In a last-ditch attempt to prevent Iraq from becoming a full-fledged failed state and mega-terror base, the battered Bush administration has apparently decided to tolerate and even support Shiite fundamentalist rule of Iraq in order to contain and defeat Shiite and Sunni (Al Qaeda) Islamists and secular Sunni (Baathist) insurgents.
Secular democracy–never a realistic possibility for the divided hell-hole–is more than ever a distant dream.
This is the lens through which one should view today’s assault on suspected Sunni insurgents in central Baghdad, which reportedly killed 50 enemy fighters. Twenty-one Sunnis were supposedly captured in the battle for Haifa Street, a notorious stronghold of Saddam supporters. The prisoners are believed to include three Syrians and one Sudanese.
Coming on the heels of the botched execution of Saddam–he was essentially hanged by a Shiite death squad–today’s raid is certain to deepen suspicions that the US is trying to divide and rule Iraq–and the Middle East, except for Israel–by siding with the Shiites, who are engaged in the ethnic cleansing of Iraq’s capital.
If this is true, the US strategy is doomed to fail; and the expected escalation of the Iraq war, termed a surge by Bush spin-doctors, is nothing more than a stupid, cynical waste of life and treasure. Sending more troops to mainly suppress Sunni insurgents will only reinforce the impression that the US is playing the Shiite card now that its Iraq intervention has ironicaly helped create a Shiite Crescent linking Iran, Iraq, and Syria with Hezbollah in Lebanon. (Thtat the crescent includes Iran’s Sunni Palestinian ally Hamas in Gaza does little to calm Sunni regional nerves.)
But … call it wishful thinking … we suspect … hope … pray … that there is more to the strategy than meets the eye. The Haifa Street operation could be the price the US feels it has to pay for relatively moderate Shiite support for additional surges–and an eventual assault on Sadr City, the sprawling Shiite slum in northeastern Baghdad. This center of Islamist hate and militancy is controlled by the so-called Mahdii army, a well armed militia of anti-American Shiite cleric (and clerical fascist) Moqtada Al-Sadr.
As long as Al-Sadr is alive and well, Iraq will continue on its path toward Islamist rule. The present prime minister is Al-Sadr’s stooge–and Iran’s agent.
Which brings us to the key point: Iran must go. Removing Tehran’s turbaned tyranny is essential to isolating and defeating the Shiite Islamists of Iraq. For this reason, we believe the US has decided to give Israel the green light to destroy Iran’s nuclear arms program.
End the Iranian menace (before it ends Israel) and everything changes–is this the real Bush plan?
We’ll know soon enough.
This Bush policy is stupid. The Sunni Arabs in Baghdad and elsewhere in Iraq are the only trained, capable armed native force than can stand up against Iran. The US should be allying with the Sunnis against the Shiite Iran proxies– al-Sadr and also the Badr people. We all know the US is headed for a major confrontation with Iran soon, so the least the Bush Administration could do is to undercut Iran’s forward force in Iraq and join with the Sunnis to reduce overall Shiite power. A simple strategy that the Bush Administration can’t seem to wrap its head around.
He had this idea in place in 2003 to hand over Iraq to Iran when the Bush administration realized they lost the war, but wanted to keep the white house.
Yes, the plan is doomed to fail because he is a pathological failure who already said he is throwing this on the lap of the next person in the white house as he has thrown all his many failures in the past upon others.
Have Israel destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities? Was that not the responsibility and burden of the Bush administraion?
Oh wait, see above explaination.
I hope this is the plan.