The ongoing debate over the Iraq War is becoming a bit simplistic. It is true that the American public will probably decide whether or not the war was worthwhile and justified based merely on three factors:
1. Do we find WMD?
2. Do we find/kill Saddam Hussein?
3. Are we able to bring stability to Iraq with a limited number of American casualties in the next year or so?
But while the public and the media will likely rely on those criteria, it smells of "Monday-morning-quarterbacking." Similarly, the debate over the Bush Administration's use of dubious British intelligence in the State of the Union speech this year also veers off course at times. The issue there is not whether the Administration used bogus evidence to convince the American people to invade Iraq. I do not know a single person who mentioned that evidence in the many heated discussions I had or listened in on prior to or after the war. Even the Bush team stopped mentioning it shortly after the speech. The significance of the use of the British intel is that it shows how careless the Administration was with the facts and the truth as part of its determined effort to justify a war they were intent on having. Lacking any hard evidence or proof from the past several years of Iraqi WMD programs, they were too willing to use anything that came across their desks, no matter how far fetched, poorly supported, or seemingly inconsequential it seemed. Even Colin Powell's presentation at the UN after the State of the Union seemed woefully short on evidence of a major program.
The bottom line on the British intel, however, is that the Bush Administration did not trust that the American people would buy into their own rationale for going to war against Iraq, so now the American people should be hesitant to trust the Bush Administration on just about anything. We'll need to set a much higher standard for corroborating evidence before we trust their economic plan or their next foreign policy adventure.
But, getting back to how we should evaluate the decision to invade Iraq this spring, let's look at the decision on its own merits. As we do so, however, let's keep in mind who bares responsibility for this decision:
* Most of the responsibility must fall on President Bush. Isn't the buck supposed to stop on his desk? It was his call, his mission. He's the Commander-in-Chief.
* Congress tried to absolve itself by giving Bush a blank check last year. Congressional oversight was stunningly understated. This vital check on executive power was missing in action.
* The media dropped the ball on this, as well. The media is the public's last line of defense against being railroaded by an administration with its own agenda. Invesitgative journalism is not what it used to be and too many of the the pundits that clutter the cable networks and talk radio tend to opt for soundbites instead of sound analysis.
* Finally, the American people must step up to the plate and take responsibility. We need to get better at holding our elected officials accountable to us, about asking the tough questions, about being engaged in our country's affairs rather than merely watching the news like it's just another reality TV program.
Now, here's my take on the merits of the decision to invade Iraq this spring:
1. A confrontation with Iraq was inevitable. Iraq had violated or ignored countless UN Security Council resolutions over the course of a decade. The last reliable evidence - from the UN inspectors in Iraq until 1998 - showed a serious effort on the part of Iraq to build WMD and protect their program from the UN inspectors. At some point in time, unless Saddam Hussein suddenly came clean and allowed inspectors to have unlimited access to all facilities and to demonstrate that he had dismantled his programs completely, force was going to be necessary to bring about Iraqi compliance and avoid having the UN look like the League of Nations II. Moreover, if force was going to be used, avoiding an endless dance with Saddam that involved pinprick airstrikes on our part and limited cooperation on his part - a dance that had become tiresome by the mid-90s - regime change would have been the logical goal of any serious attempt to bring about Iraqi compliance. It was not so much a matter of if but when we would need to invade Iraq and remove Saddam. I found myself focusing on this point before the war. I saw this confrontation as inevitable, even if the timing was not particularly logical. But as with so many things in life, timing is everything - or at least critical. And many of us - politicians, journalists and pundits, so-called "experts" alike - downplayed this before the war.
2. War with Iraq was not necessary this spring. In terms of presenting a clear and present danger, al Qaeda was and is a more urgent threat to U.S. national security than Saddam Hussein's regime. Was Saddam a threat? Yes. A serious threat? Most likely. But stopping al Qaeda and finding bin Laden are, in my mind, clearl more urgent needs than the major undertaking in Iraq was. Al Qaeda's continued ability to carry out missions around the world - and bin Laden's continued freedom, even if his freedom of movement is limited to the mountains of eastern Afghanistan and border areas in Pakistan - are further evidence that the Bush Administration moved on to a war they thought they could win easily before they made a full commitment to engage against our foes in al Qaeda. Ultimately, this may be the critical issue. Even if, long-term, we are successful in bringing peace and stability to Iraq, did we need to do it now? Would America - and many of our friends around the world - have been better off if we had focused the people and resources we are investing in Iraq instead on a more robust campaign to defeat al Qaeda? A question impossible to answer with complete certainty, but it certainly seems obvious to me that al Qaeda was and is a more clear and present danger than Iraq was. Having gone this far in Iraq, however, we must not fail there. Which leads us to the next issue...
3. The Bush Administration underestimated - or ignored - the requirements of post-war stabilization and nation building in Iraq. We did win the war - quickly, decisively and at a limited cost to American soldiers. But it seems quite clear that the Administration woefully underestimated the need for rapid efforts to stabilize Iraq immediately after the war and to organize the nation building program that will take years, if not decades to firmly take hold. Hopefully, Congressional inquiries and investigative journalism will eventually shed enough light on how this could have happened. It seems simplistic here, as well, to merely blame it on Rumsfeld's disdain for nation building as a matter of principle. It would seem that great minds at both State and DoD were asleep at the wheel or made some grossly inaccurate estimates of the needs post-war. It also would seem that Colin Powell did not, initially, have the clout he needed to press State's agenda and have a strong voice in the planning; only in the face of immediate chaos after the fighting ebbed did Powell have the ability to assert some of his will. But the decision to go to war this spring must be evaluated, in part, based on whether or not we were ready and well-prepared - not just for the fighting, but for the immediate needs in Iraq after the war and the long road ahead in bringing peace, stability, and maybe even some form of democracy to Iraq. On that score, we seem to have missed the mark.
Is it too soon to tell? Only somewhat. It is clear that the first months of our post-war Iraq planning has been a fiasco in many regards, tragically so for many American soldiers, UN workers, and , lest we forget, the Iraqi people we are trying to help. We did a poor job of securing key Iraqi facilities - including potential WMD sites - and of restoring basic services to the Iraqis. We will need to turn this program around 180 degrees, however, if the long-term prognosis is going to improve.
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