Thursday, 04 December 2003

Custer had a plan too. Via e-mail, Sara is curious about how I'd respond to this blog post from Tacitus:

Okay, assorted know-it-alls of the internet....

....what would you do if someone handed you Iraq right now? Iraq and all the tools you might want to fix it up just how you'd like it? Say you were someone with that power. We'll call it a "President." Seems to me like there are several value judgments you'd have to make:

Tacitus then lists seven questions, and provides his own answers for reference.

While I'd modestly decline the title of internet know-it-all (unless of course it allows me to make "Rocky and Bullwinkle" jokes), Tacitus's question is worth thinking about—in the game show "Who wants to be President in 2005?", this one will be the final tiebreaker. If the Democratic challenger answers correctly, he takes the grand prize; if not, our departing contestant will receive a teaching gig at Columbia University and a year's supply of Rice-a-Roni.

So. Some of the options that I'd pursue, if I were elected President and took office tomorrow, are ones that George W. Bush can't: Some doors that Dubya has already closed can only be re-opened by a changing of the guard. Even if I took office planning to continue the exact letter and spirit of Bush's policies, I'd still have more options available than Dubya has right now; I could more easily heal the rift between America and Germany, for example, since I wasn't in office when it opened. (By "healing the rift" I specifically mean "convincing them to put German lives at risk on the ground in Iraq." All other gestures of reconciliation are, for our purposes, meaningless.)

1) What is your primary value with regard to Iraq? Secondary?

My primary value with regard to Iraq, and for that matter the rest of our foreign policy, is to secure the United States against 9/11-style terrorist attacks. I believe the most effective way to do this is to engage and defeat Al Qaeda—not only in the direct, physical sense, but also by discrediting their ideas and demoralizing their supporters.

My secondary value is to secure the blessings of liberty for those who've proven unable to secure it themselves. I would much prefer that Iraqis secured their own liberties—I consider this to be a fundamental duty of the Iraqi people—but I realize that, absent outside help, Iraqis did not have the means to overthrow Saddam nor the experience required to establish a functioning democracy.

2) What sort of state and society do you prefer in Iraq if you leave?

I would prefer to see a secular, stable, democratic government with a well-established respect for the rule of law, property rights, and the freedom of the individual. Iraqi society can be whatever it pleases, provided it respects and retains that system of government. (Note that I consider terrorism to be incompatible with "a well-established respect for the rule of law," to say nothing of individual rights.)

3) What are you unwilling to do to achieve goals 1 and 2?

Generally speaking, my statement of goal 1 limits what I can do to achieve it—for example, actions that run counter to American principles (depriving citizens of the right to a trial by jury, say) would reduce my credibility and impede my efforts to defeat terrorism. I'm also constrained in what I can achieve without the support and assistance of the Iraqi people; I'll pursue my primary goal ahead of my secondary one, but ultimately my success in both efforts is now tied to establishing a democracy in Iraq.

4) What immediate action would you take upon assumption of command?

Internally, I would take the blinders off: I would immediately enact policies to prevent "cherry-picking" of raw intelligence data, ensure that my intelligence, defense, and foreign policy teams were reasonably free of crippling biases, and make certain that our policies were grounded in objective reality rather than ideological doctrine. I'm assuming here that Bush's political appointees are also on their way out; if not, I would immediately fire Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, Secretary of Defense Douglas Rumsfeld, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, and (if possible) Vice President Dick Cheney. I hold these officials accountable for misleading pre-war intelligence, inadequate post-war planning, and deliberate efforts to mislead the American people.

Externally, I would as quickly as possible announce a timetable for the implementation of democracy in Iraq, identifying concrete, tangible, and independently verifiable steps toward establishing a working legislature and an interim executive; at a minimum this timetable would establish the prerequisites for local, regional and national direct elections, in that order, and establish a rough estimate (plus or minus six months, to be firmed up as conditions warrant) on the date for Iraq's first national election. Elections would be supervised by the United Nations or other suitable (non-US) agency with experience in this area. I would commit that American forces will remain in Iraq, with their role in Iraq's civil affairs diminishing over time, until the institutions of democracy were well established and secure from extremist threats.

At the same time, I would reconstitute those elements of the Iraqi army that surrendered without firing on coalition forces, and assign them to non-combat "peacekeeping" roles (e.g., guarding infrastructure, rebuilding schools, etc.) to reduce the demands on our warfighting troops. To the greatest extent possible, I would concentrate our efforts on the Baghdad area and its surroundings; as far as the public eye is concerned, the battle for Iraq will be won or lost there.

I would require the Iraqi Governing Council to appoint one of their number as an interim head of state, with the understanding that this role would be largely ceremonial—that is, a true head of state, rather than a chief executive. This distinction is largely lost in the United States, where the President fulfills both roles; other countries, such as England, distinguish between the ceremonial head of state (Queen Elizabeth II) and the actual leader of the government (Tony Blair). (I'm not suggesting that Iraq should have a monarch, but it does need an individual who acts as the public face of the Iraqi people; having a 25-member committee in this role achieves little, except to allow Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani to step into the gap.)

I would immediately begin training American soldiers and reservists to be fluent in Arabic, and recruiting volunteers with civil affairs experience (i.e., law enforcement, jurisprudence, etc.). I would be candid and accurate with both the troops and the American people about the expected costs of the war, in terms of dollars, lives, and tours of duty.

And, finally, I would turn the Iraqi public television franchise over to Fox News. (I'm only half joking. I originally wrote "I would reinstate funding for the Voice of America," our Cold War-era radio network that countered Soviet propaganda and told our side of the story—but, after a moment's reflection, why not make fair and balanced Fox do something that would help America's image overseas?)

5) What long-term action would you take?

I would attempt to restore the proper role of the United States Congress as the crucible of our democracy, in which our plans and policies are debated, tested and improved, in order to avoid a repeat of the current situation—where our post-war plans for Iraq were not subjected to scrutiny, and popular support for our Iraq policy is not as robust as we'd like. This would require both of America's major political parties to put the national interest ahead of partisan politics—or, perhaps, would require a renewed sense of civic duty from the American people.

I would make a sharp distinction in the armed forces between warfighting and peacekeeping troops, and develop our capacities for peacekeeping independently of our combat roles. This would probably result in creating a separate peacekeeping entity that had more in common with the Peace Corps than the Army; it would handle the tasks required to create a democracy, vs. those required to destroy a tyrannical regime. It would be centered on the current Civil Affairs and Engineering corps, and would ultimately correct the morale-draining problems we currently have with combat troops assigned to ill-fitting roles.

To the extent possible, I would restore America's influence and support for multinational organizations, including NATO, the EU, and the United Nations, and seek to expand the number of countries involved in the reconstruction of Iraq. By "involved in the reconstruction" I mean not only materially involved (i.e., sending troops), but also convinced that promoting democracy and stability in Iraq is essential to the well-being of all nations. I would open a sincere dialogue with our allies about the conflict between America's desire to respect international sovereignty vs. our right to protect ourselves from terrorist attacks, and how we may be able to accommodate, or at the very least listen, to the concerns of other nations.

6) At what point would you declare your plan a failure?

When the American people's support for it fell below 50%. This is not for cynical election-related reasons (I might win re-election even without a popular mandate on the Iraq issue), but because my plans and policies can only succeed if a majority of the people are solidly behind them.

7) How much time are you willing to allot to your occupation?

This is a potentially misleading question: American troops are still in Germany almost 60 years after World War II, but we don't speak of "occupied Germany" today. I expect the United States to play a gradually diminishing role in Iraq's civil affairs over the next five to ten years, but I expect that we'll be the guarantor of stability in Iraq (to the extent that we're providing stability now) indefinitely.

I have to take off my hat to Tacitus, whose blog I don't usually read: His questions have sparked a very lively debate in his comments section, and I'm glad to see a constructive exchange of ideas happening there. Now if we could just get Congress—or, heaven help us, the Administration—to host that kind of debate again.

- Posted by Scott Forbes at 8:00 am. comments.