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September 29, 2006

Troop Withdrawals, Salted Peanuts, and College Football
Posted by Heather Hurlburt

So Henry Kissinger told the Bush Administration that troop withdrawals from Iraq would be "like salted peanuts to the American public:  the more U.S. troops come home, the more will be demanded."

This caught my eye, because I spent yesterday moderating a forum at Notre Dame on What Next for Iraq -- I could have used a Chex Snack Mix metaphor to describe the salty mix of ideas we got.

What we didn't hear:  anyone -- including military officers just back from tours of duty in the region -- arguing that things are going well or even that the media view of affairs is exaggerated.  Any enthusiasm for the Iraqi democracy project.  Anyone advocating a "bring all the troops home this month" position.  Any partisan-bashing.  This was an audience of students and professors, experts and laypeople, military and civilians, liberals and conservatives in a heavy faith-and-values context, genuinely wanting to discuss how to improve the mess we're in.  From an American point of view, I found it heartening, even as the views of the situation ranged from dire to disastrous.

I was actually quite encouraged to see panelists who started out with very diverse perspectives --  staying the course as a moral imperative, staying in for 12-18 months, shorter-term strategic withdrawal, and partition -- at least edging toward each other and toward a set of steps that one could imagine recommending in a "what now" sort of paper...

1.  Renew efforts to bring all the Iraqi parties back to the table, even (or especially) the armed groups that the US rightly finds objectionable.

2.  Bring regional and other interested actors together and invite them to put up or shut up:  what will Syria, Iran, etc., but also the UN and others contribute to keeping the lid on when US forces are gone?

3.  Acknowledge that troops will be out in 12-18 months, figure out what can be accomplished in that time, and tell Iraqis that's all they've got.

4.  Heated debate over partition, and what its effects would be, ended with several players endorsing a "soft partition" within a confederation-in-name.

5.  Angst over the question of what the US owes Iraqis ended with one panelist still convinced we owe it to Iraqis to stay and fix things, and that therefore we should be aiming policy to do that, and the other three convinced that outcome was no longer possible, and thus concerned that it might be less moral to push for an option that in fact was not feasible.

I report this discussion not because it was so earth-shattering, or because the folks involved were top Iraq experts, but because it demonstrates how thoughtful people of good will can actually grapple with these issues and come out with some ideas that, even if not happy ones, make some sense.  Worth thinking about the next time you read a "hopelessly polarized" headline.  Also, I'm tempted to start a pool to see whether this Administration can do better than this bunch of political scientists from their armchairs... I'm not counting on it.

(A unifying factor I have failed to mention here is the unanimous horror in the room, uniting Republican and Democrat, professor and student, military and civilian, on learning that their moderator was from... Ann Arbor.)

September 29, 2006 at 10:09 PM in Iraq |

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Comments

While it's amusing to hear from someone who thinks we should stay on and "fix things," as if five hundred pound bombs, depleted uranium and detention calls in the night could actually fix anything, the only solution to this fiasco is to leave immediately, if not sooner. Alas, it won't happen unless the troops rebel against this meaningless exercise "Operation Iraqi Fiasco."
War criminals, excuse me, peace prize winners, like Kissinger will prevail (it's a guy thing) because our government doesn't have the common sense of Michigan's Prescott Burgess who stepped up and ran for success. They're losers. Vietnam redux.
A theme of mine: Men suffer from a dangerous drug, testosterone. So we need more women like Cindy Sheehan and Medea Benjamin to carry the ball against the warmongers. Or Lysistrata.

Posted by: Don Bacon | September 29, 2006 at 11:07 PM

The salted peanuts remark was part of a memo Kissinger wrote for President Nixon early in his first term about Vietnam and troop withdrawals from that conflict. Bob Woodward has been cited in the Washington Post for alleging that Kissinger sees the Iraq situation through the prism of his experience with Vietnam, and in private has urged President Bush not to contemplate withdrawals from Iraq. It might be best to wait until the book is released and Kissinger offered a chance to comment on its claims before drawing conclusions on this point.

Posted by: Zathras | September 29, 2006 at 11:27 PM

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