Word: iraqi
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...benchmarks, in fact, are already well known to the Iraqi leadership, because the U.S. has spent the past year cajoling the Iraqis over them - reaching out to the Sunnis by reopening talks on the constitution, passing a new oil law guaranteeing an equitable sharing of revenues across the regions, reversing most of the purge of former Baathists from political life and government employment, and dismantling sectarian Shi'ite militias. The response of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has been to verbally reassure U.S. envoys all the way up to President Bush, but then to, if not quite ignore U.S. demands...
...that they each have registered their respective positions about tying Iraq war funding to a withdrawal timetable, congressional Democrats and President Bush are seeking a workable compromise. The most likely deal appears to be to make continued U.S. commitment in Iraq conditional on the Iraqi government meeting certain political "benchmarks." But there's no reason to believe Iraqi leaders will take a new set of benchmarks any more seriously than they have taken Washington's political exhortations until...
...Like most Iraqi leaders, Maliki is unlikely to believe that what his government does or does not do will prompt the U.S. to simply pack up and go home. The Iraqi leadership knows that the U.S. didn't invade their country out of concern for their well-being. It went to war in order to secure its own objectives - and that's exactly what the main Iraqi political factions are doing, too. (Indeed, it's hardly surprising that both the Shi'ite and Kurdish parties that dominate the current government are more inclined to pursue their own objectives than follow...
...Iraqi leaders appear to recognize the limits on U.S. leverage in Baghdad a lot more clearly than Democrats in Congress. Withdrawing support from Baghdad would prompt it to turn to Iran - even China might be willing to kick in a few billion if that could buy an edge in oil deals. Nor does there appear to be any plausible scenario for replacing al-Maliki. The days when a strongman regime might be able to contain Shi'ite aspirations are long gone: today's Iraqi army is predominantly Shi'ite, after all, and the Shi'ite street - answering to Sadr...
...that it matters. If al-Baghdadi does exist, and whether or not he is alive, he is a titular leader with no real power. His "promotion" last year was a PR exercise, designed to give al-Qaeda an Iraqi face - under the Jordanian al-Zarqawi, the group was dominated by foreign fighters. The publicity stunt failed, however. Although al-Qaeda nominally proclaims fealty to al-Baghdadi as the ruler of the "Islamic State," it is no secret that the group's real leader is al-Masri, an Egyptian...