New course in Iraq: Let the Shia and Sunnis duke it out

The Hadley memo, headlined everywhere this week, contained an important if overlooked portent of the administration's new course in Iraq. In the memo, Hadley suggested ways the U.S. could make Iraqi PM Maliki more independent of Shia militia leaders like Moqtada al-Sadr. One of bulleted suggestions stands out:   

Continue to target Al Qaeda and insurgent strongholds in Baghdad to demonstrate the Shia do not need the [Mahdi Army] to protect their families — and that we are a reliable partner."

In other words, if the U.S. hopes to stabilize the Maliki government and wean it off Moqtada al-Sadr and his ilk, it needs to display a positive tilt toward the Shia. "Al Qaeda and insurgents" in this bullet point is really code for Sunni. About two weeks back, Laura Rozen reported in the LA Times that the president sat down with his top advisors over Veterans Day weekend to discuss plans for changing course in Iraq. Among the options discussed was the viability of picking sides in what has become a full-blown civil war. Labeled the "Shiite option," the plan involves siding with the numerically-superior Shia against the Sunni insurgency. In other words, tip the balance in the civil war to end it early and decisively. It also has the added advantage of "reducing some of the critical security concerns driving Shiites to mobilize their own militias in the first place." What do the experts have to say?

As an alternative Plan B, it has the virtue of possibly being more militarily effective," said Thomas Donnelly, a military expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

When you are trying to police [a civil war], all you can do is contain it," said Monica Toft, a professor specializing in ethnic conflict at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government. "Whereas if you're backing one side, there are not as many variables to control."

More after the JUMP. 

However, such a strategy wouldn't be as easy as it sounds. U.S. support for Shia militias would alienate every major ally in the region (think: Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan), not to mention the moral quandary the U.S. would find itself facing. Additionally, it's not clear whether American officials, most of whom do not even know the difference between a Shiite and a Sunni, will be able to pull off a succesful divide-and-rule strategy.

On the other hand, perhaps it's time to make hard, realist choices. There are only three options open in Iraq now: Stay and fight everyone, pick sides, or leave. There is near unanimity among experts that civil war is inevitable. And because it is likely to be worse in the absence of foreign troops, it may be better to stay and pick sides. For those uncomfortable with that idea, it may be too late in the game to start feeling queasy. As Kevin Drum puts it:

 Such is the moral calculus we're left with in Iraq. It's not a battle between good and bad, it's a battle between bad and worse."