A Time to Move On

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     There has never been any doubt in my mind that the liberation of Iraq conducted in 2003 was the right thing to do. The past three years of stabilization efforts have been the necessary result of that action, making them the right thing to do. These actions have been part of our wider role in the War on Terror and were a necessary part of our ability to reduce and eliminate our enemies’ ability to threaten us. Yet, we have reached a turning point in our current activities in Iraq, and that turning point leads me to believe that it is time for American to begin the process of permanently handing over the security of Iraq to the Iraqis.

     The turning point has been the recent upsurge, not in insurgent violence which has been relatively steady for the past year or so, but in sectarian violence between Shiites and Sunnis. While the insurgency is an American problem, brought about by the resistance of former Baathists and foreign fighters looking to fight Americans, the sectarian violence is rooted in hatreds as old as Islam and existed well before the liberation in one form or another.

     If the Iraqis chose to fight a sectarian civil war over religious and ethnic differences, then the US has no ability to mediate such a conflict. The end result will be that Americans will kill and will die, while the enemy is never truly defined because in a religious war everyone is the enemy.

     Further, the US must consider the reality that the War on Terror goes on beyond Iraq. There is no doubt that we will soon have to deal with Iran and Syria. Somalia is still a breeding ground for Islamic terrorism. Islamic insurgencies in Thailand and the Philippines deserve our attention.

     This idea is not advocating a complete or immediate pullout. Obviously, we must focus on phasing such a drawdown so that the Iraqis can legitimately take over as the coalition leaves. The truth is that the US presence, at some level, will likely have to remain in Iraq and the region for decades to come in order to provide the cornerstone of stability. The Iraqis, however, must sooner or later take responsibility for themselves, and they will never do so while we are there to do the work and take the blame.

     Ultimately, the US must demonstrate to the Iraqis and their newly elected government that they must take care of themselves. The government and the people must accept responsibility for the recent sectarian violence and have the will to put it to a stop. The Iraqis are using the US as a crutch in this current round of violence, and we must have the will to force them to stand on their own.

     The only alternative to a policy of drawdown is to put an end to this violence in the only way a stabilizing power like the US can: by the use of overwhelming force, and that is a policy that the US cannot sustain and the international community will not allow. Instead, the US must turn its attention to making Iraq part of the broader goals in the War on Terror, and Iraqi sovereignty and independence must be a part of that plan.

     None of these ideas are intended in any way to detract or invalidate the mission which we undertook in Iraq, nor do they question the outstanding job the US Forces currently in Iraq are doing under difficult circumstances. Instead, these ideas are an acknowledgement that the goal of Iraqi liberation was Iraqi sovereignty, and it appears the time for that independence has come.

DLH