Wednesday, July 20, 2011
No doubt because it is such a lovely place
As the end date stipulated in the 2008 SOFA nears, the Obama administration has been quietly but vigorously nudging the Maliki administration to ask us to stay just a little bit longer.
Several Iraq experts and former defense officials, including people who were involved in the formulation of the original 2008 agreement that permitted American troops to remain in Iraq, said the administration appears to be wary of the consequences of leaving Iraq in full, or with too few troops left in place – and is in the process of seeking a new pact with the Iraqi government.Maliki of Iraq has two very good reasons to be careful and cautious about this. The first is his ruling coalition which relies heavily on its large Sadrist component. The Sadrists most definitely do not want any Americans troops to stay. And the second, unmentioned in the article is that if he asks the US to stay, we will become a permanent part of Iraq. We will not leave Iraq in his or his children's lifetimes. It is hard to say if he understands this last point.
"At the time of the negotiations it was made clear that it would not be the last agreement, it would be the first," said a former defense official with knowledge of the talks over the 2008 pact, known as the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA).
"Subject to conditions on the ground in 2011 there might be revisiting of the agreement -- if not as a SOFA then as part of the Strategic Framework. But there was never a contemplation that we would walk out of Iraq at end of 2011 like we did at the end of Vietnam. The SOFA was a bridge document to get us to end of 2011."
President Obama has repeatedly pledged to adhere to the original terms of the deal and withdraw all of the nearly 50,000 American troops still in Iraq by the end of the year, save, perhaps, a handful in embassies and other select locations.
But in recent months, the U.S. has let it be known that it is willing to consider staying in significant numbers -- if the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki requests it.
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