Problems without solutions

I tend to spend a lot of time, arguably to much time, thinking about my life. When I was in Peace Corps, I analyzed myself to the point where my own being almost became nothing but an abstraction for me. It was as weird as it sounds. However, that helped me realize a few very important things about myself. I realized that for all my strengths and weaknesses, my shyness and my social quirks, the one thing I can do fairly well is analyze and solve problems. I can generally break down a problem to find a solution. I can't remember facts or names. You may not agree with my solution, but I generally have a reason for it.

Why do I mention that? Because I cannot for all my thought or all the reading I have done come to a conclusion I am comfortable with for our situation in Iraq. This annoys me. I thought it was a mistake to invade and I still believe that. However, arguing that point is currently irrelevant. We - you, me, congress, the president, America in general - have to solve it, or rather, we have to do something. The two ideas on the table are to leave and let Iraq figure it out or to send in more troops, gain control of the growing violence and, well, let Iraq figure it out.

The closest I can come to a conclusion is the two items break down into the same idea, but nobody wants to admit it. To leave, we talk about creating a timetable and making the Iraqis responsible for being ready to assume full control of the country based on the timetable. Conceptually, I like the idea of Iraqis assuming responsibility for their country but it does put a lot of faith in a young democracy that we don't have any real reason to believe in. The 3 major ethnic fractions don't seem all that interested in being friendly and I can't imagine why, if we leave, the Kurds won't try to become their own country (bad for Turkey -> bad for Europe/US -> bad for world) and why the Shiites won't want retribution for the Sunnis power abuse under Saddam. This option saves us money and military lives in the short term, but doesn't resolve any problems. Also, if Iraq falls victim to a great civil war and ethnic cleansing, won't we have to return anyway? This does not resolve any problems we created.

The other option is to send in more troops to gain control of the most violent areas while giving the government a series of steps to prove they are assuming control of their country. In this scenario, we lose more lives, spend more money, more Iraqis die, and ultimately, the government probably can't hit their milestones. Which brings us to the possibility that our president can then say we gave it one more chance but Iraq wasn't able to do their part. He can then bring troops home on his own terms and call it a win for his leadership while calling his opponents weak. However, there is a chance that, in this situation and this is really where the two options truly diverge in my mind, he will not withdrawal troops and work to create a new puppet government that is stronger. Basically, we are swapping Saddam's military law for our own. So I figure, since Bush isn't telling us what he will do if the government fails to hold up their end of this bargain, there is a 50-50 chance he just withdrawals on his own terms or we make Iraq an unofficial province of the US by installing the leader we choose.

Why do we even care? Why do we care if Iran has more power in the Middle East? Is a united Iran and Iraq a military threat to us? Probably not. It may be an economic threat, only because of their natural oil reserves. We have had plenty of time as a country to address that moving back into the Clinton presidency and we have not. VP Cheney should be locked up for treason for not developing a real sustainable energy policy when he had a chance in the first presidential term, and the entire brain trust should follow him for not releasing the notes of that energy committee. We have no plan to free ourselves from the middle east, and neither solution is better. For lack of a better idea, I am tempted to promote leaving Iraq because it won't bankrupt my government and raise my taxes. It's not a solution, I realize that. I don't have a solution. I don't even know if one exists. Saddam was a bastard and probably deserved the death he got. He probably deserved a worse one. At least with Saddam we knew what the issues were and more or less what the situation was. I think the biggest reason we can't resolve the current problem is that now we don't.

I'll probably blog more on this as the weeks progress. I'll also discuss my views of how Israel fits into it all, and whether or not a Jewish state even has a right to exist. I don't agree with Iran that it should be eliminated, but I don't believe the current status is correct either.