Baker Group: Iraq Solution? "Super-Bases" in the Desert!

[leftchick]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,1928058,00.html

This is an excellent article in the Guardian by Julian Borger mostly about the "genteel rebellion" of Repukes with cheney's I mean the chimp's Iraq policy change. How they are going about giving him a way out of Iraq so he can "save face". :puke:

The most interesting part is at the end where he lists the 8 potential ways to change course in Iraq to be presented by Baker's Iraq Study Group. I believe it will be number 7 here. There is no way cheney is leaving his oil unprotected and unattainable now that he is so close.......

7 Redeploy & contain

There are two variations. One is for US forces to leave populated areas and retreat to "super-bases" in the desert from where they could support Iraqi forces - something the army has already begun. An alternative would be for the US forces to move out of Iraq altogether and use bases in nearby countries.

Against "Super-bases could be the worst of both worlds," argues Larry Diamond, a former adviser to the Coalition Provisional Authority. The troops would be too cut off from the streets to have much impact, but they would remain foreign occupiers. It could be difficult to persuade other Arab countries to provide bases, and once out, it will be harder going back. It could also be perceived as cutting and running.

For US forces would no longer be in the firing line and with them gone, the motivation for many of the insurgents might evaporate. They would still be at hand to prop up the elected government.

Likelihood Quite possible in the short term as the US tries to stem its casualties, but unlikely as a lasting solution.

[Hugin]

1. I will again state the obvious... If the goal is to reduce violence.

Getting our troops out of Iraq would reduce a significant portion of the violence.

[leftchick]

2. we all know that is not the goal

Or anyone paying attention does. The goal is the Oil and the bases. Always has been.


Of Oil, War and Power
– Learning From History
By Greg Muttitt
Niqash
July 10, 2006

One year before he became US Vice President, Dick Cheney told an audience of oil company executives in London that, “y 2010 we will need on the order of an additional fifty million barrels a day … While many regions of the world offer great oil opportunities, the Middle East with two thirds of the world’s oil and the lowest production cost, is still where the prize ultimately lies.”

Now, seven years after Cheney’s speech, Iraq’s new oil minister is writing an oil law to open the way for contracts to be signed with multinational oil companies - contracts that could last for several decades. The law will be voted on by parliament by the end of this year. With such a long-term impact on Iraq’s economy, development and politics, politicians would be wise to observe the lessons of the history of Iraq’s oil.

Cheney’s speech echoed a comment 91 years earlier, by a member of the world’s then superpower, Great Britain. The Secretary of the War Cabinet, Maurice Hankey, wrote in a memo in 1918, “Oil in the next war will occupy the place of coal in the present war, or at least a parallel place to coal. The only big potential supply that we can get under British control is the Persian and Mesopotamian supply … Control over these oil supplies becomes a first class British war aim.”

Maurice Hankey also had to wait seven years for his aim to be realised. In 1925 a concession contract was signed between the British-installed Iraqi government of King Faisal and the Turkish Petroleum Company (later renamed the Iraq Petroleum Company). The IPC was jointly owned by the companies that would later become Shell, BP, ExxonMobil and Total, some of the very same companies that are pushing for contracts in Iraq now.

http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/oil/2006/0710power.htm

[Hugin]

5. Can you imagine where we would be if these resources had been spent on...

Alternative Energy Research and Development?

First of all... 653,000 people would still be alive.

If we'd spent $300 Billion... on alternatives. We'd be there by now.
Not only have the alternatives, but, they'd be implemented.

*slowly shakes head side-to-side*

Unbelievable.

[leftchick]

8. well, dick is an oil man

that is where he makes his billions for he and his cronies and apparently that is all that matters.
I share your disgust. :(

[rzemanfl]

3. Super bases would have to be supplied. I know they use Asian

drivers for this work (who are considered expendable) but what about the supplies and trucks?

[leftchick]

4. I believe I read a few months ago

There are actually four super-bases completed. I can't find the link right now. I will look again. If that is true then they are being supplied already, probably with civilian contractors. Who are indeed not counted and expendable.

[leftchick]

13. "The military is in Iraq for the long haul"

Here is one article but I found several referencing Balad Air Base. It is huge! And there are plans or are already three more permanent bases.....

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12441799/site/newsweek/#storyContinued

<snip>

With 27,500 aircraft passing through each month, Balad is second only to London's Heathrow airport in traffic worldwide, according to Brig. Gen. Frank Gorenc, the base commander and leader of 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing. In an interview with NEWSWEEK, Gorenc said he's "normalizing" the giant Balad airfield, or gradually rebuilding it to U.S. military specs. The Saddam-era concrete is considered too substandard for the F-16s, C-130s and other aircraft that fly in and out so regularly, they crack the tarmac. At this point, virtually none of the traffic is Iraqi: the national Air Force has only three crews of transport airmen. "It's safe to say Balad will be here for a long time," says Gorenc, who feels at home in Iraqi skies, where the Air Force has been having its way since the first gulf war. "One of the issues of sovereignty for any country is the ability to control their own airspace. We will probably be helping the Iraqis with that problem for a very long time."

If you want an image of what America's long-term plans for Iraq look like, it's right here at Balad. Tucked away in a rural no man's land 43 miles north of Baghdad, this 15-square-mile mini-city of thousands of trailers and vehicle depots is one of four "superbases" where the Pentagon plans to consolidate U.S. forces, taking them gradually from the front lines of the Iraq war. (Two other bases are slated for the British and Iraqi military.) The shift is part of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's plan to draw down U.S. ground forces in Iraq significantly by the end of 2006. Pentagon planners hope that this partial withdrawal will, in turn, help take the edge off rising opposition to the war at home—long enough to secure Iraq's nascent democracy.

But the vast base being built up at Balad is also hard evidence that, despite all the political debate in Washington about a quick U.S. pullout, the Pentagon is planning to stay in Iraq for a long time—at least a decade or so, according to military strategists. Sovereignty issues still need to be worked out by mutual, legal agreement. But even as Iraqi politicians settle on a new government after four months of stalemate—on Saturday, they agreed on a new prime minister, Jawad al-Maliki—they also are welcoming the long-term U.S. presence. Sectarian conflict here has worsened in recent months, outstripping the anti-American insurgency in significance, and many Iraqis know there is no alternative to U.S. troops for the foreseeable future. "I think the presence of the American forces can be seen as an insurance policy for the unity of Iraq," says national-security adviser Mowaffaq al-Rubaie.

[DoYouEverWonder]

6. Baker must be kidding

He will do everything he can to salvage this fiasco without giving up the oil fields. That is the only reason why they want these 'superbases' in Iraq which will be sitting ducks and extremely expensive to maintain. They don't care how many more troops and/or Iraqis have to die, just as long as they get to keep their precious oil fields.

The US needs to get out and give the Iraqi people back their country and their oil.

[Hugin]

7. The Soviets tried the 'super base' foolishness in Afganistan.

Didn't work then either.

[Zambero]

9. Mideast Guantanemos?

So, we withdraw forces from populated areas and let the Iraqi civil war run its course, albeit retaining sufficient military presence via "super-bases" for protection of oil fields in the desert. Mission FINALLY accomplished!

[Toots]

10. I thought our new 104 acre Embassy was our "super base"

The next largest Embassy in the world is only slightly more than ten acres in area. The Iraqis are developing a huge resentment against this monstrosity. They have no power no schools no hospitals and yet Americans behind these walls have all the luxuries imaginable. And to top it off they (Americans) are out killing people, Iraqi people, on Iraqi soil while living a life of luxury...If it means they have to kill each other to turn the American public against this occupation then so be it. They are fighting for their country against enemy occupiers and they are doing so by any and all means necessary. Americans would probably do less.

[KharmaTrain]

11. Delaying The Inevitable

Moving troops "over the horizon" in this ugly war has never made any sense to me...other than to place them around the oil wells (which this sure sounds like). As long as we're occupying that country, all sides will use that presence as a reason to keep up the killing and strife and find ways to get to our troops as well.

Without international intervention (I submit the Arab League is best suited for this role), a continued U.S. presence in Iraq serves no purpose. It won't stem the civil war, it'll only prolong it. The country is militarize and no matter hwere our troops are, they'll be a target as one side or another attempts to provoke us and ratchet up the violence even further.

The best way to stem casualties is to bring them home...NOW!

[NNN0LHI]

12. I want a "Super-Base" here in Illinois to live in...

...when the friends and relatives of some of the 600,000+ Iraqis Bush has murdered figure out a way to get over to extract some revenge on us for allowing this to happen.

Don

[C_U_L8R]

14. More Crusader Castles In The Sand

Repukes seem determined to keep repeating history's mistakes

[entanglement]

15. Baker is part of the old (criminal) elite

n/t