Defeat is an orphan: Iraq

President John F. Kennedy famously said "victory has a thousand fathers but defeat is an orphan." The front page of today's Washington Post contains proof of that observation, as if any were needed. Several of the prominent neo-cons who clamored for the invasion of Iraq are now heaping scorn on the Bush Administration for the obvious failure of that enterprise.

Let's begin with some truths that are not widely understood. The invasion of Iraq was never about 9/11. It was not about creating democracy. It was not even about Saddam Hussein's assumed possession of weapons of mass destruction. (Everyone believed he did but the issue was whether they presented an "imminent danger" to the United States -- and most people, including those in Congress who voted for the war, understand that they did not.)

The invasion was always about changing the dynamic in the Middle East, eliminating Saddam Hussein, a force for instability, and replacing his rule with a friendlier government. The goal was simultaneously to put pressure on Iran and Syria, assure the safety of the Gulf States (and, of course, their oil resources) and eliminating a threat to Israel. How do I know that: because I heard it -- in October 2000, prior to George Bush's election -- from two people who subsequently became leading officials at the Defense Department.

They told a small gathering in which I happened to be present that Saddam Hussein would be ousted during George W. Bush's first term in office. The speakers had been in the administration of Bush I; and they were among many in that administration who regretted not having dismantled Saddam's dictatorship after the Iraqis were driven out of Kuwait and who were ashamed by the fact that Bush I had allowed an attempted coup to be quashed with the loss of many lives without the U.S. intervening.

They scorned what the Clinton Administration to contain Saddam Hussein by establishing "no fly" zones in the north and south. They ridiculed the International Atomic Energy Administration's efforts to locate the WMDs which they were certain existed. And they put no trust whatever in sanctions that might be imposed by the United Nations Security Council if Iraq refused to cooperate further with IAEA inspectors.

But those complaints were really beside the point. A group of intellectuals, mostly neo-Cons, had long since
called publicly for Saddam Hussein's ouster in an open letter signed by some people who became officials of the new Bush Administration -- Rumsfeld, Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, among others -- and some who never joined but formed an unofficial cheering section as war preparations got under way. It was going to be "a piece of cake" one of them (Ken Adelman, a former U.S. ambassador to the U.N.) declared when the war started. And he subsequently crowed about the accuracy of his prediction when U.S. forces "won the war" and George W. Bush claimed "mission accomplished."

None of the enthusiasts had a real understanding of Iraq, and Rumsfeld, Cheney, Wolfowitz and company never wanted to hear a single word from "experts" who might contradict their assumptions. Those experts might, for example, have told the Bush Administration stalwarts that Iraq was an artificial construct created by the British when they relinquished control of the area, that it was really three countries (at least) consisting of a Kurdish entity in the north, a Shi'a-controlled area in the south, and a Sunni minority to the west.

The ability to forge a workable government out of these conflicting elements was blithely assumed partly because that's what they were told by Iraqis in exile who expected to run the country once Saddam Hussein and the Ba'athists were deposed. It turned out to be not that simple. In fact, it has turned out not to be possible at all.

The cheerleaders were right about one thing: Saddam Hussein's ouster has certainly "changed the dynamic" in the Middle East -- all for the worse.

I'm no expert on Iraq. So I don't have a solution. But it looks to me as if the best that can be hoped for is a loose confederation in which considerable autonomy is granted to the three centers of power. And the worst -- which seems more likely -- is a continuation of sectarian violence with the Sunnis and the Shi'as continuing to take vengeance on one another, the Kurds in control of their own region thanks to their own militia, and the U.S. struggling to find a way to disengage while American casualties mount.

The people who were for the war and now heap blame on the Bush Administration national security team (and especially Rumsfeld) for botching it are half right. The Bush people certainly botched it. But the fathers of the war deserve a large share of the blame.

(Footnote: The quote that Kennedy made famous is said by the Columbia Encylopedia of quotations to have originated with an Italian fascist named Galeazzo Ciario who wrote it in his diary in 1942. There was one small difference between what he wrote and what Kennedy said. Ciario's version was "victory has a hundred fathers but defeat is an orphan.")