Worth a re-read:
Iraq crisis shakes foreign policy goals
As conflict looms, concern grows over U.S. need for allies
ANALYSIS
By Michael Dobbs
THE WASHINGTON POST
WASHINGTON, Jan. 27 ? The Bush administration is entering a week of crucial decision-making on Iraq looking for ways to patch a damaging transatlantic rift that could jeopardize many of its longer-term foreign policy goals, including the war on terrorism.
ALTHOUGH SOME administration officials may feign indifference on whether ?old Europe? will join an American-led war to topple Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, many understand that it is much better to go to war with allies than without.
Faced with rising criticism from Congress, uncertain public support and behind-the-scenes lobbying by Britain, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said yesterday that Washington would work ?patiently and deliberately with our friends and allies.? However, Powell said, the United States was prepared to act alone, if necessary, to force Iraq to give up its weapons of mass destruction.
In strictly military terms, the United States could almost certainly win a second war in the Persian Gulf without the participation of France and Germany, which have emerged as the two most vocal European critics of an early showdown with Hussein. Under any realistic scenario, the United States would supply the vast majority of combat troops for an invasion of Iraq, with perhaps 10 percent coming from Britain, its closest and most dependable ally.
RISING STAKES
Politically and economically, however, the stakes are much higher. The Bush administration is counting on European allies to make up the bulk of a postwar occupation force in Iraq that could cost as much as $50 billion a year. In addition, analysts and foreign diplomats said, it is important to avoid turning what the White House has depicted as a dispute between the international community and Hussein into a U.S. crusade against the Arab world.
Frustrated by diplomatic opposition from key members of the U.N. Security Council to American war plans, President Bush and other administration officials talk about forming a ?coalition of the willing? to confront Hussein. In addition to Britain, such a coalition could include small Arab sheikdoms, such as Kuwait and Oman, as well as a very reluctant Turkey, the only Muslim member of NATO. But it would be only a shadow of the international coalition of nearly 40 countries that President George H.W. Bush assembled in 1990 to fight the Persian Gulf War.
?You can forge a coalition of the unwilling and pressure countries into following you once, but that only works if the war goes extremely well and the peace justifies the choices you have made,? said Anthony H. Cordesman, a military analyst and Middle East expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. ?If you get the reputation of being an international bully, you create a new underpinning for every extremist organization, terrorist movement and anti-U.S. group that is out there.?
The debate over how much international support the United States needs to confront Hussein is likely to heat up today, when U.N. weapons inspectors submit a report to the Security Council on Iraq?s compliance with its disarmament obligations. This will be followed by Tuesday?s State of the Union address, in which Bush is expected to begin laying the groundwork for a possible war with Iraq to the American people. On Friday, the president will hold talks at Camp David with British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who has been urging the administration to grant more time to U.N. inspectors.
RUMSFELD?S ?OLD EUROPE? REMARK
Last week, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld infuriated French and German leaders by depicting them as belonging to an ?old Europe,? unrepresentative of an alliance that now includes former communist states such as Poland and Hungary. White House spokesman Ari Fleischer followed up by saying that it was up to the French and Germans whether they chose to remain ?on the sidelines,? but that most Europeans would follow Washington?s lead.
Although it may be true that NATO?s center of gravity is shifting to the east, military analysts point out that France and Germany contributed many troops to peacekeeping efforts in the Balkans and could have a similarly important role in stabilizing a post-Hussein Iraq. Without strong European participation in the Iraq peacekeeping effort, said Michael O?Hanlon of the Brookings Institution, the United States might even have to expand its standing army to provide a long-term occupation force.
?If Rumsfeld had thought through how much we will need these allies for the occupation of Iraq, I presume he would not have made such a stupid comment,? said O?Hanlon, who estimates that the postwar stabilization force could number about 100,000 troops for the first three years and 50,000 for five more years. ?In Kosovo and Bosnia, we provided only 15 percent of the peacekeeping forces. Europe provided most of the rest.?
Some administration officials, particularly at the State Department, cringed at Rumsfeld?s remarks. By the end of the week, there were signs that a damage repair operation was being launched. One such indication was a willingness to delay issuing an ultimatum to Hussein for several more weeks. This concession may be more symbolic than real, however, given that U.S. troops will not be fully in position around Iraq until the end of February or beginning of March.
CONFLICTING GOALS
Bush administration pronouncements on Iraq have been dictated by two conflicting goals: escalating the pressure on Baghdad and reassuring nervous allies. The result has been a pendulum-like swing from obduracy to reasonableness and back. To counter the impression of a wobbly alliance and convince Hussein that the time for prevarication is over, the White House believes it has to signal iron resolve. But this, in turn, leads to a counter-reaction, as friends and critics point out the dangers of going it alone.
?These are all combustible, dangerous threats to international stability and peace. We have to deal with these. We can?t do it alone. We need the resources and support of our allies.?
? SEN. CHUCK HAGEL
R-Nebraska After a period of relative quiescence, congressional leaders last week began expressing rising concern about the risks of American unilateralism. Some of the sharpest criticism came from an independently minded Republican, Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, whose distinguished Vietnam War record gives him credibility on national security issues.
?It won?t be the military might of the U.S. alone that wins the war against terrorism,? Hagel said in an interview. Sustaining and building ?a new Iraq,? he added, will require ?a vast amount of resources. ... America cannot do this alone. That was the lesson we should have learned from Vietnam, the greatest foreign policy failure in our history.?
Iraq, Hagel said, ?is not the most imminent threat to America today. There is also North Korea, the Israeli-Palestinian issue, the Pakistan-India issue, major problems in South America. These are all combustible, dangerous threats to international stability and peace. We have to deal with these. We can?t do it alone. We need the resources and support of our allies.?
Similar points have been made by leading Democrats, including presidential candidates such as Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.), another Vietnam War veteran. In a speech to Georgetown University students last week, Kerry accused the Bush administration of ?alienating our longtime friends and allies, alarming potential foes and spreading anti-Americanism around the world? through its ?blustering unilateralism.?
CONCERN IN THE MIDDLE EAST
Arab diplomats, meanwhile, warned that a war against Iraq without the backing of the United Nations could boost the already high level of anti-Americanism in the Middle East, producing more recruits for the terrorist organization al Qaeda.
?If you raise the anxiety level [inside Arab countries], you give criminals and terrorists the chance to nurture their cause.?
? NABIL FAHMI
Egyptian ambassador to the United States Nabil Fahmi, the Egyptian ambassador to the United States, said he was less concerned about the immediate aftermath of an invasion of Iraq than the medium- and long-term consequences for the war on terrorism. ?It will be much more difficult to fight the war on terrorism,? he said. ?If you raise the anxiety level [inside Arab countries], you give criminals and terrorists the chance to nurture their cause.?
Bush administration officials argue that Hussein?s ouster would likely produce long-term benefits for the war on terrorism, because it would deter other Third World dictators who want to challenge the United States. They also maintain that the ?liberation? of Iraq from three decades of dictatorial rule by Hussein would encourage democracy throughout the Middle East.
Recent public opinion polls suggest that although most Americans still trust Bush?s instincts on Iraq and the war on terrorism, they are much more comfortable with U.N. backing for an attack on Iraq. A Washington Post-ABC News poll last week reported that seven in 10 Americans would give U.N. weapons inspectors ?months? more to pursue their investigation in Iraq.
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