The new US dilemma on Iraq crisis
It’s meant to be peace that ends wars. That is, unless you have a change of president at a time when a war is unpopular, and that president is elected on a platform of arranging to end not one, but two wars. And so it is in America.
On Capitol Hill, there’s standing room only in committee rooms combing over whatever detail is available on the deal to release Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl, who was held by the Taliban for five years.
The defence secretary appeared before one this morning. As far as I can work out, no-one asked Chuck Hagel about Iraq, the war America left behind nearly three years ago.
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At another committee, a hearing to confirm the new US ambassador to Iraq, there were, thankfully, questions about Iraq. Senator Bob Corker rolled his eyes and declared that the Obama administration has no regional strategy.
Linking inaction on Syria to inaction on Iraq, all blame as far as the senior Republican is concerned rests with President Barack Obama. He bemoans the American failure to leave troops behind to secure stability, and the diplomatic disengagement which means the US can no longer play the go between role it once did with Iraq’s Sunni and Shi’a factions.
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The incoming ambassador went on the record to explain that in his opinion, the reason why American troops didn’t stay behind was because the Iraqi people didn’t come together and ask them to stay in a way that made it possible for them to stay. So, what about the future? The state department wants Prime Minister Al-Maliki to do more.
They’ll provide additional assistance, but wouldn’t say exactly what, in a world where American hardware is being driven across borders by ginger bearded smiling jihadists. And they want greater national unity. Indeed, they’re encouraged by the notion that the upside of what’s happened in Mosul is that now all the various factions who aren’t jihadi are talking (i.e. the Kurds and the al Maliki government).
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Which seems very glass half full given what Jonathan Rugman’s report revealed about life in Iraq today. As for political discourse, one side can only blame the other for so long.
The question is how many Iraqi towns and cities need to unravel, and how much territory ISIS has to gain, before someone in the US administration remembers the reason why it used to engage with the world.
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