The Iffy News From Iraq

Advance word of a new National Intelligence Estimate casts doubt on the idea of "victory" in Iraq, creating problems for both John McCain and Barack Obama on the issue of withdrawal.

"A nearly completed high-level U.S. intelligence analysis warns that unresolved ethnic and sectarian tensions in Iraq could unleash a new wave of violence, potentially reversing the major security and political gains achieved over the last year," the McClatchy Newspapers report today.

Such a prediction undermines McCain's claims of "victory with honor" and complicates Obama's promises to begin immediate withdrawal if and when he takes office.

A consensus of all 16 US intelligence agencies, the new NIE cites as sources of continuing tension the struggle among Sunnis, Kurds and Turkmen for control of oil-rich Kirkuk and the Shiite-dominated central government's stalling over hiring former Sunni insurgents converted, for a price, into members of Awakening groups as well as fragility of the truce by Shiite militias led by Muqtada al Sadr.

Unlike McCain, Gen. David Petraeus is still refusing to proclaim victory, calling the situation "fragile" and "reversible," and the soon-to-be former Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice this week publicly said that "nothing is certain in this life. And success in Iraq is not a sure thing."

Meanwhile, our troops continue to die there, albeit at a slower rate, and $10 billion from a strapped economy keeps being poured into the war that should never have started and shows no signs of ending.

Burying Iraq as an Issue

At the Republican Convention, the public desire that dominated the elections two years ago--to get out of Iraq--will be low on the agenda, buried under John McCain's rhetoric about "victory" with "honor."

But as a New York Times editorial points out, McCain is alone in trying to sell that grotesque claim:

"Iraq’s leaders are pushing a timetable that would have American troops out in 2011.

"Even President Bush--who had long scorned the notion of a withdrawal deadline as defeatist--looks set to go along...

"That leaves Mr. McCain as the stubborn man out.

"While the war is no longer front-page news, thousands of Americans are still fighting and dying there. The war is costing American taxpayers $10 billion a month--that is $10 billion that cannot be spent on health care, education and many other urgent priorities.

"Mr. McCain told veterans on Aug. 11 that he would end the war, but intended to 'win it first' and assured them that 'victory in Iraq is finally in sight.'

"He needs to explain what he means by victory. A free and democratic Iraq, as Mr. Bush originally promised? That would take generations. Even after spending nearly $700 billion, the United States will be lucky to leave behind a marginally functioning central government in a very fragile country."

McCain on Iraq recalls the loony character in the World War II movie "Arsenic and Old Lace" who thinks he's Teddy Roosevelt and keeps rushing up the stairs blowing a bugle and yelling "Charge!" Meanwhile, real bodies are buried in the cellar.

That character's Panama Canal was the product of a disordered mind, but Iraq is real and American voters should get an explanation from McCain or take away his bugle.

Petraeus: "Can't Kill Our Way Out"

In a place some Americans may have heard about long, long ago, our man in charge is still trying to figure out how to pacify a country where enemies and allies keep changing all the time and hand their political hot potato back to them.

In an interview with Foreign Policy, Gen. David Petraeus says "the Iraqis have formed 160,000 police, soldiers, border police, and other security force elements during the past year. To be sure, there’s an uneven nature to their quality, to their capability, and to their level of training and equipping, but they’re significant in quantity.

"And quantity does mean quality in counterinsurgency operations, because you’ve got to secure so many infrastructures against the terrorist and insurgent and militia elements...(O)nly when they can handle it we will have this transfer."

Asked about working with former enemies, Petraeus makes a distinction: "Some were what we call fence-sitters; some were oppressed and some probably were shooting at us, but you don’t kill your way out of this kind of thing. You can’t kill or capture everybody in an insurgency. What you have to figure out are the irreconcilables, and ideally you want these numbers as small as possible because they have to be killed, captured, or run off."

When will that be? The General can't say. Meanwhile, the number of confirmed US deaths has passed the 3900 mark. Killing our way out is not a one-way street.

When the Presidential candidates start debating "victory" in Iraq, maybe Petraeus can tell them--and us--exactly what we have won.

Bush's Plan B

For years, the Administration ducked and weaved to avoid allowing the morning-after pill called Plan B to become available to Americans facing the consequences of imprudence, mishaps or poor judgment.

Now President Bush, faced with his own need for a Plan B in Iraq, is unwilling to abort his misbegotten war.

The crux of the analogy is that the man who self-righteously wants individuals to take responsibility for their mistakes keeps denying his own and letting innocent young people pay for them with their lives.

Tonight he will again insult our intelligence by claiming success in Iraq and then take credit for bringing home the additional troops he put there this year who were scheduled to leave in any case.

When Vietnam was failing, a shrewd old Republican Senator from Vermont, George Aiken, said, “There's only one way out of there, that's to declare victory and just leave."

For the Iraq disaster, Bush’s answer is to declare victory and stay.