Australia explores pulling out of Iraq

By THOMAS PLATE

PROVIDENCE JOURNAL

LOS ANGELES — John Howard, often the most patient and sure-footed of Western leaders, is reported to be losing patience with the current Iraqi government and is mulling over options for an Australian troop withdrawal.

Howard, who has served as Australia’s prime minister much longer than George W. Bush has been America’s president, is no dummy. The Australian people have soured on the war effort, to which their country has committed a troop contribution of about 1,500. And the facts on the ground in Iraq do not seem to be improving rapidly. America does not go to the polls until late next year, but the probability is that Australians will choose their next government later this year. Howard, the PM since 1996, has seen his opinion ratings deteriorate and faces the prospect of leading his Liberal Party (read: conservative party) to defeat.

Time is not on the chiseled veteran’s side. The squeeze has begun and the wily Howard is looking for a way out that avoids the appearance either of defeat or of a timetable.

Judging from his public statements, though, the prime minister, it seems, thinks that timetables for withdrawal are sort of unwise and unmanly. Just a few months ago Howard, in an utterly gratuitous commentary on the U.S. presidential debate, lambasted Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., not so much for advocating withdrawal as for proposing a specific timetable: sometime in the spring of 2008. The prime minister was suggesting that this very idea is problematic, if not unpatriotic.

“I think that will just encourage those who want to destabilize and destroy Iraq, and create chaos and victory for the terrorists to hang on and hope for an Obama victory,” he told Australian Nine Network television. “If I were running al-Qaida in Iraq, I would put a circle around March 2008 and be praying as many times as possible for a victory, not only for Obama but also for the Democrats.”

Impending election

But if Howard is aiming to time the beginning of the Australian withdrawal to the country’s impending election, then why shouldn’t al-Qaida “put a circle” around an even earlier date than Obama’s? In fact, those running Obama’s presidential campaign might well be justified now in throwing the PM’s angry words right back in the Aussie’s face.

Petty get-even politics aside, the Iraq tragedy raises the very important issue of excessive alliance loyalty, if not dysfunctional geopolitical co-dependence. Sure, President Bush had put it on the line when the unwise decision to invade was made. And, as if in response to the snap of the president’s fingers, three prime ministers were in short order at Bush’s feet: Tony Blair of Britain, Junichiro Koizumi of Japan, and, of course, John Howard of Australia.

Each calculated that it was in his country’s national interest to leap at the master’s command. But with the benefit of hindsight — which admittedly always does put tough issues into perfect focus — we can now ask the question: Was it in America’s interest to have allied leaders who were such yes-men? Might not it have been better for the United States to have had real friends courageous enough to challenge the administration’s thinking, instead of pimping it to their domestic publics and around the world?

Death toll

After all, the United States has lost more than 3,600 soldiers in Iraq — and more than 27,000 have been significantly injured. The British have had 168 killed, as of this writing. The Japanese have had none from combat; the Aussies have lost two soldiers.

In Japan and Britain the governing parties remain in power and there is still time for Howard to pull out a victory from the jaws of defeat in Australia. After all, none of these governments staked everything on this awful war, as did the Bush administration. It is the latter’s legacy that will be largely colored by this unnecessary war.

Worse yet, history will be even more condemnatory of Bush if it turns out Afghanistan (which was a necessary war) is to be lost because of the diversion of too many resources to Iraq.

So it may be asked: With miscalculating, fawning friends like Howard — and Blair and Koizumi — Bush, in the end, really didn’t need enemies, did he? And so it is Howard — far more than Obama — who has blood on his hands from this tragic mess.

X Thomas Plate is a professor of media studies and public policy at UCLA and a longtime editor and foreign correspondent. Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service.