Thought Theater

Biden: Seeking A Reasoned Plan For Iraq genre: Just Jihad & Polispeak & Six Degrees of Speculation

As with most controversial issues, the tendency is for people to migrate to the extremes as polarization becomes the predominant drumbeat...which subsequently drowns out otherwise reasonable solutions. The conflict in Iraq has succumbed to this formula both here in the U.S. and amongst the people within the troubled country. Unfortunately, satisfactory resolutions rarely evolve from such an environment...and the Iraq conflict merely offers another example. Senator Joe Biden of Delaware proposed a solution for Iraq a few months back that was largely ignored by the opposing sides. Nonetheless, the Senator has again offered his proposal in a new Washington Post article that can be found here.

Four months ago, in an opinion piece with Les Gelb, president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, I laid out a detailed plan to keep Iraq together, protect America's interests and bring our troops home. Many experts here and in Iraq embraced our ideas. Since then, circumstances in Iraq have made the plan even more on target -- and urgent -- than when we first proposed it.

The new, central reality in Iraq is that violence between Shiites and Sunnis has surpassed the insurgency and foreign terrorists as the main security threat.

No number of troops can solve this problem. The only way to hold Iraq together and create the conditions for our armed forces to responsibly withdraw is to give Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds incentives to pursue their interests peacefully and to forge a sustainable political settlement. Unfortunately, this administration does not have a coherent plan or any discernible strategy for success in Iraq. Its strategy is to prevent defeat and hand the problem off when it leaves office.

Meanwhile, more and more Americans, understandably frustrated, support an immediate withdrawal, even at the risk of trading a dictator for chaos and a civil war that could become a regional war.

Both are bad alternatives. The five-point plan Les Gelb and I laid out offers a better way.

Biden succinctly details both the realities within Iraq and the propensity to jump to partisan conclusions here in the United States. He then quickly points out that despite all the debate, we have yet to address a tangible solution that actually seeks to confront the less than desirable circumstances and eventualities that cannot be ignored. There are three key components to Biden's argument...one; Iraq is a mess that results from decades of sectarian tensions that will not be quelled with the stroke of a pen or purple fingers. Two, our current approach to Iraq isn't working and there is little reason to believe that it is going to work...and thirdly, we can leave Iraq immediately, but the aftermath won't leave us unaffected or forever uninvolved. Frustrating as this assessment may be, it is no doubt accurate.

First, the plan calls for maintaining a unified Iraq by decentralizing it and giving Kurds, Shiites and Sunnis their own regions. The central government would be left in charge of common interests, such as border security and the distribution of oil revenue.

Second, it would bind the Sunnis to the deal by guaranteeing them a proportionate share of oil revenue. Each group would have an incentive to maximize oil production, making oil the glue that binds the country together.

Third, the plan would create a massive jobs program while increasing reconstruction aid -- especially from the oil-rich Gulf states -- but tying it to the protection of minority rights.

Fourth, it would convene an international conference that would produce a regional nonaggression pact and create a Contact Group to enforce regional commitments.

Fifth, it would begin the phased redeployment of U.S. forces this year and withdraw most of them by the end of 2007, while maintaining a small follow-on force to keep the neighbors honest and to strike any concentration of terrorists.

Complex? Yes it is...but to imagine otherwise is to engage in folly and denial. Is it understandable to fault the Bush administration for failing to comprehend the complexities prior to electing to invade Iraq? Absolutely...but to refuse to move past the blame towards resolution is also pointless...as is an equally hasty election to call it quits. Why? Because our actions...bad as they may have been...have set in motion a new reality that requires the application of the judgment that wasn't employed at the outset. To do otherwise is to simply repeat our mistakes.

Additionally, our past actions have not only impacted Iraq but they have consequences for the entire region...and left unchecked they may well lead to further escalations and conflict. By altering the course of events within the region, we must now address those outcomes. Choosing to bide our time removed from the situation will not mean that we will never be compelled to intervene. In fact, withdrawal may assure further and more deadly involvements that have expanded exponentially.

The example of Bosnia is illustrative, if not totally analogous. Ten years ago, Bosnia was being torn apart by ethnic cleansing. The United States stepped in decisively with the Dayton Accords to keep the country whole by, paradoxically, dividing it into ethnic federations. We even allowed Muslims, Croats and Serbs to retain separate armies. With the help of U.S. troops and others, Bosnians have lived a decade in peace. Now they are strengthening their central government and disbanding their separate armies.

At best, the course we're on has no end in sight. At worst, it leads to a terrible civil war and possibly a regional war. This plan offers a way to bring our troops home, protect our security interests and preserve Iraq as a unified country. Those who reject this plan out of hand must answer one simple question: What is your alternative?

Unfortunately, the answer to Biden's rhetorical question may be nothing more than political expediency as both Democrats and Republicans attempt to manipulate voters in order to benefit from the situation this November. Frankly, the situation in the Connecticut Senatorial election perfectly demonstrates the current political dynamic. Lamont, for the most part, rightly painted Lieberman to be supportive of more of the same in Iraq. Lieberman, on the other hand, seeks to portray Lamont to be in favor of an immediate withdrawal.

Both men have blurred the lines of their positions for political gain such that neither man has actually offered meaningful solutions. Essentially, the goal is to avoid clarity in order to maximize appeal...all done at the expense of any reasoned dialogue that might help illuminate alternatives. Why? Because human nature is often inclined to avoid difficult situations and decisions such that politicians attempt to navigate voter denial in order to achieve maximum advantage. In other words, our political system has become focused on winning office at the expense of meaningful debate and prudent policy.

Until such time as "truth" is elevated to its proper place...that being a worthy pursuit...we will wallow in partisan banter and bickering in order to hold power over a state or a country or a world that is racing towards irreconcilable conflict. I refuse to be drawn into the extremist mindset and I abhor those who are intent on imposing "truth" as opposed to finding "truth". While the United States divides over the Iraq situation...a situation that we smugly define to be a conflict amongst intransigent factions...we race towards our own intransigence in an escalating disregard for civility and an expanded embrace of obtaining power in order to shove one man's "truth" down the collective gullet.

Absent real leadership, there will be no meaningful resolution in Iraq because we continue to abandon the pursuit of real "truth". I reject partisanship for the sake of power because I embrace the pursuit of "truth' as the cure for conflict. I will not follow convention because it now comports with contrivance. The rhetoric that seeks to portray compromise as capitulation is the construct of those who foment fractionalization in order to foreclose the clarity that comes with a commitment to uncovering "truth". The "truth" they seek is akin to a large paint roller...it efficiently covers the walls but it cannot, nor does it seek to decipher the intricacies over which it imposes its will.

Truth is like art...it is the result of painstaking effort to dissect that which is obvious in order to depict that which is definitive. In the spirit of Erica Jong from her collection of poetry, “Testament (Or, Homage to Walt Whitman)", I declare myself now for “truth".