Fatal Exit Flaw: No Iraq Army

01 December 2005 |permalink | email article

President Bush still doesn’t get it. After Baghdad fell, he was flown onto an aircraft carrier and prematurely declared victory with a giant ìMission Accomplishedî banner strung from the Flag Bridge.

At the U.S. Naval Academy yesterday the stage of a huge hall of the campus was adorned with a giant background emblazoned with the words, ìPlan for Victoryî where he again used a military venue in an attempt to regain public confidence about his management of the war in Iraq.

It was a sobering speech he should have made two and a half years ago after the invasion. He laid out what he called a strategy for victory ñ a copycat version of the Afghanistan mission, rejecting artificial timetables for withdrawing U.S. troops and offering a first vague hint of extricating American forces. What it lacked was a specific vision to avert a quagmire - a clear “they stand up, we stand down” policy which now appears inoperable in the short run.

His remarks coincided with a 35-page document outling a new strategy he candidly said, ìwill take time.î The report says increasing numbers of Iraqi troops have been equipped and trained ñ an assertion disputed by military commanders in the field ñ and a point Bush conceded in noting U.S. forces cannot withdraw until sufficient Iraqi forces are able to ensure stability and public order.

Here is the underreported, and central, flaw in Bushís strategy - and the subject of a must-read essay, ìWhy Iraq Has No Army,î by James Fallows in the December issue of The Atlantic Monthly.

An orderly exit depends on a viable security force. But Fallows contends the Iraqis arenít even close, and the White House has never taken the problem urgently. He blames much of the problem on the inability of the military to solve its major language problems, citing the author T.X. Hammes, who was then in Iraq and a Marine colonel, saying U.S. forces and trainers should have about 22,000 interpreters instead of just one or two per company.

Fallows believes the U.S. must choose one of two difficult alternatives:

ìIt can make the serious changes ñ including certain commitments to remain in Iraq for many years ñ that would be necessary to bring the Iraqi army to maturity. Or it can face the stark fact that is has no orderly way out of Iraq, and prepare accordingly.î

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