Foreign Policy Blogs

GailForce: Iraqi Lessons Learned

The military has a process called “Lessons Learned”.  Basically after the conduct of a major operation, be it an exercise or real world conflict, you study what worked and what didn’t.  The purpose of the process is to constantly improve the way you do business by documenting what worked and what didn’t work.  The hope is the next time a similar operation or evolution is conducted the military planners will incorporate the results as part of the planning process and use and expand on the good and but don’t repeat things that didn’t work.  With that in mind, I thought it might be a useful format for some thoughts I had on the Iraq conflict.

 

Lesson Learned One:  Have a clear vision of what it is you expect the military to achieve.

 

It seems to me this is one we constantly need to work on.  Earlier this year there was an interesting debate on the question of whether the “Powell Doctrine” was still relevant.  On March 3, the Chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, gave a talk at Kansas State University on the nature of war.  Some media saw the talk as a repudiation of the famous Powell Doctrine.  As summarized in an article by PBS:  “After the end of Persian Gulf War in 1991, Colin Powell, then chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, outlined his vision for efficient and decisive military action… military action should be used only as a last resort and only if there is a clear risk to national security by the intended target; the force, when used, should be overwhelming and disproportionate to the force used by the enemy; there must be strong support for the campaign by the general public; and there must be a clear exit strategy from the conflict in which the military is engaged.”

An article in the New York Times focused in on one statement to suggest Mullen’s remarks were rejecting the Powell Doctrine.  The Admiral remarked the military “must not try to use force only in an overwhelming capacity, but in the proper capacity, and in a precise and principled manner.”  I think if you look at the text of the entire speech you’ll see that the Admiral’s essential point is that war strategy is something that is continually evolving and changing.

Admiral Mullen says that in terms of armed conflict, each era in American history can be “defined by an overarching strategy”.  During the Cold War it was nuclear deterrence.  “So came our nuclear triad, and the theory of mutually assured destruction, and the advent of NATO.”  He went on the state “During World War II, we followed a doctrine very much akin to that used by General Grant in the Civil War – attrition of the enemy force.  To accomplish this…we needed to also to attack the enemy population’s will to fight.  And so came the bombings of Dresden and Hiroshima and Nagasaki…”.  Admiral Mullen concluded this portion of his talk by saying “Each era has something to teach, for there is no single defining American way of war.”

In terms of today’s environment Admiral Mullen made a case with which I agree that essentially we have been at war since 1990. Many people have forgotten the intense military operations that were waged in support of the UN sanctions against Iraq after the first Gulf War.  He added that “Today, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have generally become a fight against a syndicate of Islamic extremists led by al-Qaida and supported by a host of both state and non-state actors.”

Mullen talked about the principles for dealing with the current threat:  “The first is that military power should not – maybe cannot- be used as the last resort of the state.”  That is pretty much in agreement with the Powell Doctrine.  Principle number two is “Force should, to the maximum extent possible, be applied in a precise and principled way.”  This principle highlights the way the current war is different from earlier wars and is the only change I see from the Powell Doctrine.

Lesson Learned Two:  Public support for a war is essential therefore when planning a military strategy make sure the public has a thorough understanding of the history of a conflict and what it is you’re trying to achieve.

The debate over why we invaded Iraq is a prime example.  The WMD issue was just one part of the Iraqi problem.  I don’t think this was communicated to the public very well at the start of the process.

 

In his Iraqi speech a couple of weeks ago announcing the end of combat operations in Iraq, President Obama said it was the end of a 7 year conflict.  As stated earlier, I think a case can be made that’s its actually been a 20 year conflict, even longer than that if you count our involvement in the 1980’s “Tanker War” during the 8 year Iran/Iraq war when both sides attacked tankers transiting the Persian Gulf.  Much of the public is either unaware or does not understand the significance of  what Time Magazine once called the Forgotten War, the time period between when the first Gulf War ended in February of 1991 and the second began in March 2003.  Saddam did not abide by the agreed upon terms and the UN spent a lot of time and effort keeping his feet to the fire.  The U.S. and its allies maintained a significant military presence enforcing the various UN sanctions.  Combat operations were conducted daily and at times it was quite intense.  Here are some highlights:

       January 13 & 18, 1993 strikes were conducted against selected air defense targets.

       January 17, 1993 the Navy launched 44 cruise missiles against Zaafaraniyah, a Nuclear related facility.

       June 27, 1993 the Navy conducted a strike against Iraqi Intelligence headquarters.

       October 1994 in response to the threat of Iraqi troops deploying towards the border of Kuwait (again), U.S. Central Command deployed over 28,000 troops and 200 additional aircraft (this was in addition to the large number of forces already deployed in the region).

       September 1996, Operation Desert Strike, launched 12 cruise missiles against surfare to air missile sites and command and control facilities.

       December 1998, Operation Desert Fox aimed at installations associated with WMD and Iraq’s command and control network.  On just the first day of operations 280 cruise missiles were launched, almost as many as was used in entire first Gulf War.

 

Of significance, after Operation Desert Fox, the Clinton administration stated since Saddam had thrown the UN inspectors out, we no longer had people on the ground determining the status of Iraq’s WMD program.  They also stated that the U.S. intelligence collection capability was designed for a Cold War type threat.  As a result we would not have the capability to determine what Saddam was or was not doing with his WMD program.  It is also worth noting that during the first Gulf War when Saddam was popping off Scuds we still could not find his WMDs.  Hence the U.S. anti-missile efforts during the conflict focused on shooting the Scuds down before they hit their targets as opposed to taking them out before they were launched.

 

Why is knowledge of this important?  First off it gives the public insight into why the Bush administration may have been inclined to go in and take Saddam out.  It wasn’t just about the WMD issue.  By 9/11 we had been involved enforcing post war sanctions for over 10 years.  Many national security types felt enough is enough; this guy has got to go. Second, if we couldn’t find Saddam’s WMD during the first Gulf War when we know for a fact he still had the capability because he was using them; it would follow that it would not be easy to find them when he wasn’t and would presumably hide his remaining capability.  This should have been a major consideration when considering what our Iraq policy should be.  Maybe it was.  I will be interested in reading President Bush’s upcoming book to see what he has to say about it.

 

Shortly before this most recent Iraq conflict began I was asked during an interview if Saddam would use WMD against U.S. and British troops.  I answered it depended on whether he wanted to win the battle or the war.  If he wanted to win the battle he would use them.  I stated if I were Saddam I would not use them and get rid of any WMD capability I had.  Therefore the U.S. and Britain would have egg on their face.  There is a precedent for this speculation that I’ve blogged about before.  During the first Gulf War when it became apparent that he would not be able to maintain air superiority over Iraq, Saddam sent what remained of his Air Force to Iran.  An interesting choice considering the two nations had recently fought a long and bitter war.

 

I think the bigger question should have been not whether Saddam still had any WMD capability but rather had he been contained by the Clinton administration’s national security policies.  What if the military strikes against suspected WMD facilities combined with the enforcement of UN sanctions had neutralized Saddam’s military capabilities to the point where he was no longer a threat?  In my opinion that should have been the real debate.

 

Well that’s about it for now.  Heading out of town so have to do the packing thing. There are many more lessons learned about Iraq.  I’ll probably do some more blogging on that in the future.  As always my views are my own.

 

 

              

 

Author

Gail Harris

Gail Harris’ 28 year career in intelligence included hands-on leadership during every major conflict from the Cold War to El Salvador to Desert Storm to Kosovo and at the forefront of one of the Department of Defense’s newest challenges, Cyber Warfare. A Senior Fellow for The Truman National Security Project, her memoir, A Woman’s War, published by Scarecrow Press is available on Amazon.com.