US/IRAQ: Druk om Kosten, de Spanningen „Schommeling“ te snijden van Troepen
Door Jim Lobe | Het groeiende ongeduld in Congres over de enorme kosten die omhoog door de oorlog van Irak worden gerekt, evenals de overtuiging dat van het Pentagoon het meer troepen in Afghanistan om insurgents vereist daar te vechten, zetten het beroemde succes van George W. Schommelings“ strategie van Bush van het beleid de „aan de test.
Hoewel het Huis van Vertegenwoordigers in evenwicht gehouden lijkt om een extra 163 miljard dollarsDonderdag voor militaire acties in zowel Irak als Afghanistan door het eind van het jaar goed te keuren, geloven de meeste waarnemers dat het Congres ongekende voorwaarden bij hetbetrekking hebbende besteden zal opleggen. Dit kon vereisten dat omvatten de Iraakse overheid van Eerste Minister Nouri al-Maliki wezenlijk meer in wederopbouw en verwante kosten betaalt dan het moet dateren.
Het argument dat Bagdad meer van de last moet dragen bereikte vorige week impuls toen de Speciale Inspecteur van het Pentagoon Algemeen voor de Wederopbouw van Irak dat de de olieopbrengst van Irak in 2008 70 miljard dollars zou moeten overschrijden, tweemaal rapporteerde zo veel zoals de enkel een paar voordien maanden waren voorspeld.
Dat rapport, dat amid hier het kweken van zorg over de zwakke binnenlandse economie komt, heeft inspanningen door een tweeledige groep senatoren van brandstof voorzien om de vrijwel al V.S. te stoppen. financiering voor belangrijke wederopbouw en infrastructuurprojecten in Irak.
Het Comité van de Strijdkrachten van de Senaat stemde namelijk eenstemmig vorige week om een rekening goed te keuren die het Pentagoon van de financiering van om het even welk wederopbouw of infrastructuurproject in Irak zou verbieden dat meer dan twee miljoen dollar kost. De gelijkaardige wetgeving zou door het Huis moeten worden opgenomen.
„Dit is de eerste significante tweeledige verandering in ons beleid naar Irak,“ verklaard Republikeins Sen. Susan Collins, één van de sponsors van de wetgeving na de stem van vorige week, terwijl de commissievoorzitter, Sen. Carl Levin zei het nalaten van Irak om wederopbouwkosten te betalen „unconscionable (en) onvergeeflijk“ gegeven de meevaller was het van de overweldigende stijging van wereldolieprijzen heeft ontvangen.
Een andere voorziening van de zelfde rekening zou de overheid van Irak vereisen om de salarissen en de opleidingskosten van de hoofdzakelijk Sunni milities te betalen, of zogenaamde „sahwa“ of „Wekkende“ raden, waarop de V.S. ruwweg 27 miljoen dollar een maand heeft besteed.
Ondanks de V.S. pressure, the al-Maliki government has strongly resisted integrating the vast majority of the estimated 90,000 members of these militias — most of which were previously part of the Sunni insurgency — into the army or police for fear that they will eventually turn their guns on the regime.
The result has been growing frustration on the part of the militias, frustration that reportedly was significantly enhanced last month after al-Maliki enlisted thousands of members of the Badr Organisation into the government’s security forces during fighting with Moqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army in Basra and Sadr City in Baghdad. The Badr Organisation is the armed wing of the Shi’a Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council (SIIC), the strongest party in the coalition.
Both the intra-Shi’a conflict between the Sadrists and the government and the growing anger of the sahwa militias — most recently dramatised by a series of strikes and public protests and by an increasing number of attacks on U.S. and Iraqi forces in al-Anbar province and other Sunni strongholds where the militias have kept the peace for most of the past year — have resulted in a sharp rise in both Iraqi and U.S. casualties over the past two months, threatening the security gains made by the surge.
The surge, which was initiated in February 2007, was aimed at pacifying both al-Anbar province and the capital by adding some 30,000 U.S. troops to the 140,000 already deployed to Iraq to stop and reverse the drift to sectarian civil war between Sunnis and the various Shi’a militias. Its strategic aim was to foster a climate of peace and stability that would encourage all factions to make the political compromises necessary for national reconciliation.
While the surge made substantial headway in achieving its tactical goals of improving security — with the critical help of the sahwa militias which had mostly broken with al Qaeda in Iraq and allied themselves with the U.S. even before the surge got underway — its strategic goal of political reconciliation has been far more elusive.
Moreover, the surge’s tactical success has failed to translate into additional popular or Congressional support for the war at home. As a result, the Bush administration, which promised months ago to withdraw the 30,000 surge troops by the end of July, is adhering to its pledge, leaving fewer troops to ensure that a new round of violence does not break out.
At the same time, the Pentagon leadership is pressing the White House to continue the drawdown from Iraq beyond July so that it can deploy the three brigades — between 10,000 and 12,000 troops — it says it needs to cope with the Taliban and their allies in Afghanistan. While Bush has announced that there will be at least a 45-day pause to assess the impact of the surge withdrawal after July, the pressure on him to resume the process — not only from the Pentagon, but from Republican candidates in the November elections — is expected to be intense.
Republican backing for the Armed Services Committee bill banning additional spending on major reconstruction projects and support for the sahwa militias is clearly seen by both the administration and the promoters of the surge as a worrisome portent, and not only for maintaining the relative — albeit fragile — peace that has prevailed for much of the past year.
One of the surge’s architects, Frederick Kagan of the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), said that legislation would “do catastrophic damage to our image in the world, particularly the Muslim world…The argument that Iraq should use its oil revenues to pay the United States sounds like the ultimate proof that we invaded Iraq for mercenary reasons.”
Ending U.S. funding for the sahwa militias, in particular, will pose a critical — and long overdue — test of the surge strategy, according to a number of observers, who see Maliki’s failure to integrate them as a critical stumbling block to national reconciliation.
“If the Awakenings are not integrated into the national security forces, then there is little hope for political accommodation or for lasting security and the U.S. is effectively trapped,” according to Marc Lynch, an expert at George Washington University whose blog, abuaardvark.com, is widely read here. “Since all other forms of persuasion seem to have failed, it’s time to give Maliki an ultimatum…If he gives in, then there may finally be some hope for political accommodation…”
“The downside is that if Maliki doesn’t go along…then things may well get ugly. But all signs suggests that they will get ugly anyway — and better that they get ugly while the U.S. is at the highest troop levels it will ever have,” Lynch wrote.
“If Maliki won’t do this now, when U.S. troop levels are high and security is relatively better, with the shadow of a new president who likely will not continue to offer an open-ended commitment, then he never will…and everyone should know this.”
*Jim Lobe’s blog on U.S. foreign policy, and particularly the neo-conservative influence in the Bush administration, can be read at http://www.ips.org/blog/jimlobe/.
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This entry was posted on Thursday, May 8th, 2008 at 11:45 am and is filed under War & Terrorism News . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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