Intelligence

Successful elections? Bush sets bar low

TheStar.com - Successful elections? Bush sets bar low

What happens today could encourage George W. Bush's vision for the Mideast or hasten lame-duck status just 10 days after his inauguration.

But does he see it that way?

TIM HARPER
WASHINGTON BUREAU

For President George W. Bush, success in Iraq is always as close as the next turning point.

Over 22 months of war, the battleground is littered with such pivotal points.

There was the quick, decisive Battle of Baghdad and the "Mission Accomplished" victory lap on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln.

There was the killing of Uday and Qusay Hussein and the capture of Saddam Hussein, the handover of power to an interim government, the cleansing of Falluja, the ceremony at the White House for the "liberators" of Iraq.

And with each turning point, more bloodshed, a growing insurgency, more American families receiving the dreaded knock on the door from a Grim Reaper military team in full dress uniform.

Today, with Iraqis at the polls for their historic elections, comes the most important turning point of all.

The success of today's voting can define the second Bush term only 10 days after his inauguration.

A failure could hasten his lame-duck status and colour every other initiative, domestic and foreign, he has laid out in an ambitious agenda.

Success could go a long way to repairing ruptures with allies, Canada included; forcing other nations to begin to engage in his long-term goal of exporting democracy to the Middle East; and taking much of the steam from a Democratic party that is now opposing the war with a vigour it could not muster in 2002.

More than anything, it will add momentum to what is known here as the "Endgame" — the debate over an exit strategy for 150,000 U.S. troops that began in earnest last week.

Ultimately, successful elections in Iraq could determine Bush's place in history.

This is the president who has outlined the grandiose goal of planting the flag of liberty worldwide.

But this is also the man who has set the bar for success so low that today's exercise in democracy will almost certainly be hailed as a success in Washington.

And this is a man so relentlessly upbeat — refusing to acknowledge U.S. deaths in Iraq unless prodded — that many believe he has sealed himself off from all those who would bring him bad tidings.

Such is his enthusiasm, The New York Times reported Friday, that Bush cut off attempts by press secretary Scott McClellan to wrap up an interview in order to spend more time talking about his democratic goals.

One story making the rounds in Washington, given more credence when The Financial Times published it, illustrates the extent to which Bush has become the blinkered president.

Former secretary of state Colin Powell, in a recent meeting with Bush, was asked for an update on progress in Iraq, the story goes.

"We're losing," Powell is said to have responded.

With that, Bush ushered him out of the office.

There are other reports that Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld no longer brings accurate pictures of Iraq to the Oval Office.

The White House denies the stories, but Bush was incongruously upbeat on Wednesday about his freedom doctrine on a day when 37 Americans died in Iraq.

He tied the Iraqi vote to recent democratic breakthroughs in Afghanistan, the Palestinian territories and Ukraine, saying the fact that there will be an Iraq vote at all is evidence enough of success.

"The notion that somehow we're not making progress, I just don't subscribe to," Bush said.

"I mean, we're having elections."

Rumsfeld and Gen. John Abizaid emerged from a private Capitol Hill briefing with lawmakers mid-week to warn that it could be April before key Iraqi ministries are sorted out and violence during this period of flux could be even worse than during the run-up to today's vote.

"The period of aftermath of the election is fraught with uncertainty, and we should prepare the American people for as many eventualities as could possibly happen," said Republican Senator John Warner of Virginia, chair of the armed services committee, after he met with the military leaders.

If there is widespread uncertainty over how Iraqis will move forward from today over the next year, it is largely the product of mistakes made by the Bush administration, says Anthony Cordesman, a former director of intelligence assessment for the secretary of defence and now an expert on Iraq with the Centre for Strategic and International Studies.

He told a seminar last week that odds were no better than 50-50 that the political process will yield success because Washington allowed the deadly insurgency to take hold by wasting more than a year before trying to train effective Iraqi military and security forces.

Much of the money earmarked by Congress for reconstruction has been wasted or remains unspent, Cordesman added

"It's up to the Iraqis now to shape the political climate."

But this turning point brings with it the obvious question, asked plaintively in the Senate by West Virginia Democrat Robert Byrd, the longest-serving member of the chamber.

`Aftermath of the election is fraught with uncertainty, and we should prepare the American people for as many eventualities as could possibly happen'

John Warner, Republican Senator from Virginia

"Oh, when will our boys come home?" he asked.

On the eve of today's voting, it appeared everyone was asking that question.

Bush stressed there could be no point in talking withdrawal until Iraqi forces are sufficiently trained to handle their own security.

Although estimates of the number of Iraqis prepared to take on the ruthless killers loyal to terror-boss Abu Musab al-Zarqawi are wildly divergent, all agree their numbers are nowhere near sufficient.

A senior army official, Lt.-Gen. James J. Lovelace, said last week he is working on the assumption that he will need 120,000 U.S. soldiers on the ground in Iraq until the end of 2006.

A Massachusetts Democratic congressman, Martin Meehan, outlined an ambitious plan last week at the left-of-centre Brookings Institution, calling for the reduction of U.S. troop strength to a mobile force of no more than 30,000 within 18 months.

"The first step in achieving stability in Iraq is recognizing that the U.S. presence has become inherently destabilizing," said Meehan, who had just returned from Iraq.

"We also need to recognize the fact ... we are fighting not foreign terrorists or former regime loyalists but indigenous factions within Iraq who have united against us.

"It's a native insurgency."

He said the insurgency is fuelled by a young population with a 30-40 per cent unemployment rate. And he cited polling data indicating that 92 per cent of Iraqis see Americans as occupiers, with just 2 per cent viewing them as liberators.

"More troops do not mean more security in Iraq," Meehan said.

"Despite 150,000 boots on the ground and tactical victories in Falluja and elsewhere, the insurgency is only growing in size and lethal capacity."

Democratic congresswoman Lynn Woolsey of California, a long-time critic of the president's Iraq policies, introduced a House resolution calling for the president to withdraw U.S. troops immediately.

"We've gone as far as we can with this and we're sacrificing our troops every day," Woolsey said.

The resolution has the support of 24 other House Democrats.

Two days later, Democrat Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts became the first senator to call for a timeline for withdrawal.

"The U.S. military presence has become part of the problem, not part of the solution," said Kennedy.

"We need a new plan that sets fair and realistic goals for self-government in Iraq, and works with the Iraqi government on a specific timetable for the honourable homecoming of our forces."

But even most Democrats caution against setting a withdrawal date.

Bill Nelson, a Florida Democratic senator, said Iraq has to be stabilized before withdrawal can be discussed.

He said he understands Kennedy's frustration because this is "becoming ghastly close to the Vietnam experience," but declared that the Massachusetts senator was not speaking on behalf of the party.

From Davos, Switzerland, former president Bill Clinton also weighed in.

"We need to get out of there, but we don't need a timetable," he said.

"We've got to stay there and do the job, but if we stay there too long, a certain per cent of the people will believe we are there for the oil or for imperialist reasons and not try to make the deal work"

Conservative pundit William Kristol, editor of The Weekly Standard, countered Meehan at the Brookings conference.

"Announcing a date simply tells the terrorists and the insurgents that they just have to hang on till this date and they have a chance to wreak more havoc," Kristol said.

Danielle Pletka of the conservative American Enterprise Institute agrees and argues that a permanent American military presence in Iraq is an attractive possibility.

"The only time a wholesale withdrawal works is when you want to give up," she said.

"That's what we did in Somalia. We left because we were not interested in Somalia's future.

"That is not the case with Iraq."

Cordesman noted that no Iraqi party seeking votes today is advocating an American withdrawal.

"The realities are simply this — it isn't a matter of who would like U.S. withdrawal, it is a matter of realism in terms of how quickly Iraqi forces could be put together that can replace the U.S."

January 30, 2005 at 10:55 AM in Iraq | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home