Go Big, Go Long, Go Home: What to do about Iraq
By Chad A. B. Wilson
Published November 21, 2006, 9:37 am in Military / Foreign policy.
After my column last time on the presumptuous Republican candidates for President in 2008, I wanted to spend this post talking about the likely Democratic candidates, but smoething else has caught my attention. Last time, I talked a lot about John McCain's plan to increase troop levels in Iraq, and the Washington Post ran a story yesterday about the Pentagon's study on what to do about Iraq. There are two other studies waiting in the wings, too: one is the President's own study, and the other is by the Iraq Study Group, which is headed by former Secretary of State James Baker III and a former Democratic representative of Indiana, Lee Hamilton.
So we should expect to see a lot of different ideas over the next few months about what to do in Iraq. People agree that a change is needed, and the President realizes that the recent midterm elections were largely about our failed policy in Iraq. So these three studies--Pentagon, Iraq Study Group, and Presidential--will probably each have a different take on the situation. But I think they will all reach a similar conclusion, which will be similar to John McCain's appraisal.
The Pentagon study is not out yet, but there are rumors that it will likely recommend a hybrid approach. Last time, I said that the two options are basically that we should pull out or send in more troops to stabilize the country. The Pentagon suggests that there are three options: "send in more troops, shrink the force but stay longer, or pull out", and the Washington post calls these the "go big, go long, or go home" approaches. What seems most likely is a combination of all three, or a hybrid approach.
No one wants to get wrapped up in a huge war, and everyone agrees that our people should come home. We don't want anymore soldiers to die, after all. The question is when they should come home. According to many Democrats, they should come home now, no questions asked. It's almost like a continuation of the "don't ask, don't tell" policy. You know, "don't ask what's wrong in Iraq," and "don't tell anyone that things are screwed up." In other words, keep your mouth shut, your eyes closed, and you can come home. But this ignores the reality of the mess we've made over there. Civil war is ripe, just waiting to be picked, and if we pull out now, it seems inevitable that the violence will escalate out of all proportion. I don't think we can pull out now, not without abandoning the mess of our own creation. I can't stand it that we went in, mucked everything up, and then left them with something like, "hey, you now have democracy--good luck!"
In fact, such actions are strongly discouraged under U.N. guidelines. Under these guidelines, a country is responsible for rebuilding when any military actions are taken. Therefore, the U.S. would be ethically and perhaps even legally responsible for what happens in Iraq after the U.S. invasion. Using even general morality and disregarding legality, it seems wrong that we leave Iraq in the state it is in now. Even if the people are free now, and they don't have to put up with the bad guy Saddam, I'm not sure I would say that the situation is better for the people. Some of the people are in much more danger now than they ever were under Saddam. Some of them, of course, are much better off, especially groups such as the Kurds.
If the "go home now" approach isn't really an option (and I don't think it is), we have to figure out a way to finish the job and then get the heck out of there. So we either dramatically increase our forces, keep the forces we have there for longer periods of time, or combine these things by increasing forces and staying there until the job is done. I don't think it will work with the amount of forces we have there now. Violence is not decreasing, and it doesn't look like this will happen anytime soon. We need more people there before the country can be stabilized.
First, we have to prevent the violence. If the Iraqi forces are not up to the job yet, then we need more American troops there to do this. As many as it takes. We can't make ourselves or our interests vulnerable by piling all of our resources into Iraq, but we need a lot more people there. I'm not a military strategist, so I can't say whether 100 or 100,000 will do the trick, but we need a bigger presence.
Once the violence is curbed or crushed or however it is to be done while still respecting democracy and human rights, then we need to train the Iraqis. General John Abazaid, the top U.S. military officer in Iraq, agrees that our efforts need to work towards training the Iraqi forces. A recent Washington Post article suggests that it could take five to ten years to fully train a large enough Iraqi force to keep order in the country. And according to this article, the training hasn't been going so well. The officers in charge of training haven't fully understood the situation in Iraq in the first place, and they're trying to train people they can't fully communicate with on how to handle a situation that they themselves don't fully understand. So first, our troops need to be trained on the situation and how to train the Iraqis.
But the U.S. soldiers need more support to even accomplish this much. Tere aren't enough interpreters or office supplies to fully support training, so the Washington Post article claims. So our military may not be fully set on training.
It makes sense, too. There's no glory in training. In fact, there's nothing in it. But it's an exit strategy, and it's not a new one. It has been the plan all along, according to the Pentagon and the White House. I'm not saying anything new here, for that has been the goal: establish democracy and train the Iraqis to take care of themselves (with our interests in mind, of course. The criticisms in this area suggest that the effort has been half-hearted. We don't hear about it on the news, do we? "Two more Iraqi officers trained in combat today..." That's not news. We don't hear about much, except a celebrity was killed and three more Americans were killed.
But we need to know the good, too. We need to know because it will lead to what everyone wants: an exit from Iraq. Keeping the forces there and trudging through it doesn't seem like an option. And turning tail before its over isn't an option, no matter how much we may want it. We must put our efforts into stabilization and training. That's where the good will come.
Nancy Pelosi and John Murtha may not like it, but it seems like the only option.
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