The inaugural speech: a rebuttal

There is no freedom at the barrel of a gun, Mr. President. Just as we could not force the Vietnamese into accepting our brand of liberty, so too are we seeing the results of the shoot first, think later (never?) policy of this administration. And now Condi, one of the architects of this debacle, is the diplomatic face of our nation. That should help alot in the nation building phase of this operation. So, while we train a defacto Shi'ite Army of Southern Iraq (>60% Shi'ite with no Sunni senior officers) that will lead the opposition against their former Sunni masters when the US pulls out, we wait to see what post election Iraq will look like.

We'll be asked to leave (see post of Jan. 4), so we can declare victory and come home. I mean, they voted, right? So we've helped spread Democracy to one of the most troubled areas on the globe and overthrown an evil-doer and, gee-whiz didn't we do good? And we will try to gloss over the fact that the new killing fields and torture rooms of Iraq are being run by the "security" troops that we trained and armed. And anyway, shit happens, right Rummy? Bush will say that those that resist "hate freedom" and not mention the messy details of the genocide and civil war that was our gift to the Iraqi people.

But I think there is one group that may benefit from the descent into chaos. The Kurds have several advantages: they already have a well armed fighting force (Peshmurga, anyone?); they live in a defensive mountainous region; they have an independent, functioning infrastructure; and they hold the key to the stability of the parliament(Kurd and Shi'ite cohesion can give at least the illusion of statehood). Because of this, they have several intriguing options- stay in the government and broker the strongest deal for an autonomous region that they can. Or they can wait for chaos to descend and declare statehood. With the Shiah and Sunni at each others throats, who could stop them?

Well, Turkey, Syria and Iran might give it a try. And while we have little compassion for Syria and Iran's Kurdish problems, we have promised Turkey over and over that we would never support a Kurdish state. Will we keep our word and undermine the only region of Iraq (and indeed the entire Middle East) that has a chance at becoming a true Western- style democracy? Or will we risk further alienating Turkey and peeling her away from NATO and back into her fundamentalist brothers arms? What will we do when the tanks roll in from Eastern Turkey and attempt to crush our best allies in Iraq? Won't it be fun to find out?