So now it's a "time horizon"

Apparently President Bush couldn't get the word "timetable" out of his mouth, having equated timetables with defeat for so long, but with a good deal prodding from Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, he managed a phrase with the word "time" in it. Here's the Register's editorial on the subject, written a bit ago and updated to include the Bush mention. Bottom line? Conditions seem ripe to begin an orderly withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. The Iraqi government is acting more and more like a sovereign government, with Maliki even coming close to endorsing Obama (or at least his plan), and while a good bit of the apparent reconciliation may be a facade, it's the facade the U.S. always claimed it was looking for. So give Iraq back to the Iraqis and let them make their own mess of it, if that's what happens. At least it will be their own mess.

Iraq getting independent

Here's a link to my most recent column for Antiwar.com, on the inconvenient (for the administration and a few warhawks) but growing apparent sense of independence of the Iraqi government. Maliki said last week, of course, that a status of forces agreement or relationship agreement to replace the UN resolution authorizing the presence of "coalition" troops should include a timetable for withdrawal of U.S. forces. It's a popular position in Iraq. The White House gulped and said this is what we wanted all along, sorta, but it was hard not to detect a sense of panic. Talk about mixed feelings! McCain isn't the only one in the U.S. establishment who sees troops in Iraq as a more-or-less-permanent phenomenon.

What I missed getting in was this piece from Juan Cole's blog suggesting that what's driving the Iraqis is the desire to get rid of Blackwater and other private contractors. Remember the massacre last September, and the Iraqi demand that Blackwater be kicked out of the country? They're still there. I suspect Blackwater is an important part of Iraq's demand, but I think there's a great deal more to it.

Why Iraq could blow

Here's a piece by Patrick Cockburn, the conservative Cockburn who was an opponent of the Iraq invasion from the beginning and has spent considerable time reporting from Iraq for various British newspapers. He notes that while things are better in Baghdad compared to the really violent period in 2006. Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki, for example, visited an ice cream parlor recently to show how safe the neighborhood is. But before he made the little visit, a horde of soldiers, including colonels and generals, swept the neighnorhood and checked all the shops within proximity.

Thanks to the U.S. and its subsidies, the Sunnit now have armed, trained and "blooded" militias, to match those of the Shia and the Kurds. One may certainly hope the place stabilizes, but it's a long way from being a certainty. John McCain had better hope his prayers work.