The Los Angeles Times recently published an article outlining what they said are the strategic and diplomatic options being explored by the Iraq Study Group. The Westhawk blog recently posted a description of those options:

1. Set a timetable for withdrawal. A report in today’s news states that the Bush administration will soon insist on a timeline of specific benchmarks and goals on security, associated with a timeline for turning security responsibility over to the Iraqi government. This approach amounts to brinkmanship with the Iraqi government. What if the Iraqi government is either unwilling or incapable of meeting the proposed U.S. timeline? Would the U.S. government then essentially be negotiating with itself? Would a timeline for handing over responsibility to the Iraqis lead inevitably to a timetable for U.S. troop withdrawals? Once those begun, they could not be slowed or stopped. If the U.S. commits to a withdrawal timetable, it must simultaneously accept the possibility of a worst-case outcome, because it would have conceded all control over events.

2. Enter into negotiations with Syria and Iran. The theory with this idea is that Syria and Iran have an interest in a stable Iraq. Getting them involved in the Iraq problem will allow them to be part of a stabilizing solution, so it is argued. This is a terrible idea for several reasons. Going to your enemies for help when you are in a weak position is a very poor negotiating tactic. For the Iranians, such a course would formally legitimize Iranian subversion of Iraq, a completely opposite outcome from what the U.S. should be seeking. In addition, the Iranians would likely also seek to extract Western concessions on their nuclear program, in return for their cooperation on Iraqi security. Formally legitimizing a security role for Iran and Syria inside Iraq would be a betrayal of Iraq and a strategic debacle for the West.

3. Encourage the legal trisection of Iraq. The natural forces of ethnic cleansing are already slowly bringing this about. The formation of a Shi’ite homeland in Iraq’s nine southern provinces, led by SCIRI’s Abdul Azziz al-Hakim, will be another large step down this path. However, the Sunni-Arabs will never formally agree to the legal breakup of Iraq, because they will be left with nothing from the deal. Therefore, they will resist this course, as they are doing everyday in Baghdad and Anbar. Iraq will become stable only when the Sunni-Arab population is reduced enough for it to no longer be a base for military activity. Hopefully this can come about through orderly international resettlement. Until that happens, large mixed cities like Baghdad and Kirkuk will be very violent places. Once again, the U.S. is highly unlikely to publicly back a policy of ethnic cleansing and resettlement, nor does Mr. Bush wish to be the Lord Mountbatten of the 21st century.

4. Replace Prime Minister al-Maliki with a “strongman.” Who might be this strongman? And what would then happen to Iraq’s national unity government after he was appointed? If Iraq’s current national unity government and parliament want to replace Mr. al-Maliki, they can do so at any time. If such a better candidate for prime minister already existed, might not the parliament have chosen him in the first place? Appointing a strongman would certainly intensify the civil war; the strongman would have to be a Shi’ite, and if he were truly strong (stronger than the national unity government allows Mr. al-Maliki to be), then the Sunni-Arabs would walk away from legal politics. This reaction, combined with the ethnic cleansing of the Sunni-Arabs, we believe is necessary to stabilize Iraq. But they are not likely to be Bush administration policies.