"Here's Everything Wrong With the White House's War on the Islamic State"/Nation Institute

(Article a is long read and it was hard to give a sense of it without Generous Snips. However the author did said to "Share With Everyone"-- Whole thing is a Great Read for the History of how we got to this current situation with ISIS.)

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Sunday, 05 October 2014 15:32

Here's Everything Wrong With the White House's War on the Islamic State

by Peter Certo, Foreign Policy in Focus

This article is a joint publication of Foreign Policy In Focus and TheNation.com.

If Barack Obama owes his presidency to one thing, it was the good sense he had back in 2002 to call George W. Bush's plans to go to war in Iraq what they were: "dumb." (The war was many other things too—illegal, cynical, not to mention disastrous—but "dumb" was pretty good for a guy running for Senate back when both parties had largely lined up behind the war.)

Since then, Obama's had his ups and downs with the antiwar voters who delivered his 2008 nomination and subsequent election. But throughout the arguments over drones, Afghanistan, Libya, and NSA spying—among other issues—Obama could always come back to these voters and say: Hey, at least I ended the war in Iraq. What do you think the Republicans would have done?

But now, with scarcely a whisper of serious debate, Obama has become the fourth consecutive U.S. president to launch a war in Iraq—and in fact has outdone his predecessors by spreading the war to Syria as well, launching strikes not only on fighters linked to the Islamic State (IS, or ISIS) but also on the al-Qaeda-linked al-Nusra Front and al-Khorasan.

This was no minor escalation. According to the Washington Post, the United States and its Arab allies dropped more explosives on Syria in their first engagement there than U.S. forces had dropped over all of Iraq in the preceding month. It was the largest single U.S. military operation since NATO's intervention in Libya was launched back in 2011.

War planners are predicting that the latest conflict could rage for three years or longer, meaning Obama will bequeath to his successor a quagmire much like the one he inherited—the one he'd so distinguished himself by opposing and subsequently ending. That'll make five U.S. presidents at war in Iraq and beyond in a row.

Polls show some significant public support for air strikes against IS, albeit alongside ample wariness about getting dragged in too far. Support for action against IS is easy enough to understand: Many fair-minded people otherwise weary of war in the Middle East are appalled by the brutality of IS and feel compelled to "do something" to stop them.

And we should do something. But not this.

We'll come to regret this war, potentially long before it's had three years to run its course. Here's why.

This war is illegal.

Continued ......(Great Background History Read on Events Up to Now)
http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/26641-here-s-everything-wrong-with-the-white-house-s-war-on-the-islamic-state

There are other options.

War, in short, is a terrible option.

But the fact remains that IS is a determined and brutal threat to millions of people on both sides of the Iraqi-Syrian border (and beyond, if you believe the ambitions expressed in some of its more fanciful maps). And given IS' origins in al-Qaeda in Iraq—a group born and nourished in the chaotic years following the U.S. invasion—the United States bears no small share of responsibility for the current state of affairs. That means Washington should shoulder some of the responsibility for fixing it.

There's plenty that the United States can do to weaken IS on the more technocratic front. To start, it can freeze the bank accounts of IS' funders, negotiate partnerships with villages where oil pipelines run to cut IS' oil revenues, and work with partners in Europe and Turkey to stem the flow of Western fighters into the conflict. The U.S. should also dramatically increase its support for the United Nations' badly underfunded humanitarian assistance programs in Syria, and send support to neighboring countries like Jordan, Lebanon, and Turkey that have absorbed millions of refugees.

More fundamentally, the White House must recognize that IS flourishes not simply because of its resources—and much less on account of its ideological appeal—but because of political breakdown on both sides of the Iraqi-Syrian border.

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The answer, then, is political. But the current campaign of airstrikes and arms peddling threatens to deepen the political crises in Iraq and Syria, not resolve them. Instead, the Obama administration should work to ameliorate political conditions on each side of the border.

In Syria, it should convene rebel groups, the regime, civil society activists, and regional players like Turkey, Iran, Russia, and the Gulf States to restart negotiations for a political solution to the war. If there's a silver lining to these latest airstrikes, it's that the administration can use them as leverage to get Assad and the rebels to the table.

In Iraq, it should condition all further assistance on the development of a more inclusive political order that protects the country's minorities—not just smaller groups threatened by IS like Christians, Turkmen, and Yazidis, but also the country's millions of Sunnis. The administration could also link its nuclear negotiations with Iran to the political crisis in Iraq—quietly exploring, for example, an agreement to allow Iran to enrich more uranium for peaceful nuclear power generation in exchange for a pledge from Tehran to rein in the Iranian-backed militias most likely to sow sectarian discord in Iraq.

These are tall orders, and they're unlikely to see quick results even if pursued aggressively. But given the horrendous legacy of U.S. wars in the region—and not to mention America's failure to destroy even a single terrorist group after over a decade of continuous military mobilization—diplomacy is a much better option than the guaranteed failure we're currently embarked on.

It's not too late to change course.

Obama and his military planners have announced that they expect this new war to last for years. But that's assuming Congress authorizes it.

Support for some kind action is quite broad in Congress, especially among party leaders. But as Frank Rich has observed, this support is about "an inch deep." Few members are willing to vote on a protracted new war before a contested midterm election. They may take the issue up after the election if the war doesn't look too disastrous yet, but that gives opponents of the conflict plenty of time to organize against it before a vote is held.

Arguing that some kind of authorization is inevitable, groups like the Congressional Progressive Caucus have focused their efforts on pushing a resolution that restricts the scope of the conflict while still permitting strikes on IS. Others, like Just Foreign Policy, have organized petitions urging a firm "no" vote on any kind of authorization whatsoever.

Personally I favor the latter approach—I don't think this poorly considered war deserves a congressional vote of confidence, much less domestic legal authorization. If the last time the U.S. was on the edge of the abyss in Syria—when public opinion was much more resolutely opposed to intervention than it is now—is any indication, a vote could potentially be avoided altogether if it looks doomed to fail. Last year, the Obama administration resigned itself to jettisoning its war plans and pursuing a diplomatic track to dispose of Assad's declared chemical weapons arsenal, illustrating the power of organizing to avert a war even when it enjoys widespread elite support.

It's not yet too late to educate your friends, neighbors, and lawmakers about the pitfalls of this new war and the availability of alternatives—you can send them this article, or one of many others like it, and find local groups in your community organizing against military intervention.

Maybe you'll launch the career of the next rising star to recognize a "dumb war" before it's fashionable.

This article is a joint publication of Foreign Policy In Focus and TheNation.com.
http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/26641-here-s-everything-wrong-with-the-white-house-s-war-on-the-islamic-state