War Deadenders Take Hope: The Surge May Not Be Working, But a US-Allawi Coup May Be On Its Way
As we all await the Petraeus Report on the state of the surge, we may also need to be anticipating the Allawi Coup.
I’m talking, of course about Ayad Allawi, longtime C.I.A. asset and former interim prime minister of Iraq. He’s making quite the PR push to get his old job back, penning an op-ed for the Washington Post, hooking up with Wolf Blitzer on Late Edition on Sunday, and even putting the high-powered GOP lobbying firm Barbour Griffith & Rogers on a $300,000 retainer.
It says everything you need to know about who the true power holders in Iraq are that Allawi, who has a “six-point plan” for Iraq that involves replacing the current Prime Minister, is campaigning in Washington — not Baghdad. He clearly knows that despite Bush’s bathetic paeans to Iraqi sovereignty, the real deciders in Iraq are not the Iraqi people, but a few dozen folks in the White House and the Pentagon. They are Allawi’s true constituency.
So where does the White House stand on the idea of Allawi replacing current embattled prime minister Nouri al-Maliki? Well, it depends on whether you think Mitch McConnell was freelancing on Fox News Sunday when he jumped on the bash-Maliki bandwagon, calling the Maliki-led Iraqi government “pretty much a disaster” — or whether you think he was performing his familiar function as White House water carrier.
Could the White House be seeing in the blame-Maliki-for-the-disaster-in-Iraq meme an opportunity replace the sputtering “give the surge a chance” plan with a “give Allawi a chance” plan?
Let’s go to the Blitzer-Allawi interview to see what such a move would mean for the White House.
For starters, Allawi told Blitzer that his “six points call for a full partnership with the United States” and that his “objective is to develop a plan to save Iraq and to save American lives, as well as, of course, Iraqi lives, and to save the American mission in Iraq.” Full Partnership? Save the American mission? Surely, music to the White House’s ears. And it was good of him to toss in those Iraqi lives — of course.
So what would an Allawi takeover mean in terms of U.S. troops remaining in Iraq? “If we talk around the region of two to two-and-a-half years,” Allawi told Blitzer, “I think we are in the right direction.” Who needs Petraeus buying the administration another few months with his report when the Allawi coup can buy them another two-and-a-half years?
And the White House doesn’t have to worry about Allawi knowing his lines — he’s already memorized the playbook. When Blitzer asked him when the United States might be able to start reducing our presence in Iraq, Allawi responded with a Bush classic: “As soon as the Iraqi forces are able to stand on their feet and provide security for the Iraqis I think the draw-down should start.” Ah: When they stand up, we can stand down! Misty water-colored memories. Being away from Iraq so much, I guess Allawi missed all those reports about the repeated failure of Iraqi forces to “stand on their feet.”
So exactly how would an Allawi-for-Maliki switch occur? Allawi says he wants to proceed by “democratic means.” But after being appointed interim prime minister by the U.S.-led coalition in June of 2004, Allawi had six months to campaign before the January 2005 legislative elections. He came in third with 14% of the vote.
When Blitzer asked Allawi who is paying for the $300,000 Barbour Griffith & Rogers lobbying contract, Allawi wouldn’t say. He was only willing to disclose that the “payment is made by an Iraqi person who was a supporter of us, of the INA, of myself, of our program, and he has supported this wholeheartedly, without any strings attached.”
As Spencer Ackerman of TPMmuckracker wrote, perhaps it’s being financed by Allawi’s old buddy Hazem Shaalan, who Allawi appointed as his defense minister. Shaalan is currently fighting charges that he stole $1 billion from the Iraqi defense budget (out of a total of $1.3 billion). That’s some way to endear yourself to the Iraqi people.
Allawi and Shaalan are also closely tied to the Iraqi National Intelligence Service, which is funded and controlled by the C.I.A. and which has been a persistent thorn in relations between the U.S. and Maliki.
Meanwhile, we’ll have to see whether Barbour Griffith & Rogers’ lobbying will be as effective with administration officials as it has been with Washington’s media gatekeepers. Last week, Bush issued a tepid defense of Maliki, saying he is “a good guy, a good man with a difficult job, and I support him.” Hmm, didn’t he say the same thing about Alberto Gonzales? And Don Rumsfeld?
While I was working on this post, I got a call from John Cusack, who had watched Blitzer’s interview with Allawi from Berlin, where he is making a movie. He was stunned by Blitzer’s remark to Allawi, after he had read him Maliki’s quote about Iraq being able to “find friends elsewhere”: “Those words,” Blitzer said, “were seen here in Washington as pretty biting, given the enormous amount of support the United States has provided Iraq over these years.”
“Can you imagine?” Cusack told me. “We invade their country, an invasion that has resulted in over 100,000 — and maybe as many as 650,000 — Iraqi civilians dead; 2 million Iraqis having fled the country, with 1.14 million displaced from their homes within Iraq; and tens of thousands of Iraqis detained — with many of them tortured. After that ‘enormous amount of support,’ Iraqis have the temerity to complain?”
Talk about ingratitude. I bet Allawi would never bite the hand that feeds — and bombs — him.
Arianna Huffington is the editor of The Huffington Post and the author of many books, including her most recent, On ‘Becoming Fearless….in Love, Work and Life‘.
© 2007 The Huffington Post
think it’s about time we rename the Petraeus Report to something a little more appropriate.
it’s already been established that this report will in fact be written by the white house, and will probably have little if anything to do with betrayus other than his name being in the title.
another ploy by bushco to push the blame onto someone else.
if we don’t start calling it precisely what it is, we’ll be lead into yet more screw-ups.
the republicans know the only way to “win” (whatever that is today) is to cheat, and our continual use of the words “petraeus report” helps them in that endeavor.
remember… keywording and sloganeering (9/11, terror, terrorists, fight them over there so we don’t have to fight them here, wmd and the list goes on and on) is how this war began and has managed to continue.
we must be smarter than bumper-sticker politics.
it’s their only play and if we can’t beat that…
the terrorists win.
and maybe as many as 650,000 iraqi civilians dead
that number needs updating. the johns-hopkins study that produced that result was completed more than a year ago and by most accounts (everyone’s but the white house, of course) the latest estimate could more along the lines of a million dead iraqi civilians.
1,000,000 innocent iraqis dead at the hands of a pro-life, compassionate conservative.
well done, indeed.
doesn’t help that their only pro-life when it comes to taking away your rights. but i guess that’s how you play to an audience of gun-totin’ rednecks.
Alawi won’t save them either.
Maliki better hope Bush doesn’t use the tried and true method from Viet Nam days to oust those that won’t do our bidding. ASSASSINATION!
This seems like a very real possibility. Good bye Nouri Al Maliki. An advantage Allawi has is he isn’t as cozy with the Iranians as Maliki is. Maliki will be a goner in weeks, maybe months at most.
“It says everything you need to know about who the true power holders in Iraq are that Allawi, who has a “six-point plan” for Iraq that involves replacing the current Prime Minister, is campaigning in Washington — not Baghdad. He clearly knows that despite Bush’s bathetic paeans to Iraqi sovereignty, the real deciders in Iraq are not the Iraqi people, but a few dozen folks in the White House and the Pentagon. They are Allawi’s true constituency.”
Hardly a surprise since the US investment is great and the Bush plan is to hand control of Iraqi oil to American oil companies. They need someone to rubber stamp the oil law before the US withdraws and the Maliki government seems to be stalling on this. It has to be done quickly before too many Iraqis catch wind of this and protest across the country. Once that is done the real Bush Administration MISSION ACCOMPLISHED banner will truly be realized. Then they can guard American corporate interests from the safety of the largest embassay fortress in the world courtesy of the American taxpayers. (And who really cares about a few dead Iraqis and American soldiers. After all people are too busy shopping to give it much though.)
Quite a coup for the “patriotic” “God Bless America” crowd lead by George Bush and Dick Cheney and their loyal corporate friends. Americans are suckered yet again.
His advantage is he is a thug.
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/07/21/1353247&mode=thread&tid=25
That always works for the US.
I am surprised that there wasn’t a coup by Muqtada al-Sadr while the current Iraqi government was on vacation.
Cool!!! A new CIA-trained leader for Iraq. Problem solved. Mission accomplicated.
The plan for a permanent state of war remains unchanged and our economy LOVES it!!!
Go shopping or back to sleep.
Peace to you and yours.
A coup to overthrow an elected leader doesn’t sound democractic to me.
This is more proof of the lie that says we are there to build democracy.
Maliki can’t get the oil bill passed, so the US imposed benchmark hasn’t been met.
1963 we got Diem asassinated in Vietnam. When will we ever learn.
We’re supposed to be a republic not an empire.
While we are at it - let’s give Alawi a good reliable assistant who will do our bidding - Chalabi, remember our initial choice for leader.
“…and that his “objective is to develop a plan to save Iraq and to save American lives, as well as, of course, Iraqi lives, and to save the American mission in Iraq.”
So we’ve gone from “mission accomplished” to some loyalbushieIraqi promising to save the mission already accomplished. Most excellent.
Are we going to Allawi this? Maybe it’s all Malarki.
LOL rebelnow!!!!
citizen is right. Change the Petraeus Report’s name to the Betrayus Report.
Get the f*** out of Iraq, Bush. That means your invading troops and your trying to direct their government, from signing the US drafted oil agreement to trying to replace their prime minister Malarki with that CIA paid for crony Allawi again. In fact, it’s time for the Iraqis to tell us “Get the hell out of our country”
BAGHDAD, Iraq - U.S. troops raided a Baghdad hotel Tuesday night and detained about 10 people. A U.S.-funded radio station said the group included six members of an Iranian delegation here to negotiate contacts with the Iraqis.
The Iranian Embassy said seven Iranians — an embassy employee and six members of a delegation from Iran’s Electricity Ministry — were staying at the Sheraton Ishtar Hotel, which American forces entered late Tuesday.
Videotape shot by Associated Press Television News showed the Americans leading about 10 men, blindfolded and handcuffed, out of the hotel in central Baghdad.
Other U.S. soldiers left the hotel carrying what appeared to be luggage and at least one briefcase and a laptop computer bag.
U.S. military spokesman Lt. Col. Christopher Garver declined to comment, saying the action was part of an ongoing operation.
The Web site of Radio Sawa, an Arabic language station financed by the United States, said the Iranian delegation was in Baghdad to negotiate contracts on electric power stations. The report said the Iranians were detained and taken to an unknown location.
An Iranian diplomat told The Associated Press that the Iranian Embassy had notified Iraqi authorities about the Radio Sawa report. The diplomat refused to give his name.
Tension between the United States and Iran is running high, with the Americans accusing Tehran of arming Shiite militias in Iraq, a charge the Iranians deny.
since when do “terrorists” stay in downtown Baghdad hotels? I guess there crime in daring to step onto Haliburtons turf
I imagine that Maliki will not receive as gentle a detainment
What will become of the US “benchmark” - the surrender of Iraqi oil under contracts. You can bet CIA Allawi will hand the US that on a plate. And once he does, then Iraqi hearts and minds will turn against him. They know that the oil is theirs by right. No major Iraqi faction will co-operate with Allawi. If anything, the war will escalate one more notch.
Also, the US will have replaced the “democratically” elected prime minister more than once. Oh yes - very democratic! All the rhetoric about having invading, occupying and slaughtering to impose democracy is going to look very shabby indeed.
On a related note, the arrogance of Carl Levin and Hilary Clinton in calling for Maliki’s ouster is breathtaking. Aren’t we supposed to at least pretend that Maliki was democratically elected, and that we’re the side in favor of democracy? Our political thugs are getting rather crude lately, even the ones from the Democratic party.
Sounds like Vietnam all over again, when we were deposing, sometimes assassinating, our figureheads on a regular basis and replacing them with new ones. And the outcomes aill be the same.
except in Vietnam, AIPAC wasn’t pulling the strings.
curmudgeon99 and thomas j hussey,
That was my initial impression too. This eery pattern looks all too familiar: Vietnam.
Allawi has a 6 figure plan (daily), not a 6 point plan
Regime change, again?
For those interested in a psychological analysis of warmongering, I have recently completed a 10-minute online video entitled “Resisting the Drums of War.” It examines how the Bush administration has promoted the misguided and destructive war in Iraq by targeting five core concerns that often govern our lives–concerns about vulnerability, injustice, distrust, superiority, and helplessness. Looking ahead, the continuing occupation of Iraq–or an attack on Iran–will likely be sold to us in much the same way. The video examines these warmongering appeals and how to counter them. It’s available for viewing HERE.
Thanks for posting that article, canuckchuck, @ 4:39 pm. But I think you can take the term “terrorists” out of quotation marks. These nefarious Iranians, after all, were apparently plotting to rebuild Iraq’s electrical grid, thereby completely discrediting US reconstruction efforts. A frightening prospect, demanding swift, pre-emptive action.
Thank you Dr. Eidelson. I also viewed your other excellent presentation, “Dangerous Ideas — How Conservatives Exploit our Five Core Concerns”.
As the Bush administration prepares for yet another unprovoked and illegal aggression against another country, I hope that the American people, this time, are more critical of the propaganda the government unleashes through the corporate mass media, predominately Fox News. As we all know, the drums of war and the saber-rattling have already begun. Bush is currently on his PR tour speaking to allied audiences, in preparation for the soon-to-be-released Petraeus Report (”Betray Us” Report). I suspect, if enough support or at least compliance from the American people is perceived, the PR tour will be ratcheted-up in the following months in preparation for an eventual Iran “misadventure”.
“Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.”
Thank you again for your support.