Imperialism needs a longer war

Imperialism needs a longer war 
 
Pentagon Strategy Creates Rift Among Hawks

   By Jim Lobe, AlterNet
   March 21, 2003

   An almost audible sigh of relief could be heard from a nondescript
   downtown building in Washington, D.C. on Thursday morning when
   President Saddam Hussein appeared on Iraqi television some hours after
   U.S. warplanes and cruise missiles bombarded a residence in Baghdad.

   Media reports quoted U.S. officials as saying that the raid was
   directed at a "target of opportunity," possibly Hussein and his two
   sons themselves, shortly after the 48-hour ultimatum delivered by
   President George Bush had expired. If the raid had succeeded in
   killing the three men, U.S. officials told reporters, the Pentagon's
   war plans might have shifted dramatically against an all-out war.

   But fortunately for the neo-conservative hawks over at the American
   Enterprise Institute (AEI) on 19th St., three blocks from the White
   House, it appears that Hussein remains alive, and the invasion will
   now go forward as planned. "That we appear not to have gotten Saddam
   Hussein last night ... may be a blessing in disguise," came the email
   message from AEI's press center.

   A "decapitation" strategy targeted on Hussein, his sons, and a few
   other top Ba'ath officials without a full-scale invasion and
   occupation represents a dangerous threat to the neocon vision for the
   future of the Middle East. "As in Operation Desert Storm, the measure
   of victory in this war against Iraq will not be how big we start but
   where and when we stop," said the message from resident fellow Tom
   Donnelly. "'Going to Baghdad' means more than physically occupying the
   city. It is a metaphor for tearing out Saddamism, root and branch.
   There will be many moments - and a quick kill on Saddam would be one -
   where some might be tempted to say, as the first Bush administration
   did when the television pictures of the famous Highway of Death hit
   American airwaves in 1991, that enough has been done".

   Perish the thought, cry the AEI hawks led by chairman of the
   Pentagon's Defense Policy Board (DPB), Richard Perle. The current
   Pentagon strategy has them deeply worried that that their hopes for a
   thorough-going purge of ruling Ba'ath Party officials - which they see
   as the first step to transforming the entire Arab Middle East - may
   yet be frustrated.

   The disagreement over military strategy is the first sign of a
   disagreement within the powerful alliance that has shaped U.S. foreign
   policy since the 9/11 attacks. The coalition consists of three main
   components: hard right-wing, or nationalist Republicans like the
   Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and vice president Dick Cheney;
   neo-conservatives like Perle and most of Rumsfeld's and Cheney's
   immediate subordinates, such as Deputy Defense Secretary Paul
   Wolfowitz; and the Christian Right, whose concerns have been
   represented most forcefully within the White House itself,
   particularly among Bush's domestic advisers.

   Over the past eighteen months, these groups have agreed that the "war
   on terrorism" must include the ouster of Saddam Hussein, beating the
   war drums against Baghdad moments after the dust settled in lower
   Manhattan. While they have been unanimous on key issues of tactics,
   such as marginalizing Secretary of State Colin Powell and other
   "realist" veterans of the first Bush administration, and strategy,
   such as ousting Hussein, they have never agreed on what happens once
   Hussein is removed.

   "The earliest and most salient rift (in the hawks' coalition) will be
   the hard-right nationalists, like Rumsfeld and Cheney, and the
   neo-conservatives," according to Charles Kupchan, a foreign-policy
   analyst at the Council on Foreign Relations and National Security
   Council strategist under former President Bill Clinton. "For the hard
   right, this is really about getting Saddam Hussein and weapons of mass
   destruction. Once that's done, they're going to say, 'Okay, we've done
   our job, now let's get the hell out and go home".

   But the neo-conservatives, on the other hand, want to stick around to
   use Iraq as a base from which to exert pressure on other presumably
   hostile regimes, particularly Syria, Iran, and even Saudi Arabia. The
   third wing of the coalition, the Christian Right, is more likely to
   side with Rumsfeld and Cheney than the neo-conservatives in Kupchan's
   view, creating a split that "will complicate George Bush's life
   immensely".

   In many ways, these rifts were already apparent in Afghanistan, with
   Rumsfeld and Cheney dead-set against serious "nation-building" and the
   extension of peacekeeping forces beyond Kabul for fear it would
   interfere with U.S. military operations against al Qaeda. The result -
   which the neo-conservatives warned against at the time - is that the
   authority of the U.S.-installed central government is basically
   confined to the capital, while most of the countryside remains in the
   hands of warlords. The neocons claim that Washington cannot afford to
   leave Iraq in a similar state of disorder.

   While Cheney and Rumsfeld have both given lip service to the idea that
   Washington's occupation of Iraq will be the first step toward the
   democratization of the entire region, they have also been the most
   outspoken in insisting that Hussein's self-exile would be one sure way
   of avoiding war. This attitude has caused no end of anxiety among the
   neo-conservatives both within the administration, in the think tanks
   like AEI, and in such media outlets as the Rupert Murdoch-owned Weekly
   Standard (headquartered in the AEI building), Fox News, and on the
   editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal.

   For them, Iraq must not only be de-Ba'athized, but Washington must
   also be accorded the opportunity to show the world, (especially other
   Muslim states) just how powerful and determined the United States is
   to both wage war and enforce political reform. The neoconservatives
   view "Saddamism without Saddam" as the worst possible outcome of the
   present crisis. In the past months, they have excoriated the State
   Department and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) for encouraging
   coups d'etat or enlisting the participation of even former senior
   Ba'ath officials in any post-invasion administration.

   For the same reasons, they have voiced - albeit, far more tactfully
   due to their interest in preserving the strategic alliance - concern
   about Cheney's and Rumsfeld's calls for Hussein's exile and
   suggestions that U.S.-backed purges of the Iraqi regime will be
   carefully targeted and limited. The neo-conservatives have long
   favored a far-reaching purge that would bring to power the core of the
   exiled Iraqi National Congress (INC) led by Ahmed Chalabi, an old
   friend of Perle and Wolfowitz. Chalabi would be ideally suited to
   co-operate with U.S. efforts to knock over the other "dominoes" in the
   region who are perceived as hostile to the U.S. or Israel.

   It is still too early to tell whether the neocons will get the
   opportunity to fulfill their vision for the Middle East or whether
   their hopes will be rudely shattered by a carefully targeted Cruise
   missile.

          © 2003 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.