John Kerry came out recently with a new ad explaining how he would form a coalition to clean up Iraq.

The clarion call goes up over and over saying we need more Allies in Iraq, that we need to get the UN involved, that we need to get the EU involved, that we need to get NATO involved.

Is a coalition really necessary?

Let's look at the last war...the one in Afghanistan, who most (even on the Left) agree that Afghanistan was handled properly...

Myth or Reality?

This article deals with many of the issues surrounding Iraq, but let's focus on a few paragraphs:



International organizations are only going to enter a country which is relatively peaceful, where the security situation is under control.

Question for Debate: Do we really need a coalition to "Win the Peace" in Iraq If so, why was a large Coalition not needed in Afghanistan??

Do we really need a coalition to "Win the Peace" in Iraq If so, why was a large Coalition not needed in Afghanistan??
A coalition wasn't critical in Afghanistan for the "war" part because the world largely viewed us as retaliating for 9-11. We had cause. The world didn't view Afghanistan as a "global threat". A coalition would be handy now to help rebuild their nation but I doubt it will happen.

Iraq was a different story. Retaliation took place in Gulf War I. It was unclear whether Saddam was a threat to some countries. Coalition backing was required "theoretically" to support the cause for war. It's required even moreso now in my opinion to "share the burden" and hopefully neutralize opposition. Supposedly the world benefits from Saddam no longer being in power so perhaps they should lend a hand in the cleanup and rebuilding. Do I believe doing so will "Win the Peace"? Maybe, and a shaky maybe at that. Zealotry knows little in reason, and even less in compassion.

Doc

NATO is currently in control of Afghanistan. The point here is that these international organizations only show up AFTER the peace is won. They really have not been a large part of "securing the peace" (at least over the past 10-20 years).

A larger coalition at this point (there IS a coalition, you know) would not legitimize a war if those countries felt it is illegal to begin with.

Do we really need a coalition to "Win the Peace" in Iraq If so, why was a large Coalition not needed in Afghanistan??

Perhaps you are confusing the effective military capabilities of a coalition with the political will of a coalition?

It seems to me that the advantage of having a coalition is not in an increase in military powers (there are so few nations who can afford to mount such large scale oversea's operations any more any way) but in having the political backing to see a project through to the finish.

The difference between the two conflicts is that those troops in Afghanistan know deep down that they are doing the right thing. In Iraq, this is not the case. Every single coalition soldier in Iraq knows full well that his/ her presence is not desired, and they also know that the majority of the world disaproves of their presence.

This is not to say that they cannot do their jobs as a result, but it means that they are fighting against an extra burden which they really don't need.

The reverse is also true for the Iraqis who are fighting against the coalition. They take heart from the global support they receive and fear not the crushing casualty figures which fighting aganst the Americans will result in.

I would have thought this was logical to any politician but apparently it is not.

Do we really need a coalition to "Win the Peace" in Iraq If so, why was a large Coalition not needed in Afghanistan??

Well, Rumsfeld and Bush certainly didn't think they needed a coalition to invade Iraq (they offered Blair the chance not to send any soldiers until the invasion was over, for instance). But this question you pose really misses the many nuances in the situation that Bush has successfully trampled upon in his rhetoric.

The point is that if the US alone "runs" Iraq then they will simply solidify a psuedo-Israel/Palestine situation of "get out" terrorism and "shut up and be quite" repression by US troops.

The Afghan invasion, which was also illegal (given that not one claimed terrorist was Afghan) has been allowed to essentially wind down. Yet, hang on, wasn't Bin Laden the one behind 9/11 and not Saddam? And yet the US is spending by 4:1 more money and using mroe resources in Iraq than Afghanistan, which more than 2 years later still has no looming elections, has become the #1 supplier of heroin again and is run mainly by warlords...again. And Bin Laden hasn't been found. Does any of this make sense to you? That, despite public enemy #1 running around a country (so they say but who knows) that is lawless because the US and its coalition have a pitiful supply of soldiers there they choose not to even discuss increasing their presence there. Madness.

Iraq, because it is the hub of the region, a major oil country (potentially) and was supposedly invaded on behalf of the UN, whether the UN wanted it or not, international involvement is 100% necessary to even come close to legitimizing a final government. Afghanistan was Bush's baby - see here for how 9/11 was probably a pre-emptive attack in itself - on the other hand and (just following the justification rhetoric here for the sake of argument) so NATO in particular should have fit in here. This explains why.

In purely practical resource terms, too, the US needs help. Lets not forget that the US only contributed about 10% of the cost of Gulf War 1 (Japan and Germany paid for most of it). And now that it is languishing in trillion dollar deficits, it's gonna get harder.

Our goals in Afghanistan were totally different than our goals in Iraq. We didn’t go in with the intention of setting up a democracy, nor would it be feasible. The security of the US doesn’t depend on a multiethnic democracy in Afghanistan. It only requires that the government be deterred from harboring terrorists as the Taliban did. The US had to make it clear that direct support for terrorists who try to kill large numbers of Americans is tantamount to participation in the attack. That is why the Taliban regime had to be destroyed. We have the absolute right to defend ourselves.

Iraq is a different situation entirely. That is a nationbuilding endeavor...a concept that I abhor. But we’re in it and have to clean up our mess, so yes, we need a coalition. Consider that the nation-building endeavor in Kosovo took around 40,000 NATO troops, and that country was tiny with about 15 percent of the population of Iraq.

I think you're forgetting the Gulf States and Saudi Arabia, Schoolboy. Though I know it's hard to resist criticizing the US, make certain you have you facts straight. The US did only pay for about 10 percent of the first gulf war, but they contributed a vast proportion of the manpower. Germany and Japan contributed about 20 percent, and the rest was funded by the Coalition, Gulf states, and mainly Saudi Arabia.

OK, my proportions were wrong but the thrust of my point is correct. I also don't really see how that point is a criticism of the US. It's just an example of how the US's resources are far from unlimited, despite a $400bn military budget (more than the rest of the developed world's put together).

Because the US stopped at only just beyond the Iraqi border and most of this short war the Iraqis were running away, very few lives were lost (there were very few ground troops used).

Plus, the first war was legal and sanctioned by the UN. And see how smoothly that went in contrast to the totally different way the US went about the Iraq invasion and how the aftermath has turned out.

Afghanistan as a country had not been behind 9/11. Did you read that story about the country being on the hit-list even before 9/11?

The main source of funding for the 9/11 hijackers seems to have been the Pakistani ISI (intelligence service) not the Taleban. And Iran and Libya were sold nuclear knowledge and technology by Pakistan. The hijackers were Saudi. Bin Laden is Saudi.

Yeah, so lets invade Afghanistan. Let's see more kids die from Afghani heroin. That'll kill more in a few years than 9/11. That's how counterproductive leaving Afghanistan so unfinished is. The Taleban were horrendous but they did not declare war on the US. The US refused to go through extradition procedures to get bin Laden (i.e. provide evidence that he is a legitimate suspect) which is why the Taleban refused to hand him over.

In my opinion, the Taleban would have collapsed under their own weight anyway in time. Bin Laden would not have stayed there long, he always moved about.

A coalition based on some kind of sound strategy to fight terrorism would be easy. But this mad Bush strategy is simply not deemed a goer by most of the world. Especially as it entirely ignores the Israel/Palestine callous on the foot of the Arab world. When Bush does make a move he makes the region fill with yet more enmity, if that were possible.

Your question is based on false premises.

First of all, we won the war in Afghanistan, but peace is still a bit elusive there as well. We have 10,000 troops there (last I looked at the numbers), so having 5000 more from NATO is 50%, which is nothing to sneeze at (compared to far less for other countries in Iraq). The UN has helped to create their government and to get things running again. We haven't won the peace there, but it's in better shape because we stayed out of nation building and let the UN and NATO lead.

In Iraq, we could also have easily won the war without any outside nation's help. Our military is damn good at breaking things. But they were also initially supposed to take the lead in fixing them, and that's where they failed. Now we're trying to maintain the peace AND lead. Bush has finally indicated that the UN is needed in Iraq to help set up the new government and to negotiate with all the different factions. Finally. Having NATO or the UN lead in Iraq would help us extract many of our troops as other countries come on board with peacekeeping soldiers. Right now, most of the soldiers in this so-called "coalition" are non-combatants; that's not helping to alleviate the stress on our military.

So, yes, we need the widest possible coalition to "win the peace"... in both countries. Or any other country that Bush decides to break next.

Yes, I read the article. It sounds reasonable to me that, after a couple of Bin Laden related bombings, we would try to put the pressure on Afghanistan to stop sponsoring Al Qaeda and hand over Bin Laden.

Musharraf is one of our most valuable allies. He disavowed the Taliban and let American troops fly from Pakistani bases. He immediately fired the head of the ISI. This has put him at great personal risk. Why, exactly, would we attack Pakistan because of the activities of the ISI? How would that make us safer?

So, Bin Laden is a Saudi. The Saudi government is the best we could hope for right now. Not great, but they don't harbor and train terrorists to attack us. Why would we attack them, and how would that add to our security? If Bin Laden were Italian, would you suggest we attack Italy? They have terrorist networks too.
Yes, we won't compromise sources and their families in areas of extremely frivolous regard for human life. That would, strangely, effect our ability to obtain sources. It would also be a morally bankrupt thing to do. I'm a Libertarian. I personally don't care if people shoot themselves up with heroine as long as no one is holding a gun to their head forcing them to do so. In fact, even if people are being forced to inject heroine that would be a local concern and certainly not war worthy.

The bottom line to me (because I'm going off topic) is, Iraq and Afghanistan are two very different matters. Afghanistan was a defensive action, Iraq is a nation-building action. Therefore, we need a coalition in Iraq.

Yes we do need a larger "coalition" The Afghan situation lacks the complexities of Iraq. Namely, differing ethnic groups that can't stand each other. This Washington Post lead editorial highlights how the U.N. would be perfect for Iraq.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/artic...-2004Apr19.html

That NR article is either sloppily written or deliberately disingenuous. As has been pointed out, 1/3 of the troops in Afghanistan are non-American, compared to something closer to 1/8 or 1/10 in Iraq (including the British). It takes a kind of perversity to fool yourself into believing that America didn't 'turn off its allies.'

Anyway, the issue in Iraq isn't whether the US needs help with manpower - it doesn't - but whether a government set up by the UN will have a better chance of survival than one set up by the US. I think that a UN-instituted government would be considerably more acceptable to the Iraqi people than one put in place by the US, and in the fragile early years of a democratic government I think that the faith of the Iraqi people will be immeasurably important.

Forming a coalition in Iraq also has the advantage of bringing back into the fold, in the guise of the UN, countries who are allied in principle against terrorism but which have totally rejected the American strategy, like France and Germany. Again, a consensus is helpful because otherwise it is very easy for propagandists to portray the whole war on terror as American aggression/imperialism/greed etc. The UN doesn't have that image problem in the Middle East, and is harder to criticise. If future measures against Al-Qaeda can be taken effectively under the UN then so much the better, but consensus is needed first.

The question assumes that Afghanistan has been a success. Hardly. Don’t forget, the most recent and well-known war casualty, Pat Tillman, was killed in Afghanistan, not Iraq. Fighting in Kandahar is still occurring (a young soldier from Pennsylvania had his foot blown off yesterday, and 2 aid workers were killed there also). It begs the question of just how successful the “reorganization” of Afghanistan has been. And if the “coalition” isn’t working well in Afghanistan, it renders the question moot.


An eerily similarity between the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and the US occupation is summed up in this message:
Trading Places 4/26/04 Link

It sounds as if it could have come from 2004, but it was actually said by Andrei Gromyko to his colleagues in 1979.

This article "Afghanistan's lessons for Iraq" Link also draws a provocative parallel between the US occupation of Iraq and the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan.

I wouldn't dismiss the unrest in Afghanistan just yet.

Well we did not need a coalition in Afganastan as we, as a very powerful nation, were responding to an attack on our soil. The world community was unanimously behind us in our hunt and ultimate destruction of an enemy that hit first. The US is the most powerful nation in terms of it's military, and we don't NEED any assistance to win our battles.

Iraq, is a totally different story. Iraq had NOT attacked us, and in hindsight, probably never would have. The world community was NOT behind our (er, someone's) decision to attack the country. President Bush leaned on the term "coalition" to try to add some acceptance to his decision. To try and claim that the world WAS behind him when in fact, the majority of nations were not. Do we NEED a coalition in Iraq? No, not a military coalition. We, alone, could OCCUPY Iraq for decades all by ourselves, but at what cost? Would a united coalition benefit the citizens of Iraq? You bet. They need to see that the world is behind them as they strive towards a better tomorrow.

Will the US be able to make the country secure enough for other countries to jump in? That is yet to be determined, but it's not looking very good so far. The egg and the chicken might have to show up at the same time on this one.