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contents of this diary - contents special topics written about - topics First entry this page: this page: first entry Hugh Cook - his blog: latest entry |
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First entry deals with these topics: analysis Iraq UN bombing Iraq - analysis future Iraqi guerilla war predictions Iraq costs Iraq war costs Iraq rebuilding |
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My own take on the situation is that things will get worse because the guerillas are starting to figure out what tactics work. They're on a learning curve, and they're improving. At the outset of the recent war between America and Iraq, the Iraqis proved strategically clueless (in retrospect they don't seem to have had any military strategy worthy of the name) and, when it came to combat, their tactical range appeared to be limited to one of two options:- (i) run away, or (ii) die. Now, however, things have changed. Instead of a range of really hard American military targets (tanks with armor too strong to penetrate, jets flying overhead and helicopters which generally resisted getting shot down) the guerillas have a range of soft targets to choose from. Obviously, the more the reconstruction of Iraq proceeds, the greater the range of soft targets becomes. From a military point of view, it seems very easy for the guerillas to continue to fight. They have (evidently) considerable stockpiles of weapons. They emerge from the local population, do their stuff and then blend back into the local population. One favorite tactic (when it comes to making war on the American military) seems to be the drive-by shooting, something that kids in Los Angeles will do for kicks. Your war lasts five seconds as you spray bullets from the window, and then, all going well, you're round the corner and safe again. From a risk-exposure point of view, the guerillas are really only at hazard during the brief moments when they're engaging their targets. Thirty seconds (let's say) for a driveby shooting. A couple of minutes of hazard if you pull a gun on someone on a university campus, shoot the guy and then walk away again. Meantime, the potential targets are exposed to the psychological pressure of being full-time targets, always available to whoever wants to shoot at them. In recent months we've heard a lot about asymmetrical warfare, the warfare of the weak against the strong. In thinking about the guerilla war in Iraq, I think it's reasonable to consider the notion of asymmetrical risks. If a guerilla fighter wants to take a day off and just blob out and watch television, fine, he can do that ... assuming that the electrical power is running, which is not necessarily going to be the case. Giving that the means of war are readily available, given that the guerillas can (and do) hide in the civilian population, and given that the moment-to-moment risk that the average guerilla is running is very low (close to zero when he is not actually shooting at someone) there seems no reason (from a military perspective) why guerilla warfare in Iraq should not continue for years. If the guerillas have the will to wage war. So this brings us to the question: what is the motive? As I read this situation, during the years in which Saddam Hussein ruled Iraq, a large number of people (tens of thousands of them) joined the ruling Iraqi regime. They joined actively, becoming members of Saddam's Ba'ath Party. Or they joined in other ways, their fates becoming linked to the fate of the regime because they benefited from a situation in which the Sunni minority dominated Iraq. Now, what does the future hold for those people? Presumably, a certain number of these people are thinking along the following lines:- "If democracy comes, and the Shi'a majority rule Iraq, then there is no future for me. I'm finished. I have no chance. On the other hand, if we kill enough people, maybe the Americans will go away. The Sunni should be able to take back power in Iraq, and then I'll have my career back. I'll have my life back." Now, it may be that the number of people in Iraq who think like this is small. However, it doesn't take many people to mount a successful guerilla campaign. Throughout much of my life, the Irish Republican Army was fighting a guerilla war against the British authorities. This went on for years, and the final solution (to the extent that a final solution has been achieved) was political rather than military. The British were never able to crush the IRA out of existence. So what is to be done? "Yankee go home" does not seem to be a reasonable solution. If the Americans simply give up and withdraw, then the likely outcome is that the hardcore "Let's rule Iraq again" contingent in the Sunni triangle will try to take back all power. If they succeed, then the 2003 Iraq war becomes totally pointless, a destructive bloodbath benefiting nobody. On the other hand, if a Sunni power-takeback ends in failure, it will probably be as a consequence of a disastrous civil war. The following looks possible:- (i) America wavers, throws in the towel and leaves Iraq, probably after George Bush has gone down to defeat in the next election; (ii) A Sunni power-takeback threatens the survival of the Shi'a in the south of Iraq; (iii) Shi'a-dominated Iran moves in to prevent a Shi'a bloodbath; (iv) America, fearing the dominance of a nuclear-armed Iran, tells Iranian occupation forces to get the hell out of Iraq; (v) War follows. While "Yankee go home" does not lead to a good outcome, "Yankee stay put" doesn't really look good either, not if "Yankee stay put" means a continuation of the status quo - too few American troops trying to ride herd on too many Iraqis. The present situation is not fair to anyone. It's not fair to the American troops on the ground, who have been put in an impossible situation - too few troops to control too much territory. It's not fair to the Iraqi people - that is, to the ordinary people, quite possibly a strong majority, who just want to get on with their lives. Because there aren't enough boots on the ground to guarantee security, Iraq remains (quite apart from the problem of the terrorist guerillas) a lawless country of bandits, rapists and and looters. So what then IS the solution? One possible solution would seem to be "Bring in more Americans!" But there are two problems with this idea. The first is that the American armed forces don't have any Americans left. The second is that America probably can't afford the billions of extra dollars it would take to properly police Iraq. Another solution might seem to be "Give the problem to the United Nations!" But who is the United Nations? It's countries like Great Britain and the United States which are already in Iraq. It's Japan, which is keen to give aid, but does not really want to get mixed up in anything involving bloody bayonets. And so forth. Personally, I can't see a realistic scenario which would have the United Nations project enough force into Iraq to bring the situation to heel. Whichever way I turn this problem over in my mind, it really does seem to be a sorry mess. As I see it, the future looks like this:- America will probably not quit Iraq, at least not in the next five to ten years, because the costs of doing so would be too high. For America, withdrawing from Iraq at this stage would quite possibly mean, amongst other things, increasing the power of nuclear-armed Islamic Iran to an extent which would be unacceptable in an American political context. (Personally, I couldn't care less if a nuclear-armed Islamic Iran dominated the Middle East, but, then, I'm not an American politican.) On the other hand, America will not succeed in bringing military security to Iraq, at least not in the short term (certainly not in the next two to five years) because it's simply not possible. The necessary military muscle does not exist (America does not have enough boots to put on the ground) and the economic costs are not sustainable. So what we get is a miserable continuation of the same situation ... only, the situation will get steadily worse as the guerillas steadily refine their techniques. Section 64 Entry 0002. Date: 2003 August 23 Saturday. (diary) (previous) (top) (bottom) (next) (topics) (contents) In dollar terms, how much money will be needed for Iraq? An editorial in yesterday's English-language edition of The Asahi Shimbun addresses this issue, succinctly laying out the financial costs of the Iraqi situation:- What struck me about this long and gloomy editorial was how puzzled the writer seemed to be about the question of how to sort out the present chaotic mess in Iraq.L. Paul Bremer III, the chief American civilian administrator in Iraq, has predicted that rebuilding Iraq will require three years and cost $100 billion (12 trillion yen). The U.S. Defense Department has calculated the expenditures for military operations and other expenses involved in keeping U.S. troops in Iraq during the nine months from January to September this year alone would amount to $58 billion. How do the United States and Britain intend to raise such huge amounts of money? The editorial suggests international discussion "led by the United Nations" ... as bright ideas go, this one doesn't amount to much, though I have to admit that, contemplating Iraq, I find myself in a similar state of cluelessness.What, then, should be done. Probably nothing can be offered as a quick fix. What I'm thinking is that the United States will eventually go home simply because there isn't enough money in the world to fix what's been broken. I figure the future will look like this:- (i) The United States will cobble together some kind of Coalition of the Willing to help provide both dollars and bayonets for Iraq. These offerings will not be enough to fix the problem, but they will solve a political problem in that it will look as if something is being done. (ii) Some kind of shaky Iraqi government will be bolted together somehow. It will not have the resources needed to put Iraq back together again, but it will be politically convenient for outsiders to have some kind of entity to point to and say "You're responsible." (iii) In due course, the United States will point to the Iraqi government, will say "You're responsible" and will then go home. This, after all, is what happened in South Vietnam: the USA told the South Vietnamese they were their own rulers, went home and left the South to be steamrollered by the North. (iv) After the United States goes home (which I'm picking will be in about five years from now, after a lot more body bags have been shipped back to the States) the security situation in Iraq will deteriorate. The Saddam Machine will spring to life (even though Saddam himself will doubtlessly be long dead by then) and take a stab at winning back power in Iraq. The following scenarios are then possible:- (v)(a) Saddam (though dead) returns to rule again (albeit in slightly different form.) (New names, same old acid baths.) (v)(b) Iraq fractures into two or three pieces following a bloody civil war. Two is more likely than three: a Shi'a fragment and, opposed to it, a Sunni fragment which contains the Kurdish areas. (The other alternative is that the Kurds form their own state.) (v)(c) A civil war in Iraq leads to the majority Shi'a taking control of all of Iraq, which then makes Iraq a natural ally for nuclear-armed Islamic Iran ... which leads (possibly) to America returning to the Middle East to deal with the perceived threat of an Iran-Iraq axis, leading to ... well ... who knows? I had been hoping that World War Three would not occur in my lifetime, but, plainly, there's still plenty of time. |
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