Congratulations to our Congress this time

Senator Joseph Biden on Meet the Press

How good it is to see that finally the Congress is providing some real leadership about Iraq.

Yesterday’s substantial vote in the Senate to essentially endorse Senator Joe Biden’s call for “regionalization” in Iraq may be the breakthrough our own Foundation has been advocating for some time.

Yesterday 75 Senators united from both sides of the aisle to endorse Iraqi regionalization, what is also called Iraqi federalism.

This is not a plan for “dividing” or “partitioning” Iraq as Senator Biden rightly emphasizes, even though many news reports are presenting things wrongly using those loaded words.

Rather it is at its core a plan to end the Iraqi civil war by providing a new and more fitting means of governance for the diverse peoples of the historic Mesopotamia region who were brought together in 1921, by British design, to form at that time the Kingdom of Iraq.

The Senate vote yesterday, though in the form of a non-binding Sense of the Senate amendment, may be the first major step by our country toward truly helping all of the the Iraqi people to reconstitute their country in a way that will allow for regional self-governance, an end to ethnic strife, and an end to the need for large numbers of American forces.

We are especially heartened about this significant development in Congress because the idea of reconstituting Iraq as a federal union of regions is one Goals For Americans has championed for some time, in fact before Senator Biden.

It was back in April of last year in fact that we first published our initial ideas for a Republic of Iraq. A few weeks later we were pleasantly surprised when in a New York Times Op Ed bylined by both Senator Biden and Leslie Gelb (President Emeritus of The Council on Foreign Relations) very similar ideas were put forth.

Since that time GfA has boldly championed the idea of creating a new Republic of Iraq in many publications and forums. Over the past year in fact we have continually focused on the desireability of regionalization of Iraq and in the process our own suggestions for the future of Iraq have evolved and expanded.

In January 2005 we published this ad in Roll Call (The United States of Iraq)
In May 2006 we published this ad in Roll Call – (Three Years of Killing)
In July 2006 we published this ad in Foreign Afairs (We need an Iraqi Union)

And this year we have published the following full-page ads in the following publications:
CQ Today (Back to Iraq)
The National Interest (Mission Accomplished)

In recent months we have been in touch with leading experts and think-tanks about our plan for Iraq, and we have taken into consideration their views, reports, and publications.

Our exclusive interviews with Ali Allawi, Professor Gareth Stansfield (author of the Chatham House Report on Iraq), Professor Jeffrey Stacey (author of the recent article about the future of Iraq in The National Interest), and Pauline Baker (President of The Fund For Peace) have further contributed to bringing into focus our proposal for creating the new Republic of Iraq.

In our role as America’s Idea Center™, and in a sense a kind of “shadow government” to use a concept the British well understand, we are about to present to the Administration and the Congress a publication we are calling PLAN V, that’s Plan V for “Victory” in Iraq.

Indeed, even as the Senate vote was taking place yesterday we were busy putting the finishing touches to PLAN V which not only promotes the regionalization of Iraq but presents the steps that are needed to bring the new REPUBLIC OF IRAQ into existence, to urgently help the millions of Iraqi refugees, and to bring about a real “Victory” for all of the people of Iraq as well as our country.

PLAN V will soon be published in October and delivered to the leading officials in our Government and every member of the Congress.

Update on October 1: In recent days there has been considerable criticism from leading officials in Iraq, from the Arab League, and from journalists in the Arab world about the Senate vote last Wednesday. We have spoken with key persons working with Senator Biden on the Foreign Relations Committee. They intend to continue working closely with leading Iraqi officials to clarify these issues and to seek a much better understanding of what is being suggested. They urge that the specific text of the Senate resolution be more carefully considered by all as the clearly stated goal is definitely not to “divide” or “partition” Iraq but rather to find a reasonable way to balance competing concerns and make it possible for a peaceful and prosperous Iraq to come together again as soon as possible.

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The following report was published last evening by The Europe Channel about the U.S. Senate Iraq vote taken earlier that day:

Wednesday, September 26, 2007 at 22:19

US Senate calls for Iraq’s partition

Washington (dpa) – US lawmakers voted Wednesday to split Iraq into a loose federation of sectarian-based regions and urged President George W Bush to press Iraqi leaders to agree.

More than 20 Republicans joined Democrats to pass the non-binding measure in the Senate, 75-23, showing frustration in both parties about Bush’s war policy and lagging national reconciliation in Iraq.

Supporters of Iraqi partition believe it would let Shia, Sunni and Kurdish factions settle their differences and make it easier for US troops eventually to return home.

But the measure, attached to the 2008 defence budget, runs against US administration policy to keep Iraq united and would likely face a veto if it reached Bush’s desk.

The proposal to breaking up Iraq into decentralized regions came from Senator Joseph Biden, who heads the chamber’s foreign relations committee and is running for the 2008 Democratic Party presidential nomination.

Biden has long championed the federal plan, saying it would give Iraq’s main groups “breathing room in their own regions” and speed up a US troop withdrawal.

But partition would raise concern in neighbouring Turkey, which is fighting a Kurdish separatist movement and would be wary of broader autonomy for Iraqi Kurds across the border.

Sunni-led Saudi Arabia would likely fear a further rise in Iranian influence over Iraq if Iraqi Shiites controlled their own mini-state.

A key Republican supporter and presidential candidate, Senator Sam Brownback, has urged Bush to send a high-level envoy to Iraq “to get these people in a room to cut the deal to get different states, where you have the power mostly residing in the states.”

Biden’s amendment calls for the US government to work for a “political settlement based on the creation of federal regions within a united Iraq.”

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