October 8, 2006
DE-BAATHIFICATION....Former British Home Secretary David Blunkett, whose diary will begin serialization in the Guardian on Monday, says that it wasn't Paul Bremer who favored dismantling the Iraqi military after the invasion:
A member of the war cabinet, he reveals that Britain battled with the US vice-president, Dick Cheney, and defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, not to press ahead with dismantling "the whole of the security, policing, administrative and local government system on the basis of the de-Ba'athification of Iraq.
"The issue was: 'What the hell do you do about it?' All we could do as a nation of 60 million off the coast of mainland Europe was to seek to influence the most powerful nation in the world. We did seek to influence them, but we were not in charge, so you cannot say that if only the government recognised what needed to be done, it would all have been different. The government did recognise the problem."
I don't suppose this is really surprising news or anything — did we ever really think Bremer made this decision on his own? — but it's nice to see confirmation. Yet another disastrous miscalculation from the dynamic duo of Cheney and Rumsfeld. Have these guys ever gotten anything right?
—Kevin Drum 12:51 PM
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"Have they done anything right"
Of course, they have - They both used their government connections in the 80s to land cushy CEO jobs - Since then, they have both become very wealthy.
Why do you hate "the American Dream" so much?
Posted by: thethirdPaul on October 8, 2006 at 1:07 PM | PERMALINK
Kevin, after WWII did we not de-Nazify the German government? Of course we did. After WWII did we also not engage in de-fascisizing the Italian government? Of course we did. Then why would we want Baathists to be in charge of a post-liberation government? It makes no sense to overthrow the Islamofascists in charge of Iraq under Saddam only to put them back in charge after liberation. We should think about the Iraqi people first. The Iraqi don't want to be liberated only to have the tyranny of the Baathists forced back on them again.
Posted by: Al on October 8, 2006 at 1:10 PM | PERMALINK
Ah, no you (or you should say we) did not de-Natzify the German government except to take out the very top layer of politicians and a few others. All the rest were left in place to keep things running.
Posted by: Yukoner on October 8, 2006 at 1:20 PM | PERMALINK
And it was a very short while after May of 45 that we realized Nazis had to be brought back to run the infrastructure - And one very good reason for dismantling the Wehrmacht, was that the vast majority of German troops did not surrender until they had fired their last bullet.
In Iraq, they faded into the night with plenty of ammo left. Geez, no reason for any extra troops, huh.
Posted by: stupid git on October 8, 2006 at 1:23 PM | PERMALINK
Hi Kevin,
I just put a reply up on your most current post (about partitioning Iraq) in which I was talking about this panel held at MIT last week with Packer (Assassin's Gate author), Chandrasekaran (Life in the Emerald City author), and moderated by Ambassador Barbara Bodine. I think Chandrasekaran actually has reported the exact opposite of what David Blunkett is claiming; Chandrasekaran claims that George Bush actually signed an executive order to keep the army intact and Bremer went in and completely ignored that order acting under no one's orders (in fact Packer then asked Chandrasekaran whether Cheney's office was ultimately behind that move and he said that it really was Bremer who did it all on his own). However all the panelists acknowledge that this decision remains among the most murky, completely unresolved questions of all of post-toppling-Saddam Iraq policy.
Posted by: reader on October 8, 2006 at 1:43 PM | PERMALINK
There were Islamo-fascists in charge of Iraq under Saddam? Live and learn...
As for Cheney and Rumsfeld getting things right, they are pretty good at the Big Lie, and Spin, and using fear to push their agenda.
Posted by: RCK on October 8, 2006 at 1:51 PM | PERMALINK
Well..., they have gotten back into cushy government jobs, eh?
Posted by: Darryl Pearce on October 8, 2006 at 1:53 PM | PERMALINK
For the last fucking time, WWII was 60 years ago.
Iraq in 2003 was not Germany in 1945.
If you insist on making false historical comparisons, try looking at Vietnam or the Spanish-American War. The Phillipines occupation would be far more relevant for comparison purposes, though still incomplete and false. Every war, every country, every decade in history, are different from every other one.
I'm sorry, is that too nuanced for you to understand?
If you insist on casting the current situation in a WWII light, then where is the national gas rationing? Where is the draft? Where is the 90% tax bracket on the wealthiest Americans?
I mean, this IS an epic struggle for our very existence as a civilization, right? Right?
Posted by: RobW on October 8, 2006 at 1:58 PM | PERMALINK
Answer: No. Never.
As Atrios says, this has been easy answers to easy questions.
Posted by: Charles on October 8, 2006 at 2:08 PM | PERMALINK
Al is a hoot! "de-fascisizing" -I look forward to when we cah "de-fascisize" the American government we now have, but on to more useful musings. I'm about halfway into Woodward's "State of Denial" and the disconnect in the Bush administration regarding the Iraq war is simply staggering. I'm amazed that there is anyone on this planet who can support this travesty!
Posted by: Fred on October 8, 2006 at 2:18 PM | PERMALINK
If those two guys suggested to you a place to have lunch, you'd probably die from botulism after eating there.
Posted by: dp on October 8, 2006 at 2:22 PM | PERMALINK
Early in the Avignon Presidency there was an article on the web about the Cheney Mystique Mistake. It listed all the people who believed in his judgment and wisdom to their rue. And the reasons why. There were many. He is, without a doubt, the most persuasive bonehead in memory. His withering eye and basso voice mask an idiot.
Posted by: Jeffrey Davis on October 8, 2006 at 2:30 PM | PERMALINK
When Dick was head of Halliburton, he had "other priorities", too: he cost them millions in bungled contracts and non-starting deals. They only hired him because of perceived government connections which, of course, turned out to be ephemeral—because the Penguin don't do nothin' but lie, babies.
Oh, and Al, you're completely right about Iraq. It's exactly like Nazi Germany, having spent the last 12 years building its empire and then expending its energies in a massively destructive war that it took the US two years to get pulled into. Yes, it's identical, and that's why it's going sooooo well. Hey, have you signed up? They still need more de-Baathification officers. And I hear they let you keep the shiny badge.
Posted by: Kenji on October 8, 2006 at 2:48 PM | PERMALINK
Yet another disastrous miscalculation
And you know that continued Baathification of the government would have worked well -- how exactly do you know that?
If the Baathist Iraqi past is any guide, the Baathist-dominated security apparatus would have produced a greater "disaster" than what is there, especially in the 80% of the country that is Kurdish or Shia.
Posted by: papago on October 8, 2006 at 3:00 PM | PERMALINK
but we were not in charge, so you cannot say that if only the government recognised what needed to be done, it would all have been different. The government did recognise the problem
Is there any evidence that they did a really good job in the teens and 20s when they ran the whole show in Iraq? No. They set the pattern for post-Ottoman government brutality in Iraq (following the Ottoman brutality that they replaced.)
Posted by: papago on October 8, 2006 at 3:04 PM | PERMALINK
Blunkett and the article are pretty incoherent. But I always thought this question of "whether" the Iraqi army should have been "dismantled" was mostly a phony political charge. I heard Bremer say there was not an Iraqi army in existence to maintain. That is probably true, but even if some form of Iraqi army did exist, why would we think that keeping it in busy would have had a significant favorable effect? Presumably, the Iraqi army was led by bad guys, and we would not have been willing to allow them to operate in the manner necessary to exercise control. Also, to the extent the bad guys formerly in the Iraqi army are now the terrorist enemies, it doesn't seem like they would have been the answer.
I heard someone on TV today say something like "history does not allow for alternatives," which is a pretty smart observation. Those who claim keeping the Iraqi army in tact have the luxury of an argument that can never be tested by reality. The same with those who now say that Sadaam should not have been removed from power; they have the luxury of not having to account for what evil Sadaam and his sons would have inflicted on the world over the next 50 years. Guys like Dean and Gore who opposed the war at the time have better standing to argue we should not have gone to war in Iraq, but even they essentially now are arguing for an alternative that is not allowed in history.
Posted by: brian on October 8, 2006 at 3:21 PM | PERMALINK
All we could do as a nation of 60 million off the coast of mainland Europe was to seek to influence the most powerful nation in the world.
And how exactly did you, as my representive in our 60 million nation, influence Bush? After ignoring me and a million other people as we marched to tell you not to join the invasion?
Did you even once say that if your demands were not met, you would leave the Americans to occupy Iraq alone? Or was that too much "influence"? I suspect that our New Labour is like the Americans' Democratic Leadership Council; when it comes to saying "no" to extreme right wing lunatics, there's never a time when it's worth actually using that powder you were keeping dry.
(I wish the Yankees had "kept their powder dry" all through the American Revolution; the USA would never have come to pass, as our soldiers would have rounded up the revolutionaries, taken their nice dry powder, and used it to keep them under control.)
What's the difference between David Blunkett and a blind pig? The pig sometimes finds you a tasty truffle.
Posted by: derek on October 8, 2006 at 4:02 PM | PERMALINK
The same with those who now say that Sadaam should not have been removed from power; they have the luxury of not having to account for what evil Sadaam and his sons would have inflicted on the world over the next 50 years.
And just think, it's your doing that we have that luxury. We didn't have it all through the nineties, and now we do, thanks to you. It must just Burn. You. Up. Well, keep squirming, you worm, you deserve to burn.
If you had even a fraction of the sense of "personal responsibility" for your own actions that you mendaciously claim to have when you're smearing Democrats, you'd take it like a man, not like a whiny worm. Boo hoo, our critics can't prove an alternative history wouldn't have been worse! Pathetic.
Posted by: derek on October 8, 2006 at 4:09 PM | PERMALINK
Kevin Drum >"...Have these guys ever gotten anything right?"
Well I assume that they have been able to use toilet paper correctly; that might not be the case these days, maybe they have someone take care of that for them also
"...you cannot save your face and your ass at the same time..." - vachon@shadrach.net
Posted by: daCascadian on October 8, 2006 at 4:12 PM | PERMALINK
Is there any evidence that [the British] did a really good job in the teens and 20s when they ran the whole show in Iraq? No.
Ahem. If you didn't want us with you in your little adventure, you didn't have to have us along. This is like that bit in the movie where the villains turn and blame each other when all their plans fall apart. But go ahead and smear your "allies", I want something to show the Americanist fools in my country how much gratitude they have for helping you invade Iraq. It might teach them to have more sense next time.
Posted by: derek on October 8, 2006 at 4:15 PM | PERMALINK
Saddam did not trust the Iraqi Army to fight for him. That is why their more successful commanders died in mysterious "accidents" over the years. That is why Saddam set up the Republican Guards and gave them priviledges and priority of equipment over the Iraqi Army. Saddam didn't fully trust the Republican Guards either, and so he set up Special Republican Guard cadres, who at least initially formed the Iraqi resistance.
An astute occupation authority would not have disbanded the Iraqi Army, but rather reconstituted it under new leadership.
Oh, and aptly-named Stupid Git has it backwards. By the end of the war, Wehrmacht troops were happy to surrender--but not to the Soviets.
Posted by: Wombat on October 8, 2006 at 5:07 PM | PERMALINK
Saddam did not trust the Iraqi Army to fight for him. That is why their more successful commanders died in mysterious "accidents" over the years. That is why Saddam set up the Republican Guards and gave them priviledges and priority of equipment over the Iraqi Army. Saddam didn't fully trust the Republican Guards either, and so he set up Special Republican Guard cadres, who at least initially formed the Iraqi resistance.
An astute occupation authority would not have disbanded the Iraqi Army, but rather reconstituted it under new leadership.
Saddam's Army would have greeted our troops with flowers? Okay, that's new.
One of the more pervasive myths we're presented with is the idea that Saddam's mostly-Sunni/Baathist army would somehow have made a more peaceful transition in Iraq among the Kurds and Shiites. No one has ever come up with a good reason for this. On the other hand, if one approves of the techniques Saddam's army used to use to keep the peace in Iraq before the invasion, I guess you might have a point.
What "new leadership?" What trained pool of officers would you draw this from? Or would you expect U.S. officers to fill that role, giving orders to people who were trying to kill them a month ago?
Posted by: bart on October 8, 2006 at 5:16 PM | PERMALINK
Bart:
You are confused. The Iraqi Army was conscripted. That means many Shiites served in it. Most of the army "voted with their feet" and deserted during the invasion, which is why I used the term "reconstituted."
I am sure that an astute occupation authority could have found officers of colonel rank or below to lead the army.
The army might not have good for much more than basic internal security operations, but they would have been paid, employed, and of some use as a national entity. Since basic internal security is still lacking in Iraq, this would have been a plus.
Posted by: Wombat on October 8, 2006 at 5:35 PM | PERMALINK
Oh, and Bart, it is a sign of intellectual vacuity (ie the sort of analysis that comes from the Bush Administration and those who support it unconditionally) to come up with statements that use the phrase "greeting us with flowers."
Posted by: Wombat on October 8, 2006 at 5:45 PM | PERMALINK
...If the Baathist Iraqi past is any guide, the Baathist-dominated security apparatus would have produced a greater "disaster" ... papago 3:00 PM
... Or would you expect U.S. officers to fill that role, giving orders to people who were trying to kill them a month ago? bart at 5:16 PM
There is the simple examples from history if anyone is interested. Of course, no one in the Bush regime had the slightest interest or concern
how does an army, which does not wish to resort to unrestricted slaughter, manage the everyday running of a conquered country ? The answer is that it does not....
"Five weeks after Germany's defeat, Sir Ivor Pink, deputy undersecretary at Britain's Foreign Office, wrote to a colleague complaining that he had trouble convincing the press that the Allies had a policy toward Germany. Sir Ivor had reason to be concerned. There was no Allied policy. All that stood for a policy were two paragraphs in a handbook prepared in 1944 by the Allied command and then withdrawn. The first paragraph provided that "under no circumstances" should active Nazis or their sympathizers be retained in office. The second paragraph stated that the "administrative machinery of certain dissolved Nazi organizations may be used when necessary". Very soon, "necessary" became the rule rather than the exception.
On paper, the Allies had made the "de-Nazification" of Germany a priority. This provided that before being integrated in a new governing structure, Germans had to prove that they had not been active Nazis. De-Nazification required the completing of a highly complex questionnaire, which would then be submitted to a de-Nazification board. Confronted by some 13 million questionnaires on one hand, which would have taken years to process, and the pressing requirement of normalizing everyday life, the system soon collapsed under its own weight and was quietly shelved. ....
Half a century after the fall of Nazi Germany, the American occupation of Iraq raises many of the same questions. What will work in Baghdad will not work in Basra and might not be required in Mosul, but the basic issue remains the same: how do you run a conquered country? Three months after an occupation that is becoming increasingly contentious, Washington is slowly rediscovering that if you want to rule a foreign country you must empower the local police, pay the salaries of the former military, keep the local administration functioning, use local contractors to maintain and repair utilities. Armies are made to wage war and not to keep law and order. And as for the much-vaunted "regime change", there are enough past examples to show that it comes from the top down and not vice versa."
It's simple really: if you have an unemployed police and army with ample time on their hands, no money, and hundreds of unguarded munitions dumps, you are creating an insurgency. Americans and Brits 60 years ago were a heckuva lot smarter than the boyz drivin' da bus today
Posted by: Mike on October 8, 2006 at 5:50 PM | PERMALINK
The army might not have good for much more than basic internal security operations
A major function they could have performed would have been guarding the border, also. This is something we have never been able to do because of too few troops.
Besides being useful, this would have provided jobs with regular income to a lot of people who instead became angry at the lack of income and started building bombs. Another function they would have been good for would have been labor to rebuild a lot of Iraq. This would have been a good function for less reliable but still organized troops.
Keep also in mind that Bremer turned the job of de-Baathification over to Achmed Chalabi, along with the files from the internal security forces. This was apparently to give him a position of power from which he might have been able to take the position of President that was originally planned for him. Chalabi used the files and the de-Baathification operation to settle old scores, which did nothing at all to make the Iraqis like us any better.
Posted by: Rick B on October 8, 2006 at 6:09 PM | PERMALINK
All speculation about what the Iraqi Army might have been able to do. No real evidence it would have worked out better, although admittedly also no way to prove it would not have worked (assuming there was an Army that was reconstitutable).
Posted by: brian on October 8, 2006 at 6:17 PM | PERMALINK
Agree again, Brian. Could it be that we were not adequately prepared to fill the vacuum caused by de-baathification? Invading Iraq was the mistake. There were probably no good options from that point forward. There is nothing in the history of the region to indicate that there ever was.
On paper, solving the Palestinian problem seems a lot easier and we all know how well that has gone.
Well OK, maybe Bush didn't know.
Posted by: Michael7843853 G-O in 08! on October 8, 2006 at 8:15 PM | PERMALINK
To anyone who knew anything about history or what makes people tick, it was of course obvious that disbanding the Iraqi army made an insurgency far more like. It was obvious to me the instant I heard the decision announced.
But to someone who knows no history, who understands nothing about human psychology, nothing is predictable and nothing can be called a mistake - since how can anyone know what would have happened if we'd done something else?
I had a friend who took much the same position: the ultimate outcome of Iraq was unknowable, so uncriticizable He puzzled me, because usually he made good sense, but it turns out he had a good excuse:
glioblastoma.
Posted by: gcochran9 on October 8, 2006 at 8:43 PM | PERMALINK
Leaving the Baath military in place certainly would have improved the outlook for US withdrawal, with the illusion of stabilty intact. It also would have increased the likelihood of a baby Sadaam coming to power. If that were to happen, what would be the point of the whole exercise?
Partial deactivation and incremental reconstitution of a more diversified army probably was a better choice, but given the sectarian animosity, fueled by decades of oppression, and the apparently unstoppable influx of foreign agent provocateurs the prospects were never good in any case.
Posted by: Michael7843853 G-O in 08! on October 8, 2006 at 9:31 PM | PERMALINK
what makes people tick
To de-Baathify or not to de-Baathify maybe that is not the question. Maybe the question is how do we provide political cover for Democrats who voted for the invasion?
Posted by: Michael7843853 G-O in 08! on October 8, 2006 at 10:19 PM | PERMALINK
mmf --What is ? get your oen 360^
Posted by: DAVID on October 9, 2006 at 4:04 AM | PERMALINK
--For those in the Housing Business, Mon or Tue-
You will hear that there is to be the largest crash
in years, an may not regroup for six to ten years. Sorry to bare bad news!
Posted by: DAVID on October 9, 2006 at 4:13 AM | PERMALINK
"The issue was: 'What the hell do you do about it?' All we could do as a nation of 60 million off the coast of mainland Europe was to seek to influence the most powerful nation in the world.
Here, let me suggest what the Hell the U.K. might have done about it. It took me all of three seconds to figure this out, by the way.
Cheney: First thing let's do is, let's disband the Iraqi Army. Send them all home.
U.K.: That's a very bad idea, which only a moron would propose. Let's not, instead.
Cheney: No, I insist.
U.K.: Very well then, we're pulling our troops out of your coalition; we don't want to be associated in any way with the fiasco that will inevitably ensue.
It might not have caused Cheney to reconsider - I don't think anything up to and including standing that jackass in front of a firing squad could ever make him change his mind about anything at all - but at least the consequent disaster wouldn't have been Britain's problem.
Posted by: W. Kiernan on October 9, 2006 at 10:15 AM | PERMALINK
Iraq isn't post-WWII Germany, nor is it Vietnam, nor Algeria, nor the Philippines. The idea that all it would take to stave off the insurgency would be to pay the army its wages has a few flaws in it.
Bremer was right in saying that the Iraqi army was no longer in being after the invasion - they voluntarily disbanded, for a variety of reasons. When US commanders requested that surrendering units return to their barracks, most simply broke up and went home. The Republican Guard fought and was destroyed, but few surrendered. Instead, the RG survivors and the Saddam fedayeen shed their uniforms and escaped, apparently in accordance with their own contingency plans. The insurgency wasn't accidental, but was planned from the start. Our leadership's mistake was in not recognizing it quickly enough.
Posted by: Trashhauler on October 9, 2006 at 10:56 AM | PERMALINK
And the unreconstituted and unemployed--but still armed--Iraqi Army provided the trained manpower, and active or tacit support for the insurgency. Also, how many former conscripts are in the various militias in Iraq?
Posted by: Wombat on October 9, 2006 at 12:09 PM | PERMALINK