Turning point in Iraq

January 19, 2004

Warbaby says:

The possibility of an "end game" is finally arising in Iraq. It's an opportunity, not a settled thing. Still, the current situation is the first clear chance for the US to sign on to a set of achievable goals for creating some security and stability in Iraq and the surrounding region.

The odds are not good. The Bush administration can muff this chance -- indeed there are considerable signs that it has already committed itself to doing so. The rickety structure of US policy is now tottering. In the next month or so, we will see Iraq take the first halting steps toward stability and rejoining the community of nations or we will see Iraq and possibly the Mid-East region descend further into conflict and turmoil.

To date, the war in Iraq has been played as a means of manipulating the domestic political process. The run-up to war from early 2002 to the present has been viewed by the Bush administration as a means of consolidating political power within the US. This is the fundamental flaw that has undermined all attempts at formulating a rational policy with achievable goals.

The dynamics of the situation in Iraq have grown in power and magnitude to the point where decisions in Washington DC are now being dictated by the realities on the ground. The critical decision before the Bush administration is whether they will shift their focus from how war policy plays with domestic audiences to confronting the reality of hard choices in Iraq.

How we got here

The evolution of the conflict with Iraq has gone through several distinct phases. It's worth recapping them in chronological order:

Immediately following the 9/11 attacks, the immediate response of the Bush administration was to declare a state of siege and characterize the attacks as an "act of war." This was not the only choice available, but once made it could not be undone. The invasion of Afghanistan was probably unavoidable given the fact that the Taliban government was effectively subordinate to Al Qaida. But the decision to declare a "global war on terrorism" was a policy commitment made in great haste and without any due reflection. The choice of a vague and unfocussed policy of "global war" is now clearly established to have been intended by some of the neocons and hawks in the administration to include a commitment to overthrow Saddam Hussein and either occupy Iraq or install a government aligned with US by covert means. The declaration of a "global war" implicitly meant open or covert conflict with Iraq.
The rapid success of the military attack on Afghanistan caught the Bush administration by surprise. At the moment the Taliban collapsed, the administration was exploring how they would be able to sustain a war in Afghanistan lasting months. The important but neglected fact about Afghanistan is there was a long-running civil war going on. And the addition of American air power tipped the balance.
In the giddy aftermath of the successful intrusion into Afghanistan, the "global war" policy was fleshed out with the doctrine of an "axis of evil" defining the three "rogue states" felt to be the greatest threats to American interests: Iraq, Iran and North Korea. This was spelled out in a framework of coercive diplomacy based on counter-proliferation of WMD by preventive war. The military realities were such that military action was possible only against Iraq without immediately triggering regional conflicts involving other nations. By April 2002, the decision to invade Iraq became settled policy.
The domestic consolidation of power through the 2002 congressional elections. The Democrats conceded the Republicans the initiative on national security and war policy. The drive to war was very much part of the Republican strategy. And they used it to consolidate domestic political power.
The failure to convince the UN of US accusations against Iraq actually reinforced the unilateralists' position inside the government. So the period from October 2002 through the start of the invasion was really more about suppressing domestic opposition to pro-war policy than about international relations. It can be argued that Colin Powell's speech at the UN was a conscious sacrifice of international support for domestic influence.
The invasion of Iraq revealed the hollowness of the supposed threat to US interests and security. Again, as in Afghanistan, the rapidity of the military success exposed an enormous political weakness. In Afghanistan, there was at least a collection of contending factions in active opposition to the Taliban. In Iraq, there was no skeleton to clothe with legitimacy. Instead, the plan was to "decapitate" the Iraqi state and install Ahmed Chalabi, the Adolpho Callero of Iraq. But the Bush warriors failed to learn the lesson of their intervention in Nicaragua: the political settlement in Central America required abandoning American plans for installing a puppet government.
The premature declaration of success in Iraq was followed by chaos and confusion. There was no political consolidation of the military success because the decapitation strategy required the cooperation of the Baathist state in not dismantling itself. War is ultimately a political process. The assumptions that underlay the decapitation strategy were so unrealistic that there were no plans for the post-conflict period. "We will be greeted as liberators," Vice President Cheney famously predicted.
The long-standing Iraqi preparations for resistance and guerilla warfare were unanticipated by the American strategy of decapitation. The resulting Baathist campaign of sabotage and guerilla war was outlined in captured documents, but these were ignored. The inertia of the original plan to do a "head transplant" on the Iraqi state trundled on until July. This created a power vacuum in which the American occupying power was never able to establish legitimacy. In June, they began to play catch up, but they never succeeded in establishing a political base in Iraq.
The second plan for creating an Iraqi government was hurriedly cobbled together out of the wreckage of the failed decapitation strategy in late June and early July. Under the cover of "democratizing" Iraq it was essentially a fall-back attempt to retain the goal of installing a puppet government dominated by Ahmed Chalabi with the cover of other US-selected groups.
In July 2003, Ayatollah Sistani declared that an imposed government without elections was absolutely unacceptable to the majority of Iraqis. He was ignored. Politically, his position is unassailable. It boils down to taking the Americans at their word: democratize Iraq.
The next six months would see the Coalition Provisional Authority continue to treat Sistani like a member of the Texas legislature, as if he didn't really mean what he said and could be bought off. Much of the problem was rooted in attempts to portray Chalabi as some sort of "secular moderate" and Sistani as a "theocrat." In fact, the real issue was legitimacy in the eyes of Iraqis. And in those terms, Sistani was legitimate and Chalabi was not.
The deaths of Saddam Hussein's sons in July was hailed as a turning point in suppressing the resistance. Instead, it intensified. The expansion and continuing consolidation of the armed resistance now solidified as a strategy of severing the US from its support inside and outside Iraq. The UN bombing and other attacks steadily accelerated from August to the present.
The failure to recognize the determination of both Shia and Kurds undermined attempts at creating an acceptable process for establishing a permanent Iraqi constitutional government. UN was enlisted to stabilize the process without addressing the fact that Sistani's factions were still excluded from the process. And the US committed to delivering a workable plan for creating a constitution by December 15.
The degeneration of the security situation was underscored by the success of resistance groups in launching a Ramadan offensive. The capture of Saddam Hussein did nothing to alter the tactical or strategic realities of the insurgency against the American occupation. In the course of these disturbances, the December 15 deadline for finalizing the constitutional process was not met. Ignored in the US, the failure of the CPA to deliver on its commitment to the international community was widely noted in Iraq.
Kurdish forces, recognizing the growing power vacuum, insisted on and succeeded in obtaining US guarantees of special status for the Kurdish regions in the north. The CPA had to acquiesce to the Kurdish demands, simply because it lacked the power to oppose them.
Finally, Sistani's patience (or ability to restrain his followers) was exhausted by US shilly-shallying. Massive demonstrations began in mid-January demanding that the constitutional decisions be made by elections rather than through caucuses picked by the occupation authority.

To sum up the trajectory of the invasion and occupation of Iraq: the US was hobbled from the beginning by clutching at fantasies and ignoring the realities. So far, we've been able to coast on military action. But now the underlying political realities in Iraq have to take precedence over influencing domestic politics. The CPA and IGC have been living in a fantasy world. The lack of reality is now a problem approaching crisis level because the Iraqis aren't going to accept colonial status.

Too many players at odds with each other

There are a lot of moving parts to the situation in Iraq. In no particular order:

The resistance is not an attempt to reestablish a Baathist state. It is a loose collection of local warlords who are trying to expand the power they had as Baathists or Baathist collaborators. Anthony Cordesman has described them as "former regime loyalists." This is correct, if the emphasis is placed on "former." They are not unified, though they pursue overlapping strategies. If the wheels come off, they will be fighting for local or regional, not national control. Think of gangster-warlords like Arkan in Yugoslavia and Dostum in Afghanistan. Expanding the conflict into a full-blown civil war or fragmenting Iraq into a "failed state" is clearly a positive outcome for the resistance as a whole.
The Kurds possess sufficient military and political power in the north to enforce their demands for a Kurdish state inside Iraq. They are not going to push for national sovereignty, but what they possess and control they will fight to retain and consolidate. The Kurds are divided internally into two power blocs competing with each other, but generally able to negotiate their differences. Increased tensions could bring them closer or force them farther apart.
The Shia have learned through bloody and tragic experience the costs of war and insurrection. They want recognition of their legitimate power and aspirations. Sistani has been a moderating force and has repeatedly stated that he will accept a secularized state that recognizes Islamic law. He is not a Khomeini-style theocrat. Nor is he the sole voice of a unified Shia community. There are more radical leaders among the Shia, such as the ambitious and troublesome Moktada al-Sadr. Sistani is more of a spokesman for the largest plurality of Shia than a political strongman.
The Interim Governing Council has been unable to establish either power or authority. The Kurds have agreed to work within the IGC only so far as they get what they want. The Shia led by Sistani have not agreed to recognize the legitimacy of the IGC. The upshot is the IGC is hamstrung by lack of power and legitimacy.
The US military is about to double the number of troops in Iraq. There have been numerous statements about the "rotation" being used to enable offensive operations. The "rotation" is being simultaneously described as replacement and reinforcement. Currently, the military is hunkered down and waiting for reinforcement/replacement. Patrolling and contact with the resistance has been reduced, just at the time when the resistance needs to regroup after the Ramadan offensive. This "withdrawal behind the wire" constitutes the third time (the first was the passivity in the faces of "looting" and the second was in late July when the large area sweeps were discontinued) that the occupation forces have conceded the initiative to the resistance. There will now be a race between the occupation forces and the resistance to be the first to take the initiative.
The Coalition Provisional Authority has failed to cobble together a workable political process. Currently, Bremer is hoping the UN will tell Sistani that elections are impossible. That's neither a plan nor a strategy nor likely. It's stalling for time. Bremer is handcuffed in his negotiations with the UN. There are many things Kofi Annan could reasonably request that if Bremer agreed to them, he might as well hand in his resignation because of opposition from his superiors. The sticking point in the UN negotiations could very well be the Bush administration's insistence on a rigid schedule.
And, of course, the Bush administration in Washington. They appear to be wedded to the notion of an inflexible timetable for the creation of a new Iraqi state by July. The rigid timetable has been referred to by government officials as "holy writ" despite the repeated failures to meet now-past deadlines. The reason for the insistence on a rigid timetable is clearly not linked to the situation in Iraq, but is instead dictated by domestic political considerations about the upcoming presidential election in November. The unyielding pressure for a July deadline has the effect of barring Bremer and the CPA from pursuing some courses of action and tying their hands in negotiations with Iraqis and the UN.

A recipe for chaos

Given the number of players and their competing/conflicting goals, the situation in Iraq is not amenable to a simple and tidy outcome. Some of these multi-dimensional conflicts have existed for years, some changed from tensions to conflicts with the invasion and some were inherent in the invasion itself. There is no centralizing force that can resolve the situation.

Two critical dynamics have arisen since the failure to meet the agreed December 15 deadline for settling on a process to create a constitution: both the Kurds and the Shia have stopped waiting for the US to get its act together. Their loss of patience flows directly from the inability of the US to create a centralized power vested with credibility and legitimacy. The Kurds have worked with US forces for over a decade and have a reasonable idea of what is and is not possible. The Shia who look towards Sistani as an "object of emulation" have more or less respected his declaration of last May that he would give the US a year to pull things together.

The relationship between Sistani and his followers is such that he is more of a mirror of mass feelings than a leader who creates them. The US attempts to deal with him have not reflected this reality. Instead, the CPA first attempted to find substitutes for Sistani who would acquiesce in the US appointment of constitutional caucus delegates. When that failed, they tried to change the rhetoric without changing the substance of the appointed caucuses. That also failed because the caucus system is such a complex Rube Goldberg contrivance for maintaining US control that it is nearly possible to comprehend. What the Shia perceived was the language changed but the process didn't. And that was where they started to lose patience and Sistani had to publicly state the simple bottom line: no elections, no legitimacy for the constitutional process.

The third development within the current time-frame is the planned troop rotation / replacement / reinforcement. During this process, the US troop strength will rise from roughly 130,000 to over 200,000 and then is planned to subside to about 100,000. There have been many (and sometimes conflicting) statements about what will occur for the period of the increased troop levels. The military has said there will be increased patrolling and joint training/orientation operations with combined forces of new and old troops. Clearly, a major offensive against the resistance is contemplated.

More troubling are the statements coming from Washington, DC. Both Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld and National Security Advisor Rice have recently threatened Syria with military action. The reasons cited have been a very mixed bag: Syrian support for terrorists in Israel and Iraq and accusations of receiving Iraqi WMD or maintaining their own stockpiles of such weapons. It has not been clear what actions by the Syrians would satisfy these demands and so they look more like the basis of ultimatums than coercive diplomacy intended to produce a negotiated settlement.

The possibility of widening or intensifying the conflict is very troubling. It is also consistent with every major US troop movement of the last sixty years. When we send tens of thousands of troops somewhere, they are going to fight somebody. The question is: who?

The tipping points

There are several major fault lines in Iraq. Any of them could trigger others. Several of them are clearly going to be in simultaneous motion during the next two to three months. The most salient ones are:

The increased level of violence between reinforced occupation forces and the resistance. Given the resistance's propensity for fighting in areas likely to involve substantial numbers of civilian casualties and the occupation forces' rules of engagement relating to reactive fire and reconnaissance by fire, increased fighting will inevitably involve the civilian population, if only because they are caught in the crossfire. Civilian casualties are immensely harmful to the efforts to stabilize and pacify the country. As was seen during the sweeps in July, increased contact with the resistance mobilized more resistance fighters and spread the fighting. This could activate previously unengaged factions like the Shia who have -- so far -- opted to stay out of the armed conflict.
The possibility of conflict between the United States and Syria. There is no certainty about the risk here. If Syria takes steps to appease the US, like increasing troop strength on its borders in an effort to demonstrate a commitment to sealing up its admittedly porous borders, it would also raise the risk of incidents like the cross-border incursions by Task Force 20 last year. The danger is that Syrian actions intended to appease or reassure Washington could be misinterpreted as escalation. That's assuming the Syrians don't decide they are already in the crosshairs. It they read the situation as the US preparing to attack Syria, the chances for hostilities rise astronomically. The fact that Syria is the last major Mid-East state directly threatening Israel affects the risk level, given the bellicose statements made by the most aggressive neocon hawks like Wolfowitz and Pearle, now being echoed by Rumsfeld and Rice. Both Syrian actions and the nature of occupation troop movements in Iraq will demand attention in the coming months.
The CPA's increasingly unrealistic stance on the constitutional process may exhaust Shia patience. The failure to engage the UN in stabilizing the political situation would dramatically increase Shia restiveness. The recent protests have involved more than 100,000 Iraqis. Several factions have been visible, including increase agitation by the more radical factions. In Southern Iraq, the British occupying powers have conceded that elections are feasible and possible in the very near future. This recent development is clearly due to the problems the British would be faced with if the unmet demands for elections created civil disorder. The British recognition of the possibility of elections in the South increases the pressure for elections in the American occupied areas.
Kurdish demands for the expulsion of Arabs from Kurdish territories may trigger a backlash against Kurds in other parts of Iraq. Currently, the Kurds and the Shia are moving on parallel courses of mobilizing and consolidating political power. At this time, they are not committed to conflict with each other. But the Kurdish presence in other parts of Iraq makes the Kurdish demands for the expulsion of Arabs from Kurdish regions an extremely volatile situation. These Arabs were moved to northern Iraq by the Baathists in an attempt to "Arabize" the Kurdish regions. If the threatened expulsions occur, the possibility of reactive expulsions of large numbers of Kurds would be very destabilizing.

There are plenty of other things that could go wrong in the near future, but these seem to be the most volatile flash points. It is possible that none of these fault lines will get out of control. But the fact remains that these and other tensions do not have ready solutions.

There are several things which would increase the chances of a favorable outcome. The Bush administration could decouple Iraq policy from domestic politics to give the CPA more flexibility in negotiating with the UN and the Shia. The occupation forces could behave with restraint and still succeed in pacifying large parts of Iraq. The Kurds could moderate their demands and make a visible commitment to supporting Iraqi unification by guaranteeing the civil and legal rights of other ethnic groups in Northern Iraq. The Syrians could demonstrate a commitment to reaching a modus vivendi with its neighbors and lowering the level of conflict in the region.

Any of these things could happen. But the likelihood that they will all happen is remote. The next few months will see some visible and dramatic changes in the situation. Whether or not an "end game" will actually happen is uncertain. Equally uncertain is what that end game might look like. But the present time is the first time since the invasion began that there is some possibility an end game might begin.

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1/23/04 update: additional links added to right-hand column since this article was first posted.

	Turning point in Iraq