Brookings Institute: One Year Later

My name is Michael Gaubinger and I am working at the Education for Peace in Iraq Center for the summer of 2008. I will be entering my junior year at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in the fall and am studying political science.

On Friday, June 13, the Brookings Institute hosted Senior Fellows Michael O'Hanlon and Kenneth Pollack for a discussion of their recent visit to Iraq. The discussion was called "Iraq: One Year Later." The fact-finding trip was sponsored by the Department of Defense and, while on the trip, they met with American and British soldiers, Iraqi government officials, and other Iraqis. They were unable to meet with very many Iraqi civilians, so their report is not an accurate gauge of the pulse on the street. The discussion began with a brief lecture by each individual about his impressions of the current situation in Iraq. Both men highlighted the improvement in security. O’Hanlon commented that, “This has been the spring of the beginning of the blossoming of the Iraq security forces.” Did the surge work? O’Hanlon says: “Since 2007, Iraq has seen an eighty percent reduction in violence against citizens as measured by the United States military, the Iraqi government, and even some independent sources.” He also stressed the increasing sense of control by the Iraqi government. Great challenges still exist, but the trend-line is positive. Pollack also noted that Iraqi security forces have emerged as a factor for the first time and are now contributing to the coalition effort. There are now 560,000 Iraqi Security Forces and that number is growing by 100,000 troops per year. The training system is working and as many as ten Iraqi brigades are combat ready now. The first wave of problems have been identified and confronted. Now, the United States faces the task of solving the old problems while shifting its focus to the second wave of problems. While the military and police are growing strong, Iraq’s civilian institutions remain weak. The progress of Iraqi regiments and security forces is a large contributor to the reduction in civilian violence in Iraq. For the nearly five-million Iraqi refugees and internally displaced persons, a sense of security and safety is a crucial step towards helping these individuals return home.

O’Hanlon and Pollack were asked about the potential for a decrease in American involvement in Iraq through the withdrawal of U.S. forces from the region. Both agreed that an immediate withdrawal would be dangerous and set back the progress that they described. Furthermore, any reduction in current troop levels must be based on progress and not set to a calendar. O’Hanlon stressed that improvements in the mind-set of the Iraqi government were, in part due to the pressure applied by the Democratic leadership which reinforced the notion that American presence in Iraq must not be taken for granted by the Iraqi government. To ensure continued support from the United States, the Iraqi government must match the effort of the United States. According to Pollack, the general election in Iraq in 2009 represents a key moment politically within Iraq which could either cement and solidify the improvements or reverse them. Therefore, America withdrawal of troops before the elections could have dire consequences.

Planting the seeds of sustainable economic development is one of the first steps in redressing the humanitarian needs of Iraq. O’Hanlon and Pollack were asked about the current state of the Iraqi economy, specifically at the individual level. Oil exports are the backbone of Iraq’s economy, accounting for 98% of its revenue. Although oil exports are high and profitable for Iraq, they painted a bleak picture of life for the average citizen. Healthcare is poor and infant mortality rates are rising. There is not enough potable water. Unemployment is high and, among Iraqi civilians, there are no optimistic expectations of improvement. Due to the poor state of the economy, the return of refugees and internally displaced persons is a greater concern. Pollack suggested that an Iraqi government initiated housing project would help the economy by providing jobs and creating houses for some of the millions of displaced citizens.

A core component of the security improvement is sectarian separation. So far, approximately one-half of the sectarian separation has occurred, but there are some important concerns about the long-term sustainability of the recent improvements, which are due to forced ethnic division. What will happen when the walls are taken down? They were also asked about the current debate over the status of forces agreement. I will discuss this further in an upcoming blog. The final question directly addressed the willingness of the United States to take in refugees from Iraq. In 2008, the United States government promised to take in 7,000 refugees from Iraq, while Sweden is expected to take in 20,000 displaced persons. Pollack credited the low number of Iraqi refugees in America to fears by the Department of Homeland Security that the United States would be letting potential terrorists into the country; fears he categorized as foolish and repugnant.

O’Hanlon and Pollack both agree that Iraq faces many great challenges and unforeseen obstacles, but that the nation shows signs of improvement. Iraqi security forces are standing up as we transition to a plan where Iraqi forces are in the lead with American support, rather than the United States playing the lead role.

Plan B- Containment

Bush's new strategy in Iraq, the centerpiece of which is a 20,000 odd surge in the number of troops in Iraq, may well be the US' last chance to "win" Iraq. I've already outlined my reservations regarding the plan so I won't repeat them here, but suffice it to say that without a winning economic strategy to complement any political and military strategies, the chance for success is considerably diminished. So what next? What is our plan B? It is not an option to simply ignore the problem, the stakes are too high; hundreds of thousands more Iraqis will die, millions more refugees will flood the region and the civil war itself could spill over Iraq's borders creating a regional conflict of unimaginable proportions.

Yesterday, Ken Pollack and Dan Byman of the Brookings Institution released a paper [pdf] examining one such plan B: containment. The authors argue that should Bush's new strategy fail, the US must do everything in its power to insulate Iraq's neighbors from the effects of an all-out civil war towards which Iraq has been slowly slipping for several years. The report is quite long and introduces a number of recommendations including financial assistance to Iraq's neighbors, stationing US troops at Iraq's borders, and engaging the neighbors-including Iran- in a diplomatic dialogue. But if this plan B is to suceed, the US and international community must commit to it completely. Pollack and Byman cite case studies in which the commitment was not entirely there, noting the disastrous results.

Another plan B that you may have heard is to partition Iraq and create a loose federation of three states defined by their sectarian identity; Sunni, Shia, and Kurdish. I won't dwell on this here as I plan on posting another entry that addresses this option featuring an excerpt from an interview I did with Rutgers professor Eric Davis, but let me just quickly say that this is a horrible idea that ignores, not reflects, the realities on the ground in Iraq.

Making Private Contractors in Iraq Accountable

In the last few years many incidents involving criminally negligent private contractors have made headlines, yet in each instance the guilty parties are rarely, if ever, prosecuted or punished. In fact not one contractor in the entire military industry in Iraq has been charged with a crime in the past three and a half years. According to Peter Singer of the Brookings Institution, as of a few weeks ago, this has all changed.

It seems that amidst all the add-ins and pork spending attached to the Pentagon's 2007 budget, a rather important, almost revolutionary clause was slipped in. Section 552 states that "Paragraph (10) of section 802(a) of title 10, United States Code (article 2(a) of the Uniform Code of Military Justice), is amended by striking ` and inserting `declared war or a contingency operation'.

Dr. Singer explains:

"The addition of five little words to a massive US legal code that fills entire shelves at law libraries wouldn't normally matter for much. But with this change, contractors' 'get out of jail free' card may have been torn to shreds. Previously, contractors would only fall under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, better known as the court martial system, if Congress declared war. This is something that has not happened in over 65 years and out of sorts with the most likely operations in the 21st century. The result is that whenever our military officers came across episodes of suspected contractor crimes in missions like Bosnia, Kosovo, Iraq, or Afghanistan, they had no tools to resolve them. As long as Congress had not formally declared war, civilians — even those working for the US armed forces, carrying out military missions in a conflict zone — fell outside their jurisdiction. The military's relationship with the contractor was, well, merely contractual...When such incidents happen, the officers [in charge] have had no recourse other than to file reports that are supposed to be sent on either to the local government or the US Department of Justice, neither of which had traditionally done much. The local government is often failed or too weak to act."

While this is certainly a good sign, it is still unclear as to how effective this new law will be. Will it apply to all ongoing contracts? Do "contractors" include civilians, such as journalists, who are embedded with troops but not contracted? Either way, just the fact that this clause is in the books is a considerable leap forward and should make some contractors think twice about their activities in Iraq.