Opinion (Christopher Dickey): Closer to the Abyss

The Iraq Study Group

Dec. 6, 2006 - On this the day of the Grand Plan, such as it is, let’s dream that a year from now there are a new set of givens in the Middle East growing out of the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group: the United States, working with the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, has trained up an efficient military and police force. Baghdad is secure. Tens of thousands of American ground combat forces are on their way home. (Many tens of thousands more remain for air-to-ground combat, intelligence, logistics, training, advising, embedding and such.)

Meanwhile, the Palestinians and Israelis, prodded by Washington, are moving ahead toward a resolution of the issue that has bled the region like an ulcer for more than 50 years. Damascus is tilting away from Tehran and democracy is allowed to flourish once more in Lebanon. We’re still spending more than $2 billion a week on the Iraq adventure, but there seems to be an end in sight.

Another possible improvement that Study Group co-chairman James Baker probably has in the back of his mind, if not in his report: a year from now Saudi Arabia will have ramped up its oil production considerably. Once again, as in the 1990s, it may have the spare capacity to turn on the pumps at will, driving global prices down in coordination with U.S. policy. If it does, it could starve Iran of the money the mullahs need to fuel their plans for regional dominance and nuclear development.

All that might happen … But, no, I don’t think it will. Much more likely is that our dreams in the Middle East a year from now, like this year, last year and the year before, will be nightmares. And that’s true even if by then we’re “winning.”

Every day we move closer to the edge of a humanitarian abyss. Think the Balkans, Rwanda or Darfur, but with this grim difference: the United States won’t be able to stand back from the slaughter and wring its hands in Iraq. It is implicated up to its elbows already, and there’s more to come. Attempts to hold Iraq together by political compromise have failed. If the Americans stay there in any way, shape or form, they’re going to have to choose sides, backing Iraqi “friends” who will do whatever they think is necessary to impose order.

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