Did the U.S. Withdraw from Iraq Too Soon? >
Withdrawal Served Obama's Electoral Agenda
Iraq might take 15 or 20 years to become a functioning democracy
January 23, 2012
About Michele Dunne:
Michele Dunne is Director of the Atlantic Council's Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East.
Jackson Diehl wrote in January 2007 what I consider the best column ever published on the invasion of Iraq. Expressing frustration at the Bush administration’s repeated promises that the country would be stabilized in six to 12 months, Diehl asked why Iraq should operate on Washington’s timetable. “One day, on its own time, Iraq will reach equilibrium,” Diehl predicted, adding that the United States should want to be present at that point to help shape the deal that emerged, and should reconfigure its mission to adapt to the clock that was running in Iraq. It is a lesson that the United States has still not absorbed.
[See pictures of soldiers returning home from Iraq.]
Knowing that Americans would expect Iraq to become a success within a few years—and that this most likely would not happen—was one reason why I was not in favor of the 2003 invasion. But invade we did, and the question at hand now is whether US forces staying longer than eight years would have made a difference in how stable, peaceful, and democratic Iraq ultimately will be.
While I admit to experiencing a sense of relief at seeing US troops leave Iraq before Christmas 2011, there is a nagging fear inside my head that we should have stayed a bit longer, albeit in much smaller numbers and in a training and advisory capacity. The Obama administration went through the motions of reaching an agreement with the Iraqi government to extend the U.S. presence into 2012, but without much energy or conviction. Leaving the initiative to reach such an agreement up to a government as beset by troubles as that of Nouri al-Maliki was like leaving the initiative to get a driver’s license up to your ADHD-diagnosed 16 year old—you can sit back, do little, and pretty much be assured that it won’t come about but that you won’t have to bear the blame.
[Mort Zuckerman: Barack Obama's Middle East Miscalculation.]
The brief but horrific sectarian bloodletting that followed the U.S. withdrawal in December has already created doubts as to whether the United States was wise to have devoted so little effort to a longer drawdown of forces. It served President Obama’s electoral agenda to have all US forces out before the campaign began and, after all, if you believe that we never should have invaded, shouldn’t you believe that the sooner we leave, the better? I hope for the sake of Iraqis—and of the vulnerable American diplomats and other civilians who remain--that this turns out to be true. But I am beset by doubts.
- Join the debate on Facebook.
- Follow U.S. News Debate Club on Twitter.
- With Leaner Military, a New Focus on China.
- Other Arguments
-
#15527
Yes — The U.S. must pressure Iraq to avoid a new sectarian civil war
ROBERT ZARATE, Policy Director of the Foreign Policy Initiative
-
#29068
No — The war should never have been launched--so it can't be ended soon enough
PHYLLIS BENNIS, Director of the New Internationalism Project at the Institute for Policy Studies
-
#33928
No — The United States should never have invaded in the first place
CHRISTOPHER PREBLE, Vice President for Foreign Policy Studies at the Cato Institute
-
#42518
No — Mission to promote "democracy" in Iraq was an unobtainable objective
DANIEL J. GALLINGTON, Senior Policy and Program Adviser at the George C. Marshall Institute
-
#53934
No — The withdrawal demonstrated to the people of Iraq and their neighbors that democracy works
LAWRENCE J. KORB, Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress
-
#63026
Yes — Iraq's fragile coalition government has begun to come apart at the ethnic and sectarian seams
ILAN BERMAN, Vice President of the American Foreign Policy Council
-
#73231
Yes — The real winner in the Middle East will be Iran
HELLE DALE, Senior Fellow in Public Diplomacy Studies at the Heritage Foundation
-
#93031
Yes — Pulling the covers over our eyes and leaving the region is not a thought-through strategy
THOMAS HENRIKSEN, Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution and at the U.S. Joint Special Operations University
-
#103035
Yes — The president, in his own words, wanted to fulfill a campaign promise
DANIELLE PLETKA, Vice President for Foreign and Defense Policy Studies at the American Enterprise Institute
-
#11819
No — Arms sales to Iraq also will provide a continuing source of connectivity
DANIEL GOURÉ, Vice President at the Lexington Institute
-
#124153
No — The Iraq War cost the United States 4,421 lives and $806 billion
DENNIS KUCINICH, U.S. Representative, Ohio's 10th District
