Please bear with me, because this is not an idle charge.
This is a very specific charge, that Cheney committed treason this month, during his meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister al-Maliki.
I believe the the Vice President conspired with a foreign government to draw US troops into a fight in Basra without consent of the president nor the American military command.
The quick summary:
- Prime Minister al-Maliki launched an attack on Sadrist forces in Basra this week.
- President Bush has stated that Maliki undertook this attack on his own, without discussion with American commanders.
- There was no major provocation between Sadr's forces and Maliki in recent weeks. The attack was not the obvious outcome of escalating problems.
- The attack comes 10 days or so after Cheney's secret visit and conference with Maliki.
- Cheney is reported to have insisted on provincial elections, knowing that Maliki would be likely to lose Basra to Sadr's allies if nothing changed between now and October.
- Basra is the urban center of the Iraqi oil producting region and the port for outflow of oil. Without control of Basra, central government guarantees of oil contracts will be meaningless after the departure of the Bush administration.
- McCain, a neo-con but not an oil neocon, made a major play to European allies. Cheney understood that this means the oil jig is up. If the central government can't be solidified, any possible successor to Bush will either withdraw troops or use oil contracts as a lure to draw in allies.
- The security forces loyal to Maliki are weak, since the only fighting core of the Iraqi army remains the Kurdish divisions, northerners who have no incentive to fight in Basra, nor even to support a stronger central government, since they are widely believed to be seeking a slow path to independence in the Kosovar manner.
- Even the British, who occupied Basra for the first years of the occupation, were unable to secure the city until they reached a balance of power with Sadr.
- That means that only the Falluja strategy remained. Cheney believed that Maliki could provoke a battle that American forces would be drawn into, and ultimately, the city would be leveled, with many American casualties, but Sadrists would be driven underground, unable to win provincial elections in the fall.
- American forces are already being drawn in. The Washington Post reports that Iraqi forces are pulling back, and American forces are already the primary ones engaged. The New York Times has just published a report on the first serious American air strikes.
- So Cheney's Falluja Strategy is underway. Without the sanctuaries in-country that the Sunnis had, and the outside backing (Saudi, etc.) that protected Sunnis from total annihilation, Sadrists will likely be driven into exile.
- Though Sadrists have not had great backing from Iran, the new existence of large exile groups there would cement a new alliance, inflaming Iranian public opinion against the anti-Shiite west.
- With Sadr driven from political power, the central government's role would be secured, and its guarantee of American oil contracts solidified for years to come, at the price of hundreds of American casulties, thousands of Iraqi casualties and a newly hardened police state in Iraq.
Someone needs to find out more about that meeting between Cheney and Maliki. Who was present? What was said? Did Maliki tape it? Is Cheney now subject to extortion as well, since Maliki can hold this over him?
I accuse.