Posted on 09/03/2003 4:36:21 PM PDT by Brian S
Jack Straw fears failure in Iraq: determination is the answer By Daniel Johnson (Filed: 04/09/2003)
Yesterday's meeting at 10 Downing Street between Jack Straw and Tony Blair revealed that they are now seriously alarmed by the deteriorating situation in Iraq, and confidential advice to the Foreign Secretary depicts a country on the brink of collapse.
The devastating attacks on the UN headquarters in Baghdad and the Shi'ite holy city of Najaf have clearly prompted a new sense of urgency. Participants at yesterday's meeting were invited to think the hitherto unthinkable: "We are at risk of strategic failure in Iraq."
We cannot be sure that Mr Blair shares this view, as Mr Straw does, but I am confident that it reflects the Whitehall consensus. That consensus claims that Iraqi consent is being undermined by lack of progress in fighting terrorism, maintaining order and restoring the infrastructure and Iraqi self-government.
What is to be done? Mr Straw recommends that an additional brigade be sent to Iraq, bringing British forces back to roughly the level at the end of hostilities. The aim is threefold: to demonstrate resolve to the Iraqi people and coalition partners; to provide more manpower for security and reconstruction; and to persuade America to send more troops, too.
The Foreign Secretary hopes to convince the Prime Minister of the necessity of reinforcements, which are opposed by the Ministry of Defence and the Treasury. He also wants Mr Blair to urge George W Bush to put pressure on the Pentagon to follow suit. But with only 10,000 British troops in Iraq, compared with 140,000 Americans, Mr Blair has a weak hand.
The Foreign Office is particularly anxious about three things. First, diplomatic isolation: "If there is another spectacular [bomb] (eg against a British barracks) we and the US could... find ourselves entirely alone."
Second, money: a cash injection of $127 million (£80 million) to meet "short-term costs" is required, but far more will be needed in the medium term.
Third, time: Mr Straw wants "a major coalition effort to provide visible improvements by the start of Ramadan (Oct 27)". Solidarity, money and time are all in short supply.
The implications of the increasingly fraught private debate on Iraq now being conducted within Government are grave. Islamist terrorists continue to pour into Iraq, and Saddam Hussein is still presumed to be at large.
The additional troops Mr Straw demands will be hard to spare from our overstretched and depleted forces. The economic downturn has dampened Gordon Brown's readiness to replenish the Iraq war chest, and it is clear that Iraq's infrastructure will require investment of a wholly different order of magnitude.
Yesterday, writing in the Telegraph, the US Deputy Secretary of Defence, Paul Wolfowitz, argued eloquently that recent terrorist attacks are intended to "test our will", but that coalition troops "will win, if we continue to give them the moral and material support they need to do the job" [opinion, Sep 3].
The Government believes that the battle for hearts and minds can only be won with far greater support than Washington has so far provided.
However, Mr Bush, too, is reassessing American policy in Iraq. In recent days he has mounted a diplomatic offensive to obtain a new UN resolution, though anticipating French opposition.
He aims to restore full international status to Iraq, so that trade in oil, food and other necessities can resume. He has asked Congress for a further $2.75 billion to spend on reconstruction, with the grid as top priority.
There are also signs that the Pentagon is becoming more flexible in its approach to Iraq. Donald Rumsfeld wants more countries involved so that American forces can concentrate on the fight against terrorism, above all the capture or elimination of Saddam himself.
Like the British, however, Mr Rumsfeld has no more troops to spare for Iraq, and his commander there, Gen John Abizaid, says he does not need them.
It is not true that only the British are alert to the danger of Iraq descending into anarchy, or that the Americans are complacent. The Foreign Office has been more inclined than the Bush Administration to make conciliatory gestures to those of Iraq's neighbours that still support terrorism: Iran and Syria. This includes conceding to Iran a degree of influence on the Shi'ite population of Iraq.
Inside Iraq, the British have been more inclined to trust the former Ba'athists than have their American counterparts. The intensification of the terrorist conflict in recent weeks tends to vindicate the tough-minded American analysis rather than the Foreign Office version.
The British and the Americans agree that handing over power to the Iraqis could improve security and bring UN recognition, thereby releasing funding from international financial institutions. But Washington is determined that the new Iraqi government should be seen by Iraqis not as a puppet regime but as genuinely legitimate.
Americans envisage a transitional period that could last years, before full sovereignty is restored; they do not want to relinquish control prematurely. Former exiles, such as the present chairman of the interim governing council, Ahmad Chalabi, need time to establish their credentials among the populace.
Dr Chalabi has been critical of US governor Paul Bremer for failing to make use of Iraqi warnings of the bombing of the UN; but he would be the first to agree that the new Iraqi cabinet appointed this week is far from ready to take over running the country. A precondition for self-government is the retraining of the entire Iraqi police and security forces, which is already under way but will take years to complete.
Iraq is not a quagmire. If it is to emerge from the shadow of Saddam, however, it will need a coalition presence for years to come. The problems of peace were harder to anticipate than those of war.
Mr Blair and Mr Bush may have underestimated the task of transforming Iraq into a model of freedom for the Muslim world to follow. That does not render their enterprise less noble or less necessary. The fate of the West hangs on its outcome.
Weren't those both places that folks didn't want us to guard as well as we might have liked?
The intensification of the terrorist conflict in recent weeks tends to vindicate the tough-minded American analysis rather than the Foreign Office version.
These incidents underscore the fact that we've let them try it "their way," and their way was not as sensible as ours.
Quagmire, or flypaper?
"We fail!
But screw your courage to the sticking-place,
And we'll not fail."
--Macbeth
Well, if we let the UN in with a strategic say, we sure are!
I fear all the naysayers demanding an "international coalition" are having an effect and the Administration is getting fearful of electoral politics and starting to fold it's winning hand. One would think they would stop listening to America's mortal enemies, which includes the Democrats.
This is the same crap which got us into trouble the last time. We are still paying a huge price for the delay and obfuscuration which in the end did us a lot more harm than good.
As the old Kingston Trio song says,
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