US army college attacks Bush terror policy

By Thomas Ricks

Washington Post

January 13, 2004

The United States' top training institution for military leaders has criticized the Bush Administration's handling of the war on terrorism. The Army War College accused the Administration of taking a detour into an "unnecessary" war in Iraq and pursuing an "unrealistic" quest against terrorism that might lead to US wars with nations that posed no serious threat.

Its report warns that as a result of those mistakes, the US Army is "near breaking point".

It recommends, among other things, scaling back the scope of the "global war on terrorism" and instead focusing on the narrower threat posed by the al-Qaeda terrorist network. "The global war on terrorism, as currently defined and waged, is dangerously indiscriminate and ambitious, and accordingly . . . its parameters should be readjusted," the report's author, Professor Jeffrey Record, a veteran defense specialist, writes.

At present, he adds, the anti-terrorism campaign "is strategically unfocused, promises more than it can deliver, and threatens to dissipate US military resources in an endless and hopeless search for absolute security".

Professor Record's report, published by the Army War College's Strategic Studies Institute, carries the standard disclaimer that its views are those of the author and don't necessarily represent those of the army, the Pentagon, or the Government.

But retired army colonel Douglas Lovelace, the director of the Army War College's Strategic Studies Institute, whose website carries the report, hardly distanced himself from it. "I think that the substance that Jeff brings out in the article really, really needs to be considered," he said.

Colonel Lovelace said the report's publication was approved by the Army War College's commandant, Major-General David Huntoon. He said he and General Huntoon expected the study to be controversial, but considered "it to be under the umbrella of academic freedom".

Larry DiRita, the top Pentagon spokesman, said he had not read the report. "If the conclusion is that we need to scale back in the war on terrorism, it's not likely to be on my reading list any time soon," he said.

Many of Professor Record's arguments, such as the contention that Saddam Hussein's Iraq was deterred and did not present a threat, have been made before by critics of the Administration.

Iraq, he concludes, "was a war-of-choice distraction from the war of necessity against" al-Qaeda. But it is unusual to have such views published by the War College, the army's premier academic institution. The essay also goes further than many critics in examining the Bush Administration's handling of the war on terrorism.

Professor Record's core criticism is that the Administration is biting off more than it can chew. He likens the scale of US ambitions in the war on terrorism to Hitler's overreach in World War II.

"A cardinal rule of strategy is to keep your enemies to a manageable number," he writes. "The Germans were defeated in two world wars . . . because their strategic ends outran their available means."

He scoffs at the Administration's policy, laid out by President George Bush in a November speech, of seeking to transform and democratize the Middle East. "The potential policy pay-off of a democratic and prosperous Middle East, if there is one, almost certainly lies in the very distant future," he writes. "The basis on which this democratic domino theory rests has never been explicated."

The report concludes with several recommendations. Some are fairly non-controversial, such as increasing the size of the army and Marine Corps, a position that appears to be gathering support in the US Congress.

But it also says the US should scale back its ambitions in Iraq, and be prepared to settle for a "friendly autocracy" there rather than a genuine democracy.