Top Sunni And Shiite To Meet With Bush

President Continues Diplomatic Push; U.S. And Iraqi Forces Launch Raids Against Insurgents

(CBS/AP)  As Sunnis and Shiites continue to target each other in Iraq, top leaders from each group will be meeting with President Bush.

First up will be one of the most powerful Shiite politicians in Iraq, Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim. He will meet Mr. Bush on Monday to discuss ways to improve the deteriorating situation.

Meanwhile in Iraq, U.S. and Iraqi forces launched six raids against insurgents, including one that killed at least three Iraqis in house-to-house fighting and another in which American forces wounded a female Iraqi who the U.S. command said was being used as a "human shield."

Al-Hakim is leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, or SCIRI, the largest party in Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's governing coalition. He is a rival of al-Maliki, and many consider al-Hakim an even more powerful political figure because of his party's electoral strength among Shiites and its Badr Brigade militia.

U.S. intelligence sources tell CBS News that al-Hakim's forces were the first to send death squads against Sunni targets, CBS News White House correspondent Bill Plante reports.

SCIRI runs the Badr Brigade, a militia that is widely blamed for some of the sectarian killings that have been tearing Iraq apart since the bombing of a major Shiite shrine north of Baghdad in February.

Al-Hakim repeatedly has denied the involvement of the Badr Brigade in the violence, arguing the militia has been turned into a political organization. Before succeeding his slain brother as leader of SCIRI, al-Hakim was in charge of Badr, which was trained and armed by Iran's Revolutionary Guard and fought on the side of Iran in its eight-year war against Saddam Hussein's army in the 1980s.

The empowerment of Iraq's Shiites following the ouster of Saddam's Sunni-led regime in 2003 has been a source of alarm to many governments in the overwhelmingly Sunni Arab world and sparked fear of Iran's growing influence in the region.

Bush will meet with al-Hakim in Washington on Monday in a bid to find a new approach in Iraq, said National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe. "President Bush looks forward to an exchange of views and a discussion of important issues facing Iraq today," Johndroe said.

In addition to his White House meeting, al-Hakim will also speak to the U.S. Institute of Peace. On Tuesday, he has a scheduled appearance at the Catholic University Law School, CBS News State Department reporter Charlie Wolfson reports.

In January, President Bush will meet with Iraq's vice president, who is a Sunni leader and is on record saying the current Baghdad government should be replaced by a coalition that would guarantee collective decision-making.

Mr. Bush returned Thursday from an overseas trip that included a meeting with al-Maliki, whom the president called "the right guy" for the job.

Meanwhile, in some of the fiercest fighting in Iraq, Iraqi soldiers backed by U.S. helicopters swept through Fadhil, one of Baghdad's oldest areas, in house-to-house combat, said police Lt. Ali Muhsin. The neighborhood is about a mile from the heavily fortified Green Zone, where Iraq's parliament and American forces are based.

Fighting in the narrow streets and alleys, suspected insurgents armed with rifles and machine guns killed one Iraqi soldier and two civilians, said Muhsin. U.S. helicopter gunships hovered overhead, but did not open fire on the crowded neighborhoods of one-story homes, he said.

State-run Iraqiya TV said 43 suspected insurgents were taken into custody. Lt. Col. Scott Bleichwehl, a U.S. military spokesman, said 28 people were detained in an operation aimed at capturing insurgents.

During five other raids, U.S. forces killed two insurgents and detained 27 Iraqis. The sweeps took place in Baghdad, the town of Youssifiyah to the south, and two locations to the north: near Taji, the U.S. Air Force base, and the town of Tarmiyah.

In the Taji area, soldiers killed one insurgent and wounded "a female local national who was being used as human shield by the terrorist," the U.S. command said. The female, whose name and age were not given, was hospitalized, the U.S. military said.

It was the fourth time this week that a female Iraqi civilian has been killed or wounded in crossfire between U.S. forces and insurgents.

"Terrorists continue to deliberately place innocent Iraqi women and children in danger by their actions and presence," the U.S. statement said.

Friday's show of force came a day after President Bush rejected calls for a measured withdrawal of American troops from Iraq. At the meeting with Mr. Bush, al-Maliki — who faces domestic opposition to U.S. forces — said Iraqis could take full control by June.

A widening revolt within al-Maliki's divided government showed no signs of subsiding, with 30 lawmakers and five Cabinet ministers loyal to anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr continuing their political boycott to protest the prime minister's meeting with Mr. Bush.

A report due Wednesday from the bipartisan Iraq Study Group will suggest gradually phasing the mission of U.S. troops in Iraq from combat to training and supporting Iraqi units.

"This has really got to become more and more of an Iraqi problem, and less and less of a U.S. one," National Intelligence Director John Negroponte said in remarks that will air Sunday on C-SPAN. "I would hope that our forces can take more of a support role and a training role, and fall more into the background rather than being in the lead in the months ahead."

The study team headed by former Secretary of State James A. Baker III and former Rep. Lee Hamilton, D-Ind., also recommends a gradual reduction of U.S. forces and a more aggressive regional diplomacy. However, it sets no timetable, according to officials familiar with the group's deliberations. The report could give Bush political cover to shift tactics in the increasingly unpopular war.

The Sadrists, who want Iraqi forces to take control of the country's security and coalition forces to pull out, said Thursday's meeting was an affront to Iraqis.

Falah Hassan Shanshal, a Shiite lawmaker with the Sadrist group, criticized al-Maliki for winning a unanimous vote by the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday to extend for one year the mandate of the 160,000-strong multinational force in Iraq. At the time, the prime minister said a priority of his government is to assume full responsibility for security and stability throughout Iraq, but that it needs more time.

The U.S. military, meanwhile, said an American soldier was killed during combat in the capital Thursday, raising the number of U.S. troops who died in November to at least 67, well under the 105 reported dead in October.

Sectarian attacks also continued Friday in Baghdad, with at least 12 Iraqis killed and a Sunni Arab mosque damaged in Baghdad, despite a weekly four-hour vehicle ban aimed at preventing suicide car bombers during Friday prayers.

Gunmen also kidnapped the Sunni head of one of Iraq's leading soccer clubs on Thursday and, in separate abductions Friday, two Iraqi women, ages 17 and 20.

[alphaa10-2009]

End Game in Iraq-- 4
As Baker and company arrive to wrap up matters in Iraq, we do a slow, sweeping Anaheim-shot of the entire Iraq Experience. Lesson study question-- Where were these wiser heads when Bush invaded Iraq? Plausible answer-- They were in the audience, cheering and applauding loyally with the rest, hoping quietly that Bush had not screwed everything up. And to their discredit, they continued to applaud and salute as Bush went deeper. Only a few-- a pitiful few-- were willing to warn Bush away from his scheme to invade Iraq.

Now, the press is full of disclaimers and disavowals from fleeing GOP figures, who delight in proving they saw the debacle from years away. If the Iraq Experience proves anything, the term of G.W.Bush is yet another example of group-think in Washington politics.

We need not use Hitler, as a prime example of a man given too much power, too fast, to understand normal checks and balances and a multi-party system are vital to intelligent, balanced and stable policy-making. Total control of government by any party is usually a formula for disaster.

In the end, we learn once again nothing is more vital to America and its future than a political system which encourages dissent and different points of view, voiced in a truly free press.

[alphaa10-2009]

End Game in Iraq-- 3
The effective UN partition of the Balkans also demonstrates comparative stability after several bloody years without the UN presence, and there are other examples showing an international or regional body can defuse tensions in a way that allows lasting healing to occur. Of course, the UN itself does not do the healing, but promotes conditions to allow healing to occur.

Yes, Iran and its Iraqi Shia would get something out of it, but so would the Saudis and their Sunnis in secured protection. The end point being, regional resolution of a regional problem. As more than one diplomat has counseled, such a solution is the most lasting.

[alphaa10-2009]

End Game in Iraq-- 2
But the process demands a comparatively honest broker, one not identified with the US or UK or regional players like Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Syria, Iran or Turkey. After his unilateralist invasion, how ironic Bush might find the UN has great utility, after all. Kissinger observed the best agreements, even with enemies, can be relied upon to work when they express mutual interest.

In the same sense of mutual interest, partitioning resolved successfully the vicious civil war which issued India and Pakistan. In that model, lines are drawn and refugees allowed to pass to their home sector. In 1947, there was no effective officialdom to safeguard passage, and groups of refugees of opposite religions set upon each other with massive carnage. Obviously, the way to avoid that is to have the US forces-- already in place, and under auspices of the UN-- shepherd the respective groups.

[alphaa10-2009]

End Game in Iraq-- 1
The end game leaves Iran in control of Iraq, in whole or part, a situation far worse and more destabilizing than when Saddam was in power. In marked contrast to the politician who wanted to "stay the course", Bush now wants out at almost any price. While Bush once may have wished to stay on in Iraq, Alamo-style, and entrench Americans indefinitely (if only to avoid the appearance of defeat), Baker and almost everyone else pulling levers in the GOP have served notice the game is virtually over.

However, even as the Iranians hope to have regional dominance in their grasp, a lasting solution to Iraq is not merely to substitute the Iranians for the British and other great powers after WWI. If Iraq is not truly a nation, but a political amalgam of warring and disparate political and religious factions, there is the viable alternative of partitioning Iraq.

Partitioning the country is plausible, simply because partitioning Iraq allows all sides to win something. Partitioning is also stable, since warring factions are not forced to compete for power in the same territory. The violence stops, and there is no longer the issue of US withdrawal from Iraq, because there is no Iraq. The Sunnis join Jordan and/or Syria, the Shia join Iran and the Kurds have no sponsor but us and a lot of diplomacy-- for example, letting Turkish Kurds migrate safely to the south to join Kurds in North Iraq (the Turks might buy in, if only to depopulate the Kurdish rebellion in south Turkey).

[alphaa10-2009]

End Game in Iraq
----

When al-Hakim, intimately associated with the Iranian-supported Badr Brigade, flies to Washington to meet with Bush, none of the Sadrist Shia are offended-- but when Shia al-Maliki meets with Bush, the same elements pull support from his government. Clearly, the more Iranian-oriented Shia factions want to marginalize al-Maliki altogether.

Bush, by meeting with al-Hakim, tacitly cooperates with isolating al Maliki, the same politician he claims is "the guy for Iraq". (Heckuva job?) Left unsaid is the implication al-Hakim visits Bush to open a proxy negotiation with Iran over the future of Iraq, and the manner of US withdrawal.

Beyond another snub to al-Maliki, the Bush-al-Hakim meeting legitimizes the agenda of al-Maliki rivals who want US troops to leave Iraq now. In effect, Bush, having opposed a measured pullout, has begun talks with those who want a total pullout. Left to his own devices to preserve his fading authority, al-Maliki scrambles to respond that Iraqi forces can pull the whole load on their own, by June of next year.

Bush now plays both al-Malaki and al-Hakim against each other, in hopes to declare victory and go home, having negotiated a settlement with somebody-- anybody-- to the war he began. Far from diplomacy, however, this is a fire-sale, as Iranian elements sense Bush is more than eager to sell out, provided he gets sufficient assurances.

[patriotic9]

SHURCH4TRUTH
"Bill O'Reily is shameless"
Couple a days ago,in his talking point memo,Bil O'reliy was trying to convince that Iraq is not in a civil war.These people are not dreaming but SEVERLY HALLUCINATING.
Rush limbough needs to take more XANAX and Bill O'Reily needs to keep finding women at work to SEXUALLY HARASS them and then to give them TEN MILLIONS DOLLARS to keep their mouths shut and then talk on TV about MORAL VALUES and criticize Bill Clinton's affair with MONICA LEWINSKY,just like those PREISTS who preach people against the evils of HOMOSEXUAL BEHAVIOR in the same churches where they SEXUALLY MOLEST and SODOMIZE little young boys who call them father.People like Bill O'reily,Micheal Savage,Rush Limbough are the CATHOLIC PREISTS of our MEDIA.They are the MOST SHAMEFULL CREATURES on the face of earth who are responsible for the CASUALTIES of so many of our men and women in UNIFORM.

[grumpas]

Why don't we send in Stan Laurel to talk to the Sunni's and the Shiite's! He would probably do more good than that moron Bush!

[agnim]

How fitting that the top maniac muslims are to meet with the 'devil'?
It's must feel like dying and reaching muslim heaven. LOL

This is just right up their alley considering the mayhem these insane islamists have been meeting out against their unfortunate and foolish followers! Tsk-tsk

[patriotic9]

These RADICAL CHRISTIANS,MUSLIMS and JEWS should be shown BRITNEY SPEARS news pictures.That might be able to help their PSYCHOSIS.Is Britney Spears with her new pictures better or these RADICAL CHRISTIAN,JEWS and MUSLIMS who cause death and destruction on GOD's name.Is it better to see a NAKED BODY or a DEAD BODY?Is Britney Spears with her new picture better or Condi Rice who compared the deaths of innocent lives and destruction of Billions of dollars of properties with BRITH PANG.Condi was thinking that the deaths of innocent women,children and elderly in LEBANON will lead to the SECOND COMING of CHRIST.Jesus didn't come back but we had created a lot more enemies.How cruel these people and their UNSEEN GOD and their RELIGIONS are which needs the sacrifice of innocent lives for the second coming of his son JESUS.Why people criticize Britney Spears but don't cricize these HOLY BUTHCERS.Probably because some people don't have problems seeing DEAD BODIES but they do have problem seeing NAKED BODIES.Again which one is better in your opinion,to see a NAKED BODY or a DEAD BODY?

[bushrocks1]

Would I send my son to this war? You might ask would I send him to World War II? Or Vietnam? Maybe you would distinguish those conflicts and whether you would send your son to fight in them. But that question is misdirected in a very important way: I can't command my son to go to war. He has to make that choice. So the better question would be: would I volunteer to fight in Iraq, WW II, Vietnam? Would I volunteer to fight in any war? Respond if drafted? I don%u2019t know. I'm not equivocating, only addressing that it is a hypothetical. To a hypothetical, I can answer, sure I'd fight. But I have nightmares of battle (from my past life as a Jacobite). So how do I feel toward those who do volunteer? Impressed and maturely knowing that many things go into their decision. But I do strongly believe that a country that can't find those men is doomed. The fact that we can find them is one reason why I say there is no failure in Iraq. Objectively, I also believe it for other reasons. An attempt to establish democracy in the Middle East is a bold, brilliant, noble effort, facing a high chance of failure. That's why I greatly respect and admire those who have made the attempt--the Bush administration. They have been resolute, something I have not seen in my lifetime. They may not succeed, for reasons outside their control or fault: traitors on the home front being a big one. Now those traitors have apparently occupied the high ground. Yet... we're still in Iraq. Why?...I'm waiting.

[grazinggoat]

bushrocks1: One tend to think U R a castrate. U R talking of a son U don't have, everyone here bets. Like Walking-Liar Bush, he has no sons to send to war. U must only have daughters, if at all. So If that is the case, U are just a frustrated castrate dissipating your frustration over this blog and disturbing the heck out of us... Just to mention U, Most of us here can understand fromt he first time, not like U, who need to repeat and repeat to make sure U understand, Re-****! Or maybe U R Bush himself...