If The Iraqi Government Falls

07/26/2007

Paul Munnis


We need to spend a few minutes considering the political situation in Iraq. Indeed the Iraq government is a shadow of its former elected self and is on the verge of collapse. Few doubt anymore that the government represents the Iraqi people and we all know it is too unsafe to hold an election in the midst of a civil war. So a vacuum will be created if the Iraqi government collapses.

Yesterday, when the Sunni Bloc walked out of the Iraqi Parliament many say it sounded the death knell for the Iraqi government. I don’t know if that’s true or not but I think we need to ask ourselves how we would fill the vacuum if collapse occurs?

As best as I can understand it the occupying country, that’s us, becomes responsible for the health, education, and welfare of the Iraqi people. We become responsible for the peace, safety, and domestic tranquility in Iraq. We will also be responsible for controlling crime, corruption, and maintaining proper law and order. Great Britain has pulled out and is now downsizing in Iraq. They are getting out fast. That leaves us holding the bag.

As long as the al Maliki government existed, they were responsible for these things, but if it folds then America will find itself bogged down in Iraq for a long-time and our first task will be to end civil war in Iraq. To do that we will need to install an occupation government and the last time we tried to do that, using Paul Bremmer, it was a major disaster.

So the first idea we will have to get used to is that if the al Maliki government collapses then we will need to keep large numbers of combat troops deployed in Iraq. They will need bases to operate out of.

The second issue that we will inherit the largest welfare caseload of any nation in the world. All of these people will need food, water, shelter, education, jobs, and livelihoods plus medicine and vaccines and hospitals and doctors. Remember that most of the skilled people have left Iraq as refugees and they now live elsewhere.

The third issue for us is the notion of sacrifice here at home. For example, instead of putting healthcare in place for Americans we will have to put healthcare in place for Iraqi’s. We also may need to institute a draft once again. Instead of the Iraq War costing us $12 Billion per month the bill could double. To pay for it a major tax hit would be needed.

We could go on with this but now that we have raised the subject I am sure you get the picture.

It is for this reason that many Americans want us to get out of Iraq while we still can and they want immediate withdrawal now. If the al Maliki government falls then we will have one heck of a mess on our hands.

Likely here at home the American people would demand the resignation of the Bush Administration but it isn’t clear we would get that and in a sense the Gonzales case is a test case. He refuses to resign and ousting him is proving problematic. We could have that problem with many of these Administrative people. They would ignore subpoenas and Congressional orders too. They would say they are a government under siege and they need to exercise Executive Power to keep the government running.They are busy now issuing Executive Orders making that possible.

If we do manage to oust them then we would put in an interim President, most likely Nancy Pelosi, and she would need to do a wholesale house cleaning. She would also need to rapidly fill posts and positions and these people would need to hit the ground on the run and perform superbly.

Democrats would thus inherit the whole Iraqi mess and not be able to walk away from it.

The UN lacks motivation to come in and pick up the pieces and run Iraq. Some sort of diplomatic solutions (plural) would be needed. Likely we would end up forming three states (Shiite, Sunni, and Kurd) and installing three governments. We would have to crank up oil production to generate quick cash to pay for the mess. We would need all the contractors we have and more. The best diplomatic team in the history of our nation would be required to establish a workable situation in the mid-east. We would need more boots on the ground.

When Bush says it would bring chaos to America it is true. It would bring political chaos to America at a time when we don’t need it. Bush has put America into a very bad position now, a very dangerous one. He has a penchant for lying but he is promising us chaos if he is forced to pull out and we are facing chaos if he remains. In either case -- chaos likely lies ahead. We need to carefully pick out what we want to do.

In my opinion the outlook is grim.