Lack of troops threatens Bush's postwar goals

Ethnic rivalries, persistent militias and hidden weapons in Iraq (news - web sites) will greatly increase the burden on our postwar occupation. In fact, the Iraqi conflict has exposed a looming manpower problem: A full-blown peacekeeping operation would require as many as 500,000 troops. To avoid stretching our forces too thin, President Bush (news - web sites) will be forced to sacrifice at least one of three cherished policy goals:

* Continuing the war on terrorism against the remnants of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan (news - web sites), Pakistan, the Philippines and, if necessary, against states such as Syria, Iran and North Korea (news - web sites).

* Avoiding unpopular measures such as reinstituting the military draft or calling up large numbers of military reserves to extended active duty.

Unfortunately, the numbers for all three don't add up. History shows that two factors determine the force level necessary for policing operations: the size of the population and the underlying level of violence. As documented by Rand Corp. analyst James Quinlivan, societies with relatively low levels of civil violence, such as the United States, require only two to three police officers per thousand residents. By contrast, during instability in places such as Northern Ireland, Malaysia, Bosnia and Kosovo, intervention forces have required approximately 20 troops per thousand residents to maintain order.

Postwar Iraq will likely fall in the latter category. Even before this war, Iraq was seething with ethnic discontent, partly due to Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s vicious suppression of Kurdish and Shiite revolts in 1991. Now, Iraqi Kurds are taking back their former homes in the north, sending Arabs fleeing for their lives. In the south, Iraq's Shiite majority likewise seeks revenge against anyone associated with the Sunni-dominated regime of Saddam.

Further complicating matters, Turkish troops might cross into northern Iraq to defend ethnic brethren and oil claims if Iraq's Kurds attempt to consolidate control over Kirkuk and Mosul. In addition, the demise of Saddam's security apparatus has sparked widespread banditry and looting, leading some areas to embrace radical religious leaders hostile to the U.S. occupation. Finally, the unexpectedly strong resistance of Saddam's militias during the war, the discovery of arms caches throughout the country and the influx of self-declared Arab holy warriors suggest that armed insurgency and suicide attacks could persist.

To quash all of this simmering civil violence, centralized policing of postwar Iraq would require an average troop level of about 20 per thousand residents. Given Iraq's population of about 24 million, that could mean 480,000 peacekeepers.

Two factors potentially could lessen the demand for U.S. troops. First, past cases indicate that if violence were lighter or regionally circumscribed, policing requirements might drop as low as 10 troops per thousand, or a total of 240,000. Second, our allies might contribute troops; the United States is making ''a very active effort'' in this regard, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Tuesday. However, given the original opposition of France, Germany and Russia to the U.S.-led invasion -- and the limited ability of these states to project force in any case -- these allies are unlikely to provide a large share of the troops. At least 200,000 peacekeepers probably would have to be Americans.

U.S. manpower requirements would climb even higher because of the demands of troop rotation. For every U.S. peacekeeper on duty in Iraq, another would be at home training to take his place, and yet another who had recently served would be recovering. Depending on the length of these training, deployment and recovery cycles, troop requirements could be multiplied by two to three times.

Given that the U.S. Army and Marines have combined active-duty forces of only about 700,000 men and women, this would leave very few for other missions -- either long-term commitments in Asia or the war on terror.

* He could sacrifice democracy in Iraq. This would ease U.S. troop requirements by delegating policing to regional warlords. Kurdish rebel groups could rule the north, the Shiites would try to rule the south, and some remnant of Saddam's Sunni regime would retain central Iraq.

The limits of this kind of ''peace-on-the-cheap'' solution have been revealed in Afghanistan, where a slim force of about 15,000 U.S. and international troops has delegated authority to local warlords, who continue to battle each other and to harbor remnants of al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters that target U.S. forces.

Similar shortcuts in Iraq might be adequate to buy temporary order, but would have no hope of delivering Bush's promised democracy.

* Bush could sacrifice the war on terror, conceding that peacekeeping demands in Iraq do not leave sufficient forces to fight the remainder of al-Qaeda and the ''axis of evil.'' This seems the least likely sacrifice.

* To provide sufficient forces for both Iraq and the larger war on terror, he could either reinstitute the military draft or activate large numbers of military reserves for extended tours of active duty. Both options would be opposed by White House pollsters, but the president may well accept such political risk in the name of national security.

Obviously, the United States must concentrate first on finishing this war. But it is not too early for Congress and the American people to ask Bush how he plans to address the looming postwar crisis.

Mr Kuperman’s anti war anti Bush opinions have already been focused on

http://www.jhubc.it/bcjournal/opinions/20030225palermo.cfm

Should The US Punch First? Yes.
Richard C. Palermo, Jr.

Alan J. Kuperman’s op-ed piece in December(1) was overly simplistic, misinterpreted the facts and used irrelevant examples in a vain attempt to support his view. Kuperman’s arguments actually build the case FOR a preemptive strike against Iraq. Let’s run through some of his examples and get to the real story.

First is his ridiculous example of the Soviet Union in the 1940s. This one is probably the most absurd, but we’ll have a look anyway. Kuperman asks us to “imagine” the United States being faced with the threat of nuclear weapons development from the Soviet Union. Well, I ask you to imagine if the United States had acted preemptively, not in the late 1940s when it was too late, but earlier. Kuperman argues the costs would have been too high had the United States acted. Sure, in 1949. But what about 1936, when Stalin was murdering 20-30 million innocents? Unfortunately, America sat on its isolationist hands and instead ended up in the most costly and risky arms race in the history of the world and near nuclear annihilation. Yeah, the Cold War was a real Nirvana.

The U.S. policy of containment against the Soviet threat that Kuperman exalts is fundamentally different from the containment policy toward Iraq. As Kenneth Pollack so aptly notes in his recent book The Threatening Storm, U.S. policy toward the Soviet Union was aimed at keeping the Soviets within their own borders and preventing them from spreading communism elsewhere. The goal was not disarmament. In Iraq, containment policy means not just keeping Iraq within its borders, but also disarming the country(2). Unfortunately, it’s in the area of disarmament that containment has failed miserably.

Next, Kuperman argues that the preemptive strategy will backfire making all sorts of unsubstantiated claims that have no historical precedents or relevance. Let’s run through them all to clear this up. Kuperman argues that the first-strike strategy will likely “cause the wars it ostensibly seeks to prevent.” That sounds like a pretty good point, especially quoting the game theory specialist Schelling. However, that argument assumes that Iraq would have to take preemptive action, which U.S. coercive tactics are trying to stop. Given that most pundits and pacifists claim that Saddam is not suicidal, that prospect is fairly remote(3). Starting a war with the United States would actually legitimize U.S. military action – both in public opinion and under the United Nations Charter that allows for self-defense.

Third, he claims that rogue states like Libya can be reigned in without risky invasions. True, Col. Muammar Qadhafi was reigned in after the bombing of Tripoli in 1986, but that same strategy has not worked with Saddam. For the past 12 years, U.S. and British planes have flown patrols over the U.N. sanctioned “no-fly” zones, routinely getting fired upon and firing back with a consistency that should be distressing to those arguing for a containment policy. Despite our obvious policy of containment, all intelligence points to Saddam’s continued efforts to develop WMD, including nuclear weapons. Secretary of State Colin Powell’s speech to the UN gave ample evidence.

Worse, a continuation of a containment strategy will prolong the unnecessary suffering of the Iraqi people. Ten more years of containment could result in millions of deaths. Coercive threats and bombings worked on Qadhafi, and even Milosevic in Yugoslavia, but that same strategy has failed to work with Saddam. We are still at the same spot as we were at the end of the 1991 Gulf War.

Better still, the most recent run-around that the UNMOVIC weapons inspectors have gotten over the past three months only reinforces the futility of continuing a policy of containment. Interestingly, Bill Clinton tried the containment approach so beloved by Kuperman with North Korea, and that cannot be classified as anything but a colossal failure. Certain leaders lack the morality and integrity to respond to negotiations and formal agreements. We discovered that with Kim Jong II. Fortunately, we already know Saddam falls into this category, so we should have the intelligence to recognize that a different approach is needed. Saddam appears to only understand once his nose is bloodied, so logic leads us to a more coercive approach that utilizes military force if necessary. Read Pollock’s account of Iraqi challenges and concessions between 1992-2002 and this pattern is clearly evident.

Now we move to Kuperman’s “copy-cat” argument that other states may take a cue and act preemptively. History tells us otherwise. In 1967, Israel conducted preemptive strikes against neighboring Arab states. According to Kuperman, this should have triggered a rash of preemptive wars, however one glance at the history books shows this didn’t happen. Further, in 1981, the Israelis acted preemptively again when they destroyed the Iraqi nuclear reactor Osirak I, effectively preventing Saddam from developing nuclear weapons at the time. Oddly enough, again, no wars broke out, the sky didn’t fall, and better still, potential proliferation of WMD was prevented.

Lastly, Kuperman argues that “history’s most fundamental lesson” is that military force results in opposition rather than compliance. I guess Kosovo doesn’t count in Kuperman’s analysis. For all its flaws in execution, the threat of a ground invasion backed by heavy NATO bombings forced Milosovic to capitulate. Obviously, this may not work in every instance as the circumstances and political will of the world will vary, but in certain cases, coercive diplomacy, as General (Ret.) Wesley Clark calls it(4), can be effective.

One should never take war lightly. It is an inherently dangerous and risky venture that places many lives at risk. However, it sometimes is a necessary evil, even if this evil lies somewhere in the future. It is difficult to support Kuperman’s arguments when the result could be a world where Saddam Hussein has nuclear weapons. Inspections are pointless, especially when led by a man who in 1991 declared that Iraq was clean of any nuclear weapons programs. Saddam has no intention of giving up his WMD – we should recognize this and act accordingly. Punch first.
1 See Alan J. Kuperman, “Should the US Punch First? No,” USAToday, December X, 2002, section A, p. 10.
2 Kenneth M. Pollack, The Threatening Storm (New York: Random House, 2002).
3 For example, Alan Bock, “Eye on the Empire: Weak Arguments for an Attack,” Antiwar.com, September 3, 2002. < http://www.antiwar.com/bock/b090302.html >
4 General (Ret.) Wesley K. Clark, Waging Modern Warfare (New York: PublicAffairs, 2001), pp. 415.
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