A month ago, we learned that military planners in the Bush administration have given up on the whole they-stand-up, we-stand-down idea. Officials grudgingly came to realize that the strategy hasn’t worked — about more than four years of fighting, there are only 6,000 Iraqi troops who can operate independently — and that U.S. forces would have to defeat insurgents and secure control of troubled provinces.
Today, the WaPo’s David Ignatius suggests the opposite.
President Bush and his senior military and foreign policy advisers are beginning to discuss a “post-surge” strategy for Iraq that they hope could gain bipartisan political support. The new policy would focus on training and advising Iraqi troops rather than the broader goal of achieving a political reconciliation in Iraq, which senior officials recognize may be unachievable within the time available.
The revamped policy, as outlined by senior administration officials, would be premised on the idea that, as the current surge of U.S. troops succeeds in reducing sectarian violence, America’s role will be increasingly to help prepare the Iraqi military to take greater responsibility for securing the country.
“Sectarian violence is not a problem we can fix,” said one senior official. “The Iraqi government needs to show that it can take control of the capital.” U.S. officials offer a somber evaluation of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki: His Shiite-dominated government is weak and sectarian, but they have concluded that, going forward, there is no practical alternative.
You. Have. Got. To. Be. Kidding. Me.
Here’s the plan: After the surge is a sterling success, the U.S. will emphasize training Iraqi security forces. How is this different from the last three years? It isn’t. Why would this “gain bipartisan political support”? It won’t.
Indeed, reading Ignatius’s piece is a thoroughly frustrating exerience. He explains in one sentence that the surge strategy is predicated on reducing sectarian violence, and then explains in the very next sentence that “sectarian violence is not a problem we can fix.”
In the next paragraph, Ignatius notes that the Maliki government is overtly sectarian, which leads to additional violence, and the Bush administration is content to empower the Maliki government further, in order to help reduce sectarian violence.
Last month, retired Marine Gen. John J. “Jack” Sheehan, a former top NATO commander who turned down Bush’s “war czar” job, told the Post, “The very fundamental issue is, they don’t know where the hell they’re going.” It’s striking how the administration seems anxious to prove Sheehan right.
Ignatius’ conclusion made even less sense.
The wild cards in this new effort to craft a bipartisan Iraq policy are the Republican and Democratic leaders, President Bush and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. They both say they want a sustainable, effective Iraq policy, but each is deeply entrenched in a partisan version of what that policy should be. America is in a nosedive in Iraq. Can these two leaders share the controls enough that Iraq will become a U.S. project, rather than George Bush’s war? There’s a bipartisan path out of this impasse, but will America’s leaders be wise enough to take it?
So, to summarize, Ignatius believes the “bipartisan path out of this impasse” is to stick with Bush’s policy of the last three years. To hear Ignatius tell it, the way to reach a consensus is for Bush to embrace his own idea — the one that has led us into a “nosedive” in Iraq — and for congressional Dems to go along.
Someone really needs to explain to me why the Washington Post runs columns like this. I just don’t understand.