Monday, June 30, 2003
As the death toll of American and British soldiers in liberated Iraq continues to mount and the transition to democratic government remains as elusive as ever, we find ourselves fighting the urge to say, "We told you so." In the months leading up to the invasion of Iraq, we not only argued that President Bush had failed to make a clear case for sending Americans into battle, but we cautioned against going in without an exit strategy.
Indeed, when a top military official warned that the United States would have to remain in Iraq for an extended period of time after it had eliminated Saddam Hussein's regime and that a occupation force of at least 200,000 would be needed, he was roundly criticized by the White House and some Republican leaders on Capitol Hill.
But now, three months after what was undoubtedly a stunning military victory by American and British forces against Saddam's highly touted fighting machine -- it sputtered from day one -- the reality of liberated Iraq is evident.
Iraqis loyal to Saddam have been conducting almost daily attacks on the American and British liberators, various ethnic groups vying for a share of the power have been fomenting trouble among the masses, and even those Iraqis who welcomed Saddam's ouster are now losing patience with the lack of basic necessities, such as drinking water.
"This idea that we will be in just as long as we need to and not a day more -- we've got to get over that rhetoric! It's rubbish!" said Sen. Richard Lugar, a Republican from Indiana and chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. "We're going to be there a long time."
Nonpartisan appraisal
Lugar and two other members of the committee, Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., and Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., recently visited Iraq and offered a nonpartisan appraisal of the situation. Their bottom line: The Bush administration must level with the American people as to how long an occupation force will have to be in Iraq and how large a force will be necessary to keep the peace and ensure that extremists don't gain a foothold in the country.
As Biden put it, "This is not a partisan thing. There's a gigantic gap between expectation and reality in terms of what the administration, in my view, had anticipated."
The senators have urged the White House to seek more help from NATO, including France and Germany, which opposed the war, and from the United Nations.
There's a good reason to involve as many democratic nations as possible in the stabilization and reconstruction of Iraq: money.
If the U.S. and Britain continue to insist that they will control all the major contracts, then other nations whose companies are hoping to get a piece of the pie will be unlikely to offer assistance in peacekeeping.
And make no mistake about it, peacekeeping in Iraq will be an extremely costly proposition.
While the Bush administration continues to insist that things are going according to plan, the almost daily attacks on American and British units suggest that the situation is spinning out of control.
It's time President Bush leveled with the American people.