After the Shiite fundamentalists overthrew the Shah of Iran, the great fear of American leaders was the spread of Shia influence throughout the Middle East. We spent the last twenty-five years trying to hold back their fanatacism. In the eighties, we armed Saddam to the teeth and sent him after the Iranians. We put up with his crap all these years because he kept the Iranians in their box.

By toppling Saddam and bringing attemptive democracy to Iraq, we opened the door for the Shia to control that country, too. When the Israelis started pounding (the Iranian-backed Shiite) Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Shia take to the streets to shout "Death to Israel. Death to America." I would say that's a bad sign of what happens if they actually ever control the foreign policy of Iraq.

Bush reversed a generation of U.S. policy to invade Iraq and oust Saddam. That policy might have been morally gray (due to allowing Saddam's dumb ass to stay in power and simply containing him), but it was a policy based on sober calculation.

In pursuing his naive dream of democracy in Iraq, Bush created a natural ally for Iran in the heart of the Middle East. That's why Iran's influence in that region is beginning to alarm policy makers in America, Isreal, Saudi Arabia and other "moderate" Arab states.

All we can hope for is a natural enmity between (the Arab) Iraqis and (the Persian) Iranians. My guess is that will be dwarfed by their common love of Shia fundamentalism and common hatred of American foreign policy.

Now we're in a Catch-22 situation. As long as we have troops in Iraq, we influence Iraqi policy. But as soon as our troops leave, we increase Shiite power and influence throughout the Middle East. Basically, neither choice is particularly attractive. Since pulling out of Iraq makes Iran potentially stronger, we'll probably be in Iraq for a long time.

The one thing that may overturn that assumption is an Iraqi civil war. A general or two appearing before congress the other day layed out a possible "exit strategy", if you want to call it that. He said if American military and political leaders ever decide that a full scale civil war has broken out, then we would withdraw our troops. That's when things get real ugly.