Rumsfeld’s war, Powell’s occupation

In a recent article for National Review, Barbara Lerner provides an insightful analysis of what has gone wrong to date in Iraq and she counsels persuasively against granting increased authority to Kofi Annan & Co. at the United Nations.

According to Ms. Lerner, resistance to the American occupation is due in large part to the rejection of a plan — put forward by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld prior to Operation Iraqi Freedom — to enlist thousands of indigenous Sunni, Shia, and Kurdish fighters to liberate Iraq. Secretary Rumsfeld, she writes, "wanted to put an Iraqi face on everything at the outset — not just on the occupation of Iraq, but on its liberation too. That would have made a world of difference." If this plan had been allowed to proceed it would "have put a proud, victorious, multi-ethnic Iraqi face on the overthrow of Saddam Hussein." Ms. Lerner notes that the State Department and the C.I.A. actively opposed such initiatives and the groups that would have affected regime change in Iraq.

She also warns that "putting a U.N. stamp on an Iraqi government will delegitimize it in the eyes of most Iraqis and do great damage to those who are actively striving to create a freer, more progressive Middle East." In particular, she predicts that "the damage [special envoy Lakhdar] Brahimi will do to the hope of a new day in Iraq and in the Middle East" will be "so profound" that "it would not be worth it even if empowering him would bring in a division of French troops to reinforce ours in Iraq."

Click here to read Ms. Lerner’s analysis of the current situation in Iraq.