Voices Worth Hearing and Featured Experts

Nir Rosen, author of In the Belly of the Green Bird.

According to almost every Iraqi, the Americans “came as liberators and now they are occupiers.” For Amer-icans occupation conjures images of postwar Germany or Japan, and the repair of damaged societies. In Arabic, tahrir, or liberation, and ihtilal, or occu-pation, have a much greater moral and emotional significance. Ihtilal means the Crusaders who slaughtered Muslims, Jews, and Orthodox Christians, it means the Mongols who sacked Baghdad in the thirteenth century, it means the British imperialists who divided the spoils of the Ottoman Empire with the French, and means the Israelis in southern Lebanon and Palestine.

Vali Nasr, author of The Shia Revival.

Just as the settlement of religious conflicts marked Europe’s passage to modernity, so the Middle East will have to achieve sectarian peace before it can begin living up to its potential. In the coming years Shias and Sunnis will compete over power, first in Iraq but ultimately across the entire region.

Rabbi Michael Lerner, proposes bringing about positive change and greater security through-out the world through a new Global Marshall Plan of Generosity.

He suggests that giving money isn’t enough but that it requires a different spirit in keeping with the global wellbeing and ecological sustainability of our planet.

He declares in his publication, Tikkun, that the Israel Lobby is “Bad for the World, Bad for the United States, Bad for Israel, and Bad for the Jews.”

Sam Brownback, Senator from Kansas.

“Winning in Iraq will require more than bullets – we need a political surge to match our military surge.”

Peter W. Galbraith, author of The End of Iraq.

Iraq’s civil war is the messy end of a country that never worked as a voluntary union and that brought misery to most of its people most of the time. By invading Iraq and mismanaging the aftermath, the United States precipitated Iraq’s collapse as a unified state but did not cause it. Partition – the Iraqi solution – has produced stability in most of the country and for this reason should be accepted.

Dennis Kucinich, Representative from Ohio, unveiled a comprehensive exit plan to bring troops home and stabilize Iraq.

“What is needed is a comprehensive political process. And the decision is not President Bush’s alone to make. Congress, as a coequal branch of government has a responsibility to assist in the initiation of this process. Congress, under Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution has the war-making power. Congress appropriates funds for the war.”

Zbigniew Brzezinski, national security adviser to President Jimmy Carter, is the author most recently of Second Chance: Three Presidents and the Crisis of American Super-power (Basic Books).

“In addition to the internationalization of Iraq, we have to transfer power, as soon as possible, to a sovereign Iraqi authority. In Iraq, we must succeed. Failure is not an option.”

Featured Experts: Reinforce the need for appropriate action NOW!

Clearly, the Iraqi people hold the ultimate key to their own destiny, but the United States and others who want to see Iraq emerge as a peaceful and prosperous country have a responsibility to contribute to its ultimate success.

In addition to our own Plan V, we present the following section in which we feature ideas from six respected experts:

Senator Joe Biden – authored a vital Amendment, that the Senate passed 75 to 23, for a federal Iraq Government.

Ali Allawi – ex-Defense and Finance Minister of Iraq, and author of The Occupation of Iraq: Winning the War, Losing the Peace.

Professor Gareth Stansfield, Iraq expert at The Royal Institute of International Affairs, Chatham House, London.

Anthony Cordesman – a prominent Government Official with deep insight and wisdom, and a Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Pauline Baker – provided an extensive analytical study of Iraq, President of The Fund for Peace and author of the report “The Way Out: A Union of Iraqi States.”

Representative Lee Hamilton – Co-Chairman of The Iraq Study Group with James Baker, and past Co-Chairman of the 9/11 Commission with Thomas Kean.