A foreign policy wake-up call
David Mortlock, WG'07
Issue date: 11/13/06 Section: Perspectives
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Last week, University of Pennsylvania's esteemed president, Dr. Amy Gutmann, hosted her annual Halloween party and posed smiling for a photograph with a student dressed as a suicide bomber. Ironically, while Penn students played dress-up, the latest issue of People magazine profiled a young Marine sergeant disfigured beyond recognition by a suicide bombing in Iraq. That Marine is not alone in suffering the consequences of our failed foreign policy decisions. If the war continues its current trend, Americans will have buried 4,500 service members and contributed $400 billion to our nation-building efforts by the time President Bush leaves office in 2009.
Dr. Gutmann's flippant behavior represents a sad reality - namely, that few of America's elite bear the costs of this war. With U.S. troops dying every day in Iraq, I question why Dr. Gutmann has the time to host costume parties for America's privileged youth. Her biography on the school website reads, "As Penn's President, Dr. Gutmann has assumed a national and international leadership role." If this is true, I challenge Dr. Gutmann, a renowned political scientist, to use her talents, experience, and influence to help shape a new strategy for Iraq. The men and women in uniform who serve this nation deserve better.
I volunteer the following idea to facilitate discussion: the United States should bring home 100,000 troops from Iraq over the next 12 months and station the remaining 40,000 on permanent bases in the Kurdish territories of northern Iraq. What are the consequences of this strategy? An American withdrawal from Baghdad would likely split the country into three autonomous regions. In western Iraq, Sunni nationals would gain complete control over a resource-depleted region. Religious extremists would revoke civil liberties, particularly for women and girls, and offer sanctuary to Sunni terrorists groups including al Qaeda. Increasingly isolated from the richer Kurdish and Shiite regions, civilians in the Sunni region, hungry and desperate, would begin to flee to Iraq's neighbors, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. In southern Iraq, the various religious Shiite groups, all influenced by Iran, would continue infighting for control of local institutions. Revenue from Iraq's southern oil fields would substantially enrich these armed groups, and some of this money would ultimately flow to the poor through Hezbollah-like aid organizations. Concurrently, the Kurds would attempt to establish an independent state of Kurdistan, inciting the separatist movement among Kurds in Turkey and Iran. Ethnic conflict between these groups would rise throughout the country, especially in ethnically diverse cities like Baghdad. This is certainly a dismal future for Iraq.
Dr. Gutmann's flippant behavior represents a sad reality - namely, that few of America's elite bear the costs of this war. With U.S. troops dying every day in Iraq, I question why Dr. Gutmann has the time to host costume parties for America's privileged youth. Her biography on the school website reads, "As Penn's President, Dr. Gutmann has assumed a national and international leadership role." If this is true, I challenge Dr. Gutmann, a renowned political scientist, to use her talents, experience, and influence to help shape a new strategy for Iraq. The men and women in uniform who serve this nation deserve better.
I volunteer the following idea to facilitate discussion: the United States should bring home 100,000 troops from Iraq over the next 12 months and station the remaining 40,000 on permanent bases in the Kurdish territories of northern Iraq. What are the consequences of this strategy? An American withdrawal from Baghdad would likely split the country into three autonomous regions. In western Iraq, Sunni nationals would gain complete control over a resource-depleted region. Religious extremists would revoke civil liberties, particularly for women and girls, and offer sanctuary to Sunni terrorists groups including al Qaeda. Increasingly isolated from the richer Kurdish and Shiite regions, civilians in the Sunni region, hungry and desperate, would begin to flee to Iraq's neighbors, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. In southern Iraq, the various religious Shiite groups, all influenced by Iran, would continue infighting for control of local institutions. Revenue from Iraq's southern oil fields would substantially enrich these armed groups, and some of this money would ultimately flow to the poor through Hezbollah-like aid organizations. Concurrently, the Kurds would attempt to establish an independent state of Kurdistan, inciting the separatist movement among Kurds in Turkey and Iran. Ethnic conflict between these groups would rise throughout the country, especially in ethnically diverse cities like Baghdad. This is certainly a dismal future for Iraq.
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