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Wednesday, August 09, 2006

What does the best case for the US in the Middle East look like? You may not want to know

Please read Wonky Muse's immediately preceding post on the Connecticut primary before you read this one. That one is straight-out good news. (Regular readers know not to expect too much of that in my posts.)

Anthony Cordesman has three new papers out that are very relevant to US policy in the Middle East. Unfortunately, policies that involve other countries with their own priorities and interests aren't nearly so quick and easy to change as the daily Republican Party line. The Cheney-Bush policies are really going to haunt the United States for a long time. Possibly a very long time.

I'm willing to see some good news still possible for the immediate future. The punditocracy will freak now that their Liebling (darling) Joe Lieberman lost the Democratic primary. So will quite a few Republican politicians. It certainly wasn't all because of the Iraq War. But with the publicity that race got and the (disproportionate) focus the coverage focused on the war issue, it will become harder and harder for even the slumbering David Broders of the world to ignore that a solid and growing majority of the public is unhappy with the Cheney-Bush disaster known as the Iraq War.

It may also - miracles do happen! - persuade the Democrats to raise the roof this fall if Cheney and Bush go for a repitition of the war campaign of 2002 this year, only with Iran in the bomb sights this time. It was at the end of August 2002 that Cheney gave the speech to the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Nashville that kicked off the final push to war with Iraq.

Cordesman's new papers, all published by the Center for Security and International Studies (CSIS), are The Middle East Crisis: Six "Long Wars" and Counting 08/04/06, Winning the Battle of Baghdad: The Challenges US Forces and the Iraqi Government Must Meet 08/07/06 and American Strategic and Tactical Failures in Iraq: An Update 08/08/06.

I want to mention the "Long Wars" paper in particular. It's the best brief (5 pages of text) discussion I've seen of what we got ourselves into - or rather what Cheney and Bush and Rummy got us into - when we invaded Iraq and made the US part of the Middle East "neighborhood" to the extent it did.

The Long War is the Pentagon's current label for the unending struggle against Evil (Communism, terrorism, Islamonism, etc.) and for ever-increasing military budgets of ever-increasing irrelevance to American defense needs. Although Cordesman adopts the term - in his own way - something tells me that Rummy won't be passing out copies to the press:

The US is only beginning to understand what "long war(s)" really mean in terms of US military commitments and budget expenditures and in terms of complexity, interaction, and time. The sooner it learns these lessons, the sooner it turns back to realism, and the sooner some effort is made to restore bipartisanship the better. Right now, the phrase the "world's only superpower" risks becoming something of a sick joke. (my emphasis)

This is not somebody writing a political pamphlet. This is one of the best-known military analysts in the country. It's becoming "something of a sick joke", he says. Wow!

Looking at the coverage I've seen in the mainstream press on the Israel-Lebanon War, its effect on the misbegotten American mission to carry the White Man's Burden to Iraq has been seriously lacking. Cordesman ties it together well. But being a serious analyst and not a Republican hack or a FOX News "reporter", even at the most optimistic he can't make it look like a pretty picture.

Here are some samples from Cordesman's six "long wars".

Israel-Lebanon War:

The broader regional impact will be negative for the US and Israel even —as now seems unlikely — if it eventually leads to backlash against the Hezbollah as well. Like Iraq and Afghanistan, the lesson is you don't need nuclear weapons to attack the US or Israel. The impression in the region (however fair or unfair) is one of an Israel that escalates without being effective and causes needless human suffering—a message that well serves Al Qa’ida, Hamas, and the PIJ [Palestinian Islamic Jihad].

... It also seems likely that the US will pay for some years for this war, although perhaps more for a diplomacy that seemed distant, unfeeling, and unbalanced than for Israel’s actions per se. (my emphasis)

Iraq War:

Defeat can come in days, weeks, and months. Progress and some form of "victory" almost certainly mean a major US effort beyond 2010. This will involve US combat support indefinitely into the future — it is over when it is over not, at some date certain — although the levels of such support may decline sharply. It probably requires at least another $20 billion in aid, and this time aid that goes directly to Iraqis with the US tasked to ensure the projects are real by limiting corruption and measuring progress and effectiveness. Grim as it may sound to say so, the US may have to think in terms of 5,000 American lives and more than $800 billion, five-year plans, and only 50-50 odds of success at best.

It also needs to think far more about how to give the Iraqis the lead in every area of activity as soon as possible, how to work far more closely with other regional states and the Arab League, and how to defuse the short and mid-term backlash the Israeli-Palestinian and Lebanon conflicts will create because of US ties to Israel. There is a direct connection. The US is perceived as Israel's cobelligerent and every anti-US movement in the region, and many of America’s friends, will act accordingly. (my emphasis)

I know it may be hard to believe, but Cordesman supports the Iraq War. And he stresses its importance in this paper. But, as the above indicates, he's trying to be honest about what a colonial-type war like the one is Iraq really entails. Let's look again at those first two lines:

Defeat can come in days, weeks, and months. Progress and some form of "victory" almost certainly mean a major US effort beyond 2010.

And that's the Republican Party prescription for the Iraq War: More Of The Same!

Iranian nuclear proliferation and other problems:

Talk with Iran and Syria may help; it may not. The US, however, needs to offer the carrot as publicly as possible, with as few slogans and as little vacuous political rhetoric as possible, before it uses the stick.

The US also needs to learn from the Israeli experience in Lebanon and its own experience in Iraq. If it does use the stick, the US is almost certain to provoke a much more direct form of asymmetric war with Iran that will be regional, involve energy and Israel, and lasting. The US will desperately need moderate Shi’ite support - if it can get it. It will need to play the Arab card against the Persian one, and the best results will not be pleasant. (my emphasis)

What's amazing to me is in that case and in others in this paper, Cordesman is describing a best-case situation. And saying things like "the best results will not be pleasant".

It almost makes you appreciate the head-in-the-sand eccentricity of the Christian Right apocalyptics. They at least can tell themselves that every new war and every setback is God's plan. A horrible plan for war and death and destruction. Well, maybe it isn't so easy to appreciate ...

Afghanistan and Pakistan:

The US may not be losing in Afghanistan, but as General Schoomaker said of Iraq, it is not winning. The Afghan government and Afghan forces are not taking hold; they are losing it. The Pashtun problem is growing steadily, and Pakistan’s role (and future stability) is increasingly uncertain. US efforts to convert Afghans away from a drug economy are doing far more harm than good, and traditional religious and cultural values are resurfacing along with the Taliban. ...

Nothing may be more politically unpalatable in the short term than calling for more American forces and expenditures in Afghanistan over a period of at least half a decade. ...

Afghanistan is only a threat as a sanctuary for terrorists and extremists. Pakistan is a major power and a nuclear one at that. An Islamist Pakistan is not likely but is certainly possible, and a nuclear Pakistan with missiles to sell could be a major new problem child in the "greater Middle East." (my emphasis)

They'll say it wasn't easy
Just another job well done
As the government in Kabul falls
To the sounds of rebel guns

- Arlo Guthrie, "When a Soldier Makes It Home"

Israel and the Palestinians:

One central reality does, however, have to be kept in mind. Israel and the Palestinians have been locked in a war of attrition since September 2000, and the prospects for peace are now much worse than they were under Arafat. Neither the Palestinians nor the Israelis are really peace partners for the other side. ...

All talk and no walk for the foreseeable future. The best the US can do is reduce the backlash effect. It also cannot be certain that Israel will not face more serious threats like Iranian proliferation or the transfer of far more advanced arms to the hostile elements near its borders.

GWOT (global war on terror):

If the US is to win, it has to address each of the other struggles as well as the war on terrorism. This is particularly true of Iraq and Afghanistan, but US success is also linked to Israel’s actions and to the struggle of Arab governments against their own internal threats. The US needs allies like Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, etc. more than it has in decades.

Overall prognosis:

Almost regardless of the level of violence involved, all of these conflicts now promise to involve religious, ideological, political, and perceptual struggles that will play out over at least a decade.

The most the US can hope to accomplish is to limit the scale of risk and intervention, contain the worst violence and risks, and put a given struggle on a path to progress that time can eventually turn into real conflict resolution. The US can lose quickly in some cases, but it cannot win quickly in any. Moreover, there are no conflicts where it can act unilaterally. In every case, success depends on international and local partners.

If the academic language muddles the message, Cordesman is saying that in the best case, we're [Cheney]ed in the Middle East for the next decade.

And that's the optimistic case. Thank you, Scalia Five. Thank you, "press corps" with your flaky stories about how Al Gore "invented the Internet". Thank you, New York Times and Judith Miller. Y'all have done a huckuva job!

And, seriously, all partisan considerations aside - even though today's Republican Party never leaves partisan considerations aside - US Middle East policy is a pitiful mess right now.

posted at 12:55:00 AM by Bruce Miller

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