Regional Conflict?

Are we headed for a regional conflict in the middle east? The magic 8-ball says it's possible. Remember that Cheney was summoned to Riyahd by King Abdullah a month ago, where the Saudi Royal was not told to go fuck himself as he informed Vice that the House of Saud would throw their support behind the Sunni's in Iraq if the United States pulled out of Iraq before the Sauds are ready for the United States to go.

The United States has been engaging Iran "below the CNN line" for several years. We had barely toppled Saddam when the first American commandos were sent across the border into Iran, snooping for nukes.

The Kurdish areas of Iraq have been a staging ground for Kurdish paramilitaries to train and group and cross the border into the Kurdish areas of Iran and ambush Republican Guard troops.

The United States has been accused of shooting down Iranian aircraft on at least two occasions, killing Republican Guard soldiers.

Now, we learn that the United States has captured Iranian operatives inside Iraq, and they stand accused of plotting attacks against Iraqi security forces. It is - or at least should be - a major embarrasment to the Bush administration that

at least two of the Iranians were in this country on an invitation extended by Iraq’s president, Jalal Talabani, during a visit to Tehran earlier this month. It was particularly awkward for the Iraqis that one of the raids took place in the Baghdad compound of Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, one of Iraq’s most powerful Shiite leaders, who traveled to Washington three weeks ago to meet President Bush.

Okay - get your programs out folks. We have the Wahabbist Sunni Saudi's summoning Vice so they can, in person, threaten to fund and materially support the Sunni insurgents in Iraq. We have a Shi'ite dominated government in Iraq that snuck off into the bedroom with Iran and we hear moaning sounds coming down the hallway. We catch Iranian fomenters of violence who are in the country at the invitation of the president in the compound of a Shi'ite power-broker who was less than three weeks ago a guest of the US president at the White House.

When we consider the stability of the region, we have to consider the refugees who have fled the violence of Iraq - about 1.5 million - and relocated to Syria and Jordan, where they are affecting the social fabric of their foster cities.

An overall picture of stability int he cradle of civilization is not inspiring. Syria and Jordan are being internally compromized because they have absorbed many more Iraqi refugees than the social fabric of those countries can bear. (You only think the US has immigration problems!) Then you have your Iranians backing Shi'ite militias and most likely death squads, too. Throw in the threat by the Saudi's to fund the Sunni insurgents that are giving US forces in Iraq fits, and you have four countries with common borders to Iraq that are directly affected by or getting directly involved in the Iraqi Civil War.

And the saddest part of the whole thing is, some of us tried to tell them this would happen, and we cited our sources. We weren't merely dismissed, we were scorned. Those of us who opposed the invasion for months before it was launched were called traitors - and worse. Hatred was fostered by pro-war politicians and their operatives that branded political opponents as the enemy.

The United States went to war on false pretenses at the whim of an idiot child. And the results we see? A treasury going broke, an Army that's broken, three thousand dead Americans, ten thousand wounded and unable to return to service, and an economically vital region of the world on the precipice of regional warfare.

Now I ask once more, and think carefully before you answer: Was toppling Saddam worth any of this?

Operation Together Forward: II

Who believes this is all coincidence...first the announcement is made that the size of the armed services needs to be beefed up permanently. A couple of days later, they start talking of a "surge" of troops to stabilize Baghdad. The Generals initially resisted; but now, suddenly have capitulated. Then the Friday News Dump...The test of the Selective Service.

No way this is all coincidence and I can't believe even the distracted and appathetic American public isn't raising hell about this. Let the draft notices start landing in mailboxes in Overland Park and Leawood and we will hear a chorus of outrage, and no one will be raising hell with Kelly Feigenbaum any more, calling her selfish for not offering up her son to be saccrificed in Iraq.

When they talk about a surge, they are talking about escalation. Call it what it is. It's a troop buildup and the result will be an escalation of hostilities. The result will be ramped up death and destruction. The result will be bloody fucking chaos and we can not stand by and let this happen.

I am hearing people on the left say that we should let them have their "surge" and when it fails the Republicans will be done for decades.

What utterly crass and craven perfidy.

No one, and I do mean no one, who has ever put on the uniform or loved someone who did can stomach the thought that anyone would view the life of a single troop as expendable in the interest of some future election.

Bush's troop-buildup is not a done deal. The new congress will be seated before the call-up can go out, and they can enact some oversight and accountability. If you oppose the actions that are brewing, contact the chairmen of the Senate and House Armed Services Committees. Senator Levin can be reached by clicking here, and Congressman Skelton can be reached by clicking here.

Not to repeat myself, but for years Americans have said they were mad as hell and not gonna take it any more. Once more I ask...Do you mean it yet?

Officers are warming to the idea of timelines

The most political SOB on the face of the planet is a Bird Colonel with stars in his or her eyes. "Generals who don't play politics...are Captains" goes an old saying in military circles. So when active duty senior officers start talking favorably and publicly about timetables and deadlines that are opposed and denounced by the C-in-C, it is significant.

I have been aware of this trend for some time, but the conversations I have at the bar of the Officer's Club with men and women I consider my friends are not fodder for my politics. When they speak to me frankly and off the record, that is exactly how I treat it. I may mention in passing what someone said, but conversations I have with officers, especially when they are still active duty, are sacrosanct. I am honored that they will speak openly with me and tell me what they really feel, and I will never betray that trust. I will, however, say that I have been aware for the better part of a year of a pervasive undercurrent among officers above the rank of Captain of the opinion that we are doing more harm than good, that the presence of our troops is what is gumming up the works. Now they are saying so on the record, although mostly anonymously.

"Deadlines could help ensure that the Iraqi leaders recognize the imperative of coming to grips with the tough decisions they've got to make for there to be progress in the political arena," said a senior Army officer who has served in Iraq. He asked that his name not be used because he did not want to publicly disagree with the stated policy of the president.

Many officers who have been charged with executing the duties that come with mounting a counterinsurgency share the opinion that the U.S. troop presence is giving the fledgling Iraqi government cover, and that failure by the Iraqi government to move forward on key political and security measures has left senior military leaders frustrated.

Still, the administration cleaves to the notion that setting deadlines will just embolden the insurgents. Once the U.S. sets a withdrawal date, the argument goes, the Sunni-led guerrillas know exactly how long they must hang on before American troops are gone. They also argue that drawdown dates would allow Sunni-led militias to foment unrest that could undermine any political advances the government might manage to achieve.

Many military officials are wary of the consequesnces of timelines, but increasingly the officers who have faced the task at hand say they are looking more and more attractive. This opinion shift is a sign that gridlock in the Iraqi government is seen as a greater threat to achieving stability in Iraq than the insurgency itself. Without government reform, the Iraqi security forces are unlikely to ever be strong enough to take on the insurgency or the sectarian militias.

Retired Major General John Batiste, former commander of a division in Iraq and outspoken critic of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, has said that setting a date for a drawdown of combat brigades must be considered. Before the deadline, Batiste said, the U.S. also needs to step up its effort to advise and train the Iraqi military and police. "Holding the Iraqi government accountable is important, and that has everything to do with setting expectations and timelines," Batiste said. "It also has everything to do with doing all we can to ensure they are capable of completing the task they are trying to do."

"It's basic counterinsurgency," said a military officer who has served in Baghdad and did not want to publicly disagree with the president's stated policy. "You have to have a trusted, capable government."

That capable and trusted government does not exist. The train of reality is rolling down the tracks, and the stalled car of denial is about to get creamed.