Iraqi Shia government angry at US Congressional bill to directly arm Kurds and Sunni tribes to fight - Polidicks

[quote]Erbil, Iraq - Iraqi reactions to a bill recently introduced in the US Congress to arm Kurdish and Sunni forces directly has laid bare the extent of the divisions among Iraqi groups, as the country works to combat advances by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). Members of the Iraqi parliament's Shia-majority bloc, the Iraqi National Alliance (INA), passed a resolution last week to reject a law proposed by US Republican Representative Mac Thornberry of Texas. Parliamentarians representing Kurdish and Sunni Arab-dominated blocs boycotted the vote. In late April, Thornberry, who chairs the House Armed Services Committee, introduced a bill calling to directly arm "Kurdish Peshmerga and Sunni tribal forces" with a "national security mission" in Iraq. [B]The bill, expected to be considered this week, stipulates that 25 to 60 percent of a $715m budget allocated for US military assistance to Iraq in its war against ISIL be directly supplied to Sunni and Kurdish forces.[/B] Last Tuesday, Democratic Senator Barbara Boxer and Republican Senator Joni Ernst followed with a [B]bill proposing to directly arm Kurdish forces "temporarily".[/B] [/quote] [url]http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/05/150509084945317.html[/url] I guess the US has all but given up on trying to legitimize the Baghdad government. 12 years of war all down the drain if you're going to just arm paramilitary groups. Sure they may be a great asset against the Islamic State, but it's only going to further distance Baghdad and Washington.

[QUOTE=Zang-Pog;47707276]Yeah we should definitely just keep sending more guns there, that hasn't backfired at all in the past :rolleyes:[/QUOTE] Yeah, we should definitely not try to assist the situation and just let it burn itself out instead, that hasn't backfired at all in the past.

[QUOTE=Thlis;47707293]Yeah, we should definitely not try to assist the situation and just let it burn itself out instead, that hasn't backfired at all in the past.[/QUOTE] The Baghdad government have continuously insisted that the US [I]not[/I] help them, or have very very limited aid, such as specific locations have air strikes to aid Iraqi advancement. The US is basically agreeing to this and then going behind their back to arm and directly aid paramilitary groups that, while are on the same side as Baghdad (though 'enemy of my enemy...'), it undermines both the stability and legitimacy of the Baghdad government as the government of all of Iraq. Needless to say, it's impossible to perfectly vet every tribesman and Kurd that gets a gun from this bill, or whether it'll be passed on, sold to, or simply taken by forces unfriendly to us and Iraq. Undermining Baghdad this way not only drives them even closer to Iran for help, aid, and friendship, it further divides sectarian lines in Iraq between Sunni tribes and Kurds versus Shia Baghdad and unravels any kind of half-assed progress America did with its decade long nation-building project in Iraq.

[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;47707316]The Baghdad government have continuously insisted that the US [I]not[/I] help them, or have very very limited aid, such as specific locations have air strikes to aid Iraqi advancement. The US is basically agreeing to this and then going behind their back to arm and directly aid paramilitary groups that, while are on the same side as Baghdad (though 'enemy of my enemy...'), it undermines both the stability and legitimacy of the Baghdad government as the government of all of Iraq. Needless to say, it's impossible to perfectly vet every tribesman and Kurd that gets a gun from this bill, or whether it'll be passed on, sold to, or simply taken by forces unfriendly to us and Iraq. Undermining Baghdad this way not only drives them even closer to Iran for help, aid, and friendship, it further divides sectarian lines in Iraq between Sunni tribes and Kurds versus Shia Baghdad and unravels any kind of half-assed progress America did with its decade long nation-building project in Iraq.[/QUOTE] The Iraqi government brought this upon themselves by refusing to cooperate with the Sunnis and marginalized the Kurds. The Shias were going to rely on Iran regardless of our actions in Iraq, you'd be insane to say that a major Shia power in the region wouldn't have any influence on it's next door neighbor which is surrounded by Sunnis.

[QUOTE=Zang-Pog;47707305]There are better ways of assisting than just sending military hardware and hoping the right people use it for the right purpose[/QUOTE] There was a mention the commo equipment sent to various groups were bugged. That how the Intel community knows there no longer any moderates. The politicos decide ignore this any way 😒

[QUOTE=MattSif;47707386]The Iraqi government brought this upon themselves by refusing to cooperate with the Sunnis and marginalized the Kurds.[/QUOTE] Pretty much this. The Kurds have been doing a TON of work and the Iraqis barely even looked at them for the longest time. Without the Kurds Iraq would've been overrun by ISIS long ago and Iraq hasn't been NEARLY as grateful for that as they should've been.

[QUOTE=MattSif;47707386]The Iraqi government brought this upon themselves by refusing to cooperate with the Sunnis and marginalized the Kurds. The Shias were going to rely on Iran regardless of our actions in Iraq, you'd be insane to say that a major Shia power in the region wouldn't have any influence on it's next door neighbor which is surrounded by Sunnis.[/QUOTE] Well if the US doesn't want to see the Iranian sphere of influence grow (which mind you, I don't personally see an issue with but it seems contradictory to the US's policy as a whole over the past decade), then it really needs to go to lengths to extend friendship to Baghdad. Literally spent, millions of dollars, American blood and a decade of time to try and build up Iraq, only to hand it over to a country that the US's government doesn't like. It just doesn't make sense to me.

[QUOTE=Zang-Pog;47707276]Yeah we should definitely just keep sending more guns there, that hasn't backfired at all in the past :rolleyes:[/QUOTE] Well, the Kurds aren't nearly as crazy as the Mujahideen were. We should still be careful, though.

[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;47707316]The Baghdad government have continuously insisted that the US [I]not[/I] help them, or have very very limited aid, such as specific locations have air strikes to aid Iraqi advancement. The US is basically agreeing to this and then going behind their back to arm and directly aid paramilitary groups that, while are on the same side as Baghdad (though 'enemy of my enemy...'), it undermines both the stability and legitimacy of the Baghdad government as the government of all of Iraq. Needless to say, it's impossible to perfectly vet every tribesman and Kurd that gets a gun from this bill, or whether it'll be passed on, sold to, or simply taken by forces unfriendly to us and Iraq. Undermining Baghdad this way not only drives them even closer to Iran for help, aid, and friendship, it further divides sectarian lines in Iraq between Sunni tribes and Kurds versus Shia Baghdad and unravels any kind of half-assed progress America did with its decade long nation-building project in Iraq.[/QUOTE] I trust the Kurds more than the Iraqi government.

[QUOTE=Swilly;47710078]I trust the Kurds more than the Iraqi government.[/QUOTE] I don't think people are getting my point. But I've tried reiterating it twice now; I don't know how else to say it.

We've spent so much effort in the form of billions of dollars and thousands of dead US soldiers... and actions we take now drive them to form a closer alliance with Iran. Figured I should mention, before we started airstrikes, Iran had actually been doing them. Iran gave them back a few Sukhoi SU-25's in addition to the ones that Russia provided, and even helped train the Iraqis. Iran stepped in when we kinda screwed them over. Of course our current actions aren't really helping either.

[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;47708541]Well if the US doesn't want to see the Iranian sphere of influence grow (which mind you, I don't personally see an issue with but it seems contradictory to the US's policy as a whole over the past decade), then it really needs to go to lengths to extend friendship to Baghdad. Literally spent, millions of dollars, American blood and a decade of time to try and build up Iraq, only to hand it over to a country that the US's government doesn't like. It just doesn't make sense to me.[/QUOTE] We already did hand the country over to Iran the moment we stepped back and let them make sunnis and Kurds second class citizens and returned to the sectarian policies that had divided the country for forty years, analysts were ringing alarm bells for the last 5 years that the iraqi government was dividing instead of uniting and we still ignored the signs as we kept divesting our control to the Iraqis as the american people were tired of the war, and we lost the patience to keep the government from lashing out at the minorities, now we have the results of 5 years of sitting on our asses with our fingers in our ears The Iraqi government has lost legitimacy and Iraq itself will probably never be the same size as it was before 2003, I think the general school of thought is that we will rebuild the trust and reorganize the government after Isis and Syria are dealt with, the Kurds are going to demand independence after this anyways and that northeastern syria-western Iraq area is never going to be under government control again due to all the tribal fighters that have popped up there. Its really sad that we lost a lot in Iraq but its far from vietnam levels of shit because the Kurds are actually a lot better off even if its alienating turkey