[Mb-civic] Bush ¹ s hollow fiction of Iraq war >By Zbigniew Brzezinski - Ftimes

[Michael Butler]

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Bush¹s hollow fiction of Iraq war
>By Zbigniew Brzezinski
>Published: June 30 2005 20:24 | Last updated: June 30 2005 20:24
>>

Like a novelist who wishes to inject verisimilitude into his fiction, George
W. Bush, US president, began his speech on Iraq with a reference to a
historical fact all too tragically well known to his audience. The evocation
of the monstrous crime of September 11 2001 served as his introduction to
the spin that followed: that Iraq was complicit in 9/11 and thus, in effect,
attacked the US; that the US had no choice but to defend itself against
Iraq¹s aggression; and, finally, that if America does not fight terrorists
in Iraq, they will swarm across the ocean to attack America.

Since fiction is not ruled by the same standards as history, Mr Bush was
under no obligation to refer to his own earlier certitude about Iraqi
³weapons of mass destruction² (or, rather, to their embarrassing absence),
or to the inept sequel of the initially successful US military campaign; or
to the fact that the occupation of Iraq is turning it into a huge
recruitment centre for terrorists. Similarly, there was no need to deal with
the perplexing fact that the Iraqi insurgency does not appear to be in ³its
last throes², or with the complex choices that the US now confronts.

But a more disturbing aspect of the speech was the absence of any serious
discussion of the wider regional security problems and their relationship to
the Iraqi conundrum. That connection poses the danger that America risks
becoming irrelevant to the Middle East ­ largely through Mr Bush¹s own
doing. Much depends on how long the US pursues unrealistic goals in Iraq.
And on whether the US becomes seriously engaged in the Israeli-Palestinian
peace process, on how the US relationship with Iran is managed and on how
the advocacy of democracy in the Middle East is pursued.

The reality in Iraq is that 135,000 American soldiers cannot create a stable
³democracy² in a society rent by intensifying ethnic and religious
conflicts. US military commanders, contradicting Mr Bush, have publicly
stated that the insurgency is not weakening. It is useful to recall in this
regard Henry Kissinger¹s wise observation (made in regard to the war in
Vietnam but pertinent here) that guerrillas are winning if they are not
losing. The longer US troops are involved in Iraq, the more victory will
remain ³on the horizon² ­ that is, a goal that recedes as one moves towards
it.

Only the Iraqis can establish a modicum of stability in Iraq, and that can
be achieved only by Shia-Kurdish co-operation. These two communities have
the power to entice or to crush the less numerous Sunnis. Hence the
immediate goal of US policy should be to develop a dialogue with
self-sufficient Shia and Kurdish leaders about the circumstances in which
they could issue a public demand for American disengagement.

All this would be far less risky if accompanied by serious progress in the
Israeli-Palestinian peace process. That progress has to go beyond the Gaza
disengagement or a renewal of reciprocal violence is to be expected.
Progress requires US involvement and a willingness to press both parties
with real resolve and towards clear goals. Equivocation, partiality toward
one side and the temptation to evade this issue are prescriptions for
continued conflict.

Similarly, US withdrawal from Iraq could be made more difficult and costly
by any escalation in US-Iranian hostility. Iran has not taken full advantage
of the opportunities for mischief but the temptation to do so would increase
if American policy towards it again conflated the issue of nuclear power
with the pursuit of ³regime change². There is little indication that the
White House is sensitive to this reality.

Democracy in the Middle East is a worthy goal but one that the people of the
region can pursue only on their own terms. Public hectoring by US officials
is likely to promote the emergence of radical populist regimes motivated by
strong anti-American (and anti-Israeli) passions.

The fictionalised account of America¹s war against terror in Iraq failed to
take into account the reality that the conflict there mobilises hostility
towards the US, that the persistence of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
stimulates regional anger against America, that continued US threats of
³regime change² in Iran harden Iranian enmity towards the country and that
heavy handed advocacy of democracy poses the risk of legitimising populist
hostility toward the it. In explaining the causes of imperial failure,
Arnold Toynbee ultimately ascribed it to ³suicidal statecraft². Of course,
he was dealing with history and not fiction.

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