Doubts begin to ripple in capital
Second-guessing, complaints, impatience on war signal discontent
DAVID E. SANGER
New York Times
WASHINGTON - After 10 days of watching smart bombs, sandstorms and stiff resistance from the Iraqi regime, a capital that usually embraces the president and his strategy in wartime is beginning to show fissures.
Few have openly split with the president, or the decisions made so far. But one does not have to scratch deep to hear the doubts.
There are the CIA analysts, quietly complaining that their warnings that Saddam Hussein's government might not crack like peanut brittle were dismissed. There are ex-generals on nightly cable television, expressing unease about a plan that relied more on speed than numbers, and that seemed overly dependent on welcoming cheers from the Iraqis. There are field commanders such as Lt. Gen. William Wallace, whose public complaints of an enemy that was "different from the one we'd war-gamed against" set off denials at the Central Command.
There are the terse comments of Secretary of State Colin Powell, who, in an interview on Friday, declined to say whether the Iraq war planners were in danger of violating the famed "Powell doctrine" -- the use of overwhelming force. He assured two visitors to his office that he was certain the Pentagon would, in time, "bring decisive force to bear" -- and then changed the subject.
And there are Democrats who chafe about the war's progress but will not say so publicly. Acutely aware that their Senate leader, Tom Daschle, walked into a hornet's nest two weeks ago when he suggested that the war itself was the result of failed diplomacy, they measure every word.
"No one is going to make that mistake again," said one veteran Democrat. Still, plenty of Democrats recognize that Bush has staked his presidency on success in Iraq. So they will not hold their fire for long.
Finally, there is a White House that is scrounging for evidence that it warned the nation all along that this could be a long slog, even in the face of predictions by Vice President Dick Cheney and others that, in all likelihood, the war would be quick and that "the streets in Basra and Baghdad are sure to erupt in joy."
Cheney may yet prove to be right, the White House says, but 11 days into the war there is a feeling that the enthusiasm of the hawks got out of control.
"There were very high expectations about the conduct of the war and enormous confidence in the military forces; we've all had drummed into us how superior they are," said Lee Hamilton, the former Democratic head of the House International Relations Committee.
"Then you run into difficulties," he said.
Even if the Iraqi government collapses in three weeks, or three months, the war is unlikely to be remembered as an easy struggle.
"It was hubris to go on Fox News and proclaim the war would be a cakewalk," one former aide to the first President Bush said. "The gods were bound to hear it." |
