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Study Reveals Postwar US Flaws in Iraq |
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Thursday, 03 July 2008 |
A new Army history of the Iraq conflict faults the invasion's top US commander for his sudden decision to overhaul the Baghdad-based military command, The New York Times said in its Sunday edition.
The 696-page report, to be released Monday, documents problems that hampered the Army's ability to stabilize the country during the postwar stage.
The unclassified study focuses on the 18 months after US President George W. Bush announced in May 2003 that major combat operations in Iraq were over, the Times said.
The period, called Phase IV, was when the Army took on unanticipated occupation duties and was forced to develop new intelligence-gathering techniques, armor its Humvees, revise its tactics and, in the wake of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, review its detention practices.
"On Point II: Transitions to the New Campaign" concludes that Gen. Tommy R. Franks' decision, opposed by the Army's vice chief of staff, led to a short-staffed headquarters led by a newly promoted three-star general.
"The move was sudden and caught most of the senior commanders in Iraq unaware," the military historians concluded, according to the Times report.
"The Army, as the service primarily responsible for ground operations, should have insisted on better ... planning and preparations through its voice on the Joint Chiefs of Staff," the study noted.
"The military means employed were sufficient to destroy the Saddam regime; they were not sufficient to replace it with the type of nation-state the United States wished to see in its place."
Some of Franks' other moves also appeared divorced from the growing problems in Iraq.
Before the fall of Baghdad, Col. Kevin Benson, a planner at the land war command, developed a plan that called for using about 300,000 soldiers to secure postwar Iraq, about twice as many as were deployed.
But that was not what Franks and the Bush administration had in mind.
In an April 16 visit to Baghdad, Franks instructed his officers to be prepared to rapidly reduce forces during "an abbreviated period of stability operations," the study notes.
The study, based on 200 interviews conducted by military historians, also says the new headquarters "was not configured for the types of responsibilities it received."
Gen. Franks, speaking through an aide, told the Times he had discussed the Iraq invasion in his book and that he had not yet seen the study.
"On Point" -- a military term for troops who lead a unit into enemy terrain -- says one major problem was a lack of detailed planning ahead of the invasion for the postwar period.
The study in part reflects White House and Pentagon optimism about the future of Iraq at the time.
"I can remember asking the question during our war gaming and the development of our plan, 'Okay, we are in Baghdad, what next?' No real good answers came forth," Col. Thomas G. Torrance, the commander of the Third Infantry Division's artillery, said in the report.
Inadequate training was also a factor. Lt. Col. Troy Perry, the operations officer of the 1st Battalion, 68th Armor Regiment, told Army historians.
He said his unit trained extensively, but not for the sort of problems that it would encounter in conducing "stability operations" for securing Iraq once Baghdad fell.
A fundamental assumption that hobbled the military's planning was that Iraq's ministries and institutions would continue to function even after Saddam's regime was toppled.
L. Paul Bremer, who replaced Jay Garner as the chief civilian administrator in Iraq, issued decrees to disband the Iraqi Army and ban thousands of former Baathists from working for the Iraqi government.
The study asserts that the orders caught US field commanders "off guard" and "created a pool of disaffected and unemployed Sunni Arabs" that the insurgency could draw on.
Source: Al-Alam News
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