Wolf D. Fuhrig

Home

Iraq: To Stay Or Not To Stay?

Since the fall of Baghdad 20 months ago, 982 U.S. soldiers have been killed and over 8,000 wounded, mostly by insurgents. Yet, there is no end in sight to the damage insurgent terror is inflicting upon the occupation forces, the Iraqi people, and the country's productive capacity. The Bush administration seems to be at a loss as to how to deal with terrorist threats that defy traditional military confrontation.

Dreaming that the coalition forces would be greeted as liberators, the President's advisers were not only unprepared to confront hit-and-run guerilla tactics, they were stunned by the extent of the terrorists' manpower, arms supplies, and financial resources. According to last Sunday's New York Times, the U.S. command estimates that the insurgents now control between 8,000 and 12,000 hard-core militants. Worse yet, the coalition leaders do not seem to know most insurgents' identities, military capabilities, and hideouts.

Since the invading forces failed to secure and destroy Iraq's vast supplies of conventional arms and munitions, it came as no surprise when 250,000 tons of unguarded explosives, including warheads as well as anti-tank and anti-personnel mines, were reported missing from the former nuclear site of Al Qaqaa, south of Baghdad. According to Kenneth Roth, the director of Human Rights Watch, the U.S. deployed more than 1,000 people to search for weapons of mass destruction, but "they weren't organized to neutralize the threat of conventional weapons right under their noses."

The Bush administration finds itself trapped in a dilemma of its own making. Last July, the President challenged the Iraqi insurgents when he exclaimed: "Bring them on!" Yet, he forgot to ask himself how even the best equipped soldiers could prevail over unseen attackers striking and disappearing unpredictably any place any time, not only against the occupation forces but also against anybody cooperating with Americans.

The insurgents are clearly on a campaign to intimidate everybody and to undermine public order through random bombings, assassinations, kidnappings, and beheadings. The insurgents' message can hardly be misunderstood: They want all uninvited foreigners out of their country and out of the Middle East.

When the U.S. command orders air and artillery strikes on suspected insurgents' hideouts, collateral damage is often extensive and large numbers of bystanders get killed and maimed. In despair, relatives and friends of the victims cry out against the occupation, often turn more sympathetic and supportive toward the insurgents--some may even decide to actively support or join them.

It is this kind of scenario that kept U.S. commanders from an all-out attack on Fallujah and Ramadi. "If we can't stop the intimidation factor, we can't win," explained Lt. General John Sattler. Sunni clerics are warning that any more American attacks will cause them to call for a boycott of the national elections set for January.

Many of the tens of thousands of unemployed young Iraqis would like to earn an income by joining the American-sponsored police force, but they have ample reason to fear bloody opposition from insurgents. When a unit of 750 Iraqi soldiers was scheduled to join American forces at Samarra, 300 ran away. Nobody knows how many Iraqis would be willing to fight with the occupation forces and their native supporters against the insurgents.

Even the rebuilding of Iraq's infrastructure is being severely crippled by terrorists. Last Tuesday, Reuters reported that saboteurs blew up three pipelines in northern Iraq, sharply curtailing oil exports to Turkey and reducing supplies to the country's biggest refinery at Baiji. It was the biggest single-day assault yet on Iraq's oil industry. Executives told Reuters that "relentless sabotage since the war has cost the treasury billions of dollars in lost revenue."

Many patriotic Americans and most people abroad feel that the U.S. did the Iraqis a distinct service by ridding their country of Saddam Hussein's regime. With this mission accomplished, President Bush now ought to consider what is best for all concerned: Give Iraq back to the Iraqis.

Without a foreign occupation, the insurgents would surely lose their reason to fight and lose whatever sympathy or support they may receive from their countrymen.