democracyarsenal.org: Petraeus Again

June 04, 2007

Petraeus Again
Posted by Ilan Goldenberg

So, first, Colonel Boylan, I’d like to change the subject and get your response to today’s reports that to date we’ve only secured 1/3 of Bagdhad’s neighborhoods and are behind schedule on the “surge”. Combine this with the statements by General Petraeus that "You have not even seen the start of real operations," and this makes me think that the military still doesn’t have a clear idea yet on whether the “surge” is working or not. But at the same time you also have reports coming out that

The senior U.S. commanders in Iraq -- Lt. Gen. Ray Odierno and Gen. David Petraeus -- want the surge to continue until at least December and expect to report enough progress in Iraq by September to justify it

There seem to be some contradictions here. Things aren’t going as well as the planners expected. The strategy hasn’t been fully implemented yet. But we are going to report enough progress to give us more time. I guess my question to Colonel Boylan is: Are there any circumstances under which General Petraeus would actually be willing to say that the current strategy isn’t working? Because It doesn’t seem like he will

Now, as to the other points made by Colonel. First he states:

You and Korb both say that the piece written by Gen Petraeus was “misleading” when in fact the article is a series of facts about the conditions on the ground at that time.

Three years after General Petraeus’s op-ed we still don’t have functional security forces in Iraq. Just today Brig. Gen. Vincent K. Brooks, the deputy commander of the First Cavalry Division stated in an interview:

That while military planners had expected to make greater gains by now, that has not been possible in large part because Iraqi police and army units, which were expected to handle basic security tasks, like manning checkpoints and conducting patrols, have not provided all the forces promised, and in some cases have performed poorly.

This is what General Petraus wrote three years ago. I repeat. Three years ago!!

There will be more tough times, frustration and disappointment along the way. It is likely that insurgent attacks will escalate as Iraq's elections approach. Iraq's security forces are, however, developing steadily and they are in the fight. Momentum has gathered in recent months. With strong Iraqi leaders out front and with continued coalition -- and now NATO -- support, this trend will continue. It will not be easy, but few worthwhile things are.

General Petraeus is one of the foremost experts on counter insurgency. You can list a number of metrics that prove your point, which is what the General did in the op-ed. But he either grossly misunderstood the situation by painting a positive picture or he was purposely trying to put the best face possible on a bad situation. Considering his expertise I doubt he misunderstood the situation that badly. It does not matter how many facts you list. If you know that the conclusion you are promoting is questionable, you are not being fully objective.

In terms of the op-eds. The Record in Bergen County was just a reprint of the Washington Post op-ed and the piece in the Weekly Standard was just clips from the General’s briefing. So, it is still one op-ed, written six weeks before the election with questionable conclusions that support the administration’s policies.

Finally, there is the question of the independent commission and corporate analogy. General Petraeus is probably the COO, in charge of operations. Secretary Gates is the CEO in charge of overall strategy. Bush is Chairman of the Board who is ultimately the man responsible. Congress is the Board of Directors. Again if you were doing a major deal you'd still need an outside opinion. What they call in the Mergers and Acqusitions world a Fairness Opinion from your financial advisors. So I guess my question to Colonel Boylan is, would he or General Petraeus object to an outside opinion prepared by members of the Baker-Hamilton commission or a panel of retired generals and experts?

June 04, 2007 at 05:57 PM | Permalink

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Ilan - I wonder if it is fair to General Petraeus to assume that he will take no account of past forecasts of Iraqi security. My recollection is that he conceded before Congress late last year that the prospects for the surge were hardly certain.

The question is whether recent developments in Anbar province, in which the Sunnis appear to have turned against the foreign insurgents in their midst, is a portent of wider change. Bartle Bull's op-ed in the NYT on the Mahdi Army, while no doubt a reflection of his access to it, also suggests that Moqtada Sadr may not be as alienated from the government as appearances would periodically seem to imply. If things really are changing, then a delay of several months in securing greater Baghdad would take on a different meaning than if conditions in the country as a whole showed no change.

This is not to say that the surge gives us what we need to make a real difference in Iraq or that the Iraqis are shifting with sufficient speed to save a common government from the deeper civil war and partition that threatens. But I wonder if we shouldn't look beyond Baghdad and ask if there is reason to give our efforts in Iraq another 3-6 months to see if recent political gains can be turned into something with wider impact. It seems like the prospect of US departure may be causing Iraqis to make hard choices that they need to make, one way or the other.

Posted by: David Billington | June 04, 2007 at 09:09 PM

Not to be picky, but Col. Boylan's response makes me wonder at least one other thing in addition to the thought Goldenberg expressed the other day, as to why a general's public affairs officer needs a bird on his shoulder. This is that a general's public affairs officer really ought to be able to write better than Col. Boylan does.

Actually, the observation that the operational environment in Iraq today is "...much more complex than it was when [Gen. Petraeus] left last in September 2005" suggests several things to wonder about more weighty than whether Col. Boylan can punctuate properly. Is the environment more complex because Gen. Petraeus failed in his last assignment (directing training for the Iraqi army)? Because American combat commanders failed in their assignments? Because operational environments just get more complex sometimes, in the same way tornadoes just brew up in Oklahoma at some times of the year? Because, perhaps, years of attacks directed at Shiite soldiers, policemen and police recruits and civilians by the Sunni Arab-dominated insurgency outweigh any amount of American-designed training, and have made the objective of a neutral army and police force in Iraq unattainable?

I'll pass over the business school debate over whether a commanding general should be considered as an employee or some more exalted personage, like a chief operating officer. It begs the key question -- as, indeed, all the issues raised above beg the key question. This is whether Gen. Petraeus knows precisely how much the situation in Iraq has deteriorated, how much it is costing the American military, and how quickly support for continuing to bang on in Iraq is dissipating in the United States -- and is plowing ahead with his counterinsurgency ideas anyway, because he is sure they are better than the ideas that motivated past American policy in Iraq and must have their chance.

I suspect this is exactly what is going on, and wish here only to point out that it is a very expensive experiment. It is not given to the American commander in Iraq to do 2003 over again. It has been given to him -- because no one in Washington is willing to give him orders to the contrary -- to keep the commitment in Iraq elevated above every other American interest in the world, at least until September, or maybe December, or sometime next year. If Gen. Petraeus succeeds, we will have gained an Iraqi state that will depend for its stability on American power into the indefinite future. If he does not, we will have gained data allowing the next generation of students at the Army War College to discover what I could have told him last January, that it is too late to achieve anything in Iraq worth the cost of the American commitment there.

General Marshall used to say, "don't fight the problem; decide it." We are still fighting the problem of Iraq because no one wants to decide it. Fighting the problem now places inertia on our side. It is the easy thing to do, for the generals and politicians anyway. Though it costs lives, it defers questions of responsibility and blame. In five years it will be regarded by everyone as the height of folly; in ten, there will emerge scholars to explain how the tactics employed in 2007 could have worked, if only....they had been employed in 2003. Vietnam all over again, except that the case for staying in Vietnam was a lot stronger.

Posted by: Zathras | June 04, 2007 at 09:53 PM

Let's not lose sight of the facts that (1) the 'surge' was not designed to be an end end in itself, but rather to provide necessary security for the political progress that is the only real solution to the Iraqi fisaco, and (2) General Petraeus is patently unqualified to make any judgments about political progress anywhere.

In regard to Iraqi political 'progress' (from a cited source):

In late February, Iraqi President Jalal Talabani was flown to neighbouring Jordan for medical treatment amid conflicting reports about his health. Sources in Amman and from Talabani's office in Baghdad told reporters that the 73-year-old had suffered a stroke, but in a televised interview his son said that Talabani was suffering from fatigue or exhaustion.

Meanwhile, Shi'ite leader Abdul Azizi al-Hakim, leader of Iraq's largest Shia party, recently arrived in Iran for treatment for lung cancer after being diagnosed at a hospital in the southern U.S. state of Texas.

This development, in particular, is expected to create chaos within the Supreme Islamic Council in Iraq, the political organisation the George W. Bush administration has counted on to push through legislation, particularly regarding the new Iraqi oil law.

The ailments of their leaders are not just perceived as physical by many Iraqis.

"It is a sick government right from the start and these people's absence shows the huge size of the chaos in Iraq," Waleed Zaidi, a political analyst in Baghdad told IPS. "The truth about rumours does not count as much as the solid fact that all those who are supposed to lead the country to stability are abroad for different reasons. A close look at the Iraqi scene shows that no one is really working to improve the situation." . . .

"Iraqis now feel that they do not have a government," said Sultan Kathum, a teacher from Hilla who visits Baghdad frequently to volunteer as a human rights activist. "(With) the absence of security, the humiliation, poverty and lack of essential services... Iraq appears to have gone back to a time when tribal leaders and clerics were the only powers that could solve some of their problems."

Some Iraqis interviewed by IPS were unwilling to accept the reasons given by Talabani and al-Hakim for leaving the country.

"I think Talabani and al-Hakim fled the country after they looted it together with their relatives and loyal servants," said Ali Abbas from the Sadr City area of Baghdad. "I would have done the same if I were them because why stay in a sinking ship while one has a life boat that is made of gold?"

Sources inside the heavily fortified Green Zone, where the Iraqi government is headquartered, estimated the number of members of Parliament and government staff attending to their work may be less than 50 percent.

"More than half the MPs, ministers and senior officials are on vacation, sick leave or on official assignment abroad (at any given time)," a government official told IPS on condition of anonymity. "It is common practice now that they spend more time abroad than in their offices. The main reason is their fear of being targeted inside the country."
http://www.dahrjamailiraq.com/hard_news/archives/iraq/000596.php#more

Posted by: Don Bacon | June 05, 2007 at 08:19 PM

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