September 9, 2004
WHAT IF WE HAD NOT GONE INTO IRAQ?
BY RICHARD REEVES
WASHINGTON -- I have thought for a long time that communism
would have collapsed in the 1970s rather than at the end of
the 1980s if the United States had not chosen to go to war
in Vietnam. We squandered years of moral, political,
financial and military capital in jungles and rice-paddies
we could not name, much less "conquer" or "liberate".
Because of that, a couple of sentences in the current issue
of the Atlantic Monthly seem etched in stone more than
slapped on paper. James Fallows, the magazine's National
Editor, in an article entitled "Bush's Lost Year" writes of
spending the past two years with military, intelligence and
diplomatic personnel at the "working level of America's
anti-terrorism efforts". Most are Republicans, he says,
many supported the decision to invade Iraq in March 2003.
Next he writes:
"I have sat through arguments among soldiers and scholars
about whether the invasion of Iraq should be considered the
worst strategic error in American history -- or only the
worst since Vietnam ... Many say things in Iraq will
eventually look much better than they do now. But about the
conduct and effect of the war in Iraq one view prevails: it
has increased the threats America faces, and has reduced
the military, financial and diplomatic tools with which we
can respond."
Among the many people quoted in the Atlantic is Jeffrey
Record, a professor of strategy at the Air War College, who
summed up a good deal of the thinking in Washington now:
"Are we better off in basic security than before we invaded
Iraq? The answer is no. An unnecessary war has consumed
American Army and other ground resources, to the point
where we have nothing left in the cupboard for another
contingency -- for instance, should the North Koreans
decide that with the Americans completely absorbed in Iraq,
now is the time to do something."
So, what would be different or what would life be like if
we had not made the choice to invade Iraq:
- The life of Iraqis would be what it was before we came.
The tyranny of Saddam Hussein would continue, but it would
be contained without threat to us. Evil, yes. But there is
evil everywhere, beginning these days in western Sudan.
- We would be safer. There is danger everywhere in this age
of terror, but our resources are bogged down in one place
-- and could be there for many years. An example: those
surveillance satellites that once were pointed at the
Soviet Union and then at Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda have
been pointed at Iraq for almost three years.
- Afghanistan would be in better shape. And Osama and al
Qaeda might be gone or rendered less effective. We cut and
ran to Iraq, without accomplishing that vital mission,
leaving the country that sheltered Osama to be fought over,
again, by warlords of the drug trade and the crazily
puritanical Taliban.
- The United States would still be admired in most places
and a feared superpower everywhere -- perhaps even liked a
bit. Iraq, like Vietnam, has revealed the limits of our
power, allowing enemies everywhere to mock us.
- We would be engaged in trying to contain the greater
dangers in our adversaries North Korea and Iran -- and the
dangers in the lands of our allies, Pakistan and Saudi
Arabia. But, again, we choose to look away from the reality
and threat in those places.
- We would be buying the weapons of mass destruction of the
old Soviet Union. But now there is no money for that -- or
for the problems of education and health care at home.
There is only money for war and security.
- We would be playing a useful role in trying, as always,
to find a way to peace between Israel and the Arabs.
Instead, our Arabic speakers and other intellectual assets
are tied down trying to find out what is happening in the
cities and regions of Iraq again under the control of
fundamentalist zealots and thugs trying to kill our young
men and women.
- Lawrence Lindsey might still be President Bush's chief
economic adviser. But he was fired for truth-telling, for
saying our costs in Iraq would be between $100 billion and
$200 billion.
All that, I think, must have been way back in the
President's mind when he branded his war a "catastrophic
success". It is, without doubt, a successful catastrophe.