THE IRAQ VISION

The general knock against President Bush’s speech Monday was that it lacked specifics and restated the obvious. In his defense, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John W. Warner said the president was “at his best tonight in laying a foundation, upon which he has to build every week to sustain the support of the American people and the world in bringing freedom to Iraq.” More than a year after the end of the war, that’s an important foundation to lay, though given some of Mr. Bush’s comments during the speech, many of the bricks are still on the hod.

Consider some of the following from the speech:

“We will hand over authority to a sovereign Iraqi government; help establish security; continue rebuilding Iraq’s infrastructure; encourage more international support; and move toward a national election that will bring forward new leaders empowered by the Iraqi people.” This is the new five-part plan the president mentioned a couple of times in his speech, but it includes the same assertions the United States made a year ago and even before the start of the war. The goals are admirable; the doubts Americans are expressing are about the means for getting there, which the speech did not fully answer.

“The swift removal of Saddam’s regime last spring had an unintended effect. Instead of being killed or captured on the battlefield, some of Saddam’s elite guards shed their uniforms and melted into the civilian population.” There are several implications about the character of the elite guards in this statement, and no doubt it wasn’t the intention of the Bush administration

to have the Republican Guard live to fight another day, but their melting into the civilian population certainly wasn’t unexpected. It happened in ’91 and it was talked about as a strong possibility before this war. To suggest that it is noteworthy now as a reason for the lack of success is not accurate.

“This interim government will exercise full sovereignty until national elections are held.” How can a government exercise sovereignty when a foreign army occupies its country? British Prime Minister Tony Blair explains, “That doesn’t mean to say that our troops are going to be ordered to do something that our troops don’t want to do.” This suggests the new government will have full sovereignty over, say, Iraq’s waste-water treatment plants, but on matters of national security, armed conflict and the protection of its individual citizens, no, not yet anyway.

“These two visions – one of tyranny and murder, and the other of liberty and life – … have now met in Iraq and are contending for the future of that country.” The president closed his speech with a neat splitting of a messy world, reminiscent of his November 2001 declaration, “You’re either with us or against us in the fight against terror.” This simple bifurcation – tyranny or liberty, murder or life, with us or against us

– scares the dickens out of potential allies because they see not only two visions and not only 20, but multitudes of competing ideas and are reluctant to swear, in effect, a loyalty oath to the president’s vision, no matter how noble.