Security Agreement Update***
| Sun Oct. 19, 2008 10:23 PM PDT
SECURITY AGREEMENT UPDATE....Negotiations to put in place a long-term security agreement with Iraq aren't going well:
Key members of the Iraqi parliament's largest political bloc have called for all American troops to leave this country in 2011 as a condition for allowing the U.S. military to stay here beyond year's end, officials said Sunday.
The change sought by the influential United Iraqi Alliance would harden the withdrawal date for U.S. troops....The Shiite bloc, which includes Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's Dawa party, also insists that Iraqi officials have a bigger role in determining whether U.S. soldiers accused of wrongdoing are subject to prosecution in Iraqi courts, said Sami al-Askeri, a political adviser to Maliki.
....It was not immediately clear whether the U.S. side would accept the changes to the draft agreement. The document would provide legal authority for American troops to remain in Iraq after a U.N. mandate expires Dec. 31. If there is no accord or other legal cover for U.S. forces, they must leave.
The Bush administration has long resisted setting firm dates for the departure of U.S. troops from Iraq, saying that the decision should be based on security conditions. U.S. authorities ultimately accepted a compromise, which set the 2011 withdrawal date but provided for an extension if Iraq requested one.
Normally, I'd say that this is probably yet another sign of hard bargaining, and in the end an agreement will almost certainly be signed. And that still seems the most likely course to me. On the other hand, the U.S. occupation is unpopular with the Iraqi public, and with elections coming up soon no politician in the country can afford to be seen as soft on the Americans. That's democracy for you. Could be interesting times ahead.
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Comments
Soft on Americans. think about that for a second. a democracy we helped to put in place treats americans just like we seem to treat arabs or muslims. cant be soft on them. does the gop have any idea what they have done to our standing in the world?
The Iraqis appear to be trying really hard not have any dealings with Bush at all.
AND why is Bush so interested anyway since he is headed out the door in couple months? No oil signed either, as if the Iraqis are simply bidding their time until Bushie leaves office, (so beyond Dutch Shell and Hunt oil, Western contractors may not get any contracts).
And we see than is Bush holding the Iraq oil, threaten to take the profits. Maybe the US will start leaving on December 31st. I got no problem with that, as we all know that we've got too many domestic money problems anyway. The whole time Clinton was in office we got oil from OPEC for $ 20.00 a barrel, and drill for new domestic oil because there was not enough money in it.
Of course, than we had 9/11. I think we could move away from fossil fuel all together, Pickens is just setting us up for fossil fuel dependence.
I have an Iraqi neighbor from Baghdad-a Shiite-and I asked him about the American Occupation and whether Iraq has benefited from it. He just shrugged and said Sadaam has killed millions-America just thousands so I guess we aren't as bad as Sadaam! But there is another problem that he won't even talk about-to the Shiite and Sunni, the U.S. soldiers are infidels-non-believers in Muslim Law and tenets and, unlike the U.S., they are extremely serious about their beliefs! The lands will not be cleansed until the U.S. leaves! The people of Iraq want their Nation back and I, for one, want them to have it back! We had no business in "planting a democracy" or "getting exclusive Defense Contracts" and increased Defense Budgets in the first place! Why is Bush interested in staying-Oil, Cheney-Defense Contracts for Haliburton, Pentagon-continued expansion of the U.S. Military Influence!
I think it is not a good-cop bad-cop negotiating strategy, but rather strong differences of Iraqi opinion that is making getting their side to agree on a position so difficult. Dec-31 is some sort of legal deadline, our legal mandate to be there runs out then. I'm sure nearly all Iraqis want us out, some may be more willing than others to extend a bit of leeway in exchange for military protection.
Good. We need to be out of there before 2011. If the Dems are smart, they'll figure out a way to drag this out so nothing is approved prior to Shrubs ignominious exit. The white elephant embassy is bad enough. We don't need to continue spending hundreds of millions a year maintaining any kind of military force there.
Submitted by bob5540 (not verified) on Mon Oct. 20, 2008 9:42 AM PDT.
I believe the Iraqis will stall until 2009. That will put us in an even worse bargaining position. They can then show us the door.
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