[Senate Hearing 108-645]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 108-645
IRAQ'S TRANSITION--THE WAY AHEAD
[PART II]
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
MAY 19, 2004
__________
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COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
RICHARD G. LUGAR, Indiana, Chairman
CHUCK HAGEL, Nebraska JOSEPH R. BIDEN, Jr., Delaware
LINCOLN CHAFEE, Rhode Island PAUL S. SARBANES, Maryland
GEORGE ALLEN, Virginia CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut
SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas JOHN F. KERRY, Massachusetts
MICHAEL B. ENZI, Wyoming RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin
GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio BARBARA BOXER, California
LAMAR ALEXANDER, Tennessee BILL NELSON, Florida
NORM COLEMAN, Minnesota JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER IV, West
JOHN E. SUNUNU, New Hampshire Virginia
JON S. CORZINE, New Jersey
Kenneth A. Myers, Jr., Staff Director
Antony J. Blinken, Democratic Staff Director
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Biden, Hon. Joseph R., Jr., U.S. Senator from Delaware, opening
statement...................................................... 4
Cordesman, Dr. Anthony, Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy,
Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington, DC. 8
Prepared statement........................................... 11
Diamond, Dr. Larry, senior fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford,
CA............................................................. 41
Prepared statement........................................... 44
Hoar, General Joseph P., USMC (Ret.), former Commander in Chief,
United States Central Command, Del Mar, CA..................... 30
Lugar, Hon. Richard G., U.S. Senator from Indiana, opening
statement...................................................... 1
Marr, Dr. Phebe, former senior fellow, National Defense
University, Washington, DC..................................... 34
Prepared statement........................................... 38
(iii)
IRAQ'S TRANSITION--THE WAY AHEAD
[PART II]
----------
WEDNESDAY, MAY 19, 2004
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Foreign Relations,
Washington, DC.
The committee met at 9:38 a.m., in room SD-419, Dirksen
Senate Office Building, Hon. Richard G. Lugar (chairman of the
committee), presiding.
Present: Senators Lugar, Hagel, Chafee, Voinovich, Sununu,
Biden, Feingold, Boxer, and Corzine.
opening statement of senator richard g. lugar, chairman
The Chairman. This hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee is called to order.
Six weeks from today the Coalition Provisional Authority in
Iraq will turn over sovereignty to an Iraqi government. With
that deadline in mind, the Committee on Foreign Relations meets
today to further explore the administration's plans for the
transition. Yesterday, Deputy Secretary Armitage and Deputy
Secretary Wolfowitz answered questions on many aspects of our
Iraq policy, and despite the difficult challenges ahead, both
noted progress in preparing for Iraqi governance.
This is the sixth hearing that the Foreign Relations
Committee has held on Iraq in the last month and the twentieth
since January 2003. I might add that many of you have
participated in several of those hearings and made very vital
contributions. We are hopeful that these hearings enlighten the
American people, as well as stimulate thinking within our
government and within the Coalition about creative policies
that will optimize our prospects for success.
Secretary of State Powell reflected the perspective of many
Americans about Iraq last weekend when he said: ``The United
States is not anxious to keep our troops there any longer than
we have to. We want to finish our job, turn full sovereignty
over to the Iraqi people, see them elect a government that is
fully representative of the people, and let us come back home
as fast as we possibly can. But we're also not going to leave
while the Iraqi people still need us, and while the interim
government or the transitional government still sees a need for
our presence.''
Now, with lives being lost and billions of dollars being
spent in Iraq, the American people must be confident that we
have carefully thought through an Iraq policy. A detailed plan
is necessary to prove to our allies and to Iraqis that we have
a strategy and that we are committed to making it work. If we
cannot provide that clarity, we risk the loss of support of the
American people, the loss of potential contributions from our
allies, and the disillusionment of Iraqis.
Achieving a positive outcome in Iraq is a vital national
security priority. The appalling revelations about prisoner
abuse in Iraq have added to the stakes, because they have hurt
our reputation in the Middle East and the international
community. As we pursue the noble goals of independence and
security in Iraq, the deeds we perform must be consistent with
our words about freedom, democracy, human rights, and
accountability.
As we discussed in our hearing yesterday, we must use every
tool at our disposal to ensure that the transition to Iraqi
sovereignty succeeds, and we should make every effort to
accelerate stabilization and reconstruction in Iraq. Once the
new caretaker government is named by United Nations Special
Envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, the transition to sovereignty should
begin immediately.
It is vital that we put an Iraqi face on the governance of
that country. The Iraqi people must have a visible role in
securing the country, organizing elections, managing
reconstruction. The most effective way to make this happen is
for elections to take place as quickly as possible. If national
elections can be accelerated for the transitional and permanent
Iraqi governments, scheduled now for January and December 2005,
respectively, we should move up that timetable. In the
meantime, we should push forward with as many elections at the
provincial, municipal, and neighborhood levels as possible.
Yesterday Secretary Armitage underscored that local elections
are taking place and are making a positive difference in the
attitudes of Iraqis.
Accelerating completion of a new United Nations Security
Council resolution could also help give international
legitimacy to the new Iraqi government and clarify new security
arrangements. We want to hear from our witnesses today about
what a Security Council resolution should contain and whether
opportunities will emerge after the transition of sovereignty
to broaden the international coalition working in Iraq.
Our committee also has closely followed the management of
reconstruction funds appropriated by the Congress. I noted
yesterday that only $2.3 billion out of the $18.4 billion
appropriated for Iraqi reconstruction in the November 2003
emergency supplemental have been obligated by March 24. And we
would like our witnesses to comment on whether they see
legitimate reasons for the slow pace of reconstruction
activities. Can the coalition move more efficiently and swiftly
in this area given that delays in reconstruction undercut the
United States' credibility and increase suspicions among Iraqis
who are impatient for those improvements?
We are pleased to have a distinguished panel of experts
today to help us assess the way ahead in Iraq. Before welcoming
this panel, let me intrude with one other item that I add to my
opening comments.
I was struck by the final paragraphs of a column by Arnaud
de Borchgrave in the Washington Times this morning. He is an
old friend of many of us, and I would admit to having enjoyed
conversations with Arnaud, as many of you have, around the
world for many years. He writes in the Washington Times today
some thoughts of outsiders. Yesterday our hearing was with
insiders within our government. Today it is with scholars,
people who have been witnessing this situation and who are not
a part of the CPA or our government. And this is all now a
quote from Arnaud de Borchgrave's column in the Washington
Times of today.
He says: ``One former low-intensity warfare specialist at
the Pentagon described his visit to the Coalition Provisional
Authority in Baghdad's Green Zone as `Alice in Wonderland.'
`It's hard to get out of it, let alone get into it,' he told an
audience of strategic experts. Some of them have never met an
Iraqi outside the Green Zone and yet they draft proclamations
they have no way of implementing. CPA is part of the problem,
not part of the solution.
``Some of the other observations from recent visitors''--
and this is Arnaud de Borchgrave speaking--``who have had
experience in previous conflicts in the developing world:
First,``We have outworn our welcome and we now find
ourselves in a hell of a pickle.''
Second, ``If you don't know where you're going, you're
likely to wind up where you don't want to be. Forget about
installing a liberal democracy in Baghdad. Such constructs need
a lot of fertilizer to take root. We don't have the time.''
Third, ``There is no way to put a good face on the
strategic withdrawal. Civilian heads must roll; generals are
tired of taking the fall.''
Fourth, ``The transition government that takes over July 1
must be inclusive, even with people who don't like us. It can't
be a little bit sovereign. Colin Powell said we would leave if
asked to by a sovereign Iraqi government. That is the only
posture that will restore U.S. credibility.''
Fifth, ``The civilian contractors hired to train a new
Iraqi Army cost the U.S. taxpayer a lot of money and got it all
wrong. The target of 27 battalions meant quantity, not quality.
They were designed as an external protection force, unable to
deal with urban warfare.''
Sixth, ``There is an urgent need for a national force
capable of protecting the core functions of government. The
immediate need is for five or six Iraqi battalions to protect
the new government, which will be challenged almost immediately
after July 1.''
Seventh, ``There are no genuine Iraqi leaders on the
horizon.''
Eight, ``A strongman is needed, one that will understand
that the Shi'ites, for the first time in hundreds of years,
have a chance to escape the role of low man on the totem
pole.''
And finally, ``The Swiss cantonal system for Iraq's three
or more component parts is probably the best bet for a new
constitution. The alternative could be Lebanon-and civil war.''
Then Arnaud concludes: ``The U.S. has given top priority to
a new U.N. resolution that would confer legitimacy on a U.S.
military presence in Iraq after July 1. The coalition is
splintering as its members with boots on the ground--Britain,
Italy, Denmark, Poland and Hungary--face growing domestic
opposition. And Mr. Rumsfeld's `old' Europeans--France and
Germany--and Russia are negotiating among themselves what
demands will be made on President Bush in return for a
favorable vote on a new U.N. resolution. The I-told-you-so
European `oldsters' may see this one as diplomatic payback
time.''
With these rather challenging comments in front of you, you
already have provided provocative testimony, but the purpose of
our hearing today is really to try to push it all out. I cannot
think of a better panel to do this.
I would like for you to testify in the order that I will
introduce you, and that will be, first of all, Dr. Anthony
Cordesman; second, General Joseph Hoar; third, Dr. Phebe Marr;
and finally, Dr. Larry Diamond. We thank you for coming, and
before I ask you to testify, I will call upon my friend, the
distinguished ranking member, Senator Biden.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR.,
RANKING MEMBER
Senator Biden. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Again,
thank you for this hearing.
It sounds like a little bit of hyperbole, but it is not.
You said we are looking for clarity, and we have had the
chance, privately and publicly, to plumb the ideas of the
witnesses we have. I can really say from my perspective--and I
suspect yours--without equivocation, we have a panel that is
capable of providing clarity and they have been providing
clarity on this for a long time. I just hope to hell people
start to listen a little bit.
I also want to thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the clarity
that you are providing in the sense that you have been
consistent in one simple, clear question, and that is, what is
the plan? Or as they used to say back in my generation,
``What's the plan, Stan''? What's the deal? What is the plan?
I realize we spend a lot of time talking and having serious
witnesses come and discuss the strategic situation in the
Middle East, in Iraq and the consequences that flow from that.
To use the vernacular again, the devil is in the details. It is
the tactical decisions that we are making, I think, so badly
from, as one of the witnesses and I were talking earlier,
literally not being able to get into the Green Zone. I mean,
why there is not a special ``express line,'' to use his phrase,
to allow people to get in there, things that when you go there
and you are on the ground, you wonder how can this be managed
this way.
I want the public to know just because we spend a lot of
time, because we do not have a strategic plan that has been put
forward, talking about that, no one should misunderstand that
the success or failure of our effort to provide a whole stable
state that is secure within its borders, not a threat to its
neighbors, not a haven for terror, not seeking or having
weapons of mass destruction ultimately comes down to some
significant tactical judgments that I hope we will get to talk
a little bit about today because these people know of what they
speak.
And the last point I will make, looking at General Hoar.
General, I am not going to put you in a spot and ask you this
today. We heard yesterday, we hear constantly that the generals
on the ground do not need any more forces. When we were on the
ground, people I talked to, coming back from on the ground,
there is a genuine resentment that is communicated coming from
the operational commanders on the ground in Iraq who do not
think they are being supported.
Now, if you are here as long as many of us have been and
all the people here, you end up over time just establishing
contacts, friendships, relationships with people who are not
going out of the chain of command. They are your friends, and
you get e-mails and you have discussions. I just want to make
it clear that I really think that, as our colleague Carol
Moseley-Braun used to kid and say, we should not have the
generals wearing the jacket here if this thing goes south.
I apologize for being as personal as I am being here, Mr.
Chairman, and I actually do have a short opening statement. I
remember when you and Senator Hagel and I--it will be a year in
August--were in Iraq.
The Chairman. June.
Senator Biden. June I should say. I remember Chuck Hagel,
when we were talking to somebody, I turned around and I saw him
walking back to a Humvee and getting in a conversation. As a
non-commissioned officer that he was, he really knows where the
real power is. He was talking, if I am not mistaken, to a
sergeant. I may be mistaken. But then one gathered and two and
three and four, and they started talking to us. They were
already--``angry'' may be the wrong word. If he wants, I will
let him elaborate on this. But they were already concerned.
They were already feeling that they were not getting the
straight scoop. They were already of a mind.
Then we met with a group of deployed forces from our home
States. And it was like, hey, someone tell us the truth here,
will you? Someone tell us what the deal is here. Someone tell
us how long we are really going to be here. Remember, I know
the Secretary of Defense says this is not the case, and it may
not have been, but the perception was we were going to be down
to 30,000 troops by December. That was clearly coming from the
Pentagon. My point was we have not leveled here, and I want to
make sure that, if you are willing, general--and if you are
not, I understand. I would a little straight talk about what is
going on, what you think as a Marine four-star--by the way,
damn, you look good. I tell you what. Does he not? He looks
like he stepped out of Gentlemen's Quarterly.
At any rate, I would like some straight talk and I know we
can get it from you.
So, Mr. Chairman, it seems to me our policy right now seems
to be stuck in second gear. To continue this silly metaphor, I
do not think it is in reverse, as some of my colleagues think.
I do not think it is lost. I do not think it is beyond the
pale. But I do think it is in second gear because we tend to be
reacting at events and are continually behind the curve.
When this administration makes a judgment that is sound, it
is usually a day late and a dollar short. It appears every time
that they are being pushed into a position. If Secretary
Wolfowitz had said--how many months ago was he here? I cannot
recall. Three, four months ago. We asked him if there was
anything they got wrong. Well, no. Everything is just right. If
he had said what he said yesterday, that they underestimated
the opposition, that they underestimated the amount of force
that was needed, if they had leveled a little bit, we would be
moving along a little more here.
And getting them to level is not getting them to level in
order to say, ``We told you so, you are wrong.'' You have got
to figure out what mistakes were made, whether you say them
publicly or not, in order to figure out what we do from here.
It seems to me two of the mistakes that were made, Mr.
Chairman--and I know I am a broken record on this--is we went
into Iraq with two towering deficits, a security deficit and a
legitimacy deficit. As a result, I think we are losing the
Iraqi people, and without their support, we have little chance
of succeeding.
As I have said time and again, the Iraqi people have to
want to have a government that is representative more than we
want them to have it or it is not going to work. At least as
much as we want them, they have to want it.
We also risk losing the support of the American people.
They too sense that our policy is adrift and that we do not
have a plan for success.
There was a report that came out at the request of the
Secretary of Defense last year, a commission led by John Hamre
goes over and comes back and says we have a window of
opportunity, but it is closing in Iraq. We all in one form or
another sent out a report saying the window of opportunity is
closing in America. We only have a window that is only open so
long for the American people to say let us get this done, we
are willing to make the sacrifices to get it done.
But the American people I think are still with us because
they know if we fail in Iraq, it could take a generation to
recover from the damage. But without a new plan--not staying
the course--a new plan to succeed that overcomes the security
deficit and the legitimacy deficit, I am concerned that we are
headed for serious trouble in Iraq and at home.
This includes the plan, which I hope we will get to talk
about, for successfully dealing with the militias and the
mutations off of these Iraqi militias that we asked about
yesterday and I did not seem to get an answer.
To change the dynamic, I believe the President has to
articulate a single, overreaching goal, and I think we should
take this June 30, as badly as it has been planned, as badly as
it has been handled, and turn it from a liability into an
asset. We should use that date as the rationale for our
continued and increased presence and international presence or
major power presence in Iraq, and that is that our purpose is
to hold successful elections in 2005 in December. That is the
rationale for our being there. That is the rationale for why we
are going to stay there because that is the vehicle through
which the Iraqis ultimately get control of a stable, God
willing, government that can be held together. I think he
should use those elections as a rallying point within and
beyond Iraq to build more security and more legitimacy.
Putting the focus on elections in my view would provide a
rationale for Europeans and Arab leaders to join the effort. It
would provide a reason for an Iraqi caretaker government to be
able to be seen as cooperating with the ``occupiers'' and would
give the American people more confidence that we have an end
strategy--not an exit--an end strategy.
I know that our witnesses today will present their own
ideas for recapturing the initiative, and I look forward to
asking some very specific questions. Would using elections next
year as a rallying point offer a way to broaden the coalition
and recoup some of the ground we have lost? Just as we do not
know the strategy, I do not think the Iraqi people know the
strategy. I do not think they know what the deal is.
How do we energize the moderate center in Iraq, assuming it
is there, because if it is not there, all this is for naught in
my view--that silent majority of people who reject an Iranian
style theocracy and a new strongman but remain on the sidelines
because they have been conditioned for over 30 years not to
raise their heads.
What should we do about the al-Sadr militia and all the
militias for that matter?
With at least 82 percent of the Iraqis saying that they
oppose American and allied forces, how long do you think it
will be before the Iraqi government asks for our departure? As
one person said, the race will be who asks us to leave first,
the American people or the Iraqi people? And how should we
respond? .
Who should be the primary international figure that the
Iraqis interact with during this difficult transition period
from July 1 to December 2005? Should it be an American super-
Ambassador or should it be a major power representative in
place who will be the referee?
What will we have to do to attract support of our NATO
allies? And is it important that we put a different face on
this, that it be a NATO-led multinational force?
How can we attract more support, if we can, from our Arab
allies? What specific support can we reasonably expect?
I believe we can still succeed in Iraq, but we need a
strategy for success and we need leadership from the President.
And that is not a political comment. I am not being a wise guy
here. This is not the President is responsible, the President
has to fix it. That is not what I am saying. I literally
believe things have gotten out of whack to the point that
sending your Secretary of Defense, your Secretary of State,
your National Security Adviser, is not sufficient. The
President of the United States of America has it within his
capacity, because of the power of the office and because of his
character, if he will exercise it, to bring the major powers in
the world together on this. As a plain old politician, it does
not matter what level that political discourse takes place.
Presidents and Senators and Congressmen and mayors are no
different. When you want to get it done, the principal has to
engage the other principals directly.
By the grace of the office he holds and the country he
represents, I believe the President of the United States has
the power to reverse this downward spiral we are in. And I will
support him if he begins the process, publicly support him, but
we must act decisively and deliberately. We cannot continue to
fall backward into a strategy that not many people understand.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I apologize for the
length of the statement. I think it is important that we get
some straight answers.
The Chairman. Well, thank you very much, Senator Biden. As
the witnesses will note, after 20 hearings on Iraq, we have
developed quite a bit of passion for the subject and so have
you.
I want to, first of all, introduce Dr. Anthony Cordesman,
who is holder of the Arleigh Burke Chair in Strategy at the
Center for Strategic and International Studies. Welcome, Dr.
Cordesman, and would you please proceed with your testimony. I
will just say at the outset, all of the statements of the
witnesses will be made a part of the record in full. You may
proceed in any way that you wish.
STATEMENT OF DR. ANTHONY CORDESMAN, ARLEIGH A. BURKE CHAIR IN
STRATEGY, CENTER FOR STRATEGIC AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
Dr. Cordesman. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and
Senator Biden. I would like to thank the committee for the
opportunity to testify today.
Let me begin by noting we are dealing with truly complex
problems, and I have provided a formal statement that goes into
these answers in depth. I am all too well aware, however, of
the time pressures on U.S. Senators, and let me confine my oral
comments to a few short remarks.
First, it may be too late to deal with the most serious
problem we face within the U.S. Government, the fact that a
small group of neo-conservative idealogues were able to
substitute their illusions for an effective planning effort by
professionals using the interagency process.
Some 40 years ago, I entered the office of the Secretary of
Defense at a time when an equally small group of neo-liberals
were able to do the same thing. These ``best and the
brightest'' trapped us into a losing war and their names were
written invisibly on the body bag of every American who died in
that conflict.
This time it is neo-conservatives, not neo-liberals who
trapped us into a war without setting realistic and obtainable
goals without a realistic and workable approach to creating
stability, security, and nation-building. And once again, we
find that the end result is that incompetence kills just as
effectively as malice.
The resulting message is simple. We need an interagency
system that works, a National Security Council that forces
jointness on military and civilian alike, and a clear
understanding that idealogues of any stripe should never be
allowed to function in sensitive positions in the office of the
Secretary of Defense, the National Security Council, the office
of the Vice President, and organizations like the CPA without
adequate controls and checks and balances.
Second, we must never again treat forging a piece as phase
IV or talk about post-conflict operations as if peace was a
secondary objective. Our war planning should make reaching a
successful peace--a peace with clear, long-term strategic
benefits--its primary goal from the start. The effort to win
the peace should begin as a political struggle before the first
shot is fired, and it should continue to have first priority
through every day of combat.
Moreover, the Congress must act firmly and decisively to
find a workable alternative to the War Powers Act. It must find
one which ensures it is fully consulted on the reasons for war,
the battle plan, and the precise nature of the strategic and
grand strategic goals which are the reason for using military
force. The Congress should never again vote for the equivalent
of war without a clear and realistic plan for armed nation-
building and clear and achievable goals for peace. It is not
just the names of neo-conservatives that are written invisibly
on every American body bag that is coming out of Iraq.
Third, to turn to the specific issues here, I cannot assure
this committee or anyone else that we can still win an
acceptable level of victory in Iraq or that we could have done
so with proper planning before the war started. We have to deal
with the aftermath of decades of tyranny and economic failure,
the resulting power vacuum, and political, religious, and
ethnic tensions, which have never worked their way out.
I do believe, however, that we have at least a 50/50 chance
of coming out of this war on such terms if we do the following
things, and I should note that many of my recommendations are
underway in some of the actions of the administration and
follow the recommendations of the chairman and ranking member.
First, we need to support the transfer of power to Iraqis
along the lines proposed by the U.N. Envoy, Lakhdar Brahimi, as
soon as possible.
We need to dump the Iraqi Governing Council and
particularly its most unpopular members like the Iraqi exile,
Ahmad Chalabi.
Above all, we need to accept the fact that only a broad
range of Iraqis from within Iraq can create a government that
Iraqis require as legitimate. We must recognize that such an
Iraqi government must be as inclusive as possible and include
many ex-Baathists and Shi'ite Islamists. There can be no real
progress or security solution without a broadly based
government that various Iraqi factions see as acceptable and
which is chosen by a majority of the key factions within the
Iraqi people.
The United States cannot abandon its military effort to
bring security to Iraq as long as there is hope and progress.
But we must make every effort to rush forward the realistic
training and equipment of Iraqi security forces, and there must
be tangible and clear benefits that we are doing this and not a
series of half-truths, false reports, and an inability to
report on the fact that the equipment and training is not being
rushed forward and is not being provided on the basis that is
needed. We must remember that only trained, effective cadres
can do this mission, not untrained masses of men.
Above all, a new Iraqi government must play a major and
visible role in Iraqi security, must be consulted in, support
and participate in all new military operations. A government's
legitimacy will never be credible without this.
The United States must abandon its Green Zone approach and
effort to rule through a massive new embassy and to transform
the Iraqi economy through U.S.-chosen projects driven by U.S.
contractors. We need to totally restructure the American aid
process to go directly to Iraqi ministries and Iraqi
governments and do so through programs that they choose or
through U.S. military-run programs designed to supplement
bullets with dollars. Aid must be focused on tangible, visible
progress on the ground, not idealized dreams of some future.
Our management should consist of demands, programs, avoid
corruption and produce clear benefits.
The Iraqis, not the United States, should shape this
country's destiny. At the same time, we must make it clear to
the Iraqis that they, not the U.S. or United Nations, are
ultimately responsible for success or failure. They must know
that we and the international community will leave and will not
aid or sustain them if they do not reach workable political
compromises, do not make real progress, or turn toward civil
war. No Iraqi should operate under the illusion that either the
U.S. or the U.N. will save Iraq from itself.
Fourth, we cannot succeed in Iraq unless we understand that
no issue so drives Iraqi, Arab, and Islamic perceptions of the
United States as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Our peace
efforts are perceived throughout the region and Iraq as weak
and dishonest, and the United States is viewed as little more
than Israel's proxy.
False as such perceptions are, we cannot succeed in Iraq or
have a strategy that will function unless we revitalize the
peace process. We must accept the fact we are now dealing with
two failed regimes, not just one, and that steady and visible
U.S. pressure is needed on both governments. That means U.S.
pressure on the Palestinians to halt terrorism must be matched
by equal pressure on Israel to halt the expansion of
settlements and those Israeli security measures that do more to
make a Palestinian state impractical than to aid Israeli
security.
And finally, the Bush administration must not make another
major strategic blunder in the Middle East. It must accept the
fact it is currently too unpopular to issue a U.S.-led Greater
Middle East Initiative and that it must concentrate on Iraq and
the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
Mr. Chairman, in the interest of time, I will not go into
detail on just how dangerous I think the public drafts of the
Greater Middle East Initiative are. It should be clear,
however, we have no climate of trust. We have no basis for
pushing reform unilaterally at this point in time. If we are to
succeed, we need to reestablish our credibility, focus on
essentials, and seek joint efforts with the EU and with the
Arab League. Above all, we must do more than issue vacuous
rhetoric about democracy and liberty and develop tangible plans
to bring democracy and deal with human rights, establish a rule
of law, focus on economic reform and demographic problems and
not simplistic and unworkable slogans at a time when those
breed nothing but distrust and the feeling we are somehow
seeking to establish regimes friendly to us.
The last remark I would make is simply this. We can succeed
through pragmatism. We can succeed by focusing on what we need
to do, but if we continue to dwell in a climate of ideological
illusions, no strategy can succeed and this government cannot
function.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Cordesman follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dr. Anthony H. Cordesman
The ``Post Conflict'' Lessons of Iraq and Afghanistan
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The current situation in Iraq and Afghanistan has exposed the fact
that there is a serious danger in the very term ``post conflict:'' It
reflects critical failures in American understanding of the world it
faces in the 21st Century, and in the nature of asymmetric warfare and
defense transformation:
First, the US faces a generational period of tension and
crisis in the Middle East and much of the developing world.
There is no post conflict; there is rather a very different
type of sustained ``cold war.'' The ``war on terrorism'' is
only part of a period of continuing tension and episodic crises
in dealing with hostile extremist movements and regimes. At a
minimum, the US faces decades of political and ideological
conflict. More probably, the US and its allies will deal with
constantly evolving and mutating threats. These will involve
steadily more sophisticated political, psychological, and
ideological attacks on the West. They will be sustained by
massive economic problems and demographic pressures that create
a virtual ``youth explosion,'' and by the regional failures of
secularism at both the political and ideological level. The
``wars'' in Iraq and Afghanistan are actually ``battles,'' and
the keys to victory lie in a sustained US campaign to help our
allies in the region carry out political, economic, and social
reform; in supporting efforts to create regional security and
fight terrorism, and in checkmating and containing hostile
movements and nations.
Second, defeat or victory in this struggle will be shaped
largely by the success of American diplomacy, deterrence, and
efforts to create and sustain alliances that occur long before
military action. They will also be shaped by US ability to
reach out to the UN, international organizations, and moderates
in the Islamic world and other challenged areas. US efforts to
create favorable strategic outcomes in asymmetric conflicts and
in conflicts involving any form of nation building must be
conducted in a political environment shape by information
operations on a continuing and global basis. Victory can only
come through the equivalent of a constant program of political,
psychological, and ideological ``warfare'' that is design to
win a peace more than to aid in the military phases of a
conflict. A climate of trust and cooperation must be
established before any given clash or war takes place.
Third, no matter how well the US adapts to these realities,
it will have to make hard strategic choices which should be
made well before it uses military force. The present contest
between neoconservatives and neoliberals to see who can be the
most self-deluded, intellectually ingenuous--and use the most
naive and moralistic rhetoric--is not a valid basis for either
war or dealing with its aftermath. Iraq and Afghanistan are
both warnings of the complexity, cost, and time required to
even attempt to change national political systems, economies,
and social practices. Long before one considers any form of
``nation building,'' one must decide whether such activity is
practical and what the strategic cost-benefits really are. In
many cases, it will not be worth the cost of trying to deal
with the aftermath of overthrowing a regime and carrying out
any form of occupation. When the objective is worth the cost,
both the executive branch and Congress must honestly face the
fact that the results will still be uncertain, that 5-10 years
of effort may be required, and that the end result will often
be years of occupation and low intensity conflict, as well as
years of massive economic aid.
Fourth, preparation and training for the security and nation
building phases of a conflict require that planning, and the
creation of specialized combat units and civilian teams with
suitable resources and regional expertise to carry out the
security and nation building missions, take place long before
the combat phase begins. Success requires the battle plan and
US military operations to be shaped to aid nation building and
create security after the enemy's regime and armed forces are
defeated. It requires the ability to make a transition to
security and nation building activity as US forces advance
during the combat phase and long and before ``victory.'' It
requires political campaigns designed to win hearts and minds
of the peoples in the nation to begin before combat starts.
Fifth, in more cases than not, the aftermath of conventional
conflict is going to be low intensity conflict and armed nation
building that will last months or years after a conventional
struggle is over. As Iraq and Afghanistan show that it's the
war after the war that counts, and which shapes US ability to
win conflicts in any grand strategic sense.
Sixth, the US cannot succeed through a mix of arrogance and
ethnocentrism. The US is not the political, economic, and
social model for every culture and every political system. It
has much to contribute in helping trouble nations develop and
evolve, but they must find their own path and it will not be
ours, in most cases, economic and physical security; dealing
with the educational and job problems created by demographic
change, and creating basic human rights will be far more
important that trying to rush towards ``democracy'' in nations
with no history of pluralism, no or weak moderate political
parties, and deep religious and ethnic divisions. Evolution
tailored to the conditions and the needs of specific countries,
can work; revolution will inevitably prove to lead to years of
hardship and instability. The idea that the US can suddenly
create examples of the kind of new political, economic, and
social systems it wants in ways that will transform regions or
cultures has always been little more than intellectual
infantilism, and Iraq provides all the proof the US can ever
afford to acquire.
What is to Be Done: The Broader Grand Strategic Lessons of the Iraq and
Afghan Conflicts
If the US is to succeed in the conflicts that are likely to shape
much of the 21st Century, it must learn from both its successes and
mistakes in Iraq and Afghanistan. Strategic engagement requires an
objective--not an ideological--assessment of the problems that must be
dealt with, and of the size and cost of the effort necessary to achieve
decisive grand strategic results. Neither a capabilities-based strategy
nor one based on theoretical sizing contingencies is meaningful when
real-world conflicts and well-defined contingencies require a strategy
and force plan that can deal with reality on a country-by-country
basis, rather than be based on ideology and theory.
There is no alternative to ``internationalism.'' There may
be times we disagree with the UN or some of our allies, but our
strategy must be based on seeking consensus wherever possible,
on compromise when necessary, and on coalitions that underpin
virtually every action we take.
Great as US power is, it cannot substitute for coalitions
and the effective use of international organizations, regional
organizations, and NGOs. In order to lead, we must also learn
to follow. We must never subordinate our vital national
interests to others, but this will rarely be the issue. In
practice, our challenge is to subordinate our arrogance to the
end of achieving true partnerships, and to shape our diplomacy
to creating lasting coalitions of the truly willing rather than
coalitions of the pressured or intimidated.
At the same time, armed nation building is a challenge only
the US is currently equipped to meet. While allies, the UN, and
NGOs can help in many aspects of security and nation building
operations. They often cannot operate on the scale required to
deal with nation building in the midst of serious low intensity
combat.
Deterrence and containment are more complex than at the time
of the Cold War, but they still are critical tools and they too
are dependent on formal and informal alliances.
War must be an extension of diplomacy by other means, but
diplomacy must be an extension of war by other means as well.
US security strategy must be based on the understanding that
diplomacy, peace negotiations, and arms control are also an
extension of--and substitute for--war by other means. It is
easy for a ``superpower'' to threaten force, but far harder to
use it, and bluffs get called. Fighting should be a last
resort, and other means must be used to limit the number of
fights as much as possible.
Military victory in asymmetric warfare can be virtually
meaningless without successful nation building at the
political, economic, and security levels. ``Stabilization'' or
``Phase IV'' operations are far more challenging than defeating
conventional military forces. They can best be conducted if the
US is prepared for immediate action after the defeat of
conventional enemy forces. Both in Afghanistan and Iraq, the US
wasted critical days, weeks, and months in engaging in a
security effort before opposition movements could regroup or
reengage. It left a power vacuum, rather than exploited one,
and it was not prepared for nation building or the escalation
of resistance once the enemy was ``defeated.''
Force transformation cannot be dominated by technology;
manpower skills, not technology, are the key. The military
missions of low intensity combat, economic aid, civil-military
relations, security, and information campaigns are manpower
dominated and require skilled military manpower as well as new
forms civil expertise in other Departments. Human intelligence
can still be more important than technical collection, local
experience and language skills are critical, and the ability to
use aid dollars can be more important than the ability to use
bullets. Simply adding troops or more weapons will not solve
America's problems any more than trying to use technology to
make US forces smaller and more cost-effective will. The
missions that are emerging require extremely skilled troops
with excellent area skills, far more linguists, and training in
civic action and nation building as well as guerrilla warfare.
Technology-based force transformation and the revolution in
military affairs are tools with severe and sometimes crippling
limits. The ability to provide Intelligence, Surveillance, and
Reconnaissance (IS&R) coverage of the world is of immense
value. It does not, however, provide the ability to understand
the world, deal with complex political issues, and fight
effectively in the face of terrorism, many forms of low
intensity conflict and asymmetric warfare, and the need to deal
with conflict termination and peace making or protect nation
building. In practice, there may be a need to make far more
effective use of legacy systems, and evolutionary improvements
in weapons and technology, to support ``humancentric'' forms of
military action requiring extensive human intelligence and area
skills, high levels of training and experience, and effective
leadership in not only defeating the enemy in battle but
winning the peace.
``Jointness'' cannot simply be an issue for restructuring
the US military, and is far more than a military problem. It
must occur within the entire executive branch, and on a civil-
military level as well as a military one. An advisory National
Security Advisor is a failed National Security Advisor;
effective leadership is required to force coordination on the
US national security process. Unresolved conflicts between
leaders like Secretary Powell, and Secretary Rumsfeld, the
exclusion of other cabinet members from key tasks, insufficient
review of military planning, and giving too much power to small
elements within given departments, have weakened US efforts and
needlessly alienated our allies. The creation of a large and
highly ideological foreign policy staff in Vice President's
office is a further anomaly in the interagency process. The US
interagency process simply cannot function with such loosely
defined roles, a lack of formal checks and balances, and a
largely advisory National Security Advisor. ``Jointness'' must
go far beyond the military; it must apply to all national
security operations.
Policy, analysis, and intelligence must accept the true
complexity of the world, deal with it honestly and objectively,
and seek ``evolution'' while opposing ``revolution.'' The US
cannot afford to rush into--or stay in--any conflict on
ideological grounds. It cannot afford to avoid any necessary
commitment because of idealism. What it needs is informed
pragmatism. One simple rule of thumb is to stop over-
simplifying and sloganizing--particularly in the form of
``mirror imaging'' and assuming that ``democratization'' is the
solution or even first priority for every country. The US needs
to deal with security threats quietly and objective on a
country-by-country and movement-by-movement basis. The US must
also seek reform with the understanding that progress in
economic reform, dealing with population problems, and
improvements in human rights may often not only be more
important in the near term than progress towards elections, but
that ``democracy'' is purposeless, or actively destructive,
unless viable political parties exist, political leaders have
emerged capable of moving their nations forward toward
moderation and economic development, and enough national
consensus exists to allow different ethnic, ideological, and
religious factions to function in a stable pluralistic
structure. Finally, the US must act with the understanding that
other societies and cultures may often find very different
solutions to political, social, and economic modernization.
Stabilization, armed nation building, and peacemaking
require a new approach to organizing US government efforts. The
integration of USAID into State has compounded the problems of
US aid efforts which had previously transferred many functions
to generic aid through the World Bank and IMF. There was no
staff prepared, sized, and training to deal with nation
building on this scale, or to formulate and administer the
massive aid program required. Contractors were overburdened
with large-scale contracts because these were easiest to grant
and administer in spite of a lack of experience in functioning
in a command economy and high threat environment. US government
and contractor staff had to be suddenly recruited--often with
limited experience--and generally for 3-12 month tours too
short to ensure continuity in such missions. This should never
happen again. Denial of the importance and scale of the mission
before the event in no way prevents it from being necessary
when reality intervenes.
New capabilities are required within the National Security
Council, the State Department, and the Department of Defense
for security and nation building missions. It does not matter
whether these are called post conflict, Phase IV,
stabilization, or reconstruction missions. The US must be as
well prepared to win a peace as it is prepared to win a war, It
must have the interagency tools in place to deal with providing
security after the termination of a conflict, and to support
nation building in terms of creating viable political systems,
economic stability and growth, effective military and security
forces, and public information system and free press. This
requires the National Security Council to have such expertise,
the State Department to have operational capability to carry
out such a mission, the Department of Defense to have the
proper military capabilities, and other agencies to be ready to
provide the proper support. The US must never again repeat its
most serious mistakes in Iraq and Afghanistan. It must make
security and nation building a fundamental part of the planning
and execution of military operations directed at foreign
governments from the start. A clear operational plan for such
activity must be prepared before military operations begin, the
costs and risks should be fully assessed, and the Congress
should be fully consulted in the same way it is consulted
before initiating military operations. The security and nation-
building missions must begin as combat operations proceed,
there must be no pause that creates a power vacuum, and the US
must act from the start to ensure that the necessary resources
for nation building are present.
Our military strategy must give interoperability and
military advisory efforts the same priority as jointness. The
US needs to rethink its arms sales and security assistance
policies. The US needs to pay far more attention to the social
and economic needs of countries in the Middle East, and to work
with other sellers to reduce the volume of sales. At the same
time, it needs to work with regional powers to help them make
the arms they do need effective and sustainable, create local
security arrangements, and improve interoperability for the
purposes of both deterrence and warfighting. The US needs to
recast its security assistance programs to help nations fight
terrorism and extremism more effectively, and do so in ways
that do not abuse human rights or delay necessary political,
social, and economic reforms.
The US needs to organize for effective information campaigns
while seeking to create regional and allied campaigns that will
influence Arab and Islamic worlds. The US needs to revitalize
its information efforts in a focused and effective way that
takes advantage of tools like satellite broadcasting and the
Internet while working directly in country. The US, however,
can never be an Arab or Islamic country. It needs to work with
its friends and allies in the region to seek their help in
creating information campaigns that reject Islamic radicalism
and violence, encourage terrorism, and support reform. The US
should not try to speak for the Arabs or for Islam; it should
help them speak for themselves.
The US private sector and foreign direct investment should
be integrated into the US security strategy and efforts to
achieve evolutionary reform. The US has tended to emphasize
sanctions over trade and economic contact in dealing with
hostile or radical states, and assign too low a priority to
helping the US private sector invest in friendly states. A
``zero-based'' review is needed of what the US government
should do to encourage private sector activity in the Middle
East.
Current methods of intelligence collection and analysis,
cannot guarantee adequate preparation for stabilization
operations, properly support low intensity combat, or properly
support the nation-building phase. The US needs to
fundamentally reassess its approach to intelligence to support
adequate planning for the combat termination, security, and
nation building phases of asymmetric warfare and peacemaking
operations. It is equally important that adequate tactical
intelligence support be available from the beginning of combat
operations to the end of security and nation building
operations that provides adequate tactical human intelligence
support, combined with the proper area expertise and linguistic
skills. Technology can be a powerful tool, but it is an aid--
not a substitute--for human skills and talents.
New approaches are needed at the tactical and field level to
creating effective teams for operations and intelligence.
Tactical intelligence must operate as part of a team effort
with those involved in counterinsurgency operations, the
political and economic phases of nation building, and security
and military advisory teams. It is particularly critical that
both intelligence and operations directly integrate combat
activity with civil-military relations efforts, US military
police and security efforts, the use of economic aid in direct
support of low intensity combat and security operations, the
training of local security forces and their integration into
the HUMINT effort, and the creation of effective information
campaigns.
Current methods of intelligence collection and analysis, and
current methods of arms control and inspection, cannot
guarantee an adequate understanding of the risks posed by
proliferation. The US needs to fundamentally reassess the
problems of intelligence on proliferation and the lessons Iraq
provides regarding arms control. Far too much of the media
coverage and outside analysis of the intelligence failures in
Iraq has focused on the politics of the situation or implied
that intelligence failed because it was improperly managed and
reviewed. There were long standing problems in the way in which
the CIA managed its counterproliferation efforts, and
institutional biases that affected almost all intelligence
community reporting and analysis on the subject.
The US has agonizing decisions to make about defense
resources. The fact that the current Future Year Defense Plan
does not provide enough funds to allow the US cannot come close
to fund both its planned force levels and force improvement
plans is obvious. Everyone with any experience stopped
believing in estimated procurement costs long ago. What is
equally clear now, however, is that the US faces years of
unanticipated conflicts, many involving armed peacemaking and
nation building, and must rethink deterrence in terms of
proliferation. This is not a matter of billions of dollars; it
is a matter of several percent of the US GNP.
Limit new strategic adventures where possible: The US needs
to avoid additional military commitments and conflicts unless
they truly serve vital strategic interests. The US already
faces serious strategic overstretch, and nothing could be more
dangerous than assuming that existing problems can be solved by
adding new ones--such as Syria or Iran. This means an emphasis
on deterrence, containment, and diplomacy to avoid additional
military commitments. It means a new emphasis on international
action and allies to find substitutes for US forces.
One final reality--the image of a quick and decisive victory is
almost always a false one, but it is still the image many Americans
want and expect. One thousand or more dead in Iraq is hardly Vietnam,
but it must be justified and explained, and explained honestly--not in
terms of the ephemeral slogans. The budget rises and supplements of the
last few years are also likely to be the rule and not the exception.
America may well have to spend another one percent of its GNP on
sustained combat and international intervention overseas than any
American politician is willing to admit.
America faces hard political choices, and they are going to take
exceptional leadership and courage in both an election year and the
decades to come. They require bipartisanship of a kind that has faded
since the Cold War, and neither neo-conservative nor neo-liberal
ideology can help. Moreover, America's think tanks and media are going
to have to move beyond sound bites and simple solutions, just as will
America's politicians and military planners. Put differently, it not
only is going to be a very tough year, it is going to be a very tough
decade.
What is to Be Done: The Need for Near-Term Actions in Iraq and the
Middle East
At this point, the US lacks good options in Iraq--although it
probably never really had them in the sense the Bush Administration
sought. The option of quickly turning Iraq into a successful, free
market democracy was never practical, and was as absurd a
neoconservative fantasy as the idea that success in this objective
would magically make Iraq an example that would transform the Middle
East.
The key to the success the US can now hope to achieve is to set
realistic objectives. In practice, these objectives are to create an
Iraqi political structure that will minimize the risk of civil war,
develop some degree of pluralism, and help the Iraqis take charge over
their own economy.
This, in turn, means a major shift from trying to maintain US
influence and leverage in a post sovereignty period to a policy where
the US makes every effort to turn as much of the political, aid, and
security effort over to Iraqis as soon as possible, and focuses on
supporting the UN in creating the best compromises possible in creating
Iraqi political legitimacy.
The US should not abandon Iraq, but rather abandon the effort to
create an Iraq in its own image.
Other measures are:
Accept the fact that a universal, nation-wide ``security
first'' policy is stupid and impractical, and that the US needs
to isolate and bypass islands of resistance, and focus on
creating a legitimate Iraqi government that can unify Iraqis
and allow nation building to work. This means relying on
containment in the case of truly troubled and high insurgent
areas, and focusing on security in friendly areas.
Accept the fact there is no way to ``drain the swamp.'' At
this point, there simply is no way to eliminate cadres of
insurgents or to disarm the most threatening areas. Fallujah
and similar areas have too much popular support for the
insurgents; there are too many arms that can be hidden, and too
many points of vulnerability. This does not mean the US should
give up fighting the insurgents or its efforts to disarm them.
It does mean the US must accept that it cannot win in the sense
of eliminating them or turning hostile areas into secure and
disarmed areas.
Rush aid to the Iraqi security forces and military seeking
more friendly Arab aid in training and support, and provide as
broad a base of Iraqi command as possible. Forget contract
regulations on buying equipment. Deliver everything necessary
and worry about the details later.
Continue expanding the role of the Iraqi security forces.
Understand that their loyalties will be divided, that putting
them in charge of hostile areas does not mean they can be
expected to do more than work out a modus vivendi with the
insurgents, and that the end result will often be to create
``no go'' or limited access areas for Americans. The US cannot
afford to repeat the Israeli mistake of assuming that any Iraqi
authority in hostile areas can be counted on to provide
security for Americans.
Walk firmly and openly away from the losers in the IGC like
Chalabi. Open up the political structure and deal with Shi'ite
oppositionists, Sunni insurgents, ex-Ba'athists to the maximum
degree possible. Drag in as many non-IGC leaders as possible,
and give Ibrahimi's council idea the strongest possible
support. Lower the US profile in shaping the political future
of Iraq as much as possible and bring in as broad a UN
international team as possible.
Focus on all of the Shi'ites, not just the friendly ones.
Make this a critical aspect of US diplomatic efforts. Let the
Iraqi Shi'ites deal with Sadr and stay out of internal Shi'ite
disputes, except to help insure security. Quietly reach out to
Iran to create whatever kind of dialogue is possible.
Push Sunni Arab states into helping Iraq's Sunnis and in
helping to deal with the political issues involved by quietly
making it clear that they will have to live with the aftermath
of failure and that the US presence and commitment is not open-
ended.
Zero-base the failed contracting effort for FY2004 US aid to
put Iraqi Ministries and officials in charge of the aid process
as soon as possible, with Iraqis going into the field and not
foreign contractors.
Reprogram funds for a massive new CERP program to enable US
military commanders to use dollars instead of bullets at every
opportunity. Make the focus of US control over aid whether
Iraqis spend the money honestly and effectively, and not on US
control, plans, and objectives.
Zero-base the US embassy plan to create the smallest staff
practical of proven area experts, with the clear message to the
Iraqis that not only are they going to be in charge, but non-
performance means no US money and no continuation of US troops
and support. End the image of a US end of an occupation after
the occupation.
Develop a long-term economic and military aid program as
leverage to try to influence Iraqi decision making over time.
Have the ministries manage the process, not USA1D or
contractors. Focus on whether the Iraqi efforts are honest and
produce real results. Do not try to use aid to force Iraq into
US modes and methods.
Accept the near total failure of US information operations.
Stop giving all CPA/CJTF-7 press conferences, and put an Iraqi
on the stage with the US spokesmen. Stop all procounsel-like
press conferences where the US seems to be dictating. Make an
Iraqi spokesman part of all dialogue, and give them the lead as
soon as possible. Subordinate US and Coalition spokesmen as
soon as possible to Iraqis in press conferences and briefings
that are held in Arabic.
Look at the broader failures of US policy in the region.
Revitalize the Road Map and the Quartet in the light of
Sharon's problems. Deal with the reality that there are two
failed sets of political elites in the Israeli-Palestinian
conflict, and that settlements should be unacceptable and not
just terrorism.
Abandon the Greater Middle East Initiative in its present
form. Do not add another strategic and policy blunder to the
present situation by appearing to call for regime change and
seeking to dominate the region. Focus on a broad cooperative
initiative worked out with the EU and where the EU puts
pressure on the Arab League. Stop talking about region-wide
democracy and liberty before there are responsible political
parties and the other reforms necessary to make democracy work.
Focus on a country-by-country approach to reform that considers
human rights, economic welfare, and demographic issues to be at
least as important as elections. Stress cooperation in
``evolution;'' not random efforts at ``revolution.''
Prepare for the fact that nation building may still fail, and
position the US to use the threat of withdrawal as leverage. Make it
clear that the US can and will leave Iraq if the Iraqis do not reach
agreement on an effective interim solution and if they do not proceed
with reasonable unity to implement the UN plans.
The US position should be that the US is ready to help an Iraq that
will help itself, and that it supports a true transfer of sovereignty.
It should make it clear to Iraq and the world, however, that the US has
a clear exit strategy. It has no interest in bases or control over
Iraqi oil. It has no reason to stay if Iraq become unstable, devolves
into civil war, or ends up under a strong man. The US can live with a
weak or unstable Iraq, and Iraq still will have to export oil at market
prices and will still be far less of a threat than Saddam's Iraq.
* * *
The Security Problems that Drive the Need for Continuing Engagement
US intervention in Iraq--like its role in the war in Afghanistan,
the broader struggle against terrorism, and the Arab-Israel conflict--
must be seen in the context of continuing region-wide problems that
will take at least 10-20 years to resolve, and which are spilling over
into Central, South, and East Asia.
At the same time, the history of the modern Middle East shows that
the way in which these forces will play out is normally highly
national. No one can deny the reality that Arab and Islamic culture are
powerful regional forces, or that the rhetoric of Arab unity still has
powerful influence. The fact remains, however, that history shows most
demographic, social, economic, and political problems play out at a
national level. Solutions are found, or not found, one nation at a
time, and there is little historical evidence since the time of Nasser
that any one nation may serve as an example that transforms the others.
This scarcely means that short-term American success in Iraq is
unimportant. It does mean that the forces shaping the region are far
too powerful to play out quickly or be deeply influenced by a single
case. Regardless of how well or how badly America does in Iraq--and in
the other three wars it is involved in it faces decades in which:
Internal tensions will lead to violence in many states.
Demographic momentum will increase demographic pressure on
virtually every nation for at least the next three decades.
Economic reform will come slowly, particularly in reaching
the poor and badly educated.
Political evolution may succeed over time, but there is--as
yet--no foundation for sudden democracy or political reform.
Stable political parties, the rule of law, human rights,
willingness to compromise and give up power, and all the checks
and balances that allow our republic to function, are still
weak. Attempts at reform that outpace the ability of societies
to generate internal change will lead to revolution and new--
and generally worse--forms of authoritarianism or theocracy.
Islamic extremism and terrorism may never come to dominate
more than a handful of states, but they will mutate and endure
for decades after Bin Laden and Al Qaida are gone and only
sheer luck will prevent them from dominating at least some
states or at least posing a critical challenge to some regimes.
Anger and jealousy at the West and against the US in
particular, may fade some if the US can find a way of helping
to end the Arab-Israeli conflict, and can succeed enough in
Iraq so that it is not perceived as a modern group of
``crusaders'' and an occupying enemy. This anger will not,
however, disappear. It may well be compounded by the backlash
from cultural conflicts over immigration and a steadily growing
gap between the wealth of the West, and living standards in
much of the MENA region.
The fact that the future of Iraq and the Middle East will be as
difficult, complex, and time consuming as its past, however, does not
mean that the US can disengage from the region. Neither do the facts
that US influence will be far more limited than we might like, that
reform and change will be driven by local values and priorities, and
that there will often be set backs and reversals.
America is not involved in a ``clash of civilizations.'' It is,
however, on the periphery of a clash within a civilization that affects
their vital strategic interests, that can lash out in the form of
terrorism and extremist attacks, and which deserves an active US role
on moral and humanitarian grounds. Like the Cold War, the fact America
faces what could be half a century of problems, and can neither foresee
nor fully shape the future, in no way allows Americans to stand aside.
Like it or not, the US is also involved in a war of ideas and
values in the Arab and Islamic worlds, and there is no easy dividing
line between the Middle East, the general threat of Islamic extremism,
the Arab-Israeli conflict, the war in Afghanistan, and instability in
Central and South Asia. We will be a target regardless of how active we
are in the region. The events of ``9/11'' have made part of the threat
as obvious as the previous points have shown the need for outside aid
and encouragement. Terrorism can reach anywhere in the world, and
sometimes will.
STRATEGY, GRAND STRATEGY, AND THE ORGANIZATION OF THE US GOVERNMENT
CIVIL AND MILITARY EFFORT
In fairness to the Bush Administration, only one of the four wars
the US now faces--Iraq--can be called ``optional.'' Afghanistan came as
the result of a major attack on the US. The problem of terrorism had
arisen long before ``9/11,'' and US involvement in Arab-Israeli
conflicts is inevitable unless a true and lasting peace can be achieved
or the US abandons an ally.
Even Iraq is ``optional'' largely in retrospect. The Bush and Blair
governments may have politicized some aspects of the assessment of
Iraqi proliferation, but virtually all experts felt the threat was more
serious than it has proved to be. Moreover, it seems doubtful that
Saddam's Hussein's Iraq would not have triggered another regional
conflict at some point, just as it is doubtful that most of Iraq's
present internal problems would not have surfaced at some point in the
future even if the US, Britain, and Australia had never invaded.
The end result, however, is the US does not face the possibility of
fighting two major regional contingencies the strategic focus of both
the first Bush Administration and the Clinton Administration. The US
instead faces the reality of actually fighting three low intensity
conflicts and deep strategic involvement in a fourth. Moreover, the US
still faces the risk of involvement in major regional conflicts. These
risks include Iran, North Korea, Taiwan, and Columbia.
American military planning and strategy must be reevaluated in
terms of this situation and many of the lessons that grow out of US
experience in Iraq apply to the other wars as well:
Strategic engagement requires an objective--not an
ideological--assessment of the problems that must be dealt
with, and of the size and cost of the effort necessary to
achieve decisive grand strategic results. Neither a
capabilities-based strategy nor one based on theoretical sizing
contingencies is meaningful when real-world conflicts and well-
defined contingencies require a strategy and force plan that
can deal with reality, rather than theory. The US does not face
a world where all problems were solved by the end of the Cold
War. It does not face a world it can control or predict in the
future. It must constantly adapt to the tasks at hand and those
it can immediately foresee, not base its plans on hopes and
strategic slogans.
The US must pursue strategies and tactics that reflect the fact
that many of the conflicts we are now involved in cannot be
resolved by defeating a well defined enemy and involve
political, social, and economic forces that will take years, if
not decades to run their course. Iraq, at best, will be an
unstable and evolving state for a decade after we leave. At
worst it could be the subject of strong antiAmerican feelings
in the Gulf and Arab world.
The war in Afghanistan is mutating in ways that are beyond our
control and nation building so far is failing. The war on
terrorism is not a war against Al Qaida but against violent
Islamic extremism driven by mass demographic, economic, and
social forces in a region with limited political legitimacy. It
may take a quarter of a century to deal with. The Israeli-
Palestinian conflict seems years away from peace, and the last
peace process has shown how tenuous and uncertain even a
seemingly successful peace process can be.
``Superpower'' has always been a dangerous term. The
resulting exaggeration of US capabilities and strategic focus
on bipolar threats and ``peer rivals'' misses the point. The
real problem is being a global power with limited resources--a
problem that Great Britain encountered throughout the 19th
century. The world already is multipolar. There are severe
limits to what the US can do, and how many places it can do it.
Coalitions and alliances are more important than ever.
There is no alternative to ``internationalism.'' There may be
times we disagree with the UN or some of our allies, but our
strategy must be based on seeking consensus wherever possible,
on compromise when necessary, and on coalitions that underpin
virtually every action we take. Our rhetoric can no longer be
simply American or be driven by domestic politics; it must take
full account of the values and sensitivities of others.
Our military strategy must give interoperability and military
advisory efforts the same priority as jointness. In order to
lead, we must also learn to follow. We must never subordinate
our vital national interests to others, but this will rarely be
the issue. In practice, our challenge is to subordinate our
arrogance to the end of achieving true partnerships, and to
shape our diplomacy to creating lasting coalitions of the truly
willing rather than coalitions of the pressured and
intimidated.
Great as US power is, it cannot substitute for coalitions
and the effective use of international organizations if at all
possible. The term ``superpower'' may not be a misnomer, but it
certainly does not imply US freedom of action. At the same
time, most NGOs and international organizations are not
organized for armed nation building and face severe--if not
crippling--limitations if they are targeted in a low intensity
combat environment or by large-scale terrorism.
At the same time, armed nation building is a challenge only
the US is currently equipped to meet. While allies, the UN, and
NGOs can help in many aspects of security and nation building
operations. They often cannot operate on the scale required to
deal with nation building in the midst of serious low intensity
combat. Armed nation building requires continuing US military
and security efforts, and civil and economic aid programs.
Security and nation building not only require new forms of US
``rapid deployment,'' but major financial resources and the
development of new approaches to providing economic aid and the
necessary contract support.
Deterrence and containment are more complex than at the time
of the Cold War, but they still are critical tools and they too
are dependent on formal and informal alliances. The need to
create reliable structures of deterrence must also respond to
the reality of proliferation. The problem no longer is how to
prevent proliferation, but rather how to live with it.
The US needs to develop more mobile forces that are better
tailored to rapid reaction, power projection in areas where the
US has limited basing and facilities, and capable of dealing
better with the kind of low intensity combat dominated by
terrorists or hostile movements that require an emphasis on
light forces and HUMINT, rather than heavy forces and high
technology.
Military intervention cannot, however, be the dominant means of
exercising US military power. The problem is to find better
ways to use the threat of US military power to deter and
contain asymmetric conflicts, and new kinds of political and
economic threats. War avoidance is just as important in the
post-Cold War era as it was during it.
War must be an extension of diplomacy by other means, but
diplomacy must be an extension of war by other means as well.
US security strategy must be based on the understanding that
diplomacy, peace negotiations, and arms control are also an
extension of--and substitute for--war by other means. It is
easy for a ``superpower'' to threaten force, but far harder to
use it, and bluffs get called. Fighting should be a last
resort, and other means must be used to limit the number of
fights as much as possible.
Military victory in asymmetric warfare can be virtually
meaningless without successful nation building at the
political, economic, and security levels. These
``stabilization'' or ``Phase IV'' operations are far more
challenging, however, than defeating conventional military
forces. They also probably can best be conducted if the US is
prepared for immediate action after the defeat of conventional
enemy forces. Both in Afghanistan and Iraq, the US wasted
critical days, weeks, and months in engaging in a security
effort before opposition movements could regroup or reengage.
It left a power vacuum, rather than exploited one, and it was
not prepared for nation building or the escalation of
resistance once the enemy was ``defeated.''
The Quadrennial Defense Review was right in stressing the risk
asymmetric warfare posed to the US in spite of its conventional
strength. It failed, however, to look beyond the narrow
definition of the problems of direct combat to the problems of
containment and deterrence, conflict termination, and armed
nation building. Much of today's problems in Iraq stem from the
fact that the Defense Department and the Bush Administration
were as badly prepared for conflict termination, nation
building, and low intensity threats after the defeat of
Saddam's regular military forces, as they were well prepared to
carry out that defeat.
The price tag also involves more than dollars and includes some
share of responsibility for every US body bag being flown out
of Iraq. To a lesser degree, the same is true of the situation
in Afghanistan, and the problem is scarcely new.
The US failed in both nation building and Vietnamization in
Vietnam. It failed in Lebanon in the early 1980s. It failed in
Haiti, and it failed in Somalia. The stakes, level of
involvement, and the costs to the US may have been far lower in
some of these cases, but the fact remains that the US failed.
Force transformation cannot be dominated by technology;
manpower skills, not technology, are the key. The Afghan War
led to an emphasis on a method of using airpower that could not
secure the country or deal with Taliban and Al Qaida forces
that quickly mutated and dispersed. The Iraq War began with
heavy conventional land forces and soon became a heavy air-land
battle. It was all airpower, armored, Intelligence,
Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (IS&R) and precision through
late April. As such, it showed that high technology forces
could decisively defeat lower technology conventional forces
almost regardless of force numbers and the kinds of force
ratios that were critical in past conflicts. Yet, the US has
since been forced to virtually reinvent the way in which it
uses its forces since the fall of Saddam's regime. Technology
and netcentric war--and an emphasis on destroying enemy hard
targets and major weapons systems--failed when the problem
became conflict termination, armed nation building, and low
intensity warfare.
The military missions of low intensity combat, economic aid,
civil-military relations, security, and information campaigns
are manpower dominated and require skilled military manpower as
well as new forms civil expertise in other Departments. Human
intelligence can still be more important than technical
collection, local experience and language skills are critical,
and the ability to use aid dollars can be more important than
the ability to use bullets.
This requires a fundamental reexamination of US force plans and
force transformation concepts. For decades, the US has sought
to use technology to substitute for defense spending, for force
numbers, and for manpower numbers. During the conventional
phases of both the Afghan and Iraq conflicts, suggestions were
made for further force and manpower cuts and further efforts to
achieve savings in defense spending by acquiring
transformational technology.
Technology has been, is, and will be critical to American power
and military success. It is extremely questionable, however,
that the US has any credible way of using technology to make
further force and manpower cuts without taking unacceptable
risks. Creating the proper mix of capabilities for asymmetric
warfare, low-intensity conflict, security and Phase IV
operations, and nation building requires large numbers of
skilled and experience personnel. It is manpower intensive, and
technology is at best an aid to--not a substitute for--force
size and manpower numbers.
This problem is further compounded by the fact that the US does
not have a single major transformational weapons system or
technology under development which now seems likely to be
delivered on time, with the promised effectiveness, and at even
half of the unit life cycle cost originally promised. The US
has made little meaningful progress in the effective planning
and management of the development and procurement of advanced
military technology in the last quarter century--at least in
the sense of being able to integrate it into realistic budgets
and force plans. While the US has shown it can transform, it
has not shown it can plan and manage transformation.
For at least the next half decade, the US must also deal with the
backlog of maintenance and service requirements created by its
operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, and with the fact it must
retain and modernize far more of its so-called legacy systems
that it now plans.
Technology-based force transformation and the revolution in
military affairs are tools with severe and sometimes crippling
limits. The ability to provide Intelligence, Surveillance, and
Reconnaissance (IS&R) coverage of the world is of immense
value. It does not, however, provide the ability to understand
the world, deal with complex political issues, and fight
effectively in the face of terrorism, many forms of low
intensity conflict and asymmetric warfare, and the need to deal
with conflict termination and peace making or protect nation
building.
The ability to use precision weapons, helicopter mobility, and
armor to destroy enemy conventional forces and blow fixed
targets up ``24/7'' is also of great tactical value, but it
does not mean that defeating enemy conventional forces really
wins wars. The US is as bad at knowing what to blow up in terms
of strategic targeting and many aspects of interdiction bombing
as it was in World War II.
There also are good reasons to question whether many aspects of
``Netcentric'' warfare are little more than a conceptual myth,
concealing the military equivalent of the ``Emperor's new
clothes'' in a dense forest of incomprehensible PowerPoint
slides than cannot be translated into procurable systems,
workable human interfaces, and affordable Future Year Defense
Plans.
In practice, there may be a need to make far more effective use
of legacy systems, and evolutionary improvements in weapons and
technology, to support ``humancentric'' forms of military
action requiring extensive human intelligence and area skills,
high levels of training and experience, and effective
leadership in not only defeating the enemy in battle but
winning the peace.
This, in turn, means creating US military forces with extensive
experience in civil-military action and which can use aid as
effectively as weapons--dollars as well as bullets. It also
means redefining interoperability to recognize that low
technology allied forces can often be as, or more effective, as
high technology US forces in such missions.
Simply adding troops or more weapons will not solve
America's problems any more than trying to use technology to
make US forces smaller and more cost-effective will.
Manpower quality is at least as important as manpower quantity,
and they require suitable increases in the strength of military
and civil units. The problem is not boots on the ground, but
the capability of those wearing the boots. The missions that
are emerging require extremely skilled troops with excellent
area skills, far more linguists, human intelligence experts,
experts in urban and low intensity warfare, military police,
security experts and experts with training in civic action and
nation building. Personnel are require who can train local
personnel in security, police functions, and well as guerrilla
warfare. Many of these personnel and forces, however, would
have little value in a Korean or Taiwan contingency. The US
needs to pause and think out the issue of quality before it
does anything about force quantity. The fact is that 200,000
under-trained troops in Iraq would not be better than 150,000,
and having F-22s instead of F-15s would be pointless.
``Jointness'' cannot simply be an issue for restructuring
the US military, and is far more than a military problem. It
must occur within the entire executive branch, and on a civil-
military level as well as a military one.
The Iraq War has shown that the end result of allowing small
cadres in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Vice
President, and National Security Council was to allow
ideological cadres to bypass the US national security process
in ways that led to critical failures in key strategic tasks
like conflict termination and nation building. More broadly,
similar failures have occurred in virtually every aspect of US
strategic engagements and diplomacy, including critical areas
like counterproliferation and the Arab-Israel peace process.
To date, this lack of ``jointness'' in the Bush Administration's
national security team has had many of the same effects as a
similar Department of Defense-driven breakdown in the
interagency process during the period in which critical
decision were made to carry out a massive US building up in
Vietnam.
An advisory National Security Advisor is a failed National
Security Advisor; effective leadership is required to force
coordination on the US national security process. Unresolved
conflicts between leaders like Secretary Powell, and Secretary
Rumsfeld, the exclusion of other cabinet members from key
tasks, insufficient review of military planning, and giving too
much power to small elements within given departments, have
weakened US efforts and needlessly alienated our allies. The
creation of a large and highly ideological foreign policy staff
in Vice President's office is a further anomaly in the
interagency process.
The US interagency process simply cannot function with such
loosely defined roles, a lack of formal checks and balances,
and a largely advisory National Security Advisor. ``Jointness''
must go far beyond the military; it must apply to all national
security operations.
Policy, analysis, and intelligence must accept the true
complexity of the world, deal with it honestly and objectively,
and seek ``evolution'' while opposing ``revolution.''
The US is involved in four very complex wars, each of which
requires the most objective intelligence and analysis that is
possible. There is no room for ideological sound bites or
overly simplistic solutions, and force transformation cannot
cut some mystical Gordian knot. The US cannot afford to rush
into--or stay in--any conflict on ideological grounds. It
cannot afford to avoid any necessary commitment because of
idealism. What it needs is informed pragmatism.
One simple rule of thumb is to stop over-simplifying and
sloganizing--particularly in the form of ``mirror imaging'' and
assuming that ``democratization'' is the solution or even first
priority for every country. The US needs to deal with security
threats quietly and objective on a country-by-country and
movement-by-movement basis.
The US must seek reform with the understanding that progress in
economic development, raising the living standards of the
ordinary citizen, dealing with population problems, and
improvements in human rights may often not only be more
important in the near term than progress towards elections, but
that ``democracy'' is purposeless, or actively destructive,
unless viable political parties exist, political leaders have
emerged capable of moving their nations forward toward
moderation and economic development, and enough national
consensus exists to allow different ethnic, ideological, and
religious factions to function in a stable pluralistic
structure. Finally, the US must act with the understanding that
other societies and cultures may often find very different
solutions to political, social, and economic modernization.
The US cannot afford to carelessly abuse words like `Islam'' and
``Arab,'' or ignore the sensitivities of key allies like South
Korea in dealing with the threat from the North. It cannot
afford to alienate its European allies or lose support in the
UN by throwing nations like ``Iran'' into an imaginary ``axis
of evil.'' It needs nations like Saudi Arabia as an ally in the
struggle against movements like Al Qaida, and it cannot afford
to confuse terrorist movements driven by different and largely
neo-Salafi beliefs with terms like Wahhabi, any more than it
can afford to act as if Al Qaida somehow dominated a far more
complex mix of different threats.
The US needs a nuanced pragmatism that deals with each nation and
each threat individually and in proportion to the threat it
really presents. It must give regional and other allies a
proper role and influence in decision-making rather than seek
to bully them through ideology and rhetoric. It needs to engage
the checks and balances of the fully interagency process, of
area and intelligence professionals, and seek a bipartisan
approach with proper consultation with the Congress.
Stabilization, armed nation building, and peacemaking
require a new approach to organizing US government efforts.
It is not clear when the US will have to repeat stabilization and
nation building activities on the level of Iraq. It is clear
that the civilian agencies of the US government were not
adequately prepared to analyze and plan the need for the
political, security, aid, and information programs needed in
Iraq, and to provide staff with suitable training and ability
to operate in a high threat environment. The State Department
was prepared to analyze the challenges, but lacked both
planning and operational capability and staff prepared to work
in the field in a combat environment.
The integration of USAID into State has compounded the problems
of US aid efforts which had previously transferred many
functions to generic aid through the World Bank and IMF. There
was no staff prepared, sized, and training to deal with nation
building on this scale, or to formulate and administer the
massive aid program required. Contractors were overburdened
with large-scale contracts because these were easiest to grant
and administer in spite of a lack of experience in functioning
in a command economy and high threat environment. US government
and contractor staff had to be suddenly recruited--often with
limited experience--and generally for 3-12 month tours too
short to ensure continuity in such missions.
It is a tribute to the CPA and all those involved that so much
could be done in spite of the lack of effective planning and
preparation before the end of major combat operations against
Iraq's conventional forces. The fact remains, however, that
this should never happen again. Denial of the importance and
scale of the mission before the event in no way prevents it
from being necessary when reality intervenes.
New capabilities are required within the National Security
Council, the State Department, and the Department of Defense
for security and nation building missions. It does not matter
whether these are called post conflict, Phase IV,
stabilization, or reconstruction missions. The US must be as
well prepared to win a peace as it is prepared to win a war. It
must have the interagency tools in place to deal with providing
security after the termination of a conflict, and to support
nation building in terms of creating viable political systems,
economic stability and growth, effective military and security
forces, and public information system and free press. This
requires the National Security Council to have such expertise,
the State Department to have operational capability to carry
out such a mission, the Department of Defense to have the
proper military capabilities, and other agencies to be ready to
provide the proper support. The US must never again repeat its
most serious mistakes in Iraq and Afghanistan. It must make
security and nation building a fundamental part of the planning
and execution of military operations directed at foreign
governments from the start. A clear operational plan for such
activity must be prepared before military operations begin, the
costs and risks should be fully assessed, and the Congress
should be fully consulted in the same way it is consulted
before initiating military operations. The security and nation-
building missions must begin as combat operations proceed,
there must be no pause that creates a power vacuum, and the US
must act from the start to ensure that the necessary resources
for nation building are present.
The US needs to rethink its arms sales and security
policies.
The US still is selling massive amounts of arms to the region
with more attention to the dollar value of sales than to their
impact on local societies, the need for interoperability and
effectiveness, and changes in security needs that increasingly
focus on internal security.
The US signed $13.3 billion worth of new arms sales agreements
with Middle Eastern countries during 1995-1998, of total sales
to the region of $30.8 billion. Most are still in delivery or
early conversion and require extensive US advisory and contract
support to be effective. The US signed another $17.2 billion
during 1999-2002, out of a worldwide total of $35.9 billion.
All of these latter sales require extensive US advisory and
contract support. At present, almost all of these sales are
going to countries with poorly integrated arms buys, and low
levels of readiness and sustainability. They are also being
made in ways that offer only limited interoperability with US
forces.
The sheer volume of these sales also does as much to threaten
regional security as it does to aid it. The US needs to pay far
more attention to the social and economic needs of countries in
the Middle East, and to work with other sellers to reduce the
volume of sales. At the same time, it needs to work with
regional powers to help them make the arms they do need
effective and sustainable, create local security arrangements,
and improve interoperability for the purposes of both
deterrence and warfighting.
At the same time, most countries now face internal security
threats that are more serious than external threats. The US
needs to recast its security assistance programs to help
nations fight terrorism and extremism more effectively, and do
so in ways that do not abuse human rights or delay necessary
political, social, and economic reforms.
The US needs to organize for effective information campaigns
while seeking to create regional and allied campaigns that will
influence Arab and Islamic worlds.
The integration of the US Information Agency (USIA) into the
State Department, and major cutbacks in US information and
public diplomacy efforts, have deprived the US of a critical
tool that works best when regional efforts are combined with
well-funded and well-staffed efforts at the embassy and local
level. The US needs to revitalize its information efforts in a
focused and effective way that takes advantage of tools like
satellite broadcasting and the Internet while working directly
in country.
The US, however, can never be an Arab or Islamic country. It
needs to work with its friends and allies in the region to seek
their help in creating information campaigns that reject
Islamic radicalism and violence, encourage terrorism, and
support reform. The US should not try to speak for the Arabs or
for Islam, it should help them speak for themselves.
The US private sector and foreign direct investment should
be integrated into the US security strategy.
Far too often, the US ignores the role that the US private sector
can and must play in achieving evolutionary reform. The US has
tended to emphasize sanctions over trade and economic contact
in dealing with hostile or radical states, and assign too low a
priority to helping the US private sector invest in friendly
states. A ``zero-based'' review is needed of what the US
government should do to encourage private sector activity in
the Middle East.
The US has agonizing decisions to make about defense
resources.
In spite of major recent increases in defense spending, even the
present force plan is unsustainable in the face of the combined
funding burdens of operations, modernization, and
transformation.
The fact that the current Future Year Defense Plan does not
provide enough funds to allow the US cannot come close to fund
both its planned force levels and force improvement plans is
obvious. Everyone with any experience stopped believing in
estimated procurement costs long ago. What is equally clear
now, however, is that the US faces years of unanticipated
conflicts, many involving armed peacemaking and nation
building, and must rethink deterrence in terms of
proliferation. This is not a matter of billions of dollars; it
is a matter of several percent of the US GNP.
The US must limit new strategic adventures where possible:
The US needs to avoid additional military commitments and
conflicts unless they truly serve vital strategic interests.
Regardless of the outcome of the reevaluation of force
transformation recommended earlier, it will be two to three
years at a minimum before the US can create major new force
elements and military capabilities, and some change will take
at least five to ten years. The US already faces serious
strategic overstretch, and nothing could be more dangerous than
assuming that existing problems can be solved by adding new
ones--such as Syria or Iran. This means an emphasis on
deterrence, containment, and diplomacy to avoid additional
military commitments. It means a new emphasis on international
action and allies to find substitutes for US forces.
LESSONS FOR INTELLIGENCE AND ANALYSIS
Current methods of intelligence collection and analysis, cannot
guarantee adequate preparation for stabilization operations, properly
support low intensity combat, or properly support the nation-building
phase. The US needs to fundamentally reassess its approach to
intelligence to support adequate planning for the combat termination,
security, and nation building phases of asymmetric warfare and
peacemaking operations. The same jointness is needed in the
intelligence community effort to prepare for asymmetric warfare that is
needed in the overall interagency process, and to ensure that the
analysis given to policymakers, planners, and operators fully presents
the problems and challenges that must be dealt with in stabilization
and armed nation building. There must never again be a case in which
the Department of Defense filters or rejects community-wide analysis or
priority is given to intelligence for military operations in ways that
prevent adequate intelligence analysis and support being ready for the
stabilization and nation-building phase.
It is equally important that adequate tactical intelligence support
be available from the beginning of combat operations to the end of
security and nation building operations that provides adequate tactical
human intelligence support, combined with the proper area expertise and
linguistic skills. Technology can be a powerful tool, but it is an
aid--not a substitute--for the human skills and talents necessary to
support low intensity combat, expand the role of tactical human
intelligence, and do so in the context of supporting aid efforts and
civil military relations, as well as combat operations. At the same
time, civilian intelligence agency efforts need to be recast to support
nation building and security operations.
Iraq and Afghanistan have also shown that tactical military
intelligence must operate as part of a team effort with those involved
in counterinsurgency operations, the political and economic phases of
nation building, and security and military advisory teams.
It is particularly critical that both intelligence and operations
directly integrate combat activity with civil-military relations
efforts, US military police and security efforts, the use of economic
aid in direct support of low intensity combat and security operations,
the training of local security forces and their integration into the
HUMINT effort, and the creation of effective information campaigns. In
the future, this may require a far better integration of military and
civil efforts in both intelligence and operations than has occurred in
either Iraq or Afghanistan.
THE NEAR TERM SITUATION IN IRAQ
It may not be as apparent in the US as it is in the Arab world, but
several weeks of travel in the region indicate that the course of the
fighting in Fallujah and Najaf are perceived in much of Iraq and the
Arab world as a serious US defeat. This is not simply a matter of
shattering an aura of US military invincibility; it is a growing shift
in political attitudes and in the prospects for political change in
Iraq.
It is also all too clear that any idea the US is engaging in
``post-conflict operations'' is little more than a farce. The shock of
Saddam's fall produced a brief period of near paralysis in the Iraqi
opposition to the US and the Coalition. By August 2003, however, a
state of low intensity conflict clearly existed in Iraq, and the level
of this conflict has escalated ever since January of 2004.
In fact, this follows a pattern that makes the very term ``post-
conflict operations'' a stupid and intellectually dishonest oxymoron.
As we have seen in Afghanistan, Somalia, Lebanon, Cambodia, and many
other cases, asymmetric wars do not really end. Nation building must
take place on an armed basis without security and in the face of
adaptive and innovative threats. The reality is that this is a far more
difficult aspect of ``transformation'' than defeating organized
military resistance, and one for which the US is not yet prepared.
Senior US officials have been in a continuing state of denial about
the depth of support for this conflict. They have misused public
opinion polls like the Zogby and ABC polls and they have ignored the
fact that the ABC poll conducted in February found that roughly two
thirds of Sunnis and one third of Shi'ites opposed the US and British
invasion and found it to be humiliating to Iraq. Senior US officials
have ignored the fact that roughly one-third of Sunnis and two-thirds
of Shi'ites support violence against the Coalition and want the
Coalition forces to leave Iraq immediately. They talk about a small
minority of Iraqis because only a small minority have so far been
actively violent--a reality in virtually every insurgent campaign and
one that in no way is a measure of support for violence.
A year into the ``war after the war,'' far too many US officials
are still in a state of denial as to the political realities in the
Middle East. They do not see just how much the perceived US tilt
towards Israel and Sharon alienates Iraqis and Arabs in general. They
do not admit the near total failure of US information operations, and
the fact that Iraqis watch hostile Arab satellite TV stations and rely
on papers filled with misinformation and conspiracy theories.
They talk about ``success'' in aid programs measured in terms of
contracts signed, fiscal obligations, and gross measures of performance
like megawatts; not about actual progress on the ground the kind that
can really win hearts and minds. They cannot understand that US calls
for ``liberty,'' ``democracy,'' and ``reform'' have become coupled to
images of US interference in Arab regimes, the broad resentment of
careless negative US references to Islam and Arab culture, and
conspiracy theories about control of Iraqi oil, ``neoimperialism,'' and
serving ``Zionist'' interests.
The fact these perceptions are not fair is as irrelevant as US
tactical military victories that are often political defeats. The
present mix of armed nation building and low intensity conflict takes
place in a region shaped by such perceptions. This is why the
photographic evidence of US mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners is so
devastating. For many in the region, it validates every criticism of
the US, and vastly strengthens the hand of Islamic extremists, Sunni
insurgents, Shi'ite insurgents, and hostile media and intellectuals in
both the Arab world and Europe.
The time has come to face this reality. There was never a time when
neoconservative fantasies about the Middle East were anything but
dangerous illusions. Those fantasies have killed and wounded thousands
of American and Coalition allies, and now threaten the US with a
serious strategic defeat. It may not be possible to avoid some form of
defeat, but the US must make every effort to do so, and this means
junking the neoconservatism within the Office of the Secretary of
Defense, the Vice President's office, and the NSC and coming firmly to
grips with reality.
WHY THE US HAS ALREADY ``LOST'' SOME ASPECTS OF ITS BATTLES IN FALLUJAH
AND WITH SADR
The US is scarcely defeated in either a military or a political
sense, but it is suffering serious reversals. The Iraqi insurgents do
not have to win battles in a tactical sense; they merely have to put up
a determined enough resistance, with enough skill and courage, to show
their fellow Iraqis and the Arab world that they are capable of a
determined, strong and well-organized effort. Many of their fellow
Iraqis will perceive any determined resistance as a ``victory'' against
the world's only superpower.
If the Sunnis in Fallujah, and Sadr in Najaf, continue to show they
can survive a US military threat--and that they can force the US and
Coalition into a posture of containment and compromise--they will be
able to change the rules of the game in nation building as well as in
the fighting. They will score a major victory at the political level
while they effectively create ``no go'' areas and sanctuaries. They
will do so even if they do have to end open confrontation and turnover
some weapons and activists.
Solutions like the ``Fallujah Brigade'' are de facto defeats for
the US in both military and political terms. They signal a coming
struggle for power in which hostile elements of both Arab Sunnis and
Shi'ites will be much stronger than the US and its allies previously
estimated. They also create a national political climate in which the
Coalition is perceived as lacking any clear plan or goals, the Interim
governing Council is divided and lacking in legitimacy, the Iraqi
security forces are seen as ineffective, and the UN becomes both a tool
for insurgent pressure and a potential target.
LOSING A WAR OF ATTRITION IN A ``PERFECT STORM'' OF NEGATIVE IMAGES?
The fighting during April 2004 has also created a climate in which
the US and its allies are seen as being in the middle of a war of
attrition that they are losing. The totals of US, allied, and friendly
Iraqi killed and wounded have already reached the point where Iraqi
insurgents and foreign extremists have every reason to perceive the
Coalition as politically and strategically vulnerable--an image
reinforced by the steady loss of support for the war and a continued
effort in Iraq in US and allied public opinion polls.
Hostile Iraqi losses to date can be sustained indefinitely. As a
result, the mix of Coalition and friendly Iraqi casualties, sabotage
and paralysis of the aid process, and growing political uncertainty at
the edge of the transfer of sovereignty act as a virtual road map for
future battles in Iraq and later battles against US military and nation
building operations in the rest of the world. The end result is to show
that an Arab asymmetric force can delay and possibly checkmate the
strongest Western military power that Arabs are not weak or passive,
and that Arabs can ``take back their homeland.''
It will take a new public opinion poll to determine just how much
the ``perfect storm'' of negative events since February has changed
opinion inside Iraq, but it seems almost certain that events in
Fallujah and dealing with Sadr have sharply cut support for the US
among moderate Iraqi Arabs. (The fact the Kurds have nowhere else to
go--and have to be friendly--means they should be largely excluded from
polls analyzing how Iraqi attitudes are affecting the war.)
It seems equally certain that this drop is compounded by the flood
of Arab images of Iraqi civilians suffering in the fighting, the images
of mistreatment of Iraqi POWs, and newscasts that claim every US use of
a modern weapon is a careless use of excessive force. These images are
clearly having a powerful impact throughout the Sunni world--strongly
reinforced by Israeli military action and statements that make the
constant Arab media linkage between the US and Israeli occupations
steadily more damaging. Furthermore, similar images are being portrayed
in Iran and it seems likely that Iranian opinion is turning away from
the US.
THE LACK OF COALITION AND IGC POLITICAL LEGITIMACY
The last few weeks of resistance have sharply undercut the already
low political legitimacy of the CPA, the US approach to nation
building, and the Interim Governing Council. Iraqis and the region
perceive the US as lacking any credible plan of action and as being
``forced'' to turn to the UN.
The ``pro-American'' Iraqis have been divided and weak, and have
been unable to rally the Iraqi people. The end result is that the US
ability to convey ``legitimacy'' has been sharply undercut at precisely
the time the US needs legitimacy for its June 30 turnover. In addition,
US ties to some members of the IGC are becoming steadily more
damaging--particularly the image of US ties to ``losers'' like Chalabi.
TURNING A NON-TERRORIST THREAT INTO A REAL ONE
Iraq has become a natural battleground for Islamic insurgents and
``volunteers'' of all persuasions. There is no meaningful evidence that
Iraq was a focus of terrorism before the war, or a primary focus early
in the fighting. Over the last few months, however, the outside
presence and support for insurgents has increased.
Over the last few weeks, it has become all too clear that such
support is paying off well in terms of American and allied casualties,
and in boosting the image of Islamic resistance as being able to take
on the US. Iraq was never a magnet for terrorism before the war, and
only a limited magnet before Fallujah and Sadr. It has become a major
magnet now.
PARALYZING MUCH OF THE EFFORT TO WIN HEARTS AND MINDS
Much of the aid and economic development program has been
paralyzed, and the economic security of the Shi'ite areas and oil
exports is now far more at risk. The US reliance on contractors, rather
than Iraqis, makes everyone involved in aid and reconstruction a
natural target. The use of contract security has created the image of
mercenary forces, and efforts to win hearts and minds in troubled areas
have essentially collapsed, as they have in some formerly ``friendly
areas'' as well.
The flood of aid that should have helped win hearts and minds
during a critical period of political transition is often little more
than a trickle.
A NEGOTIATED SOLUTION MEANS LIMITING THE SCALE OF DEFEAT
The end result is close to a no win situation for the US: Any
negotiated solution effectively legitimizes the Sunni and Shi'ite hard-
line opposition, while weakening the IGC--exposing the fact the US is
now trying to turnover power to ``mystery men'' on June 30, who cannot
have legitimacy because they have no identity.
This compounds the problems inherent in the Ibrahimi approach,
which effectively says that the government of June 30 will not have
legitimacy until a popular council takes place, and that a real
government and constitutional base must be voted on by the Iraqis and
not from the legacy left by the CPA/IGC.
In effect, the period of political illegitimacy or non-legitimacy
is now extended long beyond June 30th, and the period in which Iraqis
must compete for power by both political and violent means will now
extend through all of 2004 and much of 2005.
This political struggle has several key characteristics:
The game has no clear rules. There are ``maybe'' milestones
and objectives that are undefined.
Federalism and power sharing is up in the air, and even if
an interim allocation of power to a President, Prime Minister,
and Vice Premiers takes place, it is only for an interim period
and does not affect struggles over money, power, land, etc. The
ethnic divisions between Arab, Kurd, Turcoman, and other
minorities are not really resolved. The same is true of
divisions between Sunni and Shi'ite, and religious and secular.
There is no economic underpinning for political stability,
and far too many jobs are dependent on aid and paid security
positions. Iraq now has a ``bubble'' economy, not real
reconstruction, and Iraqis know this. Some 70% expressed fear
over their future job security in the ABC poll in February.
No Iraqi leaders now have broad popular political support in
public opinion polls, including Sistani. Most have powerful
negatives--often more negative than positive. There is usually
intense competition within given factions, and leaders have a
growing incentive to show their independence from the
Coalition. A near political vacuum exists where there are
strong incentives to seek support from ethnic or religious
factions and demagogue the way to victory.
No political party has significant popular support, and
nearly 70% of Iraqis opposed political parties in the ABC poll
in February, largely because of the heritage of the Baath.
More Iraqis support a strong leader as an interim solution
than ``democracy,'' although no one is clear on who such a
strong leader will be.
No Iraqi leader is as yet organizing for the series of
elections to come, aggressively trying to create popular
political parties, or making efforts to capture the media. The
peaceful political struggles necessary to create the groundwork
for democracy are being subordinated to political struggles
within the IGC, efforts to game Ibrahimi's political efforts,
and challenges from the outside.
Many potential Iraqi leaders have every reason to fear
losing in the coming struggle for power, and no clear plans
exist to coopt the Sunni insurgents and Shi'ite ``Sadrs'' into
the system. Hostile areas and factions are largely excluded
from the political process under the illusion they are too
small to really matter. The US still seems to be trying to
stage-manage the creation of a secular democracy of friendly
moderates, but true legitimacy is the government Iraqis want,
not the one the US and Western reformers want.
There is no meaningful chance of ``security first.'' The
political and nation building process will almost certainly
have to go on in the midst of terrorism and low intensity
conflict through 2006. Elections will be extremely difficult,
hostile areas will continue to exist, and governance will be
under continued attack.
The rush to create Iraqi armed forces and security forces
suitable for a post conflict Iraq has left tens of thousands of
untrained and poorly equipped men recruited locally on an
ethnic, religious, and tribal basis. No clear plan seems to
exist for giving them the training, equipment, and facilities
they need on a timely basis. The rule of law is erratic and
often local.
Politics may fascinate politicians, but Iraqis live with
governance. The creation of 25-27 functioning ministries,
governorates, and urban governments will affect every aspect of
daily life and security. The plans to create effective
governance will lag far behind the transfer of sovereignty on
June 30--and extend well into the winter of 2004 and beyond.
A CLASSIC MILITARY SOLUTION CANNOT WORK
In retrospect, the US might have been far better off to act
decisively in hot pursuit in both Fallujah and in dealing with Sadr.
Certainly, the military effort and the causalities would have been far
smaller, the political momentum of support for the insurgents would not
have had time to build, and any criticism would have been tempered with
reluctance to challenge the US again. That was then, however, and this
is now.
The US can defeat any given group of Iraqi insurgents and largely
secure any area it occupies with sufficient strength. However, any
military solution that involves serious combat with a Sunni or Shi'ite
faction is now likely to be the kind of ``victory'' that creates a new
firestorm over excessive force, civilian casualties, and collateral
damage. At the same time, the US cannot hope to use such combat to kill
or arrest all of the Sunni, Shi'ite, and foreign insurgents that exist
now and many tactical victories are likely to create more insurgents
than they destroy. As the US learned in Vietnam, tactical military
victory without political victory is large irrelevant.
As in Vietnam, the US also cannot afford to loose the largest
ethnic faction. In Vietnam, the US arguably lost the war when it lost
the Buddhists. In Iraq, the key is to avoid losing the Shi'ites. Any US
arrest or killing of Sadr at this point means creating an instant
martyr that will have a powerful impact on many young Shi'ites in Iraq,
and militant Shi'ites all over the world--pushing them towards some
form of alignment with Sunni insurgents. A serious fight from a now
cold start against a well-organized resistance in Najaf would be a
disaster, triggering much broader Shi'ite alignments against the US.
WHAT THE US SHOULD DO NOW IN IRAQ
At this point, the US lacks good options--although it probably
never really had them in the sense the Bush Administration sought. The
option of quickly turning Iraq into a successful, free market democracy
was never practical, and was as absurd a neoconservative fantasy as the
idea that success in this objective would magically make Iraq an
example that would transform the Middle East.
The key to the success the US can now hope to achieve is to set
realistic objectives. In practice, these objectives are to create an
Iraqi political structure that will minimize the risk of civil war,
develop some degree of pluralism, and help the Iraqis take charge over
their own economy.
This, in turn, means a major shift from trying to maintain US
influence and leverage in a post sovereignty period to a policy where
the US makes every effort to turn as much of the political, aid, and
security effort over to Iraqis as soon as possible, and focuses on
supporting the UN in creating the best compromises possible in creating
Iraqi political legitimacy.
The US should not abandon Iraq, but rather abandon the effort to
create an Iraq in its own image.
Other measures are:
Accept the fact that a universal, nation-wide ``security
first'' policy is stupid and impractical.
The US needs to isolate and bypass islands of resistance, and
focus on creating a legitimate Iraqi government that can unify
Iraqis and allow nation building to work. This means relying on
containment in the case of truly troubled and high insurgent
areas, and focusing on security in friendly areas.
Accept the fact there is no way to ``drain the swamp.''
At this point, there simply is no way to eliminate cadres of
insurgents or to disarm the most threatening areas. Fallujah
and similar areas have too much popular support for the
insurgents, there are too many arms that can be hidden, and too
many points of vulnerability. This does not mean the US should
give up fighting the insurgents or its efforts to disarm them.
It does mean the US must accept that it cannot win in the sense
of eliminating them or turning hostile areas into secure and
disarmed areas.
Rush aid to the Iraqi security forces and military seeking
more friendly Arab aid in training and support, and provide as
broad a base of Iraqi command as possible.
Forget contract regulations on buying equipment. Deliver
everything necessary and worry about the details later.
Continue expanding the role of the Iraqi security forces.
Understand that their loyalties will be divided, that putting
them in charge of hostile areas does not mean they can be
expected to do more than work out a modus vivendi with the
insurgents, and that the end result will often be to create
``no go'' or limited access areas for Americans. The US cannot
afford to repeat the Israeli mistake of assuming that any Iraqi
authority in hostile areas can be counted on to provide
security for Americans.
Walk firmly and openly away from the losers in the IGC like
Chalabi.
Open up the political structure and deal with Shi'ite
oppositionists, Sunni insurgents, ex-Ba'athists to the maximum
degree possible. Drag in as many non-IGC leaders as possible,
and give Ibrahimi's council idea the strongest possible
support. Lower the US profile in shaping the political future
of Iraq as much as possible and bring in as broad a UN
international team as possible.
Focus on all of the Shi'ites, not just the friendly ones.
Make this a critical aspect of US diplomatic efforts. Let the
Iraqi Shi'ites deal with Sadr and stay out of internal Shi'ite
disputes, except to help insure security. Quietly reach out to
Iran to create whatever kind of dialogue is possible.
Push Sunni Arab states into helping Iraq's Sunnis and in
helping to deal with the political issues involved.
Quietly make it clear that they will have to live with the
aftermath of failure and that the US presence and commitment is
not open-ended.
Zero-base the failed contracting effort for FY2004 US aid.
Put Iraqi Ministries and officials in charge of the aid process
as soon as possible, with Iraqis going into the field and not
foreign contractors. Accept the fact that it is far better to
move more slowly and imperfectly on Iraqi terms, with some
degree of Iraqi corruption, than to waste billions more on
security, failed US projects, and immense overhead costs.
Reprogram funds for a massive new CERP program to enable US
military commanders to use dollars instead of bullets at every
opportunity.
Make the focus of US control over aid whether Iraqis spend the
money honestly and effectively, and not on US control, plans,
and objectives.
Zero-base the US embassy plan to create the smallest staff
practical of proven area experts.
Give the clear message to the Iraqis that not only are they going
to be in charge, but non-performance means no US money and no
continuation of US troops and support. End the image of a US
end of an occupation after the occupation.
Develop a long-term economic and military aid program as
leverage to try to influence Iraqi decision making over time.
Have the ministries manage the process, not USAID or contractors.
Focus on whether the Iraqi efforts are honest and produce real
results. Do not try to use aid to force Iraq into US modes and
methods.
Accept the near total failure of US information operations.
Stop giving all CPA/CJTF-7 press conferences, and put an Iraqi on
the stage with the US spokesmen. Stop all procounsel-like press
conferences where the US seems to be dictating. Make an Iraqi
spokesman part of all dialogue, and give them the lead as soon
as possible. Subordinate US and Coalition spokesmen as soon as
possible to Iraqis in press conferences and briefings that are
held in Arabic.
Look at the broader failures of US policy in the region.
Revitalize the Road Map and the Quartet in the light of Sharon's
problems. Deal with the reality that there are two failed sets
of political elites in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and
that settlements should be unacceptable and not just terrorism.
Abandon the Greater Middle East Initiative in its present
form.
Do not add another strategic and policy blunder to the present
situation by appearing to call for regime change and seeking to
dominate the region. Focus on a broad cooperative initiative
worked out with the EU and where the EU puts pressure on the
Arab League. Stop talking about region-wide democracy and
liberty before there are responsible political parties and the
other reforms necessary to make democracy work. Focus on a
country-by-country approach to reform that considers human
rights, economic welfare, and demographic issues to be at least
as important as elections. Stress cooperation in ``evolution;''
not random efforts at ``revolution.''
Prepare for the fact that nation building may still fail, and
position the US to use the threat of withdrawal as leverage. Make it
clear that the US can and will leave Iraq if the Iraqis do not reach
agreement on an effective interim solution and if they do not proceed
with reasonable unity to implement the UN plans.
The US position should be that the US is ready to help an Iraq that
will help itself, and that it supports a true transfer of sovereignty.
It should make it clear to Iraq and the world, however, that the US has
a clear exit strategy. It has no interest in bases or control over
Iraqi oil. It has no reason to stay if Iraq become unstable, devolves
into civil war, or ends up under a strong man. The US can live with a
weak or unstable Iraq, and Iraq still will have to export oil at market
prices and will still be far less of a threat than Saddam's Iraq.
AVOID STRATEGIC OVERREACH
One final reality--the image of a quick and decisive victory is
almost always a false one, but it is still the image many Americans
want and expect. One thousand or more dead in Iraq is hardly Vietnam,
but it must be justified and explained, and explained honestly--not in
terms of the ephemeral slogans. The budget rises and supplements of the
last few years are also likely to be the rule and not the exception
America may well have to spend another one percent of its GNP on
sustained combat and international intervention overseas than any
American politician is willing to admit.
America faces hard political choices, and they are going to take
exceptional leadership and courage in both an election year and the
decades to come. They require bipartisanship of a kind that has faded
since the Cold War, and neither neo-conservative nor neo-liberal
ideology can help. Moreover, America's think tanks and media are going
to have to move beyond sound bites and simple solutions, just as will
America's politicians and military planners. Put differently, it not
only is going to be a very tough year, it is going to be a very tough
decade.
The Chairman. Well, thank you very much, Dr. Cordesman,
for, first of all, the very comprehensive statement you have
submitted to the committee. It is a remarkable document, and
likewise we appreciate the very strong summary you have given
this morning.
I want to call now on General Joseph Hoar, the former
Commander in Chief of the United States Central Command. It is
a privilege to have you again, General Hoar. Would you please
proceed.
STATEMENT OF GENERAL JOSEPH P. HOAR, USMC (RET.), FORMER
COMMANDER IN CHIEF, UNITED STATES CENTRAL COMMAND
General Hoar. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Senator Biden,
members of the committee. It is an honor once again to be here
to testify before you today.
If you will recall in August 2002, when I spoke to you
last, I indicated that I was in favor of regime change in Iraq
but not under the conditions or at the time suggested for the
overthrow of the Saddam Hussein government. My view about the
inadvisability of the war against Iraq remains unchanged.
However, now that we find the facts on the ground as they are,
I am convinced that we must stay, continue to take all
necessary means, and turn this very serious situation around.
My remarks this morning can be divided into three broad
areas: first, a brief review of the events of the past year as
a means of setting the stage for my second topic, which is what
needs to be done, and finally, a discussion about the region,
what is going on in the Arab and Muslim world and what are our
options.
In the past year, we have seen enormous successes and
abysmal failures in Iraq. The offensive campaign conducted to
overthrow Saddam Hussein was a brilliant military success
carried out by the finest armed forces in the world. The young
men and women who captured Baghdad did a masterful job.
However, even as that superbly conducted operation was
unfolding, it became apparent that there were not enough troops
on the ground to perform all the necessary tasks. Not only were
we not capable of adequately securing supply lines, but when we
reached Baghdad, there were no reserves to exploit the great
success that had been achieved by the 3rd Infantry Division and
the 1st Marine Division. The resulting looting, the
destruction, and the failure to protect property and to secure
Iraqi weapons and ammunition have had profound consequences in
the past year.
This reconstruction phase that began after the seizure of
Baghdad has been characterized by poor planning and frequently
poor execution. Indicative of this is the amateurish way in
which the CPA dealt with the Iraqi Army. First, we dismissed
them. Then we hired them back and then sent them home. And now
we have come full circle and are about to embark on hiring
former members of the Iraqi Army to return and go to work.
The progress on the development of the country has been
poor. Political issues have been handled with characteristic
lack of sensitivity, and we find continued reliance on people
like Mr. Chalabi who, from the start, has been untrustworthy,
who has continued to demonstrate his inability to contribute to
our success. Until recently, we continued to pay him and his
people over $300,000 a month. Incidentally, I read on the
Internet this morning that there is a new group emerging in
Baghdad today which has aligned Mr. Chalabi with the Iraqi
Hezbollah representative. We have come that far.
This month, unfortunately, has been capped by the tragedy
of the Abu Ghraib prison. Faced with these difficulties, the
questions we must deal with are how serious is this and what
can be done. My answer to these questions is that it is gravely
serious but not necessarily terminal. But we need a fast
turnaround and we need to begin right away.
My concerns are that the policy people in both Washington
and Baghdad have demonstrated their inability to do the job on
a day-to-day basis this past year. It seems to me that a year
is more than enough to give people an opportunity to show how
well they perform. I believe we are absolutely on the brink of
failure. We are looking into the abyss. We cannot start soon
enough to begin the turnaround.
The first step is to designate the Department of State as
the lead agency. Since the end of offensive combat, the
emphasis should have shifted to political concerns in Iraq.
What is required of the military is to support the political
objectives. Success in a counter-insurgency operation is based
on three elements: security, political activity, and
development. Security and development support the overall
political objective.
We need a U.N. Security Council resolution which will
provide legitimacy to our operations in Iraq under the
provisions of chapter 7 of the U.N. Charter.
We need the participation of NATO. It is fundamental to
broaden the base of support and to give countries that might
have joined us an opportunity to assist with troops, to assist
politically and perhaps financially as well.
Finally, we need the Iraqis to be involved and to be more
visible. We need to turn the transition from CPA to the new
government over to the U.N. We need to take special care that
those members of the interim government authority who have not
played a positive role in the government thus far be excluded
from serving in the interim government.
We need to give military commanders on the ground adequate
troops to provide for the security throughout the country, even
if it disrupts the current plans for rotation of troops in the
future. Until we are able to demonstrate a credible ability to
provide security to the country, it will be difficult to
achieve our political objectives.
Within Iraq, the NATO governing apparatus will assure that
military operations are in keeping with our overall objectives.
Offensive operations should be used sparingly. Those areas that
are considered too dangerous or too politically sensitive to
enter can be isolated and bypassed. As in all successful
counter-insurgency operations, intelligence is key. Offensive
operations not based on hard intelligence will cause excessive
damage and will not further our interests. The kind of human
intelligence that is necessary to act promptly and decisively
must come from the Iraqis themselves and can only be developed
with the formation of an Iraqi intelligence service.
Today I am told that U.S. civilian government officials
assigned to Iraq sometimes are there for 6 months or even, in
some cases, for as little as 3-month periods. The lesson of
Vietnam was that it is not practical to assign people to these
kinds of duties for less than 18 months. If we are to gain some
degree of continuity in the cities and towns around the
country, we need to have political officers that are there for
the long haul. And if they cannot be provided, from the
civilian force, then they should be assigned out of the
military. In this regard, we need to get contractors out of the
development process and put together the rules that will allow
the military to disburse money, to put people to work in the
cities and in the countryside.
Last June, shortly after the military victory and the
overthrow of Saddam Hussein's government, I had dinner with an
old friend, Nizar Hamdoon. Members of this committee perhaps
remember Nizar. He had been the Iraqi Ambassador to the United
States and during the 1990-1991 war was the Iraqi Ambassador to
the United Nations. Nizar was ill and was in the United States
undergoing medical treatment. He passed away on the 4th of July
last year. When I asked him what the American forces needed to
do in order to successfully complete the transition from Saddam
Hussein's regime to democracy, he said three things: provide
security, services, and jobs. And if we did those three things,
we would have the support of the Iraqi people.
I am convinced, more than ever, that Nizar Hamdoon was
right. This is the yardstick. We need to take the time, the
money, and the resources to make sure that in those three areas
of endeavor, we are doing all that we need to do.
Finally, with respect to the region, you will recall when I
was here last, I spoke about our failure to define the nature
of this war and that terrorism was a manifestation of a far
more complex and potentially dangerous dynamic. In nearly 2
years that have passed since that time, our government has done
a reasonably good job against al-Qaeda. Had we not lost our
focus and invaded Iraq, I suspect we would have done a better
job, but as a result of the Iraq invasion, I believe the United
States is even less secure than it was in August 2002. Today
al-Qaeda is not only a threat, we now have home grown,
independent mujahedin showing up in Iraq, in Europe, in Africa,
Southeast Asia, and even North America. The threat is more
diffuse and it is certainly every bit as dangerous.
As we look to the future, we are now paying the price for
not focusing our attention on the 1.2 billion Muslims around
the world. We are, through our actions and our lack of
sensitivity, turning good, hardworking Muslims around the world
against us. As a government, we continue to be insensitive to
the fact that what we say in Washington and what is being done
in Baghdad, Gaza, and Kabul reverberates in Sibu, in Jakarta,
Casablanca, yes, and in Marseilles and in Buffalo, New York as
well. We are on the verge of losing the battle of public
diplomacy for the fight for the hearts and minds is now in the
last phase and it is getting worse by the day.
The support of the President of the United States for the
Israeli Prime Minister regarding withdrawal from Gaza, ending
the right of return of Palestinians, and the status of 1967
borders without input from the Palestinian people was
considered an outrage by Muslims the world over. When coupled
with the disclosures of our Abu Ghraib prison, it consisted of
a one-two punch that has brought us to our knees. It is not al-
Jazeera or al-Arabiya's fault that we are badly portrayed in
the Muslim world. It is our fault because our message has been
inconsistent, legalistic, and Western in its orientation. We
cannot win the war of ideas if our ideas are no good.
Finally, we are fighting a counter-insurgency as if it were
being conducted in Iowa. We are advised by opportunists,
frauds, and the ill-informed. Until leaders, both civilian and
military, are advised by the people that know Iraq and its
culture, its history and that of its neighbors, we will repeat
the same mistakes that we have made in the past year and those
of the British who occupied Iraq after World War I.
The eyes of the whole world have been on us for the past
year and a half as we prepared for and went to war. Aside from
the extraordinary success and coverage of the armed services
men and women in battle, we have little we can be proud of. Is
this what our Founding Fathers had in mind? Is this what the
world has come to expect from the city on the hill? I hope not.
I deeply believe that this country can do a better job.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, General Hoar.
You mentioned the need of the committee and the public to
heed voices that understand the culture and the politics of
Iraq, and we have such a witness next in the batting order. Dr.
Phebe Marr, author and former senior fellow at the National
Defense University, has been with us on several occasions
during these hearings. We appreciate your return and we would
love to hear your testimony presently, Dr. Marr.
STATEMENT OF DR. PHEBE MARR, FORMER SENIOR FELLOW, NATIONAL
DEFENSE UNIVERSITY
Dr. Marr. Senator Lugar, Senator Biden, thank you very much
for having me again. I hope I can offer you at least something
that is new. I have to say that in most respects I agree with
my colleagues on the platform.
I have submitted a longer statement. I will try to
summarize some of the main points in it.
Until April, the situation in Iraq seemed to be relatively
evenly balanced between the bad news of insurgency and some
good news on the political and economic front, but the events
since then have delivered a crushing blow to our credibility. I
believe we are in a crisis situation which needs rapid
attention and strong nerves. Policymakers must put their heads
together and address three broad questions.
Are these setbacks decisive, a critical turning point which
has so affected American credibility in Iraq and the world,
that it can no longer take the lead in rebuilding Iraq? If so,
how fast should it turn over to others, in what areas, and to
whom?
Second, as we turn over greater authority to the Iraqis,
what are our minimal interests that must be satisfied?
And third, as we view the scene in Iraq, what potential
outcomes are likely over the medium to long term? What is the
worst case and how do we prevent it? What is the most realistic
best case and how do we encourage it?
Of course, I cannot answer these questions definitively. I
will make a few suggestions on the first two and then try to
deal in a little more detail with the third, which is more in
my area of expertise.
What about the point of no return? I would caution three
things. Do not panic. Take the long view. We should not be
misled or sidetracked by all these instant polls which show the
Iraqis want us out now. All indications are that Iraqis show
intense and increasing dislike of occupation. What a surprise!
But they also fear a precipitous pullout of our forces. Iraqis
want better management of the transition, not a ``cut and run''
policy. We need to remember that the Iraqi project is a long
distance race, not a spectacular high jump.
Second, a piece of advice few will follow. Turn off the TV,
listen to Iraqis on the ground in developing intelligence and
assessments. There is nothing like hands-on, ground-level human
intelligence. Iraqis may give you a different view.
When I was in the gulf in April, admittedly before the
downturn in events, I was surprised in talking to Iraqis
quietly in my living room. They had come back from Iraq, they
had children there. They were all more optimistic about their
future than I was. Now, events have subsequently taken a
downturn, but we need to remember these views.
And third, something that I think will address one of
Senator Biden's questions, the U.S. needs to remember that it
faces a long historical and cultural pattern in Iraqi thinking.
Most Iraqis are schizophrenic in their attitude to outside
influences, and there is nothing new in that. They have always
had a strong streak of nationalism, a desire for independence.
Under Saddam they were isolated from the outside world and had
little experience of cooperation with outside powers. But most
Iraqis also want what America and the West have to offer:
economic prosperity, openness to the outside, and a modern
future. To move in this direction and rebuild their lives, they
will need to cooperate with outsiders, especially the United
States. And they will have to pay the price of taking more
responsibility for their future and not just complaining and
looking to others.
The U.S. also has the problem of incompatible aims: turning
an occupation into liberation. The U.S. claims it wants
democracy in Iraq, but it also has some well-known interests
and objectives. What if a freely elected Iraqi government does
not agree? We need to think through now, publicly, what our
minimal aims and interests are in Iraq. In broad terms, I would
say they are three: a state free of terrorism, a state free of
weapons of mass destruction, and a government, if not friendly,
at least not hostile to the U.S. and Israel. And I would make
it very clear we have no long-term designs on military bases or
control of oil in Iraq.
This does not preclude the U.S. trying for more maximalist
aims. Such as working with Iraqis on building a more stable,
prosperous, democratic regime, so long as this is done with a
good dose of realism. And in doing so, we must lower our
expectations and our rhetoric and theirs.
Now, what are some realistic scenarios, worst case, best
case? How do we prevent the former and encourage the latter?
Iraq is now engaged in two profound and wrenching
struggles. One is an identity crisis. The key question here is
whether there is an overarching Iraqi identity, and if so, what
is its basis? I believe there is but it has been badly battered
and needs nurturing.
The second more immediate question is a struggle for power,
which is critical. This struggle encompasses ethnic and
sectarian groups, but also political parties with differing
outlooks and orientations and individuals with patronage
networks. Right now these groups are focused on the United
States and the Governing Council, but if our presence is
removed, they are going to be focused on one another.
These struggles will not be resolved easily. If they take
place peaceably, we will have something like democracy. If not,
we will have civil conflict. Civil conflict will erode the
fragile authority of the central government and the state,
creating my definition of the worst case scenario, a failed
state.
In my submitted statement, I have gone into some detail on
ethnic and sectarian differences, political parties, and the
nature of this power struggle which I cannot go into here.
Suffice it to say, however, that none of these communities--
Kurds, Arab Sunnis or Shi'a--is homogeneous. The pattern in
Iraq is of a mosaic of groups, not clear-cut ethic and
sectarian fragmentation.
Given these circumstances, what outcomes can we expect in
Iraq over the next 5 years or so? Let me deal with the worst
case scenario, the breakdown of the state to a point beyond
which we could not reconstitute it. This process is underway,
but it is by no means irreparable, and we want to prevent it
from reaching such a point. A number of pundits and analysts
have advanced the notion that Iraq might break up into three
component parts: a Kurdish north, and Arab Sunni or mixed
center, and a Shi'a south. They pose a potential civil war
between and among these groups, Kurds versus Arabs, Shi'a
versus Sunnis. Some are even asking whether the Iraqi state or
Iraqi identity has already disappeared and we should be
thinking about managing a separation as in the former
Yugoslavia.
The answer to this question should be a resounding no. Our
government is officially on record as supporting the
territorial integrity of Iraq. The overwhelming majority of
Iraqis do not want their state divided. Moreover, Iraq is not
likely to break up into three distinct ethnic and sectarian
parts with clear boundaries between them. There are too many
demographic frontiers which would be very difficult to
separate. Unscrambling these areas in any divide would be a
nightmare.
Nor is there any evidence yet of ethnic and sectarian
warfare on the ground. Kurds are not fighting Arabs. Shi'a are
not fighting Sunnis. On the contrary, in the face of increasing
violence and extraordinary provocation, including attempts to
incite civil war, Iraq's communal leaders have shown a clear
awareness of the threat, a firm commitment to avoid it, and so
far considerable discipline in reining in their constituents.
The more plausible scenario we face for a failed state is
the breakdown of a weak and fragile central government unable
to exercise control over the country, with something of a
vacuum at the center. Without a cohesive Iraqi Army or police
force, local militias are taking root. This is not yet
warlordism, but it could begin to resemble it. In any ensuing
struggle for power, it is these groups led by extremists who
may engage in fighting several different civil wars. These
could destroy the potential for a buildup of the new government
at the center. That is the bad scenario.
What would be a good scenario that is realistic and
achievable? That is more difficult to predict. It depends on
Iraqi desires and a willingness to compromise and their ability
to surmount the zero sum political game. Any such scenario will
take 5 to 10 years to produce. It will not be achieved on June
30 or even next year.
But one can speculate on the outlines. It would provide a
mechanism--a constitution, elections--to create and strengthen
a central government that would be representative of most, but
not all Iraqis; and second, and most important in my opinion,
be able to govern. This is going to involve wrenching
compromises between Kurds and Arabs and among those who want
more and those who want less religion in their lives.
To reach this state, we should be encouraging negotiations
and alliances between and among various factions and an open
political process which is already underway. Who will dominate
this government and how power will be distributed is up to the
Iraqis to decide, but it is not impossible that something
better will eventually come out of this process. We just cannot
predict exactly what it will be.
How do we make this happen? Our ability to change Iraq is
limited, but we can encourage a positive outcome. I have six
steps I would suggest.
I think we need to change the subject and stop talking
about civil war, division of Iraq, Shi'a, Sunnis, Kurds. These
identities are realities, but it would be best to downplay
them. The same is true for tribalism. In the short term, to
achieve security, we may need to work with these groups, but
over the long term, we need to hold out a vision for a more
modern Iraq which I believe has broad appeal in Iraq.
Second, I believe there is an Iraqi identity espoused by
the majority--the silent majority--of Iraqis. We need to begin
to work with groups who are committed to this identity. We
should identify areas where pluralism is working and expand
these zones of peace and cooperation. And there are a number of
them in Iraq: Hilla, Mosul, Basra, and the north.
Third--and this is the most important point I want to
make--the U.S. and the coalition should be focusing on economic
development and the prosperity of Iraqis. To quote a phrase
used in a previous campaign, ``It's the economy, stupid.'' This
includes the development of a small and medium-sized business
class, jobs for the lower classes and the poor, and protection
for workers. At the middle level, things have improved for
educated professionals who are working and have more money.
Every single Iraqi I talked to reminded me of this. The middle
class is out spending this money, helping merchants at the
lower level. We need to strengthen this trend. Rather than
concentrating so much on elections and representation, we ought
to be concentrating on delivering services because that is what
Iraqis are used to, that is what they expect. It's the economy,
jobs.
Fourth, our strategy should be to strengthen, support, and
rebuild Iraq's middle class. While this class has been greatly
weakened, it is still present in Iraq. It should be the
backbone of the new Iraqi state. The middle class can be
nourished by the Iraqi-American community from outside, by
funds which help businessmen, and by contacts which strengthen
educated professionals. The middle class in Iraq has always
been the repository of modernism, secularism, and national
identity. If this class is strengthened, in time it will
mitigate the tendencies toward ethnic and sectarian separatism,
tribalism, and Islamic fundamentalism. It is, of course, also
the mainstay of democratic society.
Fifth, the United States should continue to open Iraqi
society to the outside, encouraging professionals, businessmen,
and others to participate in the international economy and
society.
Last, the United States should be encouraging civic and
political groups in Iraq which cut across, rather than
reinforce, ethnic, sectarian, and tribal lines. Iraq has a long
tradition among its urban, educated community of doing this. We
need to strengthen this trend. The middle class has lost its
voice. We need to help them regain it.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Marr follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dr. Phebe Marr
Up until April, the situation in Iraq seemed evenly balanced
between the bad news of the insurgency and some good news on the
political and economic fronts. But the events since then have delivered
a crushing blow to our credibility. I believe we are a crisis situation
which needs rapid attention and strong nerves. Policy makers must
seriously address three broad future-oriented questions.
1. Are these set-backs decisive--a critical turning point
which has so affected US credibility in Iraq--and the world--
that it can no longer take the lead in rebuilding Iraq? If so,
how fast should it turn over to others? In what areas? And to
whom?
2. As we turn over greater authority to Iraqis, what are the
minimal US interests that must be satisfied?
3. What potential outcomes are likely in Iraq--over the
medium to long term? What is the worst case and how do we
prevent it? What is the most realistic best case and how do we
encourage it?
I cannot answer these questions definitely, but will try to make a
few suggestions on the first two and deal in more detail on the third
question which is more in my area of expertise.
A POINT OF NO RETURN?
On the first question: Does the current crisis represent a point of
no return? I would caution the following.
Don't panic. Take the long view. We should not be misled or
sidetracked by all these instant polls which show that Iraqis
want us out now. All indications are that Iraqis show intense
and increasing dislike of occupation--entirely predictable--but
also fear a precipitous pull out of our forces. Iraqis want
better management of the transition--not a ``cut and run''
policy. The Iraq project is a long distance race; not a
spectacular high jump.
Turn off the TV. Listen to Iraqis on the ground in Iraq in
developing intelligence and assessments. They may give you a
different view. A number of private conversations I have
recently had with Iraqis living in the Gulf--admittedly in
April--greatly surprised me. They were more optimistic about
Iraq's future than I was.
The US should remember it faces a long historical and
cultural pattern in Iraqi thinking. Many, indeed most Iraqis
are almost schizophrenic in their attitude to outside
influences. On the one hand, they have a strong streak of
nationalism and a desire for independence. Under Saddam, most
Iraqis were isolated from the outside and had little experience
of cooperation with outside powers. But, most Iraqis also want
what America and the West have to offer--economic prosperity;
openness to the outside and a modern future. To move in this
direction, to rebuild their lives and their futures, they will
need to cooperate with outsiders, especially the US. They will
also have to pay the price of taking more responsibility for
their future and not just complaining and looking to others.
U.S. AIMS AND INTERESTS
The US also has a problem of incompatible aims: turning an
occupation into liberation. The US claims it wants democracy in Iraq.
At the same time, the US has some well known interests and objectives
it wants in the region. But what if a freely elected Iraqi government
does not agree? We need to think through, publicly, what our minimal
aims and interests are in Iraq. In broad terms, my list would include
three:
A state free of terrorism
A state free of weapons of mass destruction
A government, if not friendly, at least not hostile to the US
and Israel
I would make clear we have no long term designs on:
Military bases
Control over oil
This does not preclude trying for more maximalist aims, working
with Iraqis on the building blocks for a stable, prosperous, democratic
regime--with a heavy dose of realism. In doing so, we need to lower our
expectations--and theirs.
FUTURE SCENARIOS
What are some realistic scenarios? Worst case? Best case? How do we
prevent the former; encourage the latter:
Iraq is now engaged in two profound and wrenching struggles. One is
an identity crisis. The Ba'th defined what it meant to be an Iraqi for
over three decades. That definition has been destroyed. A new one is
now in gestation. The key question here is whether there is an
overarching Iraqi identity, and if so, what is its basis? I believe
there is, but it has been badly battered and needs to be nurtured.
Iraq is also engaged in a divisive but critical power struggle.
This struggle encompasses ethnic and sectarian groups, but also
political parties with differing outlooks and orientations and
individuals with patronage networks. Right now these groups are focused
on the US and the IGC which it has selected. But if our presence is
removed, they will focus on one another.
These struggles will not be resolved easily. If they take place
peaceably, we will have democracy. But if not, we will have civil
conflict. These will erode the fragile authority of the central
government--and the state, creating my definition of the worst case
scenario--a failed state.
In my written testimony I have looked at the three main ethnic and
sectarian communities in Iraq--Arab sunnis, Arab shi'ah and Kurds and
the multiple divisions within their communities and well as political
groupings within them. I can only touch on these briefly here. Suffice
it to say, that none of these communities is homogeneous . . . This
pattern shows a mosaic of groups, not clear cut ethnic and sectarian
fragmentation.
The Arab sunnis have never identified on a sectarian basis; they
are best understood as the WASPs of Iraq, a political elite. As is well
known, they are the main losers in the change of regime, mainly because
of the extent to which they have been Ba'thized. But the community has
many differences which shape their views.
Many of the sunnis in the so-called triangle come from small towns;
they have strong tribal and clan ties; are generally more traditional
and conservative and many have imbibed strong Arab nationalist
sentiments. These groups will be the most difficult to integrate into
the new Iraq.
In recent years a new spirit of fundamentalist Islam has grown
among sunnis in Iraq, coming from elements of the Muslim Brotherhood
and from the Salifi movement (often called Wahhabis). This has added a
fundamentalist Islamic identity to the mix.
However there is another broad category of Arab sunnis who are
urban and inhabit large, mixed cities like Baghdad, Mosul and Basra.
They form the backbone of Iraq's educated middle class; most are
secular and many were educated abroad. Some may be nationalist in
orientation but others are sitting on the fence and need to be
integrated into the new order.
The main problem of the sunnis is Bathism and a pattern of
political entitlement, not a sectarian identity.
The Kurds will be the most difficult to reintegrate into a new Iraq
for well known reasons, including self-rule for the past 13 years. But
it is far from impossible. Kurds have played an important role in Iraq
in the past and they can again. Indeed, they are doing so today.
However the Kurds themselves are far less homogeneous than they appear.
The two Kurdish parties have deep historical divisions between them.
Although both are now cooperating, neither has dissolved their separate
governments. There are other limits to Kurdish demands for semi-
independence. Iraq's neighbors will not tolerate it and will meddle in
domestic politics in the north. The Kurdish militias cannot control
their borders; they will need US forces to protect them--permanently.
The PKK is nested all along the northern border with Turkey. Worse, in
PUK territory the PUK lost control of its border with Iraq near Haibja
which came under the control of a radical Islamic group, Ansar al-
Islam, an affiliate of al-Qa'ida which is now causing us so much
trouble. The Kurds cannot create a flourishing, independent economy
without control over oil resources. And the Kurds have their own ethnic
minorities--Turkman, Christians--who do not want to be absorbed into a
truncated mini-state in the north. Lastly there are Kurdish tribal
groups, some of whom have been working closely with us, who offer a
more flexible approach to integration in the new Iraq.
The shi'ah population is not homogeneous either. At least a third
is thoroughly secular, and has lost much of its sectarian identity.
Many of these joined secular parties, especially the Communist and even
the Ba'th Party. Another portion of the community is moderately
religious. This group would follow shi'ah religious clerics on
religious matters but not necessarily on politics. Only a minority of
shi'ah favor more radical shi'ah leadership, like Muqtada al-Sadr, who
espouses a clerically led state. Two political groups represent
portions of the shi'ah community and both are currently cooperating
with the US in the IGC. One is the Da'wah Party, whose representative,
Ibrahim al-Ja'fari is said to be one of the most popular leaders in
Iraq. The second is SCIRI, which had, and probably still has, strong
influence from Iran. Both parties have disavowed the Iranian policy of
clerical rule and espoused democracy, but it is not clear how firm that
commitment is; both will push for more, rather than less, Islamic law
in Iraq. More important than the parties is shi'ah clerical leadership,
but this is far from uniform. Competition among such families,
including the Sadrs, the Hakims and the Khuis, has been acute,
including violence. Clerics also differ on interpretations of scripture
and the role of clerics in the state. Lastly, shi'ah, especially in
rural areas, have strong tribal affiliations which undercuts shi'ah
identity. In any future government of Iraq in which shi'ah gain a
majority, it is not clear which of the shi'ah elements will
predominate. Nor is there any indication of separatism among either the
shi'ah or the Arab sunnis. The shi'ah consider themselves Iraqi and
Arab, as well as shi'ah and want to dominate government in all of Iraq.
OUTCOMES
Under these circumstances, what outcomes can be expected in Iraq
over the next five years or so? Let me deal first with the worst-case
scenario--a break down of the Iraqi state and its national institutions
to a point beyond which they could not be reconstituted. This process
is underway, but it is by no means irreparable; we want to prevent it
from reaching such a point. A number of pundits and analysts have
recently advanced the notion that Iraqi might break-up into three
component parts--a Kurdish north, an Arab sunni or mixed center, and a
shi'ah south; they pose a potential ``civil war'' among these groups--
Kurds vs. Arabs; shi'ah versus sunnis. Some are even asking whether the
Iraqi state--or Iraqi identity--has already disappeared and we should
be thinking about managing a separation--as in the former Yugoslavia.
The answer to this question should be a resounding ``no''. Our
government is officially on record as supporting the territorial
integrity of Iraq. The overwhelming majority of Iraqis do not want
their state divided. Moreover, Iraq is not likely to ``break-up'' into
three distinct ethnic and sectarian parts with clear boundaries between
them. As indicated above, too many areas in Iraq, particularly in the
geographic frontiers between these communities, are mixed; the most
mixed sector of Iraq is the Baghdad province which contains a third of
Iraq's population. Unscrambling these areas in any divide would be a
nightmare. Nor is there yet any evidence of ethnic and sectarian
warfare on the ground in Iraq. Kurds are not fighting Arabs; shi'ah are
not fighting sunnis. On the contrary. In the face of increasing
violence and extraordinary provocation--including alleged attempts to
incite civil war--Iraq's communal leaders have shown clear awareness of
this threat; a firm commitment to avoid it; and considerable discipline
in reining in their constituents.
The more plausible scenario for a ``failed state'' is a ``break-
down'', with a weak and fragile central government, unable to exercise
control over the country. Developing indigenous national leadership
with some degree of legitimacy in the aftermath of Saddam's
dictatorship has been a major problem of the transition, not likely to
be easily solved. The result has been something of a vacuum at the
center. Without an Iraqi Army or police force, local militias are
taking root. This is not yet ``warlordism'' but it could begin to
resemble it. In any ensuing struggle for power, it is these groups, led
by extremists, who may engage in fighting several difference ``civil
wars'' which would destroy the potential for building up a new
government at the center.
What would be a good scenario that is realistic and achievable?
That is more difficult to predict because it depends on Iraqi desires;
their willingness to compromise, and their ability to get beyond a
zero-sum game. Any such scenario will undoubtedly take 5 to 10 years to
produce, but one can speculate on its outlines. It would provide the
mechanism (a constitution; an election) to create and strengthen a
central government that would be 1) representative of most Iraqis and
2) able to govern. This will involve wrenching compromises between
Kurds and Arabs and among those who want more and those who want less
religion in daily life. To reach this state, we should be encouraging
negotiations and alliances between and among the various factions and
groups and an open political process which is underway. Who will
dominate this government and how power will be distributed is up to the
Iraqis to decide. But it is not impossible that something better will,
eventually come out of this process.We just cannot predict exactly what
it will be.
How do we make this happen? Our ability to ``change'' Iraq is
limited But we can encourage this outcome.
1. We need to change the subject, and stop talking about
civil war; division of Iraq, and shi'ah, sunnis, and Kurds.
These identities are realities but it would be best to downplay
them . The same is true for tribalism. For the moment, we may
need to work with these groups to achieve security, but over
the long term we should hold out a vision of a more modern Iraq
which I believe has broad appeal in Iraq.
2. I believe there is an Iraqi identity, espoused by a silent
majority of Iraqis. We can begin by working with groups who are
committed to this identity and a new Iraq. We should identify
areas where pluralism is working and expand these areas of
peace and cooperation.
3. The US and the coalition should be focusing on economic
development and prosperity among Iraqis--including the
development of a small and medium sized business class; jobs
for the lower classes and the poor and protection for workers.
At the middle level, things have improved for educated
professionals who are working and have more money. We need to
strengthen this trend.
4. Our strategy should be to support, strengthen and rebuild
Iraq's middle class. While this class has been greatly
weakened, it is still present in Iraq. It should be the
backbone of the new Iraqi state. This middle class can be
nourished by outside the Iraqi-American community from outside;
by funds which help businessmen, and by contacts which
strengthen educated professionals. The middle class in Iraq has
always been the repository of modernism; secularism; and
national identity. If this class is strengthened, in time it
will mitigate tendencies toward ethnic and sectarian
separatism; tribalism; and Islamic traditionalism .It is also
the mainstay of democratic society.
5. The US should continue opening Iraqi society to the
outside, encouraging professionals, businessmen and others to
participate in the international economy and society..
6. Lastly, the US should be encouraging civic and political
groups in Iraq which cut across--rather than reinforce--ethnic,
sectarian and tribal lines. Iraq has a long tradition, in its
urban, educated community of doing this. We need to strengthen
it. The middle class has lost its voice. We need to help them
regain it.
The Chairman. Well, thank you very much, Dr. Marr, for your
paper and your presentation.
It is our privilege now to have as a witness Dr. Larry
Diamond, senior fellow of the Hoover Institute. Dr. Diamond.
STATEMENT OF DR. LARRY DIAMOND, SENIOR FELLOW, HOOVER
INSTITUTION
Dr. Diamond. Chairman Lugar, Senator Biden, distinguished
members, ladies and gentlemen, I appreciate the honor you have
bestowed on me by asking me to testify before you today
particularly in the presence of these three very distinguished
experts who have preceded me who I think have given very
powerful statements, much of which I strongly agree with.
I think it is clear that the United States now faces a
perilous situation in Iraq. We have failed to come anywhere
near meeting the post-war expectations of Iraqis for security
and post-war reconstruction. Although we have done many good
things to eliminate tyranny, to rebuild infrastructure, and to
help construct a free and democratic political system, the
overall ineptitude of our mission to date leaves us and Iraq in
a terrible bind. If we withdraw our military forces
precipitously in this security vacuum, we will leave the
country at the mercy of a variety of power-hungry militias and
criminal gangs, and Iraq will risk a rapid decent into one or
another form of civil war. I think Dr. Marr has spoken and
written very insightfully about this. If the current situation
persists, we will continue fighting one form of Iraqi
insurgency after another with too little legitimacy, too little
will, and too few resources. There is only one word for a
situation in which you cannot win and you cannot withdraw:
quagmire. We are not there yet but we are close.
The only way out of this mess is a combination of robust,
precise, and determined military action to defeat the most
threatening anti-democratic insurgency led by Muqtada al-Sadr
and his al-Mahdi army--unfortunately, we are close to doing
that--combined with the political strategy to fill the
legitimacy vacuum as rapidly as possible.
The Bush administration has taken two vital steps in the
latter regard.
First, it has sought to improve the international
legitimacy of our mission and our ability to find a
transitional solution that will be credible and acceptable to
most Iraqis by giving the U.N. Special Envoy, Lakhdar Brahimi,
a leading role in the process. Ambassador Brahimi is an
extraordinarily able, imaginative, and fair-minded mediator. I
could not imagine a better candidate for this arduous task.
The second essential correct decision of the administration
is to hold to the June 30 deadline for transferring power to an
Iraqi Interim Government. One of the few positive things that
has been suppressing Iraqi frustration and even rage over the
occupation has been the prospect of a return to Iraqi
sovereignty on June 30 and the promise of elections for a
transitional government within 7 months after that. It is vital
that we adhere to the June 30 deadline. There is no solution to
the dilemma we face that does not put Iraqis forward to take
political leadership responsibility for the enormous challenges
of governance in that country.
We need to embrace a number of other steps that will
advance three key principles: building legitimacy for the
transitional program, increasing the efficacy of emergent Iraqi
control, and improving the security situation in a more lasting
way. I would actually say, first and foremost, ``It's security,
stupid,'' because you cannot get economic development unless
you have security. All three of these goals require an
intensive effort at rebuilding the now decimated, fragmented,
and demoralized Iraqi state.
Here briefly are my recommendations.
First, disavow any long-term military aspirations in Iraq.
We should declare unambiguously that we will not seek permanent
military bases in Iraq. We are not going to get a treaty from
the Iraqis to approve them anyway.
Second, establish a clear date for the end to military
occupation. We should set a target date for the full withdrawal
of American forces. This may be 3 or 4 years in the future, but
setting such a date will convince Iraqis that we are serious
about leaving once the country is secure.
Third, respond to the concerns about Iraqi detainees which
we have been hearing for months and months now. This is not
new. We need an independent investigation of the treatment of
Iraqi detainees with international participation. And we should
release as many detainees as possible for whom we do not have
specific evidence or a strong and credible suspicion of
involvement in insurgent or criminal activity.
Fourth, reorganize and accelerate recruitment and training
of the new Iraqi police and armed forces. Police training in
particular has been an astonishing disaster. There is no hope
of avoiding renewed oppression and/or civil war in Iraq unless
we can stand up Iraqi police and armed forces that are
independent of party and religious militias and answerable to
the new and ultimately democratically elected Iraqi government.
Fifth, proceed vigorously with our plan for disarmament,
demobilization, and reintegration of the principal militias
into the police and armed forces. The most radical and anti-
democratic militias, al-Sadr's Mahdi army, but others as well,
have to be isolated, confronted, defeated, disarmed by force or
the credible threat of force. With the militias of the Kurdish
Peshmerga, SCIRI, Da'wa, and other political parties, that have
indicated their willingness to play in the political game, we
need to complete negotiations which have been underway for
months to achieve this DDR effort. Outside of Kurdistan, which
is a special case, militia fighters should be merged into the
new police and armed forces as individuals, not as organized
units with their command structures intact.
Sixth, get more money flowing to our Iraqi allies. We
should, in particular, increase the pay of the Iraqi Army and
police to encourage them to sign up and stick with us.
Seventh, make the new Iraqi Interim Government dependent on
some expression of popular consent. Once the consultative
assembly is chosen by a large national conference, which is to
be indirectly chosen after June 30, that consultative assembly
should have the ability to interpolate the Prime Minister and
cabinet ministers, and even to remove them in the interim
government at least through a constructive vote of no
confidence.
Eighth, aim as much as possible for instruments of
democratic control, even in the interim government. I could not
agree more with Dr. Cordesman's judgment about the Governing
Council. If its members want a place in the interim body, they
can seek election to the consultative assembly.
Ninth, provide for the appointment of an Iraqi Supreme
Court according to the Transitional Administrative Law as soon
as there is a consultative assembly that could confirm the
appointments which are initially to be generated by a higher
judicial council, which is already in place. This is a vital
step that we need to take in order to begin to generate a rule
of law.
Tenth, codify the domestic and international arrangements
for Iraq in a new U.N. Security Council resolution, which
should recognize the Iraqi Interim Government and whatever
temporary status of forces agreement is reached between the
U.S. and that interim government, hopefully with U.N. mediation
or participation. I think if we do this, we can get the kind of
international participation, including NATO participation, that
my colleagues have spoken of.
Eleventh, we should do something in this period to
acknowledge the grievances over the Transitional Administrative
Law. I helped to advise on it. It is an extraordinarily
impressive, deeply liberal document, but there are serious
grievances over some of the compromises that were reached. We
should emphatically acknowledge at a minimum that this is only
a temporary document and that Iraqis will be fully free and
sovereign to write a new permanent constitution. Even more
negotiations may be necessary over the annex.
Twelfth, we should invest in supporting moderate secular
Shi'a who draw support from parties, movements, and
associations that do not have muscular militias. Hopefully, a
fair process of selection of national conference participants
will put many of these new faces forward.
Finally, we urgently need to level the political playing
field with respect to political party funding. More independent
and democratic political parties, again that do not have
militias, that are not getting massive funding from Iran and
Saudi Arabia, are begging us for support. As soon as an Iraqi
independent electoral administration is established, we should
help it create a transparent fund for the support in equal
amounts of all political parties that pass a certain threshold
of demonstrated popular support.
In conclusion, for a long time now, it has been clear that
the three great challenges of restoring security,
reconstructing the economy, and rebuilding the system of
government are intricately intertwined. We cannot revive the
economy, generate jobs and electricity, and get a new Iraqi
government up and functioning unless we dramatically improve
security. But we cannot improve security unless we have a more
credible and legitimate framework for Iraqi governance. The
U.N. mission, working with the CPA, holds out some promise of
progress in the latter regard. But we have a lot of hard work
to do on the security front as well, and we are not going to
get there unless we put some of the worst thugs and spoilers
out of business, beginning with the Mahdi army. On both the
security and political fronts, the choices we make and the
actions we take between now and June 30 will have diffuse and
lasting consequences for the future political order in Iraq.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Diamond follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dr. Larry Diamond
Chairman Lugar, Senator Biden, Distinguished Members, Ladies and
Gentlemen:
As you all well understand, the United States now faces a perilous
situation in Iraq today. Because of a long catalogue of strategic and
tactical blunders, we have failed to come anywhere near meeting the
post-war expectations of Iraqis for security and post-conflict
reconstruction. Although we have done many good things to eliminate
tyranny, to rebuild infrastructure, and to help construct a free
society and democratic political system, the overall ineptitude of our
mission to date leaves us--and Iraq--in a terrible bind. If we withdraw
our military forces precipitously in this security vacuum, we will
leave the country at the mercy of a variety of power-hungry militias
and criminal gangs, and Iraq will risk a rapid descent into one or
another form of civil war. If the current situation persists, we will
continue fighting one form of Iraqi insurgency after another with too
little legitimacy, too little will, and too few resources. There is
only one word for a situation in which you cannot win and you cannot
withdraw: quagmire. We are not there yet, but we are close.
The scope for a good outcome has been greatly reduced as a result
of the two insurgencies that we now confront in Iraq. One of these, in
the Sunni heartland, has been festering since the end of the war, but
has picked up deadly momentum in recent months and then took on a new
ferocity with the grisly murder of the four American contractors in
Fallujah on March 31. The other, in the Shiite heartland, broke out
shortly thereafter when the radical young Shiite cleric, Muqtada al-
Sadr, launched a violent uprising after the Americans badly bungled the
long-delayed imperative of confronting his violent network. Add to this
the awful news of grotesque humiliation of Iraqi prisoners by our own
forces, and you have a profoundly deteriorating and potentially
disastrous situation for the United States.
I will not dwell long on how we got to this perilous point, but a
few observations are necessary. In any situation of occupation or
imperial dominion, there is always a tension between control and
legitimacy. The less control you have or can impose as an occupying
power, the more you need legitimacy and voluntary cooperation. In many
parts of its colonial empire, Britain addressed this challenge through
the system of ``indirect rule,'' which used local rulers to maintain
control and gradually devolved more power through elections and local
self-rule. As a result of this, Britain needed less troops relative to
population than other colonial powers. United Nations peace
implementation missions have addressed this problem in part through the
mobilization of international legitimacy, via UN Security Council
resolutions, and in part by developing explicit and transparent
timetables for the transfer of power back to the people through
elections. But even in these UN or other international trustee
missions, success has depended in part on the presence of a
sufficiently large and robust international force to keep (and in some
instances impose) peace.
In Iraq, we have had too little legitimacy, but also in some ways
to little control as well. We insisted on maintaining full political
control from the start, but we did not have sufficient control on the
ground, through adequate military force, to make our political and
administrative control effective. Thus we could not meet popular
expectations for the restoration of security and basic services like
water and electricity (though progress we did make on all of those
fronts). Because we did not deliver rapidly enough (and it could never
truly have been rapidly enough to meet the inflated public
expectations), because it was always an American administrator out in
front decreeing and explaining, and because the Iraqi people did not
see new Iraqi political leaders exercising much effective
responsibility, the American-led occupation quickly developed a serious
and growing legitimacy deficit.
Many things could have relieved this deficit. For example, if we
had pushed more reconstruction funding out to local military
commanders, through the rather effective CERP (Commanders' Emergency
Reconstruction Program) channel, and if we had given some real
authority and funding to the local and provincial councils we were
establishing around the country, Iraqis might have seen more progress
and found emerging new forms of Iraqi authority with which they could
identify. We might have also made more progress by organizing actual
elections, however imperfect, at the local level where the people were
ready for it and the ration-card system provided a crude system for
identifying voters. In the few places where this mechanism was
employed, it worked acceptably well--before CPA ordered that no more
direct elections be held (for fear of giving the impression that it
would be possible to hold national elections soon--which it would not
have been). Even so, the local governance teams did a pretty good job
in many cases of finding ways to choose, and then later ``refresh'',
the provincial and local councils. Sadly, the CERP funding was
terminated prematurely, and the Local Government Order, defining the
powers of provincial and local governments, sat around at CPA for
months in various states of development and imminent release, while the
local councils dawdled and dithered without much of anything to do, and
ominously in some cases, without getting paid for months at a time.
Within the CPA itself, I think historians will find that there was an
obsession with centralized control, at the cost of the flexibility and
devolution that might have gotten things done more quickly and built up
more legitimacy.
So we had serious problems of security, reconstruction delivery,
and legitimacy. We failed to ameliorate these by putting enough
resources in (particularly enough troops) and by giving Iraqis early on
more control over their own affairs. Now we are transferring control
soon to Iraqis, and that is truly the, only hope for rescuing a rapidly
deteriorating situation. But in transitional politics, as in all other
politics, timing is crucial, and what could be achieved by a certain
initiative at one moment in time may no longer be possible months or
years later, when the parameters have shifted and the scope for
building a moderate center may have been lost.
One June 30, governing authority will be transferred to an Iraqi
Interim Government, terminating the occupation authority, the CPA (or
Coalition Provisional Authority). Despite all the violence and
turmoil--which the Baathist spoilers, external jihadists, and Islamist
extremists have always intended to escalate in the run-up to the
transition--that transfer is going to happen on schedule. A United
Nations team, led by special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, is in Iraq now for
a third visit, completing work to select the members of the Iraqi
Interim Government. As the interim constitution (called the
Transitional Administrative Law) provides for, the government will be
led by a prime minister and cabinet, with some oversight and symbolic
authority being exercised by a presidency council of a president and
two vice-presidents. But there will be no law-making parliament until
elections are held, by the end of next January, for a transitional
government. Rather, Mr. Brahimi plans to return again to help mediate
the selection after June 30, through indirect means, of a widely
representative national conference of some 1000 to 1500 delegates,
which will discuss national problems and select a smaller consultative
assembly to advise the cabinet.
This plan is not without some serious problems. It is easy for
Iraqis to agree in principle on elections to choose a transitional
government, even if many parties plan to try to rig or mutilate those
elections in practice. But having the United Nations select the interim
government, even a so-called ``technocratic'' government of non-
partisan officials, risks a whole new set of legitimacy problems.
Everyone who loses out in the bid for interim power will complain
bitterly that the selections were illegitimate. The problem is that the
method that some of us within CPA preferred--having Iraqis select the
national conference delegates before June 30, and having that body then
choose an assembly which would choose the prime minister and presidency
council--is just not feasible given the pressure of time and the
deterioration in the security situation since the end of March. Thus,
many key members of the twenty-five-member Iraqi Governing Council
(IGC), which has exercised some advisory authority alongside the CPA
Administrator, Ambassador L. Paul Bremer III, since last July, are
denouncing the plan and calling for the IGC to continue, perhaps in
expanded form, as a kind of senate or consultative body with some
authority. Some of the political parties on the IGC that are pushing
this line are powerful players because, independent of whatever popular
support they command, they have large, armed militias whose
cooperation, or at least forbearance, the Coalition needs now more than
ever if it is to survive this treacherous period.
The next step in the timetable will be the organization of
elections by January 31 of 2005. To do this, Iraq will need an
independent electoral commission, a law to define and structure that
body's authority, and a law to define the electoral system for choosing
members of parliament. A separate UN team, led by the head of the UN
electoral assistance division, Carina Perelli, has been in Iraq working
on all these issues. Its work has been slowed by the upsurge in
violence, and by the group's decision to invite any and all Iraqis to
apply in writing for one of the seven Iraqi slots on the commission. In
the current chaos, it is going to be a real challenge to appoint and
train an electoral commission with sufficient credibility,
independence, and competence to organize decent elections by the
January deadline. Fortunately, they will have considerable assistance
from the UN. But if the violence is not brought under control, they
will not even be able to move around the country to set up local and
regional offices, much less prepare for the crucial tasks of
registering voters and parties. Even if the violence subsides to a
degree that permits the administrative work to proceed, the Electoral
Commission will need to tackle the question of how to level the
political playing field, which will otherwise be dominated by political
parties that are already ruling (in Kurdistan) or that have been
receiving huge amounts of money and other assistance from Iran.
The Interim Government's structure, powers, and functions are to be
spelled out in an Annex to the Transitional Law. This Annex will be
written through negotiations this month. During my final weeks in Iraq,
I encountered in speeches and meetings around the country some vigorous
and frequent objections to specific provisions of the Law, particularly
article 61 C, which gives any three provinces (and there are three
predominantly Kurdish provinces) the ability to veto the final
constitution in the referendum. Many Arab Iraqis are in fact quite
upset about this and other provisions, which they feel give too much
veto power to the Kurds. These Iraqis object as well to other features
of the Law, and to the lack of public discussion over its final
provisions before it was adopted (unanimously) by the Governing
Council. If we did not have the crisis of mounting violence in the
country, and now the new crisis over the treatment of Iraqi prisoners
at Abu Ghraib, we would probably be dealing with a crisis over the
Transitional Law. Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani, the most important Shiite
religious and moral leader in the country, and some of his key
followers have been quite outspoken in rejecting the Law and demanding
changes. Indeed, Muqtada Sadr's remarkable success in mobilizing many
thousands of supporters in March-April-May is the direct result of the
crisis between the CPA and the Governing Council on the one hand and
Sistani (and the Hawzah, or senior Shiite clergy) on the other. At long
last the isolated Muqtada could claim, as he indeed did, that he was
``Sistani's Striking Arm.'' This way one crisis led directly to the
other.
Here is another manifestation, in sharp relief, of the legitimacy
problem. The negotiations over the Annex provide a new opportunity to
address this problem, and given the high threshold for amending the Law
once it comes into effect, perhaps the last realistic opportunity in
the transitional period. We should seize this opportunity as part of a
broader strategy of building up the more moderate Shiite political and
religious establishment as a counterweight to Muqtada al-Sadr.
All counter-insurgency efforts ultimately depend on winning the
larger political and symbolic struggle for ``hearts and minds.'' Though
he has gained in popular support in recent weeks, Muqtada Sadr--a
fascist thug with only the thinnest Islamist religious credentials, who
is reviled by much of the Shiite population and religious
establishment--cannot win the broad bulk of Iraqi ``hearts and minds,''
even in the Shiite south. Neither can the diehard Baathist remnants of
Saddam's regime, who, in connivance with external jihadists such as Al-
Qaeda, have been driving the insurgency in the Sunni center of the
country. Indeed, one of the fascinating, potentially destructive, but
also potentially positive elements in the fluid political situation we
confront is that there is no coherent political and military force in
Iraq that is capable of rallying, and for any meaningful period of
time, sustaining, broad popular support.
No single force can win in Iraq, but the United States could lose,
and very soon. Even before the outbreak of the scandal over US forces'
degrading, disgraceful abuse of Iraqi prisoners at the Abu Ghraib
prison, Iraqi patience with the American occupation was dwindling
rapidly. More and more Iraqis have been coming around to the view that
if we cannot give them security, jobs, and electricity, why should they
continue to suffer the general humiliation and countless specific
indignities of American forces occupying their land?
What seemed possible six weeks ago, and certainly three months ago,
is not necessarily feasible today. Clearly, the option of sending in
significantly more troops to combat the insurgency and defeat the
diehard and spoiler elements is dead. It is now clear that the Bush
Administration--which has never been honest with itself or the American
people about what would be needed to succeed in Iraq--is not going to
up the ante for the United States in that kind of way in an election
year. Moreover, even introducing two more divisions--which would still
leave our overall troop strength far below the 250,000 or so that many
military experts believed was the minimum necessary to bring and
maintain order in post-war Iraq--would so strain the capacity of our
armed forces that it would require drastic measures.
So we are stuck in Iraq for the moment with too few troops to
defeat the insurgency and way too many for a growing segment of deeply
disaffected Iraqi public opinion. Thus we have basically opted to live
with the city of Fallujah under the control of insurgents, hoping the
Iraqi force we have quickly stood up there will at least contain and
dampen down the problem. And we are slowly trying to take back some of
the facilities and installations that Muqtada Sadr's al-Mahdi Army has
seized in the past few weeks and months, while so far avoiding a
decisive confrontation with Muqtada himself (so as not to inflict
civilian casualties or damage the religious shrines). If there is any
chance of decent governance emerging in Iraq in the near to medium
term, I believe we are going to have to defeat the insurgency of the
Mahdi army. But we can only do so if we work with Iraqi Shiites of at
least somewhat more moderate and pragmatic political orientations, and
most of all with Ayatollah Sistani. No Iraqi commands a wider following
of respect and consideration, and has more capacity to steer political
developments away from violence and extremism, than Sistani, who
insists on free elections as the basis of political legitimacy.
In fact, there are many Iraqi forces with whom we can work. But the
tragedy is that the most democratic among them do not have sizable
armed militias at their command, and for the most part, have not had
the money, time, training, and skill to build up broad bases of
support. At least four political parties represented on the Governing
Council do have some basis of support in the country. The problem is
that two of these are the ruling parties of the semiautonomous
Kurdistan region, the PUK (Patriotic Union of Kurdistan) and the KDP
(the Democratic Party of Kurdistan), and their influence largely ends
at the borders of that region, while the other two forces, SCIRI and
Da'wa, are backed in various ways by the Iranian regime and, despite
the moderation they have evinced in Baghdad, appear to favor one or
another form of Islamic fundamentalist regime. Each of these four
parties has its own militia with probably at least 10,000 fighters, and
in the case of the two Kurdish Peshmerga forces, maybe each several
times that number.
If Iraq has elections with these forces, and many other private
armed forces, controlling various strongholds, and without a superior
neutral force on the ground to rein them in, the elections are not
going to be free and fair. There will be a war for dominance along the
margins of different strongholds, opposing candidates will be
assassinated, electoral officials will be intimidated, ballot boxes
will be stolen--it will be a nasty business. Beyond this, there is the
danger that if the militias are not demobilized before the Americans
withdraw, other political forces would arm in self-defense, or more
precisely--if you consider that in many parts of rural Iraq, every male
over 14 already has a Kalishnikov (or at least older) rifle--they will
acquire heavy weapons, in preparation for the coming war for Iraq. Then
you would have a truly awful mess, in which different parties, tribes,
and alliances would have their own armies contesting violently for
local, regional, and perhaps ultimately national dominance, with every
neighboring country in the region intervening on behalf of its favored
group or groups. This would be what Thomas Friedman calls ``Lebanon on
steroids''--a hellish (and possibly like Lebanon, protracted) civil war
in which no central government could exert coherent authority.
Such a scenario could spawn disastrous humanitarian and political
consequences. There would be thousands, possibly tens or even hundreds
of thousands, of Iraqi casualties. In the chaos, terrorism and
organized crime would thrive. Anti-Americanism, which is already
gaining momentum in Iraq, would take on an entirely new breadth and
intensity. We would be blamed for this, even if the instigators were
more properly located in Syria, Saudi Arabia, and most of all Iran.
The only alternative to civil war or another truly brutal and total
dictatorship is a political system based on some kind of
constitutional, consensual power-sharing bargain. Any plan to break up
the country, explicitly or implicitly, into its constituent ethnic or
religious pieces will inevitably bring massive bloodshed, much of it
regionally driven. And any effort to simply hand power over to a
reconstructed Baathist dictatorship would be violently, and I am sure
successfully, resisted by both the Kurds and the Shia. Any scenario
that is even vaguely positive--that avoids the disaster of total war or
total dictatorship--must involve key elements of democracy:
negotiations, mutual concessions and compromise, delineation of
individual and group rights, sharing and limiting of power, and
elections in which different political parties and independents contest
to determine who will exercise power.
However, elements of democracy do not necessarily add up to
democracy, and the situation has deteriorated to the point that we need
a strong dose of realism about what is possible. The two best-organized
parties in the Shiite South, SCIRI and Da'wa, are not democratic
political parties. That is why they have heavily armed militias that
are already flexing their muscles. That is why they are being backed by
hardline conservative elements in the Iranian regimes. And doubts are
even raised about whether the two Kurdish parties, who fought a war for
political control in Kurdistan during the 1990s, will tolerate
electoral competitors. In the last few months, their militia forces
have been involved in acts of ethnic cleansing to push out from Kirkuk
Arabs who were settled there by Saddam Hussein in his campaign of
``Arabization.'' This violent preemption of the intended process of
peaceful, judicial dispute resolution is hardly a reassuring sign.
Much of the country's politics remains, literally, tribal.
Particularly in the rural areas, loyalties are mobilized and delivered
by tribal sheikhs, and alliances are built on these foundations. So can
blood debts be incurred and avenged deep into the future as a result of
violence against a member of the tribe. Inevitably in emergent
democratic politics, important political formations will be constituted
from among Iraq's many tribes. In fact, one of the potentially more
moderate and democratic political party formations--the Iraqi
Democratic Gathering, based largely in the Shiite south--has its base
among a vast network of tribes that do not want to see Iraq or any part
of it dominated by Iran or forces loyal to the Iranian regime. If other
parties play by the rules of the democratic game, so will this one. If
elections are to be fought by more violent methods, I do not expect
that these tribes, which are already heavily armed, will sit on their
hands and wait to be bullied and shot.
The establishment of the Fallujah Brigade as a solution to the
insurgency there was probably the least bad option, but it comes at a
price. In effect, we created (or fully legitimized) a new sectarian
militia, small for now, but probably the best trained of them all.
Similarly, by encouraging SCIRI's militia, the Badr Brigade, and the
Da'wa militia to attack Muqtada's Mahdi Army in Najaf and Karbala
(again, probably a necessarily evil), we will also pay a heavy price.
To the extent they do our bidding, we will owe them something.
I am suggesting, then, two points. First, the chance for any kind
of decent, peaceful, constitutional order heavily depends on what
happens to the militias. Unless they are to some considerable extent
demobilized and replaced by the armed forces of a new and legitimate
Iraqi state, the near-term political future will be very rough. But the
militias that would need to be demobilized for this to happen have in
fact been strengthened enormously in their bargaining leverage vis-a-
vis the United States as a result of the disintegration of recent
weeks. Now, we need them, and their cooperation and assistance, more
than ever. So we are in less of a position to ask of them painful
concessions--not to mention compelling those concessions by force.
Since the beginning of the year, we have been negotiating with the
principal militias a comprehensive DDR plan for ``disarmament,
demobilization and reintegration'' of their fighters into the new Iraqi
police and armed forces and the civilian economy. To succeed, any DDR
plan has to rely heavily on positive incentives (jobs, pensions, status
in the new armed forces) for those militias that agree to cooperate,
and force to demobilize those militias that will never cooperate. The
Mahdi Army clearly falls into the latter category, which is why it is
so important that it be defeated now. But it was always questionable
whether the other four largest militias would really fully demobilize
and disarm, rather than warehouse their heavy weapons while taking up
positions, temporarily, in the new armed forces. With the country in
the state it is and our leverage so much reduced, demobilization--if it
happens at all--is likely to be much more superficial, and even to
concede to the integration of whole militia units into the police and
armed forces, with their command structures more or less intact. In
that case, the new and truly independent Iraqi state that is so
desperately needed will not emerge. Rather, it will parceled out among
and become a captive of these preexisting armed groups. Probably the
big winner then, at least initially, will be Iran, which has seeded the
whole Shiite south with arms, weapons, propaganda, and thousands (by
one estimate, 14,000) intelligence agents.
I am not sure, at this point, that there is any way to prevent a
scenario something like this. To do so would require a sizable and
credible international--which is to say, largely American--force on the
ground in Iraq for some time to come. And the way things are going, we
are likely to find ourselves in something of a race to see who demands
the withdrawal of American forces first, the Iraqi public or the
American public. Even if American troops are able to stay in large
numbers for another year or two to help provide security, I doubt they
are going to be given the authority, or that they would be able to
muster the legitimacy within Iraq, to really confront these other
militias--even assuming that the Sadr insurgency is somehow defeated,
and that the Fallujah insurgency is at least contained.
We are in an utterly Hobbesian situation, as we always are in such
post-conflict settings, in which the balance of force will shape all
the other political parameters. If we do not succeed in standing up
Iraqi police and military forces that are loyal to the state of Iraq,
and not to this or that party, militia, or warlord, there will be no
hope for even a semi-democratic political system. But creating any kind
of coherent Iraqi armed forces will take years (by some estimates, two
to five years), and the prospect is rising that an Iraqi government
will demand (possibly under popular pressure) that American forces be
withdrawn well before that. Then (absent a new international force that
is nowhere on the horizon), the only force that Iraq could fall back on
to maintain order would be the major party militias, and the only
question would be whether they could work out among themselves some
modus vivendi that gives each a relative monopoly of power within some
region or locality, while sharing power at the center. That would be
better than all-out civil war, but lacking any roots or constraints in
a rule of law, it would be highly susceptible to descent into civil war
if the elite bargains were to shatter. And it would still be very bad
for most of the Iraqi democrats we have sought to help in politics and
civil society--decent people, with ideas and ideals, who placed their
faith in our own professed commitment to stay the course to help build
a democracy in Iraq.
One silver lining is that the overall national situation is highly
unlikely to revert to the kind of coherent, total dictatorship that the
country has suffered under the Baathists in particular. There will be a
profusion of power centers. Even if these are not democratic in
themselves, the interaction among them will provide some pluralism,
some space for democratic discourse and action--if the country does not
drown in bloodshed, and if some kind of self-sustaining constitutional
bargain can be struck among them. That is risky, but not impossible.
what is to be done?
The only way out of this mess is a combination of robust, precise,
and determined military action to defeat the most threatening, anti-
democratic insurgency--led by Muqtada Sadr and his Mahdi Army--combined
with a political strategy to fill the legitimacy vacuum as rapidly as
possible.
The Bush Administration has taken two vital steps in the latter
regard. First, it has sought to improve the international legitimacy of
our mission, and our ability to find a transitional solution that will
be credible and acceptable to the largest possible number of Iraqis--by
giving the United Nations and its special envoy, Lakhdar Brahimi, a
leading role in the process. Ambassador Brahimi is an extraordinarily
able, imaginative, and fair-minded mediator; I could not imagine a
better candidate for this arduous task. One reason why he is the right
person for the job is that he has a habit of doing something elementary
that our own CPA has not done often and well enough: listening to
Iraqis themselves, and as wide a range of Iraqi opinion as possible.
The second essential, correct decision of the Administration is to
hold to the June 30 deadline for transferring power to an Iraqi interim
government. One of the few positive things that has been suppressing
Iraqi frustration and even rage over the occupation has been the
prospect of a return to Iraqi sovereignty on June 30, and the promise
of elections for a transitional government within seven months after
that. It is vital that we adhere to the June 30 deadline. There is no
solution to the dilemma we are in that does not put Iraqis forward to
take political leadership responsibility for the enormous challenges of
governance the country confronts. They cannot do it alone, but they
must take the lead, and Iraqis must see that Iraqis are taking the
lead. We should stop talking about ``limited sovereignty.'' Iraqis have
suffered enough humiliation. They need the dignity of knowing that they
will be able to assert control over their own future after June 30,
even if this will obviously be limited on the security side by the
presence of some 150,000 international troops.
We need to embrace a number of other steps that will advance three
key principles or goals: building legitimacy for the transitional
program, increasing the efficacy of emergent Iraqi control, and
improving the security situation in a more lasting way. All three of
these goals require an intensive effort at rebuilding the now
decimated, fragmented, and demoralized Iraqi state.
Here, briefly, are my recommendations:
1. Disavow any long-term military aspirations in Iraq. We
should declare unambiguously that we will not seek any
permanent American military bases in Iraq. (No Iraqi parliament
in the near term is going to approve such a treaty, anyway).
Iraqis fear that we harbor long-term imperial intentions toward
their country. This would help to allay this fear.
2. Establish a clear date for an end to the military
occupation. We should declare that when Iraq is at peace and
capable of fully providing for its own security, we intend to
withdraw all American forces from Iraq. We should set a target
date for the full withdrawal of American forces. This may be
three or four years in the future, but setting such a date will
convince Iraqis that we are serious about leaving once the
country is secure--that the occupation, in every respect, will
come to a definite end.
3. Respond to the concerns about Iraqi detainees. We need an
independent investigation of the treatment of Iraqi detainees,
with international participation, and we should release as many
detainees as possible for whom we do not have specific evidence
or a strong and credible suspicion of involvement in insurgent
or criminal activity. This has been a profound grievance of
Iraqis virtually since the end of the war, and it has been a
major factor feeding the Sunni insurgency.
4. Reorganize and accelerate recruitment and training of the
new Iraqi police and armed forces. Police training in
particular has been an astonishing disaster. There is no hope
of avoiding renewed oppression and/or civil war in Iraq unless
we can stand up Iraqi police and armed forces that are
independent of party and religious militias and answerable to
the new, and ultimately democratically elected, Iraqi
government. We can no longer allow ourselves to be hampered by
divided responsibilities, bureaucratic face-saving, and
resource constraints. We must find the best, most experienced
experts and give them all the resources they need to get the
job done.
5. Proceed vigorously with our plan for disarmament,
demobilization, and reintegration (DDR) of the principal armed
militias into the police and armed forces. There cannot be free
and fair elections in Iraq--or even sustainable peace--if the
most powerful forces in the country are a variety of competing
and antidemocratic religious and political party militias. The
most radical and antidemocratic militias, particularly Muqtada
Sadr's Mahdi Army, must be isolated, confronted, and defeated--
disarmed by force, or the credible threat of force. With the
militias of the Kurdish Peshmerga, SCIRI, Dawa, and other
political parties that have indicated their willingness to play
in the political game, we need to complete negotiations that
have now been underway for several months. We will have a much
stronger hand in these negotiations if we compel the Mahdi Army
to disarm, rather than offering to merge it into the new police
and armed forces. Outside of Kurdistan, which is a special
case, militia fighters should be merged into the new police and
armed forces as individuals, not as organized units with their
command structures intact.
6. Get more money flowing to our Iraqi allies. In particular,
we should increase the pay of the Iraqi Army and police, giving
them a stronger incentive to risk their lives to join up and
stick with us. We might also want to increase the pay of the
provincial and local councils, and most of all, we should make
sure that all of these Iraqis who are part of the newly
reemerging Iraqi state get paid in a timely fashion.
There are several other steps we can take to address our debilitating
deficits of legitimacy with the Iraqi people and the international
community:
7. Make the new Iraqi Interim Government dependent on some
expression of popular consent. It is a pity that time did not
permit the proposed Iraqi national conference and consultative
assembly to be chosen well before June 30, so that one of these
two more representative bodies could have elected the
presidency council, the prime minister, and the cabinet.
However, it is vital that the plans for indirect election of
these bodies proceed after June 30. Once the consultative
assembly is chosen by a large national conference, it should
have the ability to interpellate the prime minister and cabinet
ministers, and even to remove them, at least through a
``constructive vote of no confidence'' (which brings down the
government only if there is a simultaneous majority vote for a
new government).
8. Aim as much as possible for instruments of democratic
control, even in the interim period. I do not think the
Governing Council should continue in its current form. It has
its own severe legitimacy problems, due to widespread Iraqi
perceptions of its inefficacy and corruption. If some members
of this Council have real bases of popular support, they should
be able to demonstrate this within the national conference, to
win election to the consultative assembly, and to exercise
influence through that more democratic means. And one or
members of the GC may wind up being appointed to positions in
the presidency council or the new government.
9. Provide for the appointment of an Iraqi Supreme Court,
according to the Transitional Administrative Law, as soon as
there is a consultative assembly that could confirm the
appointments. If the spirit and practice of constitutionalism
is to develop in Iraq, it must do so from the beginning of the
reemergence of Iraqi self-rule. The Prime Minister, Cabinet, or
Presidency Council should not each decide for itself what is
constitutional. There must be a neutral arbiter, and it should
no longer be the US or the UN. The TAL provides for the Iraqi
Higher Judicial Council to propose three nominees for each of
the nine vacancies on the Supreme Court, with the Presidency
Council then nominating and the transitional parliament
confirming. This new method would involve only a minor
modification to be codified in the TAL Annex.
10. Codify the domestic and international arrangements for
Iraq in a new UN Security Council Resolution. This resolution
should recognize the Iraqi Interim Government and its right to
name its own representation at the UN. Beyond this, however, a
UN Security Council resolution should also recognize whatever
temporary ``status of forces agreement'' is reached between the
US and the Interim Government, hopefully with UN mediation or
participation. UN involvement and recognition of this element
might then make it possible for a number of other countries to
contribute troops to help maintain peace and security in Iraq
until the country can fully manage its own security.
11. We should do something in this period to acknowledge the
grievances over the Transitional Administrative Law. The TAL is
the most liberal and progressive basic governance document
anywhere in the Arab world. Iraqis can take great pride in many
of its features, such as the bill of rights. However, there is
intense controversy over a number of its provisions, including
the degree of minority rights and the balance of power between
the center and the provinces and regions. At a minimum, we
should emphatically acknowledge that the TAL is only a
temporary document, that Iraqis will be fully free and
sovereign to write a new permanent constitution (and this
declaration could also be incorporated into a new UN Security
Council Resolution). It might be possible, however, to go
further, and encourage the key parties to negotiate soon, in
the Annex to the TAL, some modest amendments that might address
some of the most serious objections that have been raised.
Finally, we need to continue to think and act more innovatively in the
quest to build as democratic a political system as possible.
12. We should invest in supporting moderate, secular Shi'a
who draw support from parties, movements, and associations that
don't have muscular militias. Hopefully, a fair process of
selection of national conference participants will put many of
these new faces forward.
13. We urgently need to level the playing field with respect
to political party funding. The big parties either sit on huge
resources, or are getting lavish funding from neighboring
states, particularly Iran. More independent and democratic
political parties are begging us for support. As soon as an
Independent Iraqi Electoral Administration is established, we
should help it create a transparent fund for the support (in
equal amounts) of all political parties that pass a certain
threshold of demonstrated popular support, and we should fund
it generously (perhaps with an initial infusion of $10 to $20
million). Unless the gross imbalance in access to funding is
established, there will not be anything approaching free and
fair elections.
Senators, we should in fact do much more. As I have said, we should
have had significantly more troops in Iraq--perhaps twice as many more
as we now have there. We should apologize explicitly for our scandalous
treatment of Iraqi detainees, and we should hold accountable everyone
in the chain of command who was in a position to prevent it and stop
it, and did not.
I have tried to recommend here steps that are achievable within our
resources, timetable, and overall strategy. These steps largely
comprise a political strategy for improving the legitimacy of the
transitional program in Iraq, and the legitimacy and efficacy of the
new Iraqi Interim Government. But none of these steps will amount to
much if we do not make much more progress in securing the country.
For a long time now, it has been clear that the three great
challenges of restoring security, reconstructing the economy, and
rebuilding the system of government are intricately intertwined. We
cannot revive and rebuild the economy, generate jobs and electricity,
and get a new Iraqi government up and functioning unless we
dramatically improve security on the ground. But we cannot improve
security unless we have a more credible and legitimate framework for
governance. The initiative of the UN mission, working with the CPA,
holds out some promise of progress in the latter regard. But we have a
lot of hard work to do on the security front as well, and we are not
going to get there unless we put some of the worst thugs and spoilers
out of business, beginning with the Mahdi Army. On both the security
and political fronts, the choices we make and the actions we take
between now and June 30 will have diffuse and lasting consequences for
the future political order in Iraq.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, Dr. Diamond.
We will have a 10-minute question round first and then an
additional round, if necessary. We have good attendance. So let
me ask all Senators to try to stay within their 10 minutes on
the first try so that we can all be heard, and then we will try
again. Let me start the clock running with these first
questions.
Dr. Cordesman, you make a very tough comment in your
initial written testimony. You say, ``At this point, the U.S.
lacks good options in Iraq, although it probably never really
had them in the sense the Bush administration sought. The
option of quickly turning Iraq into a successful free-market
democracy was never practical and was as absurd a neo-
conservative fantasy as the idea that success in this objective
would magically make Iraq an example that would transform the
Middle East.''
And then you have gone on in oral testimony today to point
out the dangers of the Middle East democracy idea at this
point, suggesting that we have Iraq and Afghanistan to solve
prior to greater ambitions that have antagonized others.
You finally say, ``The key to success the U.S. can now hope
to achieve is to set realistic objectives. In practice these
objectives are to create an Iraqi political structure that will
minimize the risk of civil war, develop some degree of
pluralism, and help the Iraqis take charge of their own
economy.''
Now, as a followup, Dr. Marr points out that the worst case
scenario, as you have pointed out, Dr. Cordesman, is a failed
state. She counsels that by this she does not mean simply three
elements that do or do not get together. She talked about a
mosaic of groups, an extraordinarily complex situation, which
she described prior to the war as well as after the war.
Nevertheless, bravely you both sort of trudge on. You see
possibilities here.
And likewise, Dr. Diamond, I noted your comment, which is
supportive of this general thesis, although very bleak. You
said, ``We are in an utterly Hobbesian situation, as we always
are in such post-conflict settings, in which the balance of
force will shape all the other political parameters. If we do
not succeed in standing up Iraqi police and military forces
that are loyal to the state of Iraq, and not to this or that
party, militia, or warlord, there will be no hope for even a
semi-democratic political system.''
Now, without getting into the post-war conflict and whether
the neo-conservatives are right or wrong or what have you, this
does raise basic questions with regard to our foreign policy
and how we get into these situations. You are contending, Dr.
Cordesman, in the broadest sense, that the objective was to
have a shining light of democracy that would have, hopefully,
heralded a large change of thought in other states in the
Middle East, and that this was a practical objective in the war
against terrorism, and that that is a reason for the war to be
fought. At the time, there were discussions of weapons of mass
destruction and so forth, but essentially the argument has
drifted from that to the thought that this was going to be a
change. To have 1.2 billion people in hostile circumstances
with madrassas schools, with all the rest of this, is to have a
fate for the United States after 9/11 which is not only
uncomfortable but potentially disastrous.
So, as a result, you try to change a state. In this case,
Iraq was selected for a good number of reasons, including the
fact that the Saddam regime had ignored U.N. sanctions, invaded
it's neighbors, and so forth, but also that Iraq could be
transformed, over time, into a democracy, and an example in the
regfion. However, as Dr. Marr describes the terrain and the
population and the prospects, that looked fairly bleak from the
beginning, and now you are all suggesting that this prospect
still does, except that there is, Dr. Marr contends, a sense of
Iraqi nationalism.
This seems to me to be the heart of the question. In this
group of people thrown together by Europeans or others after
World War I, and suppressed by monarchs, the last of whom was
Saddam Hussein, is there a sense here of nationhood, an
integrity of a nation that will not become a failed state? It
will not be a source of civil war, an incubator for terrorism,
and all the rest?
I ask you, first of all, Dr. Cordesman, do you sense that
there is a sense of being Iraqi, that there is something here
with which to work even at this point?
Dr. Cordesman. Yes, Senator, I do. I was in Iraq repeatedly
during the Iran-Iraq war and I saw tensions between ethnic
factions there, between Shi'ite and Sunni, and I certainly saw
the problems the Kurds encountered. But I also saw many
elements of nationhood, and I saw those long before the Iran-
Iraq war.
As Dr. Marr has said, I think the problem we face is to
help bring those people together. As Dr. Diamond and others
have said, it is to ensure that the more violent minorities and
elements are not going to take over or displace things, but it
is to also accept the fact that we cannot, after 35 years of
tyranny, after 35 years of an economy which is a command
kleptocracy where no sector works or has functioned on our
level, where the infrastructure is sized more for 16 million
people than the 25 million people who live there, see instant
solutions.
Here I would just make one quick comment. A sense of
nationhood does not prepare people for instant democracy. There
are no political parties that are real as yet. There are no
leaders which have had the chance to emerge. There is no sense
of compromise. There is no actual experience in being a
politician, and that, I think you know all too well, can be an
extraordinarily difficult job even for the experienced.
I think what this says is not that we should give up but
that it is going to take time. We have to look beyond 2005. Dr.
Marr said 5 to 10 years. I think that is realistic. We do not
have to be there that long, but we have to see that as the
timeframe to act.
Finally, just one comment. I have seen a lot of concern
within the Congress over the cost of the military operation
there. Last year a promise was made by the Bush administration
it would not come back to you for foreign aid in 2005. To deal
with the economic problem that Dr. Marr has raised, if you are
not prepared to see an aid program going on through 2008, you
are as much a factor in our eventual defeat as the neo-
conservatives have been in the past.
The Chairman. Dr. Diamond, on the security situation
specifically, because you have described this Hobbesian effect,
let us take for granted that the security has to be obtained.
Our troops now are attempting to do that in Najaf and
elsewhere. But on the 30th of June sovereignty passes to the
Iraqi people. Our committee has been questioned, what does this
mean for security? Secretary Powell was asked this at the Dead
Sea Conference. What if this new government says to us, we want
you to leave? And Powell said, well, then we would leave. He
doesn't think we will be asked to do that.
But what are the practical effects, as we count down from
now May the 19th to June 30? And we have all described the army
coming and going, coming back in parts and so forth. How is
this to occur with the United States cooperation, with Iraqi
training and an Iraqi security presence?
Dr. Diamond. Well, first of all, you have got the right
answer from Secretary Powell, independent of what anybody else
in the administration has said, because I can tell you if an
Iraqi Interim Government asks us to leave and we do not, our
situation there is going to become utterly unviable. And I feel
very sorry for every American officer and soldier who has to
serve in that circumstance. So I do not think that is going to
be tenable.
But as Dr. Marr has indicated, there is a very dualistic
feeling about this, and I do not think they are going to ask us
to leave unless there is some new disaster or scandal.
I think that the reason why it is so important to complete
the DDR effort--disarmament, demobilization and reintegration--
of the militias between now and June 30 is that after June 30
we will still have command of all American forces there. I do
not think that is going to be diluted. But we are not going to
have the purity of freedom of action that we have now,
particularly the ability, the political space to take offensive
action against certain militias in the way we are now doing to
essentially and correctly demobilize and destroy the Mahdi
Army.
The Badr Brigade, which is the militia of SCIRI, I worry
about a lot. Some of its figures are frankly not any more
committed to democracy than Muqtada al-Sadr and Da'wa's army.
They have to know that we want them to negotiate peaceful
integration and demobilization, but that we have a different
way of dealing with them if they do not cooperate through
peaceful negotiation.
The Chairman. So one signal from this hearing you are
pointing out is that we have got 42 days during which we still
have some freedom of operation to demobilize these militias,
and to do so with strength. And absent that, if they are still
around, security for everybody may be imperiled in the
thereafter.
Dr. Diamond. That is my essential point.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Senator Biden.
Senator Biden. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I realize
I am not going to get to all I want to get to in this first
round. So I just want to give you a sense where I think the
consensus points are, and maybe some of you can take issue if I
have got it wrong.
Let me start by saying that the one thing I get from all of
you and, quite frankly, from everyone for whom I have any
respect on this issue--and there are scores of people, left,
right, center, conservative, neo-conservative, liberal,
moderate--is that there is a greater need for sense of urgency
here.
And one of the things we have to kind of cut through here--
as a matter of fact, we are going to be debating a resolution
on the floor today or tomorrow by Senator Byrd that is going to
attempt to lay out a new authorization for the presence of
American forces, arguing that the one that was passed last year
no longer has any relevance because it says, take down Saddam.
Saddam is gone, so the rationale for continued presence has to
be validated by Congress. It is a confusing moment.
Here are the areas where I think we need some clarity. One
is how to deal with the militias, and I am going to get back to
Dr. Diamond on that.
Two is the role of elections, when they should take place;
the role of this consultative assembly, what role it should
pay.
Three, this notion that Iraqis should set the priorities
for their reconstruction.
Four, NATO. I have been a broken record on NATO for the
last year and a half. Now serious newspapers, serious
columnists believe, cynically in my view, that we cannot get
anybody else involved in this process. Why do we keep talking
about it? It is really a dodge to be talking about it.
This notion of Iraqi visibility, that is, when you turn on
the TV, Dr. Marr, you said turn it off. I hope when they turn
it on in Iraq sometime in the near term, they only see Iraqis;
they do not see Americans, that is, American spokespersons.
And jobs and this notion of the definition of civil war.
Partially what has to be done here--and I do fault the
administration on this--is, to put it in very simple terms,
they have not told the story. They have not laid out for people
in Iraq or America what the plan is. I do not mean in terms of
foreign policy speak, but just what are we talking about here.
What is our objective?
As General Hoar said, there is this idea that the only way
we can continue to get support from the American people in Iraq
is if we say this is the war on terror, that absent saying
``terror''--we take the word ``terror'' out of it, ``meaning
bin Laden and the international terrorist organizations''--that
the bottom will fall out. That is what I think our neo-
conservative friends think. Therefore, I think they make this
tenuous connection. There is a connection, but that is not the
rationale for keeping 150,000 troops or 140,000.
So let me begin this way. First of all, General Hoar, as
succinctly as you can, I have spoken to seven of you guys,
four-star generals, CENTCOM commanders, NATO commanders, among
the most respected military leaders in a generation. Everyone I
have spoken to says it is totally, completely practical with
the right leadership to get NATO to sign on with relatively
small forces to leading the coalition, leading the
multinational force post June 30. You were a CENTCOM commander.
You were one of the most respected generals of the last decade.
Tell me straight up. What do you say to the Washington Post
when they say this is fanciful?
General Hoar. I think it is possible. The difficulty is
that there have been people in the administration, Senator,
that have continued to disparage old Europe and some of the
members of NATO who are really key to going forward. Germany
and France are good examples. Germany and France have a stake
in Iraq just as we do, and I know that there are many people in
government today that are behind the scenes attempting to
encourage more dialog between the leadership of the NATO
countries and the United States. But it is going to require
leadership on the part of this administration to put on their
industrial strength knee pads and go on over there and talk to
these people and say we need you to come on board. This is your
fight as well as ours.
Senator Biden. Any of the questions I ask you all directly,
if you would rather defer, I understand.
But if the President of the United States literally called
a summit of our major allies, literally asked for a principals
meeting in Brussels and said I need a resolution saying that
NATO will take over the operative control, which means America,
I am not asking you, France, for troops, I am not asking you,
Germany, for troops, I am asking for your vote, and I realize I
am only talking about 3,000 to 7,000 forces over the next 3 or
4 months, what do you think the response would be?
General Hoar. Senator, if the question is asked
appropriately, we will get a yes answer. There is a tendency to
forget that NATO is in Afghanistan and these very same people
are supporting.
Senator Biden. I can tell you my own experience. Speaking
with everyone from Chirac to military commanders in a number of
different uniforms, including German uniforms, I believe the
answer is yes, if asked--if asked--and if they are in on the
political deal, they are in on what the role of that NATO-led
multinational force would be.
The second question I have. Dr. Diamond, I think the stuff
you have written has been absolutely brilliant, as I say for
all four of you. But in my opportunity to importune you
privately I asked you about militias. There was talk yesterday
of us employing--and it was not confirmed--the Badr Brigade and
other militias in taking on the militia of Mr. al-Sadr. Tell me
whether that is a good idea, a bad idea, and tell me what your
concern is, if you have one, as to the sort of mutation of
these militias if we do not grab hold of it relatively soon.
Dr. Diamond. Well, Senator, my answer would be in two
parts.
First of all, if we ask the Badr Corps and the militia--
they are really fragmented into pieces, SCIRI and Da'wa's
militias, but if we asked them to do the hard work of defeating
the Mahdi army, which by the way is largely defeated in terms
of most of the territory that it initially took, so I am not
even sure that it is so urgent as it might have been 2 weeks
ago, but if we were to ask them to do that, we would owe them a
blood debt. They would be stronger militarily and politically.
They would have more leverage in their negotiations with us.
Our ability to do DDR, disarmament, demobilization, and
reintegration, in the way that it needs to be done, which is,
to the extent that fighters from these militias are
reintegrated into the Iraqi army, civil defense corps, and
police, it happens as individuals and not as units with their
command and control structure intact. Our ability to get that
kind of deal would be significantly diminished.
Senator Biden. Is the reason that is important is that
whatever this emerging Iraqi government is, there has to be, in
effect, a neutral army that it controls in the sense that it
can absorb these groups, but it cannot absorb them in a
balkanized way where they, in effect, are each wholly
integrated in as whole pieces? Is that the idea?
Dr. Diamond. That is correct. I think each of my co-
panelists would agree with me that we have a shattered state in
Iraq now. The imperative is to rebuild it as a coherent state
as democratic as possible, but coherent, effective, and as Dr.
Marr said, not a threat to the United States or a source of
terrorism. You cannot have a state if it does not have its own
coherent control of its security apparatus, and there has to be
neutral political leadership of that that is loyal to the
leadership of the new Iraqi state, not loyal to the head of
SCIRI, not loyal to the head of Da'wa, Hezbollah, Fadallah,
whatever militia it might be. They have to be loyal to the top
leaders of the state.
Senator Biden. Well, I will come back. Dr. Marr, I will
warn you. When I come back with you, I would like to hear you
expand on this notion of the willingness of any emerging
government to deal with an occupation army which is going to be
necessary--there is going to be some occupation force there for
some time--and this notion of the consultative assembly and
what legitimacy it can provide, if any, to the process. But I
will wait until the second round. I thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Biden.
Senator Hagel.
Senator Hagel. Mr. Chairman, thank you. Thanks to each of
you for your time and talent and effort and experience. You
each have presented a very lucid, disturbing, but I think
accurate assessment of where we are in Iraq, and we continue to
reach out to you for your sense of this. I note in particular
that each of you has provided a set of recommendations, of
priorities, of realistic assessments as to how we go forward.
And that is not always the case, easy to criticize, easy to
look back on, failed policy, failed decisions, but each of you
provided some sense of a future, and it is in that universe
that I would delve.
I will begin with quoting your opening statement, Dr.
Cordesman. If I may repeat, you say, ``The current situation in
Iraq and Afghanistan has exposed the fact that there is a
serious danger in the very term `post conflict.' '' But here is
the point I want to get to. ``It reflects critical failures in
American understanding of the world it faces in the 21st
century, and in the nature of asymmetric warfare and defense
transformation.''
General Hoar, then you state in your testimony, ``We must
define the nature of the war.''
I assume each of you and the other two panelists have in
other ways addressed this issue that you are talking about a
wider-lens understanding of what we are up against. You cannot
deal with Iraq in a vacuum. Certainly the Israeli-Palestinian
issue is very clear, at least in my mind, not because I think
it or I say it, but the Arab world, the 1.2 billion Muslims, as
well believe it.
So, therefore, I would like very much for each of our four
panelists to take that piece and talk about that. I realize it
may be a little more theoretical than the dynamic of what do we
do about Iraq now, but I do not think we can have these
conversations nor a committee exercise oversight without
getting into this point because we will continue to spin and
spin and spin in Iraq. We can put two or three more divisions
in, but if we lose the Iraqi people--in your testimony, the
four of you, saying such things as we are dangerously close,
close to a quagmire, perilous situation, crisis situation--and
I do not believe you overstate it--I think addresses the more
fundamental, larger point here. It is not just Iraq. This
challenge, this great threat of the 21st century is going to be
with us for a while, and I think we have failed miserably, all
of us, the Congress, the administration, in coming to grips
with a larger understanding of what we are up against.
So with that, may I start with you, Dr. Cordesman? Thank
you.
Dr. Cordesman. Thank you, Senator. Very briefly, we face a
series of ideological challenges from Islamist extremists,
economic problems in the Arab and Islamic world, demographic
pressures in terms of vast increases in the need for jobs,
education, and services that is going to go on for at least 20
and probably 30 more years. Some countries will deal with those
well, some will muddle through, and some will reach a stage of
crisis.
Whatever we do in Iraq can only be a first step in a
process of global engagement that may well be as long as the
cold war. If we face that, if we work on that basis, rather
than instant transformation or simple quick solutions, I think
we can deal with the problem. Part of it is to engage when we
must use force realistically and objectively knowing we are not
going to transform or end the problem, that there will be one
challenge after another, although hopefully at a low level.
Another I think is the issue of reform. Dr. Marr said,
``It's the economy, stupid.'' And Dr. Diamond said, ``It's the
security, stupid.'' And they are both right. We have to help
countries find a way of providing security, but security
involves human rights and the rule of law, not simply
strengthening counter-terrorism.
We also need to focus on economic and on demographics, the
kinds of reforms that meet the fundamental expectations of the
people, talking about democracy and liberty is fine if you can
create the conditions for democracy and political parties. And
what that means is working on an evolutionary basis with these
countries, with the individual reformers in these countries,
not dictating to them, not with simplistic, pointless, new
initiatives like a Greater Middle East Initiative, but with
greatly strengthened country teams, with strengthened military
advisory efforts through our NATO and CENTCOM efforts and
knowing that these are decade-long efforts, not something that
will go away in 2 or 3 years or with bin Laden or al-Qaeda.
Senator Hagel. Dr. Cordesman, thank you.
General Hoar.
General Hoar. Sir, I first of all endorse Tony's comments,
but the problems that we have today did not occur yesterday or
the day before. They began certainly and have their roots in
colonialism and came to the fore after the Second World War and
the end of colonialism. And we did not pay an awful lot of
attention as a country to these issues. We were locked in the
cold war. We saw this bipolar world. We were concerned about
the Soviet Union. And our interests in this part of the world--
and I speak of the Muslim world--often were seen through the
prism of the cold war, and as a result, we frequently used
these countries as pawns.
Perhaps the best example is the ability to defeat the
Soviet Union in Afghanistan with the help of Saudi Arabia and
Pakistan. When we defeated the Soviet Union and they withdrew,
which I believe was the beginning of the end of the cold war,
we turned our backs on those countries and the result was
virulent anti-U.S. feelings in Pakistan and a failed state in
Afghanistan.
So our solutions will not come to fruition overnight. It is
just going to be a long road to turn around the belief in the
Muslim community that when we speak about peace and justice and
freedom and democracy, we are talking about our peace, freedom,
justice, and democracy, not everybody's, sir.
Senator Hagel. Thank you, general.
Dr. Marr.
Dr. Marr. Yes. I am going to be very practical in my
remarks and try to make three points on this subject.
First of all, the Arab-Israeli issue is critical. We are
fighting a three-front war in the Middle East: the war on
terrorism, the Iraq struggle, and the Arab-Israeli issue. I can
not remember a time when the Arab-Israeli issue looked worse.
I am not going to present some platitudes about we need to
get the peace process going. You all know that, but I think
Congress has played an incredible role in this issue--with
respect to settlements. We have watched for years as the
Israelis built settlements in places where they should not
have. That is something that Congress itself can do something
about; so far, it has not. Maybe you can do something about it
now.
Senator Hagel. May I clarify? When you say Congress has
done an incredible job, you mean we failed.
Dr. Marr. Failed, that is correct, in putting pressure on
our Israeli allies to stop settlements. On some of the other
issues I am not nearly so sympathetic to the Palestinians, but
on this particular issue I am. We should be seen to not condone
it or be seen to be doing something to reverse these policies.
On this, I think the buck stops, to a certain extent, in
Congress. That is one practical suggestion I have. It goes
without saying that the Arab-Israeli issue is a running sore
that is perfectly awful in the area.
I want to be a little more optimistic about my next two
points. As you know, I have been spending a good bit of my time
in Qatar. That is a very important country for us right now,
and it is also a metaphor for much that is going on in the gulf
and the Arab world including some things I would like to call
your attention to.
Qatar is not going to implement a constitution that erodes
the amir's authority, but on every other front, they are doing
remarkable reform work. They are instituting an American
education system from K through 12, and establishing branches
of American universities. They have given women the vote. They
have allowed women to run for office. They are going to put in
a new constitution. And in various and sundry ways, most of the
smaller gulf states are either ahead of them or doing similar
things. Elsewhere there are reforms going on in the area
indigenously. This presents us with another reform model. It is
evolutionary. Rather than invading a state and trying to make
it some kind of a model for the rest of the region, we ought to
pay attention to what is going on here, see what there is, and
encourage it.
When I went out to the region, I was asked to give some
lectures in Kuwait. I was surprised when I was asked to talk
about the Greater Middle East Initiative. To be honest with
you, it got so little play here that I had to call around and
ask what it was. But when I got to the area, the subject was
all over the press, much of it negative. I discovered I had to
change some of my remarks because of the interest in the
subject. There are some liberals there. There are not very many
but they are very interested in getting support.
My last point is that in a practical way, we need to be
more ``hands on'' in the area, find out where our friends are,
that is, people who are interested in reform, who are pushing
ahead with the kinds of things that we would like to see, and
find ways to help them. We should not impose some Middle East
initiative on them without even announcing it. We need to get a
presence on the ground and identify such people. And they are
there. If anybody wants some names, I will be happy to provide
them. They are there working on these things. Let us find them
and support them and not give up on reform.
Senator Hagel. Mr. Chairman, may I ask that Dr. Diamond
maybe in the next round could respond? I do not want to impose
on any of my colleagues here. Maybe we could do that.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, Senator Hagel.
Senator Hagel. Mr. Chairman, thank you.
The Chairman. Senator Boxer.
Senator Boxer. Could I just say--and I said this to Senator
Biden--this panel is just incredibly wonderful and clear and
straight from the shoulder, and I really appreciate that. It
means a lot to us.
I also want to say you are looking at the committee, I
think, that has been saying all along across party lines,
whether or not we voted to go it alone in this war or not, that
we needed a plan. I think what I am hearing you say is, yes, we
need that plan and we better get it done now. And as Senator
Biden and Senator Lugar have said for a long time, it should
have been done yesterday. It is still not being done today, and
we say that again, all of us together.
Dr. Marr says do not panic about it, and you are right. You
never panic. As a lawmaker you cannot panic about anything, but
you can be honest and say it just might be too late. I am not
saying that, but I am thinking I am not sure. And I am ready
and willing and able to take the steps that I think we need to
take, but it may be that there have been so many mistakes made
here and so many opportunities lost. And I can think of three,
four, five opportunities that this administration had to say,
OK, let us bring the world in.
It started when he landed on the carrier. Every country in
the world wanted in with us. No. You cannot have the spoils of
war. You did not fight. In retrospect--well, and a lot of us
said it at the time--this is ridiculous.
And then when the U.N. was attacked and the whole world
say, oh, my gosh, terrorism has moved in here. Now it is really
a world concern. We had another chance. Alone.
I think that even this prison scandal is a chance for
America to show that as the greatest country in the world and
the strongest, maybe we lost our way just a little bit and can
the world come together with us and we will move in a different
direction.
But it just seems like nothing has changed. Yesterday, we
had Secretary Wolfowitz here and Secretary Armitage. They had
an opportunity in their opening statements to basically say,
look, we have made some mistakes here and this is a new day. I
did not hear that. I heard in the questioning a little bit of
admission of problems, but not the kind of things you are
talking about from Dr. Cordesman and everyone of you had some
very specific, clearly thought-out views.
I want to take a little time to say, general, you are just
a hero to me in terms of what you said when very few people
were saying it. I am going to put it in the record, Mr.
Chairman. This is what the general said before a shot was
fired, 6 months before a shot was fired, and 1 month before
Congress voted to give the President the go-it-alone authority.
He said, ``I am reminded of the statement of Shimon Peres who
said military victories do not bring peace. You have to work
twice as hard to achieve a peaceful settlement.'' I mean, there
you were putting it out there.
And then you said, ``The term `regime change' does not
adequately describe the concept of what we expect to achieve as
a result of a military campaign in Iraq. One would ask the
question, are we willing to spend the time and treasure to
rebuild Iraq and its institutions after fighting? If we go it
alone during a military campaign, who will provide the troops,
the policemen, the economists, the politicians, the judicial
advisors to start Iraq on the road to democracy, or are we
going to turn the country over to another thug who swears
fealty to the United States?'' Then you go into what is going
to happen to the price of oil.
I mean, you are just prescient on the point. You said the
costs of the war may be between $100 billion and $200 billion.
You are on the nose. It is headed to $200 billion. And the oil
will rise to something above $30 a barrel for some unknown
period of time, and this will have a downward spiraling effect
on our economy. ``In summary,'' you say, ``I urge you to
continue the dialog to encourage the administration to do the
hard diplomatic work to gain broad support for a joint solution
to the Iraqi problem.''
I stand in awe of your comments, and therefore, it seems to
me a lot of what you are saying today we have to look at very
carefully. And all of this panel.
I want to followup on something, and I do not know how much
time I have left.
The Chairman. You have some.
Senator Boxer. A little bit, OK.
When Chairman Lugar talked about the history of Iraq,
sometimes I wonder if anyone in the administration read the
history books. I read a book by Sandra Mackey. It is not the
only book in the world on Iraq, but it is really clear. The
thing about that book and her point that she was making--and I
wanted to ask Dr. Marr about this--is that she said, in
essence, the country was thrown together with people who hate
each other inside the borders. I am making it very simple here.
Essentially England wanted the oil and they put a prince on the
throne there from Saudi Arabia, and then while they were taking
the oil and doing their thing and doing some good things,
people were hating each other and fighting each other and so on
and so forth until they all decided they hated the English more
than they hated each other and they got rid of the English.
And now here we come, the great liberators. It just seems
to me if you just read a couple of books, you would have a
sense.
So I want to press you on something you said that is
important to me in looking at a solution here. You said do not
think about separation. You were really lecturing and very
strong on the point. There are some people like former
Ambassador Peter Galbraith who is talking about how to avoid a
civil war, maybe have federations. I am wondering if you have
thought about that because, as I look at the Iraqi situation
now and where we are--and I have been saying all along, along
with several of my colleagues from the beginning--we heard in
the beginning, well, 90 percent of the country is secure. So I
said, OK, if 90 percent of the country is secure, why not move
toward sovereignty in that 90 percent, focus our troops on the
Sunni Triangle, and move? Now I do not know what the percentage
of the country is safe. So maybe someone here who knows could
tell me that.
Would any of you consider the fact if you had a
federation--you know, I represent the State of California. It
has a Governor, a very strong one. It has a legislature. It has
local councils. It has got all the things you need,
supervisors, et cetera. We do not have a military. Arnold has
not suggested that, and that is good.
But the point is we function very well as a unit. Can any
of you see in your mind's eye a situation where you might do
that gradually in areas that are more peaceful, get these
federations up and running?
Dr. Cordesman. Senator, I think that in some ways we are
doing this when we isolate Fallujah effectively and the
Fallujah Brigade. When we go on with nation-building while we
deal with al-Sadr, as Dr. Diamond has said, trying to get rid
of his militia and get him out of key cities, you go on with
the process of governance and you can do this at the local
level and in the governance you do not need to wait. I think
this perfect security solution is never going to be feasible.
Senator Boxer. I agree with that.
Dr. Cordesman. One thing that really I wish people would do
in the U.S. command there is show you how many incidents of
violence take place outside the Sunni Triangle and outside the
places where al-Sadr is. There were 1,700 incidents I think
yesterday. There were 2,000 the day before. Most of these are
minor, but many of them are in Baghdad, in the north, in Kirkuk
and Mosul. So violence will go on even in the supposedly more
secure areas.
But we have to do this and we also have to recognize that
even if we disarm the militias and coopt them, as Dr. Diamond
says, disarmament means most of their best arms will be buried.
Almost everybody will still have an AK-47. Until this country
is truly secure, we will never really disarm the factions, and
it will take half a decade or more to make these people loyal
to the central government rather than the tribe or the clan or
whoever they were loyal to before. So if we do not begin on the
basis you are suggesting, we are almost dooming ourselves to
failure.
Dr. Marr. I would like to address some of this. I can only
say, Senator Boxer, that if you are concerned about what you
see in Iraq now, growing instability, and the emergence of more
ethnic and sectarian and tribal factionalism, just wait until
you try to separate Iraq into three parts. I have addressed
this----
Senator Boxer. I did not say separate countries. I said
federations like states like we have in the United States.
Dr. Marr. Well, Iraq is divided into 18 states now and that
is fine. The Kurds are going to have a problem with that
because they want a specific entity in the north, and that is
where Peter Galbraith is speaking from. He and I have always
had some differences of opinion on this. Maybe the Kurds can
have a more moderated entity up there. But 18 provinces is just
fine. I think that is a very good way to run Iraq.
Most people who criticize this arrangement actually talk
about dividing Iraq up on ethnic and sectarian or tribal lines.
This is just the wrong way to go and doing it is going to
create tremendous problems.
Everybody has the idea that Iraq was thrown together in
1920. So was Syria. Israel was put together even later. Iraq
has been around for 83 years. In the course of that time, there
has been not only a central government, but services. People
join an army, they go to school, they get trained, and they
live in a country which has lots of oil. They do not get up
every day of the morning and say I am an Iraqi, but they feel
Iraqi. I have never heard an Iraqi, except for some Kurds, say
they want their state divided. They do not think like Shi'a or
Sunnis first. So this idea of having to put Iraq back together;
that there is not sense of loyalty to Iraq, I think is
something that we have to get beyond.
I would like to make one comment on the militias. I
thoroughly agree that moving toward a modern state means
disbanding them and establishing a central army and police
force. Being a realist and looking at Iraq on the ground, I
think that is going to be much more difficult to achieve than
has been indicated here. I would not bet that it is going to
happen by June 30.
We have talked about the Mahdi army and others. In my view,
we have just established a new militia in Fallujah, a Sunni
militia composed of who knows what--a former general, which is
fine--but who knows who he has got in that militia, former
Republican Guards, former military. We have the Kurdish
Peshmerga which is not going to be easy to reintegrate totally.
We have had a couple of weeks of quiet in Fallujah. I have
many questions about that whole Fallujah settlement, but it has
been quiet. One of the reasons is that we are drawing on the
local population, the local power structure, whatever it is.
One of the reasons that Petraeus had success up in Mosul was
because he did that. So I think we are going to have to rely on
what we find in existence now to begin to quiet these areas.
Then we can begin to integrate those militias and local forces,
break down their loyalty to sub-national or sub-whatever
groups, and begin to integrate them into a national military.
It is going to take a long time and it is not going to be easy.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, Senator Boxer.
Dr. Marr, I would just interject it sounds much like our
hearing on Afghanistan in which you are discussing warlords,
local hegemony, lack of central government, and what have you.
But then I think each of you will be very good on that subject
too. That is a very important thing for us to be keeping our
eye on.
Senator Chafee.
Senator Chafee. Well, thank you, Senator Lugar, and I will
echo the comments of my colleagues. Thank you for your time and
good testimony today.
Senator Hagel was talking about our success in Iraq and how
we have to look at this effort in a regional way, look at
everything in the entire region if we are going to be
successful in Iraq. And, Dr. Marr, you said we are fighting a
three-front war: first of all, in Iraq; second, on terrorism;
and third, with the Israeli-Palestinian issue. Obviously, they
are all together and the stakes are so high. If we fail on any
of these three fronts, we are facing tremendous difficulties
ahead.
My question is on one of those fronts, we seem to be making
mistake after mistake. The President on April 14, sent a letter
to Prime Minister Sharon in which he said, ``In light of new
realities on the ground, including already existing major
Israeli population centers, it is unrealistic to expect that
the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and
complete return to the armistice lines of 1949.''
Now, he cannot be that unrealistic to know that--we are all
going to funerals--this is going to lead to an upsurge in
violence, and it means more funerals we will be going to. Why
would he take this course of a change that no previous
President of the last six or seven has taken? Any thoughts as
to what the President was thinking as he changes American
foreign policy? I will start with Dr. Diamond because you had
not answered Senator Hagel's question. I think it is related to
what Senator Hagel was asking.
Dr. Diamond. Well, Senator Chafee, I do not know what is in
the President's mind, but I would like to make a couple of
points, if I may. I think some things need just to be said in
the current era of crisis we are in.
One is, first of all, I strongly agree with what Dr. Marr
said. We are basically with the $2 billion, $3 billion we are
giving annually to Israel--and I am a Jewish American. I am a
very strong supporter of the State of Israel, feel strong
empathy for what it has lived through, the constant terrorism,
the struggle for existence. But we have basically been funding
Israeli theft of Palestinian land for--I do not know what--30
or more years now. And we are paying for the expansion of these
settlements. I think it should be American policy that we will
no longer pay for it and that the relationship between the
United States and Israel will deteriorate if Israel does not
immediately halt the expansion of settlements.
Now, that leaves an awful lot of territory that they still
control, but the first thing you can do is to stop doing
additional harm. And the expansion of settlements is doing
terrible harm to Israel's prospects in the region--many
Israelis understand that--and to America's standing in the
Middle East. And add to that a lot of the other things that
many of my panelists have referred to, most recently the prison
scandal, the sense that America is arrogant and has no respect
for the Arab world, and it is very deeply damaging.
To come back to the Greater Middle East Initiative, I have
a somewhat different view than Dr. Cordesman, although I
greatly respect what he has said. I think the problem is not
the message, it is the messenger, if I may say it this way. The
administration has had a very imperious and arrogant attitude
toward the world in its unilateralism and toward many of the
states of the region. Arabs know that, on the one hand, we are
saying--and President Bush has given a series of absolutely
eloquent, historic speeches on this subject beginning with the
one on November 6 to the National Endowment for Democracy about
transforming our policy in the region. But when the Arab civil
society leaders, political leaders, and state leaders see us
continuing to embrace Arab authoritarian regimes and state
security apparatuses, I must add, in extremely intimate ways
that the American people do not know about, and then call for
greater democracy and human rights, when the President gives
this speech on November 6 and shortly after that welcomes to
the White House in an honored role the President of one of the
most repressive states in the region, reforming though it is,
President Ben Ali of Tunisia, what message does this send about
our consistency of purpose and principle? When we locate a
headquarters of the Middle East Partnership Initiative in
Tunisia, which is an extremely repressive state, what message
does it send?
So I think that it is not that we cannot do this. I think
we can do this. But we need to have a greater degree of
humility. We need to have a greater degree of consultation with
the people of the region and with our allies in Europe. That is
why the Sea Island Summit could be very important in this
regard if we can craft this multilateral initiative. The NATO
summit in Istanbul at the end of June could be very important
in this regard if we could move toward more of a collective
effort. We just cannot do this unilaterally any longer, and if
we are going to go down this road, we have to have more
consistency of purpose.
Senator Chafee. Thank you, Dr. Diamond.
Does any other panelist want to take a shot at this? I
guess the question is what is the President thinking. Is this a
100-year war and that is the only way to address our
challenges? Yes, Dr. Cordesman.
Dr. Cordesman. Senator, I think that I would not have made
that choice. The President was confronted with the reality
where there was at least the offer of withdrawing from Gaza, of
taking some tangible step on the ground, and possibly actually
moving forward toward creating the first step in a Palestinian
state. And given the dilemma between having new peace
initiatives, which might simply end in more talk, and some kind
of apparent step forward, he may have chosen the latter.
I think it is also important for all of us to remember that
1949 and 1967 were not borders. They were boundaries and that
in negotiating the U.N. resolutions on this issue, we always
stated that there was the prospect of adjustment to these
boundaries and the wording of 242 and all subsequent
resolutions reflects that fact, although many people in the
Arab world deny it.
I say this because if we are to move forward on any
negotiation at this point, the road map does not address this
issue. The President brought out something which quite frankly
was one of the key principles of the Camp David negotiations
under Clinton and of the conference at Taba that followed. They
were not publicly announced as U.S. policy, but they did call
for adjustments in the 1967 boundaries and they did set limits
on the Palestinian right of return.
I think this just highlights the problem of not having a
constant and consistent effort at the highest level to reach a
peace, of being seen always as being biased in one direction
rather than as balanced because if there had been a broader
context for a peace process, we would not have been seen in the
way you correctly point out, as having favored Israel without
regard to the Palestinians or the future peace process.
Senator Chafee. You are suggesting that there is dissension
as to the direction we are taking even within the
administration.
General Hoar, do you want to comment?
General Hoar. I would like to just make a couple of points.
One is several months ago it was reported that the President
was surprised at the strength of anti-American feelings in
Indonesia. I can tell you that throughout the Muslim world this
feeling is enormously strong with respect to the perception of
our relationship with Israel.
Monday of this week, while I was in Kuwait, I attended a
Palestinian film festival in Kuwait City. A number of people
there that were former Palestinian citizens who are now
citizens of Kuwait, but a large number of others as well that
feel a bond through their Arabness with the Palestinians. This
is not going to change, and it seems to me that there is a lack
of sensitivity about the timing and the way in which these
things are expressed publicly that we can speak about our
support appropriately for the State of Israel but in a way that
just makes so many other people angry at us.
Senator Chafee. Well, thank you. I know some of the
previous witnesses have said, ``It's the economy, stupid,'' and
``It's the security, stupid.'' You might add, ``It's the
Palestinians, stupid.''
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Chafee.
Senator Corzine.
Senator Corzine. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the
panel. I have been listening in my office to the testimony of
all of you today and it is really refreshing to hear straight
talk with regard to these issues. It is very troubling where we
are and we are going.
I heard, I believe it was, Dr. Cordesman suggesting that we
do not have room for another mistake in the Middle East and
that we need to be very cautious. Unlike some of my colleagues,
I am very worried that this transition on June 30 is just one
of those events, at least from the perspective of what I have
been able to derive. I do not understand what it is that is
going to be transferred on June 30 and I have a hard time
understanding how the Iraqi people are going to understand what
that sovereignty means, and if there is a disconnect between
what is said to be happening and what the Iraqi people feel, I
think we almost bake into the cake a failure.
So I would love to hear your perspectives. We heard
``audible'' yesterday as part of the necessary ingredient of
how we have to deal with occupation and reconstruction. Is it
time for an audible to be called with regard to June 30 or do
we just not know enough or has there been enough thoughtful
planning with regard to this to actually accomplish those
things?
I have no doubt that all of us believe that elections
sooner rather than later are a good thing, if we could organize
them, but does this artificially or at least arbitrary date of
June 30 stand in the way of that? I would like to hear your
opinions about how we are dealing with this 42-day deadline and
what are the down sides if it does not accomplish what the
Iraqi people think.
Dr. Cordesman. Senator, let me begin. I think 42 days is a
day to a legal transfer of sovereignty. That is all it is. It
is a legal moment in time.
Now, we have already begun to transfer ministries. In
theory, 11 of them are transferred to the Iraqis. In practice,
that simply is not happening. Eleven are under Iraqi control,
but they do not have any effective staffs, they are not working
with the governance, they cannot yet control the money. It is
going to be, I think, talking to people in Kuwait a few days
ago, some 60 to 90 days after June 30 before many of these
ministries are really up, functioning, staffed, and working
with the governance and localities at the level of efficiency
they need.
There is no clear plan for handling the aid process. Now,
people talk about appropriations and obligations here, and with
all deference, there is only one thing that counts, that is,
how much money is actually building or accomplishing anything
on the ground. What we have is a contracting nightmare where a
lot of the money is now going to areas outside Iraq, outside
security, where a lot of fiction is being said about
improvements in things like electric power, which simply is not
true.
Now, we do not know at this point in time, nobody knows how
fast this process is going to work in a government that is
coming into it. You are looking at police, and we have just
sent one of the best commanders in the U.S. forces to help with
the security forces in the military training. But let us be
honest. The uniforms are not there. The communications
equipment is not there. The facilities are not there. The
weapons are not there, and we do not know when they are coming.
And we desperately need those elements. And it is this whole
issue. June 30 is fine, but we need facts on the ground at
every level, and at this point in time what we have is a lot of
announcements.
Senator Corzine. Just a quick followup. Do I understand you
to say that presentation of the facts that we think we are
hearing with regard to electric power production does not match
the real facts on the ground?
Dr. Cordesman. Well, first, if you look at the actual
report in depth, you will find there are serious problems in
Baghdad and Basra which are not discussed in the testimony, but
more than that, net power generation, regardless of
requirement, regardless of distribution, regardless of who
actually is getting what in given hours, is a meaningless
statistic. It is like the Russians under the Communist rule who
used to count the number of starts on buildings but never
counted the finish. And every statistic I see coming out of the
CPA is tainted with that character.
Senator Corzine. Thank you.
General.
General Hoar. Senator, I remind you again that we are
dealing with the gang that cannot shoot straight. These people
have a year of bad performance and I do not think there is
anything that I have seen that would indicate that they are
prepared to go forward with a coherent plan that hangs
together. I just have not seen it and I work hard at trying to
find out the information. Perhaps this panel has more
information, but I do not see it. I am not confident.
Senator Corzine. Well, we cannot get answers to who is
going to run the prisons, who is going to negotiate with the
Iranians with regard to what foreign policy is about. We are
told that these people who will be in charge are responsible.
So I totally agree.
Dr. Marr. I would say something that I have said before.
Perhaps it is a little bit counter-intuitive. I think the main
problem, as Tony said, is to buildup a central government that
is effective. We are talking about deadlines such as June 30
and what is going to happen then. These are just way stations
in a very long process of developing real political leadership
in a central government which is not going to take place soon.
What we need to concentrate on is getting a government that can
deliver the mail, create security, do these various things. As
Tony said, we need to build up the staffs, and of course, turn
authority as fast as we can over to them.
My gut reaction on listening to this discourse and in my
talking to Iraqis is that we are all focused on elections and
legitimacy. We keep thinking that after we have elections,
somehow this is miraculously going to create legitimacy for a
government which comes to power. It may help. I am not against
elections, but if elections are done poorly and you cannot get
into certain areas and do them--I know exactly what Iraqis are
going to say the day after--particularly the ones who lose.
They are going to say it was not legitimate. Iraqis are not
used to these kinds of elections. They are used to services.
They are used to security. Effective governments deliver
services. That will confer a great deal of legitimacy on
whatever government can do that.
So a little bit less focus on the elections and all these
turning points, which are not going to be real turning points,
and a little more on effective delivery of services will help.
It will also help get rid of the bureaucracy placed between the
money and the recipients in Iraq. I have not got any clue on
how to do it but we must get rid of the red tape. All of the
Iraqis want to get going. They want to develop businesses and
they cannot go through this contracting procedure. It is a
nightmare.
Dr. Diamond. Senator Corzine, let me first speak to the
political element. I think that we need to solve the legitimacy
problem in terms of the origins and accountability of
government if this is going to be sustainable. I completely
agree with Dr. Marr. That is not nearly enough, but that is one
precondition.
It is just inconceivable to me that we could postpone the
June 30 deadline and not have this country blow up. It is just
not an alternative. One thing that has been keeping a lid on
things is that Iraqis have been knowing that they are going to
get their government back on June 30.
Now, to my mind, there are many tragedies in this. One
tragedy in this is that the plan that we developed inside the
CPA, some of us, which is to pull together a national
conference of maybe as many as 1,000 or more people,
representative of all the great diversity of the country that
you, having studied it so long, know so well and bring them
together in one place. And it can be done. You have tribal
groups, women's groups, professional associations, local and
provincial councils. They all elect some members. They come to
Baghdad. They caucus. Then those people who have been elected
to the national conference and to the broad debate that goes on
elect a consultative assembly, maybe between 100 and 200
people.
I think once you have that, it may not have legislative
power, but it will have greater political legitimacy than any
body of Iraqis that has been constituted since the end of the
war, and we might say since, what, 1958? I mean, who knows.
Then that body can begin to hold the interim government
responsible, take responsibility for some of the future of the
country.
The plan had been, but we ran out of time, that that
consultative assembly would have elected the presidency
council, would have elected the prime minister, who would then
have chosen a cabinet. So you would not have Lakhdar Brahimi
having to choose these people. Now I think, given the time
situation, we really have no choice. But the new officials can
still be held accountable to the consultative assembly which,
as I said earlier, can then confirm nominees for the supreme
court and begin to get the politics of this on a sounder
footing.
One more point I would like to make very briefly builds on
what Dr. Cordesman said. There is no reason why all of this
reconstruction money has to go through, as it largely has been
going through, American corporations. I can tell you our
regional coordinator in the south central region, which is in
the Shi'ite heartland, has gotten more done with a very small
amount of money in terms of getting buildings built and
services going and schools up and running just by going out
there and finding Iraqi companies and getting them to do it.
And we have got to get over our obsession with pouring money
into American companies with all of the layers it goes through
and with all of the loss that we suffer and getting money out
to small Iraqi contractors, even if they cannot perfectly
account for it, pumping money into the local economy and
getting stuff done.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, Senator Corzine.
Let me just follow on in this round with a question for Dr.
Diamond regarding the consultative group that you talked about,
the 1,000 people. How could they be constituted and when? How
does that fit into the scheme of things at this particular
moment?
Dr. Diamond. What I think can happen, but we are going to
need some improvement of security in order for this to move
forward, is that you say a certain number of members of a
national conference, which could be again a total body of 1,000
people or more.
The Chairman. Who selects them? How do they physically get
anywhere?
Dr. Diamond. Develop a structure for their selection, a
plan that is mutually negotiated among key Iraqis. Ambassador
Brahimi is well capable of doing this in his consultations. So
we develop a mutually agreed plan whereby, for example, 150 to
200 members will be elected from the various provincial and
regional councils around the country, which already exist. As
Dr. Marr indicated, those are the constituent elements for
emergent Iraqi federalism. A couple hundred people will be
elected from the different professional associations of
lawyers, educators, engineers, so on and so forth. Tribal
bodies might elect a certain number. The Iraqi women's
associations, which I might add, you talked about the need for
cross-cutting affiliations to come together in new ways.
Nowhere does it happen more impressively than in the Iraqi
Higher Women's Council. So you designate them to select some
members and you go to the constituent elements that are
identifiable and existing, political and social, of the
different pieces of Iraqi society. They each elect from among
their members some delegates to go to Baghdad to a big national
conference.
It debates national issues and then from among its members,
elects a smaller consultative assembly. That assembly might not
have legislative authority because it is not directly elected,
but again it could sit alongside the interim government, hold
it accountable in a variety of ways and be a forum for
directing Iraq's future in some respects and expressing its
frustrations. It could be an outlet for some of the rage and
frustration that Iraqis feel and a way of engaging both the
Iraqi executive branch, helping to shape the Iraqi judicial
branch, and beginning to have a serious dialog about the
country's future.
The Chairman. Let me press that for more detail, especially
this time line. Physically, when do these people meet, the
women or the business people or whatever?
Dr. Diamond. It cannot happen before June 30.
The Chairman. OK. It is post June 30.
Dr. Diamond. It had been our hope that it might happen soon
enough to actually choose the interim government. That is no
longer possible, but I think Ambassador Brahimi is thinking
that it could happen perhaps by the latter part of July. At
least the selection process for the national conference could
get going in July.
The Chairman. So Brahimi has appointed his people by the
1st of July, at least this initial group.
Dr. Diamond. Right.
The Chairman. Then this group supervises, in essence, the
rest of these elections by the end of July or thereabouts so
that the people then come to Baghdad.
Dr. Diamond. Maybe in August you could have an actual
national----
The Chairman. Sometime in the July August period,
supervised by the new Iraqi government.
Dr. Diamond. Well, I think it should not be supervised only
by the new Iraqi government because you have to keep in mind,
Senator, a principle, that any government you have that sits in
Baghdad is going to have its own interests, even if it is
``technocratic'' and that is, to some extent, I think----
The Chairman. Who else supervises it? Brahimi?
Dr. Diamond. There is going to be an Iraqi independent
electoral administration. Carina Perelli, who is the head of
the U.N. electoral unit, has been in and out Iraq repeatedly
with her team to stand up--and it will and must be stood up
before June 30--an independent Iraqi electoral administration.
The Chairman. These are still all Iraqis. In other words,
when you say somebody other, you are not saying the United
Nations, the United States, NATO.
Dr. Diamond. The U.N. should have a role. The United
States, it seems to me, does not need to have a role. By the
way, there will be one international participant on the Iraqi
electoral administration, but the U.N. with the electoral
administration I think could achieve this.
The Chairman. So there is a possible plan.
Now, Dr. Cordesman.
Dr. Cordesman. Senator, I just want to make one point. I
agree with everything Dr. Diamond said. I am concerned that
early on I got the impression the committee was talking about
rushing forward in the politics. That is not what needs to be
done. The politics should play out at the pace that is
necessary, and I think Dr. Diamond pointed that out. But
remember, even in his calendar, it is going to be the middle of
summer in Iraq. That is not always, even in Iraq, the best time
to do it.
If I was going to say anything, it is give the politics all
the support they need, but rush in the money and the
assistance. Make sure the money on democratization aid is
actually going in. Make sure the Iraqis can really see the
security forces develop. Make sure there is aid money on the
ground, that you are watching something supporting governance.
And remember, of all of the figures you have seen that
really do not mean very much, the most dangerous one is jobs.
Where do those numbers come from? The 200,000 people in the
security forces, subsidies to people who have left government,
subsidies to the ex-military, artificial jobs which are one-
time, temporary jobs being created through the use of the aid
process on American-designed projects which have no job future
once completed. That is critical for this political process to
work.
I think Dr. Diamond has given you the right plan. The
question is are we going to provide the resources to allow it
to work.
The Chairman. That is a very good point. But I was trying
to press Dr. Diamond to tease out a plan here for July and
August, and he has furnished that.
My next set of questions gets to the point that several of
you are making, and that is, first of all, we have appropriated
a lot of money here, but not much has hit the street, as I said
in my opening statement.
And second, you are suggesting that probably this may not
be the way for the money to be best spent anyway; that is, to
go through endless weeks, maybe months of contractor bidding at
the Pentagon, or wherever this is happening, to ensure that
finally some contractors get there. We raised the question
yesterday with the administration, what happens in July if the
Iraqis say, we do not want your American contractors? What
then? Well, we really have not thought about that, and we will
go back to headquarters and think through that one.
Now, our dilemma here is, I think as you presented it, an
economy that is in very bad shape. It has been that way for
quite a while. What I am trying to find out from you is, where
are our potential sources of revenue for Iraq, in addition to
assistance we might give, albeit to local people who then hire
local people, because even that may run out in due course? We
have some desire in the country to help out Iraq, and we will
probably do so. But at some point there has to be some
indigenous business that takes hold. Is there that possibility
in Iraq, that given a jump start, or some stimulus, or some
money on the ground, that Iraqis begin to employ each other and
that there is then some basis for this democracy as it evolves?
Does anyone have a thought about that? Yes, doctor.
Dr. Cordesman. I think I would ask urgently from the CPA
and from the embassy that they take a hard look at this. Dr.
Marr and I think Dr. Diamond both pointed out there is a lot of
small business, service industries, things developing in Iraq
that I have not seen there in over 30 years. But there are some
very important ``buts.''
Some 250-odd state corporations, almost none of which are
viable, being funded today basically and kept alive but they do
not fit the market, and we do not have an Iraqi effort to
transform them.
An agricultural sector, which for the first time, is
actually probably going to have to buy crops on a market basis
which means for the first time in some 20-odd years, nobody is
going to pay for things that are inedible simply because they
get produced.
You have over 100,000 people who used to be employed in
defense industries that do not exist. At most you will have a
military, which is a small fraction of the former military, and
all that money that went by way of subsidies will go.
So your question is absolutely critical, but the answer is,
it is going to take a minimum of 2 to 3 years to turn around
those job statistics, and if anybody can show me on a
spreadsheet how it is going to take less time and not require
massive additional amounts of U.S. aid, I want to hear an
explanation because if you have not got a job plan that is
convincing, you have not got a plan for Iraq.
The Chairman. So let us take for granted the U.S. aid
comes, but then the question is, how is it to be administered?
Dr. Marr.
Dr. Marr. Yes. I would like to address that. My impression
is that there has been a great deal of improvement at two
levels. The paid middle class, accountants, teachers,
professors, and so on are getting three times their former
salary and they are happy. As I said, they are going out and
buying refrigerators and air conditioners and cell phones and
improving their houses. And the merchants at the retail level
are doing a land office business because there is no tax and
they are importing. They are happy.
Now for the business communities--and I am going to be
personal about it, specific. There are businessmen there that
would like nothing more than to get their hands on some seed
money from the U.S. to do whatever is necessary. You want some
generators, you want something done, they want to do it. But
the hurdle between getting the money and actually starting the
business--not just taking the money and performing services for
the U.S. Government or the company involved, but starting the
business and doing what you are suggesting, employing people--
is huge. These people cannot bridge the gap.
I know people in Iraq, somebody who is an engineer who
builds sewers, construction at the real grassroots level. He
has almost given up because he does not understand the
contracting procedure. He does not know how to do it. He wants
to build his own business. We need to find a way to get past
this contractual nightmare, get the money not just to people
who perform services, but to business people who want to
capitalize on it. Incidentally, I think in the gulf and
elsewhere, among Iraqi Americans for example, there are lots of
people who want to go in and invest and do this sort of thing,
but of course, they cannot because of the security problem.
The Chairman. Dr. Marr, as an interlocutor between these
Iraqis and our government, who in our government--that is, what
Department, what person--might get it in this respect? In other
words, how do we move the policy to one in which this aid comes
through a clearly identified entity and our government
understands what you are talking about, and the money gets to
these people, and they have seed money and they begin to build?
Do you have any suggestions, any nominees? Or where physically
should we look?
Dr. Marr. Well, I would rely on Dr. Diamond for this
because I have not worked in the bureaucracy and the CPA. The
only thing I know is that we are supposed to have $18 billion
to spend.
The Chairman. I understand. Well, the money is there but I
am trying to find out what the mechanism is right now.
Dr. Marr. What is the mechanism? We have a big worry about
accounting here. I read in the press the other day that we need
an oversight committee to make sure that corruption does not
occur. It sounds like the $2,400 toilet seat again. Maybe there
is too much accounting. Maybe there is too much of this
accountability and bureaucracy for the moment. Obviously, some
accounting is necessary and is a good thing. But we have an
emergency there over the next year or so in which we have got
to get the pump primed and get started on this. Maybe we need
to let some of this bureaucratic worry slip to make sure that
the money is getting in there so these things can get started.
Dr. Diamond. I completely agree with what Dr. Marr said,
and Senator, I would say look at what has worked. One thing
that we know that has worked reasonably well is the CERP
program, the Commanders Emergency Reconstruction Program. These
local military commanders were getting a lot done before their
money ran out. There has been a tendency, let me put it this
way, within CPA toward centralization of control. I think this
has been one of the pervasive problems with CPA as an
institution, and we need to just get money out the door to
local commanders, local civilian officials, tell them to spend
it. If you cannot account for it carefully, just get it done.
As Dr. Marr said, we are in an emergency and Iraqis have to
begin to see that their physical lives and their communities
are being transformed. So I would just push the money out into
the renewed CERP program into the control of local military
commanders.
In each province, we have had up through June 30 provincial
officials of CPA, six regional coordinators. I do not know what
is going to replace them in terms of the embassy, but in
effect, we need to have local civilian officials who are
continuing to do that as much as possible through local Iraqi
contracts.
The Chairman. And that is a good point because that is the
post July 1 thing.
Yes, doctor.
Dr. Cordesman. Senator, the grim reality is that USAID was
not particularly effective even before it was cut back and
folded into the State Department. It was a project-oriented
structure and that is all we have got.
I agree with what both Dr. Marr and Dr. Diamond said, but
it does not handle infrastructure. It does not handle long-term
institutions. If you are really going to deal with major aid
projects, somebody has to manage them on a national level.
Frankly, I think you have to add to the CERP program and
provide an immediate transfer of money to those ministries that
are up and functioning, let the Iraqis make the decisions, let
them make the plan. There may be some corruption. There may be
accounting problems, but if you focus on the fact that the
ministries actually perform something, that you can see
material benefits and you monitor progress, then they are a
vital addition to having CERP type aid or field type aid.
You cannot fix a power system or an oil company or deal
with any other critical infrastructure or national project on a
local level. You have got to have a national level as well, and
the U.S. Government and U.S. contractors are incapable of
managing and implementing such an effort. The Iraqis at some
level are.
The Chairman. Well, I thank the panel. I think that my
colleagues would agree that the value of this hearing is the
quality of your thinking. We are attempting to get some
thoughts here today that have not really come into play, and it
is very important they do with just 42 days to go. I am
grateful to all of you, and I yield to my colleague, Senator
Biden.
Senator Biden. I yield to Senator Boxer.
Senator Boxer. I am not going to ask questions because it
is not fair to my colleagues. I have somewhere I have to be in
10 minutes, and so very quickly I just wanted to again thank
you very much and thank the chairman and the ranking member.
I will say, yes, I mean, we all know we do not have great
choices and before we say get the money out there and give it
to the military and let the--oh, wait. Just take a deep breath.
I think Dr. Cordesman is right on this point. Let us get the
funding to the ministries and have some rules for them because
I am the one who actually publicized the coffee pot and the
toilet seat. The toilet seat actually was only $600 in those
years. This is not a good thing for American taxpayers to
believe. They are already upset. So we have to be a little
careful before we just say get the money out the door, do not
have rules. But you are right, get it to the Iraqis.
Two other points I would make are this. I was offended by
some of the comments about Israel, and I just want to say
something here. Nobody said, any of you who made your comments,
that when Barak was the Prime Minister he offered the
Palestinians 95 percent of what they wanted. Nobody said that.
You have to put this all in context. What happened then was
they walked away. They walked away. And what did Israel get for
being willing to give up 95 percent? They get terrorism, worse
than ever, intifadas, suicide bombers, women suicide bombers.
You cannot take your daughter to have a talk with her about her
wedding day because you get blown up in a cafe. That is what
they got.
Now, the fact that the Palestinians are saying, you see,
all this happening here is all about Israel is so much baloney.
It is two separate problems, and it is just an excuse to tie
this Palestinian-Israeli conflict, which is so sad and so
horrifying, into this Iraqi deal, which is just a separate
matter.
I would just say as experts when you say things like you
say, ``theft of land'' and words like this, please be careful
to put things in context. And now you have Sharon saying he
will give up the Gaza. So I just feel it was very one-sided on
that point. Outside of that point, I thought everything you had
to say was very balanced.
The last point I would make is about Afghanistan. If you
really sit down and write the history of this thing, the
biggest loser in all this Iraq mess is Afghanistan. We sat here
saying we cannot afford to lose Afghanistan. We cannot afford
to fail the Afghani people, and look at what is happening. We
have turned our attention away again and despite the pleas of
Senators Lugar and Biden and many of us following their lead,
they are not extending the security in that country. You want
to talk about a model that we could have turned to in the
region, there it was staring us in the face, and plus, we would
have been able to use our considerable attention and focus and
genius to get al-Qaeda. So there are so many pieces of this
puzzle.
And I just thank you all very much, despite my one
critique, for just really giving us your best advice. And I
thank my friend, Joe Biden, for his generosity in yielding to
me.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Boxer.
Senator Biden.
Senator Biden. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I really appreciate your taking all this time. You have
been sitting there a long time. As you could tell, we would
keep you another 8 hours if we could because there are so many
specific things that could, should, and need to be done that
could produce some product relatively quickly.
For example, an old colleague of yours, General Hoar,
General Zinni and I were talking, and he proposed a conference
in Amman to get Iraqi business people together with
international parties to identify needs and opportunities and
get money to them quickly. I mean, we do these business fairs
every day in Washington, DC and Wilmington, Delaware and
Indianapolis, Indiana.
One of the things that I think is a problem here is the
need for everything to go through American businesses.
But let me ask you. I apologize for going back from the
specific to the general, but all of you said this ultimately
rests on--and the Iraqis I have spoken with--security, rests on
that businessman who wants to go out and build a sewer or run
the water pipes to the homes that are being built. That guy,
including the American contractor or other contractor who may
be dealing with them, is getting shot. They are not going out.
So my first question is--if you can be explicit and
specific, it would be useful, if it is appropriate--how do we
get more security now? How do we make it safer for the Iraqi
mother to give the change to her daughter, who is 14 years old,
to run down to the market and pick up some vegetables? They are
not doing that now in many places, so I am told. Now, maybe I
am wrong. You have been there, Dr. Marr, in the region talking
to a lot more people than I have. Dr. Diamond, you were
consulting the CPA. Maybe I am wrong.
First of all, am I right that ``in the neighborhood,'' for
lack of a better phrase, in the neighborhoods, in the villages,
in the countryside, people are, if I can make an American
analogy, worried about sending their kid out the door in the
same way that people here are worried about sending their kid
out the door in some bad neighborhoods because of drug dealers?
Is it really that way? Yes, Dr. Cordesman.
Dr. Cordesman. Senator, we now have something like five
sets of surveys. All of them show, to various degrees, security
is almost the first concern if not the second. It is a
nationwide problem with the exception of part of the Kurdish
area. It is not simply a matter of what happens in the west or
the areas where al-Sadr is. And you are absolutely right.
Now, security, however, is always going to be relative. Dr.
Marr pointed out that better is often OK as distinguished from
having the kind of security we would like in the U.S.
Senator Biden. I got that. So what do we do to get
security, whatever the level? And you all may have a different
version or view of what the minimal security level is required
for the ``average'' Iraqi to feel a sense of security.
Dr. Cordesman. May I offer you a suggestion, sir?
Senator Biden. Of course. I am looking for suggestions.
Dr. Cordesman. You have got probably one of the best
commanders we have working this issue right now, but I do not
see that he is getting the money or all the manpower he needs.
You have got to get around the contracting process and get
those assets in to create the kind of security forces that are
needed.
Senator Biden. Translate that for me. You are at a town
meeting with me and Johnny says, hey, Doc, stop all the crap
here. Just tell me what do we need to do. More troops?
Dr. Cordesman. Forget about Armitage, forget about
Wolfowitz, bring that commander back every month, ask him
directly what is it he needs, is he getting it, and who is in
the way.
Senator Biden. Do you think he is going to tell us?
Dr. Cordesman. Yes, I think frankly this one will. And if
you ask him for tangible measures of how security is improving
by government and by district and by town, not a bunch of
nonsense about how everybody feels better nationally, he will
give you the statistics because they are compiled every day and
they are simply not being transmitted to you.
Senator Biden. Do you agree with that, General Hoar?
General Hoar. Absolutely, sir.
Senator Biden. Are we talking about Abizaid or are we
talking about Sanchez? Who are we talking about?
General Hoar. No. The guy that commanded the 101st
Airborne.
Dr. Marr. Petraeus.
Senator Biden. OK, got you. And he is not worried he is not
going to be on vacation with General Shinseki in Hawaii once he
does that?
General Hoar. That is a real problem.
Senator Biden. It sure the hell is. Look, seriously.
General, I am not going to mention names. You have been on some
conference calls with me when I have asked your opinion and
others of your rank and former rank, and several have said to
me--I am just going to say it straight up, not in the
conversation that I had with you on the phone. One significant
general said to me, look, I cannot come testify. They will ruin
me. I cannot do it.
I think we should try to get the commander here, but my
experience so far is--Dr. Cordesman, here is what I was told by
two people a month ago. I said, are these guys genuinely not in
need of more force? Because that is what we heard yesterday. We
heard that whatever they want, whatever they ask for, they got
it. I said, so these are men you guys all admire. You admire
Abizaid. You admire Sanchez. You admire these guys. What is the
deal? And he said the following. He said, look at their face
when they answer and listen to precisely what they say in
response to the question, do you need more forces. And he said,
they will be stone-faced and they will look in the camera and
say, I have all the force I need for my mission. But no one
ever asks them what is their mission.
I asked yesterday Mr. Wolfowitz. What is the mission that
General Abizaid has? What is his mission? What is General
Sanchez' mission beyond force protection? I have yet to get an
answer. I then asked specifically, is the mission to disarm and
integrate the militias? Well, I do not know. Is the mission to
provide security at the market in the village? Is the mission
to provide security so people can feel safe to travel from
Basra to the capital? Is that the mission? Does anybody know?
Where do I go? Whom do I ask?
General, you were a CENTCOM commander. Is there a piece of
paper somewhere? Is there a set of orders that says, this is
your mission? As CENTCOM commander, did you have a mission
statement?
General Hoar. Yes, sir.
Senator Biden. Does Abizaid have a mission statement?
General Hoar. Yes, sir, he does.
Senator Biden. How do I get it? I am not being a wise guy
now. I am being deadly earnest.
General Hoar. I think that you could ask John Abizaid and
he would give you one.
I am frankly very disappointed in how this situation that
you have described has evolved. I think the atmosphere is
poisonous. I think the public berating of Eric Shinseki is an
example of what happens to somebody that speaks his mind.
Senator Biden. All he did was answer a question.
General Hoar. Serious stuff apparently.
I think that a lot of these people are buffaloed and I am
disappointed that they cannot speak out more frankly. I asked
the same question you did of a very senior Army officer who has
a dog in this fight. Do you have enough troops? He said, I do
not have enough foreign troops. I said, give me a break. What
is the difference between foreign troops and U.S. troops? Well,
we need people to guard pipelines, to stand around on the road
and so forth. We do not want to use U.S. troops for that. But
when we cannot get foreign troops, it does not negate the
requirement for having troops on the ground.
Senator Biden. The bottom line is the pipeline still gets
blown up. The bottom line is the road cannot be ridden. The
bottom line is convoys cannot go from one place to another. The
bottom line is we end up with--if the Times is right--I am not
sure it is because we have heard conflicting numbers--somewhere
between 10,000 and 20,000 paid former military private defense
forces.
It is amazing to me, after all these years, that I cannot
get an answer. And I was here during Vietnam. When I got here
as a 29-year-old kid, Vietnam was still raging. I got
straighter answers then than I am getting now about need. But
again, we get back to the security deal.
And by the way, you know what my colleagues say to me?
I must tell you on the record, one of the things that I
really resent--and I know you know this. You, general, know
this because I think I have mentioned it. I am angry that a
guy--this is purely personal--that for someone who argued not
retrospectively, not after the fact, not Monday morning
quarterbacking, but on the record clearly well before all these
mistakes were made and as they were being made that we were
going in the wrong direction, we are going about it the wrong
way, we are making a fundamental mistake, that I am the guy,
among others--but there are not many of us--calling for greater
sacrifice on the part of the United States military in the
short term to be able to get this right while the guys who
screwed this up to a fare-thee-well are saying, well, if the
generals ask us, we will go ahead and do it.
Because it raises the question in European capitals, it
raises the question in Arab capitals--I know this part for a
fact. It is read as there is an exit strategy, that the exit
strategy is we are going to turn over as quickly as we can to
whomever we can find, incompetent or otherwise, capable or
otherwise, ready or otherwise, and say, we completed our
mission and we are getting the heck out of there.
Every European I have met with--I should not say that--85
percent say, are you getting ready to leave? Now here, we are
hearing, stay the course. There they are translating these
things. They look on the ground and say, hey, you need more
force, and you say, well, why do you not get in the game? And
they look and say, well, I do not want to get in there now. It
is like they have screwed it up so bad, no one can fix it, no
one can play it. So I am not sure I want to get in.
I realize I have run over my time, but if I can end going
back to you, Dr. Marr. Tell me about how you envision this, to
use a trite American phrase used in electoral politics--not
trite, but an overused phrase--empowering, if you do, through
this sort of--as Brahimi explains it to me--and I speak to
him--his version of a loya jirga. There is no such
institutional structure, but the 1,000 to 1,500 people who are
going to be sometime after the 30th chosen, hopefully with some
rational basis, although they are chosen and not elected, that
brings together a truly not cohesive but representative group
of people who are going to, in effect, play the role, as
Brahimi describes it to me, as--they will not have any
legislative power, but they may have some moral force of
authority but if they conclude that the interim government that
is going to be named and take over June 30 is not moving the
way they should, they will be a counterweight. They will at
least keep it somewhere in the area of legitimacy because if
this 1,500 people who are gathered together in some fora and
form were to overwhelmingly say, whoa, the new President, the
new Prime Minister, the new Vice President is off the
reservation, then that person or that group would have no
legitimacy.
So the way I kind of understand it is that it is going to
be official in that people will be named, but in a sense
unofficial in that it does not any articulated, written,
specific responsibility. And I am trying to figure it out. I am
trying to figure out, A, does the thing have any utility,
whatever it is; and what does it have to sort of be, not who is
on it, but what does it have to be. How does it have to be
constructed for it to play any positive role? That is a very
inarticulate way of phrasing the question, but it is a very
inarticulate science right now as to what the devil it is
supposed to do and mean.
Dr. Marr. Well, I think it is inarticulate because it is
inarticulate. I cannot spend a lot of time answering. Forgive
me, Senator Biden, because I am not focusing my time and
attention on these constitutional and short-term issues, as for
example, Dr. Diamond is.
My view is that everybody wants a representative
government, but basically we have a long transitional period.
The only thing that is going to matter is some kind of an
election, a constitution, and then finally a government. The
Iraqis have profound, difficult decisions to make, and these
have to involve compromises. For example: for the Kurds and the
Kurdish parties, how much separatism in the north? How much
religion? How many Shi'a are going to be represented and what
kind of Shi'a? What are we going to do about Sunnis? Which
Sunnis? Iraqis are going to have to sit in a room over a
considerable period of time and compromise.
Incidentally, the folks that we chose and who have been
generally excoriated by the press did go through that process,
and they did come up with a compromise. So we know that it is
possible.
I can only say again this is going to be a longer-term
process than June 30. I do not really know how it is going to
work out. I do not really think, as I have said, that June 30
is going to confer all that much legitimacy on what happens.
While they are going through this process, Iraq is going to
have to govern. Somebody there is going to have to do the
governing and deliver the services and if they can, this will
help to calm the situation in the short term, 6 months, a year,
a year and a half while this political process is going on.
I just want to say again there are a lot of bad guys in
Iraq. Not everybody, by bringing them under this tent, is going
to go along with the process. We have an entrenched sub-elite
among the Sunnis that we are all familiar with in Fallujah and
elsewhere. We have radical Shi'a. We may have a lot of other
radicals who are going to accept nothing that we put forward,
and we are going to have to deal with this. So I expect more
trouble, frankly, before we get through this process.
Senator Biden. Look, one of the reasons why you find
Senator Lugar and I still sitting here--I speak for myself, but
I know him well enough to know why he is sitting here--is in a
sense we are the kind of people who do not write about this in
a small fashion in our localities at home. We have to govern.
We know there are certain pieces of this. One of the things you
have got to do is you have got to, whether or not it is a flood
that wipes out a community and people are upset, and you know
cannot deliver, you cannot rebuild their homes for a year, you
have got to say to them basically, hey, look, there is a plan.
Here are the steps. This is going to go forward. Here is the
way it is going to happen.
Now, look, somebody has got to govern. We just got finished
saying they are not going to be able to govern if they do not
have security. They are not going to have security unless they
are able to cooperate with whatever the force is. They are not
real crazy about cooperating with us after Abu Ghraib and all
the mistakes we have made because they do not want to be
associated with us. They want to end up ultimately having the
power to govern. And they also know we have got to get services
out there. We have to get them out quickly because guess what.
I remember Jennings Randolph. I said, Jennings, you got
elected in 1932. You got defeated in 1948. Why? He said I knew
the moment, Joe. Swear to God. I am telling you a true story.
He said I was in a holler in western West Virginia. He said I
got a call from Derrick at a country store. He said, Jennings,
I think we are going to lose. I said, why is that, Derrick? He
said, just met with Mrs. Jones, said she ain't got no lard. Not
a joke. We politicians understand that stuff. He lost the
election. Mrs. Jones ain't got no lard, nothing to cook with.
Now, you are saying all the same things to me. Ms. Jones
ain't got no lard. Ms. Jones ain't got no lard in Fallujah or
Basra, whatever. The services are not there. There is no job
there. There is no place to send their kids every day. There is
no way to make money other than this emerging middle class that
we were able to get engaged.
So all of these things have to fit together and all I am
trying to figure out is in the short term we are going to get
this outfit named by Brahimi. We are going to bless it somehow.
We have got to get security in there that that outfit will say
I will cooperate with. So we do not get more kids flying back
to the Dover Air Force Base where they all end up when they get
shot dead.
I am not angry at anybody. I am frustrated here because
what ends up happening is we have got to come up with very
basic little things, and we have got to keep our folks in the
game, the American people. I am out there saying, send your
kid. My kid is in the National Guard. He is saying, Dad, I want
to volunteer to go to Iraq. I am going, whoa, whoa. I know we
have got to go. I hope his mother just did not hear that.
So all kidding aside, it comes down to how do you keep
people in the game here in the near term.
I will conclude. It seems to me that we have got to make
this about the Iraqis and not about us. Where are you going?
Well, I just got picked for that deal that is going to go on. I
do not know. They are taking 2,000 of us to whatever. We are
going to talk. Well what are they doing? Well, at least they
called you. That is how people in neighborhoods--that is how
the local councilmen think. That is how it works. That is how
people organize. I do not care what country they are in.
Oh, you have a stake in it. My next door neighbor, Dick,
got a call. How the hell did he get picked? OK. What are you
going to do when you go to talk to all those people down there?
What is going to happen here?
And so we can have this big picture thing, but I want to
tell you something. I was going to suggest to you all--and I am
not being a wise guy and you may not want to do it. If I were
President of the United States, God forbid, and each of you
were individually my national security adviser or chief of
staff and I said to you, I have got to make a speech, I have to
go on national television, and I have got to make a speech to
the American people, it cannot be longer than 10 minutes, and I
want to explain--I am not joking--to them what we have got to
do in the near term, what we have to do in the next 2 months,
and what pieces have to fall in place for us to succeed in
Iraq, what would I tell them? How would I, in plain English,
speak to the American people? And you all speak very good
English. I am not implying that. How would I speak to the
American people honestly if you are going to be as unvarnished
and honest as you could be?
Because I think you and I, Tony, agree on one important
thing--I think we agree on almost everything--and that is no
foreign policy, no matter how brilliantly conceived, can be
sustained in America without the informed consent of the
American people. And for the consent to be informed, they have
to understand what specifically you are going to ask them to
do.
I am always very careful about attribution to everything I
say and do, more than any other Senator probably. There is a
line I have in a speech. I had to bring it over so you would
hear it so you did not think I got it here. It is already typed
and written. It is a speech I am delivering to Rutgers
University Law School Friday. It says, ``Just as the Kennedy
administration's best and the brightest made decisions that
escalated our involvement in Vietnam, and were wrong, so today
the neo-conservatives are the best and the brightest of this
administration who have made equally and compelling wrong
decisions.'' I happen to agree with you. You should worry about
it. We actually think alike in terms of this.
But all kidding aside, folks, this has been great for you
to do this. That was a long explanation of why we keep
battering you for specifics because ultimately this gets down
to the details and how from the day this gets turned over, this
works and what our purpose here is because we batter, we
importune, we plead with this administration to try to get its
act together. Unless we can show a path to the Iraqi people--
and all of you know more about Iraq than I do, although I have
worked a hell of a long way trying to figure it out--that they
understand intuitively that we really are handing this over, we
really are going to stick with them until they get it right for
them, unless we explain that to the American people, this is a
loser. This is a loser.
At any rate, thank you very, very much, Mr. Chairman, for
your indulgence. I cannot thank you all enough for your input.
I hope you will still take our calls, or at least my calls, as
we seek more advice. Thank you.
The Chairman. Well, thank you very much, Senator Biden.
Perhaps as one conclusion of your story about the 10-minute
speech, the President might ask these four to help draft it. I
suspect that the that we have covered today, whether or not the
President would include all of them in such a hypothetical
speech, are very important. I agree with my colleague. We have
explored the governance situation, the security situation, the
delivery of services, and the priorities that are involved
here. You are not all in perfect agreement, but at least there
have been laid out some details that I think are very important
and that have not been part of a public hearing before. I
mention this to justify the efforts of this committee.
I saw on one news show last evening a commentator
commenting about our hearing yesterday. He said, all these
statements have been made, all these questions and assertions
and what have you, but what does all this mean? What are these
people going to do about it? Well, somebody rationalizing said,
this is what oversight is about. The Congress is not executive.
We are legislative. Well, he said, are they going to pass laws?
Are they going to offer legislation to put all this in place?
The panel was in a quandary as to what we would do about it.
The fact is, we should not do anything about it until we
think we have got it right. We have been trying to draw out
from you as experts some details that would be helpful to us in
advising the administration and conducting other questioning
and oversight of people who have these responsibilities. We are
not substituting ourselves in executive roles or military
roles, but sometimes asking questions of this sort, exploring
new territory is helpful to these people, and I hope that has
been the case today.
You have certainly assisted us, and we thank you.
The hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, 12:52 p.m., the committee adjourned, to
reconvene subject to the call of the Chair.]