Yes, Surge, That's My Baby: Press Responds to Bush Speech

AP Fact-Checks Bush Iraq Speech
AP Fact-Checks Bush Iraq Speech
Published: September 13, 2007

Political realignment in Iraq's volatile Anbar province was Exhibit A for President Bush's argument Thursday that Iraq is a fight that the United States is winning.

A look at some of Bush's assertions.

BUSH SAID:

"Anbar province is a good example of how our strategy is working," Bush said, noting that just last year U.S. intelligence analysts had written off the Sunni area as "lost to al-Qaida."

FACT CHECK:

Early Thursday, the most prominent figure in a U.S.-backed revolt of Sunni sheiks against al-Qaida in Iraq was killed by a bomb planted near his home.

The killing of a chief Anbar ally hours before Bush spoke showed the tenuous and changeable nature of success in Anbar and Iraq at large.

Although Sunni sheiks have defied al-Qaida and largely allied with U.S. forces in Anbar, the province remains violent and al-Qaida remains a threat.

Abdul-Sattar Abu Risha died 10 days after he met with Bush during a surprise visit the U.S. leader made to highlight the turnaround in Anbar. The charismatic young sheik led the Anbar Salvation Council, also known as the Anbar Awakening - an alliance of clans backing the Iraqi government and U.S. forces.

The Sunni revolt against al-Qaida led to a dramatic improvement in security in Anbar cities such as Fallujah and Ramadi. Iraqis who had been sitting on the sidelines - or planting roadside bombs to kill Americans - have now joined with U.S. forces to hunt down al-Qaida in Iraq, whose links to Osama bin Laden's terror network are unclear.

Anbar is not secure, accounting for 18 percent of the U.S. deaths in Iraq so far this year - making it the second deadliest province after Baghdad.

Bush's top military commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, told Congress this week that Anbar's circumstances are unique and its model cannot be replicated everywhere in Iraq, but "it does demonstrate the dramatic change in security that is possible with the support and participation of local citizens."

BUSH SAID:

Progress in Iraq, including improvement in the performance of the Iraqi army, led to Petraeus' recommendation that "we have now reached the point where we can maintain our security gains with fewer American forces."

Bush said there is still work to be done to improve the Iraqi national police.

FACT CHECK:

A new White House report on Iraq shows slim progress, moving just one more political and security goal into the satisfactory column. Efforts to let former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party rejoin the political process earned the upgrade, a senior administration official told The Associated Press.

The report largely tracks a comparable poor assessment in July on 18 benchmarks. The earlier White House report said the Iraqi government had made satisfactory gains toward eight benchmarks, unsatisfactory marks on eight and mixed results on two.

Although the benchmark list is the rubric that the White House and the Iraqi government proposed earlier this year, the Bush administration has recently said it offers a skewed or incomplete view of progress in Iraq.

BUSH SAID:

Bush noted that the government has not met its own legislative benchmarks, but he pointed to limited political progress among Iraq's national leaders. He said Iraq has passed a budget and is sharing oil wealth.

FACT CHECK:

The General Accountability Office reported last month that Iraq has only partially met a test involving reformation of its budget process, although the State Department, Pentagon and White House disputed the finding.

Some proceeds from Iraq's vast oil and gas resources are being shared among regions, but the country lacks a national framework agreement for the distribution of oil revenues.

A national oil law, which would also invite foreign investment, has been repeatedly promised by Iraq's leaders and frequently mentioned by U.S. officials as a crucial marker of the country's ability to reconcile its ethnic and religious groups.

Iraq's main political parties are deadlocked over the law and the legislation has been sent back to party leaders to see if they can salvage it, an official involved in the talks said Thursday.

BUSH SAID:

"We thank the 36 nations who have troops on the ground in Iraq and the many others who are helping that young democracy."

FACT CHECK:

There may well be 36 nations contributing to the cause, but the overwhelming majority of troops come from the United States. For example, Albania has 120 soldiers there and Bulgaria has 150 non-combat troops in Iraq. Bush visited both nations this summer as a thank you.

The United States has 168,000 troops in Iraq.

Best comment I heard was from CNN Iraq correspondent David Ware, who is actually in Iraq day to day> When asked to react he shook his head and said, "Wow!" Then went on to disassemble the Bush propaganda.

Bush's appalling Iraq speech.
Deceptive or Delusional?
Bush's appalling Iraq speech.
By Fred Kaplan
Posted Thursday, Sept. 13, 2007, at 11:42 PM ET

President Bush's TV address tonight was the worst speech he's ever given on the war in Iraq, and that's saying a lot. Every premise, every proposal, nearly every substantive point was sheer fiction. The only question is whether he was being deceptive or delusional.

The biggest fiction was that because of the "success" of the surge, we can reduce U.S. troop levels in Iraq from 20 combat brigades to 15 by next July. Gen. David Petraeus has recommended this step, and President George W. Bush will order it so.

Let's be clear one more time about this claim: The surge of five extra combat brigades (bringing the total from 15 to 20) started in January. Their 15-month tours of duty will begin to expire next April. The Army and Marines have no combat units ready to replace them. The service chiefs refuse to extend the tours any further. The president refuses to mobilize the reserves any further. And so, the surge will be over by next July. This has been understood from the outset. It is the result of simple arithmetic, not of anyone's decision, much less some putative success.

It is true that Bush is ordering the withdrawal of 5,700 of those troops?-one Army brigade and a Marine expeditionary unit?-before Christmas, a few months earlier than they need to go home. This is clearly in response to a request by Sen. John Warner, the ranking Republican on the armed services committee. The Republicans need political cover on the war; they need to show they're bringing some troops home soon; they hope that doing so will defuse the war as an election issue. Bush hopes this will be enough to keep them on his side?-and limit the support for Democrats' proposals of speedier withdrawals.

But by acceding to this political compromise?-and by selling the larger withdrawal as a decision instead of as an inescapable fact of life?-Bush undermined his case that the fight for Iraq is the central fight for civilization. If this claim is true, why pull any troops out earlier than necessary?

His showcase example of success was the recent alliance between U.S. troops and Sunni insurgents to join forces against jihadist terrorists in Anbar province (an alliance, by the way, that was formed before the surge). Yet even so, the president said in tonight's speech, "In Anbar, the enemy remains active and deadly." Again, under the president's own assumptions, what's the substantive case for letting any troops leave?

The speech was rife with evasion and fantasy from the outset.

"In Iraq," he declared, "an ally of the United States is fighting for its survival." This sounded as if some well-established government were under attack from an outside force. In fact, a U.S.-installed regime is racked with divisiveness as a result of sectarian clashes within its own society. That is a very different thing. As Gen. Petraeus has said many times, there is only so much U.S. military force can accomplish under such circumstances.

Back to the speech: "Terrorists and extremists who are at war with us around the world are seeking to topple Iraq's government, dominate the region, and attack us here at home." Even if it were true that the movement called al-Qaida in Mesopotamia is one and the same with the larger al-Qaida organization (a point that the U.S. intelligence community disputes), AQM accounts for only 5 percent of the attacks inside Iraq?-some of the deadliest 5 percent, but it is misleading to suggest that they are the biggest obstacle to Iraqi unity, much less the greatest threat to regional peace.

The rationale for the surge was to improve security in Baghdad and thus give Iraq's national political leaders the "breathing room" to reconcile their differences, pass key legislation, and form a unified government. The recent debates over conflicting charts and statistics?-some showing a decline in civilian deaths and sectarian attacks, others showing an increase?-are beside the point. The point is whether life in Baghdad has improved enough to allow for political progress on a national level. As Gen. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker conceded several times in congressional hearings this week, no such progress has been made.

President Bush tonight tried to suggest otherwise. He correctly outlined the premise of the surge strategy: "For Iraqis to bridge sectarian divides, they need to feel safe in their homes and neighborhoods. For lasting reconciliation to take root, Iraqis must feel confident that they do not need sectarian gangs for security. The goal of the surge is to provide that security and help Iraqi forces to maintain it."

But then he said: "As I will explain tonight, our success in meeting these objectives now allows us to begin bringing some of our troops home." (Italics added.) Does he really think, whatever the advances toward these goals, that we have reached "success in meeting these objectives"?

As he himself admitted, those goals haven't yet been achieved in Anbar, much less in Baghdad, much less in national Iraqi politics. He could not evade today's news?-that Abdul Sattar Abu Risha, leader of the Sunni tribes' revolt against al-Qaida in Anbar province, has been assassinated.

He admitted that the Iraqi government "has not met its own legislative benchmarks" of success. But he then returned once more to the promise of Anbar and proclaimed, "As local politics change, so will national politics." This adage isn't nearly always true in the United States. It certainly isn't true in a country like Iraq, which is fissuring into at least three separate countries.

The president then turned to long-term U.S. policy in Iraq, and his attempts at assurance were anything but.

He cited Gen. Petraeus' testimony recommending not only a reduction in troops but a gradual change in their mission. "Over time," Bush said, "our troops will shift from leading operations, to partnering with Iraqi forces, and eventually to overwatching those forces. As this transition in our mission takes place, our troops will focus on a more limited set of tasks, including counterterrorism operations and training, equipping, and supporting Iraqi forces."

However, the chart that Gen. Petraeus presented in this part of his testimony gave no dates?-not even a projected range of dates?-for when this shift in mission would take place. Many Democrats, some Republicans, and a fairly large number of Army and Marine generals would like to see this shift begin now. That is the debate that Congress will be taking up. Bush's speech is an evasion.

Then Bush muddied the waters further. On the one hand, he has a "vision for a reduced American presence" in Iraq. On the other hand, he foresees a need for "U.S. political, economic, and security engagement that extends beyond my presidency," and he talked about building "an enduring relationship" between the United States and Iraq.

What is this enduring relationship? What does it require, in the way of troops, bases, and other resources? What other countries or international agencies will be involved? Do the relationship's elements include stepped-up diplomacy with Iraq's neighbors? None of these vital questions was broached, much less answered.

Finally, he presented a series of pleas under the guise of compromise.

He asked the Congress to "come together" and support Gen. Petraeus' recommendations on troop cuts?-not seeming to recognize that a mere return to pre-surge levels (which will be inevitable by next summer), with no change in direction, is no basis for a sustained consensus.

He asked "the Iraqi people" to "demand that your leaders make the tough choices needed to achieve reconciliation"?-not seeming to recognize that "the Iraqi people" is a tenuous concept and that many of Iraq's Shiites, Sunni Arabs, and Kurds themselves have very different, possibly irreconcilable, demands about their futures.

Oddly, he thanked "the 36 nations who have troops on the ground in Iraq." At the peak of the "coalition," back in the fall of 2004, only 31 countries besides the United States had any troops in Iraq. They amounted to 24,000?-fewer than one-fifth of America's numbers?-and one-third of those were contributed by Britain. Now, according to the most recent official report (dated Aug. 30, 2007), just 25 countries have troops there; they number fewer than 12,000 (an average of fewer than 500 per nation), and more and more, including Britain, are leaving every month.

The question could be asked throughout the speech, but particularly at that point: In what world is the president of the United States living?

More 'Blather' from 'Wash Post' on Staying in Iraq
More 'Blather' from 'Wash Post' on Staying in Iraq
By Glenn Greenwald - Salon
September 14, 2007

This is how it goes endlessly with the Post editorial page and much of the rest of the Washington Establishment: (1) If X does not happen, there is no justification for staying; (2) X has not happened; (3) we must stay.

It has been extremely difficult over the past several months to pay any attention at all to the discussion of Iraq from our political and media stars. It is all just complete blather, and never means anything. All of these stern and worried and tough words spill endlessly from their mouths -- they all proclaimed in May that September was the Day of Reckoning: there would be bipartisan, forced withdrawal if the political benchmarks weren't met -- only for the same thing to happen over and over.

The conditions are not met; Bush proclaims we are staying; and the Washington Establishment submits.

Just look at the behavior of The Washington Post's Fred Hiatt in the last week alone to see how barren and worthless their words are.

Last Sunday, Hiatt came closer than ever before to admitting failure in Iraq, ending his Editorial by asking: "If Iraqis are not moving toward political reconciliation, what justifies a continuing commitment of U.S. troops, with the painful sacrifices in lives that entails?"

Thus, argued Hiatt, if the President cannot answer that question, and "if there is to be no political accord in the near future," then we must change our Iraq policy to "limit troop levels to those necessary to accomplish" very specific and more modest goals.

But today, Hiatt admits that what he said just five days ago were pre-conditions for supporting Bush's Iraq policy have not been met: "the president failed to acknowledge that, according to the standards he himself established in January, the surge of U.S. troops into Iraq has been a failure -- because Iraqi political leaders did not reach the political accords that the sacrifice of American lives was supposed to make possible."

Thus, by Hiatt's own reasoning on Sunday, it means that there is no justification for "a continuing commitment of U.S. troops." So does he embrace that conclusion? Of course not, because nothing he says matters; all that matters is that we stay in Iraq and do what the President wants: "Mr. Bush's plan offers, at least, the prospect of extending recent gains against al-Qaeda in Iraq, preventing full-scale sectarian war and allowing Iraqis more time to begin moving toward a new political order. For that reason, it is preferable to a more rapid withdrawal. It's not necessary to believe the president's promise that U.S. troops will 'return on success' in order to accept the judgment of Mr. Crocker: 'Our current course is hard. The alternatives are far worse.'"

This is how it goes endlessly with people like Hiatt: (1) If X does not happen, there is no justification for staying; (2) X has not happened; (3) we must stay.

That is why nothing they say has any meaning. Staying in Iraq is always the only real goal. Everything else is just pretext and blather to continue to do that.

Just look at the virtually unanimous consensus among our political and media class from last May, just four months ago. They all banded together to assure Americans that, come September, if the benchmarks were not met and there was no political reconciliation, that would be the end of the line for the war. Worried and principled Republicans were willing to wait until September, but come September, they would join with Democrats and end the war, or at least force a significant withdrawal.

Yet regardless of one's views regarding the latest claims of "military progress," everyone agrees that this allegedly necessary condition -- benchmark fulfillment and political reconciliation -- has not happened. It is not even a close call. As Hiatt himself said today, even Petraeus and Crocker "emphasized that political accords will be slower in coming than Washington has expected, if they are achievable at all."

Yet it does not matter. Even though the condition they all proclaimed must be met in order to stay has not been met, they still all insist we must stay. It's always the same:

(1) If X does not happen by Y date, there is no justification for staying, they proclaim;

(2) X has not happened;

(3) We must stay.

That is why what they say -- all of their sober prognostications and warnings and analyses -- is meaningless. All of the talk about "worst options" and alleged fears of what will happen if we withdraw and our "strategic interests" all just mask the simple truth that we are going to stay -- even when their own premises amount to an acknowledgement that there is no point in staying -- because we are staying to protect the reputations and credibility and egos of the Washington Establishment.
***

A full version of this column appears at Greenwald's usual blog spot at:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Glenn Greenwald ([email protected]) blogs regularly at www.salon.com. He is author of the bestselling books, "How Would a Patriot Act?" and the current "A Tragic Legacy: How a Good vs. Evil Mentality Destroyed the Bush Presidency."

Ordinary life hardly the norm in Baghdad
Ordinary life hardly the norm in Baghdad
Leila Fadel - McClatchy Newspapers
September 14, 2007

"Today, most of Baghdad's neighborhoods are being patrolled by coalition and Iraqi forces who live among the people they protect. Many schools and markets are reopening. Citizens are coming forward with vital intelligence. Sectarian killings are down. And ordinary life is beginning to return."

BAGHDAD ?- "Ordinary" isn't a word that residents of Baghdad use to describe their lives.

Gunmen are driving people from neighborhoods in the city's southwest. Electricity, depending on which block you live on, is available as little as two hours a day. Running water, if it's available, is unsafe to drink.

Car bombings are down, but most residents won't leave their neighborhoods, frightened that they'll encounter Shiite Muslim militiamen or Sunni Muslim extremists who'll kill them.

Some markets are reopening in the southern neighborhood of Dora under the watch of U.S. soldiers, but no one from outside the neighborhood visits.

As for schools, it's hard to say: The school year hasn't started yet.

Yousef al Mousawi, a 28-year-old Shiite resident of Sadr City, told this story Friday: Two days ago, his friend Mustafa was kidnapped from his computer shop. He was later found dead, shot in the head. It wasn't unusual. In his neighborhood ?- controlled by the Mahdi Army militia, loyal to cleric Muqtada al Sadr ?- he sees bodies every day.

Traffic jams terrify him, he said. He was wounded by a car bomb last year and has traveled the region since for medical treatment.

"The Mahdi Army isn't just killing Sunnis now, they are killing Shiites as well," he said. "I go to university, I'm afraid of suicide bombers and car bombs. I come home and I'm afraid of the Mahdi Army. We're living in fear, endless fear."

Even grocery shopping can be risky. Jassim Mohammed, 53, a Sunni from the neighborhood of Sleikh in northern Baghdad, said he rarely left his home, let alone traveled to marketplaces throughout the city.

This week marked the start of the holy month of Ramadan, when Muslims fast from sunup to sundown. The evening meal is a feast, and everyone wants his favorite food. But what Mohammed's family eats is up to Abu Ahmed, the lone grocer in his neighborhood. If he's selling okra, they eat okra stew. If he doesn't have yogurt, they don't eat yogurt. As a Sunni in what's become a Shiite capital, Mohammed said, he has no choice.

"It has become a dream for us to shop from any central market," he said. "No way can I roam freely in Baghdad. I can barely get from home to work, there are so many checkpoints manned by people I don't trust."

"By what standards can I consider this life ordinary?" he asked. "Would Mr. Bush consider my life normal if he knew the details? Would any American?"

Muhsin al Ribaawi, 45, a Shiite, lives in Hurriyah, a once-mixed neighborhood in northwest Baghdad that's been devoid of Sunnis since they were forced out in December. The change was good, Ribaawi thinks. He can travel freely through Shiite neighborhoods throughout the capital, though he never ventures into Sunni enclaves. He no longer sees as many bodies dumped on the streets. As a supervisor for roads and bridges in Baghdad, he used to encounter as many as 20 a day. "I'm so happy for that," he said.

Still, life is hardly back to normal. Dirty and disease-ridden, the water that comes from his tap is "terrifying."

Mohammed al Ani, 36, a Sunni, lives in Mansour, in central Baghdad. When he travels elsewhere in the capital, he maps out his route so that he passes only through Sunni neighborhoods.

"If they (militias) have my ID and they see my tribal name, al Ani, I may lose my life," he said. When he returns home at 5 p.m., the neighborhood is already empty and he shuts himself inside.

On Industry Street in central Baghdad, Mariam Shleimoon, a Christian, said she spent her days cowering in her home. Earlier this week, the Mahdi Army called her husband. They said he'd cursed the militia and that the family must pay ?- $4,000, a princely sum for a poor man who makes his money repairing kerosene heaters, a skill needed only in winter.

Shleimoon and her husband went to the police but no one would help, so they stay in to avoid the militia. She'd like her children to stay home as well. Her daughter, Rita, barely escaped a bombing, and her son watched a man be killed as he waited to buy bread. But the heat is stifling ?- they have only two hours of electricity a day, one in the morning and one at night ?- and her children want to get out of the house.

"We are living in fear," she said. "I thought about selling out and leaving the country but my husband said, 'I will live and die here.' "

In Saidiyah, in southwest Baghdad, Ali Mohammed, 30, a Sunni, said nearly all the stores in his neighborhood had closed as Shiite and Sunni gunmen battled to control the area. The only clinic closed three months ago. It didn't have any medicine, anyway, he said.

A university student, he fears leaving the neighborhood because the checkpoints are manned by police commandos, units known to be rife with Shiite militiamen, who alert gunmen in civilian cars to attack suspected Sunnis. Three days ago, a father and son were killed at a checkpoint, he said.

Bush, he said, "is speaking the opposite of what's going on on the ground."
-----------------------------------------------

(McClatchy Newspapers special correspondents Sahar Issa, Mohammed al Dulaimy, Laith Hammoudi and Jenan Hussein contributed to this report.)

I wonder what happened to those 20 benchmarks that were supposed to be met in September, and that were supposed to decide the fate of the American occupation. Suddenly, nobody's talking about these benchmarks anymore.