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Iraq
Weasley: A new course needed in Iraq
2003-11-06
MY 34 YEARS in the Army taught me to steel my spine, but not my heart, whenever I hear news of American casualties. On Tuesday I read about Sergeant Ernest Bucklew, who was headed home to attend his mother's funeral when his Chinook helicopter was shot out of the sky en route to Baghdad. Fifteen American soldiers died alongside him.
This is called personalizing the tragedy. It's designed to tug at the reader's heartstrings. From the first paragraph, we should draw a conclusion in the second, right?
For the sake of every member of our armed forces, we need a plan to end the conflict in Iraq. Retreat is not an option. Withdrawal would be a disaster for America, a tragedy for Iraq, and a crisis for the world. It would destroy our credibility, give terrorists a new haven, and throw the Middle East into greater turmoil. No matter how difficult it will be, we need a "success strategy."
I guess having an "exit strategy" didn't fly. If we don't have a plan to "end the conflict" then our military's in the wrong business. Publicizing the content of the plan would be pretty stoopid, since the Bad Guys would then be able to analyze it at their liesure and come up with counterplans. Since we're agreed that retreat isn't an option, staying is the only option. Even a brilliant "success strategy" designed by Gen. Clark would include a cold-eyed estimate of the number of casualties a continuing occupation would involve, figured as a percentage of the total force. (This, by the way, avoids personalizing the casualties — planners don't say things like "Well, guess PFC Jones is going to have to take a bullet...") So what's different in Gen. Clark's proposal from what we have now?
Success won't be easy, but only success can honor the sacrifice of our soldiers and allow the troops to come home. Success means that Iraq is strong enough to sustain itself without outside forces. Success means that representative government has taken root. Success means that Iraq's economy and civil society are healthy again.
"Honoring the sacrifice of our soldiers" is pretty-sounding blather, a semantic null. Clark's criteria for success aren't really what you'd call hard objectives. The problem is that Iraq was strong enough to sustain itself without outside forces under Sammy. The regime did that by killing people, stealing all the money in sight, and picking fights with its neighbors. We want to leave a different type of regime, but we have to work with the same raw material, a populace that's been beaten up for 30+ years and that's torn by its own internal rivalries and contradictions. We've been working on the representative government from the very first. Jay Garner set up local elections within weeks of the regime's collapse. And Iraq didn't have a working economy when we arrived. It was an artificial construct, just as artificial as the Soviet system was. The money came in, Sammy took it, and he handed it out as he pleased. We'd like to build something a bit more sophisticated than that.
Congress just gave the administration an $87 billion check to continue down the path that we're on. But President Bush still has no strategy to succeed. I do. Here's my "success strategy":
  • End the American monopoly.
    We must call a summit of the leaders we've alienated, the people whose advice we've scorned, the organizations whose assistance we've turned down. Out of this gathering, we can build a new organization to replace the Coalition Provisional Authority and internationalize the face of the occupation.
    That's making the assumption that the alienation of those leaders was our fault — we're required to please them. In every dispute leading up to the Iraq war there were two sides. In most of those cases ours was the right side. Does Gen. Clark have a plan to nudge them into pleasing us? Other than the diplomatic plans Bush/Powell have been implementing in the face of the changed circumstances Sammy's fall has brought about?
    To guide the reconstruction of Iraq, we need a civilian from an allied country. That civilian official would report to an international council, composed of representatives from nations that support our efforts to build a democratic Iraq.
    Whatever for? Is Clark accusing Bremer of incompetence? What's the matter with having an American in charge? What makes an "international council" more effective than reporting to the State Department and the Defense Department? The lights are back on, the schools are open, the hospitals are running. There are groceries on the shelves. What's Bremer doing wrong?
    As we saw in the Balkans, when we share power, other countries share our burden. I would transform the military occupation into a NATO operation with US forces in charge. With US command, NATO authority, and UN endorsement, other NATO countries would send troops, and Arab countries would also step in.
    We have troops from both NATO and non-NATO countries. There's no indication that NATO operations are more effective than American-run operations. I'd venture to say just the opposite, in fact.
  • Find the right force mix.
    The more conventional forces we have, the more logistics we need. The more unarmored Humvees on patrol, the more unnecessary American deaths from roadside bombs.
    On the other hand, the more tracks we have, the more we present the feel of heavily-armed occupation. Taking the helmets off and replacing them with soft caps has its uses, too. The right force mix for an army of occupation is heavier on military police than on artillery, heavier on civil engineers than combat engineers. Managing operations in a fluid situation — which Iraq remains — is a matter of control and feedback, with adjustments made as needed. Because there are large numbers of people, organizations, and issues involved, all of them in constant flux, plans at the operational level will often have to be made up in the morning and modified in the afternoon.
  • Better border protection.
    To stanch the flow of foreign jihadists into Iraq, we must seal the borders. That requires assistance from Iraq's neighbors. Using carrots and sticks, we can persuade these countries to cooperate.
    Or not. Iran's our declared enemy and Syria's our undeclared enemy. Regardless of the size of the stick and the flavor of the carrot, they're going to do what they see in their own interests, which at the moment involves shipping jihadis in to fight us. Once the jihadis are bumped off they'll modify their own plans, possibly toward our point of view, more likely toward some other inimical tactic. It takes two to negotiate, and it only takes one to break an agreement.
  • Secure ammunition.
    Weapons dumps throughout Iraq are unguarded. It is estimated that 500,000 tons of ammunition is still not secure. We must patrol these sites and destroy these weapons.
    I agree. So, no doubt, do Rumsfeld and the field commanders. The problem is the sheer quantity of the arms and ammunition that Sammy bought. Sammy's demand for ordnance went far beyond the requirements of a normal state and into that realm of pathological obsession. There are more ammunition dumps to guard and dispose of than we have available troops and auxilliaries.
  • More intelligence resources.
    Success in Iraq depends on developing good information and a good rapport with civilians. Right now too many of our linguists and intelligence experts are working on the search for weapons of mass destruction. International inspectors should take over that search, which would free up enough experts to help us track down those who are killing our soldiers and creating chaos.
    That's a great idea, so long as the internatinal inspectors aren't following their own agendas and report to our military and political chain of command. Otherwise, we'll just have to make due, building our own intel apparatus within the country as we can. It's too bad there aren't more Americans we speak fluent Arabic, but colleges offer more French, Spanish, and German — and there's no requirement for a foreign language in any of our schools, as far as I can see.
  • Formidable Iraqi security forces.
    We should recall the Iraqi Army to duty right now. If given good pay, good training, and solid background checks, Iraqi civilians can also help fill the intelligence and security gap.
    Wasn't there some sort of a problem with the Iraqi army before? Lemme think real hard here... Oh, yes. It was more dangerous to the citizenry than it was to us. Reconstituting the units is an idea, though I don't know if it's a good one or not. There are pros and cons. Even with reconstitution, the officers' corps certainly has to be revamped. So what's the quick solution to that?
  • Give the Iraqis a rising stake in our success.
    It would be wrong to transfer authority to the Iraqis before they are ready to succeed, but we can give Iraqis more control over their destiny. The administration says the Iraqis can't have a sovereign government without a constitution. This is backwards. Iraqis, appointed by representatives from Iraq's 50 elected regional councils, should name an interim government even while a constitution emerges. That is what our Founding Fathers did. If we give the interim government control over oil revenues and transfer authority on an ongoing basis, it will be easier for the Iraqi people to see that those blowing up pipelines are sabotaging their future. If we give civilians a stake in stemming the violence, they will help us solve this problem.
    There's a timetable for the drafting of the constitution and it'll be followed by elections for a government. The Iraqis know that. We allowed the Afghans to choose their own constitutional destiny and they came up with an Islamic republic that ten years from now won't be too different from the Taliban. Allow us to learn from our recent mistakes, at least.
As of today, 383 of our soldiers have been killed in action. When he died, Sergeant Bucklew was only 33. In Fort Carson, Colo., his wife and two sons are grieving. Not a single soldier from Fort Carson died before May 1, when President Bush declared an end to major combat. More than 20 Fort Carson soldiers have died since.
Our casualties have been relatively light in Iraq — nothing compared to the casualties we took in Vietnam. The casualties are designed by the Bad Guys to panic the country into losing its resolve and withdrawing, which probably the majority of the Dem presidential candidates are in favor of. I don't see much difference between what Clark is proposing and what Bush/Powell/Rumself are doing. I think that what they're doing will work in the long run, and that a year from now Iraq will be a lot closer to being pacified.
It is unconscionable to allow our country to continue staggering down the track that we're on in Iraq. Bush keeps saying we need to "stay the course." We need to change the course. With a strategy to succeed, our armed forces will turn things around.
And they're doing so...
Wesley Clark, a retired general, is a Democratic candidate for president.
Posted by:Fred Pruitt

#15  Clark's comments are mostly (1) obvious and represent no real change from current strategy, or (2) laughable. Especially laughable -- though perhaps it's not so funny, as here's a former 4-star SACEUR vying for a major party pres. nomination mouthing the words -- is this bizarre suggestion that a non-American be put in political control. Presumably this would be to appease the perverse, or bad-faith, or outright hostile opposition of "allies" and others to the US destruction of the Iraqi regime. That's jaw-dropping enough.

But how vapid can Clark get? Does he believe that Iraqis, overwhelmingly desperate for our basic success in vanquishing the diehards and fearing most that we will leave before the job is done, would be somehow reassured (rather than appalled or concerned) that a non-American (seemingly, ANYBODY but an American?) was "in charge" of the occupation? This is a brutal test of wills, a sort of hybrid civil war with international involvement. Iraqis, sensibly enough, care about results, not the passport of the guy at the Republican Palace in Baghdad. Equally sensibly, they know the US will make or break this, so why would a non-American proconsul help?

Honorable military service, first in his class, real smart guy, sure. But when he has talked in public much above the tactical level and outside narrowly military issues, Clark has been amazingly unimpressive (polite, respectful formulation for a reality that merits far harsher language).

I know memories are short, but was it supposed to be humorous for Clark to suggest NATO involvement? Though not probably his fault, his famous experience with NATO in the Kosovo war was one of the biggest fisacoes since WWII. It was a burlesque of political-military bumbling saved only by the fact that the adversary was a solitary little pipsqueak of a country that had a ready exit by ceding some territorial control. It's going to be "a long, hard slog" in Iraq even with a fairly well-run, determined operation with clear US control. Substituting some fanciful NATO operation cannot even be considered a serious idea.
Posted by: IceCold   2003-11-6 9:45:22 PM  

#14  Interesting. This coincides with a political opinion piece in today's Gazette by E. J. Dionne, of WaPo. In it he speaks with glowing words about the Democratic Party's alternative foreign policy. What it all boils down to is the same old sh$$: turn the whole thing over to the United Nations, apologize for acting "independently", and stop being so much of a bully.

The Democratic Party is firmly and unswervingly committed to ending US sovereignty and making this nation subservient to the United Nations and "world opinion". Those in public offices should be expelled, and the entire party dumped somewhere north of Montreal.
Posted by: Old Patriot   2003-11-6 7:24:59 PM  

#13  Please don't drag Metternichs name into anything having to do with Kissingbug. Kissingbug has Bechtel paid scholars who do nothing but look for passages with his and Metternichs name in the same paragraph.
Posted by: Shipman   2003-11-6 5:18:17 PM  

#12  Rice is an old Kissinger protege, IIRC. And Rummy an old Nixon hand, IIRC. Not people whose natural focus is on a global war for democracy. People whose thinking is "realist" if more muscular than the State Dept variety. Doesnt make them fools by any means - Kissinger was no fool - nor was Metternich! But what we need now is something different from "realpolitik" - its a vision to win an ideological war against a new variety of fascism.
Posted by: liberalhawk   2003-11-6 4:49:34 PM  

#11  LH - Lieberman is the one Donk who has been consistent and not a limp-dick phool tool. If he was electable, I'd want to know what else he thinks. He's not - and that sucks, actually, because it leaves America divided solely based on the Iraq question, I'd say: Stick it out or Cut 'n run. An election should be about the whole picture, but the Donks have chosen polarization on one issue as their prime strategy. I think they shoulda demanded a refund from their Paid Pol Advisors long ago.

Re: Admin / Nation Building / NeoCon short-term thinking. OK - you get to say I Told You So. ;-) I wondered the same thing about Afghanistan - and it may soon return to Totally Fucked. Iraq is ultra-crucial, IMO. Another dropped-ball like Afgh would make a joke of everything. Hence Bush 2004 or emigrate, officially, probably to Thailand - as I would have zero left in common with NMM's PamericaC. Re: Cheney, Rummy, Rice, and Powell... Which ones are phools? Not Rummy and not Rice. Cheney is still an enigma, IMO. Powell is smart & politically astute, as we saw when running JCS, and playing his assigned role. If he's a dolt, then Dubya is to blame cuz that's where 99% of his words and actions originate. Wolfie gets paid for Big Ideas & GlobalThink™, prolly. So it falls to JCS and State's tiff and turf games to ID the specific screwups. I've said before that I see Dubya in a somewhat unflattering light. Details are not his strength, IMO. He's like Reagan, IMO. He says what his vision is and expects the people he's hired and who report to him to get the damned job done. That works great in business, obviously it can fail / fall on its ass in Govt. Personally, I think much of what failed initially can be traced back to upper and mid-level State people and their back-stabbing political turf bullshit. I do not believe them to be above sabotage. I'd dearly love to see them fired en masse. But that time has passed. Dubya has to get on-track and keep it there till the bloody bitter end - probably another 18 months. Just my 2 cents.

I'll have a look at the Berman book. It's certainly unavailable here and I dunno about Amazon's int'l shipping. I'll check it out. Thx!

BTW, Havel would've been a great choice, if he'd been interested.
Posted by: .com (RoPMA)   2003-11-6 3:57:00 PM  

#10  rantburg - 2/27/2003

"Senior Bush administration officials, speaking anonymously, have briefed reporters on their vision of a postwar Iraq and these plans emerged last night:
The US military would control Iraq in the short term after President Saddam's removal; troops would maintain security, protect Iraq's oil fields, ensure that other nations respect Iraq's existing borders and find and destroy weapons of mass destruction.

A civilian administrator would work on engaging Iraqis in the formation of a democratic government. A transition would last months, not weeks. The administrator would not necessarily be an American.

If it's not going to be Tommy Franks, it should be somebody on the order of Havel. No Frenchies, no Arabs, no UN... "
Posted by: liberalhawk   2003-11-6 3:20:10 PM  

#9  "LH - Clark's picture is classic 20/20 hindsight"

Interestingly one of the things Clark calls for is an allied individual to head the occupation. Lieberman called for that in FEBUARY, before the war began! And IIRC, we discussed exactly that right HERE!

Clark may be a weasal, but some of us supported the war from the beginning were concerned about the admins reluctance to nation build. I think Wolfie gets the importance of changing the region. Im NOT sure about Cheney, Rummy, or Condi. Let alone Powell.

Dot com - you ever read Paul Berman's "Terror and Liberalism" ?- you should.
Posted by: liberalhawk   2003-11-6 3:07:09 PM  

#8  How about an Italian or Spaniard.... pitching in and not a lot of baggage.

Wait... make that how about an Italian?
Posted by: Shipman   2003-11-6 2:13:37 PM  

#7  The problem with bringing in a non-American to replace Bremer is the fact that there are no viable alternatives. Any of the Commonwealth countries might bring back memories (imagined, of course) of British colonialism; none of the Arab countries are trustworthy; France, Germany and Russia don't deserve even the slightest recognition for their "help"...

Another problem is that Iraq would turn into another Bosnia -- permanent international presence, as "aid workers" turn "assisstance" into careers.
Posted by: Robert Crawford   2003-11-6 1:37:39 PM  

#6  Everytime Clarkbar opens his mouth it reminds me of General Sir Michael Jackson's encounter with Clarkie over the securing of an airfield in Kosovo to prevent the Russians from landing. Here is Jeff Elkins take on the whole thing. But in summary, now that Mike Jackson is chief of staff of UK military I wonder what will happen to our 'special relationship' if Clark is elected President?

http://www.lewrockwell.com/elkins/elkins17.html
Posted by: Jack is Back!   2003-11-6 1:26:30 PM  

#5  It is unconscionable to allow our country to continue staggering down the track that we're on in Iraq.

See what happens when you let a Kennedy drive the train?
Posted by: Raj   2003-11-6 1:15:44 PM  

#4  LH - Clark's picture is classic 20/20 hindsight. All post-war occupations with which America has been involved have gone exactly this way, in fits and starts replete with mistakes and reassessment and restarts. InstaPundit has blogged numerous examples of the same things happening in post-war Germany.

OT: Which reminds me again, where has TGA gone? I miss the hell out of his perspective!!! With Bulldog, JFM, TGA, and others, I felt like I had a decent range of views to grasp the below-the-radar mood in Europe. He's sorely missed!

Re: Iraq, the true key to following through to make this a success that reaps the benefits forseen when it was undertaken is the reelection of Bush. Anyone else would fuck it up - some in spades. I'm afraid it's as simple as that, regards the big picture. Just to prove that NMM is a totally blinded moron knee-jerk, I voted for Carter cuz he was a very smart guy. Proof that smart people (like Weasley) don't necessarily deserve positions of authority.

This is one of the primary reasons that I am committed to Bush - the guy is a hardcase and will push through to the end if he's not thrown out. The warts and miscalculations and mistakes will be addressed as they are identified. Keep pointing them out - I'll bet someone is listening now and then. Thx for the analysis!
Posted by: .com (RoPMA)   2003-11-6 12:16:55 PM  

#3  "I would transform the military occupation into a NATO operation with US forces in charge. With US command, NATO authority, and UN endorsement, other NATO countries would send troops, and Arab countries would also step in."
NATO, huh? Didn't Wesley's puppetmaster, Bill Clinton, just say this? This guy is so controlled by the former Clintonites that it is laughable. The way he is dropping in the polls is heartening -- it shows that people can see the "man" behind the curtain controlling things.
Posted by: Tibor   2003-11-6 11:12:32 AM  

#2  agree clark is weaselly, and some of the criticism above are spot on.

BUT:"What's the matter with having an American in charge? ". er that it makes it look like an American occupation, and this alienates SOME Iraqis, and has costs outside of Iraq. I suggested before the war was over that we should get a non-American from the Coalition of the Willing to be in charge - i think i suggested Vaclav Havel. I havent seen anything from the admin about why they didnt do something like that - it would certainly have reduced pressure for UN involvement.

About an interim govt. Does Clark understand the implications of this? That means an interim govt composed of Kurds, SCIRI, Alawi and Chalabi. Im not sure that would be so bad (and i think it unlikely it would lead to an Islamic state) but is Clark saying that Wolfie et al were RIGHT to be enthused about Chalabi and the Kurds? Besides theres an intermediate position between current policy and recognizing an interim govt - that would be to give more DE FACTO control to the IGC, while retaining sovereignty and ultimate veto in the hands of the CPA - so that if the IGC does something totally out of hand we can step in, but we make the occupation more IRAQI and prepare them for self-govt. Reports I have seen indicate far too much micro-management by Bremer. Which is frustrating the heck out of the IGC folks. It is THEIR country after all. Maybe its better in theory (as per Fareed Zakaria) to wait 2 or 3 years and let political parties evolve, and hold all power in CPA hands to keep Kurds and exiles from running things - but A. We dont have unlimited time cause 1. We could lose in Iraq, in a number of different ways 2. The whole point of this was to achieve change to impact the GWOT. We could wait 3 years for Iraq to reach where we want it to be, and meanwhile AQ could take out a city. If we want Iraq to be the start of falling dominoes, and we want that to happen in time to matter, we've got to get things moving politically. B. I suspect even if we wait 3 years we'll end up with a similar political constellation. Certainly no change among the Kurds, who seem quite loyal to the KDP and PUK. SCIRI's influence in the south may recede a bit, but not much. And the INC, contrary to what both the left and some on the right think, is not likely to go away either - its not JUST Chalabi, it includes a number of secularist exiles, who have extensive ties with non-exile Iraqis.


in summary, i agree their are problems with Clarks view - the biggest that its expressed by someone who has been so weaselly in his few on the war in general. But I think there is a major critique that can successfully be made of Bush's policy in Iraq.
Posted by: liberalhawk   2003-11-6 10:44:01 AM  

#1  I think I'd rather have Wesley Crusher than Wesley Clark as President.

see http://www.mcdevzone.com/weblog/archives/001430.html
Posted by: mhw   2003-11-6 10:04:58 AM  

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