Twenty Years' War

Robert Haddick assesses US foreign policy towards Iraq on the anniversary of Operation Desert Shield (the beginning of Gulf War I). He, quite sensibly, notes that future historians will not really separate the two wars given the continuity of the policy problem. The First Gulf War, in a sense, never really ended either because low-level warfare with Iraq went on throughout the 90's, with 1998's "Operation Desert Fox" as the high point of the "low-intensity" war.

The roots of US policy towards Iraq, however, go back to the 1970s. Steven Metz's book Iraq and the Evolution of American Strategy, which is really the only comprehensive look at the conflict (right now, anyway), correctly assess the roots of war in the problem of Persian Gulf security. The threat of Soviet attack, Iranian encroachment, and later Hussein's Iraq deepened US military involvement into the region until direct intervention in Gulf War I cemented US involvement. The unresolved question of Hussein's regime laid the groundwork for 2003's conventional phase.

Perhaps the most intriguing comment Haddick has about the war is how the first President Bush's rhetoric minimized his postwar options. Haddick notes that a "Versailles" solution of isolating Hussein was adopted, when a "Congress of Vienna" solution of trying to rebuild the prewar regional order of an Iraq that balanced against Iran may have been a possibility. But prewar rhetoric foreclosed this option:

We have to assume that Bush, James Baker, and Brent Scowcroft, all experienced realists, were fully aware of the Congress of Vienna option. The obvious problem was that from a U.S. perspective, Saddam was simply too toxic to deal with. In order to generate public support for a military offensive to eject the Iraqi army from Kuwait – which at the time many feared would become another Battle of the Somme – Bush had to amplify Saddam’s evil impression. That succeeded in generating support for the offensive. But it ruled out a Congress of Vienna after the war. In theory, the Clinton administration could have made a fresh diplomatic approach to Iraq. But the cost at the time of maintaining the Versailles settlement seemed low while the political risk of approaching Saddam was deemed too high.

Haddick points to a familiar problem of American strategy. The American public simply does not like limited wars. In order to bring the American public to war, absolutist rhetoric must be employed. Gulf War I, however, was not an absolute war. We stopped at the Iraqi border. Not only did the rhetoric set the American public up for disappointment once Hussein was allowed to stay in power, but it also put us in a corner.

A certain college professor turned statesman might sympathize with the bind that Bush, Baker, and Scowcraft faced.

Comments

[www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=11811251]

BEHOLD!

[www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=11811251]

Ugh, that didn't work. However, it's worth noting that the Captcha included the letters "KBR".

http://images.icanhascheezburger.com/completestore/2008/3/19/yeshmomihaz128504078882133750.jpg

[A.E.]

Perhaps that was what was missing from 1993's FM 100-5. A section on lolcat-based operations

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I can haz schwerpunkt?

[A.E.]

I sense a DoD contracting job coming in which I get paid to make PowerPoints about how Lolcat-Based Operations are the way of the future. With Lolcat-Centric Warfare, all elements of national power (and lolcats) are used in the pursuit of noms.