On Saturday, I was watching The McLaughlin Group discuss the possibility of a civil war in Iraq and a thought struck me. Not a happy thought, but a thought. Is a civil war in Iraq necessarily a bad thing for American strategic objectives?
Obviously, the best solution would be if all the armed resistance and terrorism stopped and a totally political process was allowed to run its course. If this occurred, I believe the Iraqi people would be immensely better off and they would see the end of American troops in their towns and cities much sooner.
But, what if Iraq does slide into civil war, what then? Obviously, all the neighboring states would (more) openly side with the Iraqi population segment of their choosing. Iran would back the Shia and Saudi Arabia would probably back the Sunni. Other Arab states (& possibly even other, non-Arab Islamic states) would also contribute. The Kurds might be the big losers, but hopefully the US would assist them as they have been the most pro-American segment of the Iraqi population.
This would be a nightmare scenario for the Iraqi people, but it would eventually have to end and probably with some form of power-sharing agreement (assuming that the US would not allow Iran to win outright). While the war might be Lebanon-like, the end result will not be. Iraq is too big and potentially powerful for any of the other regional powers to allow one neighbor to dominate Iraq (as Syria does in Lebanon).
Another possible outcome would be some form of partition, but that would require consigning large minorities to probable tyrannical rule from their former enemies. Seems unlikely as does the idea that either the Shia or the Sunni will cede Baghdad.
Any power-sharing arrangement will have to be some form of democracy, possibly under some agreed figure-head monarch. And, if it's a success, it may be even more powerful in undermining the other corrupt, tyrannical regimes in the region as it will have been born in the Arab world rather than in Washington & London.
Like I said, this is just a thought I had over the weekend. I couldn't shake off the notion that when the strategists in the US & UK were pondering the possibilities of war with Iraq they had this same idea and decided that the worst option was the status quo.
