(Dobbs) “You break it, you own it.”Maybe it’s not an “endless war,” but for now, it seems awfully open-ended.
More than 35 years ago, in the run-up to Operation Desert Storm, the first Gulf War to chase Saddam Hussein’s army from the oilfields of Kuwait, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Colin Powell, laid out his rules for going to war. It came to be called the “Powell Doctrine.” It boils down to eight questions:
Read through them carefully. With war now burning again in the Middle East, answers to most of those questions are vague at best. Powell later wrote about his fears in Foreign Affairs: “We should always be skeptical when so-called experts suggest that all a particular crisis calls for is a little surgical bombing or a limited attack. When the ‘surgery’ is over and the desired result is not obtained, a new set of experts then comes forward with talk of just a little escalation— more bombs, more men and women, more force. History has not been kind to this approach to war-making. In fact this approach has been tragic— both for the men and women who are called upon to implement it and for the nation.” How does that square with what we’re seeing right now in this war with Iran? It doesn’t, because what we’re seeing is “a little more escalation.” As The Military Times reported before the first shots were fired, “US military assembles largest force of warships, aircraft in Middle East in decades.” Yet with Iran throwing punches that the Pentagon might not have expected— their missiles and drones have hit American military and diplomatic targets in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, and Dubai, and other targets in the UAE, Bahrain, Iraq, even the island-nation of Cyprus far away in the Mediterranean, and of course, several cities in Israel— already, more U.S. ships, planes, and personnel are headed for the Gulf. Is this all part of the plan? It is easy to doubt that the plan was thoroughly thought through when Americans working and living in the region first were told— although not until after the first Iranian strikes hit their targets— to “shelter in place,” then were told by the state department to get out “using available commercial transportation.” The trouble was, there was virtually no commercial transportation to use. After several Gulf airports were hit, flights were suspended and air space was closed. A stranded American told CNN, “I feel just like a sitting duck.” Last night the UAE. announced that it has created “safe air corridors” with its neighbors, so some planes have gotten out, although this might not inspire the highest level of confidence in the Americans who are trapped. And what does the plan say about the next stage of the war, the part where Iranians are supposed to heed President Trump’s call to “take over your government?” How exactly are they expected to do that? Short of sending in the troops, how can Trump “be there,” as he promised, “to help?” What happens if anti-regime protesters take to the streets and are met by pro-regime fanatics who have survived? And what happens if, as I have seen in other wars, clashing factions coalesce behind the common threat to their nation, which is exacerbated by every additional day of bombardment? Although evidently fifty or more government leaders have been killed by air strikes, the death toll nationwide is somewhere around 800, including more than a hundred children at a girls’ elementary school, which means Iranians are seeing more innocents die than villains. There is no question that the United States and Israel have hit the Islamic Republic with massive lethal force, and will continue to, and ultimately it is hard to foresee its zealots fighting much further. But Islamic fervor isn’t dead. Reports from Tehran say that the so-called “Assembly of Experts” has been meeting, virtually, to choose the successor to Supreme Leader Khamenei, who was killed on the war’s first day, and the two leading candidates might be the grandson of the first Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khomeini, and the son of Khamenei himself. That is hardly a white flag of surrender. Defense Secretary Hegseth promised Monday, “It’s not an endless war,” but it can’t end until that white flag goes up. Which takes us to a second principle articulated in 2003 by then-Secretary of State Powell during the run-up to the Iraq War (although originally it was coined by New York Times columnist Tom Friedman). He called it “the Pottery Barn rule” which meant, as Powell put it, “You break it, you own it.”Share We are breaking Iran. Are we prepared to own it? Are we prepared to protect citizens who want a different future and, as President Trump told them to, “seize this moment?” Are we prepared to help usher in a new government less radical than the old one? In other words, have we thought about Colin Powell’s question, “Have the consequences of U.S. action been fully considered?” Especially since Trump admitted yesterday, when a reporter asked him who he would like to see ruling Iran, “Most of the people we had in mind are dead.” Which left him to conclude, “I guess the worst case would be we do this and somebody takes over who’s as bad as the previous person.” That certainly wasn’t part of the plan. To the first question in the Powell Doctrine about a threat to our vital national security interests, the president yesterday threw a new version-of-the-day into the mix: “They were going to attack if we didn’t do it. They were going to attack first. I felt strongly about that.” But the ranking Democrat on the Armed Services Committee, Senator Mark Warner, said yesterday that after briefings by the administration, he still hasn’t heard a single explanation that there was a “direct and immediate threat.”Leave a comment To the second question, about a clear and attainable objective, we still don’t have anything on that. Is it destroying the nuclear program once and for all? Is it wiping out the old regime to install a friendlier one? Is it knocking out the colossal arsenal of missiles which Trump claims, contrary to experts’ opinions, soon could reach the United States? Is it aid and comfort for the citizens who have been oppressed by their own government?Share And to the final question about a plausible exit strategy, if there is one, nobody has yet made it clear. Maybe it’s not an “endless war,” but for now, it seems awfully open-ended. |