No More Troops
NO MORE TROOPS says RALPH PETERS.
At this point I'm inclined to agree. I've been a proponent of the Iraq war since before it started and of Transformation as well. I've been careful to delineate between trends and states. That is, the trend may be improve but the state of things is still poor. I've firmly believed that while the state of things in Iraq was generally poor, the trend was improving. Now, I don't think so anymore. Transformation from a warfighting perspective is a success. As a means of peacekeeping, however, it is an abject failure. They are two vastly different things. One is warfighting and the other is police work. Soldiers are not cops and should not be. Transformations gaping hole is that they need civil affairs battalions as large as (if not larger than) the warfighting and it's attendant support commands. Now, things are divided into Tooth and Tail. Tooth does the fighting and tail supports those fighters. We need a third distinct category for civil affairs. Something akin to Mop and Bucket. They will go about getting a civil society up and running. (Assuming we continue our foreign adventurism).
Ralph Peters has been an even more ardent supporter of the war than I have and has the experience to speak knowledgably. I've pulled some quote from his article:
This does not bode well. It's apparent that things are trending worse even though the state is better than it was when we arrived. We've somehow lost the momentum and likely the will to win this. I've been fiercely resisting the idea of a timetable for withdrawal as a cut and run scenario. I've always called for goal based withdrawal. That is, when certain goals are achieved, we will withdraw our troops accordingly. Another key reason I've resisted such calls is that I've found they usually come from the most partisan of sources who only want to withdraw because they believe it will be a black eye for George Bush, America or both. It is now apparent that the Iraqis are either unwilling or unable to help root out the terrorists in their midst. They don't want to face the very real threat of having their whole family slaughtered for working with the Americans. I don't blame them. To be an Iraqi policeman is to risks far beyond what I've ever taken. I don't know that I would do the same in their position.
That said, I'm inclined to agree with Peters in that he has no partisan dog in this fight. He is not running for election and if this rock ribbed defender of the war is starting to question our ability to win it, I have to cast a cold and cyincal eye on what we're doing there. Either the Iraqis are going to stand up and be counted or they are not. They have to be given the cold hard choice of fight these guys now when we're here to help, or you're going to be on your own to fight them when we leave in a year. It's up to you.
I've also resisted calls for Rumsfeld's head as I didn't think this was his problem. To some extent, it isn't. Our pants-wetting over Abu Gharib and Gitmo have constrained our guys to an extent that they're simply interested in keeping themselves and their comrades alive until their rotation is over. Who can blame them? Who wants to find themselves on the wrong end of an General Court Martial for roughing up a detainee? No, this is going to continue apace unless or until we fire Rumsfeld, pull out entirely or both.
If it were up to me, I'd wait until just after the election and have Rumsfeld retire "to spend more time with his family" and the appoint somebody who can start with a clean slate and get this thing back on track if possible. I'm not holding my breath.
At this point I'm inclined to agree. I've been a proponent of the Iraq war since before it started and of Transformation as well. I've been careful to delineate between trends and states. That is, the trend may be improve but the state of things is still poor. I've firmly believed that while the state of things in Iraq was generally poor, the trend was improving. Now, I don't think so anymore. Transformation from a warfighting perspective is a success. As a means of peacekeeping, however, it is an abject failure. They are two vastly different things. One is warfighting and the other is police work. Soldiers are not cops and should not be. Transformations gaping hole is that they need civil affairs battalions as large as (if not larger than) the warfighting and it's attendant support commands. Now, things are divided into Tooth and Tail. Tooth does the fighting and tail supports those fighters. We need a third distinct category for civil affairs. Something akin to Mop and Bucket. They will go about getting a civil society up and running. (Assuming we continue our foreign adventurism).
Ralph Peters has been an even more ardent supporter of the war than I have and has the experience to speak knowledgably. I've pulled some quote from his article:
Sending more troops wouldn't help and can't be done. It's too late. We've reached the point where Iraqis must fight for their own future. If they won't, nothing we can do will bring success.
If Iraq's leaders stop squabbling and lead, and if Iraq's soldiers and police fight resolutely for their constitutional state, we should be willing to stay "as long as it takes." But if they continue to wallow in ethnic and religious partisanship while doing as little as possible for their own country, we need to leave and let them face the consequences.
Give them one more year. And that's it.
And, although it pains me to write it, we can't trust the judgment of our military officers as to whether Iraqi troops and police are making sufficient progress. Clientitis happens. Our trainers inevitably cling to the success stories, insisting, Yeah, those other guys poked the pooch - but Col. Mohammed's men are doing a great job.
If Iraq does fail, the cold truth is that the United States will do fine. We'll honor our dead, salve the wounds to our vanity and march on stronger than ever (with the world's most powerful and most experienced military). But the Middle East will have revealed itself as hopeless.
This does not bode well. It's apparent that things are trending worse even though the state is better than it was when we arrived. We've somehow lost the momentum and likely the will to win this. I've been fiercely resisting the idea of a timetable for withdrawal as a cut and run scenario. I've always called for goal based withdrawal. That is, when certain goals are achieved, we will withdraw our troops accordingly. Another key reason I've resisted such calls is that I've found they usually come from the most partisan of sources who only want to withdraw because they believe it will be a black eye for George Bush, America or both. It is now apparent that the Iraqis are either unwilling or unable to help root out the terrorists in their midst. They don't want to face the very real threat of having their whole family slaughtered for working with the Americans. I don't blame them. To be an Iraqi policeman is to risks far beyond what I've ever taken. I don't know that I would do the same in their position.
That said, I'm inclined to agree with Peters in that he has no partisan dog in this fight. He is not running for election and if this rock ribbed defender of the war is starting to question our ability to win it, I have to cast a cold and cyincal eye on what we're doing there. Either the Iraqis are going to stand up and be counted or they are not. They have to be given the cold hard choice of fight these guys now when we're here to help, or you're going to be on your own to fight them when we leave in a year. It's up to you.
I've also resisted calls for Rumsfeld's head as I didn't think this was his problem. To some extent, it isn't. Our pants-wetting over Abu Gharib and Gitmo have constrained our guys to an extent that they're simply interested in keeping themselves and their comrades alive until their rotation is over. Who can blame them? Who wants to find themselves on the wrong end of an General Court Martial for roughing up a detainee? No, this is going to continue apace unless or until we fire Rumsfeld, pull out entirely or both.
If it were up to me, I'd wait until just after the election and have Rumsfeld retire "to spend more time with his family" and the appoint somebody who can start with a clean slate and get this thing back on track if possible. I'm not holding my breath.
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