Republican rebellion over Iraq escalates/Republicans start to call time on Iraq

Republican rebellion over Iraq escalates
By Andrew Ward in Washington
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Published: July 8 2007 19:29 | Last updated: July 8 2007 22:50


The Republican rebellion against the war in Iraq widened over the weekend as more of the party’s senators voiced dissent from President George W. Bush’s strategy.

Republican unity on Iraq has shattered in recent weeks, amid mounting pessimism about the ability of US forces to bring stability to the country.

Weakening Republican support for the war has left Mr Bush increasingly isolated as congressional Democrats prepare for a fresh barrage of votes aimed at forcing a US withdrawal.

Three more Republican senators have called for a change of course recently, adding to a steady trickle of defections since Richard Lugar became the most senior to break from Mr Bush over the war last month.

“It should be clear to the president that there needs to be a new strategy,” Lamar Alexander of Tennessee told the Los Angeles Times on Saturday.

Senator Judd Gregg of New Hampshire told the same newspaper that efforts to quell the violence in Iraq by increasing US troop numbers “don’t seem to be making a lot of progress” and called for “a clear blueprint” to end the war.

The comments came two days after Pete Domenici of New Mexico, said he could no longer support current strategy.

The three senators are among six Republicans who have voiced support for bipartisan legislation that aims to prepare the ground for US troops to start leaving Iraq by March next year. The measure is among the more moderate of several proposals for troop withdrawal and limits on war spending set for debate in Congress over the next few weeks, as Democrats launch a fresh push to end the war.

The White House has appealed for Republicans to withhold judgment until September, when Gen David Petraeus, the top US commander in Iraq, is scheduled to deliver a progress report to Congress.

But Chuck Hagel, the moderate Republican senator from Nebraska and a longstanding critic of the war, on Sunday warned that the party’s patience was wearing thin.

“If we do not see this administration take some initiatives to make some changes, significant strategic policy changes over the next 90 days, then of course it will be forced on [Mr Bush],” he told NBC’s Meet the Press.

The most urgent calls for a policy change are coming from Republicans facing tough re-election battles in 2008, highlighting concern throughout the party about the impact of the war on next year’s congressional and presidential polls.

Charles Schumer, Democratic senator for New York, said Republicans were “getting hammered” by their constituents over the war, and predicted the trickle of defections would soon turn into a torrent. “I think the dam is about to burst,” he told CBS’s Face the Nation on Sunday. “By September there will be real change forced upon the president by a bipartisan Senate.”

Mr Bush last week re-newed his warning against a hasty exit from Iraq, arguing that a withdrawal “based on politics, not on the advice and recommendations of our military commanders, would not be in our national interest”.

US and coalition casualties in Iraq have increased to an average of about 3.5 a day since Mr Bush took his decision to increase troop numbers in January - the highest sustained rate since the end of the initial invasion in 2003. More than 3,600 US troops have died since the war began.



Republicans start to call time on Iraq
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Published: July 9 2007 19:27 | Last updated: July 9 2007 19:27



It was only a matter of time before the growing hostility among US citizens to the war in Iraq wormed its way into Republican ranks. A matter, in fact, of election time.

Although it has long been clear that the Bush administration’s Iraq policy has been a disaster, it is not so much the realities on the ground that have percolated into Republican consciousness as the prospect of defeat at next year’s congressional as well as presidential polls.

The erosion of Republican unity falls short of bipartisan consensus in favour of US withdrawal. But it has accelerated enough for Iraq’s foreign minister to warn on Monday that a premature pull-out would lead to civil war, regional conflagration and a failed state.

Those are, of course, real risks. The problem is that Iraq is already so far down that road – and the real question is whether the continuing presence of US (and British) troops in the country is part of the problem or part of the solution.

The US invasion that promised Iraqis freedom has deprived them of their security, smashed their state and fragmented their country into a lawless archipelago ruled by militias, jihadis, ethnic cleansers, bandits and kidnappers.

The continuing US military presence shows no sign of being able to resolve this. The so-called “surge” of troop reinforcements, like everything else Washington has tried in Iraq, is far too little, much too late.

What the US occupation has done, however, is to infantilise Iraq’s public life, encouraging its leaders to believe they can continue to play sectarian, winner-takes-all politics while American forces prevent a descent into total anarchy.

Would a US withdrawal bring Iraq’s politicians to their senses, forcing them to seek ways of living together and rebuilding their country and institutions? There is no guarantee of that. But the democratic process in the US does pretty much guarantee that the troops will be brought home. It is time to start preparing for that and to use it as leverage in Iraq and the region.

The US should make support for Iraq’s government and army conditional on real efforts to promote national reconciliation and to defeat the jihadis by building alliances, including with nationalist insurgents. The prospect of the US pulling back should also be used to concentrate the minds of Iraq’s neighbours, including Iran, in ways that emphasise the benefits of a stable Iraq in a more secure region.

Measured against this administration’s fantasies of transforming the Middle East, this is not much. But it is a lot more than Iraq is likely to get under present US policies.