http://www.counterpunch.org/tilley01182007.html
CounterPunch -- January 18, 2007
What It Would Take to Stop It
By VIRGINIA TILLEY ---Johannesburg, South Africa
*Virginia Tilley is an alarmed US citizen now working at the
Human Sciences Research Council in South Africa. She can be
reached at [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>From its inception, the US occupation was a lose-lose proposition.
Simply rolling into Iraq -- a society of which the Bush neocons had so
distorted a conception and US occupation commanders and foot soldiers had
no grasp at all - was a formula for doom. But US policy in the Middle
East has now advanced to a new stage and the risk to the rest of us has
changed. For stopping an attack on Iran, which is the only way to avert
final regional disaster, may require action in Washington that falls
outside the parameters of what is normally politically possible.
For the first two years of the occupation, the US dilemma was plain to
everyone. On the one hand, pulling out "prematurely" promised an
internal Iraqi melee for power and the quick collapse of the feeble
pro-US Iraqi government. On the other hand, the ongoing presence of
American troops and the inevitable brutalities of occupation could
only inspire more armed resistance, progressively wreck US legitimacy, and
make things worse. As it staggered forward, wreaking tens of
thousands of direct Iraqi casualties (and possibly hundreds of
thousands in indirect ones), the US occupation fed an unprecedented
surge of anti-US and anti-western militancy. As a result, three short
years later, five decades of largely uncontested US hegemony in the
Middle East are collapsing into the same clouds of dust now engulfing
Iraq's national society -- the World Trade Center towers going down in
slo-mo.
Yet in a sense, the occupation has already done its work on the
support structure, as the US occupation has already combusted on
social forces that its architects never comprehended even as they
manipulated them. From the beginning, the Bush neocons viewed the
region through an Orientalist lens, and therefore saw tribes
everywhere, as mentors like Daniel Pipes encouraged them to do.
Viewing the Middle East also through an Israeli lens, they saw
ethnicity as the best way to break up national and pan-Arab
solidarities. Their staggering ignorance of the region was perhaps
best exposed by their early faith in the charlatan Ahmed Chalabi, who
promised a pro-Israeli Shi'a-led Iraqi government. On such rampant
idiocy were their enthusiasm and deceitful arguments for war fueled.
Predictably, their neocolonial efforts to foster and employ ethnic
divides - e.g., creating Shi'a militias to attack Sunni neighborhoods to
root out Baathi insurgents -- have resulted in blowback. The soaring
death count (at this writing, some 100 Iraqis are dying daily) is grim
testimony of the country's slide out of the US's hammy hands. Every day,
old norms of Sunni-Shi'a ethnic coexistence are transforming
further into mutual fears and murderous mutual hatreds. With every
death, the Iraqis' own ability to reconcile this deepening ethnic
bitterness dwindles. Every day the US stays in the country, the ethnic
militias grow in size and legitimacy. The US capacity to contain
them has withered to nothing. One might think the US military architects
would grasp their fatal blunder and try to amend their ethnic
machinations, but the latest US plan is to send Kurdish troops to patrol
Baghdad, on the insane premise that a third ethnic force will somehow
defuse the other two. (Kurdish naivety in collaborating in this fatal plan
is equally impressive.)
The report of the Iraq Study Group gets several things wrong, but its
appraisal of what must happen now is credible and widely accepted. The
only way to salvage US standing in the region, they argue, is to
withdraw as fast as possible, while obtaining essential Iranian and
Syrian help in multi-lateral efforts toward forging a new national
consensus in Iraq. From the Iraqis' perspective, too, the only hope is an
immediate US withdrawal, which can allow them to begin tortuous
negotiations toward national reconciliation. This effort cannot be
started as long as the US is there, not only because the US still
controls practically everything in the country, making genuine
domestic politics impossible, but because the US presence itself will
inevitably distort and discredit any new political process or
leadership that tries to arise.
Still, in setting out its package of recommendations, the supremely
pragmatic Iraq Study Group neglected one glaring political fact. It
assumed that the package was a real possibility -- i.e., that the Bush
administration could muster the necessary energy and faith to engage in
the multilateral diplomacy essential to it. The Bush neocons have no
talent or faith in multilateral politics and indeed openly deride them.
And they are still in charge, whatever the changing political climate
in Washington and mounting popular hostility to the Iraq war. The Great
Decider is still the president. Mr. Cheney is still the Vice-President.
All the old villains, like Douglas Feith and David Wurmser and the
scary Michael Ledeen, are still in government or guiding events from
Isengards like the American Enterprise Institute. They have exactly two
years to complete the agenda they formulated in the 1990s: that is,
reshape the entire Middle East, in the interest of Israel and their own
construction, security, and oil companies, by taking out any regional
rival to Israel's uncontested military hegemony.
Hence we have increasingly clear signals that, far from withdrawing
troops, the US plans to take the next disastrous step in their
program: bomb Iran's nuclear facilities and, they hope, change Iran's
regime.
Long in the making, a US attack on Iran has been maturing over the
past year. Most graphic, although not catching much public alarm until
now, was the transfer last year of two US naval carrier groups to the
Persian Gulf (each flanked by nuclear submarines and battleships,
carrying fleets of attack jets, and holding special Marine landing
forces). Now some staff changes in the US security and command staff are
drawing worried comment. One change is the replacement of General Abizaid
(who did not favor a troop increase) with the Pacific theatre's
top naval commander, Admiral Fallon, hitherto in charge of those same
carrier groups (which were posted in the Pacific). Another signal, less
widely noted, is that Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte,
who downplayed the nuclear threat from Iran, has been replaced by Vice
Admiral John Michael "Mike" McConnell, also a Navy man seen as much more
compliant (having already facilitated the Bush administration's programs
to monitor international financial transfers).
It is over-obvious that, while the Navy is a vital support to US
operations throughout the Middle East, a massive carrier build-up in the
Gulf cannot possibly assist the US occupation in Iraq. But it is
absolutely pivotal to launching an attack on Iran and containing
Iran's retaliation. In this context, even Bush's proposed troop
"surge", otherwise puzzlingly meaningless, may be intended to support an
attack on Iran, as the US will need more ground troops to
consolidate its transportation lines in the event of Iranian or allied
Iraqi-guerrilla reprisals. (That the "surge" itself can only prolong and
worsen Iraq's suffering and further demolish US standing in the region
is relatively unimportant.)
Bombing Iran will cast the Middle East into such a frenzy of violence,
however, that desperate editorials denouncing it are starting to
appear all over the world press. But the Bush neocons -- and, of
course, Israel - also have utter contempt for world opinion and indeed any
analysis outside their immediate crazed circle. Certainly the little
question of international law, which makes a preemptive strike on Iran
entirely illegal, does not figure for them in the slightest. (It did not
stop them from raiding and seizing Iranian consular staff and archives
in Arbil, which was also entirely illegal and has recklessly
imperiled US consular relations globally.)
The only hope of stopping a US strike on Iran is therefore the
Democrats, who now control the purse strings for US war-making and are
already sending signals that the troop "surge" might be in trouble.
Whether they have sufficient spine to stop the attack on Iran is
universally questioned. But even if a US attack is somehow stalled by
domestic action, Israel can always strike Iran instead. It is still not
widely debated that, over the past few years, Israel has purchased a
cluster of advanced German Dolphin submarines, which would allow
sea-based missile launches on Iran from the Indian Ocean, as well as a new
fleet of attack jets and thousands of "bunker-busting" bombs. Or that
last year Israel was running test bombing runs on a mock-up site of the
Natanz reactor, well ahead of its recently revealed long-distance
bombing test flights to Gibraltar.
Why such a dangerous US-Israeli alliance in such a clearly crazed
mission? The old necon strategy of A Clean Break is one obvious
answer. But the goals may go further. A strike on Iran by Israel might be
the magic bullet for the sinking US neocons and their stumbling
military global mission. No Democrat now breathing is going to vote to
withhold the US funds necessary to "defending Israel" from an Iranian
counter-attack. Generating a direct threat to Israel may indeed now be
their only way to ensure that war funding continues to flow lavishly.
If an Israeli attack is indeed pending, only something close to a coup in
Washington can stop it. The real question now, therefore, is whether
the same pragmatists who entered US politics unbidden to comprise
the Iraq Study Group (led by Baker but representing the old Cold-War
guard, including now-frightened Pentagon officers, desperate State
Department experts, and even alarmed oil men) will conclude that the US
national interest is indeed in such imminent peril that they must launch
emergency political measures to preclude a US or Israeli attack. This
effort could take several shapes, but the normal options are not
promising. Hearings to expose White House malfeasance (lying, fraud,
graft) in the Iraq war, leading even to an impeachment process, could
fatally cripple the attack plan, but would take more time than we have
and would not stop Israel in any case. Hearings to expose Israeli
espionage and discredit Israel's role in US foreign policymaking
could stymie an Israeli attack, but the AIPAC-saturated Congress would
never countenance them. Normal Washington peer pressure, represented
by the Iraq Study Group, has demonstrably failed. More urgent
methods, that might be pursued in other countries facing such a crisis,
are precluded in the US by very potent political and military cultures
that preclude any open revolt against a sitting president or the
civilian command. (Recall General Powell's quiet capitulation to lies,
deceit, and foolery that he could not possibly support.) No one wants the
US to operate otherwise.
The challenge to the US political system is therefore now extremely
grave: somehow to retake rational control of US foreign policy, from
people known to be lying criminals, within as little as two months, yet
with no precedent for doing so. It should not be impossible. Insider
Washington pressures must should now become ultimatums. But insider
operations require political backing that can only be obtained through a
pincer strategy: rapid public revelations of White House criminality by
serving officials, with responsible headline coverage by the national
press sufficient rapidly to cripple White House foreign policymaking.
This political rebellion would require rare political will.
The US occupation of Iraq has appeared since its inception like a
large and cumbersome truck driven into a swamp. We have been watching, in
horrified fascination, as it slowly sinks. In recent months, we have
been certain that even the drivers must soon surely abandon the truck,
jump for shore, and try to preserve some shred of dignity as it goes
down. Instead, we are seeing those drivers flinging out ropes around
everything in sight and getting ready to haul, apparently in the hope
of dragging the whole carcass back onto solid ground and rolling on
to glory. That they can only strangle the rest of us, and bind everyone
into the swamp with them, must finally inspire decisive collective
action. Washington insiders and key players in the new Democratic
Congress, with political backing from an alarmed electorate and frantic
international allies, can still stop the neocons' rush to disaster. But
it would require rare determination, initiative, transparency, and
courage, and it would have to happen fast.
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