Tuesday begins General David Petraeus's testimony in front of Congress. I trust Petraeus's judgment as much as I would trust Gen. George McClellan's judgment in 1862. The recent battle in Basra proves that the surge was a failure. Furthermore, it reveals that the United States is a destabilizing force in Iraq.
We must remember that one of the expressed purposes of the surge was to create space for political reconciliation. This is what the proponents of the surge said at the onset, and they must be held accountable for those words. They cannot continually move the goalposts.
In January, Bush himself said, "Yet over time, we can expect to see Iraqi troops chasing down murderers, fewer brazen acts of terror and growing trust and cooperation from Baghdad's residents. When this happens, daily life will improve, Iraqis will gain confidence in their leaders and the government will have the breathing space it needs to make progress in other critical areas. Most of Iraq's Sunni and Shia want to live together in peace, and reducing the violence in Baghdad will help make reconciliation possible."
Recently, Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki ordered an attack on Basra, where the Mahdi militia led by Muqtada al-Sadr had a strong presence. Note that al-Sadr had ordered a cease-fire last year. It was not al-Sadr who began this fight but Maliki.
We must wonder why the attacks were timed for now. Strange coincidences pop up. Maliki had recently been pressured by the United States to hold provincial elections. (After all, the United States does need its photo-ops to show "progress.") These elections had been vetoed before, but plans to hold them in October have been begrudgingly accepted by Iraq's federal government. The ruling political party was afraid that they would lose in the Shia dominated south, while al-Sadr's party was poised to win in areas such as Basra.
The attack in Basra was a blatant exercise in partisan violence. The "national government" of Iraq is a thinly veiled factional stronghold with its own ties to militias. Basra was an intra-Shiite battle for power.
Maliki got his butt kicked in Basra and was forced to crawl to al-Sadr and sue for peace. Various estimates of the rate of defection of the national government's Iraqi army range between 10 percent and 30 percent. The only thing preventing a total defeat was the presence of U.S. troops. Yes, U.S. troops took an active role in Maliki's attack. We always hear that the United States is supposed to prevent civil war in Iraq. Instead, we are taking sides and fighting in their civil conflicts.
Isn't this the opposite of what the surge was supposed to accomplish? We were supposed to have space for political reconciliation. Open warfare between factions is the opposite of political reconciliation. The American presence is supposed to prevent civil war, yet here we are, our military propping up one side in a civil conflict. The surge has taken us further away from political reconciliation.
By propping up Maliki, we preserve factional division in Iraq. Our presence also makes increased violence more likely. As we continue with this boondoggle, we pump billions of dollars in Iraq. We are funding the weapons for Maliki's faction. Also, the surge has introduced a practice of bribing Sunnis not to kill us or other Iraqis. We are essentially pouring money into Sunni militias. We increase the likelihood of Sunni-Shiite violence in addition to the Shiite-Shiite violence we already have taken a part in.
Moreover, billions of dollars have simply disappeared. Money is funneled to the shadiest characters in Iraq, unbeknownst to us. We are not only funding militias but funding criminals.
We must recognize that the U.S. presence in Iraq is counterproductive. The longer we stay, the more money we provide for future violence. We are propping up an unpopular faction in Iraq and allowing that faction to use our troops for its violent efforts. Instead of creating political reconciliation, we are fostering civil violence.
Petraeus is smart enough not to spout obvious propaganda. He will call the gains tenuous and reversible. He will ask for more patience, but we should give him none. There were not even tenuous gains. The surge has been a complete strategic failure. It is time to leave Iraq.
