Middle Way Iraq Victory

You would never know it from all the heated rhetoric but there is remarkable agreement on what to do about Iraq. President George W. Bush is closer to achieving the consensus he seeks than anyone on either side will admit.

In the wake of Gen. David Petraeus’ long-awaited testimony before Congress Hillary Clinton Barack Obama and the president and his administration have all used almost the exact language of the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group that the long-term strategy is to withdraw U.S. forces to defensible fortresses away from policing insurgency and concentrate on counter-terrorism training and border control.

There is great disagreement on current troop levels of course but the consensus on the long run represents a remarkable shift by all sides in the debate. Any sane person recognizes the surge has contributed to reducing violence in Iraq although the decline has been from its high in Fall 2006 with violence still higher than from 2004 to early 2006.

On the other side it is obvious the sectarian divisions remain deep the militias control much of the ground outside the surge zones as well as the police and even much of the army and the government of Nouri al-Maliki has not delivered on any of the political “benchmarks” they agreed to meet. Testifying with the general Ambassador Ryan Crocker would only say that “The seeds of reconciliation are being planted.”

The facts on the ground are clear. The Kurd north has been autonomous in all but name for 15 years. Its recent deal with Dallas’ Hunt Oil to handle its energy resources means the rest of the world and business are betting it will remain so. The Anbar west has been the great success of the surge period--one that none can ignore given the Sunni sheik alliance against al Qaeda with the U.S. But that very success—which reaches into Diyala Salahuddin and surrounding areas also—is at the cost of more Sunni autonomy so much so that the first planned U.S. troop withdrawals will be there letting the Sunnis increasingly alone to take the lead in doing their own policing.

What about the majority of the country to the south largely occupied by the 60 percent Shiite majority? Abdul Aziz al-Hakim leader of the largest political party the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council (closely related to Iran) and its militia formerly known as the Badr Brigade is the one who demanded the provision in the Constitution allowing autonomous regions which he believes will make him the effective Shiite leader of the south.

His major opponent Moqtada al Sadr the leader of the Mahdi Army and the second largest Shiite party has his forces split between the south and Baghdad and therefore opposes autonomy hoping to win the entire country or at least Baghdad-south. Militia forces representing the two and Maliki’s Dawah party have been fighting to see who prevails.

The British movement of troops from southern capital Basra to their nearby fortified airfield will allow the Shiite factions to decide the matter. Critically Gen. Petraeus testified that other than a small number of special forces operations he will not deploy U.S. troops to occupy the south.

A top American military official told the Washington Post “there is no disagreement on the overall strategy in the south with both the British and the Americans believing that they should not interfere with the fighting among the three Shiite groups in the south and that they should instead simply let a victor emerge.” This represents a radical change from stay-the-course.

The president was clear in his address about this “transition in our mission.” While he emphasized the immediate reduction in U.S. forces (and his promise to reduce troops only as circumstances allow) the troop dispositions were not the most important or new part of his speech.

As matters improve “our mission will evolve” he declared. “Over time our troops will shift from leading operations to partnering with Iraqi forces and eventually to overwatching those forces. As this transition in our mission takes place our troops will focus on a more limited set of tasks including counter-terrorism operations and training equipping and supporting Iraqi forces.” Obama’s policy paper issued just before the president’s used much of the same language about long term objectives.

The extremists in both Iraq and the U.S. will continue to emphasize immediate withdrawal or greater force as the only alternatives. Obama still did and so did Richard Lowry editor of National Review who insisted it is either “continue fighting to stabilize the country and route al Qaeda or withdraw and admit these goals aren’t achievable. A middle way as Sen. Dick Lugar has unintentionally demonstrated is make believe and suitable only for Senate speeches and TV interviews.”

In fact al Qaeda is rapidly being isolated and from Gen. Petraeus on down everyone recognizes stability cannot come from military force but can only allow room for a political solution. In fact President Bush presented the surge as a middle way to staying- the-course or withdrawing. Before his address to the nation White House aides again used “middle ground” to the media to describe his new policy.

Ever since your editor’s visit to Iraq in November 2003 it has been clear that regional autonomy is the only rational outcome over dismemberment or dictatorship (http://acuf.org/issues/031204news.asp). Back in 2003 the generals were forthright that the goal was to increasingly withdraw to fortified positions and leave policing to the Iraqis with infrequent military incursions in threatening situations mostly relating to al Qaeda and border issues.

Dreams of creating democracy frustrated the commanders’ plans for a few years but the British military move has forced the matter. The Kurd and Sunni successes go in the same direction. It was the fact that al Qaeda fighters began forcing the Sunni chiefs to allow them to marry their daughters (without even the traditional dowry) and disrupting their smuggling that led the Anbar insurgents to convince the U.S. to come to a political settlement. Deciding to let the factions fight it out in the south—perhaps for three autonomous provinces—is the final logical political step.

It will be neither more U.S. troops nor immediate withdrawal. It will be a middle way no matter what the extremists want. It will be a year or so draw-down and movement of U.S. forces into defensive positions. While neither President Bush nor his opponents will ever admit directly that the U.S. will step back and let the forces on the ground work out the details of the regionalization of Iraq that is what his military leaders wanted from the beginning and is in fact what is taking place. The political rhetoric will remain simplistic and heated but the middle way to victory is already set.

Donald Devine the editor of Conservative Battleline Online was the director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management from 1981 to 1985 and is the director of the Federalist Leadership Center at Bellevue University.