Welcome! Our goal at Winds of Change.NET is to give you one power-packed briefing of insights, news and trends from Iraq that leaves you stimulated, informed, and occasionally amused every Monday & Thursday. This briefing is brought to you by Joel Gaines of No Pundit Intended and Andrew Olmsted of Andrew Olmsted dot com.
TOP TOPICS
- The United States has reportedly agreed to the inclusion of greater Islamic influence on the new Iraqi constitution, sparking protests of betrayal from secular Iraqi groups and sparking fears that Iraq may go the way of Iran. The U.S. action comes as the Iraqi Parliament continues to work to develop a constitution for December's elections and is likely prompted by fears no constitution will be agreeable to all of Iraq's factions. As Mickey Kaus points out, however, disbanding Parliament and trying again might not be the worst result, as new elections might be viewed as more legitimate if there were greater Sunni turnout. Conversely, if the agreement was made, it appears to have paid off in near-agreement on the new constitution.
- Plan for the worst, hope for the best. The U.S. Army is drawing up plans to maintain 100,000 troops in Iraq for up to an additional four years if that becomes necessary. McQ of QandO explains the proper reaction to this news.
Other Topics Today Include: The Airborne heads back to Iraq; reality check from Iraq; IMF aid for Iraq; reconstruction highlights; deadline extension; al-Zarqawi losing support; Carnival of the Liberated; problems with Jordan; debt relief for Iraq.
REPORTS FROM THE FIELD
- 700 82nd Airborne Infantrymen are being deployed to help expand security at detention facilities in Iraq. Members of the 504th PIR will be deployed over the next two months.
- Michael Yon has a dispatch up, in which he talks about the Reality Check - part of that is the IED attack(wmv) that causes you to pull donuts out of the upholstry - and those are the good kind.
RECONSTRUCTION & THE ECONOMY
- The International Monetary Fund has issued a report card on the Iraqi economy, which states that it is relatively stable despite widespread terrorism and the pace of reconstruction.
- Here are some of this week's reconstruction highlights: 18,000 Iraqi schoolchildren will attend freshly refurbished schools this autumn. Forty-three schools in the northern and southern provinces have received funds for renovation and repair; contracts have been awarded to do the work. More than $1.3 million within the Iraq Relief Reconstruction Fund has been budgeted to continue a nationwide school repair program to rehabilitate sanitary facilities, electrical and mechanical systems, and make structural repairs to schools in Karbala, Dahuk, Najaf, Basrah, and Qadisiyah. During an operation August 5 in western Mosul, more than 200 Iraqi children received medical screenings from coalition forces, with support from Iraqi police. Soldiers and medics handed out soccer balls and hygiene products to the local children while conducting the screenings. More than 1,000 children have received medical screenings during this and four similar operations over since the middle of July. Iraqi journalists who have used the press center since its opening in February 2004 received the 30 laptop computers. Iraqi workers in Baghdad have just finished the $3.6-million Al Amari Water Distribution project. The facility will produce about 250 cubic meters of clean water daily, enough for the use of about 2,000 families in the Al Amari and 9-Nissan areas. Construction has begun on a $4.3-million police facility in the Samarra District of Salah Ad Din Province. It will accommodate 250 officers in the northeast part of Samarra, and will provide a police presence in the city to help insure law and order. The project is scheduled to be completed in November. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Iraq estimates that the $8.2-million project to refurbish and renovate the Najaf Maternity Hospital will be finished by December 25. Engineers report that the project, which began October 25, 2004, is 30 percent complete.
IRAQI POLITICS
- Having missed the deadline for drafting a permanent constitution, Iraq's Parliament demonstrated they understand democratic politics better than we thought: they voted themselves an extension to finish the job. (We'll know they're fully-adjusted to democracy when they attach some pork barrel spending.)
- Is al-Zarqawi hurting his own cause with his attacks on the Iraqi people? It would appear so, as several prominent Sunnis are distancing themselves from the terrorist leader as he becomes more and more desperate to undermine Coalition efforts in Iraq.
- Religious extremism in Samawah is threatening to undermine the planned turnover of security from Coalition troops to Iraqi forces. Although the city has been sold as a success story, the success is threatened by al-Sadrist extremists who hope to turn the town into a more theocratic state.
- The latest Carnival of the Liberated is up at Dean's World.
THE INTERNATIONAL STAGE
- The Iraqi government claims that former members of the Hussein government are directing part of the insurgency from Jordan, heightening tensions between Iraq and her neighbors.
- Romania has signed a bilateral agreement with Iraq cancelling more than $2 billion in debt. This represents nearly 80% of Iraq's debt to Romania - nearly all of it a legacy from Saddam Hussein's rule.
ETCETERA
- Do you have your GI Bracelet? Many military families fall into financial hardship when the breadwinner is injured or killed. The entire $5 purchase price of the GI Bracelet is donated to support our troops and their families! Please join us to give back to these brave people in their time of need.
- The troops are still there. So is the Winds of Change.NET consolidated directory of ways you can support the troops: American, Australian, British, Canadian & Polish. Anyone out there with more information, contact us!
- Don't forget Chief Wiggles' Toys for Iraq drive!
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You might have mentioned Shadid and Fainaru's Washington Post piece, "Militias on the Rise across Iraq", if only to warn your allies what the other side and the waverers are liable to be citing.
The Al-Guardian story you link to is completely unsourced. I don't see the same meme in either the NYT or WaPo both of which would love to hop on the Bush administration with hobnail boots for such a "betrayal" as the Guardian puts it. I think your got ahead of the even the irresponsible US MSM suspects.
Wouldn't it be good idea to wait and see what actually comes out of the negotiations before spreading unverified rumours like these?
Would it not be ironic though if, at the end of this war, Iraq chose an Islamic - that is, Sharia-based - government and became a Muslim rogue nation?
I don't wish it by any means but the irony of the US helping create such a state would give America-haters - internal and external - fuel for the fire for decades.
GM
GM--Remember that the constitution has to be ratified by a popular referendum. Polling in Iraq indicates that there is a miniscule level support for such an outcome among the Iraqi electorate. Can you imagine a free Iran electing their homey imams in a free election? The Iranians can't and neither can I. I don't think it will happen in Iraq either. If a Shria government is established in Iraq IMO it will have to be imposed on the people by force of arms.
Omar at Iraq the model is blogging updates.
per Omar, the language will be that legislation that contradicts the "shared values of Islam" will be invalid - more an insurance against Turkish (or French) style laicism than the establishment of clerical rule. There will be similar wording forbidding legislation against democracy and human rights.
Constitutions are only strong in what they specifically forbid, not what they provide for. We see this in our own system (although even that is apparently malleable to the whim of judges). Saying that Islam is the source of law is not particularly meaningful, because laws will still have to be passed by parliment. That is where the rubber meets the road.
There is some sort of horsetrading going on behind the scenes here, because the two issues we keep hearing about are pretty empty pragmatically. The Kurds want to build in an 'out' if they decide to leave, but if you ever decide to break a system apart its pointless what the laws of that system say in the first place. You either have the strength to do it or not. The Federalism debate is about the same, a simple statement that Iraq is whole and indivisable should wrap that problem up.
I bet dollars to donuts all this debate is about oil dollars and everything else is smoke.