- In the wake of increasing error, the latest being incredible
photos of prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib and other prisons, is it really
unthinkable to cut our losses in Iraq by just walking briskly away? Look
at the track record: It was a mistake to lie to the American people and
the world about US reasons for attacking Iraq; a mistake to go to war without
international backing; a mistake to permit unrestrained looting in the
aftermath of initial conflict; a mistake to reject well developed plans
for post-war reconstruction; a mistake to fire the first US Administrator,
Garner, for wanting to hold early and free elections; a mistake to blackball
the Baath; a mistake to send the Iraqi army home; a mistake to promise
democracy and then balk at the idea of having the majority (the Shiia Muslims)
get a chance to rule; a mistake to give the Kurds too much wiggle room;
a mistake to close the Shia newspaper run by Shia cleric Moqtada al Sadr;
a mistake to attack Falluja in force including destroying mosques; a mistake
to put a former Saddam Hussein general in charge of Iraqi troops to fight
other Iraqis.
-
- How can we improve on that track record? Probably by
sticking around while Murphy,s Law does its thing! The key argument made
to justify a continuing Coalition presence in Iraq is that the place would
come apart if we left. The place is already coming apart. What could go
wrong that already hasn,t or that could not go wrong if we stayed?
-
- Those of us old enough to track the exit from Vietnam
will recall vividly that we went through this same exercise over extricating
ourselves from that hopeless situation. In the end, as this writer observed
from a senior position in US Embassy Manila, our departure was neither
orderly nor well-planned. We hastily extracted the last of our people from
the roof of US Embassy Saigon as crowds closed on the gates. We also extracted
some key South Vietnam officials by ship to Subic Bay in the Philippines.
Through hastily set up facilities at Subic and Clark, both then US bases
in the Philippines, we helped our own refugees from Vietnam arrange their
return home.
-
- That was the end of it, because we had no access to Vietnam
for many years afterward. We left the Vietnamese no game plan, and it would
not have been followed anyway. Vietnam,s future became, as it had to be,
the choice and the responsibility of the Vietnamese people. Many still
are troubled by our involvement there, but fewer people are troubled by
the fact that we left.
-
- If we just left Iraq, what may happen then would be the
call of the Iraqi people. Over the past centuries the Iraqi people have
been given little opportunity to learn how to govern themselves. Only experience
can fix that, and the Iraqis have to acquire the experience to do it. That
could be messy, but hardly messier than what is going on now.
-
- With us gone the Iraqis would be denied the luxury of
blaming their problems on someone else, which they now have ample reason
to do every day. The Coalition performance thus far suggests that if we
stay the Iraqis will have much more to blame us for. Scanning the situation
in an interview with Reuters, the newly installed General Muhammad Latif
said that there would be "more calm if the American soldier "returns
to the United States. Latif clearly feels that peace can be achieved without
outside help.
-
- But the Bush team and its supporters are not stuck on
what might happen to the Iraqi people if we just withdrew. The Bush team
is stuck on what will happen to neo-conservative plans for Iraq. As those
plans slowly emerge from patterns of deceit and obfuscation, the plans
are to preempt control of Iraqi oil production and reserves, to weaken,
certainly to alter the links to Saudi Arabia and other oil producers in
the region, and to challenge OPEC for control of world oil markets. A fourth
goal, in many respects more critical than any actions involving oil per
se, is to retain the denomination of oil prices in dollars, i.e., prevent
moves to shift from the dollar to the euro, moves which are already quite
pronounced, and they will increase as the European system expands.
-
- Those plans have a superficial appeal, coming as they
do at a time when leading experts suggest world oil production is about
to peak. That means for oil users worldwide that things will not get better
in the future. US oil production peaked three decades ago. Bush team plans
to open the Arctic Wildlife preserve to exploitation at best would slow
or flatten the rate of decline. US dependence on imports is now above 55%
and rising. The US and global situations will grow steadily worse unless
alternative energy sources for the world,s presently oil based systems
are found. Unfortunately, through both domestic and foreign policy decisions
on energy, the Bush team has done its best to assure that the United States
does not move us seriously in that direction.
-
- So, in a future of shrinking oil supplies, and a US economy
that now consumes 25% of world oil production, what is the plan for Iraq?
As one might expect, those plans are not being publicly shared. However,
the choices are plain. If the United States intends to continue its present
oil dependence and levels of use it will be able to do so only by taking
an increasing share of declining world oil output. To do that it must bid
successfully for oil to cover more than half of US consumption, a share
that will grow as US oil output shrinks and consumption grows. If it does
that, the United States will need the active and willing day-to-day cooperation
not only of world oil producers but of oil consuming countries as well.
-
- Even with that help, US military power will be needed
mainly to keep us in oil. Since the heavy ends of American military power,
both air and ground, are oil based, that equation is binding.
-
- Some relevant facts seem obvious: if the United States
is to serve those conflicting roles it must not only remain one of the
worlds most healthy economies (oil imports are and will be the biggest
import bill); it must also sustain reliable access to a significant piece
of world oil output. Since most future oil for US uses will come from abroad,
it could prove costly to be exposed to foreign exchange risks while bidding
for an expanding share of world oil output in a market that is not priced
in dollars. The future of the dollar itself is at stake in this situation
and with it the future of the US economy because it carries a high burden
of international debt along with heavy reliance on foreign trade.
-
- The neo-conservative answers to these problems require
not only that the US stay in Iraq, but also that the US not permit significant
control of Iraqi oil to pass to the Iraqi people. The neo-conservative
scheme thus requires that Iraqis not have a democracy except in name, but
to believe that the Iraqis will acquiesce in the systematic theft of their
principal national asset is naïve in the extreme. Thus the neo-conservative
oil plan, as appealing as it seems to its designers, is likely to be fraught
with perpetual conflict. And that is assuming that no one other than the
Iraqis object to this scheme.
-
- A shorter, less conflict ridden, and less risky path
would be to restructure the system that already exists, a system that with
bumps has permitted us to obtain oil, grow and prosper over the years since
OPEC was conceived. We and other oil importing countries routinely have
paid more that twice the costs profitably to produce the average barrel
of oil, but oil product consumers have generally taken that in stride.
Consuming countries routinely have made handsome income transfers to oil
producer countries, and US producers at home have benefited handsomely
from propped up prices.
-
- The Bush statement, repeated this week, that oil prices
are high because of environmental protective measures is a myth. Oil prices
are high because oil producer country taxes and oil company profits are
high.
-
- OPEC has been modestly successful in running this system,
but only with the active participation of the international companies,
and at least the passive participation of consumer country governments.
Example: Iraqi oil costs about $1.50 a barrel to produce, and most producers
can bring their product to market for less than $10 per barrel, but world
traded oil sells within the present OPEC price band for between $22 and
$28 per barrel. Oil has sold at prices above this band since December 2003.
Can you tell why the oil companies and Bush team friends want to control
the Iraqi and perhaps the whole Persian Gulf end of this gravy train?
-
- OK. We can have that, but at guaranteed continuous conflict
costs. It is unlikely that we can do it except by maintaining a large military
presence, not only in Iraq but also throughout the region. Does that sound
like taking the oil at gun point? That indeed is what it will be as we
watch our circle of friends continue to decline and our casualties as well
as our military budgets increase.
-
- The irony of it is that the companies and oil producer
countries will prosper, while consumers will not benefit from lower prices.
Some experts are now saying that gasoline at a US pump will never again
drop below $1.25 a gallon (it now goes for more than $4.00 in Britain or
France). Rather it is more likely to rise to $2.00. Diesel fuel prices
for the trucks we depend on for movement of virtually all goods and services
will not drop either. In effect, even with the 1970s oil shock and other
ups and downs, the oil deal we have had for several years is the best deal
we are likely to have in the future.
-
- We must stop making matters worse. Let,s get out of Iraq.
Let the Iraqi people make their own decisions about how to govern and how
to use the profits from their oil sales. Let the UN help them, and help
the UN do that. Make the best deal we can with OPEC and non-OPEC oil producers
such as Russia and Norway. Get to work on reducing our oil dependence by
switching to windmills, hydrogen and other fuels as need be, and making
our future transportation habits fit our future energy supplies. Meanwhile,
as consumers we should make a decision that we are happy to pay the $0.75
topper on that $1.25 price of motor fuel to avoid wasting the lives of
thousands of young Americans, and as an ongoing contribution to world peace.
Anyway, at $2.00 per gallon we are better off by far than practically anybody
else in the world, even though we must be prepared to have that price go
up.
-
- So let,s stop struggling. Get out of Iraq. Solve our
oil supply problems at the negotiating table and through changing our energy
systems. Let the Iraqis do what no one has permitted them to do for centuries,
work out their own living arrangements. They will probably do that in spite
of us anyway.
-
- The writer is a retired Senior Foreign Service Officer
of the US Department of State. He will welcome comments at wecanstopit@charter.net
-
-
- Comment
From Jim Mortellaro
- Jsmortell@aol.com
- 5-9-4
-
- Should we summarily leave Iraq, we send a signal to Fundamentalist
Islam that we are weak, tired of battle and that our people are in similar
straights. This, I believe, is far from truth.
-
- Leaving Iraq allows the terrorists of that area to become
even more active. It allows the deployment of yet another Islamic Republic,
likely, similar to Iran. It presupposes that America (their great satan)
will not fight against terrorism and this in turn will permit great terrorist
activity in the region as well as elsewhere in the world and in particular,
the United States of America.
-
- Our lives here would not be worth a plug nickel.
-
- We are there. Regardless of why one imagines we got there,
for good or bad. Showing a lack of commitment to terror now, would, Mr.
Arnold, create more problems for this nation than it already has.
-
- The United Nations has demonstrated a complete lack of
ability to control and manage without the use of force. Largely, that force
belonged to the United States at every juncture. The UN is a mockery of
what it is supposed to be. A peacekeeping force. What peace has the UN
kept in the last 30 years? Non which I can recall. Not without the USA
behind them.
-
- As for oil pricing... it hurts. But in the long run,
high oil prices will drive all energy thirsty nations such as Japan, China
and the USA, into a surge of alternate sources, some of these are free.
Such as solar and wind power. And automobiles will ultimately turn to hybrid
followed by (God willing) a small, safe hydrogen based fuel system, perhaps
even a fusion engine. Meanwhile, this government of ours must take steps
to reduce the price of energy before it denudes our economy which has been
doing so well in the last 12 months. We've made progress and must not allow
that progress to disappear down the oil drain.
-
- We must stay in Iraq. And the fact of the comments made
by Mr. Arnold both confuse and upset this writer. What must be obvious,
what _should_ be obvious, is not. At least not to Arnold. And that's pretty
scary.
-
- So what are we reading here? Another political lie from
Libs? Or a man who is on the verge of losing his mind to the same source?
-
- Makes me wonder.
-
- How about you?
-
- Jim Mortellaro
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