Pelosi’s spring break in Syria

(This post has been cross-posted to ‘The Notion’.)
If it’s spring break in Washington, then that must be House Speaker Nancy Pelosi– accompanied by, my goodness, the perpetually pro-Israeli Tom Lantos!– heading for Syria this week.
Pelosi’s delegation is currently in Lebanon. AP’s Zeina Karam writes there that the Speaker,

    said she thinks it’s a good idea to “establish facts, to hopefully build the confidence” between the U.S. and Syria.
    “We have no illusions, but we have great hope,” she said.
    … Pelosi, who is leading a congressional delegation on a fact-finding tour of the Middle East, said she would speak to the Syrians about Iraq, their role in the fight against terrorism, their support for militant groups such as Lebanon’s Hezbollah and the Palestinian Hamas — whose exiled leaders live in Damascus — as well their influence in Lebanon.

And guess who’s waxing apoplectic about this? Yes, that would be Dana Perino, the fill-in for Tony Snow as White House spokesperson. Karam’s piece notes that Perino said,

    “We ask that people not go on these trips… We discourage it. Full stop.” [Plus, it] “sends the wrong message to have high-level U.S. officials going there (to Syria) to have photo opportunities that Assad then exploits.”

Oops! Then I guess having the Bush administration’s very own Assistant Secretary of State for Refugee Affairs Ellen Sauerbrey go to Syria last month was all a terrible mistake then?
Even Israel’s Acting President, Dalia Itzik, was much more moderate than Perino. She told Pelosi yesterday that,

    “Your expected visit to Damascus has naturally touched off a political debate in your country, and of course, here… I believe in your worthy intentions. Perhaps a step, seen as unpopular at this stage … will clarify to the Syrian people and leadership they must abandon the axis of evil (and) stop supporting terrorism and giving shelter to (terrorist) headquarters.”

But the main thing Washington needs to talk to Syria about right now is Iraq. And this strand of the American-Syrian diplomatic dance is quite complex, and in some ways very counter-intuitive. Did you think that it was the Syrians and their Iranian allies who want US troops out of Iraq and the stubborn old Bush administration that wants them to stay?
To a great degree you’d be wrong, on both counts. Here in London a couple of weeks ago my friend the veteran strategic analyst Hussein Agha told me (and on reflection, I quite agree) that, for now, all of Iraq’s neighbors prefer that US troops stay tied down inside Iraq, rather than withdraw. The gist of what Agha said was that for some of those neighboring countries– and this definitely includes both Syria along with Iran– the status quo lessens the likelihood of US attacks against them. Meanwhile for others of the neighbors (and yes, that includes Syria, once again) it represents a situation strongly preferable to the regional turmoil they fear might follow US withdrawal…
As for the Bush administration– well yes, at the ideological/political level of Bush and his resident “brain”, Dick Cheney, it is quite possible that some of them still believe all that stuff about “staying the course”, the value of the “surge”, etc. But Matthew Dowd, who was a key Bush political advisor during the 2004 election campaign is only one of the former Bush supporters who has now been “mugged by reality”, and has come out as openly critical of the way the Prez has been waging this war… Aas for the serving military, it has been clear for some time that Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Peter Pace has been prepared to quietly push back against the Bushites’ rampant bellophilia… And former commander of the US Army War College Maj.-Gen. (Retd.) Robert H. Scales recently wrote openly in the Washington Times that,

    the current political catfight over withdrawal dates is made moot by the above facts. We’re running out of soldiers faster than we’re running out of warfighting missions. The troops will be coming home soon. There simply are too few to sustain the surge for very much longer…

Since Scales is also a former advisor to Rumsfeld when Rummy was at the Petnagon, I guess that makes him a clear defector from the Bush project in Iraq, too.
Here’s the bottom line though: It is now not only (or perhaps, even, not mainly) the Dems, in Washington, who now want to find the speediest and safest possible exit for the US troops from Iraq. It is also the uniformed military– and also, quite likely, the very low-key Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who seems to see his role overwhlemingly as acting as the “anti-Rumsfeld” in the Penatgon.
But the Syrians, Iranians, and all the rest of Iraq’s neighbors are meanwhile (quietly) quite keen to see the US troops remain in Iraq. I have a little direct evidence of that, myself. When I defied the President’;s injunctions and went to Damascus at the end of February, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Mouallem was adamant during the interview I conducted with him that the US should effect a complete withdrawal of all its forces from Iraq– but when I pressed him to specify the time-period over which he thought this withdrawal should occur, he notably declined my invitation to do that.
So the diplomacy of this US withdrawal from Iraq look set to be very interesting indeed…

17 thoughts on “Pelosi’s spring break in Syria”

  2. Helena,
    Although it’s good to talk and find ways for agreements, what we saw for 50 years of different US administrations it’s not promising in fact its more adapting Israeli views and arguments whatever that can be.
    Reading her speech in the keenest when she gave full support and agreement with Israel position, can we trust her or him with balanced and genuine attitude to find ways of resolving the problems in me and him or her previously admitting full support for one side?
    As an example of here speech here when she said
    “We have no illusions, but we have great hope,” it’s quite similar in the views and speeches given by many US official as another US official touring Iraqi market with Accompanied By 100 Soldiers, 3 Blackhawks, 2 Apache Gunships saying:
    Sen. John McCain strolled briefly through an open-air market in Baghdad today in an effort to prove that Americans are “not getting the full picture” of what’s going on in Iraq. !!
    Read this article (Arabic Text) will give more in details what will be her believe with the support she got.
    The question is there genuine US view to resolve the world problem without bulling and supporting Israeli views in total?

  4. John C.
    Paul Woodward’s War in Context has an interesting post on Iran’s
    In this light, it is easy to see that every increase of tension in the Gulf plays right into the Iranian regime’s pockets.
    The high oil prices benefits both sides US and Iran, as some report saying Iran had ignored their oil industry “Refineries” for so long that they importing 40% to 60% of their petrol and other oil products from UAE, Holland and others paying the market prices for it.
    The reality is US and others to keep tension in the region for the high oil prices and other matters of selling weapons and military matters to those scary Kings and Aimers in the gulf which cost and suck their billons they got from high prices of oil today, in addition a huge a mount of cash in Swiss, US and UK banks.
    For more interesting stories of oil money read this article.

  5. “We ask that people not go on these trips… We discourage it. Full stop.” [Plus, it] “sends the wrong message to have high-level U.S. officials going there (to Syria) to have photo opportunities that Assad then exploits.”
    Its more about her to have a “photo opportunities” with running high for US next election every one start doing his homework “to have photo opportunities” like this guy:
    “Casting himself as the candidate best positioned to end the Iraq war, Delaware Sen. Joe Biden has launched a new Web site, http://www.headtohead08.com , to contrast his statements on the Iraq conflict to those of his opponents for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination.”

  6. I believe the significance of Pelosi’s trip to Syria in defiance of the Bush Administration is that it’s an important early chess move in the emerging historic confrontation on Iraq between Bush and the Congress…yes, how her visit to Damascus plays in Teheran is an intriguing sidebar…but how it plays in Jerusalem is but a footnote to this development…don’t understand why almost every thread here is Israel-centric.

  7. Why waste time on this topic? Lanton/Pelosi represent Likud, and should register as Israeli lobbyists.

  8. Connecting The Dots – ME Mission for Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi

    1- On Sunday night, Pelosi spoke at a dinner in the parliament building, and told Israeli lawmakers that the U.S. remains strongly behind their country.
    “Americans have many political differences, but we stand united with Israel now and always,” she said.

    2- Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi holds up the tags of an Israeli soldier captured by Hezbollah in Lebanon last year, during her speech at an official dinner at the Knesset, Israel’s Parliament, in Jerusalem on April 1, 2007. (UPI Photo/Sebastian Scheiner/Pool)
    3- US House Speaker ‘won’t rest till captives are home’
    by Amnon Meranda
    YNetNews.com (Israel), April 1, 2007
    During a speech she gave at the Knesset in the presence of the families of kidnapped Israeli soldiers, Pelosi presented their ID tags given to her by their families. Earlier Sunday, the families met with Pelosi at the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem, and urged her to bring back a sign of life from their loved ones on her upcoming visit to Syria and Lebanon.
    “She was very excited, and so were the other congress representatives that were with her. She said that it was very symbolic that the delegation was composed of Christians, Jews and even one Muslim,” said Karnit Goldwasser, wife of kidnapped soldier Ehud Goldwasser.
    …Earlier, Pelosi met with Rina Hever, the mother of missing soldier Guy Hever, and Yona Baumel, father of Zachary Baumel, who has been missing since the battle of Sultan Yacoub in the 1982 Lebanon war. Hever said, “I told Pelosi that she was a very brave woman for going to meet with Bashar Assad for the first time. I asked her to work to get a sign of life from my son to advance his release.
    If those POW solders captured how “their ID tags” in the hand of Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi given to her by their families?
    Should those solders wearing them when they were in war zone?
    4- The Jerusalem Post, April 1, 2007
    In her speech at a state dinner held in her honor at the Knesset Sunday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Dem.-CA) vowed to present Israel’s case to the leaders of Syria. Her speech was uniformly supportive of Israel, and she received a standing ovation at the end…
    “We must counter the terrorists’ vision of apocalypse and despair with our own vision of hope. International forces in Lebanon must implement the UN resolution effectively. Hizbullah must be disarmed. Iran must not be allowed to obtain a nuclear weapon.”
    5- ‘US State Department briefed Pelosi on Syria’
    AP, April 3, 2007
    U.S. State Department briefed House leader, Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi, on Syria before she went there, spokesman says. The Bush administration briefed Pelosi for her trip to Syria while publicly criticizing her decision to go there, the US State Department said Monday. In disclosing pretrip briefing, department spokesman Sean McCormack said it did not represent an endorsement of the visit by the speaker of the House of Representatives.

  9. If it’s ok for Republican members of Congress to go to Syria (on April 1), if it’s ok for James Baker to go to Syria, and if its still ok for Bush to keep diplomatic relations with Syria, why can’t Pelosi go to Syria? Typical Bush administration hypocrisy is demonstrated again. Thta’s right, double standards all the way … and will the supine MSM pick up on it and show some guts?

  10. “Nancy Pelosi was in Lebanon today, where she paid a visit to the tomb of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq al Hariri. Visits to the tombs of any of the thousand Lebanese killed by Israel with U.S. bombs during last summer’s assault, or any of the dozens of Lebanese children killed since then by U.S. cluster bombs? Not on the agenda. And, while there is no transcript of her remarks while in Lebanon, chances that she mentioned or even thought about those victims? Pretty much non-existent.”
    “During a visit to Israel during the weekend, Pelosi met with the families of two Israeli soldiers captured by Hezbollah guerillas this past summer. She is expected to raise the issue of the captured soldiers with Lebanese officials.”

  11. It’s a delicious irony that all the neighbours’ self interests can only be served by keeping Iraq intact and a US presence there. As a result they are being given little choice but to eventually accept the Iraqi democratic constitution. The only party to the conflict whose interests lie in a US defeat and complete withdrawal is the Islamic State of Iraq – Al Qaeda – which is now having to fight the Sunnis as well as the rest.

  12. Helena neglects to mention that in addition to the “perpetually pro-Israel” Tom Lantos, Pelosi’s delegation includes Nick Rahall, a Representative from West Virginia of Lebanese descent who regularly votes against resolutions in support of Israel. It also includes Keith Ellison, the first ever Muslim elected to the United States Congress. It also includes one republican representative from Ohio whose name escapes me at the moment.
    Bush’s condemnation of this delegation is bizarre, especially since it was preceded by three other Republican Congressman visiting Syria over the weekend.
    I think this delegation is doing a good thing. Why Helena derides it as a “spring break” trip is mystifying.

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