Bush report sharpens Iraq debate

Some analysts say a current overemphasis on the military role suggests the administration does not yet acknowledge the determining nature of Iraq's political state of affairs.

"There is still a tendency in the administration to see this as a military battle with a military outcome," said James Miller, a military expert at the Center for a New American Security, at a Washington forum evaluating the strategy this week. Regional and international diplomatic initiatives to address the Iraq conflict "are still way below what they need to be."

Bush announced he is sending Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to the Middle East in early August. On one level, that step will allow the administration in September to claim that diplomacy has not been shortchanged.

Indeed, the initiative will allow the White House to point to other than a military effort, given that little political progress in Iraq is anticipated in the weeks before the September assessment. The Iraqi government continues to be hobbled by boycotts by key ministers, in particular the Sunni bloc. The Iraqi parliament, which has yet to receive some key legislation from the government, including a crucial bill for oil revenue-sharing among sectarian communities, is set to take a month-long recess in August.

Executive-branch powers

Even as he issued a report demanded by Congress, Bush made clear that he does not look favorably on congressional efforts to encroach on policy territory he sees as the domain of the executive branch. "I don't think Congress ought to be running the war," he said. "I think they ought to be funding the troops."

That perspective on preserving executive prerogative is all the more poignant given that the report the White House issued Thursday was demanded by Republican Sen. John Warner of Virginia. Senator Warner had said in May that waiting for a September assessment was "too long," thus reflecting growing impatience with the war.

And even though the White House insists the interim report's "mixed" evaluation reflects a desire by the executive branch to be honest with Congress and get beyond political spin, some military experts say the report still fudges reality on the ground in Iraq.

In an analysis of the White House report card on the Iraq benchmarks, national security expert Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies says "the facts on the ground" demonstrate "that the Iraqi government has not really met the Bush administration's benchmarks in any major area."

Even on the military yardsticks the administration is emphasizing, progress is not necessarily what the administration is claiming, Mr. Cordesman says. The White House said the Iraqis had delivered a "satisfactory" response to the demand that it provide three trained battalions to support the security "surge" effort in Baghdad, for example. In his evaluation, however, Cordesman says that while delivery of the Iraqi forces was "more or less" on schedule, ongoing staffing levels were as low as 50 percent.

Iraqi security forces are allowed long periods for returning to families, and in some cases, their deployments to front combat lines are as short as three months. That is particularly galling to US troops who have seen their deployments extended from 12 to 15 months.

On the benchmark calling for Iraqi forces to provide "even-handed enforcement of the law," Cordesman rates compliance "a failure in Baghdad and nationally."

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