It’s late-September 2004, just six weeks before Election Day. John Kerry is awfully close to Bush in the polls, and Americans’ concerns about the war in Iraq are escalating. An op-ed appears in the Washington Post that helps change the conventional wisdom among the DC chattering class:
I see tangible progress [in Iraq]. Iraqi security elements are being rebuilt from the ground up. The institutions that oversee them are being reestablished from the top down. And Iraqi leaders are stepping forward, leading their country and their security forces courageously…There are reasons for optimism…Training is on track and increasing in capacity. Infrastructure is being repaired…Progress has also been made in police training…Considerable progress is also being made in the reconstruction and refurbishing of infrastructure for Iraq’s security forces. […]
Iraq’s security forces are developing steadily and they are in the fight. Momentum has gathered in recent months. With strong Iraqi leaders out front and with continued coalition — and now NATO — support, this trend will continue.
As Dick Polman noted, “Pretty encouraging, right? Any swing voter who read that piece might well have concluded that it would be nuts to dump Bush and elect John Kerry, what with the Iraqis so poised to take responsibility for their own security. And since nobody could possibly question the author’s bona fides, it had to be true: the Iraqis were getting ready to stand up, thereby allowing our troops to stand down — just like the Decider had long promised us.”
We now know, of course, that this wildly optimistic assessment of conditions in Iraq was also wildly wrong. Each point has proven to be untrue, based on false assumptions.
But the point, and the timing, of the piece was unmistakable: never mind that stuff you’re hearing from Kerry; Bush is right and Iraq is getting better. Given the context, you’d think the author of the piece was some kind of political hack, willing to play politics with the war. Worse, the author would also be seen as the type who might give a misleading assessment of Iraq, in order to keep the White House happy.
And who was the Pollyana who wrote this stunningly-wrong op-ed shortly before voters went to the polls?
It was Gen. David Petraeus.
The author of that ’04 column was an Army lieutenant general named David Petraeus — the same guy (now a full general) who is leading Bush’s Surge, and who has been entrusted with giving Americans a straight-talk assessment this September.
You see where I’m going with this. Given Petraeus’ rhetorical track record – and his apparent willingness, back in 2004, to inject himself into the middle of a domestic partisan campaign — why should we have confidence that in September he’ll say anything that would deviate from the White House line?
Given the recent apoplexy on the right after Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid had the audacity to offer some mild criticism of Petraeus, I suspect some Dems are going to be hesitant to question the general publicly. But one doesn’t need a crystal ball to see what’s going to happen here: Petraeus is going to issue a relatively upbeat assessment in September 2007, just as he did in September 2004, and for the same reasons. He’ll ask everyone to be patient, insist that he needs more time, and expect everyone to take him at his word.
Dick Polman explained the broader political dynamic.
So there’s the disconnect: The GOP rank and file, anxious about the ’08 elections, wants a decisive September Surge report, and a drawdown of U.S. troops — while Bush and Petraeus want a Surge extension, with no drawdown. The key issue is whether McConnell and his colleagues, having already decided that Bush has no credibility on Iraq, are therefore prepared to question Petraeus’ credibility as well.
If they’re looking for ammo, they might want to start with his ’04 Pollyana pronouncements. Nothing that Petraeus said back then is as credible as what Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki is saying now, in his attempt to explain why his Surge-supported government has failed to meet political benchmarks: “There are two mentalities in this region, conspiracy and mistrust.”
Something to keep in mind.