"The answer to everything is to appoint a committee, and then you have to help the committee," Petraeus complained privately, though he maintained that things did get done over time, however slowly.
During that same meeting with senior officials, Petraeus and the ministers couldn't agree on which phone numbers to use for the new joint security stations throughout Baghdad, which were manned by U.S. troops, Iraqi army and Iraqi policeóthe heart of Petraeus's population security strategy. As it turned out, some of the stations didn't even have telephone landlines. After much discussion, they settled on some cell phone numbers for the stations.
On another occasion, Petraeus scolded an Iraqi lieutenant general for the lack of junior officers and noncommissioned officers (NCOs) in the Iraqi army. "We all know what the problem is," Petraeus said angrily. "The problem is that you don't have an NCO corps or junior officers who'll hold your soldiers to standards. Everybody knows this. We've been talking about it for months." In the U.S. Army, noncommissioned and junior officers are the heart and soul of an effective unit. "So where's your plan to get the NCOs? We should be talking here about how to fix the problem, not your coming in wasting our time telling us a problem we all already know."
Afterward, Petraeus stopped an American adviser to the Iraqis and said he wanted to ask the Iraqi lieutenant general to lunch. "Tell him that I really think highly of him and I was just trying to help him," he said. "Tell him I'm not attacking him personally."
At one meeting of the Ministerial Committee on National Security (MCNS), which included Maliki and other top officials in the government, the problem at hand was that the acting minister of transportation had failed to pay the bill for six months to Global Strategies Group, a British contractor that supplied security at Baghdad International Airport. The contract, worth $500 million a year, was in danger of lapsing.
"The problem," said Barham Salih, the deputy prime minister, "is that other countries won't bring their planes here without security assurances."
"This is a huge situation," Petraeus said. "It's not only here, but we have to work also on Basra and the seaport at Umm Qasr that are equally important because that's the only seaport in the country. There must be a firm trusted by the international air carriers charged with security." If not, flights would cease in Baghdad, further isolating the country. Iraq's place in the new global economy could suffer a serious, if not irreparable, setback.
The top ministers in Iraq, along with the country's prime minister and the American commanding general, then turned to the issue of scrap metal. Petraeus cited a study that showed Iraq had as much as $16 billion of scrap metal strewn all over the country. It included shipwrecks that were obstructing the port at Umm Qasr. He said that the minister of industry and minerals would require $75 million to begin the project to clean up and reuse the scrap. But he noticed that the $75 million was not there.
Salih confirmed that the money wasn't in the budget. He said they hoped to privatize the scrap metal project. He promised to keep working on it.
* * *
At 1 P.M. on October 2, Iraqi National Security Adviser Mowaffak al-Rubaie went to see Rice at the State Department. Though he was keenly aware that Petraeus and Crocker were calling most of the shots in his country, a new "Status of Forces Agreement" that would allow U.S. forces to remain in Iraq needed to be negotiated. "We don't necessarily need to publicize this," Rubaie told her. Prime Minister Maliki wanted to "eliminate the irritants that are apparent violations of Iraqi sovereignty." "This is really Doug Lute's problem," Rice said, shifting the responsibility to the new Iraq coordinator in the White House, the 1975 West Point graduate Bush had appointed the administration's "war czar" for Iraq and Afghanistan nearly five months earlier. "He will be the team leader for the United States in getting this relationship developed."
"Well, you have to help us," Rubaie said.
Rice said a working group needed to be set up, but at a meeting she'd attended, Bush had told Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, "They don't want this agreement to happen in the middle of the U.S. election's political season. Because then will it not only be difficult to pass in the U.S., but it may be impossible under those circumstances to pass in Iraq."
"We need a stronger central government," Rubaie said. "And this one isn't. It won't be strong unless you, the United States, become much more aggressive with those people who are obstructionists." He meant the Sunnis and their foreign allies such as the Saudis.
"Okay," Rice replied, "Who do we need to push? What do we need to push?"
"Help us with the political bloc leaders" such as Hashimi, the Sunni vice president of Iraq, he said, "so that they know that they cannot simply resort to violence rather than participate in the political process. You take care of the Sunni party, and we'll take care of Moqtada. We'll take care of the Shia."
Rice asked about the administrative boundaries of the provinces, an issue in dispute.
"There is a general paralysis," Rubaie said. "Total stagnation."
"Why?"
"Because all these administrative boundaries are written in blood," Rubaie said. "And no one will agree voluntarily to change them. There'll be a fight about it." He added, "Very simply, only you, the United States, have enough influence to influence the region. We do not. Only you, by a real dialogue, can do something about Syria and Iran.
We cannot."
* * *
At 3 P.M. that day, General Doug Lute met Rubaie in a small conference room adjacent to the White House Situation Room. Rubaie told him the Iraqis were having real problems buying U.S. weapons. "We would prefer to have the majority of our weapons in the army, at least, to be to U.S. and NATO standards." "To be perfectly frank with you," Lute said, "what we have is a Cold War system. Deputy Secretary England is in charge of reforming the foreign military sales system to meet the needs in Afghanistan and particularly Iraq," and a team was working on it.
"Well, we have to put this on the fast track," Rubaie said. The system was way too slow.
Lute agreed, but the system had needed reform for years.
"If you have a problem, call direct," Lute said. "Here's a bunch of my cards." He handed Rubaie several of his White House business cards.
On the sensitive issue of Sadr's militias, Rubaie said it was better for the Iraqi security forces to go after them. "Even if we do it dirtier," he said, "even if we make mistakes, even if we take more casualties, let us do it. We're willing to spill more blood."
"Well," Lute said, "I thought the Iraq security forces did most of this, anyway."
"In reality, no," Rubaie said. "The U.S. is moving the security forces there. It's all seen as a U.S. operation, not as an independent Iraqi operation. Let us make mistakes while you're still around."
* * *
On October 4, Rubaie went to see Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England and Eric Edelman, the undersecretary for policy. Rubaie told them that Maliki and his government would need lots of help to show more progress by April 2008, when Petraeus and Crocker were scheduled to give their next report to Congress.
"If the Congress doesn't see you as progressing," England said, "we don't get the money, we can't help you, and it's over."
"I have a message from the prime minister," Rubaie said. "It's for the secretary"ómeaning Gates. "It's about the Iraqi security volunteers, who some people are calling the Sunni militias. In the mixed areas, because the government of Iraq has to be in charge, it has to be the paymaster." But currently, the United States was paying them. "The coalition is persuaded to go for a quick fix, but the government of Iraq has to be in the lead. It has to establish its policy and its processes. And this is an area of enormous friction between us." The Shia-led government didn't like the many arrangements with Sunnis. He continued, "This looks like an act of desperation by the coalition, who is finding any way that it can to generate force so it can leave." He said this "quick fix technique" could succeed only in all-Sunni or all-Shia areas. "Even in Sadr City, there is a 10 percent Sunni po
pulation."
"Petraeus and Odierno are certainly aware of this," said Edelman.
"Yes," Rubaie replied. "But realize that the people brought in have to be seen as value added to the Iraqi security forces, not undermining themÖ. It is a first principle of unity of command that one person be in charge."
While he was at it, Rubaie also complained again about the slowness of acquiring U.S. weapons, warning them,
"This will slow down your drawdown."
* * *
Jack Keane heard through the Pentagon grapevine that Admiral Michael Mullen, the newly appointed chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, had told colleagues that one of his first plans was to "get Keane back in the box." Keane called and arranged an appointment with Mullen. "This is a difficult session for me," Mullen said, "but I don't want you going to Iraq anymore and helping Petraeus."
"What the hell? What are you talking about?" Keane asked.
"You've diminished the office of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs," Mullen said. It wasn't clear to the American people who was actually in charge of the military.
"C'mon, stop it," Keane said. "The American people don't even know who the hell I am. This is Washington, D.C., stuff. You can't be serious."
"Yeah, I am," Mullen said.
Keane tried to tell him how in late 2006 he had gone to Rumsfeld and Pace with his complaints about the Iraq War strategy. He had wound up meeting with the president on December 11, 2006, because General Pace had recommended him.
"You probably resent the fact that I've been supporting Petraeus and the execution of the policy and tried to insulate him and protect him from some of the stuff that's going on in this town and in this building," Keane said. "I don't make any apologies for that."
Mullen said that he had become acutely aware of the strains on the Army and the Marine Corps. Military families were shouldering the strain, and the military was losing quality officers.
"Mike, all of that's true," Keane said. "But this is true every time we fight a war of any consequence." Wars break armies, and they have to be put back together. That's the price of war. But the price was worth it. "You've not talked one time about winning here, Mike. Not one time, have you mentionedÖ'I want to win in Iraq.' I mean, do you?"
It was an insulting question to put to a fellow military man.
"Of course, I want to win," Mullen said.
"I assume you do," Keane replied, "but to the degree that you're putting pressure on Petraeus to reduce forces, you're taking far too much risk, and that risk is in losing and not winning."
"Well," Mullen said, "we're just going to disagree."
"You really don't want me to help Petraeus?" Keane asked. "Dave Petraeus, no matter who he wants to talk to over there, no matter what size he is, shape he is, what his views are, given Petraeus's responsibilityóhe's got the toughest job anybody in uniform hasówhy wouldn't you let him have that?"
"No," Mullen said, "I don't want to take the chance. I don't want you to do it."
End of meeting.
Afterward, when Keane couldn't get clearance to go to Iraq, he called Petraeus, who told him that he had met with Mullen in Iraq before he had taken over as chairman and that Mullen had told him he didn't want Keane coming again. "I was really surprised," Petraeus said.
Petraeus told Mullen that he could understand how the chairman would not appreciate Keane's involvement. But it wasn't meddling. Keane was providing military advice to the president, the vice president and Petraeus himself.
"Perhaps you could consider embracing him and trying to draw on that over time."
"No," Mullen said. It was too soon in his tenure, and he was trying to reestablish the authority of the chairman's office.
Keane called John Hannah in Cheney's office to report what had happened. Shortly afterward, Keane received a call from Army Lieutenant General Skip Sharp, the director of Mullen's Joint Staff.
"We have an unusual request," Sharp said. "We have a request from the White House to provide assurances that General Keane will be able to visit Iraq and assist General Petraeus as he has been doing in the past." Sharp was apparently doing some staff work before passing the request to Admiral Mullen. "This is really bizarre. Do you have any idea why this would be happening?"
"Yeah, of course," Keane said. "I've been told I can't go."
"Who told you that?"
"The chairman." There was a long silence as Sharp realized it was his boss. "Skip, are you there?"
"I'm trying to figure out what the hell is going on here."
Keane later spoke with Lieutenant General Chiarelli, Gates's military assistant.
"The secretary has received some notes," Chiarelli said, so now the secretary and his office are telling everyone,
"General Keane, as in the past, as well as in the future, can go into Iraq to assist General Petraeus whenever they want it to happen. We have no problem with any of that."
Vice President Cheney had noticed Admiral Mullen putting the hammer down on Keane. He didn't agree, so he had sent a note and talked to Gates about how important Keane's assistance had been. The president had also requested that Keane be allowed back in Iraq.
Chapter 40
President Talabani, a main Kurdish leader, had once said, "Iraq is like a bouquet of flowersómany different, but who nonetheless combine into one." Satterfield thought of Iraq more like a tank of "mutually carnivorous fish."
The intelligence and diplomatic reporting continued to show that several of Maliki's top aides were highly sectarian with strong ties to individuals or movements deeply opposed to the U.S. presence in Iraq, such as Iranians and Sadrists.
Foremost among these aides was Bassima al-Jaidri, an intense woman with three graduate degrees whom one senior U.S. intelligence official described as "anti-Western, anti-American, anti-occupation." Jaidri and Prime Minister Maliki had become confidants, according to intelligence and military officials. She had enormous influence and had used her position in Maliki's office to order Iraqi army generals and others in the government to halt operations against Shia militia members.
"Don't arrest that person," Jaidri would order, and the generals would comply. "Halt that operation," she would say, and they would obey. The previous year, she had been instrumental in the widespread cleansing of Sunnis from neighborhoods in Baghdad. The American embassy, the U.S. intelligence agencies and Petraeus's command had spent countless hours trying unsuccessfully to figure out how to get her out of Maliki's office. Their efforts, including one to get her an ambassadorship abroad, failed.
Jaidri continued to wield immense power. At one point in 2007, despite her strong anti-Sunni disposition, Maliki appointed her to head the committee for national reconciliation that was supposed to bring the Shia and Sunnis together. The intelligence analysts could hardly believe it.
Satterfield reported to Rice that Maliki was increasingly losing touch with reality. Sadr and his Mahdi Army had fragmented and were on the run, and Maliki attributed this to his own leadership genius. He also credited his efforts with the Anbar Awakening and the recruitment of the Sunni Concerned Local Citizens, which were fighting al Qaeda and helping reduce violence in key areas. Maliki's misguided narrative went something like this: Iraq is back on its feet. Everything's fine. We've turned the corner.
Whenever Crocker, Petraeus, Satterfield or other Americans tried to push Maliki, he invoked the support he had from Bush. "I have the support of the president," Maliki said once. "I don't have to listen to you."
In Washington, the president and his principals debated what to do. Bush felt he had developed an important personal relationship with Maliki, and he judged that if he had too blunt a conversation with the prime minister, he might push him too far, causing him to retreat and withdraw. Puncturing Maliki's self-esteem could backfire.
Maliki had been living an incredibly stressful life over the last 18 months. Too much push, Bush concluded, and they could wind up with a new government and a new leader. And who might that be? No
one knew. How long might it take? No one had any idea. The intelligence analysts said there was no one on the horizon to take Maliki's place.
They said his fall could create "total chaos." They would be taking "a leap into the unknown," the president said. No, thank you. The others could push and be blunt with Maliki, but not him. He would stick with the prime minister they had and continue to support and reassure Maliki both publicly and privately.
* * *
That winter, Petraeus's evening reading was again about the Civil War. This time it was April 1865: The Month That Saved America, by Jay Winik. Petraeus read about his hero, General Ulysses S. Grant, and his efforts to force Robert E. Lee out of Richmond.
"We've got to squeeze them everywhere," Grant declared, a strategy that Petraeus had adopted in Iraq. At one point, Lee was desperately trying to reach a train that was supposed to have food supplies for his starving soldiers. Lee rushed forward, racing on his famous horse, Traveller, and threw open the boxcar doors. He found only ammunition.
General Lee, Petraeus read, made sure not to let his shoulders slump in front of his men. He didn't want them to sense his frustration. Petraeus took comfort in what generals before him had gone through and embraced the importance of leading even in the face of doubt and disappointment. He resolved that his soldiers would never see his shoulders slump.
* * *
On Tuesday, December 18, a week before Christmas, Rice flew to Iraq, where she visited a Provincial Reconstruction Team in Kirkuk and then went on to Baghdad. That evening, she had a 25-minute routine meeting with Maliki, Petraeus and Crocker. At about 7:30 P.M., Rice asked the others to leave so she could talk privately with the prime minister. "You're not succeeding," she told him bluntly, and attempted to list all the management and political problems in his government. The negotiations over new U.N. Security Council resolutions and other matters could not be conducted with only the prime minister and members of his staff. In the future, negotiations would have to include a representative team of Sunnis and Kurds. "You cannot succeed alone," she said.
The War Within Page 41
