U.S. and Iraqi officials are currently locked in tense negotiations on a pact to ratify a long-term American presence in Iraq. But it's becoming increasingly clear that differences between the two sides make agreement unlikely before the July 31 deadline set by the Bush Administration.

The proposed deal is controversial both in Washington — where Democrats see it as a move to tie the hands of the next U.S. President, and are pressing for it to be subject to congressional approval — and also in Baghdad, where many Iraqi leaders fear that they're being asked to sign away their sovereignty. Negotiators for both sides emphasize that respect for Iraqi sovereignty will be the basis of any deal. But they don't appear to mean the same things by "sovereignty." Differences over the extent of control the Iraqi government would have over the deployment and activities of U.S. military forces on their territory has cast a shadow over prospects for an imminent deal. "These are negotiations between two sovereign parties," said a senior U.S. official in Baghdad, "each of which has the ability to say yes, or to say no."

Scipio Africanus (6/8/2008)

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I wonder how long it took for Germany, Japan, and Italy to regain full sovereignty?

Did they "ever?"

Konrad von Richtmark (6/9/2008)

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It is interesting that you ask this, as you like to present these countries as examples of how US liberation brings good stuff, and not "enslavement to the US Hegemony". Undermining yourself, eh

Well, as far as I know, all the US troops left in those countries are there because the governments of those countries want it. I'm sure Bush would be grateful if he could send those 45,000 troops stationed in Okinawa to Iraq.

Of the roughly 12.4 million Germans who in 1944 were living in territory that following the dismembering of Germany would become part of post-war Poland, an estimated 6 million fled or were evacuated before the advance of the Red Army. Of the remainder up to 1.1 million died, 3.6 million were expelled by the Poles, one million were designated as Poles, and 300,000 remained.

(which not even Obama proposes)