The War Within

by Woodward, Bob

  In Amman, Maliki's proposed plan was dead on arrival. Bush had listened, but he had a different idea. "We can't be in a situation like we got into last summer, where your army would go to do something, and then they'd get a phone call saying, 'Oh, you can't go after that person.'"

  Bush then asked to meet privately with Maliki. Only their translators stayed. Rice and Hadley were banished to the hallway, where they pulled up chairs alongside Maliki's aides. One of them started in about all the problems Maliki was having with the Sunnis.

  "No," Rice said, "there is also a Shia problem, and you must recognize that. Look, we've got reportsópeople going into villages, killing all the men and sending the women into exile. Are you telling me that's not true?"

  None of Maliki's aides challenged her.

  In their private meeting, Bush was direct with Maliki. "I'm willing to commit tens of thousands of additional forces,"

  he said. He would surge U.S. forces if necessary. "You've lost control of your capital," he told the prime minister.

  "That's right," Maliki confided. "And I've got to do something about it. I can't have this happen."

  "You're losing control of your country," Bush continued. "Now, we are willing to help, but we will not do thatóbecause it won't workóunless I have certain assurances from you. They are: There will be no further interference in the conduct of military operations. There will be no political intervention in your generals' decisions."

  Bush then went through a list of additional requirements. There could be no areas that were off limits and no more

  "don't touch" lists of Shia leaders or Shia militia who were free to do as they pleased. "No matter who the perpetrators of violence may be, weóyour forces and oursówill go after them. And that includes the JAM and the Sadrists"ómeaning the Mahdi Army and its political wing. "We are going to take on elements of any group engaged in violence. If they don't engage in violence, they don't get hurt.

  "And," Bush continued, "I have to have your assurance that you are committed to a political reconciliation process, because that has to be moving on as well."

  Yes, Maliki said. He was.

  Later, Bush told me about Maliki in Amman, "He's a man who is in many ways overwhelmed by the moment. And he's getting his feet on the ground. And I've spent a lot of time talking to him. But he has always assured me that he is going to take on the extremists. I remember distinctly telling him, 'A Shia murderer is just as guilty as a Sunni murderer. And in order for you to be viewed as a just and fair leader, you have to deal with both equally.'"

  But that wasn't happening at the time. Sunni and Shia extremists were running wild in Baghdad. "Out of self-preservation, people begin to pick sides," Bush recalled. "Not, you know, political sides, but they begin to pick the side of the closest strongman or the most reliable strong person or the most active gang to hide behind."

  It was not clear that day in Amman that Maliki had understood how seriously Bush was considering a surge. And Casey, left on the sidelines, had no idea that the president had so bluntly told Maliki how willing he was to send more U.S. troops.

  Casey left the Amman meeting believing that the president and Maliki had agreed with Maliki's Baghdad security plan.

  In a joint press conference at the Four Seasons Hotel in Amman afterward, Maliki said that he and Bush were "very clear together about the importance of accelerating the transfer of the security responsibility." And in a joint statement, the two leaders said only that they had "discussed accelerating the transfer," not that they had agreed on it, but no one apparently picked up the difference.

  In the statement, they agreed that they would take steps to "track down and bring to justice those responsible for the cowardly attacks last week in Sadr City." The week before, a barrage of car bombs, mortars and missiles had killed more than 200 people in the massive Shia slum.

  Afterward, Bush told Rice that he thought Maliki had gotten it. Maliki had pledged to save Baghdad. That was the bargain. And he added, "He said the right things. I heard the right things. And now we'll see."

  * * *

  From Amman, Rice went on to the Dead Sea in Jordan for a meeting of the foreign ministers of the Gulf states, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), including the foreign ministers of Saudi Arabia and Egypt. The gathering of predominantly Sunni Muslim states was called "Forum for the Future." About this time, reporter David Sanger of The New York Times published two detailed, front-page stories on what the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group was going to recommend. The first was headlined "Panel to Weigh Overture by U.S. to Iran and Syria." The second, headlined "Iraq Panel to Recommend Pullback of Combat Troops," ran the day Rice arrived at the GCC forum.

  When Rice sat down with the foreign ministers, she expected the usual complaints about peace between Palestine and Israel or the conflicts in Lebanon.

  Instead, it was all about Iraq. One by one, the foreign ministers said they felt convinced the United States was about to fold and leave Iraq. In turn, they would then have to make their own deals with the Sunnis in Iraq and with one another. Their big fear was what they called a Shia Crescentóa half-moon-shaped swath of large Shia populations running from Iran, through Iraq and into Lebanon, Syria and Jordan, among other countriesóthat would threaten the Sunnis of the region.

  Rice received an earful. "America is going to give up," one foreign minister told her. Bush was going to redeploy and talk to Iran and Syria. They went so far as to say that they were worried that the president was going to make a separate peace with Iran. That would be like Nixon going to China or Reagan going to the Soviet Union. Such an outreach would upset the regional balance of power.

  "You don't need to be thinking about pulling your forces down," said one of the foreign ministers, "you need to think about doubling your forces."

  * * *

  After returning to Washington, Rice went to talk to Bush. They both knew the regional allies had split personalities. As she once put it, "On the one hand, the countries of the region don't want us to be aggressive and bellicose, and on the other they want us to be aggressive and bellicose." Because of the chaos and uncertainty in Iraq, she told the president, others in the region now worried that the United States wasn't going to be aggressive enough. They were terrified about a pullback or an exit.

  "I came out of that meeting convinced," she said bluntly, "that not only did they believe that we were about to fold in Iraq, but that that was going to be the end of American power in the Middle East."

  "Are you saying to me that we can't win it?" the president asked.

  Rice said she believed that the 60-plus years of American influence in the Gulf, dating back to President Franklin Roosevelt, were very much at risk. The stakes were that high. "If you don't show strength and resolve," she said,

  "then they're going to have to cut their own deals." There was no better way to persuade Bush than to urge him to show strength and resolve.

  More than ever, they had to find a way to turn things around, Rice continued. What was clear from the meeting, she said, was that "The very act of increasing American forces would have a salutary effect, whether or not it achieved population security. The fact that the president of the United States, against all odds, against all voices, would in effect double down, would have a hugely important effect on the region." Rice herself was not yet in favor of adding more U.S. forces, but the benefit of sending a needed message to the regional allies was now clear.

  "Can we win this?" the president asked again.

  "I can tell you," Rice said, "we're not winning it now."

  * * *

  On December 5, former President George H. W. Bush broke down in tears as he was speaking to the Florida House of Representatives. His son, Florida Governor Jeb Bush, was leaving office after serving two terms. Referring to Jeb's loss in his first governor's race years earlier, the former president said, "He didn't whine about it. He didn't complain." He went on, "A true measure of a man is how you handle victory, and also defeat." The 82-yea
r-old Bush choked up, began to sob and pulled out a handkerchief to dab at his tears. The rare emotional display by a former president made the national television news. Peggy Noonan, Bush senior's former chief speechwriter and close friend, wrote a column about it in The Wall Street Journal, saying, "No one who knows George H. W. Bush thinks that moment was only about Jeb." It was more likely about "another son." She noted that "growing older can leave you more exposed to the force of whatever it is you're feeling. Defenses erode like a fence worn by time.

  "Think of what a loaded moment in history it was for Bush the elder," she wrote, noting that the bipartisan Iraq Study Group report would be out the following day. "Surely" Jim Baker, Bush senior's oldest adviser, had called to say the report "would not, could not, offer a way out of a national calamity." Bush senior had to know "his son George had (with the best of intentions!) been wrong in the great decision of his presidencyóstop at Afghanistan or move on to Iraq?óand was now suffering a defeat made clear by the report.

  "And the younger President Bush, what of his inner world?ÖThe president presents himself each day in his chesty way, with what seems a jarring peppinessÖ. Unlike anguished wartime presidents of old, he seems resolutely un-anguished. Think of the shattered LincolnÖ. Or anguished Lyndon B. Johnson." Was it "serenity or a confidence born of cluelessness? You decide. Where you stand on the war will likely determine your answer. But I'll tell you, I wonder about it and do not understand it, either what it is or what it means. I'd ask someone in the White House," she wrote, but they were still stuck on the talking point that the president was sustained "by his knowledge of the ultimate rightness of his course."

  It was a true cry from the heart from one of the old Bush senior handsóone that Jim Baker no doubt felt but could not make publicly. Noonan wrote of the current President Bush: "If he suffers, they might tell us; it would make him seem more normal, which is always a heartening thing to see in a president. But maybe there is no suffering. Maybe he outsources suffering. Maybe he leaves it to his father."

  Chapter 26

  Bob Gates headed to the Senate on Tuesday, December 5, for his confirmation hearing.

  "Mr. Gates," asked Senator Carl Levin, the Michigan Democrat who would soon take over as chairman of the Armed Services Committee, "do you believe that we are currently winning in Iraq?"

  "No, sir," Gates said, realizing he was going out on a limb.

  Soon, it was John McCain's turn. "Do you agree," he asked, "that at the time of the invasion, we didn't have sufficient troops to control the country, in hindsight?"

  "I suspect, in hindsight," Gates said, "some of the folks in the administration probably would not make the same decisions that they made. And I think one of those is that there clearly were insufficient troops in Iraq after the initial invasion to establish control over the country."

  When I later asked the president whether he should have sent more troops earlier, he said only that history would have to judge and that "I haven't spent a lot of time analyzing whether more troops in 2003" would have changed the situation.

  In the confirmation hearing, McCain pointed out that while the situation continued to deteriorate, Abizaid and Casey kept insisting that there were a sufficient number of troops. How could that be?

  "Senator," Gates replied, "I was a part of the Iraq Study GroupÖI would tell you that when we were in Iraq that we inquired of the commanders whether they had enough troops and whether a significant increase might be necessary.

  And I would say that the answer we received was that they thought they had adequate troopsÖthe response that we received in Baghdad was that they had enough troops."

  Later, Senator Hillary Clinton, on the verge of announcing her presidential bid, asked Gates, "Can you tell us when and how you came to the conclusion that you expressed in your testimony, that we were not winningóa conclusion different from the president's?"

  "I think that, frankly, if the president thought that the current tactics and strategy that we were employing were successful, he wouldn't be looking for fresh eyes and looking for new approaches and new tactics in our situation in Iraq," Gates said. "I suppose that I came to that conclusion during my service on the Iraq Study Group, which was really the first time I'd had the opportunity to look at some of these circumstances in detail."

  "We have this conundrum," Clinton continued. "We have a president and a vice president who will ultimately decideóas the president is fond of saying, he is the decideróabout the direction to pursue going forward in Iraq. And it is quite frustrating to many of us to see the mistakes that have been madeósome of which you have enumeratedóand to wonder whether there is any change that will be pursued by the president. Do you have an opinion as to how and when the process will occur that might lead to some changes in options and strategies?"

  "My sense, Senator Clinton," said Gates, "is that that this process is going to proceed with considerable urgency."

  * * *

  Their report complete after eight months of work, the Iraq Study Group members met privately with President Bush just after sunrise on Wednesday, December 6, in the Cabinet Room of the White House. Baker and Hamilton summarized the unanimous report, subtitled "The Way ForwardóA New Approach," which urged a drawdown of troops with the goal of having all combat brigades not necessary for protecting a smaller U.S.

  contingent out of Iraq by the first quarter of 2008. In addition, the group recommended a diplomatic initiative, including talks with Iran and Syria.

  "Mr. President," Panetta said, "you've got the work of five Democrats and five Republicans who've tried to come to a consensus here, and it's really important to look at these recommendations. I don't know of any president that can conduct a war with a divided nation. This gives you at least the opportunity to try to begin to repair the divisions that have taken place and try to unify the country."

  Bush nodded but didn't say anything.

  When Chuck Robb had a chance to speak, he noted that the report said, "We could, however, support a short-term redeployment or surge of American combat forces to stabilize Baghdad."

  After all the members had spoken, reporters and photographers were ushered into the Cabinet Room at 7:58 A.M.

  "I just received the Iraq Study Group report, prepared by a distinguished panel of our fellow citizens," the president said. "We will take every proposal seriously." He noted that he probably would not agree with all of its 79

  recommendations. "It, nevertheless, is an opportunity to come together and to work together on this important issue.

  The country, in my judgment, is tired of pure political bickering that happens in Washington, and they understand that on this important issue of war and peace, it is best for our country to work together.

  "This report will give us all an opportunity to find common ground, for the good of the countryónot for the good of the Republican Party or the Democrat Party, but for the good of the country." It was perhaps the strongest bipartisan statement Bush had made since the invasion of Iraq. He was effusive in his praise of the study group members. "You could be doing a lot of other things. You could have had a lot more simple life than to allow your government to call you back into service, but you did allow us to call you back into service, and you've made a vital contribution to the countryÖ. We applaud your work."

  He's going to accept our ideas, Perry thought.

  As Bush was leaving the Cabinet Room, Robb again urged that he consider the provision supporting a "surge." A smile stretched across Bush's face, and he promised that he indeed would.

  Bush said later that he understood that it was Robb who had first voiced the concept of the surge months earlier.

  Robb, he recalled, "was very encouraging, and during the meetings, he would sayóhe's a kind guyó'Hang in there, Mr. President.' He was the kind of person that was hoping we'd succeed."

  The news media treated the release of the Iraq Study Group report as if it might mark a turning point in the war. "Iraq Panel Proposes a Major Strat
egy Shift," The Washington Post said. "Panel Urges Basic Shift in U.S. Policy in Iraq,"

  read the headline in The New York Times.

  "This was such a sobering report!" said Tim Russert, NBC News Washington bureau chief. "Powerful, passionate, bipartisan, unanimousóI think it's not only a wake-up call for the Bush White House, but I think for the whole country."

  "There's almost a biblical thing about wise elderly people," added Representative Frank Wolf, the Virginia Republican whose idea it had been to create the study group. "They can speak truth."

  * * *

  Hadley realized that the president was going to go with the surge. It was the only option that seemed to offer a bold change. Talk of an exit seemed absurd to Bush. The Iraq Study Group's ability to turn the tide in any other direction was neutralized because the members unanimously agreed that they could support a "short-term redeployment or surge of American combat forces." So Hadley continued his deliberate strategy to bend the Iraqi and U.S. governments to Bush's will. But there were obstacles.

  First, Maliki wasn't on board. His most recent position, at his November 30 meeting with the president in Amman, Jordan, had been "I don't need your forces. We can do it ourselves. We should do it ourselves."

  A second obstacle was the military. With Rumsfeld finally out, they would have to make sure Gates continued to support a surge. But Casey remained opposed. He and Abizaid would have to be replaced. The Joint Chiefs and their Council of Colonels were a problem, but Hadley knew he could sway General Pace by making it clear to the chairman what the commander in chief wanted.