Posted on 10/20/2006 12:06:27 AM PDT by MinorityRepublican
ELEANOR HALL: A key US military strategist who counts the former Secretary of State, Colin Powell, among his students, is absolutely scathing about the current Bush administration's strategy in Iraq and says no one except the President is in any doubt that it should change.
Harlan Ullman who's now at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, says the US lost control of events in Iraq almost immediately after the invasion and that far from assisting in the development of democracy, the US-led allies, including Australia, have fomented chaos.
But Dr Ullman says he holds out little hope that either the escalating US deaths in Iraq or the recommendations now being developed by a senior policy adviser to the former Bush administration, James Baker, will convince the President to change his mind.
HARLAN ULLMAN: We lost control of events on the ground probably in April or May of 2003. And it's taken a long time for that recognition to dawn in the White House.
The President and the administration has refused to recognise reality. Iraq is a disaster. It is a disaster at every level, and to think that they've got a functioning government and to think that the situation is better today than it was in 2003 or 2004, or 2005, is unbelievable.
We have a catastrophe on our hands and of course we've got to make course corrections and the only guy in town who seems not to be able to recognise that, sadly, is the President.
And so under these circumstances, it's very difficult to move forward because of the power of the President, and how you get the President to change his or her mind, in this case his mind, is extremely difficult.
But of course we're on a stupid course, but that doesn't mean that we are going to change it quickly enough to make a difference.
ELEANOR HALL: Does the democracy goal stand any hope of being fulfilled? I mean, Mr Bush and his allies, like Australia's John Howard still do point to elections being successfully held there.
HARLAN ULLMAN: I have a huge respect for John Howard. I think he's a great Prime Minister. But he's not naive, and I think he's supporting the administration... if you took a vote in Australia today about the chances of democracy in Iraq, I suspect that the percentage of people who would agree with that, are about the same percentage of people who expect to fly to the moon tomorrow.
It's just not conceivable, it is not feasible, probably in our lifetime. We should have understood that from the beginning, but we haven't, and what we have to do now is limit the damage in Iraq, so it does not spill over the borders and create a further catastrophe in the Middle East, which we cannot contain.
ELEANOR HALL: Now, you're saying that a change in the Iraq policy is essential. What do you know of the new strategies likely to be recommended by this Iraq study group, led by James Baker?
HARLAN ULLMAN: I know the people on the group, they are rational, and they are smart. And anybody who has looked at this, who is rational, smart and objective, understands that we are losing, that we have to change things, that we have to change our strategy, we have to take American, British, Australian troops out of the line of fire, get them out of Baghdad, get them out of Basra. It's up to the Iraqis.
We know what we have to do is to defend the sovereignty of Iraq, that is the borders, we've got to train, but it's up to the Iraqis. We also have to have a regional conference on Iraq with all the powers, we've got to talk to Iran, and we've got to talk to Syria. Question is, how do you get the President to listen?
ELEANOR HALL: Well, indeed. I mean, let's take the suggestion that the US should seek assistance from Syria and Iran. The Iraqi President has agreed that this could help to end the violence, but can you see the Bush administration agreeing to open a diplomatic front with these two states on Iraq?
HARLAN ULLMAN: No, and that's the problem, because the President is going to hold and is going to say I've got to stay the course and I can't talk to members of the axis of evil. This is the issue.
I mean, George Bush will not change his mind, he's the President. Iraq, the government there, is divided along ethnic lines, it cannot control the militias, it cannot control anything.
And so to say we can't change our course means that we're going to lose this. And what I mean by "lose" is that Iraq becomes a chaotic state, and that chaos extends throughout the greater Middle East. And all of us will suffer for it.
ELEANOR HALL: If James Baker can't convince the President to change, I mean, he's someone with credentials from working with the President's father, then…
HARLAN ULLMAN: That's the problem. James Baker is not well received by George W. Bush. Brent Scowcroft, Colin Powell, Jim Baker, they worked for his father. And they are rational, they are pragmatic, and they are right. And their views butt directly against the President's.
So, it is tough, even though Jim Baker was instrumental in helping George Bush win the (inaudible) and gain the presidency, I think that there is little friendship in that area.
And what you're saying to the President of the United States, somebody who's got a huge ego, who is very, very, very stubborn, "you are wrong". And George Bush does not want to admit he's wrong.
ELEANOR HALL: What about the simple and tragic and reality of the number of deaths of Americans? I mean, is a phased withdrawal something that the President may be able to live with, and how would that work?
HARLAN ULLMAN: Let me be very cynical. We lost 58,000 Americans in Vietnam. So far, we've lost less than 3,000. And I think people are going to say, we can afford 70 Americans, 80 Americans, 100 Americans a month. That's the cost of doing business. I find that repugnant and derelict, but from a political perspective, the public won't like, it but those numbers are not painful enough.
ELEANOR HALL: And that's Harlan Ullman from the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, speaking to me from Washington.
Harlan Ullman. Idiot extraordinbaire.
horsehockey.
If we EVER lost control on the events on the ground, that would be late March/early April of 2004.
Then we kicked the crap out of AQ in Fallujah and then Mookie Sadr in Najaf in August.
Control was reasserted again (if it was every truly lost, which I don't think it was) and the process began anew....
What a bunch of crap.
That was because idiots in the Pentagon thought that US troop levels could go under 100,000 in spring of 2004.
Mistakes were made, big ones, but this hysterical crap is a joke.
Can you imagine these people during WWII or the revolutionary war? I sure can. I can see them pointing out every failure or setback as reason to cut and run. Where would be today if such people got their way back then?
And it clearly drives them mad that Bush refuses to cut and run.
He talks about being rational. His own rhetoric is seeped in irrational emotion.
How bout DONT GIVE UP. That is how we triumph. Whatever happened to that little bit of war advice.
These jokers are saying EXACTLY what the terrorists WANT them to say. Did it ever occur to them if they are so smart?
I'm thinkin' some lonely academic saw his chance to get some press....
"And George Bush does not want to admit he's wrong."
If he gives up he is wrong!
This Ullman dork is one of Larry Wilkerson's and Armitage's gang of clowns.
He thinks our entire country and our system of federal government need his ideas for reform. I think the man overrates his own importance. I'm sure also that George W. Bush and James Baker are reasonably good friends and the President listens to Baker.
What a bunch of nonsense
Harlan Ullman is the same guy who thought that blowing up buildings in a big, loud way ('shock and awe') is all we needed to do. I don't recall him saying that we needed to outright kill hundreds of thousands of Iraqi hardline Sunnis. I don't recall him piping up about post-war planning. Did he warn Rumsfeld about the consequences of ignoring what would happen after we won the initial battles? Lord knows somebody should've...not that he would've listened, of course.
This strategist needs to talk to the SOLDIERS that I've talked to. Of course,strategists don't fight. Soldiers do!
This strategist needs to talk to the SOLDIERS that I've talked to. Of course,strategists don't fight. Soldiers do!
What people like Ullman seem to forget is that the stubborn brutality that the Baathists are using to fight democracy is the same kind of behavior that made them such a threat to the ME and America through the use of WMD. Their lack of regard for human life seen every week in Iraq is exactly the reason why they had to be disarmed of WMD. There's no doubt in my mind too that some of the key evidence about Saddam's WMD programs has not been made public because it was obtained through sources and methods that have to be protected for future use.
Yawn, another big shot spouting off at the mouth with the same old rhetoric, about losing the war, losing control, etc. etc. Just another person patting themselves on the back for "predicting" this chaos, that there never was chance for democracy in iraq. Right, and now after all this time he goes public? Brilliant.
And the "solutions?" Nothing new to any of the suggestions, every other war critic has been saying the same things about withdrawing, changing strategy, etc. etc.
Wow, really earth shaking stuff.
Just another person that anti war crowd can crow over, oh, look, colin powell used to be his student, gush.
What a pile of outrageous BS.
"the US lost control of events in Iraq almost immediately after the invasion and that far from assisting in the development of democracy,"
Yikes. 3 elections and Iraq doesnt have a democracy? we need nothing there!?
"anybody who has looked at this, who is rational, smart and objective, understands that we are losing, that we have to change things, that we have to change our strategy, we have to take American, British, Australian troops out of the line of fire, get them out of Baghdad, get them out of Basra."
When in a tough battle .... run!!!
No sense of "here is our goal and here is how to get there" this is pure defeatism.
"We are losing" - we are losing what exactly? Iraqi stability? Didnt he say "It's up to the Iraqis."
So, if Iraqis say 'help us!' would he?
Iraq's Government has made clear they want us to stay and help stabilize things.
His comments disrespect both the US military and the Iraqi govt.
"We know what we have to do is to defend the sovereignty of Iraq, that is the borders, we've got to train, but it's up to the Iraqis."
HOW WILL "GET OUT OF BAGHDAD" HELP DO THAT?!?!
" We also have to have a regional conference on Iraq with all the powers, we've got to talk to Iran, and we've got to talk to Syria. Question is, how do you get the President to listen?"
OKAY. WHAT IS THE GOAL THERE? TELL IRAN 'GO AHEAD, YOU WIN' OR DEMAND
"HARLAN ULLMAN: No, and that's the problem, because the President is going to hold and is going to say I've got to stay the course and I can't talk to members of the axis of evil. This is the issue."
Of couse, that's BS, we have spoken with Syria and Iran in back channels and we've said 'butt out'. Iraq's Government has relations with both countries and said to stop interfering negatively and help stabilize Iraq.
Right now, Iran and Syria are destabilizing Iraq. For this idiot to blame Bush for that is maddening misdirection!
We have had 4 years of talks with Iran on their nukes. NO PROGRESS. What good are talks with Iran. Simply kill the Iranian agents and diffuse the Iranian bombs.
"I mean, George Bush will not change his mind, he's the President."
Thank God for that. With the limpnoodle advice some give, we'd have lost by now.
"Iraq, the government there, is divided along ethnic lines, it cannot control the militias, it cannot control anything."
There are 250,000+ Army soldiers, the violence in Iraq is restricted to 4 of 18 provinces. This is pure and utter hysteria.
"And so to say we can't change our course means that we're going to lose this. And what I mean by "lose" is that Iraq becomes a chaotic state, and that chaos extends throughout the greater Middle East. And all of us will suffer for it. "
PLEASE EXPLAIN WHAT YOUR STRATEGY FOR WINNING IS, SIR.
So far I have:
1. We are losing, do something different.
2. Talk to Syria and Iran.
... THAT'S IT?!?
Where do we go from there to ... "Iraq is stable and peaceful"... or is this simply ... "OK, Iran, you win. Take over Iraq, just keep the neighborhood nonviolence ..."
If that is the plan, this is most idiotic advice yet.
President Bush is destabilizing the entire viper's nest of Islamofascist states. No, we are not winning, but we are not losing either ... WE ARE FIGHTING. Fighting means the issue is not yet decided. When we are fighting, we dont lose unless we 'blink' or run away.
"It seems like the problems in Iraq are not too complex. Probably 90% of the population wants a functioning democracy. The problem is that some of the formerly dominant Sunni Baathists want to go back to the old days of Sunni domination, and the neighboring Iranian regime doesn't want a democracy next door spreading democratic ideas into Iran. So the Iranian regime is stirring up Shiite militias to destabilize the new democracy. That's a simplification to some extent, but it's disingenuous to blame these problems on the President or Rumsfeld. These problems are caused by some of the Baathists who don't want to give up minority rule and the Iranian regime that doesn't want a democracy next door."
Simplification that is far more spot-on and sophisticated than the defeatist cr*p of the so-called expert.
We are hainv difficulties in Iraq because *serious, evil, violent enemies WANT IRAQ TO FAIL*. You named them. Add in Al Qaeda and their Jihadist/Salafist supporters in the Arab world. A conspiracy of all the anti-western elements to stop the US.
Right now, the "Arabists", who wanted us to suck up to Saudi princes and leave Arabs to their own despotic devices, are coming back out of the woodwork. Like this guy. He's the type who wanted to cut deals with saddam and now wants a deal with the mullah-crats in Tehran.
They are to the Global War on Terror what the 'fellow traveller' leftists were in the Cold War against Communism.
They are either clueless or actually have so fallen in love with the Arab Muslim culture they studied that they want us to lose in our civilizational fight against its darker elements.
"What people like Ullman seem to forget is that the stubborn brutality that the Baathists are using to fight democracy is the same kind of behavior that made them such a threat to the ME and America through the use of WMD. Their lack of regard for human life seen every week in Iraq is exactly the reason why they had to be disarmed of WMD."
YUP. This battle is hard because OUR ENEMIES ARE THAT BAD.
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