Picking Up the Pieces (Fisk: Ceasefire Details/alSadr in control)

[lostnfound]

Mods: This was a live on-the-ground report from Baghdad from Robert Fisk aired on Flashpoints last night.
http://www.kpfa.org/cgi-bin/gen-mpegurl.m3u?server=209.81.10.18&port=80&mount=/data/20040720-Tue1700.mp3

Robert Fisk pointed out that few journalists are willing to leave Baghdad, and said he didn't blame them for that, but that he did blame them for not telling their readers and viewers that they won't drive outside Baghdad. Then he said:

"24 hours ago I got in a car with my drivers, Iraqi's all of them, on the road to Najjaf, which is about 150 miles south of Baghdad. We had to drive down highway 8, which is one of the most dangerous roads in the country, because on this road at least 15, possibly as many as 25, westerners have been murdered by insurgents. We drove right down this road to Najjaf. And it was like a screen was pulled aside and I could see a reality. In the first 70 miles, every police checkpoint was abandoned. The road was littered with shot-through Iraqi police vehicles and burned American military petrol tankers.

There was a short period when there were some Iraqi police and soldiers on the road, and when we approached Najjaf, the police stopped us and said we can't go any further, at which point I was handed over to al Sadr's Mehdi army which is the Shiite militia controlling the center of Najjaf. A young man took me into the holiest Shiite shrine <..beautiful shrine..> and in an airconditioned office there I met the righthand man of Moqtada al Sadr. He produced a map of the ceasefire between the US forces and Shiite forces in Najjaf. It was an American map, a US military map, upon which he had drawn several lines. And HE had drawn the lines whereby the Americans could use these roads, these particular roads, to resupply their bases, but the Americans otherwise had to stay in the bases, and THAT was the ceasefire plan.

It was quite extraordinary and very humiliating, I suppose, militarily, that a Shiite man should be able to give me a U.S. map showing the restrictions on the deployment of U.S. troops in Iraq. And more than this, he then complained that the US troops had broken the ceasefire agreement, and said, 'The ONLY issue outstanding in the ceasefire negotiation is that the charges against Moqtada alSadr of killing Assayed (a very vulnerable and prowestern cleric in Najjaf last year) should be lifted.'

So what I realized -- I did a 350 mile round trip and I don't carry security with me, I had one Shiite cleric in my car -- was that the central authority in Baghdad controls only Baghdad -- just like Afghanistan, where Karzai controls only Kabul. The central government which was set up and controlled by the U.S. controls only Baghdad. We know that the cities of Aquba, Samarra, Ramadi, Fallujah in the Sunni areas are outside government control. Now I learned that 70-100 miles south of Baghdad, by traveling there and seeing with my own eyes, is outside government control. Alas, our journalists prefer to stay in the hotels, and they talk about the new Iraq, and they go to press conferences in carefully concealed areas of Baghdad where American-appointed officials say things are getting better."

(There's more from Fisk, but this was the part that was really news and not analysis.)

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. Robert Fisk-perhaps the last true journalist around

Mr. Fisk has guts, that is for sure. And if he's telling the truth, there is no way that Iraq will ever be able to have the 'fair and democratic' elections that Bush says will happen. The puppet government will remain, with these deals with warlords, etc, just to maintain the uneasy balance of power. And that will last only until one of the warlords decides he wants to have it all. Then the whole illusionary house of cards will come crashing down.

[lostnfound]

2. Shinseki was right..Is Bush holding off until after election? Or ..

they don't care whether Iraq is stable?

One of the neocons (was it Wolfowitz or Cheney) last week said something about 'who cares whether Iraq is stable?' or something to that effect. I heard it mentioned on Air America in the context of 'are they moving the bar again??'

I wondered at the time whether this was a glimpse into their actual strategy, though. Both Iraq and Afghanistan are basket-cases...but what does it matter to those who 1)got contracts for Halliburton or 2)got their bases built for the empire?

Shinseki was right in saying that many, many more troops are needed to control Iraq. So are the neocons actually planning to 1) wait until after the election to increase troops sufficiently to take control? OR 2) let it collapse as a nation into territories controlled by various mullah's armies?

[punpirate]

5. They may not...

... and because of what I quoted here a bit ago from Sun Tzu: "In chaos, there is opportunity."

Translated to what the greedy neo-cons intend, that might mean, let it all go to hell while we infiltrate every power base and bend each to our will.

The Bushies are hoping that no one will notice what is going on in Afghanistan or in Iraq before the election, and hope they won't notice when they go on to create chaos in Iran or Syria, or both, in 2005, if they manage to find a way to win the election (something they are increasingly unlikely to do legally).

Shinseki may be right about the number of troops necessary to engage, but Shinseki has been relatively silent about whether we should have invaded at all, on moral grounds, or on the grounds of international law, or on the basis of common sense, and therefore, at this point, ought not to be butting in all that much. His help in the argument is of degree, not kind.

Given that in seven years of two Bushes, we have had four wars between them, it ought to be obvious what is afoot with this particular branch of the American tree. We ought not be seduced into believing that they are distributing fruit for enemy and friend alike.

[Cooley Hurd]

3. I'd say Muqtada al-Sadr is pretty freaking generous...

...to the US forces - to allow them access to resupply their bases.

Chimpo calls Iraq and Afghanistan "victories?" If only the bulk of the American people knew how little control we have over these countries we've invaded, and in which thousands of lives were lost... if only. :(

[TheWraith]

9. Self interest

Sadr is in the "crazy but not stupid" category. He knows that while his Army could inflict a huge number of casualties on the U.S., eventually they'd be destroyed and he would be captured. His plan is to maintain his power base and wait out the U.S. occupation. Sooner or later, they'll either leave or provoke a total uprising. In either case, Sadr will be positioned in control of a strategically valuable city, including the holiest Shiite mosque, and will be the most prominent and powerful leader of his faction--someone who is seen as having defeated the U.S. before. Thus, he will be in an ideal position to sieze the reins of the entire Shiite majority and try to become the Grand Ayatollah of Iraq.

[izzie]

4. Well you can see Bush got bored with this a long time ago.

He will blame it on someone else and move on. It has been a pattern of his whole life of not sticking to things and taking an easy way out. Of course the right wing will not hear Robert Fisk. It is better to hear people who feed what you wish to hear. It is beyond belief that the "Right" does this as they work longer for less money and the country is raped of what makes life good, like the woods and clean water, but their we are and their they are.

[cap]

6. i think Fisk is wrong and...

in addition to Baghdad, we control the oil fields as well. But not much moree. I would have to see it to believe that we don't control the oil. He's right about not controlling much else in the country. That I can believe.

[Jacobin]

7. We may have the fields under control, but

about twice a week, the pipelines shipping the oil to market are blown up, so its not much use to control the fields if you can't sell what you steal.

[cap]

10. yup... a lot depends on the security of those pipelines...

your post about not much use to control the fields if you cant sell what you steal brings a smile to my lips.

[daleo]

8. So Allawi is the Mayor of Baghdad, Karzai the Mayor of Kabul

The BFEE has to quit meddling in municipal politics around the world.

[enough]

11. KICK