MOSCOW. (RIA Novosti political commentator Marianna Belenkaya.) The issue of the withdrawal of foreign troops from Iraq has a strong influence on the election campaign there and the next presidential campaign in the United States.
One can also regard the situation from the angle of the safety of foreign troops and Iraqis. The death list includes 2,100 Americans, about a hundred British troops and roughly as many servicemen from other states. But no matter how we look at the problem, the conclusion is that foreign troops cannot stay in Iraq forever, through it is not clear how and when they can be pulled out.
There are two aspects to this problem.
The first one concerns the accusations of President George Bush's administration, which is said to have launched the war relying on unconfirmed intelligence information (doing this deliberately or without evil intent). The issue of preparations and reasons for the Iraqi war is a serious matter, especially for insider settlements in the political corridors of Washington and the capitals of allied states.
And the second aspect concerns troop withdrawal. When they joined the U.S.-led coalition in 2003 and dispatched their troops to Iraq, many governments hoped to get substantial political dividends from Washington, including participation in economic projects in Iraq. Coalition losses increased as time went by, but the outlook for stabilization remains uncertain. New governments have come to power in some of the coalition members, riding on the back of the opposition's criticism of the Iraqi campaign. They have not received any dividends from their presence in Iraq and are having second thoughts now about remaining on the sinking coalition ship.
The number of foreign troops in Iraq is dwindling. Military contingents of ten countries have left the coalition and Poland, Ukraine and Bulgaria plan to pull their troops out of the country by yearend. Their decision will not seriously undermine Iraq's security because U.S. and British troops constitute the bulk of the multinational forces. But the withdrawal of allies, who were needed primarily to make the foreign presence in Iraq look like an international operation and not an Anglo-American occupation, will be a psychological blow to the U.S. administration at the worst possible time.
According to polls conducted by Gallup, CNN and the U.S.A. Today, 60% of the respondents said the U.S. should not have started the war, 54% said the deployment of American GIs there was a "mistake." The Christian Science Monitor, which compared data about the three biggest wars the U.S. had waged after 1945, claims that the public support rating of the U.S. war in Iraq is falling quicker than a similar rating did during the wars in Korea and Vietnam.
In this situation American Congressmen demanded that the administration should submit quarterly reports on the situation in Iraq. The possibility of withdrawing Americans from that country is being actively discussed. During the Iraq reconciliation conference in Cairo, the Iraqi delegation adopted a statement on the need for elaborating a clear-cut timetable for the withdrawal of foreign troops simultaneously with drafting a program for the reconstruction of the Iraqi army.
This timetable is an old demand made by the Iraqi opposition, and diplomats of some Arab countries, as well as Russia, accept it as legitimate. They think that the elaboration of a timetable would allow part of the armed opposition to agree to negotiations.
But creating a timetable is not possible now. The sources of RIA Novosti say: "The situation in Iraq is a vicious circle: there will be no stability as long as foreign troops stay there, and foreign troops will remain as long as there is no stability."
Although Russia was a firm opponent of the Iraqi war and calls for elaborating a clear-cut withdrawal timetable, it has never insisted that this should happen soon. Firstly, the Iraqi army cannot deal with security problems unaided. And secondly, Moscow fears that terrorists might see a rapid withdrawal of troops as their victory. Suffice it to recall the sharply negative reaction of the Russian authorities to the Spanish decision to pull out troops after the terrorist explosions in Madrid.
The withdrawal of foreign troops from Iraq is unavoidable, one way or another. The U.S. plans to seriously reduce its forces there in six months and complete withdrawal would depend on how soon Iraqis assume responsibility for security, said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. She said that this time would come, and rather quickly. Iraqi Interior Minister Bayan Jabr said that it would come in late 2006, and one would like to believe him.
However, the other day the non-governmental Oxford Research Group (ORG) has circulated a document that says that the pressure from the al-Qaida terrorist network will force the U.S.-led foreign contingent to remain in Iraq for a long time, probably for decades. The question is what will be the real reasons behind the withdrawal of U.S. and allied troops - the real situation in that country or their internal political problems?
