NOT THE AMERICAN WAY:

How to stop genocide in Iraq: Offering the carrot of U.S. withdrawal may be the best way to end ethnic cleansing in Iraq (Samantha Power, March 5, 2007, LA Times)

Unfortunately, many of those who favor a U.S. exit have recklessly waved off atrocity warnings or taken to blaming Iraqis for their plight. What is needed to stave off even greater carnage than we see today is neither assuming massacres won't happen nor suspending thought until the surge has demonstrably failed in six months -- at which point other options may no longer be viable. Rather, we must announce our intention to depart and use the intervening months to prioritize civilian protection by pursuing a bold set of measures combining political pressure, humanitarian relocation and judicial deterrence.

First, although it has a familiar and thus unsatisfying ring to it, the most viable long-term route to preventing mass atrocities is to use remaining U.S. leverage to bring about a political compromise that makes Iraqi Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds feel economically stable, physically secure and adequately represented in political structures. This is consistent with the position of leading U.S. generals and the members of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, who have stressed that there is no military solution to Iraq's meltdown and urged the administration, the Iraqis and regional players to reopen broad-ranging political negotiations.

Instead of simply lining up behind Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki's government in the hopes that it will one day decide to stop ethnic cleansing, recent withdrawal proposals in Congress use the leverage of the proposed redeployment to press Iraqis to reach a political solution. A plan put forth by Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) has come under neoconservative fire for setting a target departure date, but it provides for flexibility to suspend the U.S. drawdown if Iraqis meet the key economic, political and security benchmarks they have committed to achieve this year. The plan would also retain some U.S. forces in Iraq and the region to help deter atrocities by sectarian militias and aggression from Iraq's neighbors.

However, if this political pressure fails and U.S. forces remain unable to stave off an ever-widening civil war, the U.S. should go further and announce its willingness to assist in the voluntary transport and relocation of Iraqi civilians in peril. If Iraqis tell us that they would feel safer in religiously homogenous neighborhoods, and we lack the means to protect them where they are, we should support and protect them in their voluntary, peaceful evacuation -- a means, one might say, to preempt genocide in advance of our departure.

The administration must help secure asylum for those Iraqis -- and there are millions who fit this bill -- who have a "well-founded fear of persecution." At the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees' conference scheduled for April, which will be attended by Jordan, Iran, Iraq, Syria and the United States, the overburdened countries of first asylum (Syria is sheltering 1 million Iraqis; Jordan has taken in 700,000) must be persuaded to reopen their gates to fleeing Iraqis. And Western countries must dramatically expand the number of resettlement slots for Iraqis. Astoundingly, the U.S. took in just 202 Iraqis last year and, although the maximum for this year was recently raised to 7,000, this is still not sufficient.

Why should we, any more than the Shi'a, accept people who insist on minority rule? If they'll only be governed by fellow Sunni Arabs let them go to neighboring Sunni nations.

Posted by Orrin Judd at March 5, 2007 8:38 AM