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Of course, this is only being considered because of the American failure to understand that the mujahedin with whom they would be making agreements would view such agreements only as temporary respites to allow them to gather strength to fight again.
"Insurgent deal possible, Iraqi leader says," from the Seattle Times, with thanks to Mackie:
BAGHDAD, Iraq — Iraqi President Jalal Talabani said Sunday that he thinks a deal is possible with seven Iraqi insurgent groups after a series of contacts involving his office and U.S. officials."The Americans have entered into negotiations with some of these groups with my blessing," a statement issued by Talabani's office quoted him as saying. "I think it is possible to reach an agreement with seven armed groups that visited me and who I met with."
Talabani did not say what the deal could entail. He also did not identify the seven groups, except to say they do not represent what he called "Saddamis" or Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian-born extremist who heads al-Qaida in Iraq.
U.S. officials have for several months acknowledged holding meetings with intermediaries of homegrown Iraqi insurgent groups, hoping to draw them into the political process. Embassy officials in Baghdad said they are unaware of any new developments that suggest a deal is imminent.
"We haven't entered into negotiations. We've had talks. That's what we've been saying all along," said embassy spokeswoman Elizabeth Colton. "We've had contacts with intermediaries of these groups encouraging them to join the political process."
Posted by Robert at May 1, 2006 10:05 AM
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There should be no problem, as you divide and conquer, that is the oldest trick in the war trade.
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at May 1, 2006 10:16 AM
Wasn't this how Muhammed slaughtered a village of civilians, he pretended to present peace pffering to fool the infidels and disarm them, then he mounts a all-out attack .
at May 1, 2006 10:16 AM
"encouraging them to join the political process."
-- from an American spokesman in the article above
The very phrase "political process" is instinct with innocence. The "political process" is not what the two kinds of Sunni insurgents are interested in. The Zarqawi version, Al-Qaeda "Wahhabi-Salafi" etc. -- fill in, journalists, whatever adjectives you are most comfortable with -- doesn't like Shi'a because they are "Rafidite dogs," Infidels nearly as bad (and in the view of a few, even worse)as the American Infidels. The main Sunni insurgency, the homegrown variety, is determined somehow -- they don't quite know how, but don't know how else to ract -- to hold onto political and therefore, in the Muslim-state context, all other kinds of power. Any joining in the "political process" would not be because suddenly there was a comprehension that the Sunnis could gain thereby. What they are hoping for is a situation where something, anything, will happen to keep Iraq under Sunni dominance.
For some Sunnis, it was once an article of faith that the American-imposed "democracy" would inevitably lead to Shi'a dominance. Furthermore, it was also clear that the American protection of the Kurds, and American support for a Shi'a-dominated regime and, still worse, American training for the Shi'a who made up the recruits for what the Americans continued to call an "Iraqi" army and an "Iraqi" police (all part of a mental construct, much favored by policymakers in Washington, of a place they called "Iraq" inhabited by those whom Condoleeza Rice and George Bush still continue to insist are the "Iraqi people."
Now many Sunnis are not so sure about whether or not they want the Americans to stay. After all, it is not the Americans who are kidnapping Sunni men, using drills on them, burning them, torturing them as enthusiastically as possible before killing them. This is clearly something not the Americans would ever do; it's a Muslim thang, and the modus operandi of Shi'a militia.
And at the same time, the Shi'a who wanted the Americans to stay around and fight Sunnis and take all the casualties, and also build or rebuild Iraq (while assorted versions of "Iraqis" took the attitude of Wake Me When It's Over), may now be having second thoughts about letting the Americans remain if those Americans are going to restrain those same Shi'a militiamen.
And the situation could reverse again tomorrow. Each side might, in turn, wish the Americans to stay or to go, but purely for self-interested reasons, for using those soldiers (and of course hoping to get still more American money, "contracts" that are unvetted, and of course American military equipment -- now that's something to rub one's hands over, waiting expectantly for all that deadly loot). It has nothing to do with "Iraq the Light Unto the Muslim Nations," Iraq the Model, Iraq the Figment of American Imaginations. It has nothing to do with "friendship" for Americans or other Infidels -- not conceivable. It has only to do with -- What's In It For Us? And depending on the definition of that "Us" (Arab or Kurd, Sunni or Shi'a), and the place, and the time, the answer to that questio will vary, and so will, therefore, the attitude toward keeping the Americans around either to fight or to at least hold in check, one's sectarian or ethnic enemies within Iraq, will vary.
Everyone in Iraq understands this -- except the Americans. Permanent innocents at the top, with the most intelligent officers screaming about this when they can, and then either leaving the service, or remaining in order to grimly bring the rest of the military to its senses about Iraq and about Islam. And it is the latter who are the future hope of the American military.
Posted by: Hugh at May 1, 2006 10:34 AM
How can our leaders be so ignorant?
They need to think of their jobs as say a doctor. A doctor will look at the symptoms, read about the causes, diagnose, and then give the prescription.
These leaders aren't looking at the symptoms or the causes. They go from sick person to prescription without REALLY getting to the problem.
I know this is a silly comparision, but there isn't much difference. Our leaders are dancing around the real cause of this. And it's islam.
Posted by: freewoman at May 1, 2006 10:36 AM
Since we don't trust them to do anything but advance the interests of the Sunnis over the majority Shi'ites anyway, either slowly and softly or quickly and noisily, all this co-opting may do is calm the Iraqi surface long enough to allow the coalition forces to remove move our side's targets out of the crossfire of this 1350 year old religious war.
Let them wrestle in the 7th century for as long as the blood lasts.
We can secure the borders from the outside and throw encouraging messages over the nuthouse wall.
Maybe the Muslim 'moderates' will tire of the Koranic killing, eventually, and reform Islam of its homicidal suras.
But, as a wise mind once said:
"It's not my job."
We only wanted to verify the existence, or non-existence, of WMD.
Job done.
On to the next nest of nuclear-seeking nutcases.
Posted by: profitsbeard at May 1, 2006 10:36 AM
JAMMU, India - Suspected Islamic militants raided a village in Indian-controlled Kashmir and killed 22 Hindus, lining them outside their homes and shooting them execution-style, police said Monday.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060501/ap_on_re_as/kashmir_hindus_killed
Posted by: DP111 at May 1, 2006 10:42 AM
Good cop/Bad Cop method. Bad cop roughs up the one being pushed to talk. Bad cop steps away. Good cop steps in with an offer. Both have same goal, work together, but don't seem to.
Hey, they watch TV over there.
And now George Clooney wants the US to step into the Darfur crisis. To stop the government killing of a large group of people who were fighting with the government. Isn't that exactly how the situation in IRAQ started out? Saddam gassing the 'shiites' in the south who were fighting with the government? The only difference so far is Darfur hasn't got some spy whispering in Washington's ear about WMD in Khartoum. Go in and US will be the bad guy again.
Help - be the bad guy.
Don't help - be the bad guy. (but save money and your soldiers lives.)
at May 1, 2006 10:44 AM
I'm all in favor of negotiations. Talk to the devil, come up with some bogus justification, and leave. I could envision paying a tidy sum into a Swiss bank account of a few leading Sunnis, Shias and Kurds, ask them to, in public, thank us and then ask us to leave. Maybe even talk the French to offer these leaders citizenship. What's a few more Muslims to France? Bush can then thank the leaders for thanking us, then he could thank the military and we can get the hell out of dodge. We could leave in the course of a month or so without too much difficulty, perhaps leaving arms caches in Kurdistan, Shia and Sunni territories, which would be are way of 'thanking them,' so the big boys can duke it out. So as we stand down, they can stand up, open up those weapons caches and get to work.
Posted by: biorabbi at May 1, 2006 11:03 AM
biorabbi-
They've stolen enough weapons (and gotten them from dead insurgents) to arm their 'megiddo'.
The hell with leaving any more.
They can buy them on the open market, like honest 'freedom fighters'.
The Kurds we can help more directly, with a lend-lease type of trading arms for future oil program.
Until the future isn't so oily.
Onto- and geologically.
Posted by: profitsbeard at May 1, 2006 11:15 AM
The sale of guns in Iraq is wide open I'm told and legal - no ten day waiting period either.
Posted by: poetcomic1 at May 1, 2006 11:22 AM
This doesn't surprize me since we helped the mujahedin out during the Balkan Wars.
Posted by: Patriot_1/17 at May 1, 2006 12:31 PM
Speaking about Darfur...we seem to forget what happened in Somaliia when we tried to help there...Blackhawk down. Were damned if we do and double damned if we don't. Where the hell is the EU??????
Posted by: Siciliano at May 1, 2006 8:21 PM
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