Summary: Correctly understanding what happened in Iraq, and its consequences, is of extreme importance. False conclusions will lead to more foreign wars. Not only can we not afford them (we’re borrowing the cost of the Iraq and Afghan wars), but future wars might not end so well for us.
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Michael Yon is a former Green Beret and a great reporter. He has spent more time in Iraq and Afghanistan with US and British combat forces than any other journalist. He publishes at his website (an online magazine), in the major media, and has written two books. His work has been mentioned many times in posts and comments on this site. The fact that he has not yet been hired by a major news company is proof of their decrepitude.
While his reporting is excellent, I often disagree with his analysis. (Of course, that does not mean he’s wrong! We’re both writing about things on the edge of the known, the edge of the knowable.) Esp this, written a year ago — foreshadowing claims of victory that have increased in volume and intensity since then (as in Ralph Peters’ article shown at the end of this post).
“As Iraqis stop living in fear, end of Iraq war is at hand“, Michael Yon, op-ed in the New York Daily News, 20 July 2008 — Excerpt:
‘The war in Iraq is over. We won. Which means the Iraqi people won.”
When I wrote this on my Web site a few days ago, I set off a mini-firestorm. Perhaps because I have spent more time embedded with combat troops in Iraq than any journalist I know – and have interviewed countless Iraqis and members of the coalition military. But I stand by my words, just as I stood by my assertion of February 2005 that Iraq was in a state of civil war, and later understood that Al Qaeda was its proximate cause.
These issues go to the core of our Long War, and understanding them correctly will play a large role in determining America’s prosperity– or even survival –in the 21st century. Yon makes 4 assertions.
- “The war is over”
- “Al Qaeda was its proximate cause.”
- “We won”
- “The Iraqi people won.”
(1) “The war is over”
Yon explains:
So I will be very clear what I mean when I say we have won the war. A counterinsurgency is won when the government’s legitimacy is no longer threatened by the insurgents, the government is able to protect its own people and the people are participating in the government. In Iraq, all three conditions apply. … The sectarian violence is now mostly over. … There is still fighting in Iraq. But while there remain some terrorists at large, now we are truly fighting ‘the dead-enders.’
This is wrong on several levels, IMO. First, it is premature. As General Petraeus recently said, progress “remains fragile and reversible.”
Second, there were many conflicts burning in Iraq. Of the big 4, two are over — and two are simmering.
(a) Kurds fighting to establish their own state, whose borders include oil. The first phase has ended. Kurdistan exists de facto if not yet de jure. The second still simmers, unresolved.
(b) Sunni Arabs vs. Shiite Arabs — Still simmering. The Sunni Arabs were largely evicted from Baghdad, ethnic cleansing with de facto US support. They have a high degree of autonomy in their “homelands”; their relationship with the Iraq national government remains unresolved. As seen in the struggle over the “Sons of Iraq.”
(c) Different factions of Shiites fighting for dominance. Done. Iran and the US both backed Nouri al-Maliki’s faction, over Muqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army.
(d) Arab Islamic fundamentalists fighting for control. Done. When the Sunni Arab leaders no longer found them useful as shock troops against the Americans, their key base of local support disappeared (as I described in September 2007).
We can re-state the situation more accurately, using my posts at each stage of the war.
- The insurgency began in Fall 2003, despite US military denials, per my posts in October and November 2003.
- The Iraq insurgency has ended, which opens a path to peace, 13 March 2007
- Beyond Insurgency: An End to Our War in Iraq, 27 September 2007 — Our role was largely done by this date; the struggle among the 3 parts of Iraq was beginning.
- “We won the War“, William Kristol, debate transcript, page 79 — Brief comment, but widely cited.
- Iraq, after the war, 20 May 2008 — The long struggle begins between the 3 parts of Iraq (with its neighbors and us pitching in). It need not be a war.
The process I described in March 2007 has run far, but these are only steps on a long path. None can say how long it will take, or how much blood will be spilled before stability returns — and the Iraq War is truly over. As I said in March 2007:
{Iraq’s} fragmentation can be seen as a descent into civil war, or instead as the preliminary to formation of a new Iraq state. These proto-states can be building blocks for something larger. Most importantly, many of these powerful local elites have the power to negotiate and strike deals. This offers a path to peace for us and the Iraq people, perhaps the only such.
(2) “Al Qaeda was its proximate cause.”
This is wrong on two levels, IMO. First, the US invasion was obviously the war’s proximate cause, no matter how beneficial the result. Al Qaeda capitalized on the almost inevitable opposition to an occupation by infidel foreigners. Second, al Qaeda was a participant in only one of the four conflicts burning in Iraq.
(3) “We won”
This article does not even discuss in what sense “we won.” Let alone justifying the cost in blood (theirs and ours) and money. The monetary costs is probably over a trillion dollars, including future pay/benefits and replacement of equipment. We borrowed it from Asian and OPEC nations, and have no idea how to repay. They will demand repayment, eventually. Our children probably consider us to have been insane.
(a) There is little, almost no, evidence that Saddam was a threat to the US.
(i) Did we find those WMD’s?
Although the President has put forth various justifications for the war in the past 6 years, that was the first and (IMO) the only worthwhile one. Probably the only one the American people supported. The definitive government report so far is by the Iraq Survey Group released 30 September 2004 (see the DoD press conference transcript, full report, and Wikipedia,). They found nothing of significance.
(ii) Saddam the terrorist threat to America
Ditto for government efforts to prove that Saddam was a threat to the US by supporting terrorism. The key report is “The Iraqi Perspectives Project — Saddam and Terrorism: Emerging Insights from Captured Iraqi Documents“, Joint Center for Operational Analysis (JCOA), 20 March 2008. From they opening two paragraphs of the Executive Summary:
“Despite their incompatible long-term goals, many terrorist movements and Saddam found a common enemy in the United States. At times these organizations worked together, trading access for capability. In the period after the 1991 Gulf War, the regime of Saddam Hussein supported a complex and increasingly disparate mix of pan-Arab revolutionary causes and emerging pan-Islamic radical movements. The relationship between Iraq and forces of pan-Arab socialism was well known and was in fact one of the defining qualities of the Ba’ath movement. But the relationships between Iraq and the groups advocating radical pan-Islamic doctrines are much more complex. This study found no “smoking gun” (i.e., direct connection) between Saddam’s Iraq and al Qaeda.”
(2) The insurgency was a result of our occupation, so defeating it brings no net benefit to the US.
(3) Will the Iraq — or Iraq and Kurdistan — be allies of the US? Too soon to say. Kurdistan has so far not allowed US bases in their territory; most of their oil leases have gone to non-US companies. The Shiites running the Iraq government have long-standing ties to Iran.
(4) No, we have not gotten any oil. Nothing to date indicates that we — or US oil companies — will have ownership or preferred access to Iraq, Kurdish, or Sunni Arab Iraq oil.
Summary: As an expert in 4GW theory said (personal communication):
So we won in Iraq. How many more such victories can we stand? The words of the immortal Pyrrhus echo through the ages: “One more such victory will undo me!” And the Red King had a legitimate claim to having won his battles.
From Wikipedia:
Pyrrhus or Pyrrhos (319-272 BC) was a Greek general of the Hellenistic era. He was king of the Greek tribe of Molossians, of the royal Aeacid house, and later he became King of Epirus and Macedon. He was one of the strongest opponents of early Rome. Some of his battles, though successful, cost him heavy losses, from which the term Pyrrhic victory was coined.
(4) “The Iraqi people won.”
The facts do not support such a statement. The suffering since the invasion probably was worse — overall — than during Saddham’s regime. But a free and stable Iraq (or Iraqs) would make it worthwhile. The picture is not yet clear.
- Have the women of Iraq won? Most have lost both freedom and security since the invasion.
- Violence is still high — far above that before the invasion, the average of Iraq’s history, and that of the region.
- It’s too soon to say if the roots of democracy have a firm root in Iraq. Post-WWII history suggests caution about such predictions.
But even peace and freedom for Iraq — when or if achieved — does not mean that we have won, for two reasons. We cannot know if the Iraq people could have come to this point more quickly — and without the bloodshed — if the US had not so nakedly attempted to colonize Iraq in 2003. The resulting insurgency was almost an inevitable result of that.
On a deeper level, so what if we helped one nation establish a democracy. How many billion people remain? Why is it America’s job to bleed and borrow itself to ruin in order to lift up other nations? Will they thank us, or like the people of Iraq, cheer when we leave afterwards?
Other declarations of victory in Iraq
Ralph Peters has written some seminal works in the military arts (like this one). Here his euphoria runs wild: “Bye-bye Babylog – Exiting Iraq’s Cities, Victorious“, New York Post, 30 June 2009. I don’t believe his articles about the Iraq War will be read well once the dust has settled, probably seen as a low point in an otherwise powerful oeuvre.
Other declarations of victory:
- “Victory in Iraq“, Editorial of The New York Sun, 18 July 2008
- 22 November 2008 declared “Vicotry in Iraq Day” — Originally, I believe, at ZombieTime (link no longer working), and widely copied. Some examples: Gateway Pundit, News Blaze, Blackfive.
- “Quiet Victory in Iraq“, Editorial in National Review, 2 February 2009
- “Victory in Iraq“, Fareed Zakaria, Newsweek, 6 June 2009 — “How we got here is a matter for history. But the democratic ideal is still within reach.”
For more information
To read other articles about these things, see the FM reference page on the right side menu bar. Of esp interest these days:
- About Iraq & Sub-continent Wars – my articles
- About Iraq & Sub-continent Wars – studies & reports
- About the Iraq War – Goals and Benchmarks
Posts about the war in Iraq:
- The Iraq insurgency has ended, which opens a path to peace, 13 March 2007
- Beyond Insurgency: An End to Our War in Iraq, 27 September 2007
- Iraq, after the war, 20 May 2008
- Slowly the new Iraq becomes visible, 18 July 2008
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