Like many Americans, I watched President Bush’s speech last night and wondered why he felt it necessary or appropriate to address the American people. We all knew long before the speech, and even long before General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker went up to Capitol Hill, that there would be no significant change of course in Iraq. At best, we might have expected some genuine contrition had the “surge” proven an outright failure, but no major change in policy, and certainly no meaningful timetable for troop withdrawal.

Nor could the President’s speech have pacified or reassured a jittery nation, winning another year or just a few months more patience with a long, tough fight, but one that would eventually result in victory and greater security for this country. As the President has himself acknowledged, he no longer has the credibility to ask such things of Americans, or of the Congress, including loyal members of his own party. Former Bush supporters and staunch Republicans are without a doubt among the two-thirds of Americans who do not believe the Iraq War can ever be won.

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Two pieces of bad news coming out of Pakistan in recent days, one involving the political situation and the other on the security front.

Politically, the Musharraf government made a significant strategic error when they decided to deport former PM Nawaz Sharif when he returned to the country despite the fact that the Pakistani Supreme Court has ruled that he can return. Musharraf would have been better off letting Sharif back but is now reinforcing Sharif’s position as a key democratic opposition figure. The Bush Administration needs to be vocal and condemn this move. Sharif will have influence in Pakistan going forward and is close to some key religious figures, he needs to feel that he has support in the West.

On the security side a large number of Pakistani soldiers have been captured by Taliban in the area between Afghanistan and Pakistan. The lack of central government control more evident by the day and a change in the status quo will require real cooperation between the two neighbors. Again, this is something the Bush Administration needs to push very hard.

Perhaps no word is more appropriate to characterize America on September 11, 2001; it described us on so many levels.

It is an unfortunate irony that this week’s landmark hearings [on the war in Iraq] reflect, in a sense, a different country – one that has lost its way amidst a sea of despair, and worse, disparity. The bipartisan foundation that carried us through those challenging times six years quickly crumbled as our country made so many mistakes. Division made it impossible to benefit from our collective wisdom. The challenges we face today are as great as ever, and require a progressive bipartisan coalition to get America back on track and restore our values and place in the world.

This weekend the talkies were an example of life imitating art; specifically Samuel Beckett, or as George Stephanopoulous put it on ABC’s This Week, “This week, waiting for Petraeus.”

Stephanopoulous provided some historical context, though probably not the kind the White House wants, when he noted: 

When General David Petraeus begins his week-long blitzkrieg of Washington tomorrow, it will be the most high-profile appearance of a war general on Capitol Hill since April 28, 1967. That’s when General William Westmoreland told a joint session of Congress that America was making progress in Vietnam.

GEN. WILLIAM WESTMORELAND (From videotape.): Given the nature of the enemy, it seems to me that the strategy we are following at this time is the proper one, and that it is producing results. 

Although his guest, Sen. John McCain thinks George picked the wrong general:  

MCCAIN: Thank you, George. Could I just mention that General Westmoreland had the same strategy in Vietnam that Donald Rumsfeld and General Casey had. And we had a general named Creighton Abrams who came along and really did make dramatic progress on –

STEPHANOPOULOS: So you think General Petraeus is the Creighton Abrams of Vietnam?    

MCCAIN: Yes. Not the Westmoreland, yeah. And –

STEPHANOPOULOS: Thank you for the history lesson.

In evaluating the surge there is an old military saying that amateurs talk about strategy while professionals talk about logistics. In that regard Sen. McCain did make a worthwhile point with respect to sustaining U.S. military presence.  (more…)

Well, here we are at long last. The start of the official surge reports week, which will be deliberately mixed in with 9/11 anniversaries, as columnist Frank Rich noted yesterday.

During this week Congress and the American public are going to be treated to testimony by Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker, our newest and duly anointed “wise men” regarding the effectiveness of the surge. This week promises to be a real life version of the saying by well known geopolitical analyst Groucho Marx, “Who are you going to believe, your eyes or me”? For a ground level and reality based view see this piece in the New York Times yesterday. 

Hmm, that reminds me, that in the 1960s Dick Cheney was hiding behind his wife to avoid the draft.  Now 40 years later he and President Bush are hiding behind Gen. Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker, as in, only an anti-American scum sucker would dare question their forthcoming wisdom to stay the course. As the New York Times editorialized, “Mr. Bush, deeply unpopular with the American people, is counting on the general to restore credibility to his discredited Iraq policy. He frequently refers to the escalation of American forces last January as General Petraeus’s strategy – as if it were not his own creation.“

Just what is it with Republicans and this passion for human shields? Perhaps another kind of festish; like Sen. Craig, only more perverse, considering the stakes in human lives. 

Of course, even if Petraeus and Crocker did fall on their swords and say something OTHER than the party line, i.e., the surge is working; we just need to give it more time, there is no reason to expect that President Bush would heed their advice. As evidence just remember how well received were the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group, another group of “wise men” when it was unveiled last fall. 

Though, in fairness to Gen. Petraeus, in a little noted progress report to the troops last week, he did note, “Many of us had hoped this summer would be a time of tangible political progress at the national level as well. One of the justifications for the surge, after all, was that it would help create the space for Iraqi leaders to tackle the tough questions and agree on key pieces of “national reconciliation” legislation. It has not worked out as we had hoped.” As Jerry Seinfeld would say, “you think?”  (more…)

I was deeply disappointed this week listening to Abraham Foxman, the head of the Anti-Defamation League, on NPR’s Fresh Air. He went on to the show to discuss the new book “The Israel Lobby” and as it turns out he ended up showing exactly the type of intolerance his organization was set up to eliminate. I disagree with many aspects of “The Israel Lobby,” especially its failure to fully credit Israel for the many times it has been a force for good.  But here’s one thing I’m sure of: the authors of this book are not anti-Semitic and it’s reasonable for them to raise questions about the smartness of our foreign policy.

But rather than taking on “The Israel Lobby” on its merits, Foxman engaged in what was frankly one of the most outlandish attacks I have heard. The book recognizes that the Jewish community is a mosaic and that the pro-Israel lobby has a wide range of religious and political thinkers involved in it. Nevertheless, the book says that the pro-Israel lobby has disproportionate influence and it is supporting a policy toward Israel that is strategically negative for America. Here’s how Foxman tried to turn this argument into anti-Semitism. Foxman said that what the authors were saying is that some Jews are involved in a lobby that is against America’s interests. This means that the authors are claiming that American Jews are disloyal to their own country. Hitler claimed the Jews were disloyal in Germany and used that to commit genocide. Therefore, the authors are taking a cue right out of the Hitler playbook by saying that Jews are disloyal.

If at this point you think I’d have to be making this up, I invite you to click here to listen to the show. Here’s what is so wrong with this argument if it is not self-evident: questioning someone’s reasoning is entirely different than questioning someone’s intent. I can think that George Bush has the wrong policy agenda and has hurt American interests in the world, but I do not believe that George Bush hates America and wants to do us wrong. He’s not disloyal – he’s just dumb. So too can the authors of the Israel lobby believe that the pro-Israel lobby genuinely loves America but is supporting a policy agenda toward Israel that is substantively against our interests. Foxman can and indeed should disagree with aspects of the authors’ reasoning, but why question their intent? Foxman makes it wrongly appear that he has nothing substantive to say.

I say all this with a bit of self experience. I’ve been in the authors’ shoes. When I protested the Iraq war, I was called both anti-American and anti-Semitic. I remember going to synagogue around the time of the Iraq war and hearing a sermon on why Saddam was our generation’s Hitler and so we needed to invade. I went to the Rabbi to express my disagreement on the substantive merits of whether we could succeed in Iraq after Saddam was toppled. The Rabbi told me that I was not a loyal Jew. He chose not to engage me on the substance but instead to write me off entirely. When I then took the streets to demonstrate against the war while studying overseas, I was called anti-American. (more…)

Yesterday’s arrest of three Islamists plotting major bombings in Germany raises an important question as Congress debates Iraq policy this month: How would a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq affect the broader campaign against Al Qaeda and violent jihadism?

Opinion on this is sharply divided. President Bush and his supporters argue that Iraq is the central front in the war on terror and that withdrawal would embolden and strengthen Al Qaeda in Iraq. What’s more, they claim, withdrawal would allow Al Qaeda members to leave Iraq and try to attack us within our borders, as the group did on 9/11.

Many Democrats and antiwar activists make a very different argument—that withdrawal would make us safer from terrorism by allowing us to devote more resources to bolstering our homeland security and fighting Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan. They also say that withdrawing from Iraq would stem the flow of new recruits to Al Qaeda by taking away a major grievance against America.

These arguments could not be further apart, yet it’s not obvious which one of them is more correct. They are predictions, not statements of fact. The reality is we don’t—and can’t—know for sure what the consequences of withdrawing from Iraq will be for our struggle against Al Qaeda. What’s clear is that our best assessment of the consequences should shape our Iraq policy.

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Things are pretty turbulent in Pakistan at the moment. There are now several emerging power centers and each of them is using the tools at their disposal to jostle and nudge to get more political influence.

President Musharraf is still in negotiations, it seems, with Benazir Bhutto and her Pakistan People’s Party about some type of agreement that would include immunity for Bhutto from past charges coupled with the PPP’s support for another Musharraf Presidential term (as long as he hangs up the uniform).

Bhutto wants to wrap things up quickly and head back to ensure that her party can become the dominant elected force in Pakistani politics.

Former PM Nawaz Sharif is still likely to return to the country on the back of his Supreme Court victory, despite the Saudi government urging that he not renege on his immunity and exile deal with Musharraf. An unnamed Saudi government source is quoted by the BBC online as saying:

“Wisdom demands that Mr Nawaz Sharif commit himself to the promises he made – namely, not to return to Pakistan and to political activity,”

Simultaneously, the Musharrf government has been rounding up some activists from Sharif’s party presumably to blunt the effectiveness of his imminent return.

With all of this fluidity, what should the U.S. position be?

Well, first there should be support for the swift return to democracy and a clarification that the U.S. position is to work with the next elected government of Pakistan.

Second, we should see a comprehensive aid package pulled together for the next Pakistani government as part of a hearts and minds” strategy. The U.S. needs to be seen to be on the side of the Pakistani people and the best way to do that is to support democracy via word and deed.

A few moments of candor were on display this weekend, courtesy of Senator and presidential candidate Joe Biden (D-DE). Here is what he said on Face The Nation: 

SCHIEFFER: What do you anticipate is going to happen over these next weeks in Washington?    

SEN. JOSEPH BIDEN (D-DE): Well, I’m not sure what’s going to happen, Bob. But this war has got to end.. Look, the idea there’s going to be a strong central government in Iraq is not going to happen in your lifetime. It’s not going to happen in mine. It’s the central fallacy of this administration’s policy. And that’s why we have to move to separating these parties and have what Tom Friedman called today and I and Les Gelb and I have been calling for for two years, a sort of a racial federalism. The only place the administration’s efforts are working are places where they have localized — localized — the security. And Katie pointed out that General Petraeus said that, you know, now you have us working with the Sunnis in order to take on the al Qaeda. But let me tell you, there’s no “working to take on” and work with the Shi’a. They’re still fighting the Shi’a. And the idea that we’re going to have a national police force that’s going to make any sense and that — we should disband a national police force. We should move on to implementing a constitution. You’ve got to separate the parties, Bob. The central fallacy of the notion of an Alawi government some people are talking about now or a Maliki government is not going to happen. It’s not going to happen. We should get on with it. (more…)

I am discussing Iraq at several forums during the next four weeks, first tomorrow evening at an event in New York City and then at an event at Cato on Thursday, September 20th. The Cato event will also feature RAND’s James Dobbins, who has a piece in the current issue of Foreign Affairs; Marc Lynch, a political science professor at George Washington University and the author of the popular Abu Aardvark blog; and Clifford May, President of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. 

I am grateful to all of these participants, but particularly to Mr. May. It has become difficult to attract pro-war partisans to public events. Most prefer to speak to friendly audiences, surrounded on the stage by other war supporters. But public forums that allow for an open debate are essential to discussing the lessons to take away from Iraq. Those of us who advised against going to war believe themselves to be vindicated, although I take absolutely no pleasure in the harm that has come to my country. It is a tragedy, and I wish desperately that my warnings had proved unfounded.

Meanwhile, the advocates for war with Iraq have much to answer for. They have responded, so far, by explaining for why the war did not go as they planned.

They told us that our troops would be greeted as liberators. They told us that reports of sectarianism were grossly overstated and that there would be no civil war. They told us that Iran and Syria would be weakened by the toppling of Saddam. They told us that the war would not be costly, and that Iraqi oil revenues might even cover the costs. None of those predictions proved accurate.

The advocates for war told us that a congenital liar and a convicted crook, a man who had fled Iraq in the late 1950s while still in his teens, should become the leader of Iraq. Ahmed Chalabi proved so unpopular among Iraqis that his party won less than one half of one percent of the vote in the December 2005 elections, not enough support to win even a single seat in Parliament.

The pro-war partisans told us that there were weapons of mass destruction, even that they knew where they were. But David Kay (who argued for war in the fall of 2002), and later Charles Duelfer concluded, that there were no weapons.

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