Useful Fools

Posted By John Moore on January 31, 2005

Election
Iraq has just completed a remarkable election. Iraqis showed a strong desire for democracy, with a large percentage risking their lives and that of their families to vote. This is a tremendous success for Iraq and for the coalition. It should presage the start of the end for the “insurgency” in Iraq, and hence enable foreign troops to be withdrawn over time.

With the election comes the time to re-examine the Iraqi situation, and that of the overall war on terror. George Bush, the central figure in the war, is being criticized and praised. The United States is relatively isolated in the world (although much of that was inevitable, as Europe fades in importance and the Pacific Rim grows) and is facing much criticism.

George Bush, Personality
George Bush is completely genuine in his desire to spread democracy. Bush is an unusual politician in that he personally feels, as a result of 9-11, a “mission”: protect America and the world from megaterrorism, where the greatest threats involve the use by Islamic extremists of WMD’s, especially nuclear explosives. He has a related mission of halting nuclear and long range missile proliferation.

He has a broad strategy, but key is spreading democracy to failed states. Iraq is the test case of a dangerous and unpopular dictatorship being transformed into a local democratic form.

A significant advantage that Bush has as commander of this battle is his single minded determination, to the extent of forgoing some political considerations in the furtherance of national security. Additionally, his immediate intuitive understanding of the strategic depth of the megaterrorism problem, still not appreciated by many of his critics, indicates an effective viewpoint and abilities. His war cabinet is unusually good, with experience deep into critical agencies. His weaknesses are a reluctance to communicate frequently with the American people, his delay in ridding himself of low performing appointees from cabinet level on down – especially in the State Department, CIA and FBI, and his failure to veto bills from congress. The latter may be necessary to preserve the political capital needed to carry out his war aims and his Supreme Court goals, although with a more favorable congress for at least the next two years, this may be less of an issue.

The Strategy
The hope and theory (largely from neocons) is that this democracy, a great good in itself, will spread itself by destabilizing dictatorships. The preemption doctrine is for states that are major threats where internal democratic movements are likely to fail. The success of communism, Baathism and Naziism in preventing internal regime change suggest that totalitarian states can usually defeat democracy movements.

Those who ridicule or question Bush’s motives will think this analysis naive. They are wrong. This is the core of the administration’s “war on terror” (horrible name – almost as bad as “Patriot Act”) strategy. Other parts include Homeland Security (not being done well, but ultimately impossible even with significant reductions in civil liberties – primarily privacy), diplomacy, the Preemption Doctrine, covert action (such as the use of Special Forces throughout the Sahel), improving and refocusing internal and external intelligence, the Proliferation Security Initiative (apparently quite effective

Why Iraq
Iraq was attacked for a large number of reasons:

1. It was credibly thought to have dangerous WMD capability. Even the military leaders of Iraq (some of whom were in contact with their US counterparts) believed this. Saddam has confirmed that he ran a bluff with WMD in order to fend off a feared Iranian attack. He also kept intact the human and some of the physical infrastructure to resume WMD programs, with biological and chemical weapons capable of production within months and nuclear weapons apparently to be outsourced to the Khan network via Libya or purchased directly from North Korea.
2. Saddam has a history of starting of dangerous aggression – he is an unstable psychopathic personality (malignant narcissist) who thus took unnecessary risks. He also committed many acts of war against the US, ranging from attempting to assassinate a former president to frequent attempts to shoot down US aircraft enforcing the no fly zone. In 1991, he attacked a non-belligerent state (Israel) during the war.
3. The sanctions regime was about to break down. Saddam, by bribing officials and businessmen in Europe and Russia with Oil For Food money, promising oil franchises to France and Russia, dishonestly blaming the poor medical facilities for children on the sanctions, set the diplomatic, corruption and propaganda conditions to kill the sanctions.
4. The US, in addition to having its forces under frequent attack in the no-fly zones, was attacked on 9-11 expressly because of the presence of those forces in Saudi Arabia, if one is to believe Bin Laden. The presence of the forces, and their actions, were destabilizing Saudi Arabia in a way that a regime change would bring Islamofascists to power. They also had cost an aggregate of about $80 billion and were running at a rate of $8 billion/year.
5. The people of Iraq were suffering under a terrible and capricious dictatorship, one of the worst in the world (after North Korea and maybe some small African states).
6. Iraq was a supporter of terrorists, paying suicide bombers to kill Israelis and Americans in Israel, allowing others to use its sanctuary. Most notably, Al Qaeda affiliated chemical weapons specialist Zarqawi had medical treatment in Baghdad and operated an Islamofascist band working on chemical warfare technology and training in northern Iraq. Al Qaeda leaders and Iraqi intelligence had a number of meetings prior to 9-11, although there is little evidence that Iraq was directly involved in 0-11. Iraq supported the Abu Nidal, a killer of Americans. Iraq supported Hamas.
7. Iraq was in an ideal position for future actions in the war on terror – bordering Syria and Iran, and interdicting flow between the two countries

Major Mistakes in the Iraq Theater
The biggest mistake of the Iraqi invasion was involving the United Nations Security Council. US Intelligence (especially the State Department’s intelligence agency) should have known that the French and Russians would not allow an attack on Iraq, due to their economic interests and France’s desire to destroy US hegemony. The delay allowed Iraq to ready itself for the attack, and to hide evidence of WMDs. It failed to achieve any positive purpose for the US, and in fact, resulted in Turkey’s rejection of a major part of the battle plan – the southward invasion of Northern Iraq by the 4th ID.

The worst intelligence failure was not detecting Saddam’s M14’s preparations for extended guerilla warfare and terrorism.A significant mistake was not foreseeing that our actions would force international megaterrorist groups and terrorist sponsors to fight the occupation and the development of a democratic Iraq, even as we knew that democratising Iraq would be a major threat to them.

The result these three failures is an “insurgency” of al-Qaeda linked terrorists, Iranian-linked terrorists, and Syrian backed Baathists. Command and financing of Baathists originates in Syria, from high ranking former Saddam regime members. Syria is also under the yoke of its own Baathist totalitarian dictatorship.

The failure to find WMDs is a huge diplomatic and internal problem, but was not a significant failure of intelligence agencies. The information was too closely held within Iraq, with the Iraqi military itself believing it had large stocks of chemical weapons. The focus on WMDs as justification was ultimately caused by the earlier mistake of involving the UN, and resulted in discounting by the press and public of the other many reasons.

Another failure is that insufficient carrots and sticks have been used with Syria. US public democracy (information/propaganda efforts) have been dismal.

Regional Impact of the Iraq Operation

Iran’s behavior has been predictable, and so far unsuccessful in its goals. But it is trying to provoke an attack on its known (i.e: disposable) nuclear sites to justify the suppression of its internal democratic movement. An attack by Israel would be the Ayatollahs’ greatest dream (if they survived), but an attack by the US would make them quite happy. At the same time, they are expected to have ICBM capability this year, and probably nuclear warheads.

At this point, the war on terror has just had a major victory, after serious setbacks due to the unexpected strength of the “insurrection.” The positive side of the “insurrection” is the intelligence bonanza, as terrorists, forced to fight, are captured. The second battle of Fallujah achieved tactical surprise in spite of the obvious buildup, and troops advanced much faster than the opposition expected, resulting in the capture of the enemies Tactical Operations Center intact, with its computers and paper.

As an aside, the rapid advance was achieved because of a tactic of, in the last 12 hours before the main attack, destroying every vehicle which had sat in place for more than three days. As evidenced by the large number of secondary explosions, many of these vehicles were carrying large bombs, and had been the major defense strategy of the enemy.

There is no doubt that the Iraq campaign and opposition has made terrorist recruiting somewhat easier, but it has also forced terrorists to expend resources in Iraq rather than elsewhere. The care that the US took to minimize civilian casualties saved Iraqi lives at the cost of American lives, but provided no respite from the mischaracterization of the US as insensitive and racist towards Iraqi. The minor Abu Ghraib incident, because of its lurid photos and its use as a political hammer against George Bush, contributed to that view.

World War IV – The rest of it
The most dangerous states, in order, are North Korea (which only China can solve), Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Syria (and it’s puppet state, Lebanon). Al Qaeda (and related groups) are rapidly developing capabilities in other failed or sympathetic countries in the Sahel, Zimbabwe, South Asia and the South America including the Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay tri-border area. There is no question that these groups desire to attack the west with WMDs and are striving to obtain them.
In other theaters, the coalition success (which includes the European community) is varied. Afghanistan was conquered by 750 coalition troops troops with the remainder of forces indigenous – a remarkable achievement consistent with the US Army’s long held SpecOps strategy.

Pakistan has been somewhat de-fanged, with proliferator Khan under house arrest, the India/Pakistan situation stabilized, probably due to very emphatic US diplomacy.

Some Muslim parts of South Asia are active grounds for the terrorists, and may be sanctuary for Al Qaeda. On the other hand, Malaysia’s involvement in WMD proliferation has probably been stopped.

South America represents problems, if Venezuela’s Chavez or the Columbian narco-rebels make common cause with Al Qaida (the latter far more likely than the former, which would be considered an act of war by the US).

Overall, the first world is still in grave danger. Terrorist acquisition of nuclear weapons from North Korea, Iran, Pakistan or Russia is still possible. Chemical weapons are more available and could cause casualties greater than 9-11 if used at the air handling systems of large office buildings. Biological weapons such as botulinum toxins or contagious diseases of high lethality require smaller facilities to create, but more knowledge. However, for at least some potential agents, that knowledge is widespread (botulinum, for example). Furthermore, genetic engineering techniques are advancing faster than Moore’s law, and genetic engineering skills are taught routinely.

Categories: World War IV
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