My Nephew Returns to Iraq For 3rd Time As Iraq Constitution Fails

Personal Failure For Bush

After four missed deadlines and two months of talks, negotiations over a draft Iraqi constitution broke down as Shiite and Kurdish negotiators decided they would move ahead and propose the draft to the full Iraqi parliament without Sunni approval. Reaction from the Sunnis, whose support was seen "as crucial to taking the steam out of the violent Sunni-led insurgency," was anticipated after American negotiators, led by U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad, announced Saturday that "they had given up trying to broker an agreement."

For the American public, the fallout from this weekend's developments in Iraq may raise more questions about what the Bush administration is trying to achieve. As the Washington Post editorialized, "depending on the future balance of power in the Iraqi parliament, the constitution as it stood late last week could allow the emergence of a Shiite mini-state in Iraq's south closely allied to Iran, with de facto rule by clerics and a continuation of the oppression of women and non-Shiites already widely reported in the region. American military defense of such an entity would be hard to justify."

SUNNI DISSENSION A PERSONAL SETBACK FOR BUSH: The Bush administration has invested much in the Iraqi constitutional process, calling it one track in its two-front efforts to achieve progress in Iraq and ultimately draw down troops. For President Bush, the Sunni dissent was a personal setback, coming on the heels of his personal intervention in the negotiations. Last Thursday, Bush telephoned Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, a prominent Shiite cleric and leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, to "press him to be more accommodating to Sunni interests. That effort failed." In January, Bush laid down the marker for a successful constitutional negotiation. "[E]verybody ought to be able to participate in the writing of the constitution … there needs to be respect for minority rights,” he said. Secretary of State Condi Rice traveled to Iraq to stress to negotiators "the extreme importance of Sunni participation in all of these processes, particularly in the writing of the constitution." And Khalilzad said last week that "it's very important that the Sunnis participate in the political process. Without them participating, the insurgency will have a substantial base of support."