Let’s see five years, 3,967 flag-draped coffins of Americans, tens if not hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqis, about $600 billion spent so far, at a clip of $12 Billion a Month and all of it comes down to this:

In the six months since anti-U.S. cleric Muqtada al-Sadr ordered his followers to put down their weapons, violence dropped sharply around Iraq. Mohammad Salem, a young militant in al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army, wants the cease-fire to end.

That could happen as soon as Saturday and send al-Sadr’s Shiite fighters such as Salem back to the streets to resume their campaign of violence, which could result in increased attacks on U.S. troops.

No one ever points out to John McCain when he proclaims victory that the surge’s success in bringing down violence is predated by al-Sadr and the Mahdi Army’s imposition of a cease fire. No, the press just sits there and takes down the Maverick’s dictates.

But after all the blood and treasure that has been spent, and will be spent, 160,000 American troops await the word of a man they tried to arrest and/or kill four years ago and who is now pretty much untouchable and indispensable. He may choose to continue it, he may not. But whatever he chooses, it will affect the fate of millions of Iraqis and American Soldiers.

When one looks at the victors of Iraq, it’s pretty plain that one person, in particular, has been the beneficiary of our ill placed and ill executed imperial hubris. And it’s the one who thumbed his nose at Bush and the American misadventure in Iraq. By all appearances, the most important person in Iraq both hates us and has us depressingly dependent on his decisions.

Someone might want to mention this to John McCain between hugs.

(picture from panzerwaffen43)

Related posts:

  1. US Contractors Held in Iraqi Jail for Green Zone Murder
  2. Changing of the Guard: US Troops Withdraw from Iraqi Cities; Maliki Declares “Sovereignty Day”
  3. Torture: Obama Heeded Maliki on Abuse Photos, Says McClatchy; What That Says for Our Occupation
  4. Spinning the Death of a 12 Year Old – Journalism Fail
  5. Maliki vs. Odierno: Who Blinks First?