On Democracy in Iraq

...And de-de-Baathification is not about letting Sunni Arab teachers, engineers, and nurses back into the government job market...

...A Shiite-led Iraqi democracy is taking root—an astonishing achievement given the concerted efforts of the Iraqi Sunnis, and the surrounding Sunni Arab states, to attack and delegiti-mize the new Iraq...

...If they do, we can only hope that by the time they do, the leadership of the Democratic party will have ceased to have anything in common with those Sunni Arabs who have always wanted the new Iraq to fail...

...American and Iraqi forces in Baghdad will have to figure out a way to diminish significantly the number and lethality of Sunni suicide bombers...

...One of those reasons is that Sadr would not be popular with many of the area's denizens if he did...

...It hasn't worked...

...If we and the Iraqis cannot do this, then the radicalization of the Shi-ites will continue, and it will be only a question of time before the Shiite community collectively decides that the Sunnis as a group are beyond the pale, and a countrywide war of religious cleansing will become likely...

...Maliki and Sadr are not natural allies intellectually or temperamentally...

...Prime Minister Maliki actually appears to be leading his Dawa party, an awkward, tense collection of deeply patriotic, semi-Westernized Shiite activists, into an embrace of parliamentary democracy...

...We highlight this Democratic contradiction since the party's character is being put to the test, as we see whether General David Petraeus's counterin-surgency tactics, which will seriously kick into gear in June, can rescue Baghdad and Anbar and Diyala provinces from the precipice...

...Do thoughtful Democrats really believe that the Middle East, America's long fight against Sunni jihadism, and our standing in the world against potential aggressors and bullies will be improved by a precipitous and mandated departure from Mesopotamia...

...Since 2005, Sadr's calls for political demonstrations against the Americans have not been resounding successes among the Shiites...

...A Republican could try to depict himself as the candidate best able to manage retreat from Mesopotamia, but such a Nixonian approach, given how lamely the Bush administration has handled much of the war, doesn't seem compelling...

...Given the topography of Baghdad, the possible routes of attack against the capital's Shiite denizens, and the common traits of Iraq's Arabs, this will be difficult...

...One thing ought to be clear: Without President Bush's surge, the only thing Iraq's Sunnis can look forward to is war, death, and exile...

...If the Dawa embraces democracy, its commitment, along with that of senior clerics in Najaf led by Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, will likely ensure a lasting Shiite commitment to democracy—provided Iraq's current leading men aren't destroyed in an all-out sectarian war, a scenario that seems likely only if the Americans hastily withdraw from Iraq...

...And Senator Reid should take note: As a Shiite-led democracy grows, the calls for an American withdrawal will increase...

...In all probability, it could not...

...The Democratic party is beginning to sound like an echo chamber for Zbigniew Brzezinski, the national security adviser for the most inept and calamitous Democratic administration of modern times...

...And politically, Iraq is coming alive again...

...Echoing Rumsfeld and Abizaid, these critics believe that only a "political solution"—that is, Shiite and Kurdish concessions to the once-dominant Sunni minority—can solve Iraq's trauma...

...This distancing was inevitable once the Americans reversed the disastrous tactics of former secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld and General John Abizaid, which had allowed Sadr and his allies to become the only defenders of Baghdad's Shiites against the Sunni insurgents and holy warriors...

...Which is fine...

...Maliki is so far holding his ground after the resignation of Sadr's men in his government...

...We, too, have benchmarks for Iraq...

...If the U.S...

...But militarily the United States is finally waging a counterinsurgency that makes sense: We are focusing our efforts on securing Iraqi lives and property...

...A livable democratic arrangement is there if Sunni Arabs choose to take it...

...Critics of the surge often underscore the absence of a clearly defined post-surge political strategy...

...Reuel Marc Gerecht, for the Editors...

...The entire Democratic field, however, could end up looking wrong, fainthearted, and politically reckless...

...Contrary to the despair of so many, internal Iraqi politics will probably be the easiest part of this campaign...

...And the growing realization in Iraq, and among Western oil companies, that substantial oil deposits exist in the Sunni Arab zone could prove helpful in assuaging Sunni fears about starving in the new Iraq...

...It's about the Baathist Sunni elite getting the power and prestige of senior positions, especially in the military and security services...

...The retreat of Sadr, the growing Sunni tribal unease, if not outright conflict, with al Qaeda in Anbar, and the growing self-confidence of Maliki are all, in part, results of President Bush's decision...

...There are many reasons Sadr has not rallied his men against the American surge, which has already penetrated deeply into Sadr City with minimal resistance...

...Thanks in part to the ferocity of vengeful Shiite militias, we are getting there...

...The country's obstreperous, stubborn, highly nationalist, Shiite prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki, appears increasingly to be a man of mettle and courage...

...Slowly but surely, he is distancing himself from the clerical scion, Moktada al-Sadr, the overlord of the Sunni-shoot-ing Mahdi Army...

...Although not a mass movement, the Dawa has prestige among the Shi-ites: It was the first organized expression of a Shiite political consciousness and was born, in part, from the mind of Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr (1935-1980), the greatest of Iraq's modern clerics and the font of the Sadr family's continuing charisma...

...Incrementally, in many quarters of Baghdad, daily life for Iraqis appears to be getting better...

...One suicide bomber killing the right Shiite VIPs could threaten all...

...Grand Ayatollah Sistani is right about this...

...If there are potentially influential moderates among Iraq's Sunni Arabs, the "surge" is their last chance to change the rejectionist temperament and tactics of the community...

...The Sunni insurgency will likely cease when the Sunnis, who have been addicted to power and the perception of the Shiites as a God-ordained underclass, know in their hearts that they cannot win against the Shiites, that continued fighting will only make their situation worse...

...The effect of this on Iraq's politics has been enormously beneficial...

...Even for Iraqi Sunnis, the signs for a better future are increasing...

...Although Sadr will surely continue to have a significant political following (his family name alone ensures that), his base of support even within Baghdad's Shiite slum, Sadr City, is not guaranteed, provided the central government can bring security and minimal economic opportunity...

...Iraqi nationalism is vibrant among the Shiites, especially those who are religious...

...And democracy in Iraq, as elsewhere in the Muslim Middle East, is unlikely to be particularly affectionate toward the United States...

...We don't know if General Petraeus at this late date can reverse the bloody dynamic that has developed in the Iraqi Sunni, Shiite, and Kurdish communities...

...If we really want Iraq to succeed in the long term, we will stop pushing this idea...

...The Bush administration has largely been in agreement with this view, following a strategy since 2004 of trying to placate the Sunnis...

...In the next few months, of course, things could go to hell...

...Not that long ago, many—perhaps most—Iraqis thought that the United States would soon abandon Iraq...

...the State Department and the CIA are wrong...

...Certainly an approach that centers on de-de-Baathification is destined to fail since the vast majority of Iraq's Shiites, and probably Kurds, too, oppose any deal that would allow the Sunni Baathist elite back into government...

...Maliki's diverse and fractious Dawa party is of a different social milieu from the uneducated young men who give Sadr power...

...President Bush's decision to back the surge has altered this perception, in Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East...

...On the other hand, if the surge works, and the Sunni insurgency and sectarian strife no longer convulse Iraqi society, the odds of Senator John McCain—or another Republican—succeeding George W. Bush go up considerably...

...So the surge deserves to be supported...

...Iraqi democracy is much more likely to free American soldiers to go home than is chaos in Mesopotamia...

...The surge needs to show real progress in providing security by the beginning of 2008...

...If the surge fails, the Democrats stand to gain enormously in 2008...

...military can change the reality and spirit of Baghdad, the rest of Iraq will change too...

...Yet with Petraeus, Maliki, and Sistani in charge, things may work out...

...Onetime totalitarian societies that more thoroughly purge despotic party members have done much better than those that allow the old guard to stay on (think Russia...

...It isn't inconsistent to scorch Bush for his failures—and still to argue that the American blood we will spill in Iraq in the surge is worth the possibility of success...

...Although this may be news to Senate majority leader Harry Reid, who believes all is lost in Iraq, Sadr increasingly shows the anxiety of a pol who is nervous about his base, his allies, and his elected Shiite competitors...

...This is not the time for talk of timetables for withdrawal—much less talk of a war that is lost...