Perhaps -- though only perhaps -- we had a brief glimpse of the true Colean Vision this morning:
| MENA in Cairo is reporting that Harith al-Dhari, a leader of the Sunni fundamentalist Association of Muslim Scholars, is denying reports that the US has reached out to Sunni Arab insurgents in Iraq. "America might have spoken with ineffective parties that have no say whatsoever in the Iraqi resistance," al-Dhari is quoted as saying. He also maintained that the US presence in Iraq fuels the violence, and that plans for federalism are aimed at breaking up the country. Al-Dhari's allegation is given some credence by the denial being issued by Salah Umar al-Ali, an ex-Baathist dissident, that he had been contacted by the Iraqi government in an attempt to reach out to the ex-Baath leadership. The claim that the Iraqi government was talking to him was carried by al-Hayat recently. If Iraqi officials are lying to al-Hayat about al-Ali, they are probably lying about the whole range of alleged contacts. So far, both Bush and al-Maliki seem still determined to crush their enemies rather than trying to bring them in from the cold. |
Before we get to what may be the great discrimen rerum between Prof. Cole and Ms. Sapientia Conventionalis, there is at least one minor distinction to notice, a matter of low fact rather than lofty "narrative" or ideology. M. al-Dárí speaks of "ineffective parties that have no say whatsoever in the Iraqi resistance," which implies the existence of other parties that do seriously matter. Prof. Cole and Sappy and the militant Republicans all agree with the fugitive statesman about that point, as far as I can discern. It is possible that poor M. al-Málikí and the U.I.A. caucus know better.
Not to beg the question, we might say rather "perhaps they think differently," but why not beg the question, since we've already decided that our answer is better? Sobie spiewamy a Muzom, Mr. Bones, we are not out to persuade anybody or market any product.
If our own hypothesis is correct, the sort of imposition that Ann Arbour and Times Square and Rancho Crawford more or less verbally agree on is bound to fail. They cannot pander to "the Arab Sunnis," because there no longer exists any such political creature to pander to. Push Affirmative Action beyond the limits of sanity, not to mention equity, let the natural masters of "Iraq" have ten or twelve votes apiece while Twelvers get only one -- nothing will come of it all the same. The "community" that M. al-Dárí fancies he speaks for has passed beyond fragmentation into outright disintegration. The fugitive pol probably thinks he stands admirably in the middle of the road, a bitter enemy of the Green Zone neo-régime, but not actually shooting at its agents and their paleface patrons. But it is much more likely that he is really only in a void. Most of the rest of the natural masters at least recognize one of the three principal neo-régimes, that of the Ba‘th, that of the Islamic Emirate, or that of the GZ collaborationists. Whatever M. al-Dárí may think in all sincerity, setting up on behalf of "None of the Above" is probably not going to prove a helpful contribution towards Sunnite ‘asabiyya.
As we said, however, the Crawfordites and the respectable American press and Prof. Cole all assume the contrary. "Arab Sunnis" constitute a panderable-to entity in their view, and thus the intramural disagreements of these planmongers are mainly about the exact techniques that will ensure success. As to poor M. al-Málikí and all his "sectarian" "fundamentalists," no doubt 95% of the reason they don't care for that sort of imposition is that they don't think "the Arab Sunnis" deserve to be pandered to. Yet there may be a small percentage of political insight involved as well, especially in the immediate vicinity of the Rev. ‘Abd al-‘Azíz al-Hakím.
It is rather a strange consensus than Juan and Sappy and Dubya have somehow converged upon. Why should they be most eager to make concessions to the folks that are actually shooting at the Occupying Power and its neo-régime? If their maxim is "The wheel that squeaks loudest must have the most grease," such a policy might be rendered more intelligible, but I have yet to hear any of them allude to the proverb in question or to anything like it. Even if they did, there are certain antecedent objections to a policy that positively rewards troublemakers that probably ought to rule it out. In fact, they did not leap straight to this odd consensus the morning after the aggression, it is a corner they have painted themselves into gradually -- perhaps one might even say, dialectically.
For the moment, however, let us pass over the history of it and return to the quotation we started with. The sting is in the tail: Bush seem[s] still determined to crush [his] enemies rather than trying to bring them in from the cold." (Poor M. al-Málikí does not really belong in that sentence. Perhaps we may get back to him briefly at the end.)
So there is our Great Divide, Mr. Bones: at Ann Arbour it would no doubt be flatly denied that any such consensus exists at all. Mr. Bush and the GOP extremists are only pretending to want to pander to "the Arab Sunnis," whereas Don Juan -- along with (I presume) conventional journalistic wisdom -- really and sincerely wants to impose that plan.
The practical and theoretical upshot is interesting. Since Don Juan's actual powers of imposition are indistinguishable from zero, what are we to infer if the policy in question does not in fact work out? By his hypothesis, that would be chiefly because the Crawfordites will have never wanted it to work; by ours, chiefly because the object proposed is intrinsically impossible. Whether the militant GOP will fail to do what nobody can do after really trying or only pretending to try to do it is a separate question for us, and a somewhat less important one than the success-or-failure question.
Still, and as usual, we are willing to stipulate other people's political sincerity. Crawfordology is far from an exact science, but it sure looks as if the invasionites would be very pleased to bring "the Arab Sunnis" in out of the cold. We doubt that pulling that trick off is possible at all, and even if it were, that such a troupe of clowns as the Bushies could manage it, but there is no evidence I can think of to suggest that they would not like to.
In order to suggest that such evidence might exist, Don Juan had to resort to that amalgamated final sentence of his that we disassembled. It would be absurd to deny that poor M. al-Málikí and the U.I.A. are not eager to go along for this particular ride. Of course the invasionites have the whip hand over them, and they are required to pretend to want whatever Crawford thinks they ought to want, but their real attitude is so patent that even the invasion-language press has noticed it.
Prof. Cole seems to be guilty of a serious offense against the received canons of tertiary education, namely simplism. It is not just a dichotomy of "pretending" and "sincerity" that is called for in such a case, one must further distinguish between "sincere pretending" and "pretended pretending," so to speak. JC is entitled to his guess that the President is "sincerely pretending" to want extreme Affirmative Action for the Arab Sunnis of neo-Iraq -- that is, that Master Dubya authentically and unfeignedly wishes so to pretend. Our own guess is that the laddie is not pretending at all. Take your pick, but don't muddle up either choice with what poor M. al-Málikí has been reduced to.
(The question of whether poor M. al-Málikí or his minions has been guilty of "lying" to a Sunnintern organ like Al-Hayát about secret contacts with this or that subfragment of the former Sunni Ascendancy in "Iraq" may be too speculative to be worth bothing about. If pursued, though, the same sort of distinctions would be appropriate. Were they sincerely seeking negotiations? Were they sincerely attempting an impossible thing? Were they only pretending to seek negotiations, whether because they themselves wanted to pretend or because Khalílzád Pasha forced them to? Furthermore, if what they say about the matter is factually inaccurate, and they know it, do they expect anybody to be deceived by these "lies" of theirs? It's quite a can of worms, really, and perhaps not important enough to be worth the trouble of trying to sort it out exactly. But God knows best.)
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