{"id":86,"date":"2006-06-20T09:34:01","date_gmt":"2006-06-20T13:34:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/?p=86"},"modified":"2007-02-27T22:22:40","modified_gmt":"2007-02-28T03:22:40","slug":"zarqawi-and-zion-affirmed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/?p=86","title":{"rendered":"All Quiet on the Political Front"},"content":{"rendered":"

Right Arabists (so-called Realists) seem to be calling the shots at every turn and the Sunni Arab politicians in Iraq who tend to yell the loudest at the first sign of a Right Zionist tilt to Bush administration policy continue to be very quiet<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n

The stability of the political process looks impressive, although it will surely be tested by one or more possible scenarios.<\/p>\n

First, the government of national unity would be tested by any serious attempt by US forces to crush the Sunni insurgency, such as the plan that AEIs Frederick Kagan<\/a> presumably offered to President Bush during their recent meeting<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Juan Cole notes something like a news blackout<\/a> on allegedly massive counter-insurgency operations in Baghdad and Ramadi right now. According to a New York Times<\/em> report<\/a>, US military officials deny that a Falluja-style assault is in the works.<\/p>\n

Some Sunni Arab leaders have said they are worried that American forces may be preparing an offensive in Ramadi<\/strong> meant to wipe out the insurgent groups that have taken control of much of the city, similar to the November 2004 assault on Falluja by the Marines<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

An American military official in Baghdad said on Sunday that no such offensive was planned. “We’re trying to separate the insurgents from the rest of the people,” the official said. “There are a lot of rumors flying around that people think it’s another Falluja. It’s not<\/strong>.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

One reason to believe these reports: Sunni Arab political leaders are, thus far, quiet. It would be difficult for them to remain so in the face of a major assault.<\/p>\n

Second, any attempt to negotiate Constitutional changes will almost certainly re-open the sectarians wounds that have been sutured by the Maliki government.<\/p>\n

Third, the Maliki government could be tested by more sectarian violence or intra-Shiite factionalism in Basra.<\/p>\n

Until then, one cannot fail to notice that Iraqi politics<\/em> look very calm right now. Pretty impressive, given the Haditha revelations<\/a>, etc.<\/p>\n

On Haditha: Funny how quiet imperialism becomes in the US when the Right Arabist political establishment<\/em> has been restored to power and no longer has any use for the anti-war Left. Recall the extraordinary political outcry in 2004 from US political elites<\/a> over Abu Ghraib during the era when Right Zionists were still running the show. Now compare that political storm to the muted themes (“clouds” and “contradictions” seem to be the watchwords at the New York Times<\/em><\/a>) that have accompanied revelations about the Haditha massacre.<\/p>\n

Where is Richard Lugar and his outrage? Silence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Right Arabists (so-called Realists) seem to be calling the shots at every turn and the Sunni Arab politicians in Iraq who tend to yell the loudest at the first sign of a Right Zionist tilt to Bush administration policy continue to be very quiet. The stability of the political process looks impressive, although it will […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7,6,3,9,8],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86"}],"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=86"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=86"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=86"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/profcutler.com\/wordpress_blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=86"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}