Iraqi PM backs Obama troop exit plan (Update V)
Well it finally happened. Nuri al-Maliki reads the tealeaves and responds accordingly, speaking his mind on the issue of US withdrawal:
Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki told a German magazine he supported prospective U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's proposal that U.S. troops should leave Iraq within 16 months. In an interview with Der Spiegel released on Saturday, Maliki said he wanted U.S. troops to withdraw from Iraq as soon as possible:"U.S. 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."
Done and dusted.
It would seem that recent talk of a 'Time Horizon' by the Bush Administration breached the firewall, now perhaps Obama will be greeted as a liberator when he steps on Iraqi soil sometime in the next few days.
Oh, and there was a message for John McCain too:
"The Americans have found it difficult to agree on a concrete timetable for the exit because it seems like an admission of defeat to them. But it isn't," Maliki told Der Spiegel.
Note.
Nuri al-Maliki is not a general and nothing in the above should be construed to imply or infer that Nuri al-Maliki enjoys any insight into matters of a strictly military nature, nor that he has any appreciation of the military strategy employed by Gen David Petraeus dba the US government in Iraq.
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UPDATE I.
To include a link to the Der Spiegel interview original, which in fairness contains material favorable to the arguments of both sides.
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UPDATE II.
Victory and Honor - McCain camp statement, goes for the 'stabbed in the back' jugular and Vietnam redux .
ARLINGTON, VA -- Today, McCain 2008 Senior Foreign Policy Advisor Randy Scheunemann issued the following statement:"The difference between John McCain and Barack Obama is that Barack Obama advocates an unconditional withdrawal that ignores the facts on the ground and the advice of our top military commanders. John McCain believes withdrawal must be based on conditions on the ground. Prime Minister Maliki has repeatedly affirmed the same view, and did so again today. Timing is not as important as whether we leave with victory and honor, which is of no apparent concern to Barack Obama. The fundamental truth remains that Senator McCain was right about the surge and Senator Obama was wrong. We would not be in the position to discuss a responsible withdrawal today if Senator Obama's views had prevailed."
If Obama can have this much influence on events as a mere nominee just think what he might achieve as President. John McCain, neocon advisers like Scheunemann and other sundry Bush Administration hangers on, not so much.
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UPDATE III
Obama Leading on Foreign Policy, McCain Following
The next shift appears to be Iraq. For months, Senator McCain has called any plan to redeploy our troops from Iraq "surrender" – even though we'd be leaving Iraq to a sovereign Iraqi government. Now, the Bush Administration is embracing the negotiation of troop withdrawals with the Iraqi government – a position that Senator Obama called for last September, and reiterated on Monday in the New York Times. And now, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki supports Barack Obama's timeline, telling Der Speigel that, "Barack Obama is right when he talks about 16 months."
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UPDATE IV
Walk back clarified per the AP:
Iraqi officials hopes for US troop pullout by 2010
On Saturday an Iraqi official attempted to walk back PM Maliki's endorsement of the Obama withdrawal plan given in a published interview with Der Spiegel magazine. The official claimed via a CENTCOM press release that Maliki's statements had been mistranslated and misinterpreted. Well now the same spokesman reports on today's meeting between al Maliki and Obama thusly:
BAGHDAD - Iraq's government spokesman is hopeful that U.S. combat forces could be out of the country by 2010.Ali al-Dabbagh made the comments following a meeting in Baghdad on Monday between Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama, who arrived in Iraq earlier in the day.
The timeframe is similar to Obama's proposal to pull back combat troops within 16 months. The Iraqi government has been trying to clarify its position on a possible troop withdrawal since al-Maliki was quoted in a German magazine last week saying he supported Obama's timetable.
The Iraqi government later said the prime minister's remarks were misinterpreted.
Done and dusted.
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UPDATE V
McCain (and Petraeus) Know Best, al Maliki doesn't know what he's talking about.
Bonus conference call with McCain campaign senior policy adviser Randy Scheunemann. Yes that Randy Scheunemann.
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GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
- Spartacvs's blog
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Pretty good WaPo editorial http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/22/AR200807...
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)In no way means that US troops must be tied down on a military mission sorting out the political squabbles of Iraqi factions, while acting as a target for provocateurs. Iraq's geostrategic importance does not, in itself, make it a good idea to occupy the place with US Army & Marines.
Obama's right...the *military* mission is securing Afghanistan and going after al Qaeda.
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )Was that their argument (that Iraq's much greater strategic importance, in itself, necessarily means that it is a good idea to occupy Iraq?
If they are not making the extremely simplistic, absolutist argument that you are attributing to them (by charging them with a non sequitur on that basis), then you've just erected a straw man to make a false charge of a non sequitur.
Seems to me that your premise is wrong. WaPo is NOT making that argument. Rather they are including strategic importance as one very important factor, along with another general consideration that you are essentially (and correctly), albeit implicitly, arguing is necessary: the likely/potential relative consequences of one course of action vs. another.
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| parent )It was *really* eccentric in 2002. Since then Obama's eccentric has become CW.
Non sequitur. Al Qaeda is running operations throughout Afghanistan, attempting to destabilize the Karzai gov't and help widen the resurgent Taliban's growing foothold.
Non sequitur. Additional US/NATO forces are needed to clear & hold Afghan territory as it's being overrun. US commanders on the ground are saying as much.
Massive non sequitur. September 10 mentality. Afghanistan was not strategically insignificant on 9/11, when it became suddenly clear that a rogue backwater nation could provide resource & training for the most destructive terror operation in history. Now allowing that situation to recur is strategically unimportant?
Massive non sequitur. Granted that Iraq is more important in certain conventional respects, none of that implies US troops should be involved in policing the streets, taking sides in political infighting, performing general civil services, etc. Do we need to offset the risk of Iraq being overrun by Iranian Quds forces or AQI (or Turkey in the north)? Absolutely. But for the most part we are way overengaged in that country's problems, largely because of our own mistakes in creating instability in the first place, but we need to avoid mission creep. There are lots of dangerous spots in the world.
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )I've only had a few seconds to scan this comment of yours (I'll look more carefully later), but it seems different from your original argument, the one that I addressed. I was just saying that their logic was not as you represented it (it wasn't just that Iraq is more strategically important and therefore on that basis alone we should continue a full occupation, which seemed to be as you represented it and then called it a non sequitur).
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| parent )ok, read your comment. My point holds, and is actually supported by your comment, since you quote various premises and arguments WaPo presented, as opposed to WaPo simply saying that the sole criterion for deciding whether or not to maintain troop forces in Iraq is that Iraq is more strategically important than Afghanistan (regardless of other considerations, most notably where our troops and other resources can be most effective), which seems to be how you represented their argument -- then called it a non sequitur. You certainly can dispute their premises and arguments, but your original representation of their argument was fundamentally inaccurate.
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| parent )Mom says I do that sometimes.
WaPo was doing the same thing, except for the teeny difference that one of their hidden premises was a controversial opinion rather than a logical fact.
Obama wants to shift troops and military focus to Afghanistan because that's where the military security threat lies. Their hidden premise is that there is a huge *military* threat in Iraq which Obama is too "blinded," "eccentric," and "inflexible" to perceive. However they're completely unable to describe this all-consuming threat in even the vaguest terms, which makes sense because the nature of the that threat is the ground of the entire debate about the war. The editorial, in other words, is begging the five-year-old and ongoing question of whether Iraq is a huge military threat requiring a large US troop presence and hiding it in an unstated premise. Many, increasingly most, people would disagree with that premise.
Therefore I'm right to say that their conclusion, that Obama is obviously naive and deluded doesn't follow from the fact that Obama wants to shift troops from Iraq to Afghanistan. That's a lot of fallacy for one editorial.
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )Well, your argument that we should redeploy troops from Iraq to Afghanistan soleley because there are more Taliban in Afghanistan than in Iraq is a non sequitur.
Oh, maybe your argument is more complex than that, and the position you advocate contains the considerations (of other factors in this decision) that I'm mischaracterizing it as lacking and then calling it a non sequitur for supposedly lacking, but I was just "enthymeming". And anyway, even though your argument contains those considerations, I disagree with your assessment of those factors, so it wasn't inaccurate for me to characterize your argument as lacking those considerations altogether and calling it a non sequitur on that basis.
By the way, I had to look up "enthymeme", so thanks for teaching me a new word.
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| parent )how worthless newspaper columnists (and editors) can be. Unstated assumptions can be good or bad -- I'd say the one made here (that the bulk of US military effort should be focused in Iraq because...? it's a geostrategically important place and people are shooting there?) is pretty atrocious.
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )My whole point is that their argument was NOT (or not nearly as) devoid of stated assumptions as you have characterized it. That said, if you're going a level deeper and saying that their stated assumptions contained unstated assumptions, well ok, but in fairness to them, there's only so much space available for an editorial.
Anyway, all of this misses the key point: Lara Logan is frickin' hot!
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| parent )their unstated assumptions don't come close to making Obama "blinded" "deluded" and the rest.
Mmm Lara Logan. I promise, when we do our joint interview for her piece on the greatest minds here at Four Vum, I won't use the word 'enthymeme.' Unless she's got a thing for logic nerds....
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )I won't use the word 'enthymeme.' Unless she's got a thing for logic nerds
If she does, I'll say "enthymeme" first. As in "Enthymeme to meet you, Lara." I just won't take any chances on you getting the inside track (no pun intended).
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| parent )Worthless.
He's also trying to claim that the Iraq demand for a withdrawal by 2010 is closer to McCain's 'plan' than Obama's 16 month withdrawal timetable.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )SPIEGEL: Germany, after World War II, was also liberated from a tyrant by a US-led coalition. That was 63 years ago, and today there are still American military bases and soldiers in Germany. How do you feel about this model?
Maliki: Iraq can learn from Germany's experiences, but the situation is not truly comparable. Back then Germany waged a war that changed the world. Today, we in Iraq want to establish a timeframe for the withdrawal of international troops -- and it should be short. At the same time, we would like to see the establishment of a long-term strategic treaty with the United States, which would govern the basic aspects of our economic and cultural relations. However, I wish to re-emphasize that our security agreement should remain in effect in the short term.
SPIEGEL: How short-term? Are you hoping for a new agreement before the end of the Bush administration?
Maliki: So far the Americans have had trouble agreeing to a concrete timetable for withdrawal, because they feel it would appear tantamount to an admission of defeat. But that isn't the case at all. If we come to an agreement, it is not evidence of a defeat, but of a victory, of a severe blow we have inflicted on al-Qaida and the militias. The American lead negotiators realize this now, and that's why I expect to see an agreement taking shape even before the end of President Bush's term in office. With these negotiations, we will start the whole thing over again, on a clearer, better basis, because the first proposals were unacceptable to us.
SPIEGEL: Immunity for the US troops is apparently the central issue.
Maliki: It is a fundamental problem for us that it should not be possible, in my country, to prosecute offences or crimes committed by US soldiers against our population. But other issues are no less important: How much longer will these soldiers remain in our country? How much authority do they have? Who controls how many, soldiers enter and leave the country and where they do so?
SPIEGEL: Would you hazard a prediction as to when most of the US troops will finally leave Iraq?
Maliki: As soon as possible, as far as we're concerned. U.S. 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.
SPIEGEL: Is this an endorsement for the US presidential election in November? Does Obama, who has no military background, ultimately have a better understanding of Iraq than war hero John McCain?
Maliki: Those who operate on the premise of short time periods in Iraq today are being more realistic. Artificially prolonging the tenure of US troops in Iraq would cause problems. Of course, this is by no means an election endorsement. Who they choose as their president is the Americans' business. But it's the business of Iraqis to say what they want. And that's where the people and the government are in general agreement: The tenure of the coalition troops in Iraq should be limited.
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)ASAP (of course, that really means NATO should), and stay on in Iraq for as long as is practicable - at least for another couple of decades.
From an economic, political and practical point of view, for the US to suddenly get involved in Afghanistan in the 1980s was an exceptionally poor idea in the first place - almost as poor an idea as supporting French recolonisation of Vietnam in 1946. Whereas US involvement in the Middle East has a long history with specific economic (oil) and political (Israel) objectives.
--Manish Ghosh
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| parent )the attack on 9/11 came from Afghanistan, not Iraq.
--I blame it all on the Internet
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| parent )We could just as easily say the attacks came from Europe and Saudi Arabia. Remember, Al Qaeda just means an outpost, it's a very common word in Arabic, used in a variety of contexts. You could use the word for an oil drilling operation, a little cluster of trailers and a drill rig. In military terms, it's what we'd call a forward operating base, FOB, there are other words for a fortified encampment. It also appears as a root word for many things having to do with purpose or basis. It is, in fact a pun of sorts, for it also appears in the same way we'd use the word "position". The Arabs themselves have some fun at our expense, for we use the word on our signage at the entrance of all our bases in Iraq.
We are being suckered into a far more expensive war in Afghanistan. The cost of a war varies not with the number of troops in country, but the cost of supplying that army. Al Qaeda's strategy is to draw us out into the wilderness, while the real enemies are ensconced in the lacunae of our own free societies.
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| parent )but the command and control appears to have been in Afghanistan. It may be true that the best we could have hoped for was the death or capture of bin-Laden and his staff, then declare victory and go home. But that was at least a logical response that didn't involve attacking a country that had little to nothing to do with 9/11 because we could. My guess is that six years on Americans would be tired of the war in Afghanistan but would understand why we were there. Iraq, based on a bunch of lies and misdirection, has destroyed all that. As expansive as the war in Afghanistan would have been, it certainly would not have been as expansive had we not voluntarily taken on Iraq.
--I blame it all on the Internet
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| parent )"Ensconced" meaning covered or emplaced by a small barrier, lacuna meaning gap or hole, from a variant of lacus. Cognates offer options like a candle in a lake, a torch in a ditch, or perhaps a fort built on empty nothingness. The mexed mitaphors, they hurt my brain! :)
Anyhow, if we are at war with al Qaeda, then the way to win is to remove the enemy's ability to make war. Do you have a better approach to the ugly situation in the Pakistan tribal areas?
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )or cartilage cells. There's no mixed metaphor.
I have written, and will write more on what ought to be our mindset regarding the Pashtuns. Pakistan is shamefully and dangerously making treaties with these people.
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| parent )Even worse. :)
Thanks for the links, I'll go back and read more carefully, especially as it looks like I may yet dodge the moderator bullet this time around. :)
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )Iraq is flat; the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan is harshly mountainous. Conclusively defeating the insurgents there will be a lot like trying to wipe out the Viet Cong: hidden supply and escape routes, tunnels and caves, high-altitude redoubts that can survive bombardment by the heaviest of conventional weapons, neighboring countries to escape into (here, with the help of Pakistan's ISI and Frontier guards) where we cannot bomb them, a decentralized populace spead among thousands of villages with shifting allinaces and no good reason to collaberate with us, even a border with China.
The people we are fighting are controlling and supressing the opium trade. We can't trust the warloads to honor their alliances with us. The insurgents have hardened themselves and honed their fighting skills in ten years of battling a Russian military that was the rough equivalent of ours in terms of technology and manpower.
It's going to be a long war. God forbid some country decides to undermine us by supplying the rebels with the equivalent of Stinger missiles.
--Rust never sleeps.
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| parent )In Helmand, our Marines are being offered sacks of raw opium. The Pashtun don't understand a conqueror who doesn't demand tribute, they're glad enough to give us stuff, remember, in Afghanistan as in Vietnam, we're often viewed as the Good Guys. When the Americans politely refuse, the Pashtun are deeply confused.
The Americans baffle the Pashtun, they admire us, but they simply cannot grasp the idea of a conqueror not acting like an overlord. We're paying for the damage we do, another concept which just floors them.
If the Americans had any sense, we'd offer to buy the raw opium then process it into clean morphine. We'd solve several problems at once: there's a critical shortage of morphine in the third world hospitals and clinics. Oh sure, some would end up in the veins of addicts, but we'd get the majority of the opium into our trucks and not theirs. The opiates have many different uses. It would be the best use of our money I can consider at present time. It would instantly eliminate poverty in Afghanistan: poppies and wheat are all they can grow.
The economy of Afghanistan is in terrible shape, and our hearts and minds campaigns should take this in to account. Afghanistan could grow grapes and make wine, the soil and climate are perfect, but they're Muslims and therefore alcohol is shunned, but we could easily recoup our investment in Afghan opium, encouraging the growth of other less troubling crops. Almond trees come to mind. We could and should be reforesting parts of Afghanistan, they're denuding the slopes where critically endangered species like the snow leopard and the bharal live.
Our only real strategy for Afghanistan is to work with Pakistan to create a Pashtun homeland, freed from the predations of these gangster warlords. In the Panjshir, the same problem is still in place, though they're not Pashtun, they're Tajik. Curiously, American-style democracy could actually work in Afghanistan: as in our own early country, many disparate interests might find common cause in a republic worthy of the name.
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| parent )doesn't the same apply to opiates?
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )- Login or register to post comments
| parent )with their equivalent of James Dobson providing the necessary religious sanction for the trade.
In which case outright banning opium growing isn't going to work without a workable replacement cash crop like wine growing and co-opting a bigger James Dobson on the government side to support it.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )If we told the opium growers: "You have a choice. Allow the warlords to oppress you, buy your opium for less than it is truly worth and propagate the spread of crime. Your opium will be turned into heroin and be sold to addicts, who prostitute themselves, (a terrible, terrible thing in Pashtun culture). Heroin spreads AIDS and hepatitis. Do you realize how the opium you sell actually funds the very people who oppress you and very many other Muslims?"
"Here is our offer. You can sell us the opium, knowing you will be paid a higher price than the warlords pay. You will be in accordance with the Radio Mullah, who sees opium as medicine and therefore halal. You may choose the route of haram, that which is sin, and sell it to the warlords. Or you can alleviate the suffering of millions of poor people, yes, and Muslims too. The choice is yours. We cannot compel you. But Allah who sees all will follow your opium throughout the world, nothing is hidden from Him. He is called the Merciful and Compassionate, and your opium can bring either mercy and compassion to millions of suffering people or cause more suffering."
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| parent )In several different areas.
I am also deeply confused as to why this course of action doesn't seem to have been seriously looked into. I can't imagine that it's all drug war foolishness.
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| parent )what is needful in either place. Iraq or Afghanistan.
Perhaps the "solution" to radical Islam is not something the US military is capable of achieving.
Applied firepower without civilian allies on the ground to hold territory can pull weeds but pulling weeds without planting good grass is a futile exercise.
--. . . and it looks as though they’ll punish the monkey and let the organ grinder go . . .
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| parent )but the effort should be applied where it makes sense to be applied - to the country that allowed AQ a safe haven and refused to turn them over to the US after we were attacked on 9/11. The whole sideshow in Iraq has taken away from that entirely justified and legitimate effort.
--I blame it all on the Internet
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| parent )in Afghanistan was funded, trained and controlled from Pakistan. Where, if any effort had to be put in, US Intelligences and probably military forces should have been in, in any case. The lack of knowledge about Dr AQ Khan's activities in the past decade was possibly the most serious flaw in US intelligence in the 1980s-90s - he is still a free man in Pakistan today.
Be that as it may, the fact of the matter is that Afghanistan are the original badlands - it stands to reason that any enemy of the US, (or Russia or India for that matter) will find a haven there.
Let me take the example I already quoted - the hijacking of Flight 814 to Kandahar in 2001, arguably the starting point of the entire events leading up to 9/11, and indeed to the direct attack by al-Qaeda on the Indian Parliament in 2001 - a casus belli if ever there was one.
At that point it was the US and UN who "urged restraint" on the Indian Govt - something I completely agreed with at the time, btw - a restraint singularly lacking from the US post 9/11.
In any case, the war in Afghanistan can never be "won" by the US owing to the simple fact that the US has no stake in staying the course. What is there to gain in Afghanistan for the US, apart from the corpse of Mr Laden? Its not like anyone is hugely concerned about the current food crisis in Afghanistan.
Manish Ghosh
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| parent )The Messinpotamia has been an object lesson in what not to do with recalcitrant bad state actors and an effective demonstration of the limits of American military power used unilaterally against even a 4th rate power.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )I think the context for Maliki's remarks in the Der ZSpiegel interview are quite clearly the SOFA currently being negotiated between the two governments and not the competing narratives of the US Presidential election campaign. That said, Maliki clearly recognizes that Bush is weakened and there is mileage to be had by endorsing Obama's plan in order to extract the best deal he can from the Bush Administration. Prior to this the Bush Administration had been trying to force through some very unpalatable terms using hardball tactics including holding to ransom billions of Iraq dollar assets held in the US. So this is Malaki hitting back and hitting back hard, which has the benefit of making him look good domestically by standing up to the Americans. Unfortunately for McCain, while Bush looks weak, McCain looks even weaker by virtue of being joined at the hip out of necessity, to a President and a policy that isn't going to be ending up in a ticker tape 'Victory' parade anytime soon.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )I don't see any info about the translation itself so far. Did Maliki give this interview in English or German? His language does seem choppy; short sentences, somewhat simplistic vocabulary, so that's possible.
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )Misleading headline, but:
GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent ).
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )Patterico notes that Der Spiegel made an unacknowledged edit to its English translation of the interview with Maliki:
SPIEGEL: Would you hazard a prediction as to when most of the US troops will finally leave Iraq?
Maliki: As soon as possible, as far as we’re concerned. US presidential candidate Barack Obama is right when he talks about 16 months. Assuming that positive developments continue, this is about the same time period that corresponds to our wishes.
Here’s how the exchange reads now:
SPIEGEL: Would you hazard a prediction as to when most of the US troops will finally leave Iraq?
Maliki: As soon as possible, as far as we’re concerned. U.S. 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.
Funny how that part about "positive developments" vanished into the memory hole, isn't it? Patterico is right when he replies to Der Spiegel's statement that they stand by their version of the conversation:
That’s great . . . but which one?
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)I'm just not sure folks will be able to talk their way around this one, McCain included. The parsing is a day late. It's not likely to help much tomorrow, either. McCain is going to have to decide the best way to frame it, and to an extent already has. He'll take credit for being 'right' about the surge, and suggest that all other good news flows directly from that.
It'll help, but probably not enough. But the last thing he should engage in is the kind of parsing and wordplay Patterico and others are engaging in, as if this news was simply too awful and counterproductive to be believed, no matter how many ways it is delivered to them.
That's a luxury McCain cannot afford. He's already behind the curve on Iran and Afghanistan -- bet he's got a few choice words for Condi and her Iran initiative -- and can't afford to lag too far behind this latest development.
Then again, given the way his campaign has been run so far? Maybe he will.
--"How is the world ruled, and how do wars start? Diplomats tell lies to journalists and then believe what they read." -- Karl Kraus, 1909
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| parent )Assuming that positive developments continue under the remainder of Bush's tenure then Obama's 16 month timetable would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes as this is about the same time period that corresponds to our wishes.
In other words, as long as GWB doesn't screw things up in the interim, we're cool with Obama's plan.
And what about Malaki's other comments and how they stack up against McCain's rhetoric?
Bush gets to claim 'Victory' to anyone willing to listen while the troops get to come home and the Iraqi's get to take the training wheels of their nascent democracy and exercise some sovereignty. What's not to like? unless perhaps if you're a McCain supporter and you don't see enough 'honor' in any of it.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )If nothing else, Stanzel's phrase could become the pothead joke of the year.
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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)and the initiative. I get the impression from Malaki's reluctance to step in front of a microphone and clarify his statements to Der Spiegel, that Malaki has grown tired of being brow beaten by the Bush Administration and means to seize the initiative going forward. Obama's visit may be just the sort of opportunity he's been looking for.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )Snip.
Der Spiegel says a full English version of the interview will be available tomorrow. Prepare for the English language itself to be forever damaged by contortions from GOP spin control.
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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)was a Chalabi lobbyist:
The surge kerfluffle is a tiny toothpick; the FUBAR that was our original invasion of Iraq is a giant forest.
Anyone who believed Chalabi was “a patriot with the interest of Iraq at heart.” is simply unfit to be POTUS in 2008.
Full stop
--. . . and it looks as though they’ll punish the monkey and let the organ grinder go . . .
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)Never mind.
Oh, and you're misunderstanding McCain's spokesman's comments about Obama's views and their influence.
--"I want America to know that I'm, like, totally ready to lead." -- Paris Hilton
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)From CENTCOM to The Forvm! Well done. But this is one bit of toothpaste you're going to have a very hard to getting back into the tube. Not that it won't be instructive watching you try.
--"How is the world ruled, and how do wars start? Diplomats tell lies to journalists and then believe what they read." -- Karl Kraus, 1909
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| parent )Gordon Brown also since "the two men favour early troop withdrawals from Iraq to refocus resources on the 'war on terror' in Afghanistan."
and from the same link:
. . . and it looks as though they’ll punish the monkey and let the organ grinder go . . .
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| parent )walking it back already
Do try to keep up.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )The PM reaffirms conditions-based withdraws, yet you don't see the need to make a front-page update? Disappointing, sparti.
--"I want America to know that I'm, like, totally ready to lead." -- Paris Hilton
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| parent )and conditions now require reinforcement of Afghanistan and Iraq is the only place those forces can come from.
--. . . and it looks as though they’ll punish the monkey and let the organ grinder go . . .
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| parent )he's for a conditions based withdrawal.
--"I want America to know that I'm, like, totally ready to lead." -- Paris Hilton
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| parent )released by the CENTCOM press office that doesn't attempt to qualify any of the specific and unequivocal remarks quoted by Der Spiegel. Not the PM himself and not an official Bush-McCain press release.
Update (III) contains the latest press release by one of the principals, updated as a comment only because editing the diary would have bumped it from the front page. When Maliki sees fit to issue clarification of his Der Speigel comments directly, or Bush-McCain issue something more substantial then a further update will ensue.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )edit away, I'll repost it to the front page.
--I blame it all on the Internet
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| parent )Update III promoted from comments, awaiting something substantial from Bush-McCain or al Maliki himself.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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| parent )If translations of Maliki's comments are even close to correct, they aren't going to be spun away.
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )I think the McCain staffer email says it all: McCain adviser on Iraqi PM's Obama endorsement: 'We're f**ked'
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| parent )Obama Leading on Foreign Policy, McCain Following
You're up next Senator McCain, the world awaits.
--GW Bush, leading contender for worst President ever.
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)Declare victory and get the bleep out of Dodge!
After all, if al-Maliki (the one chosen by the purple fingered people of Iraq) say we've won, who are we to argue?
and this . . .
. . . and it looks as though they’ll punish the monkey and let the organ grinder go . . .
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)This isn't a huge deal. This is huger than that.
I'm assuming the McCain campaign will end their silence at some point. And as Marshall goes on to point out, the Bush admin. may twist his arm and force a retraction of some kind. But this is the worst possible news for McCain, and, as we'll no doubt see in here shortly (and have to some extent already) a veritable panic button suddenly pushed in each and every one of his supporters.
--"How is the world ruled, and how do wars start? Diplomats tell lies to journalists and then believe what they read." -- Karl Kraus, 1909
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| parent )Maliki's announcement a big BIG BIG deal
. . . and it looks as though they’ll punish the monkey and let the organ grinder go . . .
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| parent )I've already seen the idea that "Maliki can't be trusted and therefore his support of Obama's plan is evidence said plan is bad" floated around already. I expect that's the only spin that is simple enough to stick in the minds of potential voters.
--Over here on E Street, we're proud to support Obama for President. - Bruce Springsteen
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| parent )but the people promoting that have been strangely silent since he started promoting a US withdrawal.
--Rust never sleeps.
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| parent )Those of us who do follow these things understand the following Iraqi meme: "Maliki is a US tool as long as the Americans support his regime". The other Iraqi meme is "Maliki is a DAWA tool of Iran. Maliki throws a red carpet parade for Ahmedinejad." Both are true. All American memes are irrelevant.
Maliki seems to have grown a pair. Because he has, the Sunni contingent has returned to the Iraqi Parliament.
Now you can put any amount of torque on your own flavor of spin. The only Strange Silences I hear are from your side of the fence. Over on dKos, it's callooh-callay oh frabjous day, Maliki sees things Obama's way.
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| parent )which is much simpler than you're making it seem: Obama strongly opposed the surge; Maliki (according to his aide) says that the surge was such a great success that he is now able to discuss withdrawal of US troops. Obama and his supporters can dance and sing all they want without altering that fact, and what it means w/r/t their champion's ability to understand and deal with military issues.
You're talking about what you say is the insignificance of American memes in Iraq; I was talking about the impact or lack of same on the upcoming elections here.
Many liberals argued literally for years that the democracy in Iraq was not a true one because the Bush admin told the Iraqis what to do and when to do it. Those are the people who have nothing to say now that Maliki is showing independence.
Do you honestly believe that what goes on among the Bedlamites at dKos has even the most remote significance to the outcome of the presidential election? If so, dream on.
--Rust never sleeps.
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| parent )like I said to BD, it's amazing how the entire history of the Iraq war consists of the surge (to Republicans, anyway). It's a lot simpler - was the war a good idea in the first place? Obama didn't think so, Bush, McCain and the Republicans did think so. Now that the "surge" has partially corrected a f(*ked up situation, that's all Republicans want to talk about. It doesn't change that original mistake, and that's the way the public looks at it now.
The thing that war supporters don't get is that the more they talk about the war, the worse things are for McCain, even after the surge. People may be relieved that we can get out without even worse human and financial costs, but it doesn't make them any more likely to forgive those who got us in this jam in the first place.
--I blame it all on the Internet
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| parent )If Consumer Reports tells people that the Toyota Camry will run well for a long time -- better and longer than comparable models from other car manufacturers -- and that turns out to be the general experience of buyers, I'm inclined to say Consumer Reports had good judgment on that matter, and perhaps more broadly in judging car quality.
If the Toyota salesman tells people the same thing about the Toyota Camry, should he get similar credit for good judgment? I'd say no. Maybe that was his honest judgment, or maybe he just said what served his own interests.
My understanding is that Obama's constituency in 2002 was (or could be safely assumed to be) heavily opposed to going to war in Iraq. Granted, it's quite possible he was considering seeking a position with a much broader constituency (and I don't know which offices he may have been contemplating at the time -- Senator, Congressman, other -- or what the views of those constituencies were), but I think if the position he took was in line with the bulk of his constituency at the time, I think we should be asking ourselves if (or to what extent) he may have been the Toyota salesman and not Consumer Reports.
I realize partisans supporting Obama have jumped all over the talking-point idea of his prescience and extraordinary "judgment" with little critical thought with regard to the point I raise here (and leaving aside the healthy skepticism they'd probably have in other matters and which they'd apply to if the shoe were on McCain's foot), and I assume that this oversight is largely due to the dependence the Obama campaign has had from the start on his claim that his position on Iraq proves superior "judgment" -- to combat the charge that he is too inexperienced to be president -- but perhaps some folks will give some thought to my point (or perhaps not).
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| parent )guy in the room? You listen to him. Sad, but that was US politics in 2002.
--Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes. -JH
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| parent )that opposed the war in Iraq, yet war was what we got. I certainly remember that being anti-war was a brave stand to take at the time, and those who did were castigated and criticized very heavily. The drums of war were beating heavily, and every emotional button that could be pushed was pushed repeatedly. So you can consider it a salesman telling you something and discount his sincerity, I still value the fact that he came out and said it at the time. As I've said elsewhere, it's easy to say "We were in a bad situation" without explaining how we got to be in a bad situation in the first place.
--I blame it all on the Internet
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| parent )Your argument seems to be that the fact (per my understanding) that his constituency at the time was heavily opposed to the war and would receive Obama's 2002 speech very approvingly is essentially irrelevant to judging whether Obama was the Toyota salesman, Consumer Reports, or somewhere in between. If that's what you're saying, I disagree, and I certainly don't think that the question should be overlooked or quickly and easily dismissed, although I understand why Obama supporters would do so, given that the viability of his candidacy has always been largely dependent on his response to the "experience" question being "I have better judgment, and proof is my Iraq position in 2002". The thought that perhaps the deciding factor in the position Obama took may have been his interest in pleasing his constituency (rather than extraordinary prescience and judgment) must be very unnerving to Obama supporters, so there is a very strong incentive to overlook or quickly dismiss that possibility.
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| parent )there were very few political voices opposing the war. Just because a politician opposed the war because his constituency opposed it - wait, that's what they're supposed to do. It would have been far easier to say nothing. I'm not saying that it was necessarily the bravest thing anyone has ever done (granting your statements about his constituency, which may or may not have been as anti-war as you describe) but it was still valuable and deserves credit. Unless your argument is that everything Obama says is poll driven, but I really don't see that at this point.
--I blame it all on the Internet
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| parent )Unless your argument is that everything Obama says is poll driven, but I really don't see that at this point.
No, I'm not saying that "everything Obama says is poll driven", nor am I saying that I am anywhere near certain that Obama's 2002 position was based solely on pleasing his constituency. I'm saying that there is a substantial possibility that the desire to please (or reflect the preference) of his constituency was either a major factor in Obama's choice of position or a deciding factor in what he may have viewed as a tough call.
What is my point?
As I said, Obama's candidacy (his appeal as a candidate) is based in large part on his claim to having superior judgment on national security matters as evidenced by his Iraq position in 2002. This "judgment" claim is presented not only as a supposed strength (as any candidate might use such a claim), but has also been a strategically critical response to concern over his lack of experience ("Experience? No, what really matters is judgment, and I have better judgment. See my 2002 position on Iraq. Next question.")
Let me put this differently. Suppose he did not take any position on Iraq in 2002. How would he have handled the "experience" question? To what extent would people have been satisfied (re: their concern over his lack of experience) by whatever other answer he gave? To what extent would his overall attractiveness as a candidate be diminished?
If the answer to those questions is that there probably would have been a big difference in his viability as a candidate -- and perhaps in your own opinion -- then my question is an important one. Was his 2002 position based on his "judgment" or was there a deciding factor (preference of his constituency) that has nothing to do with the kind of judgment he's claiming (re: national security strategy/decisions)
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| parent )...tends to confirm the "salesman" thesis.
Either now, or then, or both.
Which is not to say that I think McCain is better.
--We are in serious, worsening trouble.