The Amherst Wire

Sgt. Kendrick Lau was among the first wave of U.S. Army Reservists deployed to Iraq. As a civil affairs soldier, his mission was to help “win the hearts and minds” of the Iraqi population.

Now, almost four years after his return, the UMass alum feels that continued major military presence “isn’t worth our resources, unfortunately.”

He has watched the situation in Iraq deteriorate in the years since his service. The last five months of his tour were spent in the city of Balad, about 68 miles north of Baghdad. At the time he was there, Lau describes the region as a “pro-American mix of Shiites and Sunni living in harmony,” a community that twice attempted to assassinate Saddam Hussein.

Now the Shiite-led Mahdi Army controls the area, killing Sunni residents and striking fear in the hearts of their once peaceful Shiite neighbors.

“I would vote for somebody who does have a tentative plan to take us out of there. Do I really think that any of the big three candidates out there actually have a plan? No. Absolutely not. I personally don’t believe that they have any idea what they’re talking about.”

John McCain’s gaffe, describing al Qaeda as an Iranian-supported Shiite group when it is actually a Sunni militia, has discredited McCain in Lau’s perspective. He also views Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton as “opportunistic,” seizing on the conflict’s unpopularity to garner political support. Still, he reiterates he would “vote for someone who has a tentative plan to get us out.”

Lau, who received a political science degree in 2006, has developed his own theory about the best course of action to get U.S. forces out of Iraq. His plan starts with an immediate 90 percent pullout of all forces in the Baghdad area. While he admits that a pullout may cause the Iraq government to fall, he questions: “Is the Iraq government a real government? I don’t believe so.” At its current state, he claims it consists of “sponsored warlord factions sitting together in power in parliament.”

Next, he would station troops in the Kurdish region to stop the spread of back and forth violence with Turkey. Once set up in the “peaceful regions” as he calls them, negotiations on an international level would have to begin with Iran in an attempt to resolve the “crisis.”

“Iranians have a huge play because they are sponsoring a lot of the Shiite militias,” he said.

International Politics professor Vincent Ferraro, of Mt. Holyoke College, agrees with Lau’s assessment of the current situation in Iraq as well as his ideas for the future.

“It acknowledges the primary role of Iran in the conflict and distinguishes between talking with Iran from embracing Iran, a distinction only a mature diplomat is capable of making,” Ferraro said.

He goes on to say that Lau’s plan “suggests that the state of Iraq has an identity that transcends the current configuration of forces and one that will likely survive without U.S. support for the current government. This assumption may be optimistic, but assuming that the government can survive with U.S. support is also optimistic.”