Juan Cole on Hillary Clinton's Iraq plan

[ProSense]

Friday, March 16, 2007

Clinton Would Keep Troops in Iraq

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton said Thursday that she would keep some US troops in Iraq to fight al-Qaeda, curb Iranian influence, protect the Kurds and assist the Iraqi military.

The elements of this plan will not work or are unnecessary.

1. The Kurds don't need protecting. Their Peshmerga military, 60,000 to 100,000 strong and well trained and armed, is the best indigenous fighting force in Iraq. There is almost no violence in the territory of the Kurdistan Regional Government, precisely because the Peshmerga are so good. There are almost no US troops up north because even now they are not needed.

2. There is no al-Qaeda in Iraq in the technical sense of the word, of fighters who have sworn fealty to Usama Bin Laden. There are a small number, probably less than a thousand, of foreign volunteers fighting in the country, mainly from other Arab states but also from Europe. They are mostly Salafi Jihadis (revivalist militants) and act as adjuncts to local Iraqi guerrilla cells, all of which are much bigger and more important. They are there to fight US occupation and would probably just go home if it ended. If peace was made with the Iraqi Sunnis, the Iraqis themselves would expel or slit the throats of the foreigners. If peace isn't made with them, they'll keep giving the foreign volunteers cars rigged up with bombs to go detonate. Either way, the US military cannot fight "al-Qaeda" in Iraq in isolation from the struggle against the Sunni Arabs. And, a small force such as she is proposing would be massacred in al-Anbar Province if there were still hostilities with the Sunni Arabs in general.

3. There are no Iranian units in Iraq. There are no Iranian prisoners to speak of in US custody in Iraq, even though 12,000 prisoners are being detained. The US did arrest a handful of Iranians deputed to the compound of Shiite cleric Abdul Aziz al-Hakim and to Irbil, the power base of Kurdistan President Massoud Barzani. These Iranians were there at Iraqi invitation. The US can only interfere here because it has a big force in the country. A small US military force could do nothing whatsoever about Iranian influence in Shiite Iraq, especially in the face of Iraqi Shiite and Kurdish desire for such cooperation. There will be millions of pilgrims coming back and forth, and they all can't be monitored. The major Shiite party, the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, is tightly linked with Tehran even while being among the main US allies. Small US units trying to take on Iranians in the Shiite south would risk being massacred by thousands of angry Iraqi Shiites.

4. Leaving small numbers of US troops in Iraq to assist the Iraqi military over the short term might be desirable and might be practicable, though I've been advised that it might not work. Over the medium to long term it would be most unwise because it would set up a strong risk of the US being pulled back into the civil war. What if you put a US company in with an Iraqi battalion, and the whole unit was ambushed by Sunni Arab guerrillas and many US troops killed? Either you let them get away with it, which is an invitation for them strike again at other US troops. Or you retaliate, which means putting more US units in for a retaliatory operation.

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[babylonsister]

1. Someone should send this to Clinton for rebuttal. Or not. nt

[karynnj]

2. Great idea - and why we need a REAL debate on Iraq

My guess is that Hillary's comments were created based on what a Hillary think tank thought would be the best US political position. She is a very smart person and I wonder if pushing her on these comments could make her rethink them.

[paulk]

3. actually, they seem to be based on the Democratic Senate

resolution, the one that got defeated yesterday.

"Mrs. Clinton has said she would vote for a proposed Democratic resolution on Iraq now being debated on the floor of the Senate, which sets a goal of redeploying all combat forces by March 31, 2008. Asked if her Iraq plan was consistent with the resolution, Mrs. Clinton and her advisers said it was, noting that the resolution also called for “a limited number” of troops to stay in Iraq to protect the American Embassy and other personnel, train and equip Iraqi forces, and conduct “targeted counter-terrorism operation.”

[ProSense]

4. That's a very general statement. Her plan is in fact very different.

“It would be fewer troops,” she said. “But what we can do is to almost take a line north of — between Baghdad and Kirkuk, and basically put our troops into that region the ones that are going to remain for our antiterrorism mission; for our northern support mission; for our ability to respond to the Iranians; and to continue to provide support, if called for, for the Iraqis.”

link

[paulk]

5. I suppose one's view of the plan

is influenced by whether one's desire is a serious discussion of how to deal with the problem of Iraq, or if one is looking for

a reason to dislike Hillary Clinton.

[ProSense]

6. Maybe that's what Juan Cole is doing.

Please, if you have nothing to contribute besides personal attacks, keep it to yourself.

I know the plans inside out, and I can read what she's calling for, her plan is different. That is the point Cole is making.

[paulk]

13. what a condescending reply

you replied to me. I didn't ask for your opinion. I think the poster I responded is capable of speaking for herself. You have no right -

no right to respond in the way you have.

[ProSense]

15. No, this is

condescending: link, and it was in response to this, which isn't a personal attack.

[paulk]

16. her plan is not "very" different, especially in the context

of Bush's plan. It fits inside the general outline of the Democratic position; to try and portray it otherwise is an excercise of those with a political axe to grind.

The expressions of horror - the charactorizations of this plan made by many posters on this board - as "pnac", Bushlike, war mongering, etc, etc, etc, are the expressions of those more interested in finding political advantage than in a real discussion of tthis plan, or any plan, IMO.

And I have every right to post my opinion on this board, whether you find it a worthwhile contribution or not. That you choose to respond to my opinion in such a juvinile way is no reflection on my opinion, AFAIC.

[TheConstantGardener]

7. HRC voted for IWR as well

Let someone who was right in 2002 be right now (like Feingold!).

[paulk]

8. Fiengold isn't running

and Kucinich may as well not be.

I've never held a "yes" vote on the IWR by a Democrat against them.

[TheConstantGardener]

9. "I've never held a "yes" vote on the IWR by a Democrat against them. "

I know Iraqis hurt by this war. I believe in morality. I believe those who help this mass murder continue should be held responsible, maybe even tried for war crimes.

Obama and Kucinich and Mike Gravel held good antiwar positions. They deserve the white house. The people who said Iraqi childrens' lives are not more important than political calculating -- they do not.

And way to give in to Big Business's control over politics, writing someone off just because he stands with the people and not Corporate America. Great enabling there.

[paulk]

11. the IWR was not a vote for war

your statement that you "believe those who help this mass murder continue should be held responsible, maybe even tried for war crimes", which, in the context of this exchange, I read as meaning all those who voted for the IWR - is foolish, IMO.

As for calling me an "enabler"... well, it doesn't take great courage to insult strangers over the internet. But I will warn you, "theconstantgardener", who has less than 50 posts - it's not a very good way to win friends and influence people on this board...

[TheConstantGardener]

12. It was telling George Bush "You can bomb Iraq any time u want, baby"

And violates the constitution by giving war powers to the President.


And add this of course to all the masturbating by these politicians in the leadup to the war about how good of an idea it was, how it was a "liberation", how we should support our troops. These guys are a bunch of clowns who have no respect for human life in the end.

Some I think are visibly shaken by the war and have truly turned a 180. Others are just wry political calculators and already ready for a war with Iran if it'll boost their poll numbers.

[karynnj]

19. I did not see this earlier - and I have seriously looked at

most of the Iraq plans. Are we not allowed to say that we don't like Hillary's plan and simply concede that she will be the candidate and we should therefore simply sing her praises. Even when Kerry was the nominee, no one demanded that lock step loyalty for him. (see Begala, Carville, etc)

The fact is that Hillary's proposal here is the most "pro-war" (for lack of a better word) than any other Democratic plan I have seen other than Leiberman. (I have seen Kerry's, Murtha's, Feingold's, Obama's, Biden's, Edwards' and Dodd's plans or comments. ) It is also a shift to the right for her.

It is also disconcerting as she seems to trying to "pull" the interpretation of the Democratic plan to the right - and it is a shift to the right herself. The only thing I can think is that it is a Hillary attempt to appear the "strongest". What is clear is that while you can say that Kerry, Biden, Dodd and Obama are leading the effort to define an exit strategy - Hillary isn't.

I have never attacked you - so I really don't see why you are attacking me.

[karynnj]

18. If so, her "view" of the plan differs from people

who were the leaders on it. Even in this paragraph, these items are less than the items she is proposing. I have heard several of the Democrats refer to forces outside Iraq being able to conduct counter-terrorism operations (as in fact the strike force that hit the AlQueda in Iraq leader was)

So, she is pushing the resolution to its extreme while minimizing her proposal to say they are the same - they aren't.

[TheConstantGardener]

10. Hillary Clinton's foreign policy is not that different from Generalissimo Bush's

She's given him almsot every blank check he's asked for. She's far from a foreign policy critic. She'd never anger the Establishment in Washington, suggesting that murdering poor people for their resources whether through the IMF's "structural adjustment" policies or wars of aggression is at all immoral.

Thankfully we have a bigger field of candidates this time around including 3 people who had the good sense to speak out strongly against the Iraq massacre.

[Morgana LaFey]

14. Spot on

and welcome to DU

[mtnsnake]

17. Bush will never be the leader Hillary is.

When the going got tough, Junior dodged the draft by having Pappy get him out of harms way and into the National Guard, which back in those days was considered a safe haven for avoiding going to Nam.

If elected, Hillary will become the strongest president since Bill Clinton, maybe even since JFK.

Hillary wants the troops out of this crooked fiasco and home ASAP, just like you or I do. Dealing with the reality of the situation is another thing.