In the long term I suspect that we have little to fear from Iranian influence in Iraq. Iraqi nationalism will overcome any desire of Iran to make Iraq a client state.
While the Shia in Iraq share a religion with their Persian neighbors they do not share a history or a culture. Or even a common language. And I suspect that the many Shia combat veterans from Saddam's army in the Iraq/Iranian War will not look favorably at taking orders from their former enemy. They may no longer hate the Iranians, but I doubt they want them calling the shots.
Nationalism is the greatest political force on the planet. And I have no doubt that it will prevail in Iraq. In the long term.
In the short term: we are screwed, they are screwed, everyone will be screwed. At least until the fools that got us into this mess remain out of prison.
Does anyone believe that the idiots who created this catastrofuck could possibly be smart enough to get us out?
Which is why I support Obama. I HOPE he will be smart enough to figure out how to solve this riddle
P.S. Notice the lack of trolls? How refreshing. People discussing things intelligently!
Why is General Petraeus Helping Iran?
Someone should ask General Petraeus today why he is working so hard to help Iran. This is not to suggest he is some sort of enemy of the state. I suppose he is following orders, but why doesn't he question his wildly counterproductive and conflicting orders?
I hear him bemoaning Iranian influence in Iraq all the time. Yet, no one has helped Iran more inside Iraq than he has. We have lent the full force of our military might to the political faction and Shiite militia most closely associated with Iran.
Granted there aren't a lot of good guys in the different Iraqi militias (on the other hand, they don't have much reason to think we're swell, either). But why have we decided to back the most pro-Iranian militia in the whole country?
The Badr Corps is linked with the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq (ISCI), which is the largest party inside Iraq. The Badr Corps also happens to be the militia with closest ties to Iran. They also happen to be the militia that ran those feared death squads during the ethnic cleansing of Baghdad. And get this - they are also the ones that want to split up Iraq instead of keeping it unified.
All of these objectives seem to be diametrically opposed to what we want in Iraq. So why have we thrown all our military muscle behind them? This is not just a rhetorical question. I'm actually curious as to what the answer is. Why are we helping ISCI and Bard Corps split up Iraq and allowing Iran to gain even greater influence inside Iraq?
I hope Gen. Petraeus isn't going to pretend that the Sadr's Mahdi Army has closer ties to Iran. That is demonstrably false. If he does that, then you know he is just Dick Cheney's puppet trying to stoke hostilities with Iran based on false premises. But beyond that, if we want to fight Iran so badly, why are we helping their top allies in Iraq?
I would love it if we actually used Congressional hearings to ask a real question for once and if General Petraeus, for once, gave us a real answer.
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Why is General Petraeus Helping Iran?
Job Security.
Great post Cenk,. However do we have a Democrat in Congress with any stones big enough to ask such questions ? Few except Biden and Obama understand the scope, and the rest like their cushy jobs and health care for life to much to see 75 % of America wants this over.
Democrat's should be on the attack and they cower afraid to say what we want them to, because it may come back and bite them in the butt some election cycle down the road.
Right on the head. You got it. For invading Iraq American political leaders should have known they were going to create another Mullah state. Shias by their doctrine do not recognise any leadership except the leadership and fatwa of an Ayatollah majority of who leave in Iran. American political leadership should learn a bit of history and try and understand the difference between these two groups (sunni and shia) in order to strategise their approach on how to deal with them. There is no way a shia Iraq government which is funded and supported by American would not have Iran'ian influence. That is totally impossible. Do you know why a lot of catholic countries look up to the pope? Trying to prevent Iranian influence in the new Iraq is like saying "All catholic dominated countries should not listen to the pope". Look, although majority of Iraq shias are Arabs, they are influenced more by their Persian (Iran) neighbours than any other Arab Country. Not even Saudi Arabia (History will tell you why)
So if Americans want to totally eliminate the influence of Iran on Iraq before they leave, then they should be prepared to stay in Iraq for an indefinite period of time. GET THE TROOPS HOME.
America hasn't figured out its own. How the hell can the "brain trust" make sense out of dramas that are far older than America, never mind the actual age of Iraq. These are conflicts rooted in tribal/family lineages. We can't fathom Hatfield/McCoy, never mind Shi'a/Sunni.
In Iraq, you *have* to deal with the actual Iran, because it's right next door. The real Iran, in relative terms, is a pretty friendly country given the abuse it's received from the US in the last 60 years. But when Patreus isn't physically in Iraq, he talks about the fantasy Iran that the war criminals have created.
The way I see it , we're caught in at least a 4 way civil war, probably more. BAdr, Sadr,(Mookie),Government, Sunni, Al Queda, Sons of Iraq etc.
yes, at least that many and with help from Syria on the sly and the largest funder of terror in the world our friends "the Saudi's"
WHY PATRAEUS BACKS SCIRI
Patreaus backs SCIRI/Badr because Hakim, with the blessings of Iran, is pro-occupation. Why? Iran's biggest fear is a US invasion. Is anyone on this board smart enough to figure out the rest?
what is the US going to invade Iran with the LA and NYPD ?
my step son is going back for tour number 4... get real we have no military to invade a country of 60 million people with.
Gen. Petraeus stays the course because he is a good soldier who will not contradict his Commander In Chief; regardless of the reality on the ground in Iraq.
A good soldier arrests war criminals, no matter who they are.
"good soldier ... will not contradict his Commander In Chief; regardless of the reality on the ground"
Not my definition of a good soldier.
go Cenk!
I honestly believe that the US Army in Iraq has no idea who their enemies from their friends are. And I do not discount that one day they may team up with Al-Qaeda in Iraq to fight another faction if it suites their very short term goal.
You have no friends when you occupy a country. Just people trying to play you for there own objectives.
Easy! Prolong the war until we can get Iran to sneeze. Makes for a nice foreign debt as well.
I hope the Vichy Iraquis have the same fate as the Vichy french. Anyone in Iraq that collaborates with us are traitors to their own people. We are like the Nazis in Iraq.
Dream on. King David is not helping Iran, he is helping Exxon/Mobil. He is killing Iraqis that are getting in the way of the theft of Iraqi oil by the Major Oil Corporations. He, like the Nazis befoe him, is only obeying orders from his fuerer. And his furer is only obeying orders from God. You see, God wants America to have all the planet's oil. It's in the bible. Just ask John McCain.
The point is, it is not intentional, the U.S. helping Iran in Iraq, it is because of our leaders' ineptness in understanding the intricacies of the alliances of the different "players" in the ME. Big Oil is the motive behind the U.S. actions in Iraq, the engineers behind the U.S. actions are not far-sighted enough to understand how the results will play out.
Your question to Petraeus should be directed at Deadeye Dick and his merry band who started this war. The minute Saddam and his regime were destroyed there was no other possibility but that Shias with close ties to Iran would take power and Iran would have majority influence over Iraq.
And come to think of it, wasn't it a Shia Iraqi exile with close ties to Iran who carried out a clandestine operation across Europe and the US, who was once funded by the CIA and who was brought into Cheney's special intel unit at DOD? And wasn't "Curveball," the perpetrator of the lie that tied Saddam to Osama, part of that campaign by the INC, led by Ahmed Chalabi? Wasn't it Chalabi's claims of WMD's, ties to bin Laden, being greeted as liberators, access to oil and US bases in Iraq that was stovepiped to GW Bush and that tipped the scales for war after Cheney bulldozed Tenet and Powell to lie in support of Chalabi's fabrications, as told to Bush by Cheney and all the other gullible morons who started this war? Didn't Iran quietly wrap this gang in Chalabi's web of lies to convince the US to destroy Saddam and Sunni control of Iraq?
Now Iran is the new mideast superpower, and isn't that just as intended when they suckered Cheney and his neocons into squandering and exhausting US military power, economic stability, diplomatic influence and national unity, to advance ancient Iranian geopolitical goals? Just asking.
General Petraeus is a decent and honorable man given an impossible task by civilian leaders this country elected. He lives and operates in the military universe where he will do his duty honorbly and professionally just as our military has done for 232 years. This isn't the movies! He doesn't walk into the Oval Office and straighten the President out and bring the troops home! I don't want to hear bitching and moaning from the people that elected this administration twice. That means everyone. If he has to work with the devil himself fine. He must be allowed to do his job and protect our service personnel. Period.
Well said bluedog.
Bluedog
That's not what Fallon said about him, I believe he called the P-man a little ass kisser, or words to that effect.
And he (Fallon) quit, rather than go along with what Georgie boy wanted him to say/do.
That would be decency and honor.
Admiral Fallon told P-Man he was a "little ass kissing chicken shit". The way P-Man dodged every question today in the Senate. reminded me of the Ali versus Frazer heavyweight fight where Ali tried his "rope a dope" style and got beat. It also shows P-Man traded honor and decency required when wearing the Uniform for political favor of the Dolt . He remains an ass kissing chickenshit to that Dolt who is the present occupant of the White House
Perhaps General Petraeus would be more believable if he didn't have presidential aspirations after his military service. Don't be so naive to think that he only lives in a military universe.
Just because he's in the military doesn't excuse his lies, damned lies, and false statistics. I'll grant you that he's been given a task by the President which is difficult, at best, and likely impossible, but he still has options available to him which he's NEVER even considered. His actions since the start of the war have been consistent that whatever the President says is exactly right, and there's no other option....
He could always resign. He certainly wouldn't be the first.
Does that excuse his forwarding of the White House meme that things in Iraq are going swimmingly? No argument with your contention that Petraeus should be protecting the service personnel - but if he's denying the realities on the ground, like the administration does, then he should be called out on it.
We can say that this country has turned the corner back towards democracy, cooperation, sanity, good judjement, decency and the constitution ONLY WHEN the debate becomes framed altogether differently.
That is, when the media starts asking the questions not about the intentions of the various factions in the Middle East, but whether the intentions of the Whitehouse AND the Pentagon (i.e. Petraus) are truly criminal.
If a suspicion that the American People and the American Economy have been had creeps into the debate, then well see some progress and consensus.
The Nuremburg Trials put to an end similar excuses for all the lies, murder and destruction of Nazi agression.
A similar phase - and unfortunately we're still far from it - will be required to discredit the Petrauses, McCains and Crockers et. al.
No wonder I love the Badr Corps.
Willing to meet Sunni terror head on with Shiite terror. God bless 'em (my sympathies for the innocents, but Sunnis don't seem too concerned with innocent Shia deaths).
Pragmatic. There will be no reconciliation because no one wants it. Sounds like Biden might just be on the Badr payroll. Did they come up with the idea or die he?
If I were a Shia surrounded by hostile Sunnis I'd want Iran watching my back.
On the bright side, the Shia crescent would be stopped with a Sunni nation smack dab in Anbar.
Time to get the heck out of Iraq and let them find their own way.
"All of these objectives seem to be diametrically opposed to what we want in Iraq."
'SEEM to want' is the operative phrase, Cenk. Excellent post.
It's actually quite simple to grasp - ONCE you understand the MOTIVATION driving those who continue to LIE about our presence in Iraq - OIL: $20 TRILLION - yes, TRILLION - dollars worth of known, easily-accessible oil reserves just waiting to be tapped and sold. This is a HUGE, HUGE incentive for all the armed actors in Iraq. Both those who want to keep Iraq united, and those - like America, its covering LIES notwithstanding - who want those oil profits going to western corporate shareholders and who will spend any amount of OUR taxpayer debt and any number of our volunteer military's lives to get it, with Congress's passive permission.
An illustration of that hidden motivation was just given by Joe Biden in his excellent opening statement in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. WHY else would we, as Biden just pointed out, "spend LESS in SIX YEARS in Afghanistan than we spend in THREE WEEKS in Iraq."
Think about that. That imbalance is beyond comprehension, when the 9/11 "enemy" is AND ALWAYS HAS BEEN in the Afghanistan/Pakistan area, and not in Iraq. Beyond comprehension, UNLESS, that is, $20 TRILLION in oil profits is driving the agenda, for the handful of political operators in the White House who know the real score and have been allowed by Congress to call the shots.
And clearly a divided-against-itself Iraq SMOOTHS the way for western corporations to move in and profit from Iraq's lucrative natural resource (see the recent Kurdish deal with Hunt Oil of Texas). A unified, nationalist Iraq will nationalize its oil - and keep the profits for the Iraqis. That's why we side with the unelected, separatist al-Maliki and the Badr "Organization" militia - al-Maliki, like Chalabi, is down with piracy, as long as he gets his cut. [Separatists will enable or ignore the "bottom-up" division of Iraq promoted by the Americans as "political reconciliation."]
Al-Sadr, however, has not yet been bought, and so any democratic, populist movement in Iraq that empowers him must be suppressed with the help of the American Army. [Looks like Crocker today was even making an effort to smear al-Sadr as sold out to Iran, to try to turn his (Iranian-hostile) supporters against him.]
Sadrist militias must be labeled "the enemy," "radical," "extremist," or "gangs." Because the Sadrists won't be bribed or threatened into selling out their nation's future to the American occupiers.
What STUNNING, BREATHTAKING MENDACITY was being used to peddle LIES to our Senate Armed Services Committee today. KNOWING lies - because any time a Senator got close to the truth, the spinning began by Petraeus and Crocker to keep it hidden. How can our legislators sit still for this?! It's pure Pravda - sickening, sickening deceit told to, and uncomplainingly accepted by, the United States Senate.
Remember when fux news (at election time) kept ear banging us that the troops were solidly behind the war because they didn't want their children to have to go to war there?
You have to base the answer to your question on shallow thinking, the circular logic of "support the enemies of your enemy".
Saddam was a Baathist Sunni. The Baathists persecuted the Shias under Saddam, so the U.S., in the neo-cons eyes, needed to be in political bed with the Shias in Iraq (because they are the enemy of our perceived enemy -- the Baathist party). Never mind that the U.S. used this same inane logic to prop up, aid and abet Saddam Hussein, since he was the enemy of our enemy, Iran. Then, of course, you have al Qaeda in Iraq emerge, the same kind of logic used again in that situation. We're being both the enemy and ally of almost everybody over there, practically simultaneously (with the exception of al Qaeda in Iraq, of course, it's clear they've got to be the enemy -- because of their name).
You got it!
The enemy of my enemy is a possible Ally, not necessarily my friend.
"Because you see, al Qaeda in Iraq, they're, they're just like al Qaeda, in Iraq!"
the shrub, date not remembered......
General Betrayed Us is just another Bush appointed spokesperson for this administration, and if he fails to do what they want, when they want it, he'll be replaced like the others before him were. Don't count on anything but the same rhetoric aimed at continual conflict until this administration is replaced.
because he is a brown-nosing water-boy for the criminals in the WH who are also influenced by zionist israeli-firsters trying to stir up another war front - this is obvious to anyone who understands the ME --- another question is why are all the politicians' questions along the lines of "the american tax payer is fed up... blah blah.... the iraqis should be paying their share.. blah blah" are they just stupid? or or posturing?? of course its the latter since the "tax payer" has not had any qualms about spending on bombs that have destroyed a country and has pulverized anything and everything that make human existence as
Posted April 8, 2008 | 10:35 AM (EST)