Obama’s right-on Iraq policy: not lost in translation

I'm really enjoying how McCain and Bush are squirming, now that the Iraqi prime minister has endorsed Obama's timeline for withdrawing U.S. troops from his country.

They've been chanting the mantra "no timeline, no timeline" for so long, and bashing Dems at any mention of setting a date for withdrawal, it's become almost a sacred policy position.

Yet Bush also has said that the U.S. goal is to have Iraq stand on its own. So neither he nor McCain can publicly chastise Nuri al-Maliki for expressing ideas that mesh with Obama's.

But al-Maliki surely has gotten an earful privately from administration mouthpieces. That's why he tried, not very persuasively, to back away from his interview with a German publication, Spiegel.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki supports US presidential candidate Barack Obama's plan to withdraw US troops from Iraq within 16 months. When asked in an interview with SPIEGEL when he thinks US troops should leave Iraq, Maliki responded "as soon as possible, as far as we are concerned." He then continued: "US presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about 16 months. That, we think, would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes."

Oops. Too honest. Bring out the tried and true excuse: I was misquoted.

Only problem: al-Maliki wasn't. Spiegel is sticking by its version of the conversation. The New York Times is on the same translation page.

And in an audio recording of Mr. Maliki's interview that Der Spiegel provided to The New York Times, Mr. Maliki seemed to state a clear affinity for Mr. Obama's position, bringing it up on his own in an answer to a general question on troop presence.

The following is a direct translation from the Arabic of Mr. Maliki's comments by The Times: "Obama's remarks that — if he takes office — in 16 months he would withdraw the forces, we think that this period could increase or decrease a little, but that it could be suitable to end the presence of the forces in Iraq."

He continued: "Who wants to exit in a quicker way has a better assessment of the situation in Iraq."

But what would you expect? The Bush administration lies about almost everything. So it figures that they'd try to cover up these truthful comments by the Iraqi prime minister, pressuring him to disavow what he said.

Thing is, the truth eventually wins out. As I'm confident it will this November.

Voters will reject McBush. We'll have a President Obama who will carry out what both Iraqis and Americans want: a well thought-out withdrawal of U.S. troops.

Comments

[Rain]

I hope you are right but we didn't get two terms of Bush by American people being thoughtful. What gets me is this constant drumbeat on the surge working. We don't know if it worked yet. If worked means less violence, was it the surge that did that or the number of Iraqis killed or forced from their homes during their civil war? Now if we leave, after peace is established, will we consider it a victory if Iraq joins up with Iran to form a new power block? Victory often can't be determined for a long time to come. I hope for the best for us and the Iraqi people, for those who already have died or been injured in the effort, but we won't know if it benefited our country for some time in the future when we see which way Iraq goes. McCain is as bad as Bush on the aircraft carrier wanting to declare mission accomplished before we know that it's happened.

[Harry Vanderpool]

So.... Abummer is correct because al-Maliki agrees with him?
Lets say you and I agree that the earth is flat; does that make us correct?
Are you elevating those two hacks above our penagon and military stragists? Really?!!!
Two knuckleheads agreeing does not set U.S. policy.
Not to flame, Brian. But things are a LOT MORE complicated in this world than that.
Hope you don't hate me for this!
:-/

[condor]

H.V. is right. Obama is a lightweight neophyte and he would get us out when the generals advised him to. Anybody can set an arbitrary timeline to appease their constituency and get elected. Then when that time comes he'll say the situation has changed, and they'll buy it. Wars don't work on a schedule. We'll be there about the same amount of time whether it's McCain or B.O. and that is as long as it takes to get the job done.

Remember all the latte' sippers saying Bush did it for the oil? I bet they wish he did now that gas is at $4.00 !

[Rain]

Condor, the oil men have done very well in this. Did you think their primary concern was that the average American did well? *s*

[condor]

Independent reporter Michael Yon has spent more time in Iraq embedded with combat soldiers than any other journalist in the world, and a few days ago he boldly declared the war over:

"Barring any major and unexpected developments (like an Israeli air strike on Iran and the retaliations that would follow), a fair-minded person could say with reasonable certainty that the war has ended. A new and better nation is growing legs. What's left is messy politics that likely will be punctuated by low-level violence and the occasional spectacular attack. Yet, the will of the Iraqi people has changed, and the Iraqi military has dramatically improved, so those spectacular attacks are diminishing along with the regular violence. Now it's time to rebuild the country, and create a pluralistic, stable and peaceful Iraq. That will be long, hard work. But by my estimation, the Iraq War is over. We won. Which means the Iraqi people won."

I’m reluctant to say “the war has ended,” as he did, but everything else he wrote is undoubtedly true. The war in Iraq is all but over right now, and it will be officially over if the current trends in violence continue their downward slide. That is a mathematical fact.

If you doubt it, look at the data.

Security incidents, or attacks, are at their lowest level in four years. Civilian deaths are down by almost 90 percent since General Petraeus’ counterinsurgency “surge” strategy went into effect. High profile attacks, or explosions, are down by 80 percent in the same time period. American and Iraqi soldiers suffer far fewer casualties than they have for years. Ethno-sectarian deaths from Iraq’s civil war plunged all the way down to zero in May and June 2008.

Yon is braver than the rest of us for declaring the war over, but it’s important to understand that there are no final battles in counterinsurgencies and it’s impossible to pinpoint the exact dates when wars like this end. The anti-Iraqi insurgency – a war-within-a-war – really is effectively over. As long as another such war-within-a-war doesn’t break out, Yon will appear more perceptive than the rest of us in hindsight when the currently low levels of violence finally do taper off into relative insignificance.

None of this means terrorism and violence in Iraq are over. Violence is never over in the Middle East, and Islamist terrorism will be with us for years, if not decades. There may yet be another war, a different war, in Iraq. It would be foolish to dismiss that possibility or assume there is no more work to be done. NATO is still not finished building a durable peace in Kosovo, and the war in that country ended nine years ago.

The 15-year civil war in Lebanon ended in 1990, but another low-grade civil war that eerily resembles the last is brewing again. The Algerian civil war between the secular police state and the Salafist insurgency quietly wound down years ago, but al Qaeda cells are doing their worst to crank it back up again. The Second Intifada was broken in Israel, but there is still no peace between Israel, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, or the Palestinian Authority. There are no clean endings to wars in the Middle East these days, and we shouldn’t expect one in Iraq either. But there is a point when a war becomes low-grade enough that “war” is no longer the best word to describe what takes place in the absence of absolute calm.

What most of us still think of as “war” in Iraq is, at this point, a rough and unfinished peacekeeping mission. Whether it is officially over or not, it has certainly been downgraded to something else, and it’s about time more analysts and observers are willing to say so.

So, Obama can say he will have us out of there in 13 months, and he would take the credit for ending the war when in fact he will have had nothing to do with it.