A Guide to the Bush Address on Iraq
On Tuesday night, President Bush will take to the stage at Fort Bragg, North Carolina in a nationally televised address aimed at rebuilding public support for the war in Iraq.
And well he should. Recent polls (from Gallup and Rasmussen, respectively) show that only 39% of Americans approve of the war in Iraq and that more people in the United States blame Bush (49%) than Saddam (44%) for the conflict. The torrent of revelations in 2002 pre-war British documents confirm that the administration almost certainly manipulated intelligence to sell a war it had already decided to wage but after which it had made no plans. This President brought this crisis upon himself; the chickens are coming home to roost.
With rising casualties, an emboldened insurgency, his credibility in tatters, and no end in sight, regaining the support of the American people will be a tall order for President Bush. Difficult, but not impossible. George W. Bush may be able to win back the confidence of the people, but only if he is frank about past mistakes, crystal clear about the war’s objectives and brutally honest about the sacrifices required. Short of that, the American effort in Iraq is in deep trouble and with it, the Bush presidency.
The following is Perrspectives’ Guide to the Bush Iraq Speech. These are the five keys to watch for in his Tuesday address. Watch to see if Bush:
- Tells the Truth About the Path to War and the Occupation
- Provides An Honest Assessment of the Current Situation in Iraq
- Defines "Victory" and State Whether or Not It Is Still Possible
- Offers a Plan for Success and Ask the Nation for Sacrifices
- Sends a Clear Message to the World About American Intentions
[Continue reading "A Guide to the Bush Address on Iraq."]
1. Tell the Truth (Finally) About the Path to War and the Occupation
President Bush can never speak with credibility on Iraq and American prospects for success until he takes accountability for the errors, deceptions, misstatements and misjudgments that characterized the run up to the war. Bush need not explain them each on Tuesday night, but he had better take ownership of them all.
Every aspect of the Bush administration’s war rationale has been completely and thoroughly discredited. Iraq had no role in 9/11 or meaningful linkage to Al Qaeda, as the 9/11 Commission concluded decisively. Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction, as the Iraq Survey Group’s Final (Duelfer) Report and the Robb-Silberman Commission showed definitively. Intelligence data was selectively used – and misused - to create a causus belli, as Ambassador Joseph Wilson and the Downing Street memos demonstrate so thoroughly. (And As I’ve argued in "The Myth of the Bush Doctrine", democracy promotion was merely a post facto rationalization for the war. We didn’t go to war to support democracy in Iraq; we support democracy in Iraq because we went to war there.)
As for the situation on the ground, President Bush and his team just as consistently got it wrong. Cheney said we would be greeted as liberators after a conflict measured “in weeks.” Rumsfeld ignored the State Department’s plans for post-war occupation. CPA administrator Paul Bremer disbanded the Iraqi army and aggressively pursued his program of de-Baathification. The cumulative result has been a security nightmare and chaos on the ground.
If Bush continues the recent rhetorical 9/11-Iraq linkages of Karl Rove, Scott McClellan, and his own June 18 radio address, you know he is not serious about speaking the truth to the American people.
2. Provide An Honest Assessment of the Current Situation
On December 9th, 1941, President Roosevelt in his fireside chat two days after Pearl Harbor spoke bluntly, honestly and optimistically about the challenges America faced:
We are now in this war. We are all in it- all the way. Every single man, woman, and child is a partner in the most tremendous undertaking of our American history. We must share together the bad news and the good news, the defeats and the victories—the changing fortunes of war.
About Iraq, President Bush has never similarly spoken of "the difficult hours of this day" and the "dark days that may be yet to come." He proclaimed "Mission Accomplished" on May 1, 2003 and of the growing insurgency later that year said only, "bring it on." And while Vice President Cheney declares the insurgency is in its "last throes", Bush says only the "cold-blooded killers" will fail.
The American people have the maturity and fortitude to hear bad news and the patience to wage a long struggle. To win their renewed support, the President must show them the respect by speaking honestly about both.
3. Define "Victory" and State Whether or Not It Is Still Possible
The Bush administration was dead wrong in claiming in March of 2003 that Iraq was in any way part of the war against Al Qaeda. But it is certainly the central front now. Thousands of foreign fighters and supposed Iraqi "dead enders" are waging an increasingly bloody and sophisticated insurgency against American forces and the Iraqi people. An abrupt American withdrawal would almost certainly leave Iraqi a failed state overrun by chaos at best, and an armed terrorist camp at worst.
At this point, the best that can be hoped for by "victory" in Iraq may just be avoiding the creation of the next Somalia, or worse, a pre-9/11 Afghanistan. That may still be possible, but it may take years, require more (and not fewer) U.S. troops, and the additional expenditure of hundreds of billions of dollars. A crippled Iraq over a decade may slowly defeat a tiring insurgency and redevelop its economy, all while denying Al Qaeda a refuge.
If we as Americans don’t believe that is possible or that we’re willing to pay the price required, we should withdraw now.
And if the President speaks only on Tuesday night about the transformational power of democracy in the Middle East as “God’s gift to humanity”, we’ll know with certainty it’s time to go.
4. Offer a Plan and Ask the Nation for Needed Sacrifices
As should be clear from the above, President Bush must offer a plan to win on Tuesday night. It doesn’t need to – and shouldn’t - include a timetable for bringing the troops home. But it must describe in detail the painful sacrifices he will ask Americans to make in order to salvage the situation in Iraq.
Those sacrifices include should national service. The United States simply does not have enough troops on the ground to win in Iraq, and cannot recruit enough to address the global security challenges we face. As I’ve argued elsewhere, these growing national security needs simply can’t – and shouldn’t – be met by a volunteer American military. The time has come for a new, expanded American armed forces, combining an enlarged professional fighting force with a new conscript-based Civil Defense Force (CDF). If President Bush rules out the draft on Tuesday, he should rule out being taken seriously about winning in Iraq.
A second sacrifice to win in Iraq is simply paying the bill for the war. Virtually every major American conflict has required tax increases to fund the war, yet President Bush and his Republican allies persist in calling for dangerous and irresponsible tax cuts. If the President continues his call for permanent tax cuts, let alone raising the needed revenues, the American people can be assured his is not serious about winning in Iraq.
And the needed sacrifices also require conservation and privation at home. As July 4th approaches, Americans grumble about gasoline prices nearing $2.50 a gallon. As a nation, we should be debating best how to achieve national energy independence by 2025 so as to free our economy – and our security – from its dangerous dependence on unreliable suppliers in the Middle East.
If President Bush doesn’t ask Americans to fight, pay for and conserve for the war in Iraq, that will be a sure signal that his “free lunch” marketing strategy is still in place.
5. Send a Clear Message to the World About American Intentions
The last of the five keys for President Bush’s Tuesday speech lies in the messages he sends to the rest of the world. While we don’t need “a permission slip” to fight the forces of Al Qaeda that attacked us, the United States needs to send clear and powerful messages about its intentions for helping reconstruct a badly damaged international community.
The first message to the Iraqi people and the world should be one of simple respect for Iraqi sovereignty. In a nutshell, the President must make it clear that we will leave. The United States will pursue no permanent military bases and expect no preferential concessions in the Iraqi oil industry. If we can’t make those guarantees, then we should prepare for a much harder fight.
Secondly, the President, as someone familiar with 12 step programs, should acknowledge American responsibility for and seek forgiveness for the abomination of Abu Ghraib. No rationalizations. The United States forever owns the taint of Abu Ghraib and the sooner we acknowledge it, the better.
Last, President Bush should signal his recognition that the festering Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a central concern across the Muslim world. While the United States cannot jeopardize Israeli security, it must make resolution of that conflict a top diplomatic priority. Bush’s unwillingness to “spend capital” in the Palestinian conflict perpetuates grievances that undermine American standing around the world.
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