[Texgreen] Secret plan to get out of Iraq

[Roger Baker]

<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tom-hayden/us-retreat-from-iraq-
t_b_34675.html>


TOM HAYDEN

11.21.2006
U.S. Retreat from Iraq? The Secret Story (98 comments )
READ MORE: Iraq, 2006, New York Times, CIA, Cindy Sheehan, Saddam
Hussein, George W. Bush
Special to the Huffington Post

According to credible Iraqi sources in London and Amman, a secret
story of America's diplomatic exit strategy from Iraq is rapidly
unfolding. The key events include:

First, James Baker told one of Saddam Hussein's lawyers that Tariq
Aziz, former deputy prime minister, would be released from detention
by the end of this year, in hope that he will negotiate with the US
on behalf of the Baath Party leadership.


The discussion recently took place in Amman, according to the Iraqi
paper al-Quds al-Arabi.

Second, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice personally appealed to the
Gulf Cooperation Council in October to serve as intermediaries
between the US and armed Sunni resistance groups [not including al
Qaeda], communicating a US willingness to negotiate with them at any
time or place. Speaking in early October, Rice joked that if then-
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld "heard me now, he would wage a
war on me fiercer and hotter than he waged on Iraq," according to an
Arab diplomat privy to the closed session.

Third, there was an "unprecedented" secret meeting of high-level
Americans and representatives of "a primary component of the Iraqi
resistance" two weeks ago, lasting for three days. As a result, the
Iraqis agreed to return to the talks in the next two weeks with a
response for the American side, according to Jordanian press leaks
and al-Quds al-Arabi.

Fourth, detailed email transmissions dated November 16 reveal an
active American effort behind the scenes to broker a peace agreement
with Iraqi resistance leaders, a plot that could include a political
coup against Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.

Fifth, Bush security adviser Stephen Hadley carried a six-point
message for Iraqi officials on his recent trip to Baghdad:

include Iraqi resistance and opposition leaders in any initiative
towards national reconciliation;general amnesty for the armed
resistance fighters;
dissolve the Iraqi commission charged with banning the Baath Party;
start the disbanding of militias and death squads;
cancel any federalism proposal to divide Iraq into three regions, and
combine central authority for the central government with greater
self-rule for local governors;
distribute oil revenues in a fair manner to all Iraqis, including the
Sunnis whose regions lack the resource.
Prime Minister Al-Maliki was unable to accept the American proposals
because of his institutional allegiance to Shiite parties who believe
their historic moment has arrived after one thousand years of Sunni
domination. That Shiite refusal has accelerated secret American
efforts to pressure, re-organize, or remove the elected al-Maliki
regime from power.

The Backstory

Underlying these developments are three American concerns: first, the
deepening quagmire and sectarian strife on the battlefield; second,
the mid-year American elections in which voters repudiated the war;
and third, the strategic concern that the new Iraq has slipped into
the orbit of Iran. It remains to be seen if Iran will exercise
influence on its Shiite allies in Iraq (the Grand Ayatollah Sistani
was born in Iraq, and the main Shiite bloc was created in Iran by
Iraqi exiles). But that is the direction being taken by Baker's Iraq
Study Group and former CIA director John Deutch in a New York Times
op-ed. The principal US track, in addition to a declared withdrawal
plan, should be to work towards a hands-off policy by Iran, at least
for an interval, according to Deutch.

This possible endgame has been in the making for some time. Even two
years ago, US officials were probing contacts with Iraqi resistance
groups distinct from al-Qaeda. Recent polls indicate sixty percent
Iraqi support for armed resistance against the United States, while
approximately eighty percent of Iraqis support some timetable for
withdrawal, an indispensable indicator for Iraqi insurgents laying
down some arms.

Even before the 2003 US invasion, peace groups like Global Exchange
and the newly-forming Code Pink sent delegations to create people-to-
people relations with Iraqi opponents of the occupation and members
of civil society. This writer met with Iraqi exiles in London, who
suggested further meetings in Amman. Those contacts were facilitated
in 2005 by a former Jordanian diplomat, Munther Haddadin, who
supported open-ended discussions with Iraqis in exile, Jordan's Crown
Prince Hassan, and with intermediaries from the insurgency who made
the dangerous 15-hour drive from Baghdad to Amman on more than one
occasion. A reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle, Rob Collier,
also interviewed Iraqi insurgents and was helpful in providing
contacts. Earlier this year, an American peace delegation, including
Cindy Sheehan, found themselves in two days of meetings with Iraqis
of every political stripe. US Congressman Jim McDermott (D-WA) was
crucial in making these contacts by his persistent efforts at mid-
east dialogue. Dal LaMagna, a self-described "frustrated peacemaker"
made both trips to Amman, and provided this writer with videos and
transcripts of the interviews on which this article is based.

It must be emphasized that there is no reason to believe that these
US gestures are anything more than probes, in the historic spirit of
divide-and-conquer, before escalating the Iraq war in a Baghdad
offensive. Denial plausibility - aka Machiavellian secrecy - remains
American security policy, for understandable if undemocratic reasons.

Yet Americans who voted in the November election because of a deep
belief that a change of government in Washington might end the war
have a right to know that their votes counted. The US has not
abandoned its entire strategy in Iraq, but is offering significant
concessions without its own citizens knowing.