Losing a Battle, Losing a War

In all the debates about winning or losing the war in Iraq, what I find extremely frustrating is that the discussion so often occurs without adequate context. Today Joe Carter writes about How We Lost the War (And Will Lose the Next One Too). I agree with many of his comments about American public opinion, but I think he also displays the dangerous tendency that Americans have to simply not think about the context of other countries, from the leadership on down.

Carter presents his rather excellent argument which is quite logical in a sterile sort of way. I even agree with the conclusion of his argument. Pulling out at this point cannot be painted as some sort of victory. It’s a loss. But in arguments the devil is often in the definitions, and there we have the real problem with this argument. Points #1 and #2:

(1) The object in war is to impose your will on your enemy.
(2) The will of our enemy is that we leave Iraq as soon as possible.

The enemy has a good idea what his will is, and what he wills is something that can potentially be accomplished. The American people, on the other hand, aided by mixed messages from their government, really never had any idea what their will was for Iraq. One could reverse the logic, and instead use our will as the standard, and our failure to impose that will means defeat. But the problem would be to discover just what our will was.

Here are some options:

1. Removal of Saddam Hussein from power
2. Elimination of weapons of mass destruction from Iraq
3. Removal of a potential base for terrorists
4. Creation of a new, stable government in Iraq
5. Creation of a democratic government in Iraq
6. Creation of a government friendly to the United States in Iraq
7. Creation of a society that would take a stand against terrorism

Well, #1 was accomplished and should have been expected. From a tactical point of view, capture and execution of Saddam Hussein was an added benefit. (What the process did to overall strategy is worth consideration.) It turns out there weren’t any weapons of mass destruction to get rid of, so #2 is accomplished, in a way. There’s no evidence that Iraq was an above average base for terrorism. In fact, Afghanistan and Pakistan probably remain better bases, and terrorists don’t settle in for the long haul in one location, at least surviving terrorists don’t. The remaining items are either contradictory or simply impossible in some other way. Donald Stoker, quoted by Carter claiming that combatting an insurgency normally takes 8-11 years, provides an interesting base line. I have no reason to dispute his estimate.

But one aspect of context when one deals with the Middle East is time or perhaps timelessness. If you spend 8-11 years imposing peace, and you succeed, you still have no assurance–or better not even a probability–that the imposed peace will last once you withdraw. Feuds can go underground only to pop back up as soon as the opportunity presents itself. Notice that the chief image for U. S. involvement from the Arab side of this is the crusades, and they were fought hundreds of years ago. Iraqis can still think in terms of restoring the glory of Babylon, which takes it into millenia. Americans simply can’t fathom that kind of thinking as a rule.

But there is a substantial problem in Iraq. Assuming that we want a democratic government, which seems to be part of the strategy, there is simply no reason for anyone to assume we’re also going to get a government that is friendly. We are much more likely to get one that is more similar to Iran than anything else, and such a government is not going to be pluralistic in nature, but inevitably will tilt toward one center of power or another. Based on population, that would be a Shi’ite dominated government. At a minimum, such a government would no longer stand as a counter-balance to Iran in the region, and could very well become an Iranian ally.

If your will in a war is self-contradictory, then there is simply no formula for victory. I don’t blame the American people for losing this war. There was never any potential strategy for victory. The one thing that could have made any of it worth anything would have been the finding and elimination of weapons of mass destruction. The removal of Saddam Hussein is, without context, a good thing to do, but we’re not going to be any happier with a Shi’ite dominated government, which right now is the most likely accomplishment of this war. We’ll still have attrocities in Iraq; they’ll just be against a different group of people.

Now I’d advocate staying on the simple grounds that we’re responsible for the current version of the mess. But I don’t think that we can make it better for the long term. The Iraqi people are going to have to decide for themselves whether they are going to return to all of the ancient feuds or whether they are going to learn to work together. History indicates that without some substantial force, the disparate elements that were brought together to create Iraq are not likely to form a terribly stable and peaceful union.

Many people seem to believe that my opposition to the Iraq war is an oppostion to war, that I don’t want us to go after terrorists or find and capture Osama bin Laden. On the contrary, my opposition to the war in Iraq is precisely because it detracts from that very goal. It expends huge quantities of human and material resources for at best marginal benefits. It is as though a commander in a war attacked a fortress that would become isolated in a properly conducted war, and expended huge amounts of ammunition and numerous troops to reduce that fortress when it could be simply isolated and allowed to become irrelevant. If you further imagine a fortress that is simply not going to fall or will take up the same enormous resources to occupy, you have the strategic impact of Iraq on the war on terror. It doesn’t get us anywhere, and it expends troops that are more useful elsewhere.

But based on the polls and on the truly silly notions held by many people, I also have to agree with Joe Carter’s conclusion:

What is even more distressing than the fact that we have lost this war is that we are likely to lose the next one too. We have no interest in fighting in engagements that last longer than a season of 24. Given this reality our best option is simply to refuse to fight. Rather than engage in ‘pre-emptive wars’? we should take a page out of France’s strategic playbook and make a habit of ‘preemptive surrender.’?

I’m afraid that no matter how much I believe the war in Iraq was a mistake from pretty much any angle, there will be numerous conflicts that will be good ideas, and based on the polls and general reasoning, I’m afraid the American people won’t back those up. I am wondering whether the completion of the war in Afghanistan, making sure that the government can stand, that the country can remain free, and that terrorist operations there can be largely eliminated, would receive the continued support of the American people were the news media focused on that country instead of Iraq. And there we do have the possibility of accomplishing good things, and we already have.

Unfortunately, I think Joe Carter is right that we simply don’t have the staying power for such a conflict. He and I disagree on the Iraq war itself, but I think we would agree on the broader issue. The American people will only tolerate a conflict if the losses are minimal and don’t distress us. The potential strategic gains or losses don’t seem to matter. At the moment, I don’t think we even have the will to pay for and support the type of security we need to protect our homeland, much less to support operations worldwide for decades to come. The 8 to 11 year estimate is probably good, based on history. Understanding the middle east would suggest that the estimate is low for the type of conflict we’re in, and we need to be ready to stay the course for more than 8-11 years, and that each such war is merely a battle in the larger war on terrorism.