Five Years of War in Iraq: The Impasse

David L. Petraeus, the General in charge of the 155,000 soldiers stationed in Iraq, is not happy with the government in Baghdad. It has “not made, at all, the political and legislative efforts ” expected “as far as national reconciliation,” says the new head of the military, troubled by the renewed outbreak of violence in the past two months. This calls for the maintenance of a contingent of at least 135,000 men and women until the end of 2008. And, without doubt, probably beyond then.

Five years after having invaded Iraq with 190,000 GIs and 60,000 British- who now number less than 5000- five years after trying to achieve the neoconservative dream of forcibly installing democracy in the Arab world, with, among others, the objective of reinforcing the security of Israel, five years after ridding the region of one of its most brutal dictatorships, America is stuck in an impasse. The “Democratic Strategy” has been abandoned mid-stream, and the ambition now is to stabilize the situation.

America has lost 4000 soldiers, and 29,000 have been wounded. But it still does not control the country, not even the 16 kilometers of highway which separates the ultra-fortified “green zone” in the middle of the capital from the airport. After having dissolved all of the Iraqi security forces -“a serious error,” one admits now – America spent more than 20 billion dollars to train and equip 250,000 police and 160,000 Iraqi soldiers, of whom the leaders themselves say that at best they will not be ready to completely take charge of national security “before 2012,” and of the borders “before 2018.” The American army is exhausted, “incapable,” said Admiral William Fallon before having to resign last week, “to fight on another front” which would not, this time, be “chosen,” as in Iraq, but which could be imposed.

With its lies, the Bush administration has ruined, for a long while, the image and the credit of the USA throughout the world. The Iraq conflict has contributed to the quadrupling of the prices of oil in five years. Despite the billions of dollars injected into its exploitation, Iraqi production, which was third in the world before 2003, has never even regained its prewar level. Same problem for potable water – of which 40% of the population is still deprived- and electricity, of which the majority of Iraqis, starting with the 5 or 6 thousand who llive in Baghdad, only receive for four to six hours a day.

In 2007, the Pentagon estimated that 70% of the 2 billion dollars (1264 billion Euros) of gas, kerosene and fuel products produced by the Baiji refinery, the largest one in the country, “disappeared” into the general corruption which rages throughout Iraq. Of course, a portion of the disappeared goods, estimated as worth “at least 200 million dollars a year” goes towards the financing of the insurrection, jihadist or nationalist, which also is privately funded in abundance by Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the other Gulf states. Today in recession, the United States, heavily in debt, has borrowed essentially 500 billion dollars which have already been spent in a war which, directly or indirectly, caused the death of at least 40,000 Iraqis, according to the World Health Organization. This war has also triggered , according to the United Nations High Commission on Refugees, the most “vast human migration” since the partition of India and Pakistan in 1947. Around 4.4 million Iraqis are currently “deplaced, ” having fled their homes, 2 million are attempting to survive in neighboring countries, with all the destabilization risks that implies.

What can be done now? Impossible to stay, since all of the opinion polls show that three quarters of the 25 or 26 million Iraqis have had enough of this occupation. When their children are often the first to applaud when the insurrection succeeds in exploding a tank or bringing down a helicopter. Impossible to pull back when almost all the analysts, the strategists, the journalists and the almost all Iraqi politicians themselves predict that a bloodbath would practically be assured and the civil war would possibly if not probably spread to neighboring countries.

“GENOCIDE AND CHAOS”

Confronted with this dilemma, what are the potential successors to George W. Bush saying? John McCain, the Republican candidate, estimates that a military retreat would trigger “genocide and chaos in the entire region.” For him, America must prepare to stay in Iraq “a century, if necessary.” Hillary Clinton proposes a “progressive pullout” which would start in the sixty days following her election. But, prudently, the Democratic candidate does not state the final date of the occupation. Barack Obama is the only one to promise a total retreat of “all combat brigades” in the sixteen months following his election. But he does not say what would happen to the 100,000 soldiers – at least -and the 60,000 foreign civil contractors who are still taking care of logistics, security, and construction for all that is still not working, and for reconstruction.

The war has reawakened inter-community hatred between Shia and Sunnis throughout the Middle East. While Iran gloats and infiltrates itself into its neighbor’s affairs of state, the Iraq “wars” follow each other, become greater and more numerous. Since the Turkish offensive in February against the PKK, the essentially Kurdish North has become a powder keg that could explode at any moment. In the South, gangs and Shia militias kidnap, assassinate, and arm themselves heavily for control of trafficked goods. Since the recruitment by the USA of 91,000 supplemental fighters – 82% of whom are Sunnis- inter-Sunni and intertribal confrontations have multiplied.

General Petraeus can certainly accuse the Iraqi government of a lack of resolution. Everyone knows that it consists of a number of fiefdoms and that it functions with half of its ministers since the rest have quit for various reasons, either political or sectarian. After five years of uninterrupted tragedy, it is not the 600 “soldiers” of Al Quaida (latest estimation of American military intelligence) who are maintaining Iraq in this war alone. It is the rivers of blood that has been shed which polarize all of the communities like never before. If the Americans stay or if they go, the stabilization of Mesopotamia will not happen any time soon.