Today Iraq, Tomorrow Iran

Neocons were dead wrong about Iraq in at least 21 (count 'em) ways. Yet
Wolfowitz, Krauthammer et al. are nevertheless pushing for "preemption"
in Iran.

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By Martin Sieff

Aug. 11, 2004 | These must be strange days to be a neoconservative:
caught between exultant hope and wild terror; utterly discredited, yet
still securely in power; proven totally wrong on Iraq, yet still
determined to believe against all odds that one more wild throw of the dice will
recoup all.

To the casual observer, the neocons in the Bush administration and
their impeccably drilled and regulated cheering section across the
commanding heights of the U.S. broadcast and print media have been routed.
Since the hand-over of power to the interim Iraqi government, the media
have for the most part turned their sensitive faces away from Iraq, giving
the public the false sense that it is becoming quiet there. The 138,000
U.S. troops still bogged down in Iraq know better, even if Deputy
Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz can't recall before a congressional
committee just how many Americans have died: Fifty-four were killed in
July, a significant rise from the 42 who died in June, the month before the
hand-over; and the total in August already looks as if it will exceed
that in July.

But the perception that the neocons -- including Wolfowitz, Richard
Perle and Douglas Feith -- have been routed, or are in retreat, could not
be further from the truth. They are as firmly in control of the levers
of real power in the government as they were in the yearlong,
synchronized buildup to their war in Iraq. Not a single National Security
Council or Pentagon official who eagerly rode the bandwagon for the war has
been fired. Dick Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, and
aide John Hannah continue to enjoy the full confidence of the vice
president.

In the media, it is the same story. Rupert Murdoch has not suffered a
sudden fit of shame and forced William Kristol to relinquish control of
the Weekly Standard. Time magazine and the Washington Post have not
shown one iota of embarrassment that they continue to provide a platform
for columnist Charles Krauthammer, whose histrionics have now ascended
into a call for our next "preemptive" war -- this time with Iran. If
that happens, of course, hundreds, probably many thousands, of young
Americans will pay with their lives for a new wave of appalling bungles. And
if the past is prologue, no neocon in government should ever expect to
lose a job.

None of these characters (like the president) has said as much as an "I
am sorry" or "I was mistaken" over their major assumptions and
assertions about Iraq, every one of which has been proved wrong. They have
shown no capacity whatsoever for self-criticism, so it is not surprising
that they do not seem interested in self-correction that might prevent a
repeat of their policy catastrophes.

What are all these wrong predictions, which are now at risk of being
relegated down the memory hole as Orwellian nonhistory that never
happened? There are at least 21.

First, that the Iraqi army would instantly collapse as soon as U.S.
forces crossed their border in a "cakewalk."

Second, that Ahmed Chalabi, now charged by our own puppet Iraqi
government with money laundering and counterfeiting, would quickly emerge as
the popular natural leader of Iraq once President Saddam Hussein was
toppled.

Third, that because no serious anti-American guerrilla operations could
ever get established Iraq, only a small number of U.S. troops would
have to remain after the fall of Saddam.

Fourth, that strong links between Saddam and al-Qaida would be found
following our occupation.

Fifth, that overwhelming evidence of weapons of mass destruction would
quickly be uncovered by U.S. troops.

Sixth, that the U.S. occupation of Iraq would discredit and weaken
al-Qaida throughout the Arab and wider Muslim world.

Seventh, that Iraq would quickly develop a stable democracy after the
fall of Saddam.

Eighth, that Sunni and Shiite forces would never find common cause
against U.S. forces.

Ninth, that reconstruction in Iraq would occur quickly and easily
(disproving the State Department's far more cautious assessment of how
difficult it would be).

Tenth, that NATO didn't matter and we could safely ignore it in
occupying Iraq.

Eleventh, that the United Nations didn't matter and that we could
safely ignore it as well.

Twelfth, that we could put together a militarily significant "coalition
of the willing" -- which recalcitrant allies like France and Germany
would quickly regret not joining and thus finally be prevailed upon to
send in troops to ease the burden on our own forces in Iraq.

Thirteenth, that leaders of countries such as Japan, Spain and Poland
who took the plunge and sent forces to Iraq would not suffer enfeebling
electoral or political losses as consequences of doing so.

Fourteenth, that Iraq's oil could be made to flow again on a lucrative
scale within a few months of the invasion, and pay for everything from
conquest to reconstruction.

Fifteenth, that the occupation of Iraq and opening up of its oil fields
would rapidly cause global oil prices to drop back into the range of
$20-$25 a barrel, if not even lower -- breaking the cartel power of the
Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries led by Saudi Arabia and
Iran.

Sixteenth, that the toppling of Saddam would demoralize the
Palestinians and break the back of the second Palestinian intifada, thereby ending
the wave of suicide-bombing massacres of Israeli civilians.

Seventeenth, that the occupation and remaking of Iraq would quickly
boost the prospects for stable, pro-American democracies throughout the
Middle East. (The prophets at the American Enterprise Institute, home to
Lynn Cheney and, since he left the Pentagon, Perle, were particularly
hot to trot on that one.)

Eighteenth, that the CIA and other primary elements of the U.S.
intelligence community who could not be bullied or manipulated by Defense
Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Feith, Wolfowitz and their acolytes in the
Pentagon could be ignored forever.

Nineteenth, that L. Paul Bremer and his Coalition Provisional Authority
(heavily staffed by neocons, almost all of whom have since prudently
fled back to suburban Washington) could ignore the intelligence
assessments and policy recommendations of the U.S. Army on the ground.

Twentieth, that last spring's crackdown on Shiite cleric Muqtada
al-Sadr would be quickly and easily carried out and that he would enjoy no
significant support from the wider Iraqi Shiite community.

Twenty-first, that any insurgency in Iraq would be carried out solely
by embittered old Saddam loyalists and evil outside agents, none of whom
would be able to operate for long because they would find no
significant support among the wider Iraqi community. (Krauthammer was
particularly enthusiastic about that one.)

Some liberal hawks, such as Joshua Micah Marshall, David Remnick,
Michael O'Hanlon, Kenneth Pollack and even Thomas Friedman, have actually
had the grace to admit they were mistaken. But none of the stalwarts of
the Washington Post editorial page has yet done so. The Post has
published no editorial accounting of how it allowed itself to be misled by
National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice and others on WMD and
everything else involving the war until its conscience awoke over Abu Ghraib.
The newspaper's editorial board cannot shake its Stockholm syndrome,
perhaps because it is a voluntary hostage. And naturally, not a single
neocon has confessed error.

What a contrast to Vietnam! Within two and half years of major U.S.
ground troops being committed, President Johnson had already dropped
Defense Secretary Robert McNamara overboard. Then Johnson himself decided he
had to abandon his hopes of reelection. That decision, 36 years on,
looks like a paragon of self-denial, patriotism and nobility in the
interest of genuine peace compared with the crass and desperate efforts to
cling to power of the current White House incumbent.

The only senior official to fall in the Bush administration, strangely
enough, is the only one appointed by President Clinton: former CIA
Director George Tenet. None of those who endlessly pressured or disparaged
the U.S. intelligence community or cooked up the flow of now utterly
discredited intelligence estimates for Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and Feith have
even been demoted, let alone lost their jobs. The almost unknown Harold
Rhode, the longtime right-hand man of serial plotter Michael Ledeen at
the AEI, continues to whisper his sweet nothings into Rumsfeld's ear as
his advisor on Islamic affairs. And Ledeen, Rhode's mentor and partner
as far back as the days of the Iran-Contra fiasco, has been openly
trumpeting the deadly dangers of Iran and the need to take preventive
action against it in the National Review Online.

With their every dream, ambition and prediction for Iraq in ruins, the
Bush administration and its neocon court are now in a panic. What can
they do next? How can they distract the American people from their
catastrophic and incompetent record on Iraq before the November election?

The answer is simple. It was stated quite expressly by Rice this past
weekend: Don't worry about our failure to find any evidence of WMD after
our preemptive war on Iraq -- we may be forced to take such preemptive
action very soon against its neighbor, Iran.

If that October surprise doesn't rally voters back around Bush and
ensure four more years for him and the neocons, what will?

The pattern of preparation for this is all too familiar from the
buildup to war with Iraq. First, the war drums are sounded by the same old
"experts"; then they are amplified by alarmist columnists. Once you see
Krauthammer or Ledeen opining, as they have over the past two months,
that Iran's nuclear capability poses the gravest possible threat to
Civilization as We Know It, and that The World Cannot Afford to Wait and
Negotiate, then you can guarantee -- conveniently close to the election to
panic voters into supporting the president -- that Bush, Cheney and
Rumsfeld will pick up the chorus.

Ledeen has already written at least two columns on the subject.
Krauthammer, prophet of the Iraq war, has made quite clear his determination
to unleash a new one. In his July 23 Post column he wrote: "The long
awaited revolution [in Iran] is not happening. Which makes the question of
preemptive attack all the more urgent ... If nothing is done, a
fanatical terrorist regime openly dedicated to the destruction of the 'Great
Satan' will have both nuclear weapons and the terrorists and missiles to
deliver them. All that stands between us and that is either revolution
or preemptive strike."

From the perspective of the chimerical and deranged weltpolitik, or
"global strategy," of the neocons, targeting Iran is not merely a tactic
of desperation but the fulfillment of what their plans were from the
beginning. For the subjugation of Iraq under the puppet Chalabi was always
seen as only the first step toward toppling target No. 2 -- Iran -- in
the president's famous "axis of evil."

Chalabi, of course, blotted his copybook by being exposed as having
been entirely compromised by Iranian intelligence in the first place
(though many would still rather defend him and slander the integrity of the
institutions of U.S. intelligence that exposed him). And so the
unfortunate Iyad Allawi was hastily shoehorned into the high-risk job of prime
minister of Iraq that had been lovingly prepared for Chalabi. But the
neocon goal remains the same: Use the new, "strong fortress" of
pro-American Iraq as the launching point to destabilize and topple the Islamic
Republic of Iran.

In reality, of course, Iraq is anything but a fortress. The embattled
U.S. troops there are on the defensive -- an understaffed,
overstretched, exhausted force in a nation that has almost universally rejected them
and about which they were given tragically inadequate preparation.

However, blaming Iran for America's continued failure to tame Iraq
conveniently creates a new demon, distracting the public once again from
the incompetence and irresponsibility of those who plunged the United
States into that quagmire in the first place. And once a new, far bigger
conflict has been generated and Bush has been safely reelected, the
American public can presumably be rallied around the flag once again.

Certainly, Iran's steady moves toward acquiring nuclear weapons are a
major challenge for the United States and the rest of the world. But
there are other ways to deal with them. Joseph Stalin's acquisition of
nuclear weapons in 1949 did not prompt the United States to launch a
preemptive nuclear attack against the Soviet Union. And although Mao Zedong
killed at least 30 million of his own people with lunatic policies,
massacres, purges and wild utopian experiments, neither Democratic nor
Republican presidents ever came close to considering a preemptive nuclear
attack against the People's Republic of China when it developed
thermonuclear weapons in the 1960s. Why, then, is an action that could very
well trigger nuclear warfare with Iran urgent and vital now when it was
not necessary against far more dictatorial regimes that slaughtered
infinitely larger numbers of people in the past?

Can Bush and his neocons get away with such an outrageous thing a
second time after being so thoroughly discredited the first time? Why not?
They got away with it before.