MB Civic

To the Editor:

Re “Unity Through Autonomy in Iraq,” by Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Leslie H. Gelb (Op-Ed, May 1):

Someone is finally willing to face reality.

Iraq has never been Vietnam. It was Yugoslavia, where a multiethnic state could be held together only by a ruthless dictator. So it was with Iraq — an artificial, multiethnic, multireligious state created after World War I.

Once the strongman Saddam Hussein was eliminated, it became clear that the “center cannot hold.”

Senator Biden and Mr. Gelb clearly recognize this and offer sage advice that has been proved correct by history not only in Yugoslavia but also in India and Ireland in the last century.

The word used then was “partition,” but “decentralization” is an accurate description of the writers’ recommendation.

Whether the center will be able to hold under such circumstances and not end in full partition is problematic, but it is a realistic proposal worthy of serious consideration.

Paul M. Wortman
Setauket, N.Y., May 1, 2006

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To the Editor:

Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s and Leslie H. Gelb’s plan for United States policy in Iraq included some helpful elements, but setting up “three largely autonomous regions” faces two near-insurmountable obstacles.

First, the northern city of Kirkuk, which is central to Iraq’s oil industry, is ethnically divided. What region would get Kirkuk, an issue that posed problems even for drafting Iraq’s interim constitution?

Second, Baghdad is home to about one in five Iraqis. Would each ethnic group really accept that Baghdad would be run by a central government, not a regional one?

Jeremy Pressman
West Hartford, May 1, 2006
The writer is an assistant professor of political science at the University of Connecticut.

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To the Editor:

Perhaps “It Looked Fine at the Time: Moments of Optimism in Iraq” (Week in Review, April 30) signals the beginnings of an acknowledgment by the press, at least, of the simple truth facing us in Iraq: militant Islamists, eager to martyr themselves in the name of religious fanaticism, don’t care about parliamentary procedures.

Does anybody really think that “elections” or the machinations of politicians, however Sunni, Shiite or Kurdish they may be, will stop fanatics from killing themselves in their war against the “infidels”?

We Americans can be a very logical bunch. We think that the world should be logical as well. But logic does not apply to fanatics. It could not be more simple, and the declarations of our leaders could not be more pathetic. “Stability” is always an election or a political deal away.

In the meantime, more brave American soldiers and innocent Iraqis are killed as we patiently, logically wait for the terrorists to come around to our perfectly reasonable worldview.

David Restrepo
New York, May 2, 2006

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To the Editor:

Re “Deep in a U.S. Desert, Practicing to Face the Iraq Insurgency” (front page, May 1):

During the Vietnam War and the Korean War, live-fire combat field-training exercises for villages and built-up areas were conducted at major training centers all over the United States.

At Fort Bragg in 1964-65, where I served with Special Forces, we had a mock village complete with tunnels, wells, straw huts — everything — and we also had a first-class, four-month counterinsurgency course at the United States Army Special Warfare School.

When I arrived in Vietnam in June 1965, I was well prepared for combat in villages and lived in one village for six months.

Paul B. Morgan
Jupiter, Fla., May 1, 2006
The writer is a retired U.S. Army major and former Army Ranger.

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