John Burns, who is the NYT’s “our man in the Green Zone” of Baghdad, has an important piece in Sunday’s paper that refers clearly to (un-named) US officers there complaining in his hearing that the troop levels at their command are far too low for them to be effective.
The piece also clearly indicates a growing realization among some top US officers that the war in Iraq is unwinnable.
Burns writes that earlier in the past week, the Pentagon had publicly offered a date for a reduction in the current troop levels “even earlier” than the October 1, 2006 date earlier requested by two Republican and two Democratic members of Congress in a letter to Prez Bush. But, Burns notes,
- in recent weeks, American generals here have been telling Congressional visitors that the disappointing performance of many Iraqi combat units has made early departures impractical. They say it will be two years or more before Iraqis can be expected to begin replacing American units as the main guarantors of security.
Commanders concerned for their careers have not thought it prudent to go further, and to say publicly what many say privately: that with recent American troop levels – 139,000 now – they have been forced to play an infernal board game, constantly shuttling combat units from one war zone to another, leaving insurgent buildups unmet in some places while they deal with more urgent problems elsewhere.
… American commanders here have been cautioned by the reality that the Pentagon, in a time of all-volunteer forces and plunging recruiting levels, has few if any extra troops to deploy, and that there are limits to what American public opinion would bear. So the generals have kept quiet about troop levels.
Soldiers in the field, though, have not. Among fighting units in the war’s badlands – in Falluja and Ramadi, in Haditha and Qaim, in Mosul and Tal Afar – complaints about force levels are the talk of officers and enlisted personnel alike.
Burns writes:
- The scope of the problem can be taken from the garrison in the Baghdad area. Maj. Gen. William G. Webster, commander of the Third Infantry Division, recently gave a rundown of the troops available to meet the surge of suicide bombings, buried roadside explosives and ambushes that have killed more than 600 people in the city since the new Shiite majority government took office in early May: 27,000 American troops, 15,000 Iraqi policemen and 7,000 Iraqi soldiers. Saddam Hussein, he said, had a regular garrison for the same area of 80,000 troops and 50,000 police.
Mr. Hussein ran a totalitarian state and had to worry about invasions, so direct comparisons can be misleading. Still, the fact that an American general had the statistics at his fingertips told its own story. The pattern of thin force levels seems to be replicated, in differing ways, almost everywhere Americans confront insurgents…
Partly, it is a matter of terrain. Iraq runs 600 miles north to south, 400 miles east to west, with vast deserts and innumerable villages that can shelter rebels. American commanders, their army bottom-heavy with support units, have at most 60,000 American and allied combat soldiers available, and only a fraction as many Iraqi soldiers rated combat-ready. Recent American intelligence estimates put the insurgents’ strength from 12,000 to 20,000.
No district of Baghdad, with Iraq’s highest concentration of troops, is remotely safe. And a rare drive outside the capital last week showed how anarchic the hinterland has become. To move concrete blocks for a new checkpoint near a base at Taji, 15 miles from Baghdad, American troops blocked the main highway north for two hours with tanks, troop carriers and Apache helicopters circling overhead. In an 80-mile round trip, it was the only sighting of Americans, though the blight of war was everywhere. For mile after mile, the highway was strewn with rusting hulks of blown-up cars and trucks, with huge bomb craters beside the road.
Another journey last month pointed at the same challenge, not enough troops to establish control. Officers of the 42nd Infantry Division at Baquba, 50 miles northeast of Baghdad, presented a picture of restored calm. A few days later, insurgents hiding in a sprawling palm grove just south of the town shot down a Kiowa helicopter in a nighttime attack, killing both crewmen, and pitted another Kiowa with ground fire when it hovered over the burning wreckage, causing it to make an emergency landing. American officers said later that with most of their troops hunkered in their bases, they had been unaware that rebels had infiltrated the grove.
Burns does spend a couple of paras reporting that Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top American officer in Iraq, and some others have said that on occasion the problem is not too few US forces in the country, but too many. However, the two examples he cites there indicate that perhaps it was not the excessive number of US forces that was the problem, but rather their inappropriate use… Also, these examples are small and isolated compared with the larger problems of too few troops that he reports on.
He concludes:
- whether there are too many American soldiers or too few, a feeling is growing among senior officers in Baghdad and Washington that it is only a matter of time before the Pentagon sets a timetable of its own for withdrawal. These officers point to the effect on American public opinion of the slow disintegration of the 30-nation military coalition that America leads, and to frustration on Capitol Hill with the faltering buildup of Iraqi forces. These officers also cite the recruiting slump and fear the risk is growing that the war, like Vietnam, will do lasting damage to the Army and the Marines.
“I think the drawdown will occur next year, whether the Iraqi security forces are ready or not,” a senior Marine officer in Washington said last week. “Look for covering phrases like ‘We need to start letting the Iraqis stand on their own feet, and that isn’t going to happen until we start drawing down’. “
So it seems that many US officers, including the tight-lipped generals, may well have reached the conclusion that the war in Iraq as presently configured, is quite unwinnable.
I reached that conclusion a while back– and the total political failure of the US command authorities to take advantage of the “negotiated way out” of the imbroglio that was made available to them in the wake of the January elections means that the ending of this war may well be extremely messy and vindictive for everyone concerned. Especially, the Iraqis– but not excluding the US forces.
Couldn’t the US just say that “we will leave when the Iraqi army gets to 200,000 people”. That way the insurgents would join the army, rather than blowing those poor guys up.
“The piece also clearly indicates a growing realization among some top US officers that the war in Iraq is unwinnable.”
The piece just doesn’t say that. The article emphasizes that more troops are wanted by US officiers, and the article discusses problems rather than victories.
Why is it so important to Helena that the war in Iraq be “unwinnable”? Hint: why did Helena write so much about the ‘Stress positions’ and lap-dancing at Gitmo but ignore this article on the torture houses of Karabila? And why no mention of the manual “The Principles of Jihadist Philosophy” that was found there? Why are Jihad and Torture in Iraq not part of “World News?”
Could Helena be rooting for the insurgents? Just maybe?
When time permits, we’ll have to have a discussion of the section of the manual called “The Legitimacy of Cutting the Infidels’ Heads.” Do you think Quakers are infidels? Or just Hindus, Christians and Jews?
Well, Warren, W, if what U.S. officers want is more troops, why don’t you oblige them by putting your sorry ass where your big, braying mouth is, and signing up?
Warren, the point you’re missing about torture, is that WE cannot be the torturers. There’s not much of story in terrorists or insurgents or any other militant group torturing people, but when the U.S.government engages in those activities and tries to justify them, that’s shocking news.
Thus your attempt to paint anyone who expresses outrage at Americans torturing prisoners is bogus. It betrays more about the moral depravity of the far right than any of them will admit, because the aim is to justify torture, and most decent Americans find that deplorable. We are better than our enemy, and we expect our government to reflect the best in us.
“Beware in fighting monstors that you don’t become one” – Nietzsche
As to the war being unwinnable. That’s just the reality.
Take it like a man.
W, this is rhetoric. First, all insurgents are not islamists. Second, America, being a democracy, should not behave badlier (Dubyahism) than a Banana Republic. Finally, the couplet about religion is sheer malice.
“If this is right, then there will be an invasion, which will be difficult if not impossible to win, the loss of many lives (most notably U.S. lives), and eventually a quasi-withdrawal by the U.S. A second Vietnam.”
– from “Iraq: how great powers bring themselves down” by Immanuel Wallerstein, April, 1 2002.
Evidently Professor Wallerstein could see this coming right from the start.
A lot of us saw it coming right from the start, because we understand Iraq.
Yes, most of the antiwar warned against the actual outcome, the French and German governments included.
Wallerstein was wrong on one thing however : the most lost lives don’t affect the US, the highest death toll hit the Iraqis.
The Iraqis are supposed to be grateful for the two rights they have been granted:
The right to say they agree with America.
The right to vote for a government that takes orders from America.
Peaceful dissent punished by threats, home invasions and detention without trial.
More American troops=more insurgent recruiters.
Like an echo to Helena’s entry, Juan Cole has an interesting piece to-day, contemplating The United Nation Strategy as a resolution to the Iraq Crisis.
As an European, I find this solution terribly arrogant. What ?! the US government plays the sorcerer’s apprentice and then when they are mirred in a quagmire, they call the UN and other nations to play the firemen and quell the turmoil they initiated. This is akin to blakmail : if you don’t come to rescue, you won’t get the oil. Let the US pay herself for her error. Let her compensate the Iraqis for all the harm she has done to them. She is responsible (along with that infamous coalition of the willing), not those who were against this war.
That said, I’m not even sure this solution is workable : The other countries are pissed off by US arrogance and won’t rush to help her. The UN has been kept out of the loop and humiliated so many times by the actual US government that they won’t rush to rescue either. The US has instrumentalized the UN to such a degree that now it is only seen like another american tool by the Iraqis who hates it; they haven’t forgot the WMD inspections, nor the sanctions.
Things look as if the neocons had burned everything down to the ground behind themselves before starting this adventure, just to be sure that whatever succeeds the US won’t be tempted to backtrack. That she will be forced to dig the hole where she stays deeper. The main thing for the neocons was to get there, hence the lies and the shameless use of 9/11. If things had been going like they promised (oil paying for reconstruction and Iraqis wellcoming the US “liberators”), then all the better. If not, then anyway, the civil war they inflammed will justify their presence for ever.
To return to Helena’s entry : the US isn’t winning, but she can deal with a situation of low grade conflict for years. The important thing, from the neocons point of view, is that as long as the US is there, they can control who is buying/getting the oil. I’m not even sure that if the Democrates are able to throw the neocons out of the government they would be able/willing to implement a withdrawal.
Sorry to be so pessimist.
Christiane,
Wallerstein didn’t mean that most lives lost would be American ones. He meant that there that would be many many lives lost, and that this would include lots of Americans as well.
Incidentally, his prophetic essay began with this acute observation “George W. Bush is a geopolitical incompetent. He has allowed a clique of hawks to induce him to take a position, an invasion of Iraq … which will have nothing but negative consequences, for everyone but first of all for the United States.”
Shirin:
If your logic about my self expression is right, you’d have to join the insurgency. And my mouth does not bray, but your remarks lack courtesy. Getting personal with people who disagree is a fault of the immature. I hope you’re young enough to have that excuse.
Diana:
Your are right, the US cannot be allowed to be the torturers. On balance, the US has done some weak play-torture (nude photos), some real stress (cuffed to the floor), and some fatal crimes (that cab driver who was murdered in Afghanistan). The US government is prosecuting at least some of it’s criminals. The head-choppers just keep on getting worse. The outrage of the moralists should be against the insurgents who would put a Saddam type terror-government into power in Iraq, not the US, which is helping to build real democracy. If you’re not outraged at the insurgents, you’re not a moralist.
In order for Iraq to be free of torture, the insurgents must lose. Any other position is support of rule-by-terror in Iraq. Even though Bush really truly does have an extensive list of faults.
Peter:
I did not mean to imply that all Muslims are Terrorists, as I do not believe that. And my line about religion was conceived as an attempt to get Helena to see the stakes, and that they’d cut off her head too, not as malice against Quakers.
Getting personal with people who disagree is a fault of the immature. I hope you’re young enough to have that excuse.-WarrenW
Seems your comments about the Quakers was pretty personal, so what’s your age?
some fatal crimes -WarrenW
I heard there were over 100 killed in US run prisons in Iraq and Afghanistan. That is not “some”. Most are not being prosecuted and many have been let off completely.
“the US has done some weak play-torture (nude photos)” -WarrenW
That was not “play-torture” it was sexual abuse and torture. Many victims of sexual abuse and assault end up being suicidal, sometimes years or decades later. I have heard in the Muslim culture that those types of behaviors result in an “impure” soul and one way to purify the soul would be a “martyr operation”. Is this were some of the suicide bombers are coming from? hmmm….
That statement you made shows your total lack of understanding on just how very, very devastating sexual assault can be on a person. I have seen people in therapy groups who are still devastated decades after it happened. It cuts to the soul. I would say, on par, sexual assault is much worse than physical assault, and that is much worse than emotional assault.
I thought the most interesting phrase in Burns’ article was one of those Helena underlined: “it is only a matter of time before the Pentagon sets a timetable of its own for withdrawal.” Burns has been doing this for a long time, and is very careful with his choice of words. Here he seems deliberately ambiguous. I wonder exactly what he meant by the Pentagon setting “a timetable of its own?” Did he mean to contrast the Pentagon’s timetable with some fictional timetable to be established by the new Iraqi “government?” Or was he hinting that the professional military may be getting ready to draw a line for the civilian hawks in the U.S. government?
from Andrew Sullivan’s blog about torture by US troops:
“Worse, the president has never acknowledged the scope or the real gravity of what has taken place. His first instinct was to minimize the issue; later, his main references to it were a couple of sentences claiming that the abuses were the work of a handful of miscreants, rather than a consequence of his own decisions. But the impact of these events on domestic morale, on the morale of the vast majority of honorable soldiers in a very tough place and on the reputation of the United States in the Middle East is incalculable.”
He has a lot more on his blog, but he forgot to mention that torture by US troops puts other US troops and even US citizens in more danger. Added to that: the US taxpayers are paying for it.
I will never understand how so-called “decent” people can think that morality is relative.
“I will never understand how so-called “decent” people can think that morality is relative.”
Er . . . um . . . I kinda think it is. I mean, aren’t some acts worse than others? Of course, I may not be a so-called decent person.
John C.
John C:
“morality” [if your acts are, or aren’t, congruent with your beliefs]is ‘relative’.
“ethics” [how you act towards others] isn’t.
“beliefs” = “ideas you decide to agree with,again and again.”
I agree with previous standpoint.
<a href=”http://exp1-24.expert-pro.net/leoneuler.html”>Leon Euler</a>