Changing the jockey

NPR’s Michele Kelemen reported today on Iraq:

I was surprised to hear Jim Jeffrey call Maliki “corrupt, nervous nelly, micromanaging, insecure, total disaster of a military leader.” Until quite recently, Jim was defending Maliki as a relative democrat. In my view, neither characterization is true to nature.

He was certainly never a democrat, relative or otherwise, though he won a reasonably free if not fair election in April and certainly had under the constitution a claim to being asked (as the leader of the largest bloc of seats in the parliament) to form a government within 15 days of election of the President. The Americans decided to ignore that, in order to get someone more “inclusive.” The notion that Haider al Abadi, sidekick to Maliki and pal of the Iranians, is the perfect guy stretches the imagination. But let’s wait and see.

In particular, I have my doubts Abadi will do much better in inclusiveness, as what the Kurds and Sunnis want now is substantial:

• the Kurds need to get assurances that the money they are entitled to get from Baghdad and the oil they want to export will flow unimpeded;
• the Sunnis need more autonomy for the provinces in which they are a majority, along with the resources needed to deliver services to their citizens;
• the Shia need a central government in Baghdad that can protect them (and everyone else) from the Islamic State.

This is a tall order.

Maliki’s problem wasn’t that he excluded Sunnis and Kurds or failed to deal with them. They were always in his governments. They still are, as he is the caretaker prime minister until Abadi is approved in parliament. Among the many deals Abadi now has to negotiate are the terms of Maliki’s retirement, including a security detail, a nice residence and immunity from prosecution.

The problem with Maliki was that he made deals with the Sunnis and Kurds that he didn’t keep, in particular deals that would give them any real power, which is all Maliki really seems to have cared about. He is not unusual in the Middle East in this respect.

He had good reason to be nervous and insecure, he was arguably less corrupt personally than his surroundings, and micromanagement is a charge the Americans should make only looking in the mirror. That the performance of the Iraqi military was disastrous is obvious, but I wonder how much that had to do with American training, which did not emphasize the kind of force on force maneuvers that the Islamic State (IS) advance required.

I agree with Danielle Pletka that changing the jockey won’t cure what ails this race horse. A much broader strategy is needed to respond to the IS threat. Hillary Clinton’s criticism of the President is well-founded. He waited too long to confront IS and now needs to do much more than Brian Katulis wants to think is feasible.