Strategically Speaking
9/11, and the surge and upsurge in Iraq
Every year since the horrible terrorist attack on September 11, 2001, the world, particularly the US administration, takes a stock of how it has fared from the strategic and security point of view. And the two events that are seen as the aftermaths of 9/11, Afghanistan and Iraq, are dissected to either validate or invalidate the rationale of the ventures. And predicated on these two is the much vaunted and, to most of us, the most significant of Bush's project, his global war against terror (GWOT)
While there had been a general acceptance of US campaign in Afghanistan, the moral high ground that the US policy could be perched upon after 9/11 was destroyed by the invasion of Iraq, which no less a person than the UN secretary general had termed illegal. The world leaders, and scholars and opinion makers, must ponder and assess whether the anti-dote has been more harmful than the disease itself, and whether the doctor is part of the problem rather than the solution.
We must also be careful not to lump the three issues together because, if one were to be faithful to history, one would find it hard to link Iraq with 9/11. Iraq was neither the cause of the Sept. 11 attack on the Twin Towers, nor was it the underlying motivation of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Planning for a possible invasion of Iraq predated Sept. 11, 2001.
Be that as it may, even the most dispassionate and detached look at operations "Enduring Freedom" and "Iraqi Freedom" will indicate that these have neither brought about anything enduring that the world, particularly the regional countries, can look forward to insofar as Afghanistan is concerned, and one is not certain what freedom President Bush had in mind when he exploited the Twin Tower attacks and the agonies of the relatives of the victims to invade Iraq in March 2003.
The greater part of Afghanistan remains outside the writ of Mr. Karzai. The Al-Qaeda operates with impunity and, with its supporters straddling the Pak-Afghan border, dictates much of the politics on both sides of the border. Suicide attacks are on the increase, and the Islamists call the shots.
With Iraq taking so much time of the US administration and the space in the western media, Afghanistan features poorly in the press. But that notwithstanding, a report card on its current situation would be a very dismal reading indeed.
A look at the achievements of the last six years should give us a clearer picture of whether the world, and in particular the Americans, ought to feel more secure now than they did before the two operations were launched. If the index of success is the prevention of terrorist attacks in the US mainland, then that is indeed no mean achievement. But the flip side is that (and I quote US analysts as well as its top ranking lawmakers) major terrorist attacks globally have doubled compared to the six years prior to Sept. 11, 2001.
In spite of the resources at the disposal of the US Osama bin Laden remains at large, directing Al-Qaeda operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, and elsewhere in the world. And even the most self-assured in the US administration would find it hard to disagree with the assertion that the US is less popular globally, not only in the Muslim world, and a Vietnam scenario is staring in the face of the US policy makers and its military commanders, in spite of their claims of recent gains in Iraq.
One is not surprised either that Iraq has been hogging the limelight since March 20, 2003. It was flaunted by Bush and his hawkish neo-con colleagues as the main front of the GWOT. But all it has managed to do is spawn more terrorism globally and, although some may take comfort in the latest State Department report on global terrorism that says "the international community has achieved significant success in dismantling terrorist organisations and disrupting their leadership, which has contributed to reduced terrorist operational capabilities and the detention or death of numerous key terrorist leaders," the attacks have been more violent and have caused more casualties. It is, therefore, no wonder that there is a demand at home for Mr. Bush to change track in Iraq and formulate a new strategy.
Both a rapid withdrawal and, at the same time, not allowing the Iraq situation to degenerate into a free for all between the three major disparate groups is a tall order. And this is what the Bush administration has been seized with for the last six months in Iraq, starting with the "surge" of US troops in Feb. to contain the upsurge of violence in order that the political objectives (and one is not certain what that might be since by some account there have as many as almost 168 different objectives articulated by the US administration immediately after operation "Iraqi Freedom" was launched) could be met.
The possibility of a Vietnam outcome has perhaps dawned on Bush and his colleagues. One of the aims of the increase in force level in Iraq was to help achieve ethnic reconciliation and establish a political government capable of assuming the security responsibility for the country. The tremendous pressure on Bush to reduce US troops in Iraq is matched by the need to make Iraq look like a success story; after all the billions of dollars spent, and with more than three thousand US soldiers killed, in Iraq, the US cannot be seen to be deserting the country with the prospect of a truncated Iraq divided along ethnic lines.
Unfortunately, things have gone wrong horribly in Iraq. The surge, that was supposed to provide a breathing space to the Maliki government to allow enactment of appropriate legislation for sectarian integration, has not been made use of by the Iraqi government. In spite of Gen. Petraeus' claim that the military objective is being met, observers say that it has been only a little tactical success.
If the number of attacks has gone down compared to the fall of 2006, it remains much above the levels of 2004, 2005 and early 2006. And, as for the Anbar success, senior ground commanders acknowledge that the fighting is far from being over since the enemy has dispersed.
There is indeed need for changing the strategy in Iraq. Experts opine that neither giving more time for the current strategy to work nor investing more resources, will salvage the current situation, because, as Phillip H Gordon asks in his Winning the Right War: "Six years into the war on terrorare the United States and its allies better off than we were before it started?" "Sadly, we are not," he answers, and the reason is that "we have been fighting -- and losing -- the wrong war." He goes on to suggest that tough talk and military power cannot succeed against a diverse enemy.
The world is waiting to see whether the Bush administration goes for a rapid but responsible withdrawal from Iraq or, as one analyst says, run out the clock in Iraq -- handover the problem to his successor.
The Author is Editor, Defense & Strategic Affairs, The Daily Star.
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