Sobering answers
White House officials have begun to acknowledge that a large commitment of U.S. troops will benecessary in Iraq "for the foreseeable future."
A Times Editorial
© St. Petersburg Times
published July 11, 2003
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Members of the Senate Armed Services Committee had some tough questions Wednesday for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and outgoing CentCom Commander Tommy Franks, and they got some sobering answers in return.
Rumsfeld said our military operation in Iraq is costing $3.9-billion a month, or about twice as much as previously estimated. Franks said a force comparable to the current U.S. deployment of 148,000 troops would be needed "for the foreseeable future." That's about four times as large a force as Bush administration officials originally projected for postwar operations. Neither man offered much hope that other nations might eventually bear significantly more of the economic, political and human costs of the mission, which claimed two more American lives that day. It was the sort of bleak assessment that got generals in trouble back when the White House was creating the impression that deposing Saddam Hussein and building a new Iraq would be a relatively quick and simple task.
It's too bad members of Congress didn't take their responsibilities more seriously and demand straight answers before the war. The White House's claims of the threat posed by Hussein's regime could have been given more rigorous scrutiny. And the likely costs and duration of U.S. involvement in Iraq could have been considered more realistically.
At this point, it is beyond serious dispute that President Bush and other officials in Washington and London grossly exaggerated the case against Iraq in the weeks leading up to war. In this year's State of the Union address, the president raised alarms about an ongoing Iraqi nuclear weapons program by referring to a document that administration officials already knew to be fraudulent. No hard evidence has been found to support the White House's repeated attempts to link Hussein to al-Qaida. And the long search for chemical and biological weapons continues. Such weapons, or at least the materials to make them, may yet be found. Hussein had them - and used them - in the past. But each passing day erodes British Prime Minister Tony Blair's prewar claim that illegal weapons were ready to be used within 45 minutes.
The American people deserve to know the extent to which the Bush administration's case against Iraq was based on false or exaggerated claims. And as the international war against terrorism continues, the rest of the world needs assurance that our government is focused on real threats rather than trumped-up ones. For those reasons, a thorough review of the administration's prewar claims is warranted.
However, the White House's postwar credibility has become a more pressing issue than its prewar credibility. Even Rumsfeld's and Franks' revised assessments of our Iraq mission may be optimistic. As our casualties mount, the dangers facing our troops seem to be multiplying rather than subsiding. Efforts to restore electricity, water and other basic services are lagging, as are plans to allow Iraqis to begin governing themselves. As a result, opposition within Iraq to our troops' continued presence has spread. Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., challenged Rumsfeld to explain why "the world's best-trained soldiers (are) serving as policemen in what seems to be a shooting gallery."
It becomes increasingly difficult to understand why the White House hasn't made every possible effort to recruit other governments to share the burden of policing and rebuilding Iraq. Rumsfeld claimed Wednesday that the administration has "reached out" to NATO, but other governments within NATO say otherwise. The United Nations has broad experience in similar peacekeeping missions, but the White House has limited it to narrow humanitarian duties.
Rumsfeld said he expects to "replace U.S. forces with U.S. forces, in large measure." American taxpayers will continue to pay almost the entire tab for that open-ended mission - and American men and women in uniform will continue to pay a far dearer price. Aside from some macho posturing from a safe remove, President Bush hasn't talked to the American people about Iraq since his premature victory speech on May 1. Rumsfeld and Franks deserve credit for giving members of Congress some straight answers this week, but the president himself should be explaining how we got to this point, and what will be required to complete the Iraq mission with honor |
