"A War We Just Might Win"

[SkyPiggie 0]

This recent New York Times Op-Ed column has been receiving a lot of attention.

It's written by Michael O’Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, and Kenneth Pollack, director of research at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at Brookings.

Because registration is required to view it, I'll post the whole thing here.

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A War We Just Might Win

VIEWED from Iraq, where we just spent eight days meeting with American and Iraqi military and civilian personnel, the political debate in Washington is surreal. The Bush administration has over four years lost essentially all credibility. Yet now the administration’s critics, in part as a result, seem unaware of the significant changes taking place.

Here is the most important thing Americans need to understand: We are finally getting somewhere in Iraq, at least in military terms. As two analysts who have harshly criticized the Bush administration’s miserable handling of Iraq, we were surprised by the gains we saw and the potential to produce not necessarily “victory” but a sustainable stability that both we and the Iraqis could live with.

After the furnace-like heat, the first thing you notice when you land in Baghdad is the morale of our troops. In previous trips to Iraq we often found American troops angry and frustrated — many sensed they had the wrong strategy, were using the wrong tactics and were risking their lives in pursuit of an approach that could not work.

Today, morale is high. The soldiers and marines told us they feel that they now have a superb commander in Gen. David Petraeus; they are confident in his strategy, they see real results, and they feel now they have the numbers needed to make a real difference.

Everywhere, Army and Marine units were focused on securing the Iraqi population, working with Iraqi security units, creating new political and economic arrangements at the local level and providing basic services — electricity, fuel, clean water and sanitation — to the people. Yet in each place, operations had been appropriately tailored to the specific needs of the community. As a result, civilian fatality rates are down roughly a third since the surge began — though they remain very high, underscoring how much more still needs to be done.

In Ramadi, for example, we talked with an outstanding Marine captain whose company was living in harmony in a complex with a (largely Sunni) Iraqi police company and a (largely Shiite) Iraqi Army unit. He and his men had built an Arab-style living room, where he met with the local Sunni sheiks — all formerly allies of Al Qaeda and other jihadist groups — who were now competing to secure his friendship.

In Baghdad’s Ghazaliya neighborhood, which has seen some of the worst sectarian combat, we walked a street slowly coming back to life with stores and shoppers. The Sunni residents were unhappy with the nearby police checkpoint, where Shiite officers reportedly abused them, but they seemed genuinely happy with the American soldiers and a mostly Kurdish Iraqi Army company patrolling the street. The local Sunni militia even had agreed to confine itself to its compound once the Americans and Iraqi units arrived.

We traveled to the northern cities of Tal Afar and Mosul. This is an ethnically rich area, with large numbers of Sunni Arabs, Kurds and Turkmens. American troop levels in both cities now number only in the hundreds because the Iraqis have stepped up to the plate. Reliable police officers man the checkpoints in the cities, while Iraqi Army troops cover the countryside. A local mayor told us his greatest fear was an overly rapid American departure from Iraq. All across the country, the dependability of Iraqi security forces over the long term remains a major question mark.

But for now, things look much better than before. American advisers told us that many of the corrupt and sectarian Iraqi commanders who once infested the force have been removed. The American high command assesses that more than three-quarters of the Iraqi Army battalion commanders in Baghdad are now reliable partners (at least for as long as American forces remain in Iraq).

In addition, far more Iraqi units are well integrated in terms of ethnicity and religion. The Iraqi Army’s highly effective Third Infantry Division started out as overwhelmingly Kurdish in 2005. Today, it is 45 percent Shiite, 28 percent Kurdish, and 27 percent Sunni Arab.

In the past, few Iraqi units could do more than provide a few “jundis” (soldiers) to put a thin Iraqi face on largely American operations. Today, in only a few sectors did we find American commanders complaining that their Iraqi formations were useless — something that was the rule, not the exception, on a previous trip to Iraq in late 2005.

The additional American military formations brought in as part of the surge, General Petraeus’s determination to hold areas until they are truly secure before redeploying units, and the increasing competence of the Iraqis has had another critical effect: no more whack-a-mole, with insurgents popping back up after the Americans leave.

In war, sometimes it’s important to pick the right adversary, and in Iraq we seem to have done so. A major factor in the sudden change in American fortunes has been the outpouring of popular animus against Al Qaeda and other Salafist groups, as well as (to a lesser extent) against Moktada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army.

These groups have tried to impose Shariah law, brutalized average Iraqis to keep them in line, killed important local leaders and seized young women to marry off to their loyalists. The result has been that in the last six months Iraqis have begun to turn on the extremists and turn to the Americans for security and help. The most important and best-known example of this is in Anbar Province, which in less than six months has gone from the worst part of Iraq to the best (outside the Kurdish areas). Today the Sunni sheiks there are close to crippling Al Qaeda and its Salafist allies. Just a few months ago, American marines were fighting for every yard of Ramadi; last week we strolled down its streets without body armor.

Another surprise was how well the coalition’s new Embedded Provincial Reconstruction Teams are working. Wherever we found a fully staffed team, we also found local Iraqi leaders and businessmen cooperating with it to revive the local economy and build new political structures. Although much more needs to be done to create jobs, a new emphasis on microloans and small-scale projects was having some success where the previous aid programs often built white elephants.

In some places where we have failed to provide the civilian manpower to fill out the reconstruction teams, the surge has still allowed the military to fashion its own advisory groups from battalion, brigade and division staffs. We talked to dozens of military officers who before the war had known little about governance or business but were now ably immersing themselves in projects to provide the average Iraqi with a decent life.

Outside Baghdad, one of the biggest factors in the progress so far has been the efforts to decentralize power to the provinces and local governments. But more must be done. For example, the Iraqi National Police, which are controlled by the Interior Ministry, remain mostly a disaster. In response, many towns and neighborhoods are standing up local police forces, which generally prove more effective, less corrupt and less sectarian. The coalition has to force the warlords in Baghdad to allow the creation of neutral security forces beyond their control.

In the end, the situation in Iraq remains grave. In particular, we still face huge hurdles on the political front. Iraqi politicians of all stripes continue to dawdle and maneuver for position against one another when major steps towards reconciliation — or at least accommodation — are needed. This cannot continue indefinitely. Otherwise, once we begin to downsize, important communities may not feel committed to the status quo, and Iraqi security forces may splinter along ethnic and religious lines.

How much longer should American troops keep fighting and dying to build a new Iraq while Iraqi leaders fail to do their part? And how much longer can we wear down our forces in this mission? These haunting questions underscore the reality that the surge cannot go on forever. But there is enough good happening on the battlefields of Iraq today that Congress should plan on sustaining the effort at least into 2008.

Web reference: Here.

[billvon 3,085]

Cool article overall. I think its credibility is somewhat diminished since we've been seeing the same sort of claims since 2003, and I have no doubt that the statement " . . .there is enough good happening on the battlefields of Iraq today that Congress should plan on sustaining the effort at least into 2008" will be repeated for as long as we are there, as it has been since 2003.

[NCclimber 0]

But have those claims been made by "two analysts who have harshly criticized the Bush administration’s miserable handling of Iraq"?

[billvon 3,085]

>"two analysts who have harshly criticized the Bush administration’s miserable handling of Iraq"?

Ah, perhaps you read the National Review commentary on this article:

"What is most interesting about this article is not what it says, but who is saying it. If a conservative were to write such an article, the skeptics most assuredly would immediately dismiss it as repeating White House talking points. But the fact that two severe critics of the Bush administration’s management of the war — from a think tank usually described as liberal to boot — have published such a piece in the New York Times of all places might, under normal circumstances, give opponents of the war pause."

I am honestly not surprised that Pollack supports the war - he wrote an entire book advocating the war before we launched it. He is surely one of the leading proponents of war in Iraq, and it should come as no surprise that he still is.

Nor am I surprised that Brookings supports the war. He has since its inception. In 2003 he wrote an article estimating potential casualties to US troops, predicted a victory and said "a quagmire in Iraq seems extremely unlikely." In Jan 2006 he wrote another article saying how much better Iraq's infrastructure was now. (Presumably it's been destroyed and rebuilt between then and now, so he can write a new article about how much better everything is getting.)

So if your question is "are you surprised to see two war supporters supporting the war?" the answer is no. If your question is "are you surprised that Bush critics are supporting the war?" again the answer is no. Most people in the US - many war-supporting GOPers included - have criticized Bush's handling of the war. Indeed, criticism of Bush is almost required nowadays to be taken seriously as a politician no matter what side of the fence you're on.

Have two analysts who have harshly criticized the Bush administration’s handling of Iraq made those claims before? In that, has that particular combination occurred before? I have no idea.

[NCclimber 0]

Good points, Bill.

This (the OP story) is a perfect example of my taking the bait. Those two seem to have a history of supporting the war, too.

[SkyPiggie 0]

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Cool article overall. I think its credibility is somewhat diminished since we've been seeing the same sort of claims since 2003, and I have no doubt that the statement " . . .there is enough good happening on the battlefields of Iraq today that Congress should plan on sustaining the effort at least into 2008" will be repeated for as long as we are there...

As long as progress is being made, then why give up?

[algboy 0]

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Good points, Bill.

This (the OP story) is a perfect example of my taking the bait. Those two seem to have a history of supporting the war, too.

Yeah, can you say: phony left gatekeepers? Tweedle Dumb and Dumber.

The Brookings Institution is the Washington establishment's "left" (read: Democratic) version of think tanks like the Heritage Foundation, AEI, etc. It's a left gatekeeper that keeps the discussion "on point" and close to the interests of its corporate sugar daddies, i.e. nothing that would rock the boat of the USS Status Quo.

Picture two bald guys fighting over a comb . . . .

[billvon 3,085]

>As long as progress is being made, then why give up?

Because there is a difference between saying you're making progress and actually making progress.

If you had an investment-fund manager in a decent economy, and every year you lost money, but he kept telling you "your investments are doing great! We just turned the corner. In six days, six weeks, _maybe_ six months you'll be doing well. Your stocks are all winners now!" how long would you keep him? Three years? Four? Five? Would you stick with him forever until you "won?" Or would you "give up" and find another investment manager/mutual fund/investment strategy?

[Skyrad 0]

This from todays (thursday) Times

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/iraq/article2224987.ece

Things are getting worse not better in the South. As for wether things are getting better in the North it hardly matters, as I have always said it doesn't matter how strong the US forces are because the people back home are not stoic and can not accept a prolonged war with casualties. The average American civillian of 2007 simply isn't made of the same stuff of the WWII generation (goes for the UK too but not so much as we have been used to sustained campaigns and loss of lives in our military every year since WWII except one)

When an author is too meticulous about his style, you may presume that his mind is frivolous and his content flimsy.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca