Major Victory in Iraq Yesterday? Catholic Voters Heads Up

Hmmmmm

A few weeks back the press , and the CYA Pentagon and State Department people in D.C were forcasting doom and gloom for the latest Iraqi offensive before it even started. The New York Times was a huge offender as to it reports as to Basra. By the way the Times had no reporters in Basra and had to rely on stringers which is always a mixed bag. Go see Strata's Mahdi Army Surrenders, Authorizes Iraq Government To Disarm Fighters!!!

As for Catholic voters in the United States let me remind you of the latest US Bishops statement:

We do not have specific competence in political, economic and military strategies and do not assess particular tactics, but we can, as teachers, share a moral tradition to help inform policy choices. Our Catholic teaching on war and peace offers hard questions, not easy answers. Our nation must now focus more on the ethics of exit than on the ethics of intervention.

The grave moral concerns we and others raised prior to the war now give way to new moral questions. In the current situation the traditional principles of “noncombatant immunity” and “probability of success” suggest these questions: How can we minimize the further loss of human lives? What actions will do the most good and least harm? What elements of a responsible transition are attainable? How can they be achieved? What actions should be avoided? How can decision makers take into account both the realities and setbacks in Iraq and the likely human consequences of rapid withdrawal?

I wish Mickey Kaus had a individual link to what he was saying about the New York Times Story that ran way back on April 8th. However since the New York Times will not revisit it , I shall do it for them: Mickey said back on April 10th:

Iraqi Offensive Against Militia is Raising Concerns on Stability"--Headline on April 8 NYT story. Uh oh. And it's a front-page story--sounds like the whole Maliki government might collapse. But we shouldn't hide our heads! Let's confront the bad news unearthed in "interviews with dozens of Iraqi politicians, government leaders, analysts and ordinary citizens" by the nine (9) Times reporters who contributed. Here's the story:

A crackdown on the Mahdi Army militia is creating potentially destabilizing political and military tensions in Iraq, pitting a stronger government alliance against the force that has won past showdowns ...

"Potentially destabilizing." Hmm. That's a bit weaker, no? A lot of things are "potentially destabilizing," like having sectarian militias in control of your major port city! And what's this about "stronger government alliance." It's stronger, and as a result there are increased "concerns" about its "stability"? Perverse and dialectical!

Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki's military operations against the Mahdi Army that Mr. Sadr leads have at least temporarily pacified Sunni political leaders ...

So the Sunni political leaders are pissed off! Oh wait, no, they're pacified. This doesn't sound so unstable, yet. Ah, but it's only "at least temporarily." Maybe the long run is where the "concerns on stability" are raising. That must be it!

And both the Kurds and some of Mr. Maliki's Shiite political rivals, who also resent Mr. Sadr's rising power, have been driven closer to Mr. Maliki. This may give him more traction to pass laws and broker deals.

Now Maliki has two additional sets of allies, and "more traction." The instability better be coming soon, because this is beginning to sound like the makings of, you know, stability.

But the badly coordinated push into Basra has unleashed a new barrage of attacks on American and Iraqi forces and has led to open fighting between Shiite militias.

Aha! He launched an attack, which led to ... fighting! But we already know he launched the attack. That's what strengthened his ties to the Sunnis, Kurds, and other Shiite groups.

Figures compiled by the American military showed that attacks specifically on military targets in Baghdad more than tripled in March, one of many indications that violence has begun to rise again after months of gains in the wake of an American troop increase.

Violence rose in March. Maliki launched his attacks March 25, meaning that most of the rising March violence happened before the (potentially) destabilizing crackdown. Blinded by conventional notions of time and causation, you might even suspect the rising violence prompted the crackdown.

In Iraq, where perceived power is a key to real authority, Iraqis saw the Mahdi Army stopping Mr. Maliki's Basra assault cold, then melting away when Mr. Sadr ordered them to lay down their arms.

Talking about "perceived power" conveniently allows the NYT to avoid reporting whether the actual events in Basra conform to its description of "Iraqis[']" perceptions. (The one Iraqi man on the street who is quoted says something a bit different: "I think Maliki and America are more powerful than [the Mahdi Army], but Maliki alone would be smashed by it." He is the first and last "ordinary citizen" in the story.)

The rest of the piece: "Senior Iraqi officials" see the rallying behind Maliki as "turning point" that could bring political reconciliation. "But for many Iraqis ... Mr. Maliki has cemented his reputation as a tool of the Americans." Nobody is quoted from this "many" except a Sadrist official. ... An NGO type says that the Sadrists are not going to disband, but that they are facing a dilemma because not disbanding might cost them the right to participate in elections. ... A parliamentarian says that disarming the Sadrists is "not an easy job." ... The Times opines that a "truer gauge of the two sides' real power" may come Wednesday, "when Mr. Sadr has called for a million of his followers to march through the streets of Baghdad." (He has now called the march off.)

Then there is the final ominous kicker:

One unexpected bonus for Mr. Maliki is that the Sadrists appear to have been dismayed by the political establishment's decision, at least in public, to back him.
"We were astonished at the political blocs' stance in supporting Maliki's government," said Hassan al-Rubaie, a Sadrist lawmaker.
Even the Sadrists are dismayed by Maliki's breadth of support. Another sign of instability! But of course it's "unexpected." (Really? By Maliki?)

kf Nut Graf: The Iraqi government may be on the verge of collapse, or not, but the NYT's piece doesn't come close to substantiating increased concerns about its stabiity. It's more like the opposite.
I'm not saying that the Times editors are predictable anti-war, anti-Bush types who reflexively leaped to a pessimistic extrapolation from the muddled Basra fighting and imposed that unsupported conclusion on their reporters. But they definitely succeeded in producing the piece that predictable anti-war types would have generated given no more information than the news that Maliki had failed to take all of Basra. Arianna Huffington could have written it from her sofa after coming back from a party. Except it would probably be more convincing. ... 10:44 P.M.