A comment on the Assassinations in Baghdad
By Amb. Chas Freeman
This was not a retaliation, as claimed, but the pre-planned
exploitation of a pretext to assassinate a foreign official designated
as an enemy as well as the commander of an Iraqi militia hostile to the
United States. It was an act of war that will inevitably evoke
reprisal. Iran has already promised that it will exact "savage"
retribution for the murder of a senior official of its government by the
United States. Major General Qasim Suleimani was the equivalent of the
U.S. national security adviser or the commanders of CENTCOM, SOCOM,
and SOCCENT. All are now potential Iranian targets. In Iraq itself,
the followers of Abu Mahdi (Al Muhandis) in Kataeb Hezbollah will seek
their own revenge. The fact that they are part of the Iraqi national
security establishment and armed forces is not irrelevant. The Iraqi
government, already under pressure to expel U.S. forces from their
country, may now find it politically impossible not to do so. Kataeb
Hezbollah is likely to be joined in its campaign against U.S. forces and
officials in Iraq by other patriotic militias, including some
historically hostile to both it and Iran.
The
Iranian government seldom makes decisions in haste. It is the heir to
one of the world's longest and greatest traditions of politico-military
statecraft. It will make considered judgments as it calculates the
appropriate asymmetric responses. If Tehran miscalculates, which is a
very real possibility, the now open but low-intensity warfare between
the United States and Iran will escalate. Those who, like Israeli Prime
Minister Netanyahu and former U.S..national security adviser John
Bolton, have long sought a war with Iran will get one. So will everyone
else.
It is hard to avoid the conclusion
that the timing of the attack was dictated by the turmoil in American
domestic politics. It was preceded by three air strikes on elements of
Kataeb Hezbollah for the death of a civilian contractor in Kirkuk. None
of these air strikes was anywhere near Kirkuk. They bore the marks of a
pre-planned operation looking for a pretext to launch. Just so with
the assassination of General Suleimani and Commander Abu Mahdi (whose
sobriquet is "Al Muhandis / the Engineer"). The charge that these two
were planning attacks on American soldiers and officials could equally
well be leveled at U.S. Secretary of Defense Mark Esper, Secretary of
State Mike Pompeo, White House officials, and U.S. military commanders
at all echelons. At what time have such officials on both the Iranian
and American sides not been planning such attacks? No concrete evidence
has been put forward to justify preemptive defense againt an imminent
attack on the United States.
The
assassinations seem intended to appease neoconservative critics of
President Trump as vacillating and weak in his response to Iranian
ripostes to his policy of maximum pressure on Iran. They provide a
welcome distraction from the pending impeachment proceedings and appeal
to the bloodthirsty instincts of the president's most ardent
supporters. They prepare the way for Mike Pompeo to offset his lack of
diplomatic accomplishments with a demonstration of his ruthlessness to
the "conservative" voters of Kansas, where he intends to run for the
Senate. In the new constitutional order in the United States, in which
the separation of powers has been replaced by the separation of parties,
the attack was politically expedient despite its blatant violation of
the clear language of the U.S. Constitution. The attack thus represents
an extrajudicial execution that marks a further departure from
constitutional government and the rule of law in the United States.
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