To the editor:

While Republicans and Democrats in Congress continue to echo on mindlessly about the failure of Iraqis to come up with a political solution, the true blame lies elsewhere. Many Iraqis – Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds – have come together from various factions more than once with proposals for a “post-occupation” Iraq.

Those proposals included disbanding all militias and weeding out extremist Islamist groups. In the summer of 2006, Prime Minister Al-Maliki, backed by many Iraqi members of Parliament, came up with a detailed reconciliation plan. The plan had approval from a majority of Iraqis. But it was soon watered down at the pressure of the U.S. and Britain.

It seems our leaders did not like the idea of giving recognition to resistance groups – groups that were not composed of crazed jihadists, but rather Iraqi nationalists who oppose the neo-imperial occupation of their country. That opposition, according to most polls, is shared widely among Iraqis. Given that they likewise do not view the current Iraqi government as legitimate, the Iraqi reconciliation plan was our best hope for ending our military involvement.

Any hawkish realist should know that recognizing the opposition is necessary. In the past we even made peace with the nationalist Vietcong. The problem is that our leaders pretend to be liberators, not occupiers. And most (even anti-war) Americans take that pretense for granted. It’s time to ask for withdrawal with the understanding that our leaders have no intention of getting out of a truly free Iraq.

Creed J. Shepard,

Lawrence