Conversation With Prominent Iraq War Critic Joe Galloway

Another of my series of pieces to bridge differences with civil discourse is my latest column at American Enterprise Institute Online, “Conversation With a Prominent Iraq War Critic.” You may be somewhat surprised at some of my interview with Joe Galloway, about to retire military editor for Knight Ridder newspapers, co-author of We Were Soldiers, and a heck of a nice guy.

The automatic “typesetting’” program at American Enterprise Online makes funny, annoying symbols in place of the many quotation marks in the piece, so here’s the text below.
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Joe Galloway, just retired military editor for Knight Ridder, co-author of We Were Soldiers, is a friend who isn’t shy to express his criticism of the U.S. Iraq invasion. He met with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, telling him, “I want you to know that I’m going to keep kicking your butt, to keep you focused.” As part of another piece I’m preparing about the reporter embedding program, I turned to Joe’s 41-years of reporting experience from Ia Drang to his trips to Iraq, most recently a few months ago, to get a picture of what’s happening there.

Joe Galloway’s criticisms of the U.S. invasion of Iraq are not uncommon: “We need not have invaded at that time. We had Saddam in an imperfect box.” “Incompetence [due to] meddling by people without military experience [and] arrogance [with a] plan warped, ham-strung, and almost perverted [in lacking] detailed planning.” “Job number 1 was to take down the Taliban and pursue them everywhere, but we diverted 90% of our resources to Iraq.” “We didn’t send enough troops to do the job.” Joe has also expressed his anguish over the loss of life and limb by any U.S. soldier or Marine, the ordinary Joes who he’s been attached to as a latter-day Ernie Pyle.

Common responses --- WMD’s appeared to all knowledgeable as likely, and Saddam encouraged this thinking; The sanctions were leaking like a sieve and crumbling; Planning was adequate to commonly expected problems, and very few expected the extent of pre-planned and developed Sunni insurgency; The Taliban was taken out and its leadership has been 75% eliminated; More troops may well have fueled increased resistance, and weren’t available anyway --- are largely irrelevant now except importantly in preparing for future military commitments. Democrats may harp on these debates over the start of the war, largely to exploit war-weariness for electoral gain.

What’s most important, however, is whether the sacrifices may yet yield a satisfactory outcome. The consequences are crucial for Americans, for America’s role in the world, for Iraqis, and for others abroad who may depend on the U.S. for their fate today or some day.

Joe Galloway told me that our military has painfully earned successful experience that’s coming to bear. The clear and hold – rather than sweep and leave -- of population centers and geography, and further securing of the borders, is effective. The “standing up of the Iraqi Army, some of which is quite good is good news.” The main problem now for Washington and Baghdad is that the “American people are fed up with it.” Galloway places Congressman John Murtha’s speaking out, regardless of its faults, to this exasperation.

Under the best of circumstances, barring a real civil war of large contending armed forces escalating from the lower level sectarian violence, Galloway sees a gradual drawing down of U.S. forces during 2006, to maybe 50,000 by the 2008 elections, and such a force remaining for several years after. However, citing Senator John Warner, Galloway says that if a larger civil war should break out we should just get out of there.

I asked Galloway to compare the political situation in Baghdad to Saigon’s during the Vietnam war. Galloway called South Vietnam a “military dictatorship” that was “semi-orderly” compared to the “not even semi-orderly” early-stage democracy in Iraq. Although there is sound evidence of corruption and thefts of public moneys by Iraqi politicians, interestingly Galloway sees the pecuniary motive as possibly Iraq’s salvation.

Galloway says the “best thing the Iraqis have going is that they are politicians, all serving a constituency…..who will end up operating from enlightened self-interest to share the oil money.” Galloway agrees with Charles Krauthammer that the most important thing is “getting a place at the table for the Sunnis.” The alternative for the Sunnis, “almost all of the insurgency”, is to be “driven out or killed.” Galloway doesn’t think a split-up of the country will happen, but if it does the Sunni will become another source of regional instability as “Palestinian-type refugees.” Galloway credits U.S. Ambassador Dr. Zalmay Khalizad is doing a “pretty good job of keeping their feet to the fire” for the Iraqis to arrange a reasonable accommodation.

Galloway emphasizes it’s the “Iraqis war to win.” Galloway ended our conversation with “I hope and pray” for a satisfactory outcome “in the context of that country and region…...which won’t be Jeffersonian.”

Given that President Bush needs to be more resolute in leading and holding back discouragement, it doesn’t sound to me like there’s that much disagreement going forward between this leading war critic and the administration’s pronouncements and policy.