The US, UN & Iraq II

March 11, 2003
INTO THE BUZZSAW. The Washington Post's ace military reporters, Tom Ricks and Vernon Loeb, have an excellent piece in today's edition on the crisis that will inevitably face U.S. forces once the shooting stops in Iraq -- i.e., the consequences of deploying large numbers of U.S. soldiers in Iraq for a sustained period of time. This is probably the most important article in the papers today:
Retired Army Maj. Gen. William L. Nash commanded the first Army peacekeeping operation in the Balkans in 1995. He also occupied the area around the Iraqi town of Safwan on the Kuwaiti border with three battalions for 21/2 months after the 1991 Gulf War. During that mission, his troops dealt with recurring murders, attempted murders, "ample opportunity for civil disorder," and refugee flows they never could fully fathom, he said.
Nash said he believes 200,000 U.S. and allied forces will be necessary to stabilize Iraq, noting that up to two divisions alone -- 25,000 to 50,000 troops -- could be required just to guard any chemical or biological weapons sites that are discovered until the weapons are disposed of properly.
"There's apprehension inside the Army as to the extent of the mission and a concern that there hasn't been the recognition by the senior leadership -- I read civilian -- as to the enormity of the challenge," Nash said.
The Army's concern bubbled up publicly two weeks ago when Gen. Eric K. Shinseki, the Army's chief of staff, told the Senate Armed Services Committee that "several hundred thousand soldiers" could be necessary for peacekeeping duties. Two days later, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz -- one of the architects of the president's postwar ambitions in Iraq -- took the unusual step of publicly differing with the Army chief, dismissing his estimate as "way off the mark."
Shinseki and other defense officials have said they hope allied forces will contribute significantly to the postwar mission, though it is unclear how much other countries will be willing to pitch in. The Bush administration has experienced difficulties recruiting other countries to send forces to the Afghan peacekeeping mission.
Ivo H. Daalder, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, said recent history shows that 60,000 peacekeepers were needed in Bosnia to separate warring ethnic factions, just one facet of the mission that could confront the Army in postwar Iraq. And Bosnia's population is 4 million, 17 percent of Iraq's 23 million.
That's rather scary. Clearly top officers are worried about the task. And don't think this doesn't have a lot to do with why the Army has such a difficult relationship with Rumsfeld's office.
What's worse is that this burden is being added to an already overstretched U.S. military. As Nicholas Confessore reports in this month's cover story in The Washington Monthly, the United States keeps about twice as many troops on overseas deployments, training exercises and contingency operations today as it did in 2000, when George W. Bush assailed Bill Clinton for overburdening the troops. Active duty troops are deploying more often than they used to, and reservists are being called up in numbers and for durations usually associated with global war. According to Ricks and Loeb, the reserves have already missed their recruiting goals for January and February, in part because being a reservist is now not too different from being a full-time soldier. And as our troops burn out and leave, they increase the burden on those who remain. Soon enough, something will have to give.
Posted at 05:22 PM
http://www.prospect.org/weblog/

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Bush didn't create the military overstretch, but he did campaign on fixing it, and instead has allowed it to worsen.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2003/0303.confessore.html

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Bush's Ulterior Motive
...In recent months, as America has threatened and prepared for war against Iraq, the price of oil has gone from the low 20s to the high 30s a barrel. American consumers, therefore, are paying an extra $15 a barrel, or $300 million a day, or over $100 billion a year as a "war premium" on the oil they consume. It's like a tax?-imposed as a result of government policy?-except that the government doesn't get the money. That's before the war even starts, and it is in addition to the $300 billion or so they're saying that prosecuting the war is going to cost directly. Of that $100 billion, $55 billion pays for the oil we import. But $135 million a day?-a day?-or more than $45 billion a year (minus some taxes) goes into the pockets of domestic oil producers.... ...I don't believe that President Bush is prosecuting a war against Iraq in order to enrich, or more accurately further enrich, his oil-patch cronies. But we all are happier when we can make our friends happy. All this happiness among his buddies must at least make a man like Bush, who is not plagued by self-doubt or second thoughts in any event, even more confident as he marches forward. http://slate.msn.com/id/2079744/

Does anybody believe for a second that if Iraq was a WASP country, Bush would be so engaged to preemptive attack? c.i.

What happens now, if Blair walks away?

The reputation of the US has been deeply damaged already. If the administration continues on its path without England, that will become very much worse indeed. Blair will have to speak to England's decision, and the points he will make will not fit easily in the administration's story line, it will devastate it. So for sure we know that enormous pressure will be exerted by the administration against such a move on England's part. That pressure (not likely to be pretty) will further drive a wedge between the US and England, and there would be future ramifications to that.

If Enland goes, who else may follow? The US will, if it continues it's path, be seen in a very clear and apparent manner to stand quite uniquely in opposition to the international community. It will also be seen as something of a war-monger and loose cannon. I suspect the US's reputation will suffer damage without precedent.

That these turkeys have brought this possible situation about is criminal. The world needs the US, but not the US as presently constitued under this administration - that US the world does NOT need.

How much ego, how much lust for power, how much of whatever is driving these maniacs stands in the way of a profound change of thinking and policy? How much courage does the Senate and Congress have to face them down?

REPORTERS IN IRAQ
10th March, 2003
by Fintan Dunne, Editor
http://www.GuluFuture.com

The Pentagon has threatened to fire on the satellite uplink positions of independent journalists in Iraq, according to veteran BBC war correspondent, Kate Adie.[/size] In an interview with Irish radio, Ms. Adie said that questioned about the consequences of such potentially fatal actions, a senior Pentagon officer had said: "Who cares.. ..They've been warned."
According to Ms. Adie, who twelve years ago covered the last Gulf War, the Pentagon attitude is: "entirely hostile to the the free spread of information."

"I am enormously pessimistic of the chance of decent on-the-spot reporting, as the war occurs," she told Irish national broadcaster, Tom McGurk on the RTE1 Radio "Sunday Show."

Ms. Adie made the startling revelations during a discussion of media freedom issues in the likely upcoming war in Iraq. She also warned that the Pentagon is vetting journalists according to their stance on the war, and intends to take control of US journalists' satellite equipment --in order to control access to the airwaves.Another guest on the show, war author Phillip Knightley, reported that the Pentagon has also threatened they: "may find it necessary to bomb areas in which war correspondents are attempting to report from the Iraqi side."Transcript follows ....

Tartarin, if I were in an active warzone I would be most careful as regards electromagnetic emissions of any sort. Weapons which pretty much autonomously seek out electronic signals will be flying about. A munition traveling several hundred feet per second cannot be expected to discriminate between a satellite uplink and a targeting beam.

Reporters who choose to operate outside approved channels face numerous risks. Succeptability to "Freindly Fire" is only one of those risks. I am sure most reporters had no need of "The Warning". An experienced, cautious reporter stands at less risk than would a gung-ho newbie, but either face greater risk than reporters who operate within the established framework. That may not make for great reporting, but it is one of the Facts of War.
Sadly, the potential for the death of journalists is a a Fact of War. War is pretty much an "Equal Opportunity" killer, after all, and the closer one gets to the killing, the closer one gets to getting killed. Journalists enjoy no special exemption from death if they elect to go in harm's way.

And while we may expect some amazing reporting, I surmise a large proportion of The War Reporters will infrequently venture far from their hotel's bar. I've seen their type in action.



timber

Good God, have those guys in Washington gone nuts? If you ask me, they've all got big heads and a possible phallic inadequacy...... but that's just a theory.

Oops, sorry, I guess that was rude. We could say that they are feeling pretty bold and haven't the wisdom necessary to get themselves out of this mess. What IS this world coming to?

I'm interested to see what will happen next election, but of course, too early to tell. Still, I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

timberlandko, i pretty much agree but i have to ask just how much of this is quite simply the need of the pentagon to avoid the press that did such havoc to the "offical" line during VietNam. as you well know i have little trust of either pentagon or administrations be they democrat or republican. while there has always been great risk to war reporters and perhaps even more so now, americas need for non varnished information is even more relevant than in the past. i think its fair to say the america did not so much lose VietNam, what was lost was an audience for the progaganda of war.

Lola,

Phallic inadequacy? Isn't that akin to after-odor of testosterone? LOL. LOL.

And to all others,
Don't worry a bit about Kara in D.C. She is invincible and well nigh invisible - what would you expect from a crone?

sumac

and all this time i thought it was Venus Envy

dyslexia, I pretty much agree with you too. I have no doubt the reporting of the "Embedded" (Controled) reporters will be subject to Pentagon Approval ... and I fully know what that means, too. I'm just as suspicious of it as you are, and for much the same reasons, as we have discussed before.

Still, a reporter who wants to cover the war automously assumes significant risk ... with or without electronics. An individual given to wandering around in the vicinity of a war should not be surprised to suffer the consequences of war. That sort of forces a conundrum, I suppose.



timber

Saddam wins and is seen smiling and waving to the silent crowds.

Chirac wins and is seen as the next Napoleon of France.

Kim Jong il is emboldened and attacks South Korea-----1,000,000 die in Seoul the first day.

Blix's dream of never ending employment is dashed as Saddam kicks out inspectors again.

Israel uses preemptive strike and kills Saddam.

The middle east cools down and everyone is happy---for now.

Chirac engineers stranglehold on US corporations worldwide and the US----bankrupt---cannot fight back.

The US military forced by it's citizens to destroy it's weapons is never heard from again.

America ----as we once knew it-----is looted by hordes of poor people streaming across it's now unprotected borders. No one can fight back because everyone was forced by it's well meaning citizens to destroy all guns. Some who refused to give up their guns were overwhelmed as they ran out of ammo.

History says the well meaning citizens did not see the dangers of dissent and that trust could be destroyed overnight from within.
The power of a strategy spawned by a man dead for 150 years was now manifested by the destruction of the most powerful capitalistic country on earth----Karl Marx would be at last vindicated. Even though George Bush was never actually proven wrong in his strategy to remove Saddam from power, he decided in the end to not risk the lives of so many good soldiers so he ordered the complete withdrawal of US forces from the middle east and Korea.

The rest, as they say, is History.

Lola -- but are you keeping those legs crossed?!

The Right War for the Right Reasons
By JOHN MCCAIN


ASHINGTON ?- American and British armed forces will likely soon begin to disarm Iraq by destroying the regime of Saddam Hussein. We do not know whether they will have the explicit authorization of veto-wielding members of the United Nations Security Council. But either way, the men and women ordered to undertake this mission can take pride in the justice of their cause.

Critics argue that the military destruction of Saddam Hussein's regime would be, in a word, unjust. This opposition has coalesced around a set of principles of "just war" ?- principles that they feel would be violated if the United States used force against Iraq.

The main contention is that we have not exhausted all nonviolent means to encourage Iraq's disarmament. They have a point, if to not exhaust means that America will not tolerate the failure of nonviolent means indefinitely. After 12 years of economic sanctions, two different arms-inspection forces, several Security Council resolutions and, now, with more than 200,000 American and British troops at his doorstep, Saddam Hussein still refuses to give up his weapons of mass destruction. Only an obdurate refusal to face unpleasant facts ?- in this case, that a tyrant who survives only by the constant use of violence is not going to be coerced into good behavior by nonviolent means ?- could allow one to believe that we have rushed to war.

These critics also object because our weapons do not discriminate between combatants and noncombatants. Did the much less discriminating bombs dropped on Berlin and Tokyo in World War II make that conflict unjust? Despite advances in our weaponry intended to minimize the loss of innocent life, some civilian casualties are inevitable. But far fewer will perish than in past wars. Far fewer will perish than are killed every year by an Iraqi regime that keeps power through the constant use of lethal violence. Far fewer will perish than might otherwise because American combatants will accept greater risk to their own lives to prevent civilian deaths.

The critics also have it wrong when they say that the strategy by the United States for the opening hours of the conflict ?- likely to involve more than 3,000 precision-guided bombs and missiles in the first 48 hours ?- is intended to damage and demoralize the Iraqi people. It is intended to damage and demoralize the Iraqi military and to dissuade Iraqi leaders from using weapons of mass destruction against our forces or against neighboring countries, and from committing further atrocities against the Iraqi people.

The force our military uses will be less than proportional to the threat of injury we can expect to face should Saddam Hussein continue to build an arsenal of the world's most destructive weapons.

Many also mistake where our government's primary allegiance lies, and should lie. The American people, not the United Nations, is the only body that President Bush has sworn to represent. Clearly, the administration cares more about the credibility of the Security Council than do other council members who demand the complete disarmament of the Iraqi regime yet shrink from the measures needed to enforce that demand. But their lack of resolve does not free an American president from his responsibility to protect the security of this country. Both houses of Congress, by substantial margins, granted the president authority to use force to disarm Saddam Hussein. That is all the authority he requires.

Many critics suggest that disarming Iraq through regime change would not result in an improved peace. There are risks in this endeavor, to be sure. But no one can plausibly argue that ridding the world of Saddam Hussein will not significantly improve the stability of the region and the security of American interests and values. Saddam Hussein is a risk-taking aggressor who has attacked four countries, used chemical weapons against his own people, professed a desire to harm the United States and its allies and, even faced with the prospect of his regime's imminent destruction, has still refused to abide by the Security Council demands that he disarm.

Isn't it more likely that antipathy toward the United States in the Islamic world might diminish amid the demonstrations of jubilant Iraqis celebrating the end of a regime that has few equals in its ruthlessness? Wouldn't people subjected to brutal governments be encouraged to see the human rights of Muslims valiantly secured by Americans ?- rights that are assigned rather cheap value by the critics' definition of justice?

Our armed forces will fight for peace in Iraq ?- a peace built on more secure foundations than are found today in the Middle East. Even more important, they will fight for the two human conditions of even greater value than peace: liberty and justice. Some of them will perish in this just cause. May God bless them and may humanity honor their sacrifice.



John McCain, a Republican, is a senator from Arizona, and is the man I would have voted for had he not been defeated by Bush.

Famous Spanish writer, vehemently against the war, wrote an open letter recently in which he opined that these people -- Bush, Rumsfeld,Wolfowitz, Ashcroft -- have to be STUPID not BAD. Because bad people at least take break now and then while stupid people don't know how to stop being stupid.

Well, I don't agree with him (I think they're BAD) but I thought that was pretty funny.

run forest, run.

Well, I DID vote for McCain, there being no Deomcratic primary in South Carolina, and the state allows such crossing of party lines in primaries. He didn't stand a chance in Bush country.

US may go it alone as Blair is caught in diplomatic deadlock

Ewen MacAskill, Richard Norton-Taylor and Julian Borger in Washington
Wednesday March 12, 2003
The Guardian

Washington was forced to admit for the first time last night that it might have to start the war against Iraq without British forces because of the internal political problems heaping up for Tony Blair.

The US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, said that Mr Blair's difficulties had caused the White House to contemplate going to war without its closest ally.

After talks with his British counterpart, Geoff Hoon, Mr Rumsfeld said that the British role in an assault was now "unclear" and that Washington was well aware that the Blair government's freedom of action might be restrained by a rebellious parliament

I too was disappointed by McCain's failure to mount a credible campaign. The situation as it has become is a powerful argument for campaign reform.




timber

And many, many, many other areas of reform.

Panel Faults Bush on War Costs and Risks
By PATRICK E. TYLER


The cost of postwar reconstruction of Iraq will be at least $20 billion a year and will require the long-term deployment of 75,000 to 200,000 troops to prevent widespread instability and violence against former members of Saddam Hussein's government, a panel of national security experts say in a new study.
The panel, consisting of senior American officials from Republican and Democratic administrations, was organized by the Council on Foreign Relations. It concludes that President Bush has failed "to fully describe to Congress and the American people the magnitude of the resources that will be required to meet the post-conflict needs" of Iraq.

The panel was led by James R. Schlesinger, secretary of defense in the Nixon and Ford administrations, and Thomas R. Pickering, ambassador to the United Nations under Mr. Bush's father. Others on the panel included Gen. John M. Shalikashvili, who was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 1993 to 1997 and is now retired, and Jeanne J. Kirkpatrick, who served in senior positions in the Reagan administration.

They urged Mr. Bush "to make clear to Congress, the American people and the people of Iraq that the United States will stay the course" in Iraq by financing a "multibillion-dollar" reconstruction program and seeking formal Congressional endorsement of it.

In Washington, meanwhile, Pentagon officials said yesterday that the Bush administration was planning to put Iraqi soldiers to work and to pay the salaries of more than two million Iraqi civil servants to enable them to rebuild their country if Saddam Hussein is ousted. But the officials declined to estimate how much such support would cost.