Imminent Stupidity

When I heard Secretary of State Mike Pompeo insist that the assassination of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani was justified because of imminent threat to U.S. embassies in Iraq and elsewhere without providing any proof or explaining just how close they were to happening, I merely looked at him on the TV screen and had one thought in response:

"Nice tie!" 

I don't think American credibility has been lower than it is right now, but with Trump still in the White House and possibility getting his lease on it renewed in November (more about that in a minute), it could plummet to greater depths than the Marianas Trench soon.  European nations are angry with us and refuse to work with us now to secure Iraq, which wants our military out of its territory and has demanded a meeting to discuss the details of a withdrawal.  (Pompeo refused.)  Senators of both parties are disgusted with Trump about the briefing over the Soleimani killing because of the lack of transparency.  Trump's operation as also united Iraqis and Iranians against America (not to mention turning the entire planet against America!) and has turned Iranians to supporting their government after demonstrating against it. 

Get used to it.  In November, the voters will cast their ballots on two issues.  One is the economy and I can't remember what the other issue is.  And in fact, the economy is chugging full steam ahead.  And no matter how Democrats insist that they are not sorry Soleimani, who made a name for himself murdering Americans, is gone while saying simultaneously that now or any other time was not the right time to take him out because of the backlash it started, Trump will paint them as being soft on terrorism and unpatriotic.  And it will work - especially among older voters who remember the Iran hostage crisis of 1979-81.  He'll likely compare Democratic dissatisfaction with the Soleimani operation and how and where it was carried out (in Baghdad's airport) to opposition to executing Hermann Göring (who actually escaped a hanging at Nuremberg by committing suicide).  Meanwhile, Bernie Sanders - the wrong man at the wrong time - is ahead in Iowa while Joe Biden is in fourth place and attractive candidates like Michael Bennet are getting no place.  (Bright side: Marianne Williamson finally quit the race.)  The Democrats ought to prove themselves in appealing to the general electorate and getting the voters to think of something more essential and more important than the economy, but the 2020 presidential campaign suggests that they're not capable of doing either.

Nice tie.

Is Baghdad Burning?

Shortly after the United States committed air strikes on on the Iran-backed Kataeb Hezbollah militia in Iraq, members of the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), a mostly Shia Muslim group formed to fight the mostly Sunni Islamic State group, attacked the high-security U.S. Embassy  compound in Baghdad.  They got through the main door of the compound, causing chaos for the American soldiers and Marines defending the embassy.  Trump blamed Iran for egging on the PMF, and he vowed to take punitive action against the Iranians in retaliation.  The U.S. air strikes were themselves in retaliation for the killing of an American contractor at an American base in the Iraqi city of Kirkuk.

Can you say, "threat to world peace," boys and girls?

At least, a threat to the global oil market, and also the Dow.  And now that Iranian Revolutionary Guard leader Qasem Soleimani has been killed on Iraqi soil on Trump's orders - an act of war by any definition - it could threaten everything else.  Yes, General Soleimani was a bad actor on the world stage who was responsible for the deaths of thousands of Americans, but will taking him out lead to even greater trouble - and more terrorist acts?

If there's a foreign-policy crisis that will end Trump's Presidency, this may be it.  Now, I'm not going to wish for a takeover of the Baghdad embassy that would result in an interminable hostage crisis, but I do note that a similar crisis ended Jimmy Carter's Presidency.  Maybe Trump can still slip through this with our so-called booming economy, but it won't be so booming if consumer confidence falls apart in the wake of the Middle East  spiraling out of control.   And as much as I don't want to compare Trump to Carter, there is an interesting symmetry to what's unfolding in Baghdad.  A crisis in the Middle East ended Democratic dominance of the Presidency and led to a Republican political era; another one could do the opposite.

Except that Carter didn't deserve the drubbing he got.  Trump deserves the drubbing he could get and then some.  Note to Trump supporters: This isn't funny anymore.

It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World

I've been so busy commenting on the 2020 presidential election campaign (which, alas, is still very much in progress) and other issues here that I haven't found any space for any one of the numerous rebellions against the established order in so many other countries around the world.  I had always hoped to get to the unrest in one country or another, but I never did.  There were simply too many distractions.  Now, I realize, after having struggled for something trenchant to say about Hong Kong, Lebanon, or some other place like that, I realize I don't have to. Because the takeaway is obvious.

The whole world has gone mad!

Actually, it went mad decades ago, but for the first time since World War II, the madness has gone beyond the pale.  In Venezuela, there's a situation not unlike our own - a fundamentally flawed leader with backing form rank-and-file military members - Nicolas Maduro - refuses to step down despite growing opposition to his rule.  The standoff between him and opposition leader Juan Guaidó continues, but the American media lost interest in the crisis months ago - and not for reasons you might think.  They've since been distracted by other hot-spot stories around the globe, such as the protests against the cost of living and economic strain in Chile and in Iran, the fragile, corrupt government trying to mollify angry citizens in Lebanon, and the pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong against its Chinese overlords, who want greater control over the administrative region even as Hong Kongers resist any threats to the autonomy granted to them by Beijing back when we Westerners were still calling it Peking, when the deal handing over Hong Kong from Britain to China was negotiated.  

And Iraq?  Well, as the former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said, democracy is messy!

Perhaps the world isn't really all that mad.  Perhaps this is an extension of what we have seen in America in the form of the rise of Trump, in Britain with Brexit, and with France with the yellow vest protests. People are getting sick and tired of the elites screwing things up to the point where people's futures are uncertain and they act out as a form of protest.  For the most part, as with Trump and Brexit, this has only made the problem worse, and in places like Iraq, all anyone is accomplishing is contributing to climate change by burning all of those tires.  Heck, in Israel, the system is so paralyzed that even after two elections, no one has been able to form a government, and there might yet be a third election that resolves nothing.  Still, the people of all of these various countries are onto something here - nothing is working for them, and they're making a desperate effort to get things to work right for a change.

Just don't expect anything to be sorted out any time soon.

Except, maybe, in Hong Kong, were pro-democracy council candidates won power in a free and open contest.

War Without End

My friend Nancy was on TV yesterday, but not to appear on a talent show. She was on News 12 New Jersey as one of several protesters demonstrating against the Iraq War, which began eight years ago yesterday. (The demonstration was held in Montclair, N.J., where I spend a lot of time.) Although that war is technically over - all of the American combat troops left in August 2010 - American service personnel are still there to help provide "security" until the end of this year. And to keep you from looking on a bright side that doesn't exist, Americans are still getting killed in Iraq despite their reduced role in the country.

Meanwhile, the U.S. has opened a third front in the Muslim world (after Iraq and Afghanistan), with a series of strikes against Libya. The United States is one of five nations taking part in what is apparently a series of air attacks designed to back up the rebels in Libya and help them get Qaddafi out of power. The main objective is to provide safe passage for civilians and rebels without directly intervening in the conflict. The U.S. is trying to limit its role in this operation as well as its scope, for obvious reasons, and it must be something of a relief for the American commanders that the French and the British are taking the lead this time, but once again, the West is pursuing a war to resolve unresolvable geopolitical headaches in the Middle East, and it doesn't look like there'll be an end to it any time soon.

Speaking of headaches, all this war news is giving me one.

The War Is Over?

The United States military has pulled its combat troops out of Iraq. Aside from changing the discussion from the Islamic cultural center near the World Trade Center site, it signifies the end of one era and the beginning of another.

The combat phase of American involvement is over. But it will be awhile before we see whether today's events lead to a lasting peace. Bear in mind that when the armistice ending the Korean War was officiated, many were unsure if it would hold. Michael Dukakis, the 1988 Democratic presidential nominee, once said something revealing - though he had served in Korea after the war ended, he was aware at the time that a second war could begin at any moment. It took several years before it became apparent that a lasting peace had been established in Korea, even though the country remains divided into two political units. If today's withdrawal is the prelude to a lasting peace in Iraq, we will not know that for quite some time.

Iraq in 2010 is different from Korea in 1953, though. Korea had two established governments on either side of the armistice line, for example; Iraq can't even form one. Moreover, Iraq is prone to different factions trying to undermine each other. Sunni and Shiite militias can be expected to fight for any kind of advantage, even as politicians in Baghdad try to form a coalition based on the parliamentary election results from March. Plus, there's the obvious threat of al-Qaeda's presence. Meanwhile, the fifty thousand American servicemen remaining in Iraq may be restricted to helping to train the national police force and the military and advise whoever ends up governing the country, but the scenario of them having to fight terrorists and factionalists in self-defense remains a possibility. As attention focuses to Afghanistan and as President Obama hopes to make sure Iraq is stable, it's important to remember that while the war may be over, the peace has yet to be won.

Iraq: It Started With a Bang

President Obama addressed a convention of disabled veterans in Atlanta today declaring that all American combat troops in Iraq - which, I believe is still trying to form a new government after the elections in March - and even though today is the twentieth invasion of Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, Mr. Obama did not mention the event.

The Iraqi invasion of Kuwait was actually a watershed moment for the world, as it was the point where the Cold War began to end and a new era of geopolitics began to emerge. With greater instability in the Middle East and Iraq's sudden control of over 20 percent of the world's oil as a result of his occupation of Kuwait, Western focus shifted from the Soviet Union - a year and change away from dissolving - and eastern Europe to the rise of Arab and Islamic influence. President George Bush sent troops to Saudi Arabia to check the Iraqi army from going any further and then push Saddam's troops out of Kuwait when it became apparent that Saddam wouldn't give it up without a fight. This angered Osama bin Laden, who resented the presence of American troops in his homeland, which led him to form al-Qaeda from the anti-Soviet resistance in Afghanistan, from which the Soviets had withdrawn and which the Americans forgot about. (Bin Laden wanted to use his commandos to defend Saudi territory, but King Fahd would have none of it.) Bin Laden himself took up residence in Afghanistan much later after living in Sudan, where he approved and oversaw the plotting of the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks that took place in September 2001, which the second President Bush used as an excuse to invade . . . Iraq.

Before August 2, 1990, Saddam Hussein was a thuggish dictator who persecuted his own people and had grand but unrealized ambitions of controlling more of the Middle East. His invasion of Kuwait upset the balance of power in the Persian Gulf region. In the eighties, the United States had supported his regime as a counterweight against the Islamic fundamentalists who ran Iran, and American support allowed Saddam to wage an eight-year war against Iran. When he forcibly annexed Kuwait, the elder Bush must have wondered who would provide a counterweight to Saddam.

I must admit this: The Persian Gulf War was the right war to prosecute, although I didn't think so at the time. Although I feared it would lead to World War III and last interminably, what happened was that the Iraqi army was decimated in six weeks, Kuwait regained its sovereignty, and a peace was quickly established in which Saddam was contained by the American and British air forces. War was never actually declared against Iraq - an official declaration of war, if I'm not mistaken was made in advance by Saddam's rubber-stamp Parliament recognizing a state of war if Kuwait was invaded by the Americans and their allies - but the resolution Congress gave to the senior to wage war was used judiciously. Bush could have allowed American troops to go deep into Iraq, march on Baghdad, and overthrow Saddam - but he merely wanted to restore Kuwaiti sovereignty, not remake Iraqi civilization. Besides, Bush, Secretary of State James Baker, and General Norman Schwarzkopf knew what would happen if they tried to invade and occupy Iraq. Exactly what happened when Bush's son did the same thing. The younger Bush's war didn't start a global conflict, but, boy, has it been interminable.

Was it about oil? Of course it was about oil, but bear in mind that in 1990, the U.S. only got twelve percent of its oil from the Gulf region, while Germany and Japan got much more of their oil from there. Japan actually paid for much of the military operation then called Desert Storm. Had Saddam been allowed to annex Kuwait, it would have amounted to appeasement and given carte blanche to starve the West of oil. The Saudis, who have more oil than they need, are happy to sell it to anyone, but Saddam would likely have used greater control of the world's oil as a weapon. It figures that American policymakers only realized that after it was too late, after having propped him up for eleven years.

If Albert Gore - who supported the Persian Gulf War but has never supported the current war in Iraq - had become President in 2001 instead of George Walker Bush, there likely wouldn't have been another war in Iraq, but we'd probably still be in Afghanistan and we would still be struggling against al-Qaeda and the Taliban. And while our dealings with Iraq would have been different, they wouldn't necessarily have turned out better. It's only fair to say they would have been different.

The effects of the invasion of Kuwait twenty years ago today, despite shift in American policies based on who's in the White House, are likely to last for a long time.

Now We're Alone

The British and Australian troops have left Iraq, leaving the United States as the only country with an occupying force in that nation. Although the American military has left the cities and has given more control to the Iraqi security forces there, the U.S. isn't leaving until the end of 2011, thanks to a deal negotiated by President Obama's undistinguished predecessor. The bright side is that the worst of the fighting is (apparently) behind us, and the violence in Iraq is not as bad as it used to be. It's bad enough, though, for one commander - Colonel Timothy Reese - to voice support for leaving now and saying our mission really was accomplished. In short, declare victory and retreat. I don't know what Obama will do about Colonel Reese's position. Maybe he'll discuss it with him over a beer.

Meanwhile, three Americans vacationing in Iraq - yes, vacationing there - have been arrested and detained in Iran. there is a perfectly logical explanation for this . really. These three Americans went to the Kurdish region in northern Iraq, where the fighting is over, to hike in the picturesque mountains along the Iran-Iraq border. The woman and two men - neither one of whom apparently asked for directions - got lost and crossed the border, leading to their detention at the hands of the Iranians.

So, while we Americans are foolish enough to go to Iraq for a pleasure trip and are stupid enough to accidentally wander into a neighboring country where the locals take a pretty dim view of us, we are not so insane that we would actually want to visit Iran on purpose. I mean, I'm certain that if I went to Tehran deliberately, I would immediately get seized upon arriving at the airport for espionage!

Joe Klein was lucky to get out of there after reporting on the demonstrations there. But at least he was representing Time magazine. And, trust me, I don't think he would have gone there as a freelancer. An American freelance journalist, Cynthia Dwyer, got arrested in Iran in the early eighties and was freed only months after the 52 embassy hostages got out.

In The News - June 30, 2009

Al Franken finally got certified to take his seat in the United States Senate when the Minnesota State Supreme Court voted unanimously to recognize his election victory by 312 votes. For once, Norm Coleman knew when to quit, and he graciously conceded. Now Democrats are under pressure to deliver with a 60-seat filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, but on major legislative items like health care, where there's a bipartisan impetus to get something done, that shouldn't be a problem.

Sonia Sotomayor's bid to take a seat on the Supreme Court suddenly got easier as well, for not only are the Republicans unable to stop her with a filibuster, Franken will sit on the Senate Judiciary Committee - here, during the Sotomayor hearings, more comedy will be provided by Jeff Sessions than by Franken.

Meanwhile, acting on George Walker Bush's timetable, President Obama had the military hand over control of Baghdad and other Iraqi cities to the Iraqi army. U.S. troops will for now remain in the areas outside the cities but still get involved on the Baghdad and other urban areas in case of further trouble.

Typical of Americans to move to the suburbs and ignore the cities except for their own interests.

Torturing the Torturers

President Obama has suggested that while he doesn't want to prosecute the CIA agents who tortured al-Qaeda prisoners to get information on terrorist plots, he would be open to prosecutions of those who wrote or endorsed the torture policies. Former Vice President Dick Cheney, likely aware of the fact that he could be prosecuted, spoke out against the recent release of the torture memos, insisting that these practices were necessary to prevent another attack in the aftermath of 9/11. Meanwhile, Newt Gingrich found the time to bash Obama for shaking hands with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. Fine. How about that cordial meeting former and future Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld had with Saddam Hussein in 1983 on behalf of the Reagan administration regarding U.S. support for Iraq in its war with Iran, which ended in a handshake?

The prosecution of just the higher-ups for advocating the torture of enemy combatants makes sense, though. It was just reported that torture was endorsed by the Bush administration as early as the spring of 2002 to get information on a Saddam Hussein-al Qaeda connection that never existed.