O.K., What would you do? (Revisited)

Several days ago Joe Williams began a discussion with this title regarding Iraq. Even though Joe and I are on opposite ends of the political spectrum I was as disheartened as he was that hardly anyone would actually answer his question.

For the sake of discussion I volunteered a suggestion I read in Sunday's editorial section. See http://www.astromart.com/messages.asp?message_id=198237&page=7 . Not one of you made any significant comment on the suggestion. Not one of you offered an alternative suggestion.

I am taking it upon myself to pick up the torch and repeat the question. "O.K, What would you do?" All of us on this forum are adept at sniping the president, the military, bad intelligence, conservatives, or liberals in an attempt to toot our horns but there have been very, very few thoughful solutions offered regarding Iraq.

I challenge everyone on this forum to come up with a specfic course of action to resolve the conflict in Iraq. In doing so, I ask that you not regress into what went wrong in the past or whose fault it was. Much of the heated arguements on this subject have as much to do with our collective frustration as our individual perceptions.

If you were the leader of the free world, what would you do to hopefully resolve this conflict and restore some of the respect we as a nation like to think we deserve?

Simple:

1) Establish a fully streamlined and productive homeland security process.
2) Remove all troops from Iraq and turn power over to the Iraqi people by year end.
3) Change to an even-handed middle east policy
4) Build a true global coalition with UN regulation to fight terrorism going into 2005.

Rob

James,
Thanks for picking this back up. Here's my opinion.

First of all, I believe the solution lies within the Iraqis themselves. We (the U.S) should foster a coalation of representatives from each of these factions, provide a set of ground rules, or tenets that cannot be breached. The representative should be selected from within each of these sects, not hand picked by US. Perhaps this should be done through a monitored election process. The goal is to provide true representation.

One such goal would be to agree on a timeframe whereby our troops would reposition out of urban areas into more isolated rural area. This would serve two purposes: It would removed them from immediate visability from the majority of Iraqi's (out of site, out of mind). Secondly, it would allow them to choose the most easily defendable areas possible. This would have the net effect of placing primary security into the hands of the Iraqi police force, but with U.S. troops at hand should they be needed.

The second goal for the coalation would be to identify and record the past and present grievances between them. These need to come out in the open in order for any agreements to have any hope of public buy-in. These need to be carefully channeled so as to be attributed to Saddam's regime. I know that sounds fishy, but I believe it's necessary. I like what South Africa did with the criminals of apartheid. They put them on trial, convicted them and then immediately forgave their crimes. Forgiveness is a trait of Christian belief and not necessarily an attribute if Islam, so I'm not sure about this.

Any constitution for the new Iraq should be validated, if not created by this coalition. Some tenets of the constitution that we should insist upon are a ban on weapons and a national army. In exchange we would promise support as we do for any other ally. An attack on Iraq is an attack on the U.S.

Once it is apparent that the Iraqi police have control, our force could, after a period, begin to come home.

Just some thoughts. Not yet fully baked.

-Joe

James,
My old thread became much too long for these old eyes to follow any longer so I missed your original reply. I just went back and read it after I first replied to this thread. I believe we're saying pretty much the same thing.
1. True representation and public buy-in in the governing process.
2. A democratic government.
3. U.S. military support as needed.