by mike Evans
MDE:
James Woolsey has said that we’ve treated the war on terrorism to some degree over the years as more of a law enforcement problem. You know, what’s your opinion of that?
Gen. Shelton:
Well, I think probably that analogy to law enforcement is the fact that they’re not a good military target. They are more like a law enforcement target. Fighting terrorism is more akin to fighting organized crime. You want to decapitate them for sure. You want to deny them their sanctuaries for sure. But you also want to go after their economics, their base of support. You want to do everything politically and diplomatically that you can.
Unlike a military organization, they don’t have tanks and airplanes and infrastructure that you can attack and bomb and whatever. So you’ve got to go after individuals, and in that regard it’s more like fighting crime than it is going after military. But again, the military is an integral piece of it, and in support of the FBI or in support of the CIA, it’s a very potent piece of it—but it’s only a piece and, to some degree, a relatively small piece….
MDE:
In our current confrontation with Iran, who would you really say at this point is winning?
Gen. Shelton:
You know, the confrontation with Iran, I think to some degree, you’d have to say, since there is no open conflict between the two nations, that the Iranians are getting away with a lot more than they should be allowed to get away with. Their continuous pursuit of a nuclear weapon even in the face of an international community telling them to stop, their resistance to do that, their continuous support of terrorism as the world’s largest exporter of terrorism resources, advisors, et cetera, tells me that they’re getting away with a lot that they should not be getting away with, and therefore I have to put them in a “win column” because they’re doing a lot more than they should be allowed to do against the international community and against America….
MDE:
You know, as far as talking about whether or not Iran is winning or losing in this confrontation, what do you think that their potential—what their mentality is or opinion—regarding who’s winning or losing?
Gen. Shelton:
I’d say that’s a good question. It’s a tough question. I think from the Iranian standpoint right now in their minds, they think they’re winning, and I think they feel like they’re winning because they have been able to get away with attacks on Khobar Towers. They’ve been able to get away with support of the radicals and fundamentalists without—you know, through both resources as well as through advisors—without having their hand called at it. They have continued to defy the UN as they pursue nuclear power, and they keep getting warnings, and it’s somewhat reminiscent of the warnings that the Taliban were getting to stop supporting Al Qaeda or they were going to pay the price. But they didn’t stop until 9/11, and we went in and took out the Taliban. So I think Iran is in the same seat right now, and in their minds they’re doing very well.
MDE:
I think there are examples of where we have gone in and addressed it fully and completely, like taking out the Taliban. You can possibly come up with other examples where we have stepped out of the situation and maybe didn’t respond as fully. Do you feel like Iran has a reason to believe that America doesn’t have the will to act and to truly take military action against them?
Gen. Shelton:
Well, if I were sitting in Iran right now with my Iranian hat on and I had defied America, if I had defied the UN inc my pursuit of a nuclear weapon—nuclear power for sure; potentially a nuclear weapon—if I had continued to provide the resources, the wherewithal, for a lot of the activities being directed against America around the world and was not having my hand called at it, I would think that I’m doing pretty well. I’m walking that fine line the way I’ve stayed just outside enough to, offering enough provocation to America to come at me directly, and yet I’m getting away with an awful lot in the process and I’m damaging, probably, their self-esteem. But I’m damaging their reputation for sure.
MDE:
When you look at the various alternatives that we have in relationship to Iran, compare the ease or difficulty with which we can potentially do an invasion versus actually make peace. You know, which do you think is potentially the easier road? Do you think that it’s impossible to make peace, or do you think the invasion is sort of a hopeless route as well? Or—you know, compare the two.
Gen. Shelton:
I think when you look at Iran, you have to put it in the context of how would you go about either one. How would you go about waging war against them? How would you go about pursuing peace with the greatest degree of leverage in your favor? And in my opinion, that is in an international environment. It is either through a coalition of United Nations partners or United Nations efforts or a coalition of European partners that you pursue peace.
And certainly if you want to—if you are going to go in and take out their nuclear capability—if it’s going to become an outright shooting war between Iran and whoever starts the invasion—it’s in America’s best interest to use the international community that is also being rebuffed by the Iranians, not just America, and form a coalition. Use those political and diplomatic tools that I talked about. Get that coalition put together just like we did in Desert Storm—Desert Shield/Desert Storm—and use that coalition either to bring pressure against them to settle peacefully and accept a UN supervision of their nuclear development, or use them to go in and take it and do whatever you feel you need to do militarily that the international community feels is necessary.
MDE:
If we actually do go in after Ahmadinejad, what would the first strike look like? What steps might actually have to be taken?
Gen. Shelton:
You know, I would not want to speculate on that. I am too knowledgeable, you might say, of what some of the plans for dealing with the Iranians are if we had to deal with them—in waging war. But I would only say that I would hope that unlike some of the plans that we’ve got, that for the most part have been operational plans that have been developed by America, that we would take the time to develop those same types of plans with partners, with a coalition. And I think, needless to say, it should be overwhelming. It should be fast and with a follow-up plan that says, “Here’s how we’re going to deal with it in Phase 4,” so to speak, unlike what we did when we went into Iraq.
MDE:
Can you speak to the advantages or disadvantages of pursuing a regime change?
Gen. Shelton:
I don’t think there’s any question that if it came down to the decision that we’re going to go into Iran and we’re going to have a regime change, hopefully, we’d be able to do that in an international—with an international force. I think that’s extremely important because of the perception throughout the Middle East that America is there just for the oil. We’re not there just for the oil, as all of us know. We’re there to try to provide a peaceful and stable environment in a part of the world in vital national interest to the United States.
And so if you’ve elected to go into Iran, you want to do it as part of an international force. After all, they’re defying the international community now with their nuclear program—not just America but the international—the UN—and, therefore, it should be the UN that makes that decision. And then in terms of what you’re going to do once you go in, I think you’re going to replace the regime. They’ve got to come out. They’ve been uncooperative. They have resulted in you having to go to war.
So consequently, you need to think through right upfront, who have we got? Who’s in the wings? Who are the moderates in the country right now that you could then reach out to once you had removed that regime—and re-establish them as the central government and a plan to follow on—to help them get back on their feet with the new leadership in that country?
Needless to say, it’s always easier to get in than it is to get out. We’ve learned that time and time again. But it’s a lot e
asier to get out if you’ve got a good plan going in for transitioning into the nation-building aspect of it, and from that a withdrawal plan to pull all of your forces out or remain—a small contingent that stays as part of an international force until the new government is fully stood up and ready to maintain peace and security themselves.
MDE:
With our open borders and ports, we have all kinds of cargo packages arriving in our ports every month. How serious is the threat of a dirty bomb, and then what kind of space would even be required for the components needed to assemble a dirty bomb?
Gen. Shelton:
Well, when you look at, you know, the same rights, privileges, and freedoms that make America the envy of the world in terms of the freedoms we enjoy as individuals are also, in the eyes of the Al Qaedas of the world—the terrorists—our greatest threat, our greatest weakness. It is the porous borders that we have, and no matter how hard we try to protect them, if you look at the miles and miles of Canadian border or even our own abilities to try to stop the infiltration along the southwest border, it’s just—it’s hard.
And therefore, I say it’s not a matter of when we’re attacked—I mean not a matter of if—it’s a matter of when. And anyone that really puts their mind to it and has time on their side and has the resources can eventually get the stuff where they need it in the United States to carry out an attack. What’s our greatest defense? Our greatest defense is the intelligence community, and it has to be done on a worldwide basis. It is tips that you pick up that are coming out of Germany or just recently out of the United Kingdom, or coming out of Australia.
I mean, if you look down in Indonesia, the fourth largest nation in the world, the largest Muslim nation in the world, it’s in the process of disintegrating. It’s an ideal breeding ground for terrorism, and it could be the next training ground for Al Qaeda. Well, just because it’s in Indonesia doesn’t mean it can’t come here and attack New York City or Los Angeles or whatever. So intelligence is how we’re going to do it, and that’s going to have to be an international effort, not just a United States effort. And if we’re good at it, if we really devote the attention that we need to and the resources, I think that’s our best defense against terrorism….
MDE:
How do you think that the terrorists are using the media against us?
Gen. Shelton:
Well, in a war of ideas—in informational warfare—the media is a powerful tool, and I think that what we find here is the terrorists unfortunately are a lot more effective in some cases of using that to their advantage than we are using it to ours. A typical example is you have an Al Jazeera that is propagating their propaganda throughout the Middle East, and yet our ability to get in as an international community—not just the United States, but everyone—to show all the good things that are happening in a lot of these countries—whether it’s Iraq and the numerous schools we’ve rebuilt, or the number of hospitals that have been reopened.
You just got to bombard them with this stuff, and some people would call it propaganda. It’s not propaganda; it’s information. And it’s getting the right information back out to the people that need it, and those are people that are making the decision as to whether or not they’re going to believe what the radicals are saying or if they’re going to believe what their own eyes are telling them—that things are getting better. You know, things are better in their life today than they were under Saddam Hussein—or under whomever. We can do a lot better, and it needs to be a really focused effort for the United States to really win this war of ideas.
MDE:
What would you say are the basic triggers that could prompt military action against Iran?
Gen. Shelton:
Well, certainly, when it comes to Iran, I think any kind of an overt military action against America—whether it was shooting one of our warplanes or transport planes or shooting down, you know, sinking one of our warships, or just an overt action of any type against us. And I would like to think that any type of a terrorist attack that immediately had, you know, a smoking gun associated with it, that Iran would pay one heck of a price by our own national retaliatory policy against terrorists.
So that’s what should happen. I think everyone understands that. That’s a policy everyone understands. If you aid, support, help, or in any other way assist a terrorist outfit and your fingerprints are on it, you’re going to be treated just like a terrorist yourself—and I think the Iranians are smart enough to understand that as well.
MDE:
Iran seems to have succeeded in utilizing four thousand missiles in its recent attack from Lebanon into Israel. They have boasted that they’ve got fifty-two thousand suicide bombers ready to attack the West, to go into America. How realistic is a scenario like that? Gen. Shelton: Well, I would not put anything past Iran as the world’s largest supporter of terrorism, from having a large number of missiles, a large number of all types of chemical or biological weapons that they could have at their disposal. I mean, here’s an outfit that sends missile technology that is illegal by the UN standards to the North Koreans, another member of the axis of evil. They’ll do about anything where they think it’s in their best interest or against America or our closest allies.
And so, you know, that’s part of the war of ideas and, you know, it tends to make you fear someone. You think fifty-two thousand suicide bombers. You know, it’s a great psychological weapon. I’ll turn them loose on you if you—you know.
Well, you know, get ready. We got something even bigger than fifty-two suicide bombers. It’s like someone who backs away because the Chinese have got 1.3 billion in population. You know, we say, well, we won’t stand up to them because they’re so big. We have a lot going for us in terms of our will to fight and the technology that we have, and we’ve got a heck of a lot of good allies around the world that, when push comes to shove, will show up and be there by our side.
MDE:
But nevertheless, you do feel like the threat of those kinds of things being thrown out has to be taken seriously?
Gen. Shelton:
When the president of a nation stands up and boasts that he’s going to eliminate another nation from the face of the earth—when he boasts that he has large numbers of suicide bombers—when he talks about his missile technology or what he would plan to do to hurt other nations—I think that has to be taken very seriously, not only by America, but by the United Nations and our other allies and friends as well.
MDE:
Benjamin Netanyahu said that the issues with the Cold War, for example, are so much different than those today and the way we are having to deal with other countries like Iran. Can you compare the way that we were maybe able to deter the Soviets with the way that we’re having to address Iran? You know, I think essentially the ideology of the Soviets was pretty well dead by the mid-’50s, and so I think that our ability to negotiate with them was maybe a little bit different. Can you compare the two?
Gen. Shelton:
Well, I think that when you look at the Cold War versus the post–Cold War, the Cold War was considerably simpler. The reason I say that is because here you had two superpowers, the United States and Russia, which had the Soviet Union and all of its partners in the Warsaw Pact countries, et cetera, lined up against the United Nations and all of its partners. And no one stepped out of line without checking with the leader—and America being the leader of the free world; Russia being the leader—and when that wall came down and all those nations broke away from the Russians, it became a much more complicated world because you no longer had just the two superpowers talking.
You had independent actors now doing their thing and no one kind of a reign in power, and then you saw the outbreak of the ethnic, religious, and tribal wars around the world. And when you look at America, our commitment of forces went up over 300 percent in the ten years following the wall coming down than it had been in the previous twenty-five years. It’s just a phenomenal number of things that started to
happen when this big coalition on each side went away, and suddenly hatred in all these tribes and, you know, it started breaking out.
And so it is more complicated in today’s world for sure, and we have to build new coalitions, and we have to build new partnerships, and in some cases they’re small groups that are united against specific threats. In others, they can be large like against the Iranian nuclear threat. There could be a rather large—like the United Nations coalition against the Iranians—but it is considerably more complicated, for sure.
MDE:
What would you consider our greatest obstacles in establishing the coalition that we need?
Gen. Shelton:
I think today the biggest obstacle that America has is the fact that we went into Iraq for the most part alone. Consequently, a lot of people are seeing the commitments that we’ve had to make for that—both in terms of troops as well as our national resources—and they’re starting to question whether or not they want to become a part of anything like that—and they, you know, start to drain their economy or start to deploy. A lot of these countries have really reduced the size of their militaries as a result of the Cold War going away, to where they have very little left and not a lot of forces to contribute to major war-fighting efforts.
And so I believe today that probably there’s a lot of resistance to joining any kind of a coalition that might get them involved in something like we’re involved in, in Iraq—and that’s something we’re going to have to overcome. We’re going to have to work hard at it to convince all of them again that, you know, you’ve got to stand for what’s right, and it may mean sacrifice by your people. It may mean using a military that’s relatively small and giving them some fatigue like our armed forces are experiencing right now. But in the end, it’s doing what’s right for peace and security throughout the world—not just worrying about their own little piece of it.
