HELTER SKELTER

The Iraq Study group will recommend pulling out most U.S. combat troops from Iraq by early 2008, according to this story from the Washington Post. American troops will remain in Iraq as advisors, according to the story. After the recent meeting with President Bush, Prime Minister Maliki said he expected Iraqi government forces would be able to take over more responsibility by June of '07. I think everybody is smoking the pipe of wishful thinking. Any significant drawdown of U.S. troops will blow the lid off the pot in Iraq. The only reason the country has not descended into a Lebanese-style civil war writ large, a war of all against all as Pat Buchanan puts it, is because the U.S. military is still capable of smashing any attempted power grabs by any given militia. Once the U.S. force has reached a low enough level, whatever that level might be, I expect al Sadr to try and grab power, which would unleash a true civil war. But, of course, this is all just delaying the inevitable. If President Bush rejects the recommendations, and keeps substantial forces in Iraq through 2008, the next President will certainly withdraw them in 2009 or 2010, and we'll get the civil war, anyway. According to Robin Wright, also in the Post, some folks in the State Department want the military to stop its outreach program to the Sunni insurgents, and just throw our lot in with the Shia and the Kurds. It sounds simple, but it would certainly result in the intervention of the Saudis to protect their Sunni brethren. I still expect at the very least an all-out civil war in Iraq and, very probably, a significant regional war that could lead to the big, global war I have been predicting.