Years Late in Changing Our Tactics in Iraq

Basically, Hillary Clinton was right. We need to combine hard military power with the soft power of our attraction (that she refers to at the end of her speech) into a smart power strategy. We failed to do that in Iraq. We lacked adequate forces to suppress the looting and the outbreak of the insurgency in May 2003. It is difficult for AID to build schools and clinics when workers are under fire. We are doing somewhat better in Afghanistan, but the Administration foolishly diverted resources away for the mistaken invasion of Iraq. I argued six months ago that the current "surge" was likely to produce some military improvements, but that success would depend on major political compromise among the three main factions. There is little sign of this occurring, and thus the military gains are not likely to last. We are years late in changing our tactics. We also need to learn to avoid dangerous illusions about invasions transforming the Middle East. It would be nice to think we will never have another war, but that is unlikely. Thus we will need a strong military, better tactics, and greater wisdom about how to combine our hard and soft power into a smart strategy.

Comments

[cuddletuffy]

it sounds like you are saying that the invasion of iraq was strategically sound. it was strategically catastrophic.

the amount we spend on the military that can't even garrison the capital city of a third world country that has no army, no air force ... tells me that there is something strategically and not tactically wrong with what we are doing. oh and the strategic error in the debt we've assumed for this vicious little caper to steal the oil heartlands. is that some minor tactical error? we've only sped the arrival and worsened the looming financial reckoning of the dollar's displacement as the world's reserve currency. oops! just a small tactical error.

oh and yes we can avoid war. name a war in the past, well any of the wars that we have fought in really that wasn't a war of choice? not a single one. even world war II. we could have defended ourselves just as well and cut way back on the scope of our operations. the same old story. war! war! war! military spending to, "stay strong." and what has it done? it has squandered the wealth of this nation in just 60 years. it has squandered countless opportunities for a safer more peaceful world. it has destroyed our balance of powers and threatens our constitution. either you are a fool or so cynical to try and peddle this crap that you ought to be ashamed.

as far as i'm concerned this endorsement of hillary only further discredits her as one of the leaders we need to salvage and repair our nation for the greatest good of the greatest many of our people.

[lobear00]

Donald Duck, Mickey Mouse, or even Forrest Gump could do a much better job if elected President, than any member in Congress,or for that matter the Clown thats in there now" Certainly better than another Clinton/Bush.

[TankerRat]

libear00 I've been saying the same for months. Vote Duck/Fudd 08. You got it all correct. Keep at it.

[Herrington]

Soft power, hard power? Surge is working?

Our diplomatic corps is a shambles. Our military is a shambles. The insurgents left Bagdad due to the surge but are blowing up people elsewhere. Arming tribal chieftains in Al Anbar is a success?

The international community, already pissed at us for starting this hugest political mistake in history, will be even more pissed if we walk away. Who cares?

Who cares whether the Sunni butcher the Shiite or the other way around? I don’t much care. Seems like a fair if insane fight with comparable capabilities. It is not like Darfur, the fight is more one sided in Darfur. But the fact is that if these two medieval tribes in Iraq might become the bonfire that starts a global conflagration over oil I do care.

But if you back off a little and look at what is really happening, it not the Iraqis that are the problem. It is us. It is the trench warfare in our own capitols to establish the guiding ideology of our own country that precludes any rational plan for Iraq. No plan can be agreed to that admits the merit of or gives advantage to the opposition party. Iraq’s deadlock in forming a viable government reflects deadlock in our nation in determining its own principles.

Satan, if you believe in such, could not have created a greater irony than that Americans nearly universally view Iraqi politics as unjustifiable folly. So seemingly desperate is the battle for ideological control of our own nation that no compromise, not solution, no action can be taken on any issue other than with a super majority of congress. As a consequence, what could be called our national thinking, the product of our consensus as represented in government, has become pathetic, dismal and wretchedly unable to solve the most concrete of problems.

Whatever idiotic path is pursued in Iraq, the problem in our home will remain unless and until we find a solution for deadlock on the oldest issue of all, who gets the money. Exactly what the Iraqis are squabbling about.

[hawkeye58]

When I was in the military, I would have paid someone to "pull the rug out from under me" and send me home.

[TankerRat]

Hey Hawkeye58. Do you remember a saying that goes "G.I., G.I., don't look down. There's no discharge on the ground."I'­d have contributed to your cause buddy. (As long as it included me) Semper Fi. and God Bless.

[mouselion]

Also a military saying, "Shit runs down hill."

Where's Dick Cheney? Where are we?
Where is Rumsfeld? Where's the Abu Gharaibe commander whose having to defend himself? Where is Lindy English.

Where are the anonymous Iraqi victims of truck-bombings or being mistaken as enemy combatants by the US?

"Shit runs down hill," and you know whose on the throne.

[nippersdad]

Mtr. Nye:

Your column seems to gloss over the fact that we never had the troops/materiel necessary to invade and pacify Iraq in the first place. It is not that the strategy and tactics necessary to win are late in coming, but that they were not possible in the first place.

Then, of course, there is the small issue of whether or not it is right for the U.S. to use its hard/soft power in a thinly veiled attempt to coerce natural resources from any country in the first place. If using the United States Military and diplomatic resources to achieve the ends of politically connected campaign contributors in Iraq is not a violation of the Hatch Act, indeed treason, I don't know what is.

[mouselion]

Precisely the point:

If you are going to do the wrong thing, then do the wrong thing the right way.

When you figure out you can't do the wrong thing the right way, then quit living in a fantasy-world and admit is a mistake.

Sorta what we were trying to get across to W and Dick all along, right?

In the mean-time, no bin Laden, no closure on 9-11. Lots and lots of angry Americans and others throughout the world. Is there an up-side to this? I can't see any.

[MinneapolisBob]

My fellow Huff-poster. You may have heard about the $15M ad campaign the ReBushlican war supporters have launched. The site is called "freedoms watch."
www.freedomswatch.org/video.aspx

Their phone number which they have "live" persons you can actually talk to is
1-877-222-8001

Please view the false information they are spreading, and call them after you have watched the videos.

[TankerRat]

Something similar to Wach em Rhien there MinneapolisBob. (Don't know if I spelled that right. I'll have to check my history.) Be that as it may. The disinformation or the bovine manure (whichever you prefer) continues at it's usual diarheal rate. Bye the bye. If you are from Mpls I'm a fellow Minnesotan from Hastings. Take care buddy.

[jazzman]

I'm sorry smart power wouldn't have launched this stupid war. Smart power would have gone after Al Queda in Afghanistan where Bin Laden and crew was hiding and not pulled our troops until he was found. Smart power wouldn't have given the President carte blanche to start this war. Hillary doesn't have smart power. She's just tap dancing around her past misjudgments.

[rssrai]

I am still wondering what this new war is going to be? So, you are saying that it is a given that the US will be at war again and we better get ready for it. Who is going to start a war with the US? The war that we have been in was of our own making. Maybe Hillary is thinking of going to war with Iran. That is where the neocons are pushing us, and maybe the democrats should be wary of Hillary. I don't trust her not even a little.

[SmackwaterJack]

Well, over 4 years ago right before they when into the war in Iraq, I said all the things you Monday morning quarterbacks now say in hindsight, and I was not a lone voice.

Hillary Clinton is a pandering opportunist, nothing more, and she still is a *Hawk* on escalating this war further by attacking Iran, as is Joe Biden and Joe Lieberman. The Blue-dogs and DLC are a part of the problem and the Bush junta.

[MPeter]

Professor Nye, you are so wrong. Then again, the last of your books that I read as a graduate student: Bound to Lead, did not make much sense either and could not anticipate the challenges America would face as the Soviet Bloc phased out and a new emerging threat was centered around non-state actors like Al Qaeda. For you to suggest today that HRC who still considers Missile Defense Shield and Nuclear Forces as relevant deterrents against the likes of Al Qaeda shows how irrelevant your theories have actually become. I think it a misnomer that your school is still called the American School of Realism. There is nothing realistic about employing nukes against an entity like Al Qaeda that experts claim can be found in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Somalia, Saudi Arabia and even in Jordan. What are you guys teaching these days?

[SamThornton]

"It would be nice to think we will never have another war, but that is unlikely. Thus we will need a strong military, better tactics, and greater wisdom about how to combine our hard and soft power into a smart strategy." -- Joseph Nye
==========­==========­==========­====

Unfortunately, having a military always capable of starting a war doesn't seem to be working out too well for us. Just as characters like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and most national leaders up to Truman have realized -- and those who've followed have demonstrated -- using the hammer is often too great a temptation for a chief of state to pass up, even when the most effective methods involve something less nailing another country.

If the ruling elites of both parties are determined to make our country the sole world power with all other nations compliant vassals, as seems to be the case, then the rest of us, including our children and grand-children, are in for some exceedingly unpleasant days and nights ahead.

[jumperpin]

This type of Monday morning imperialism makes ALL of us wanna puke.

[mouselion]

The choir members are back here shuffling around, saying, Amen brother.

[nippersdad]

Amen brother!

[FairAndUnbalanced]

Thank-you for setting the record straight.

[Sundialsvc4]

All that we have learned from the ill-timed "so-called campaign" ... a dog-and-pony show that is intended to do no more than distract us for a little while ... is that the CONGRESS is determined to escalate the war, to topple another head-of-state, to do whatever is necessary ("Greeting­...") to Get The Oil.

Please notice that I did not say "The Republicans," I did not say "The Democrats," and I did not even say "George W. Bush."

I said: The Congress.

Any one of the "so-called candidates" who have stepped forward so-far represent nothing more than "nothing different.­" The Congressional fixation on seizing the greatest war-prize ever known to man continues unchecked.

We need more from this country than people who go on military sprees while their country crumbles at home. And we cannot wait until November 2008 to get it.

[gardengoddess]

You should have said "the government" Sundial. It's been reported that the world's oil supply will be exhausted long previous estimates said it would. Much of that can be contributed to the increasing industrialization of India and China, and the fact more and more people in the world are driving gas powered vehicles.

Perhaps they (the government) believes they are "saving" us in some way. I think the American people are tougher and smarter than they give us credit for. I think we can help find alternative energy sources for our vehicles, and that we'll willingly switch to those sources if it means we live in peace.

Don't forget how much influence the oil industry has in driving our foreign policy.