Stay Out of Middle East Wars

Stay Out of Middle East Wars

Let’s not fight for generals, politicians, oil companies and arms makers

October 22, 2014 12:00 AM

By Dan Simpson / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette | http://www.post-gazette.com/opinion/dan-simpson/2014/10/22/Dan-Simpson-Stay-out-of-Middle-East-wars/stories/201410220018

Americans learned Monday that U.S. forces have proceeded from air strikes on Islamic State forces in Kobani, Syria, to providing arms to Kurdish forces there.
All of this is taking place without members of Congress, absent without leave as they run for election back home and scoop up campaign contributions, having discussed or voted on a new war. Neither has the U.N. Security Council nor any other international body provided cover for U.S. attacks in Syria, a new target in the Middle East for us.
First of all, it is unrealistic to expect that ground forces, including those of the Islamic State, which have a reasonable track record against both Iraqi government and Kurdish fighters, can be chased off definitively from Kobani or anyplace else by air attacks. But let us assume that feat can be accomplished. What next?
Islamic State forces may turn their attention for the time being away from Kobani, which has little other than symbolic value, to other targets. One possibility is the Iraqi capital, Baghdad. They already are within 30 miles of Baghdad and Iraqi government forces have demonstrated just how unmotivated they are. The U.S. general tasked with making Iraqi forces effective estimates that it will take at least a year before they will be capable of mounting a campaign to retake Mosul, Iraq’s third largest city, lost to Islamic State forces in June.
The fall of Baghdad to the Islamic State might actually be useful, in terms of making clear to Washington once and for all just how futile continued U.S. efforts in Iraq are and by putting an end to thoughts of a third war there.