{"id":292,"date":"2007-05-16T10:00:19","date_gmt":"2007-05-16T15:00:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/?p=292"},"modified":"2007-05-16T14:36:35","modified_gmt":"2007-05-16T19:36:35","slug":"dreyfuss-learning-to-love-the-neocons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/?p=292","title":{"rendered":"Dreyfuss: Learning to Love the Neocons?"},"content":{"rendered":"
The Left has lots of ways of tal<\/title>The Left has lots of ways of talking about what is “wrong” with the Iraq war.\u00c2\u00a0 Some are likely to endure more than others.<\/p>\n<p>There are claims, for example, that the invasion was <em>morally<\/em> wrong (an oil grab, an imperialist imposition, etc.).<\/p>\n<p>There are also claims that that the invasion was <em>strategically<\/em> wrong (the Neocons were incompetent, naive, ideological).<\/p>\n<p>Debate among those who make arguments about strategic calculations turn on a few major issues.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The Sunni Insurgency<\/strong>:<\/p>\n<p>Neocons arguably failed to anticipate the Sunni insurgency.<\/p>\n<p>Cheney <a href=\"http:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/news\/releases\/2006\/06\/20060619-10.html\"> conceded that point<\/a> back in June 2006.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Q Do you think that you underestimated the insurgency’s strength?<\/p>\n<p>THE VICE PRESIDENT: I think so.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Of course, Cheney has taken heat for adding, “I don’t think anybody anticipated the level of violence that we’ve encountered.”\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2006\/US\/09\/28\/rumsfeld.profile\/\">Rumsfeld, too<\/a>, suggested that nobody anticipated the insurgency’s strength.\u00c2\u00a0 This is <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2004\/09\/28\/politics\/28intel.html?ex=1254110400&en=a050dbd7b0b3d5bc&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt\"> nonsense<\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 Cheney and Rumsfeld chose to discount the threat of the insurgency.<\/p>\n<p>One might even predict that the greater “wrong” here is not strategic but<em> “<\/em>moral.”<\/p>\n<p>What if Cheney and Rumsfeld <em>did<\/em> anticipate a Sunni insurgency but thought that the US could “<a href=\"http:\/\/www.leadercall.com\/cnhi\/leadercall\/opinion\/local_story_134091930.html?keyword=topstory\">win dirty<\/a>” by allowing Shiites and Kurds to “cleanse” Iraq of Sunni resistance?<\/p>\n<p>Remember <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2003\/US\/04\/11\/sprj.irq.pentagon\/\"> Rumsfeld<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Freedom’s untidy, and free people are free to make mistakes and commit \tcrimes and do bad things.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Wasn’t Rumsfeld already talking about winning dirty?\u00c2\u00a0 His Right Zionist allies were always prepared to win dirty.\u00c2\u00a0 Remeber Reuel Marc Gerecht: “<a href=\"http:\/\/www.weeklystandard.com\/Utilities\/printer_preview.asp?idArticle=4096&R=1137417519\">Who’s Afraid of Abu Ghraib?<\/a>”<\/p>\n<p>Indeed, Right Zionists (<a href=\"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/?p=274\">Fouad Ajami<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/?p=279\">Gerecht<\/a>) are feeling optimistic today precisely because they think the US has already started to win dirty.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Handing Iraq to Iran:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Other critics have suggested that the Neocon incompetence <a href=\"http:\/\/washingtontimes.com\/upi\/20070308-095447-3161r\">handed Iraq to Iran<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The leading “Left” critic on this score has been <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Hostage-Khomeini-Robert-Dreyfuss\/dp\/0933488114\"> long-time Iran hawk<\/a>, Robert Dreyfuss.<\/p>\n<p>Dreyfuss has frequently “exposed” the “<a href=\"http:\/\/robertdreyfuss.com\/blog\/2006\/09\/secrets_of_the_usshiite_allian.html\">Secrets of the US-Shiite Alliance<\/a>” and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.tompaine.com\/articles\/2005\/12\/22\/iraq_game_over.php\"> lamented<\/a> the disastrous creation of “<a href=\"http:\/\/robertdreyfuss.com\/blog\/2006\/02\/irans_iraq.html\">Iran’s Iraq<\/a>.”\u00c2\u00a0 He has also penned <a href=\"http:\/\/www.tompaine.com\/articles\/2006\/12\/04\/bushs_meeting_with_a_murderer.php\"> vicious attacks on Iraq’s leading Shiite political figures<\/a>, denounced “<a href=\"http:\/\/robertdreyfuss.com\/blog\/2005\/12\/bushs_shiite_gang_in_iraq.html\">Bush’s Shiite Gang in Iraq<\/a>“:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>So the question is: when will [we] hear the Bush administration’s top \tofficials start calling the Shiite fundamentalist regime in Baghdad “Islamofascists”? \tSo far, they’s applied that term only to the Iraqi resistance, tarring the \tSunni-led insurgency by painting them as led by Al Qaeda-style terrorists, \twhen in fact that they are mostly Iraqi nationalists, Baathists, and \tex-military men. Their main grievance is that the United States is handing \tIraq over to Iran. I’d say they’re right.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Now, however, he seems to be changing his tune.\u00c2\u00a0 The change does not appear to be based on a reconsideration of the <em>morality<\/em> of playing the “<a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Devils-Game-Unleash-Fundamentalist-American\/dp\/0805076522\">Devil’s Game<\/a>” so much as a reconsideration of the <em>strategic<\/em> viability of the same Neocon strategy I discussed in my article, “<a href=\"http:\/\/www.zmag.org\/content\/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=10185\">Beyond Incompetence: Washington’s War in Iraq<\/a>.”<\/p>\n<p>The Dreyfuss reversal is a blog post entitled, “<a href=\"http:\/\/robertdreyfuss.com\/blog\/2007\/05\/iraqs_influence_in_iran.html\">Iraq’s Influence in Iran<\/a>.”<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Before the war in 2003, the neocons’ fervent hope was that Najaf, the \tIraqi holy city, would rise to eclipse Qom, the Iranian clerical center, \thelping to undermine the rule of the ayatollahs in Tehran. Since then, \tIran’s influence in Iraq has appeared far greater than vice versa. But a <em> \tBoston Globe <\/em> \t<a href=\"http:\/\/www.boston.com\/news\/world\/middleeast\/articles\/2007\/05\/14\/shiite_cleric_gains_sway_across_border\/\"> \tarticle <\/a>suggests that the effects are being felt both ways….<\/p>\n<p>This is interesting, and deserves further investigation. Certainly, Iraq \tand Iran influence each other, and in many ways. So far, it seems, Iran’s \tinfluence in Iraq is greater than the other way around, although the \tpossibility of clerical opposition to Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, \tis growing. Some of that, at least, could be tied to Iraqi ayatollahs, \tincluding Sistani, in concert with dissident Iranian clerics such as \tAyatollah Hussein Ali Montazeri, who challenged the political theory of the \tIslamic Republic’s founder, Ayatollah Khomeini.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Dreyfuss has penned articles attacking Right Zionists like Michael Ledeen not only on the basis that they were <em>morally<\/em> suspect but also on the basis that they simply had <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thenation.com\/docprint.mhtml?i=20040412&s=dreyfuss\">no idea what they were talking about<\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 Now, Dreyfuss finds the consequences of Ledeen’s war in Iraq “interesting.”<\/p>\n<p>That is a step toward acknowledging that when dealing with Right Zionists, we are in a realm “beyond incompetence.”<\/p>\n<p>As I have <a href=\"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/?p=137\">previously discussed<\/a>, there are critics (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.needlenose.com\/blog\/3\">Swopa<\/a> at Needlenose) who have been utterly dismissive of the notion of tension between Najaf and Qom.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been reading about (and generally \t<a rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"http:\/\/www.needlenose.com\/pMachineFree2.2.1\/weblog.php?id=P602\"> \tsneering at<\/a>) this Qom-Najaf stuff since the fall of 2003. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve seen very \tlittle evidence of it being true. Sistani and the Iranians may have their \tdifferences, but they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll work them out after the Shiite parties have \tcemented their control over Iraq, not before.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Juan Cole’s interpretation of this issue has always left me confused.\u00c2\u00a0 On the one hand, Cole wrote a July 2005 article in <em>Salon<\/em> entitled, “<a href=\"http:\/\/dir.salon.com\/story\/news\/feature\/2005\/07\/21\/iran\/index_np.html\">The Iraq War is Over, And the Winner Is… Iran<\/a>.”<\/p>\n<p>On the other hand, I have also <a href=\"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/?p=52\">previously noted<\/a> that Cole’s <em>adamant<\/em> insistence (in agreement with Right Zionist strategists) that Grand Ayatollah Sistani is <em>not<\/em> close to the regime in Iran.\u00c2\u00a0 Indeed, when Professor Cole listed his <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.juancole.com\/2005\/12\/top-ten-myths-about-iraq-in-2005-iraq.html\"> <strong>Top Ten Myths about Iraq in 2005<\/strong><\/a><strong>, <\/strong>number five was as follows:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>5. <strong>Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, born in Iran in 1930, is close to \tthe Iranian regime in Tehran<\/strong> Sistani, the spiritual leader of \tIraq\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s majority Shiite community, is an almost lifetime expatriate. He came \tto Iraq late in 1951, and is far more Iraqi than Arnold Schwarzenegger is \tCalifornian. Sistani was a disciple of Grand Ayatollah Burujirdi in Iran, \twho argued against clerical involvement in day to day politics. <strong> \tSistani rejects Khomeinism<\/strong>, and would be in jail if he were living \tin Iran, as a result. <strong>He has been implicitly critical of Iran\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s poor \thuman rights record, and has himself spoken eloquently in favor of democracy \tand pluralism<\/strong>. Ma\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d Fayyad reported in <em>Al-Sharq al-Awsat<\/em> \tin August of 2004 that when Sistani had heart problems, an Iranian \trepresentative in Najaf visited him. He offered Sistani the best health care \tTehran hospitals could provide, and asked if he could do anything for the \tgrand ayatollah. Sistani is said to have responded that what Iran could do \tfor Iraq was to avoid intervening in its internal affairs. And then Sistani \tflew off to London for his operation, an obvious slap in the face to Iran\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \tSupreme Jurisprudent Ali Khamenei.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Am I alone in being amazed that four years after the US invasion of Iraq there has never been a full airing of this issue, even among Left critics of the war?<\/p>\n<p>If, as Dreyfuss suggests, there might prove to be something “interesting” about the strategic consequences of the US invasion of Iraq, then Left “critics” might at some point contemplate abandoning their posts as armchair imperial strategists and find a different <em>anti-imperialist<\/em> basis for opposing the US war in Iraq.<\/p>\n<blockquote><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Left has lots of ways of talThe Left has lots of ways of talking about what is “wrong” with the Iraq war.\u00c2\u00a0 Some are likely to endure more than others. There are claims, for example, that the invasion was morally wrong (an oil grab, an imperialist imposition, etc.). There are also claims that that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6,3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=292"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}