Washblog

Truthdig.com: Petraeus! Is Baghdad Burning?

Posted on January 12, 2007
By Stan Goff

Editor's note: In this piece, a retired U.S. Special Forces soldier takes an oil-filtered look at Bush's "surge" plan for Iraq.

    "Jodl!  Is Paris burning?"
    --Adolf Hitler, Aug. 25, 1944

[Excerpts & my commentary. Arthur]

... The other thing we need oil for is food ... more than people realize.  In Michael Pollan's "The Omnivore's Dilemma," he traces the U.S. food chain back to the oil fields through corn, which is now the basis of most of our other foods, then back to the oil field.  It is widely known that each calorie of food consumed in the world today represents an expenditure of 10 calories of fossil energy, but Pollan's remarks while observing a cattle feed lot, where the beef-on-the-hoof was being force-fed corn produced by Cargill and Archer,Daniels Midland, are more to the point than any statistical review:

... The reason I lead into a discussion of the Bush administration's military "surge" plan for Iraq by talking about fossil fuels is that neither the government nor the media seem inclined to talk about the subject.

I've read quite a bit about peak oil and have respect for the concept. However, I was not in the mood for more peak oil when I started this article. Stan Goff has more than a peak oil on his mind here and I was not disappointed as I continued.

The Hydrocarbon Law

... The desperation of the coming escalation of criminal lunacy is based not on some fantasy but on a real and coming competition between the U.S. and basically everyone else for these energy stores, even as most honest experts agree that world production of oil has now peaked and will begin an inexorable and irreversible decline.  The reason for attempting to implant permanent U.S. military bases in the Persian Gulf area and install compliant governments (the real reason for the war from the very beginning) has everything to do with securing control over the region.

- The surge plan is a painfully twisted military option, but what is twisting it is not well understood.  Stability in Iraq could be achieved relatively easily, even now, in conjunction with a precipitous redeployment of Anglo-American military forces.  The strange attractor --strange mostly because the media never mention it--is Iraq's "first postwar draft hydrocarbon law," which would "set up a committee consisting of highly qualified experts to speed up the process of issuing tenders and signing contracts with international oil companies to develop Iraq's untapped oilfields."

This law, which is tantamount to privatization with an Anglo-American franchise in perpetuity, is the bottom line for the U.S., as evidenced by the fact that this is the one, absolute, bottom-line point of agreement between the Bush administration and the so-called Iraq Study Group.  

The rhetorical scuffle between these two entities is not the what, but the how.

...When the situation is looked at in this way, we can bypass all the chatter from government and media mystigogues about regional stability for the sake of the people, democracy, terrorism, et cetera.  These rhetorical smoke screens are concealing two inescapable facts:  (1) The U.S. has lost the Iraq war and (2) the best retrenchment position possible now is to salvage the draft hydrocarbon law.

Okay conspiracy buffs ... it is about the oil. So how desperately determined or determinedly desperate are Bush and Cheney?

Whose oil is it?

And what could B&C do with a new embassy complex  the size of Rhode Island and the 14 permanent bases in Iraq if Bush pretends that it's only a matter of more time befeore he goes along and withdraws our sons and daughters?

The Shiite leader who has most vehemently opposed this law, and the U.S. occupation, has been Muqtada al-Sadr.  The press has frequently portrayed Sadr as pro-Iranian, and nothing could be further from the truth.

... Sadr has called for Iraqi unification, left the door open to Sunnis for an anti-occupation alliance, denounced the hydrocarbon law, and modeled his political and military leadership on Hezbollah.

Here is where we come to the nub of The Surge, and why it is probably the political death knell of Nouri al-Maliki.  The principle aim of The Surge is to break the power of Muqtada al-Sadr.  

Sadr not only has the seats in the Potemkin parliament of Iraq that put Maliki (a leader in a relatively small Shiite party, the Dawa) into power against the SCIRI (the largest parliamentary faction); he commands the ferocious loyalty of two and a half million people and has an 80,000-strong militia concentrated a stone's throw from the U.S.-protected Green Zone in Baghdad.  

Baghdad has about 6 million people;
New York City has 8 million, just by way of comparison.  
The population of Sadr City, the "neighborhood" under the leadership of Sadr, is approximately that of Brooklyn.

My perception of Al Sadr - given me by media - is essentially that he is nothing more than a holy man subordinate to a holier man named Al Sistani;

that he's an overly zealous and loyal Shiite lieutenant who's run amok and needs to be restrained by somebody else now that his superior has washed his hands of the whole thing.

And if Al Sadr is such a small timer, why is there a Brooklyn-sized "neighborhood" named Sadr City?

I think we misunderstand and make assumptions based on information failure at the hands of media.

What's with Al Sadr and Maliki?

... the Maliki government--or any other government that relies on U.S. military protection to survive for a week -- commands the loyalty of only a fraction of the armed actors in Iraq, and it positions itself tactically against most other armed actors.  

The armed forces being trained for that "government" are themselves loyal to factions with agendas, and these forces are filled with opportunists and infiltrators.

... In light of those realities there is no possibility of one faction gaining the acquiescence of the whole Iraqi population and the various armed expressions of populations.

The Bush surge plan is designed to eliminate Maliki's Shiite opposition inside Baghdad, i.e., Sadr and his Mahdi Army.

What is magical about 21,500 soldiers and a surge of that specific size?

...While the U.S. gross troop numbers are about 130,000 (with around 25,000 mercenaries as an augmentative force), the actual number of combat troops is about 70,000.  Before we can begin to subdivide these forces for any possible operation to slaughter and raze Sadr City, we have to account for basic operations and force protection at nine major  permanent U.S. bases across Iraq, at least five large contingency bases, and an unknown number of smaller forward operating bases.  Camp Anaconda in Balad alone has at least 25,000 troops.

...The Surge would inject fewer troops than are required to maintain one "camp." If the entire surge figure of 21,400 troops is compared with the number of hostile residents in Sadr City, the ratio is about 112 hostiles for every American.

This can mean only one thing: airstrikes, followed by a ruthless house-to-house slaughter.  

Sadr City is targeted to be the next Fallujah.

For those who are susceptible to the personification of war, that is, the reduction of whole populations to a single leader--as in, "we are going to take out Saddam"

--I will remind readers that Sadr City is half men and half women, with 40 percent of the population under 14 years of age.  

A million children.  

Sadr City is approximately 33 million square feet.  That is a population density of one child per 33 square feet--less than a 6-foot-by-6-foot room.  

The very smallest lethality radius from so-called precision weapons delivered by aircraft is about 20 meters.  

Even the humble infantry grenade launcher fires an M406, characterized this way in the manual:

    The HE [high-explosive] round has an olive drab aluminum skirt with a steel projectile attached, gold markings, and a yellow tip. It arms between 14 and 27 meters, produces a ground burst that causes casualties within a 130-meter radius, and has a kill radius of 5 meters.

Do the math.

In Fallujah, a mass evacuation was organized before the general assault on the city.  The mandatory mass evacuation went through checkpoints in the American cordon sanitaire.

While women and children and very old people were allowed out, all "military-aged males" were turned back into the city, which, once the assault started, became a free-fire zone, and those men were dealt with like the Jews of Warsaw.  

Thousands of people refused to evacuate for a variety of reasons. They were subsequently caught up in the general slaughter.  This is the likely operational template for Sadr City.

Think about this if you will, as if your child, your spouse, your beloved family member or friend were someone like our good Lt. Watada up the road facing court martial for declaring the war illegal and refusing to lead men in a criminal enterprise.

The Other Math

There is another calculation associated with these kinds of "surge" operations: the aftermath.  

Muqtada al-Sadr has been effectively demonized in the U.S., but he is wildly popular and influential in Iraq, especially in southeastern Iraq, which has heretofore shown the least resistance to the Anglo-American occupation.

In an attack on Sadr City, according to powerful rumors, Kurdish peshmerga troops will be used to do some of the fighting, an insane political gambit.

If the Americans proceed with what appears to be a cruel and mindless plan (surely emanating from Dick Cheney's lair) there will be a possibility of igniting the Mother of All Tactical Nightmares for the U.S.: a general armed Shiite uprising in the southeast.

Maliki, of course, knows this, and has objected strenuously--only to be blown off like a gnat by the Bush administration and its fresh coterie of compliant generals.  

Lt. Gen. David Petraeus, author of yet another U.S. military manual on counterinsurgency (none of which has ever worked--ever), is the designated paladin for this disgraceful enterprise; he's getting his fourth star for this, making him a real general.

"Petraeus is being given a losing hand," notes former Gen. Barry McCaffrey.

"I say that reluctantly. The war is unmistakably going in the wrong direction.  The only good news in all this is that Petraeus is so incredibly intelligent and creative....  I'm sure he'll say to himself,

`I'm not going to be the last soldier off the roof of the embassy in the Green Zone.' "

Stan Goff is a retired veteran of the U.S. Army Special Forces. During an active-duty career that spanned 1970 to 1996, he served with the elite Delta Force and Rangers, and in Vietnam, Guatemala, Grenada, El Salvador, Colombia, Peru, Somalia and Haiti.

He is a veteran of the Jungle Operations Training Center in Panama and also taught military science at the United States Military Academy at West Point.

Goff is the author of the books "Hideous Dream--A Soldier's Memoir of the U.S. Invasion of Haiti," "Full Spectrum Disorder--The Military in the New American Century" and "Sex & War."

It's a lengthy article at Truthdig.com but it's my firm opinion that one cannot come to any reasonable estimacion of what is going on in Iraq and why Bushco is so obstinate about a surge without including Goff's article in the mix.

---

This coming weekend at the Tacoma campus of Evergreen College something extra-ordinary is going on:

CITIZENS' HEARING ON THE LEGALITY OF U.S. ACTIONS IN IRAQ
January 20-21, 2007
Tacoma, Washington, USA

The Citizens' Hearing on the Legality of U.S. Actions in Iraq will be held on January 20-21, 2007, in Tacoma, Washington, two weeks before the Feb. 5 court martial of Lieutenant Ehren Watada at Fort Lewis.

The Citizens' Hearing will function as a tribunal to put the Iraq War on trial, in response to the Army putting Lt. Watada on trial as the first U.S. military officer to refuse deployment to Iraq.

You are invited.

By helping the Citizens' Hearing document the legal case against the war, you will help present the case for Lt. Ehren Watada--and for those who may follow his example.

By highlighting the illegality of U.S. actions in Iraq, the tribunal can inform military personnel and other citizens to reflect deeply on their roles and responsibilities in an illegal war.

We intend for the Citizens' Hearing to heighten the discussion of the Iraq invasion and occupation in the public--and within the military itself--as similar tribunals did during the Vietnam War.

We are inviting testimony by Iraq War witnesses and experts. Your donation will be used to bring the testifiers and panelists to Tacoma and to record the event so everyone can benefit from the testimony.

The hearing will present the case that Lt. Watada would, if allowed, make at his court martial. His defense attorneys maintain that the war on Iraq is illegal under international treaties and under Article Six of the U.S. Constitution.

Further, Lt. Watada's defense argues that the Nuremberg Principles and U.S. military regulations require soldiers to follow only "lawful orders."

In Lt. Watada's view, deployment to Iraq would have made him party to the crimes that permeate the structure and conduct of military operations there.

The format of the Citizens' Hearing will resemble that of a congressional committee, employing a dignified approach to gathering information. Testimony will be offered by Iraq War veterans, experts in international law and war crimes, and human rights advocates.

Among the figures that have committed to testify are:

TESTIFIERS AND TENTATIVE SCHEDULE

SATURDAY 10:00-11:00 am
Opening
Joye Hardiman
Executive Director, The Evergreen State College Tacoma Campus.

Zoltan Grossman
Evergreen faculty member, for the Citizens' Hearing organizing committee.

Lietta Ruger
Introduction of panelists.

David Krieger
Panel chair, Overview of Citizens' Hearing.

11:00 am-12:00 noon   Iraq War veterans
Geoffrey Millard
8 years in Army National Guard; now in Iraq Veterans Against the War.?

Harvey Tharp
Former U.S. Navy Lieutenant and JAG stationed in Iraq; Iraq Veterans Against the War.

12:00 noon-1:00 pm Lunch

1:00-1:30 pm
Daniel Ellsberg
Military analyst who released the Pentagon Papers in the Vietnam War.

1:35-2:30 pm
Richard Falk
Professor Emeritus of International Law at Princeton University.

Benjamin G. Davis
Assoc. Prof. of Law, University of Toledo; expert on law of war.

2:35-3:10 pm
Ann Wright
Retired Army Colonel and State Department official (focus on torture)

3:15 pm-4:00 pm
Denis Halliday
Former UN Assistant Secretary General, coordinated Iraq humanitarian aid
(focus on lack of UN authorization)

SUNDAY 10:00-10:55 am  Video testimony
Francis Boyle
Professor of international law at University of Chicago.

Eman Khammas
Iraqi human rights advocate in exile in Spain.

11:00 am- 12:00 noon  
Iraq War veterans
Darrell Anderson
1st Armored Division in Baghdad, Najaf; awarded Purple Heart; Iraq Veterans Agaisnt the War.

Chanan Suarez
Former Navy hospital corpsman; now in IVAW.

12:00 noon-1:00 pm    Lunch

1:00-1:30 pm
Nadia McCaffrey
Gold Star Families Speak Out;
Brussels Tribunal advisory board.

1:30-2:00 pm
Antonia Juhasz
Policy-analyst and author on U.S. economic policies in Iraq.

2:00-2:30 pm
Dennis Kyne
15 years as Army medic & drill sergeant; trained in NBC warfare; addresses Uranium Munitions issue; IVAW.

2:30-3:00 pm
John Burroughs
Lawyers' Committee on Nuclear Policy Executive Director; Nuclear policy and the Iraq War.

3:00-3:15 Closing remarks
David Krieger
Citizens' Hearing panel chair.

PANEL

Chairman:
David Krieger
(President of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, Judge Pro Tem Santa Barbara Superior Court, Former Army 2nd Lieutenant stationed in Hawaii during the Vietnam War, Juror of Conscience for the World Tribunal on Iraq)

Gold Star families:
Elizabeth Falzone (from Seattle; cousin David was KIA in Tikrit)

Military families:
Rich Moniak (from Juneau AK; son served in Iraq & Afghanistan)

Veterans of former wars:
Russell W. McNutt
(from Centralia WA; Marine Corps veteran; enlisted 1945, commissioned 1950 served in Korea; served 3 years in Allied Air Forces in Naples, 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing Vietnam, HQ MACV Saigon 1968-69)

Veterans of former wars:
Burk Ketcham
(World War II veteran; former Naval Reserve officer, Tacoma)

New veterans:
Maricela Guzman
(from L.A.; Navy veteran in Diego Garcia & Italy)

High school students:
Estella Villarreal
(Ida B. Wells School at UW in Seattle)

Local government:
Lyle Quasim
Former Secretary Washington State Department of Social & Health Services

Religious organizations:
Rev. Elaine Stanovsky
(United Methodist Church; Superintendent of the Seattle-Tacoma District and spokesperson for the Pacific Northwest Annual Conference).

Labor union members:
Zeke Green
(Longshore worker and ILWU member, Tacoma)

Health care community:
Emily Lutz (Army Reserve medic from LA; in Individual Ready Reserve)

Academia:
Staughton Lynd
(sociologist, attorney and activist from Youngstown OH)

Link to

Cross-posted to DailyKos