[A-List] US state: internal struggle over Iraq

["Michael Keaney" <michael.keaney@xxxxxx>]

Pentagon squares off against Powell, Europe
By Jim Lobe
Asia Times, April 3 2003

WASHINGTON - Even as United States troops grind their way toward Baghdad,
the administration of President George W Bush remains at odds over its
post-war plans to occupy Iraq. The main issue - who will be in charge of the
occupation - pits the Pentagon against the State Department and its allies
in Europe, notably British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

The Pentagon appears determined to maintain as much power for itself and its
favorites in the opposition Iraqi National Congress (INC) as possible, while
the State Department, backed by the intelligence community and Blair, is
arguing for major roles for other US allies, the United Nations and other
opposition figures.

The Pentagon recently vetoed as many as eight current and former State
Department officials for key posts in the occupation administration,
according to the Washington Post. Excluded were a number of former
ambassadors and high-level foreign service officers with expertise in the
Arab world.

Some sources said that they were vetoed because they were "run-of-the-mill"
and not "doers", while others revealed that they were opposed by Under
Secretary of Defense for Policy, Douglas Feith, who has supported Israel's
Likud Party in the past and is said to consider some candidates to be too
pro-Arab, a bias that neo-conservatives believe is endemic to the State
Department's Near East bureau. Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld has also
reportedly insisted that all relief and aid work come under the jurisdiction
of retired army general Jay Garner, the coordinator of the Pentagon's office
of reconstruction and humanitarian assistance, who will report directly to
the chief of the US Central Command, General Tommy Franks.

Secretary of State Colin Powell argued in a letter to Rumsfeld last week
that US government relief work should be headed by the US Agency for
International Development, which reports to the State Department. He
reportedly said that international agencies and voluntary relief groups were
unlikely to accept an arrangement in which they reported to the military.
The aid groups themselves have called for the United Nations to assume
control of relief operations.

But the Pentagon rejects that scheme. In testimony late last week, Feith
insisted that as long as the situation on the ground is insecure, the
military has to remain in control. "If things go well, we will be able to
hand things over to the Iraqis so there would be no need for UN
participation," he said.

In addition to being opposed by Powell and the relief groups, the Pentagon's
anti-UN position has come under fire from Blair and the European Union,
which has long called for a major role for the world body in any relief and
reconstruction effort, similar to that it assumed in Afghanistan after the
ouster of the Taliban. "We believe that the UN must continue to play a
central role during and after the crisis," EU leaders said last week.
France, in particular, has threatened to veto any Security Council
resolution that subordinates the UN to a US occupation authority.

The breach between the Pentagon on the one hand and Powell, the aid groups
and the Europeans on the other, has become so serious that 29 prominent
Democrats, neo-conservatives and right-wing Republicans published a joint
letter this week that they proposed as the basis for an acceptable
compromise.

Signed by analysts and former policy makers from the mainstream Brookings
Institution and the Council on Foreign Relations and from right-wing think
tanks such as the American Enterprise Institute and the Hoover Institution,
the letter called for Washington to "seek passage of a Security Council
resolution that endorses the establishment of a civilian administration in
Iraq, authorizes the participation of UN relief and reconstruction agencies,
[and] welcomes the deployment of a security stabilization force by NATO
allies".

"While some seem determined to create an ever deeper divide between the
United States and Europe, and others seem indifferent to the long term
survival of the trans-Atlantic partnership," the letter stated in what some
sources called an implicit rebuke to both Rumsfeld and French President
Jacques Chirac, "we believe it is essential, even in the midst of war, to
begin building a new era of trans-Atlantic cooperation".

"To my mind, it's a statement of opposition to the 'scorched earth' sense we
have crossed the Rubicon and we can do everything by ourselves," said one
right-wing signer, Tod Lindberg of the Hoover Institution.

"The message is: 1) The US doesn't need to go it alone; and 2) That it
can't," said Lee Feinstein, another signer and former Bill Clinton official
currently with the Council on Foreign Relations.

While the administration may indeed opt for such a solution, it appears
clear for now that the Pentagon is still insisting on complete control of
the occupation.

The Washington Post reported on Monday that the Defense Department was
insisting on a prominent role for former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
director R James Woolsey, a protege of the controversial former chairman of
Rumsfeld's Defense Policy Board (DPB), Richard Perle, who has also been one
of the most outspoken champions of radical change throughout the Arab Middle
East.

Woolsey, who also helped lead the media campaign to link Iraq to al-Qaeda
and who has blamed Saudi Arabia's Wahhabi establishment for anti-US
sentiment in the region, was reportedly being promoted by Feith as the
occupation's minister of information, but other officials thought that his
previous link to the CIA might reduce his credibility in that post. Woolsey
has also been one of the strongest Washington supporters of the INC, and its
controversial leader Ahmed Chalabi.

Both Woolsey and Garner have been associated with the Jewish Institute of
National Security Affairs (JINSA), which promotes military and strategic
ties between the US and Israel. Woolsey serves on the board of advisers of
JINSA, as well as the Pentagon's DPB, and several other neo-conservative
groups, including Americans for Victory Over Terrorism.

Garner, who was also promoted by Feith and Perle as the best candidate for
administering the occupation, helped the humanitarian effort to save
hundreds of thousands of Kurdish refugees in northern Iraq in 1991. He
visited Israel as a guest of JINSA in 1998 and in October 2000 was one of 26
US military leaders to sign a staunchly pro-Israel statement released by
JINSA that condemned the escalating Palestinian intifada.