Obama's decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq is the mother of all disasters

Obama's decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq is the mother of all disasters 4.11.2011
By Frederick W. Kagan, Kimberly Kagan and Marisa Cochrane Sullivan - The Weekly Standard

http://www.ekurd.net/mismas/articles/misc2011/11/govt1859.htm

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A SNIP OF THE ARTICLE:

The price of failure

America will pay a high price for defeat in Iraq. Our global credibility is seriously damaged—it is surely no accident that the weekend after President Obama announced that we were abandoning Iraq, President Hamid Karzai said that Afghanistan would stand with Pakistan against a U.S. attack. Why not? The Iranian and Pakistani narratives all along have been that the Americans will ultimately abandon their allies to their fate, while the neighbors will be around to exact revenge. President Obama has just reinforced that narrative before all the world.

The United States will also pay a high moral price for this retreat. Tens of thousands of Iraqis sacrificed and put themselves and their families in enormous danger relying on the backing of the United States against our mutual enemies—al Qaeda and Iranian militias. The Maliki government, perhaps partially at the behest of the Quds Force, is now beginning to eliminate some of those people, and the trickle of blood and refugees will likely become a river. Yet another group of brave people who share America’s core values and risked their lives to fight with us will conclude bitterly that Americans can never be trusted.

Iran will be strengthened in the region, and Iraq’s traditional tensions with its Arab neighbors will suit Tehran’s policies. The United States has worked tirelessly to maintain decent relations between Iraq and Kuwait, and to mediate between Baghdad and Riyadh. Iran has no similar interests, and will likely encourage Baghdad to pursue its territorial and financial disputes with Kuwait (not through direct armed conflict, of course) and to distance Iraq from Saudi Arabia. In place of a coalition of Arab states resisting Iranian expansion, we can expect the emergence of an Iran-Iraq-Syria axis as a counterweight and deterrent to any such coalition. If the Syrian regime should fall, Iraq could be a valuable replacement, but also a point of leverage for continued Iranian involvement in Syria and the Levant.

Above all, the war is not over even when that last American soldier leaves Iraq. Sadr’s troops with Iranian support will continue to attack and probably kill our embassy personnel. Iran and its allies—now bolstered by militias and political groups that can function without hindrance in Iraq—will continue their explicit efforts to expel the United States from the Middle East entirely. Iran will gain free access to the world’s trade through Iraq’s cities, highways, ports, and banks, circumventing any sanctions the United States might painfully push through the U.N. Security Council. And the Shiite world will lose its leading advocate for a vision of Islam that is more compatible with Western ideals—and with the views of the overwhelming majority of Iraqi Shiites.

The return of an al Qaeda franchise to Iraq, finally, is all but certain. Al Qaeda in Iraq—which even today the Obama administration is loath to recognize as part of the al Qaeda movement despite irrefutable evidence to the contrary—has been trying to reestablish itself in the wake of the U.S. drawdown of surge troops since 2009, with limited success. The American retreat and the reemergence of sectarian conflict in Iraq will create fruitful ground for such a reestablishment. U.S. Special Forces and drones, now denied formal bases in Iraq, will be hard-pressed to develop the intelligence necessary to continue to degrade that organization, nor is it clear that they will be allowed to act as they see fit. Tehran is working to establish a U.S.-free Iraq, and will pressure Iraqis to resist American violations of their sovereignty, fearing Iraqi-American military partnership at any level. The likelihood is that al Qaeda will regain some sort of safe haven in Iraq, and the main pressure it will face will be renewed Shiite sectarian cleansing operations that will exacerbate internal conflict and regional tensions but will not eliminate al Qaeda itself.

Now that President Obama has perfected so many of the analogies between Vietnam and Iraq, we may well come to wish that Iraq, like Vietnam, were ultimately a sideshow. But Iraq is much more vital to our national security than Vietnam ever was. The United States will have to bear the burden of this defeat and its disastrous consequences for a long time to come.

Who ever wrote this article is completely misinformed and is lieing to you straight out. The really screwballs hate mongers and Whites in this country cannot find anything good to say about this president but can't find anything bad to say about the sob that caused this mess..."Mr.G W Bush". I guess you would rather live under a Nazi than a black man... too bad for you folks, ignorance is is oun piece of heck.

This article I believe was written by the Kurds in Iraq. I cannot say I agree but I wonder if this sentiment is the general feeling among them for fear of their safety.

I understand the Bush sentiments.

I think this article is right-on. People like DevaronDLH scare me with their white hatred (gee, that sounds like racism!!) and their lack of understanding of the consequences of Iran taking over Iraq. I'm sure if Iran could, they would stop the RV so that Iraq would stay underdeveloped and more open to Iran's invasion. As for our black president, I hope the next one is black also -- Herman Cain.

DevaronDLH wrote:Who ever wrote this article is completely misinformed and is lieing to you straight out. The really screwballs hate mongers and Whites in this country cannot find anything good to say about this president but can't find anything bad to say about the sob that caused this mess..."Mr.G W Bush". I guess you would rather live under a Nazi than a black man... too bad for you folks, ignorance is is oun piece of heck.

Well actually if you want to be 100% correct, he is only half black!