Were it only so. In that moment, the president went from being merely stubborn and out of touch to constructing and inhabiting his own personal alternate reality.

There are forces of terror to be sure. A Sunni insurgency, aided by Al Qaeda and the international jihad, assisted by Syria, Iran, private citizens in Saudi Arabia, and maybe many others. This insurgency finds a welcoming enough home in Baghdad and Anbar, probably even more welcoming since the bombing in Samarra and the hanging of Saddam. The majority of rank and file Sunnis support attacks on American soldiers.

On the other side, however, are not Madison, Jefferson and their liberty-loving merry men. It’s a fragile government coalition of religious conservative Shiite parties, most with their own extra governmental militias, death squads, revered Ayatollahs, and ties to Iran. A near majority of this group’s public favor attacks on American soldiers. These are the freedom loving moderates.

I’m certain that there must be some in Iraq who favor a unified, peaceful, reconciled, secular, liberal, pluralistic, Western-tolerant democracy. But what’s telling is just how little this viewpoint seems to manifest itself in the Iraqi polity. If there are masses who share this vision, then why don’t they show up in polls? Where are their media organs? their politicians? their rallies?

We can only conclude that their numbers must be thin, and must have gotten thinner given the mass departures from the country over the last few years. They probably got thinner still in an atmosphere of civil war which encourages alignment with more violent and polar forces. For president Bush to suggest that this outlook represents the outlook of the average Iraqi is the grandest of delusions.

The surge strategy is based on the idea that Iraq has a center, that the Maliki government is that center, and that the center can gradually expand to take in the entirety of Iraqi society, marginalizing terrorists and militias. Again, this seems wishful thinking.

If the U.S. focuses its efforts on hammering the Sunni insurgency, it may take another Fallujah or two to have any desired effect. And how long with the Sunni Arab world allow the Sunnis in Iraq to get hammered without amping up their own assistance, be it private or state sponsored; financial or jihadist. We risk getting drawn into what was dubbed the “80% solution” in which we effectively take the Shiite side in the civil war with potentially calamitous repercussions.

On the other hand, if we pressure the Shiites to make a political deal on the Sunni’s behalf, or confront Al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army or other Shiite militias, then we risk further alienating the Shiites with little corresponding rise in support from Sunni. If we handle things especially incompetently or get unlucky, we may end up unifying all factions virgorously against us.

There are massive, undisclosed risks to the surge, beyond simply more blood and treasure. Moreover, there is also a serious silver lining to “failure”. That Al-Qaeda and Iran are thoroughly at odds in Iraq is one of the most underreported stories in the MSM. When your enemies want to fight one another, its generally wise strategy to get out of the way.