More 'hands-on' U.S. approach to Iraq
The Rummy-Condi double-team in Iraq yesterday marks a shift in U.S. policy here, moving from a backseat "we're just here to help the democratic process" approach, to a much more "hands-on" management style.
U.S. diplomats told me the State Department plans to embed more advisers in Iraqi ministries and dispatch more of them to work with local Iraqi authorities outside of Baghdad.
The reason for the shift is simple. The hands-off approach didn't work.
Silence didn't work
The U.S. administration in Iraq watched almost silently last year when the outgoing Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari formed a government that Iraqis, U.S. military commanders and yes, even western reporters, predicted was going to be a disaster.
In particular, we all drew attention to the now outgoing interior minister, Bayan Jabr, who as a sectarian militia leader seemed especially ill-suited to lead a powerful security force in a nation with long-smoldering ethnic tensions being stoked by the likes of al-Qaeda's Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
Jaafari proved weak and the interior ministry became worse than expected as the U.S. military uncovered a network of secret torture prisons holding mainly Sunni suspected insurgents.
Although Jaafari's government did have some significant accomplishments (hosting a successful constitutional referendum in October and elections three months later), mercifully it only lasted nine months.
Now much more is at stake because the government being formed by Nouri al-Maliki (Jaafari's reputedly more decisive former aide) has a term of FOUR YEARS!
How to do it: More advisers, and send them outside Baghdad
It's hard to guide foreign policy when you can barely support yourself.
In a former boys’ club - complete with a broken-down boxing ring - converted into a headquarters for the U.S. military and civil-affairs teams in Fallujah, I saw U.S. diplomacy at work. It was last year and I was watching a young American "adviser" meet with the local sheikhs.
The men, dressed in white robes and Arab headdresses, were complaining that they didn't trust the new Iraqi security forces in Fallujah, accusing them of being Shiite militia fighters in uniform. They also argued U.S. soldiers didn't respect their role as the city's elders.
The U.S. "adviser" - a smart, clean-cut all-American type - took notes. I don't know if anyone read them. The impression I had at the time was that he was on an island, forgotten. He was alone at the Fallujah meeting and seemed to have almost no support. He was totally dependent on the whims of the military to take him to meetings or not. I left Fallujah thinking, "this guy has a tough job."
Wanted: Willing diplomats
It's easy to say the U.S. will bring in more people to monitor the government and send them to more remote places, but apparently no one wants to the job.
The State Department has serious trouble finding qualified people to come to Iraq; it's even more difficult to convince them to be stationed in lonely, dangerous outposts far from Baghdad. Compounding the problem, the U.S. military complains it doesn't have the manpower to protect them.
It's a major dispute tying the hands of diplomats at this critical time of state building.
Iraq's 'brain drain' continues
EMAIL THIS
advertisement
Slide Show
- Life beyond the violence
Suicide attacks and murders due to sectarian conflict continue around Iraq. See how residents live their lives amid the attacks.
Read the Nightly News blog
