The Iraq War is Over: Mission Accomplished

Posted by Ben-T on 8/31/06

The Iraq War, as the Bush administration sold it to the American people, is by now well over. Not some objectives, not certain objectives, but every objective that we were told we were being brought into Iraq to achieve has been achieved. Saddam Hussein is no longer in power, any threat he may have ever posed, whatever your view on the validity of those claims, was neutralized. We oversaw Iraqi elections, aided them in forming a constitutional republican form of government, and transferred national sovereignty to them. From a realist perspective, we have signed a deal with the Iraqis for the construction of fourteen long term US military bases inside of Iraq. The Middle East regional dominance that America lost when Saudi Arabia requested we remove our bases from The Kingdom post-9/11 is neutralized, and we have re-established ourselves as the main power player in the region. In this editorial I will establish that the Iraq War is over and that the Iraqi Civil War has begun, that we have achieved all objectives that can be achieved through use of military might, and that continued application of military force to the Iraq situation is a detriment to our strategic interests in the region.

I have supported, and still support, the decision by the Bush administration to invade Iraq in 2003. I feel that in light of the removal of our bases from Saudi Arabia, it was necessary for us to take action to re-establish dominance in the region, both in a real way through the construction of military bases, and in a symbolic way, by making an example out of Saddam Hussein to other governments in the region. Saddam's government had long been a thorn in the American side when it came to the Middle East, and his repeated invasions of his neighbors had provided a constant headache. Three times in the 1990s we were forced to take military action against him, once during the administration of George H.W. Bush, and twice during the administration of Bill Clinton. The post-9/11 environment and our removal from Saudi Arabia provided the perfect chance to kill two birds with one stone, removing a government that had been a snare to our policy and re-establishing regional dominance of the Middle East. If we had chosen not to, I think that today we would be dealing with a strategic advance by China, or less likely, Russia into Middle East, most likely through a deal by one or both of those nations to build military bases on Iranian or Iraqi soil and a much more serious challenge to our regional dominance than we are currently facing in the form of ascendant Iran. However, the Iraq War has accomplished this goal. We once again have regional dominance of the Middle East, and 14 permanent US military bases are being constructed inside of Iraq. Literally every objective of the Iraq War has been fufilled. We can only conclude then that the mission that began in 2003 is over and accomplished. The question then becomes that, if we have accomplished the misson we set out to accomplish in 2003, is the mission we are currently undertaking, which began sometime after the fall of Iraq's government and continues today, worth fighting? Is it a worthy strategic investment on the part of the United States, and is the application of military force to this new war an option that will lead to success?

I say no to both. After we invaded Iraq, we rightly did what we could to aid the Iraqis in constructing a constitutional republic. However the Iraqis have not proven themselves to be capable of preserving, or maybe never even desired, any such government. Instead what has occured is the Iraqi Civil War. In the low level conflict that currently rages in Iraq, Iraqis, motivated by sectarian strife, are the main combatants on both sides. While American soldiers die, the United States has no clear mission and is carrying out no material objectives. Indeed what is occuring in Iraq now is a textbook example of what is known as "mission creep". Wikipedia is hardly a scholarly source, but for basic familiarity, it serves well. I quote;

"Mission creep is the expansion of a project or mission beyond its original goals, often after initial successes. The term often implies a certain disapproval of newly adopted goals by the user of the term. Mission creep is usually considered undesirable due to the dangerous path of each success breeding more ambitious attempts, only stopping when a final, often catastrophic, failure occurs."

Mission creep has occurred in Iraq, and must be stopped while it still can be. American policy makers, sitting comfortably in Washington, do not understand the dynamics of Iraqi society, nor the traditions, language, religion, ethnicity, and other factors that tear it asunder. They are incapable of solving a problem that must be solved by Iraqis themselves, most likely through splitting the artifical state that is Iraq into three different states. Applying American military force did not put a stop to internecine violence in Somalia, it will not in Iraq. American firepower cannot keep Iraqis from hating one another, and smart bombs cannot turn human beings from what they are into what they ought to be. We are far more likely to achieve the fufillment of our strategic objectives in Iraq by leaving now, and aiding the Iraqis in facilitating as amicabally as possible the divorce of their country into three seperate nations. Low level civil war may rage for years into the future. But if that is the case, than America cannot stop it from happening now, and indeed never could have. More likely I think, the Shi'ites, Sunnis, and Kurds, three seperate nations unto themselves, will find themselves less tempted to kill one another if they no longer have to worry about governing one another, nor fear a bloody retribution from one another for past crimes. Indeed, the de facto independence of Iraq's Kurdish autonomous zone has provided evidence of the possible success of such a policy.

In any event, America's continued military involvement in the Iraqi Civil War is a strategic drain on our own resources. While we have sought to heal what are most likely unhealable rifts among the Iraqis, the Middle East has moved on. Iran has ascended, and is ready to challenge the United States for the regional dominance that we so recently fought a war to protect. Wasting time, money, and manpower on the Iraqi Civil War has kept us from an effective response to the Mullah, while it is becoming increasingly obvious that we will have to confront Iran in a military way. Though stopping short of a full scale invasion, air actions at least, are going to be eventually necessary. Iran has made clear they have no intention of ceasing their progress towards a nuclear weapon, and if they were to attain such a weapon it would be a disaster for the United States and her allies on an unprecedented scale. If we were extricated from the Iraqi Civil War we would be able to devote more of our considerable military strength in the region towards taking a strong stance against Iran, reminding them that we are possessed of sticks as well as carrots. While we all hope that sanctions alone will be enough to discourage Iran from its ambitions, taking for granted that they will is a gamble, and the American military presence in the Iraqi Civil War reduces our readiness for a direct confrontation that may arise. It also puts American lives more directly in the path of the Shi'ite militias within Iraq that answer to Teheran, and whom Iran may use to strike back against America, should we take action against them.

In conclusion, the mission that we set out to complete is 2003 is completed. Saddam is gone, elections have been held, sovereignty has been transferred and we have aided the Iraqis in creating a constitutional republic. We have launched the construction of fourteen permanent bases in the country and re-established our regional dominance. Since the conclusion of that war a new war has begun, the Iraqi Civil War, in which we have little strategic stake and which our military power has little capability to influence. Outside of Iraq, the region has moved on and it will not be long before we may need the strength currently devoted to the Iraqi Civil War for a confrontation with Iran. The best course of action both towards serving American strategic interests and alleviating the suffering of Iraqis would be to remove our immediate military presence from the country, and aid them, through diplomacy, in divorcing their country in a way that is as amicable and peaceful as possible. The driving force behind Iraq's sectarian violence is Al Qaeda in Iraq, and without a strong American military presence in the country, Al Qaeda's own incentive to fight there will have been removed, and they themselves will probably move on to other battlefields. The Bush administration has been good when it comes to realizing that there are limits to diplomacy and times when the application of military force is desirable. But it must remember that there are equally so, times when the application of military force is useless. American firepower cannot remove from the hearts of Iraqis a bitter hatred decades old, nor can it create out of three seperate nations a single unified people. Attempting to do so is a hindrance to our strategic interests, and a cause of unnecessary suffering for the innocents of Iraq. You can comment or debate this editorial by going here: