LIMITING THE CATASTROPHE

By Adrian Pohr

[This article published in: DIE ZEIY, October 2006, is translated from the German on the World Wide Web,  http://www.zeit-fragen.ch/.]


Everything stays on course. “We want victory in Iraq,” George W. Bush announced over the weekend, irrespective of the desolate situation in the country and the enormous and increasing death toll that the American troops must pay there. Only the tactics will be revised. This was the result of the president’s conversation with his generals. This change in tactics will be made known first after the American mid-term elections in November. That a long-term occupation of Iraq is excluded seems obvious in view of the situation and the mood in the US.

The discussion about the role of the West in Iraq concentrates on a simple question: How soon? How soon will Great Britain and America withdraw and what kind of country will they leave behind? “No one thinks we should remain for ever; few believe we should withdraw tomorrow,” the British Daily Telegraph replies. “The use of our soldiers to create a stable democracy in Iraq is not a tenable goal any more. A speedy withdrawal is the best option for us and for the Iraqi population.”

The British Independent sees this differently: “We made a mistake in occupying Iraq and would make a mistake by withdrawing now.” The Washington Post urges an immediate withdrawal: The most unattractive option is a withdrawal in phases. The “job” that president Bush resolved to finish in Iraq will probably never end, the Washington Post said. “How many Americans and Iraqis must die before the president admits what Americans already know: “I made a mistake.”

The problems in Iraq resulted from deploying “too few” US soldiers, the Los Angeles Times said. For a country with the third-largest population, Americans have a markedly small army. In 2004, 1.427 million had served, “significantly less than the two million American prison inmates.” Only a fifth of the soldiers were in foreign deployments in 2004, 171,000 of them in Iraq. This amounts to 0.06 percent of the US population. This is a strange number since the American military budget is several times greater than all other countries.

The Chicago Tribune makes different calculations. More than 300,000 Iraqi soldiers were trained in 2005, only 13,000 less than planned. Two-thirds of the soldiers waged combat operations, according to the Defense Department. Why not withdraw its own forces? The answer is simple: Despite enlarging its forces, the violence in Iraq increases. The Chicago Tribune concludes that remaining there and fighting actively for peace is important.

By contrast, Leslie Gelb in Time Magazine writes that admission of a defeat in Iraq is not the worst thing but rather serves to minimize the extent. The New York Times as the liberal spearhead drafts a plan to avert disaster. First of all, a timetable for the withdrawal of US troops must be made public and defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld fired. The newspaper calls this “cleaning up house.” Conversations must be started between the Iraqi groups. Bagdad’s stabilization is obligatory. In addition, dialogue with refractory Teheran and Damascus must be promoted to create long-term peace in the Middle East. Finally with a sideswipe at Bush’s years of denying reality, the seriousness of the situation must be recognized with prompt negotiations. Only a few options are on the table. While the prospects are trifling, they are worth striving for given the terrible alternative scenarios for the future of the whole region.

The Lebanese Daily Star asks whether the US government sees its mistake. The greatest error of the Bush administration consisted in exacerbating America’s missing integrity in the region.” Bush intensified this deficiency by beginning an unnecessary war in Iraq.

The People’s Daily newspaper published in China is ready for fundamental criticism of the US. The US had always explained Islamic terror and the growing anti-Americanism as envy for its national strength and hatred for American values. However most countries in the world believe anti-Americanism was against the misguided foreign policy and the hegemonial actions of the US. “In the last years, the US has consciously capitalized on the incident of September 11 to pursue its global strategic interests with disdain for international norms. The inhuman catastrophes and sufferings inflicted on people spreads anti-Americanism in a globally uncontrolled way.” The Chinese newspaper concludes: “No one but the US itself caused its own defeat.”

Only one man can avert this defeat, according to the Italian La Republica: “Since president Bush kindled the fire, he now has to put it out. The pyromaniac is forced to become the firefighter.”

On the theme

Is London planning to withdraw its soldiers from Iraq next year? The government in Bagdad is worried.

Bush’s late insight – “The US government is considering a change in strategy in Iraq.”