Bad Vibes

Tom Ricks gets an e-mail from a friend in Iraq:

I'm afraid things are coming to a tipping point here. If  the Chalabi-Iranian faction succeeds in keeping those 15 pro-Alawi Sunni parties off the ballot all bets are off. I can see a Shiia-on-Shiia civil war (with the Sunnis backing the Alawi faction) or a military coup as real possibilities. At this point, the best thing to happen would be to postpone the election. If they go ahead toward March the way they are heading, all bets are off. I don't think Washington is fully engaged with Haiti and Afghan distracting them. A lot of bad vibes here.

I fear my belief that the surge failed is being borne out by events. Even worse, you know what the GOP is about to do: blame Obama for the failure they set up. It's their new line: everything we screwed up over eight years is Obama's fault. Blame him. Re-elect us.

But we have known for quite a while that there has been no profound sectarian reconciliation within Iraq, and that the surge's success in tamping down violence was not equaled in its core goal: a united polity that could resolve its sectarian differences peacefully. A year and a half ago, I believed that Iraq would be the real nightmare for Obama, despite all the neocon reassurances that everything would be fine and that "victory" was already won. For a while, there were grounds to hope that this might not happen. And then the entropy of understandable mistrust and bitterness returns.

So what do we see now?

Purging of key Sunnis from the electoral process, growing restiveness in Anbar, no solution in Kirkuk, and a population armed to the teeth and trained by the US for another round of civil war. And at that point, of course, the neocon right will insist on staying there for another five years, because the alternative is so awful. And we will have this discussion as frequently as we discuss how to reform healthcare and entitlements, with the same result: nothing will ever be done because the US system cannot agree on what should be done.

Maybe we can avoid this fate. Maybe Iraq's Sunnis can come to terms with a Shiite government. Maybe the Kurds can come to some deal over Kirkuk. Maybe the election can be rescued. Maybe. I sure hope so.

But doesn't this feel like a chapter from a text book on how empires implode? Paralysis at home, over-reach abroad, mounting debt, and the disappearance of any political center. And we remain trapped in mistakes we cannot undo and yet cannot abandon.

Until even the borrowed money finally runs out.