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IRAQ: WINNING HEARTS AND MINDS

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY,

EMERGING THREATS AND INTERNATIONAL

RELATIONS

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON

GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED EIGHTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

JUNE 15, 2004

Serial No. 108–233

Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpo.gov/congress/house

http://www.house.gov/reform

(II)

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM

TOM DAVIS, Virginia, Chairman

DAN BURTON, Indiana

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

DOUG OSE, California

RON LEWIS, Kentucky

JO ANN DAVIS, Virginia

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

CHRIS CANNON, Utah

ADAM H. PUTNAM, Florida

EDWARD L. SCHROCK, Virginia

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee

NATHAN DEAL, Georgia

CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan

TIM MURPHY, Pennsylvania

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio

JOHN R. CARTER, Texas

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee

PATRICK J. TIBERI, Ohio

KATHERINE HARRIS, Florida

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

TOM LANTOS, California

MAJOR R. OWENS, New York

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

DIANE E. WATSON, California

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts

CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland

LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California

C.A. ‘‘DUTCH’’ RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of

Columbia

JIM COOPER, Tennessee

BETTY MCCOLLUM, Minnesota

———

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

(Independent)

MELISSA WOJCIAK, Staff Director

DAVID MARIN, Deputy Staff Director/Communications Director

ROB BORDEN, Parliamentarian

TERESA AUSTIN, Chief Clerk

PHIL BARNETT, Minority Chief of Staff/Chief Counsel

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, EMERGING THREATS AND INTERNATIONAL

RELATIONS

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut, Chairman

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio

DAN BURTON, Indiana

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

RON LEWIS, Kentucky

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

ADAM H. PUTNAM, Florida

EDWARD L. SCHROCK, Virginia

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee

TIM MURPHY, Pennsylvania

KATHERINE HARRIS, Florida

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

TOM LANTOS, California

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California

C.A. ‘‘DUTCH’’ RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

DIANE E. WATSON, California

EX OFFICIO

TOM DAVIS, Virginia HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

LAWRENCE J. HALLORAN, Staff Director and Counsel

R. NICOLAS PALARINO, Senior Policy Analyst

ROBERT A. BRIGGS, Clerk

ANDREW SU, Minority Professional Staff Member

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on June 15, 2004 ............................................................................... 1

Statement of:

Al-Rahim, Rend, Iraqi representative to the United States ......................... 17

Schlicher, Ambassador Ronald L., Deputy Assistant Secretary, Bureau

of Near Eastern Affairs/Iraq, Department of State; Peter Rodman, Assistant Secretary of Defense, International Security Affairs, Office of

Secretary of Defense; Lieutenant General Walter L. Sharp, Director

for Strategic Plans and Policy, Joint Chiefs of Staff; Gordon West,

Senior Deputy Assistant Administrator, Bureau for Asia and the Near

East, U.S. Agency for International Development ..................................... 43

Shehata, Samer S., Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, Georgetown

University; Richard Galen, former Director, Strategic Media, Coalition

Provisional Authority; and Danielle Pletka, vice president, Foreign and

Defense Policy Studies, American Enterprise Institute ............................ 84

Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:

Al-Rahim, Rend, Iraqi representative to the United States, prepared

statement of ................................................................................................... 21

Galen, Richard, former Director, Strategic Media, Coalition Provisional

Authority, prepared statement of ................................................................ 113

Kucinich, Hon. Dennis J., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Ohio, prepared statement of .................................................................... 7

Pletka, Danielle, vice president, Foreign and Defense Policy Studies,

American Enterprise Institute, prepared statement of ............................. 125

Rodman, Peter, Assistant Secretary of Defense, International Security

Affairs, Office of Secretary of Defense, prepared statement of ................. 54

Schlicher, Ambassador Ronald L., Deputy Assistant Secretary, Bureau

of Near Eastern Affairs/Iraq, Department of State, prepared statement

of ..................................................................................................................... 47

Sharp, Lieutenant General Walter L., Director for Strategic Plans and

Policy, Joint Chiefs of Staff, prepared statement of .................................. 65

Shays, Hon. Christopher, a Representative in Congress from the State

of Connecticut, prepared statement of ........................................................ 3

Shehata, Samer S., Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, Georgetown

University, prepared statement of ............................................................... 88

West, Gordon, Senior Deputy Assistant Administrator, Bureau for Asia

and the Near East, U.S. Agency for International Development, prepared statement of ........................................................................................ 71

(1)

IRAQ: WINNING HEARTS AND MINDS

TUESDAY, JUNE 15, 2004

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, EMERGING

THREATS AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS,

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM,

Washington, DC.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2 p.m., in room

2247, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Christopher Shays

(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.

Present: Representatives Shays, Turner, Platts, Kucinich, and

Maloney.

Staff present: Lawrence Halloran, staff director and counsel; R.

Nicholas Palarino, senior policy advisor; Robert Briggs, clerk; Richard Lundberg, detailee; Andrew Su, minority professional staff

member; and Christopher Davis, minority investigator.

Mr. SHAYS. A quorum being present, the Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations

hearing entitled, ‘‘Iraq: Winning Hearts and Minds’’ is called to

order.

Almost 1 year after the capture of Saddam Hussein, the hard lessons of liberation are coming into sharper relief. For many Iraqis,

euphoria over the fall of the tyrant has decayed into disappointment over the pace of reconstruction. Eagerness to embrace long

suffering suppressed freedoms has become impatience over halfmeasures and interim organizations that look and act more Western than Iraqi. Welcomed liberators are now viewed in some quarters as resented occupiers. Why?

In the course of five visits to post-Saddam Iraq, my staff and I

asked the same questions. Four of those visits were sponsored by

nongovernment organizations [NGO’s], allowing us to travel outside

the military umbrella that can sometimes shield Members of Congress from useful information not included in the official briefing

slides. Across Iraq, we saw families and communities celebrating

weddings, building schools, and trying to weave the fabric of civil

society from disparate, often conflicting, ethnic, religious, and political threats. We also saw a rigid, centralized Coalition Provisional

Authority [CPA] at times succumbing to hubris and condescension

in dealing with the sovereign people it was created to serve. Many

Iraqis noticed.

In that hostile terrain, our accomplishments whither quickly

while our errors are grotesquely magnified. Conveying American

good intentions through the cacophony of competing tribal, religious, and factional voices requires patience and a cultural senVerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:13 Dec 17, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\96993.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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sitivity that were apparently not part of the original war plan. So

today we ask: What have we learned about how a newly sovereign

Iraq will perceive U.S. words and actions? How do we reach the

Iraqi people?

Our previous oversight of post-war humanitarian assistance and

public diplomacy in Iraq pointed to the need for clarity, persistence,

and humility in that unforgiving, volatile part of the world. The

perceived dissonance between American rhetoric and actions breeds

mistrust at home and in Iraq about why we are there and how long

we will stay. The same lack of strategic clarity causes others to

doubt our will to see the mission through. And when we forget why

we are there, when we forget it is their revolution not ours, we

allow ourselves to be portrayed as arrogant agents of empire rather

than as trustees of noble ideals.

Today we welcome three panels of most distinguished witnesses

who bring first-hand experience and invaluable expertise to our

continuing oversight of U.S. efforts to reach the hearts and minds

of the Iraqi people. We asked for their insights and analyses of U.S.

efforts to secure, stabilize, rebuild, and foster civil discourse and

democracy in post-Saddam Iraq.

We very much appreciate the participation of Ms. Rend AlRahim, the Iraqi Representative to the United States. Thank you

for being here. She brings a unique perspective to these important

issues. We look forward to her testimony and that of all of our witnesses.

I will just say before recognizing the ranking member, it is our

custom to swear in all witnesses. But we do make rare exceptions.

In one instance I chickened out, for example, and could not bring

myself to ask Senator Byrd to take the oath. But in other instances

and in deference to protocol, we also do not administer the oath to

international diplomats and international civil servants who agree

to provide information to this subcommittee. So we will not be

swearing in our first witness. But I cannot tell you how grateful

we are that you are here.

At this time, the Chair would recognize Mr. Kucinich, the ranking member of this subcommittee. Thank you, Mr. Kucinich.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Christopher Shays follows:]

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Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you very much, Chairman Shays, for holding this hearing.

We are familiar with the fact that the Vice President predicted

back in March 2003 that U.S. forces would be greeted by Iraqi citizens as their liberators. Instead, recent polls of the Iraqi people

show that 80 percent have negative views of the United States, and

that a majority of Iraqi people want U.S. military forces to leave

immediately. That this data was gathered prior to the prison abuse

scandal and the escalation of violence against Coalition forces in recent weeks is instructive.

I believe our military presence in Iraq was, is, and will continue

to be counterproductive, and it endangers the security of Americans

both here and abroad by uniting those and strengthening those

who oppose us. Since the end of major combat operations was declared on May 1, 2003, the lives of nearly 700 additional U.S. soldiers have been lost in Iraq, many of them victims of homemade

bombs, which are strategically placed by the Iraqi roadside to inflict harm on our troops. And at this moment, I believe we have

over 830 who have lost their lives in this conflict, thousands have

been injured, and over 10,000 innocent Iraqis have lost their lives.

It is clear that the United States has underestimated the level

of resistance of the Iraqis. The U.S. Government has erred in the

fixed idea that only Baathists, Al Qaeda, and criminal groups oppose the U.S. occupation.

Mr. Chairman, without objection, I would like to insert in the

record an article from the June 6, 2004 edition of the Washington

Post. It is entitled, ‘‘The Military: Losing Hearts and Minds?’’

Mr. SHAYS. Without objection, so ordered.

Mr. KUCINICH. It is actually written by an Army Reserve Captain

Oscar Estrada, who is serving as a civil affairs team leader in Iraq.

Captain Estrada writes that the good efforts of American troops

are having the opposite effects. He finds that paying townspeople

a dollar to collect a bag of trash is demeaning to Iraqis, that providing medical care leads to disappointment and resentment when

there is no medicine to heal the sick, and that buildings and cars

are needlessly damaged as soldiers in Humvees speed through

Iraqi cities shooting in all directions.

I want to say that while I take strong exception to our presence

in Iraq, the men and women who serve this country and who love

this country need to be appreciated. But at the same time, it is essential that we point out any of the shortcomings that I believe is

the direct result of failed policies.

The bombing of the wedding in Western Iraq near the Syrian

border killed over 40 people, including women and children. The

U.S.’ subsequent denial of the incident only inflamed tensions. The

indiscriminate use of force that the United States used in Fallujah

to target the insurgents killed over 800 innocent civilians, creating

a further uproar from people.

This is the real face of the U.S. occupation seen everyday by the

Iraqi people. When combined with the egregious abuses our military leaders apparently condoned at the prison, it is no wonder

that Iraqi frustration and resistance is mounting. The question for

us now is what, if anything, we can do to earn the trust of Iraqis

and regain moral standing in the world.

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Take, for instance, the question of how the United States should

handle the prison torture scandal. What level of accountability of

high ranking officials is required to demonstrate U.S. contrition?

And I am not only talking about military officials here, Mr. Chairman. Is it enough, as one of our colleagues has said, that a few low

ranking ‘‘bad apples’’ are dishonorably discharged? Or will that be

seen in Iraq as scapegoating the responsibility of higher up officials

who authored the policy that resulted in the prison scandal? Does

that responsibility go to the White House, where the White House

counsel penned a memo providing a legal rationale for freeing the

President from the international obligation of honoring the rights

of prisoners?

I think that this hearing is important because it gives this Congress an opportunity to discuss some of the things that the chairman raised in his opening statement. We need to see where this

whole effort is going, and we need to determine at some point, Mr.

Chairman, whether it is the purview of this committee or not, at

what time we are going to get out of Iraq and create international

cooperation which will enable the U.S. troops to be brought home.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Dennis J. Kucinich follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. I thank the gentleman. At this time I recognize the

vice chairman of the subcommittee, Mr. Turner. Welcome.

Mr. TURNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Of course, we are all so

appreciative of our chairman’s leadership in the issue of this committee and national security and the issue of the global war on terror. Specifically in the area of Iraq, though, our chairman has travelled to Iraq many times and in ways not like most Members of

Congress have gone; in ways where he has direct contact with the

Iraqi people and places himself in a great deal of risk compared to

many of the just fact-finding missions that even I attended. We

know that from our chairman’s efforts to make certain that he is

in Iraq and on the ground and having contact with the Iraqi people

in ways that most of us do not have the opportunity or have not

been willing to take the risk, he brings with him a great deal of

information and insight that we very much appreciate to this topic

and to the committee.

It is interesting, in listening to the issues of mistakes the United

States has made or may have made, it is easy to criticize a policy

by listing a number of mistakes. It is easy to criticize a policy by

listing mistakes without taking the responsibility for what it would

mean if there is inaction. Whenever I hear the United States criticized for what we have done and the mistakes that have been

made, I always think back to when Tony Blair came before Congress to receive the Congressional Medal and he talked about the

issue of the war on terror. He said that ‘‘History would condemn

us if we failed to take action on the war on terror. Along the way

we may make mistakes, but they will forgive us for these mistakes

as we rise to the occasion to make certain that this threat that we

have for the civilized world is addressed.’’

One of the things that I think no one questions is that the U.S.’

role and goal in Iraq is for a transition to democracy. It is important for us to have hearings like this and that the chairman’s leadership in knowing how we should address this issue, in that we

need to know: How is the issue of democracy being perceived in

Iraq? How are we being perceived? How is the overall goal viewed?

What support do we have of the Iraqi people? And how do we communicate. What are the ways that we are seeing our actions communicating a message that we do not want to have conveyed that

might undermine our efforts?

Our efforts in this hearing should not be to just list a litany of

mistakes, but to embrace the goal and look at how we can, through

greater information, make certain that we achieve it, both for us

and the Iraqi people. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SHAYS. I thank the gentleman very much. I would just want

to say, since I have some real concerns about how we have done

the rebuilding of Iraq, and the extent that we have been culturally

sensitive, and so on, I strongly support our reasons for being there

and am very grateful that we have brave men and women who

have taken on this task. We just want to make sure that it ends

in success.

Representative Al-Rahim, thank you so much for being here.

You, by your testimony, may have tremendous impact on the success of this mission and the ultimate transformation of power that

happens in a few days. This is not an American revolution, it is an

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Iraqi revolution, and on June 30th that will be very clear. I am certain that Iraq will do certain things that we may not like. But

guess what? It is your country.

So with that, welcome. You have a statement that I would like

you to feel you can give in its entirety. I would like you not to feel

rushed, so that we have the benefit of what you would like to say.

So I am going to encourage you to give your statement and not say

that it will all be in the record and just summarize. My only concern is that as you look at me, I think we should move that water

in front of you, get that microphone in front of you. Let’s help out

there, somebody. Thank you, Bob. Welcome.

STATEMENT OF REND AL-RAHIM, IRAQI REPRESENTATIVE TO

THE UNITED STATES

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much for inviting

me to testify on this important subject. Having testified before, I

have learned to make a summary of my statement. In any case, my

full statement is rather long; it is eight pages of single space, and

it would be really rather long to read it all. I have summarized it,

but I would welcome any questions to clarify so that I can get into

some issues in greater detail. So lets work on the summary.

Thank you for inviting me to testify on this important issue, Mr.

Chairman, Congressman. I would like to take this opportunity to

thank the United States and the Coalition forces for bringing to

Iraqis freedom from dictatorship and tyranny. Ending the murderous regime of Saddam Hussein was, indeed, a moral victory

against evil and we should celebrate that victory. We should never

have any doubts about the rightness of the removal of Saddam

Hussein’s regime, even by force.

I also wish to express our deep appreciation for the sacrifices

made by Americans, Coalition members, and hundreds of Iraqis

over the past 14 months. We should honor their sacrifices and the

memory of those who have fallen.

Mr. Chairman, it is important to recognize that the picture is not

all gloomy and dark in Iraq. And I want to make that statement

first and foremost. Iraqis did, indeed, welcome the Coalition forces

as liberators. There have been many successes, although many

challenges also remain. To measure the magnitude of the achievements and the challenges, it is essential to bear in mind that the

old regime destroyed Iraqi institutions, society, and the Iraqi economy for 35 long years. We have to rebuild the country from the

ashes left to us by Saddam Hussein’s regime.

Let me list some of the achievements.

First, the economy has made significant progress and there is

thriving trade and entrepreneurship. Somebody called Baghdad a

Boom Town a while ago. And from my own personal experience, I

would concur with that.

Salaries and the standard of living of Iraqis have risen dramatically.

A free press is flourishing. Civil society institutions are being

formed, and professional associations are, for the first time, free

from the control of government.

Political parties are taking their first steps and political debate

in Iraq is open and lively.

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Ministries have resumed their services and are active in the reconstruction process of their own ministries.

The Iraqi Governing Council in March adopted a Transitional

Administrative Law, a sort of proto-interim constitution, with a Bill

of Rights that is the most progressive in the Middle East. And I

would want to add here that it is not just the outcome of this law

that is significant, but the process that it entailed, which was a

process of debate, of deliberation, of negotiation of true political

horse trading, and of compromises. I was witness to some of those

meetings resulted in the TAL, as we call it, and it was truly impressive the way that Iraqi politicians were able to debate.

Since early June, there have been two noteworthy successes.

First of all, a new, well-qualified Iraqi government has been

formed, with the help of the United Nations, which will assume full

sovereignty and authority on June 30th. And second, a Iraqi delegation went to New York for the very first time and took part actively in shaping a U.N. resolution on Iraq, and this resolution has

been passed unanimously by the U.N. Security Council.

These are all significant achievements in the space of 14 months.

At the same time we have faced, and continue to face, problems.

Some of these problems arise from miscalculations in U.S. policy

and failures in implementation. And I strongly feel that as representative of a country that looks forward to a long and lasting

friendship with the United States, it is important for all of us to

take stock and measure the successes as well as the failures. We

ought to be able to talk to each other about these things in order

to move forward.

I would like to draw attention here to some reports written by

Iraqis prior to March 2003; that is, prior to military action in Iraq.

The first one is a report that was written by a group of Iraqis in

November 2002, under the auspices of the State Department’s

project called Future of Iraq Project. The report is entitled, ‘‘Transition to Democracy,’’ in which Iraqis wrote about how they conceived

that transition and their recommendations for policies during the

transition period. I would also like to refer to my own testimony

in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on August 2002. And

finally, I would like to refer to a report I wrote when I was still

executive director of the Iraq Foundation. I wrote it in September

2003, after 5 months in Baghdad, and the report is entitled, ‘‘Iraq

Democracy Report No. 1,’’ with the hope that I would do a No. 2

and 3. But this job intervened.

One of the important issues that we noticed in Iraq is that there

appeared to be multiple conflicting policies within the CPA, causing

confusion and frequent reversals. This confusion within the CPA

became infectious and affected the confidence of the Iraqi population. It was visible through the U-turns, the reversals, and Iraqis

felt destabilized.

The first and, so to speak, the ‘‘Mother’’ of all policy errors is the

declared policy of occupation. Many Iraqis had urged that the Coalition should be a liberator and a partner of Iraqis, not an occupying power. It is humiliating to Iraqis. It goes against their sense

of dignity and patriotism. There are no nice words by which to talk

about occupation. Moreover, occupation has proven to be practically

unworkable.

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With the collapse of the old regime, the political and security infrastructure of the country were dismantled and the logic of occupation allowed the ensuing political and security vacuum to persist.

This was a mistake that still haunts us.

With occupation came the suppression of Iraqi sovereignty. Another policy decision that Iraqis warned against before military action. Sovereignty, like occupation, is an emotional issue that touches on people’s dignity and nationhood. But there is also a very

practical issue to the suppression of sovereignty. The Coalition did

not have the resources, the understanding, or the ability to run the

Iraqi state. Iraqis, as we urged, should have run the Iraqi state

and its institutions. An Iraqi government, with authorities seen by

the people as embodying the power of the state, should have been

a pillar of post-liberation transition. I should add here that it was

indeed with difficulty that the CPA was persuaded to create a Governing Council of Iraqis rather than the Advisory Council of Iraqis

that they wished to create. Many Iraqis protested strongly, saying

it is the Iraqis who should form the government and the United

States should provide the advice, not the other way around.

The security situation immediately exposed some of the contradictions of the occupation. Law and order broke down and there

was little effort by Coalition forces to put a stop to it; indeed, probably Coalition Forces were unable, did not have the resources to

put a stop in the degeneration of law and order. Looting, kidnapping, blackmail, and assassinations were ignored by the Coalition.

People had no one to turn to. The military forces did not have the

personnel, the language skills, the intelligence capacities, or the social understanding to be an effective police and security force. Yet,

really little attempt was made to mobilize local Iraqi resources in

security and law enforcement. To my knowledge, not one individual

has been captured, indicted, and tried for a crime of looting, kidnapping, or assassination in Iraq, or indeed any crime committed

against an Iraqi, in the past 14 months.

The message that went to troublemakers in Iraq is that the coast

is clear. The message to ordinary law-abiding citizens was that the

Coalition did not care about their safety, only about force protection. Now this may not have been the reality, but I am talking

about perceptions and perceptions are important in attitudes.

Iraqis had high expectations after liberation. Repressed and deprived of basic necessities for decades, Iraqis were expecting some

dividends from liberation in the form of more electricity, water,

sanitation, personal safety, redress of grievance, participation in a

democratic process. Perhaps these expectations were unrealistic.

Certainly, delivery was short. Moreover, some sectors of society

were disenfranchised as a result of policy decisions. The incidents

in Abu Ghraib unfortunately compounded the sense of alienation

felt by Iraqis.

Within all this context, public diplomacy and communication between the Coalition and the people was virtually non-existent. The

local Iraqi television station, as we all know, was a dismal failure.

The Coalition did not exploit the opportunity or the resources of

the press or any other vehicles to communicate with the people, to

tell them what to expect and what they could not expect, to tell

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able, to tell them that this was because of terrorist activities and

so on. Iraqis lived in the dark and fed on rumors and urban myths.

In short, the dividends of liberation did not trickle down to the

majority of Iraqi society. Unfortunately, Iraqis did not have the opportunity to be an active part of their own liberation, to be part of

liberation and part of the transition process. A feeling of alienation

has set in because of a feeling of a disempowerment and disenfranchisement.

Today there are disturbing voices in the United States calling for

the United States to lower our sights in Iraq. The voices claim that

the U.S. objective should not be democratization and reform, but

only stability. It is a call that comes out of a sense of panic. But

stability can hardly be a vindication for the sacrifices made by the

United States, by its Coalition partners, and by Iraqis. Stability, of

course, is important. But we have a right through our sacrifices to

aim for a higher goal. We must stay firmly committed to a vision

of democracy in Iraq. This is important for Iraqis and important for

the credibility of the United States in the region.

As we move forward, the paradigm of occupation has to be abandoned in favor of a paradigm of a true partnership. As we build our

country, Iraqis need the support of the United States and we need

the multinational forces in Iraq to help us until we can handle security issues on our own. Mr. Chairman, we cannot do without

multinational forces now, and we need international support in reconstruction and economic recovery. Failure in Iraq is absolutely

not an option. It will plunge Iraq and the region into anarchy and

give victory to terrorists, extremists, and fanatics. We must succeed, and we must do it in partnership with the United States and

the international community. Iraqis look forward to a lasting and

firm friendship with the United States based on mutual respect,

shared interests, institutional cooperation, and friendship amongst

our two nations.

Thank you very much. I would be happy to answer questions.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Al-Rahim follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. Thank you very much. I am going to turn to Mr.

Turner in a second to start off. But first I want to say, you have

studied in Great Britain, you have studied in France, and you are

well aware of American frankness. I would love to have a nice dialog that is very candid. So we are going to ask you questions that

may appear to be aggressive, but from that we learn, as I think you

know. I just want to say whenever I hear someone say we have lost

over 800 Americans, as of June 13, we have lost 833 Americans.

Each one of those lives is precious. We have 4,704 wounded, and

each one of those lives is precious and many of them have come

back without arms, limbs, their faces have been blown apart. Obviously, each one of those incidences tears our heart apart. I think

your testimony can help us be more successful, and ultimately,

have less deaths, less wounded, and can move this transition along.

So I cannot wait to have the opportunity to talk with you. But it

is Mr. Turner, then we are going to go to Mrs. Maloney, and then

Mr. Platts, and then I will have my opportunity. I believe in the

10-minute rule, so that is what we are going to do. We have better

dialog that.

You are on, Mr. Turner.

Mr. TURNER. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Al-Rahim, for your honest discussion and for the issues that you brought before us. Your

passion and commitment to the end result of a democracy for Iraq

really shows your interest in a partnership. And your experience

and intellect that you bring in giving a critical analysis of where

we have gone wrong in areas of communication and approach and

ways that we can improve it is very helpful.

There is no question that whenever you are an invading military

force, that transition from an invading force to one of partnership

is difficult to balance. And in this instance, there is no question

that there was an invasion that occurred.

Second, the issue that we all know of the instability in Iraq is,

in part, contributed by individuals that have entered Iraq that are

not even representative of the Iraqi people that cause difficulty for

both of us as we try to manage both the safety of our troops and,

of course, the safety of the Iraqis.

But the issues that you raise are ones where decisions could be

made for outcomes to be different. I am assuming by your passionate commitment to success and your description of these that you

do not believe that learning these lessons is too late and that we

still have an opportunity for a partnership that could result in not

only just success for a transition of democracy, but a positive relationship between the Iraqi people and the United States.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Congressman, thank you very much. First of all,

I want to affirm that all Iraqis want a partnership with the United

States and they want a friendship with the Untied States. It is a

question of how to remodel the relationship so that it is not a relationship of occupier and occupied, but of two equal partners who

can work in synergy and in cooperation to forge a friendship. We

need the United States and we do not feel that we can go it alone

by any means. But we also want this friendship to be a long-term

friendship, not just a friendship while we rebuild the country. We

do not see this as a temporary thing. We want it to be long-lasting

30

and we want it to be stable. This is why I think it is important

to look at areas of error in order to rectify them.

Mr. TURNER. On the issue of democracy, when we talk about that

as being a mutually shared goal and a goal of the Iraqi people,

when we talk about a democracy here, obviously, we are talking

about not just our form of government but really historically, what

goes to the fabric of American society and the birth of our Nation.

When we talk about democracy in Iraq and that being a goal, in

looking at both the period of oppression for Iraq and also the educational system and the anti-West communication that had to occur

throughout the system, what do you think the view is of democracy? And is it a shared concept? Is part of our issue one of communicating what democracy is, how it works, and really what it

brings?

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Democracy happens to be the word most used by

Iraqis in their political discussions. Now this does not mean that

all Iraqis mean one thing by democracy, nor does it mean that they

mean the same thing as the United States would mean by democracy. But I think that there are constant human values attached

to democracy that all nations share that are beyond a certain country or a certain group of people, and that Iraqis are as capable of

sharing those democratic values as any nation on Earth and is capable of practicing democracy as any nation.

However, you did point to some serious issues. We had a period

of repression that lasted 35 years. We have an education system

that was corrupted by a dictatorship. And we have a number of

other problems in Iraq that lead me to believe that democracy is

going to have to be built block by block. In any case, I do not believe democracy is a kit that you take off of a shelf and assemble

in this country or that. It has to be a process that moves forward

and has to grow organically within a country. It is a series of policies, of principles, of operational mechanisms and practices that are

implemented, the sum of all of which eventually amount to something recognizable as democracy.

What frightens me is that if the United States and the rest of

the world forget about democracy in Iraq and say, well, Iraq is not

going to be democratic, it is inherently an undemocratic society,

that Iraqis will also give up on the notion of democracy. And yes,

stability is important, and stability is important for a democracy to

flourish. But we really have made a good start in this democratic

process. We have a free press. We have a civil society that is very

vibrant. We have NGO’s that have started, independent professional associations, entrepreneurs; all kinds of seeds of democracy.

We do not want those to die. And it is very important for the

United States and for the international community to reinforce and

nurture those seeds rather than say, well, it is hopeless anyway.

Mr. TURNER. I think that you certainly have the U.S. commitment to democracy, and certainly there will always be a chorus of

naysayers. But the basic bedrock of democracy is a belief in freedom of individual liberty, and that certainly includes everyone.

I do have one concern about the issue of how a democratic Iraq

is structured. One of the things that struck me while I was there

is that as we went to schools, and we were there as the school was

letting out and the parents came and were picking up their kids,

31

we were able to have a free flow discussion about the issues of the

school, their community, and the city of Baghdad. What we do not

have here that is an issue that will have to be addressed in Iraq

is that you do have, even though there will be freedoms in the

economy of entrepreneurialship, you do have a concentrated commodity economy with oil. You have almost a singular commodity

economy, but I am going to say concentrated in the hopefulness

that the entrepreneurialship that will occur will rise and play a big

role in the economy. That concentrated commodity economy is

going to require some entity to have both control and disposition

of those funds. That is a role that currently you do not see in like

our country or other structured democracies, is that you see predominantly the government having authority over tax collection

and the disposition of those funds but not over the issue of a jointly

owned commodity. How do you see that as being an issue of concern and what thoughts do you have as to how that is addressed?

Ms. AL-RAHIM. In fact, Congressman, you do touch on a very important issue. All the countries, apart from the countries in Europe, that rely so heavily on oil income have been called the ‘‘renter

states.’’ In other words, states that do not need to do anything except collect the revenue from oil. Therefore, instead of no taxation

without representation, it is no representation without taxation.

So, you do not tax them, they do not have to be represented, and

therefore the government is not accountable. And that is really the

problem I think that you are addressing.

There are some studies that have said that countries that rely

over-heavily on oil, where oil is the monopoly of the state, have

great difficulty in democratizing. Certainly, there is that risk. I do

not think, however, that at this stage we can anything other than

keep oil revenues in the hands of the government. I think anything

else would truly destabilize the country, partly because of the massive reconstruction effort that needs to be orchestrated and managed by the government.

However, I would like to point to some historical facts about

Iraq. First of all, Iraq is rich in other respects, not just oil. We have

very good agricultural potential, we have plenty of water, we have

other mineral resources, and we have an extremely entrepreneurial

and highly educated population that is eager to do things. In the

1950’s there was a movement toward private sector industrialization in Iraq which was very successful. It was somewhat dropped

in the 1960’s, revived in the early 1970’s again very successfully.

We must place a lot of emphasis on this private sector because this

is how we form civil society and a middle class that can actually

ask for accountability from its government. This is something that

we need to concentrate on because right now we cannot say privatize oil.

Mr. TURNER. I thank you very much. I will just note than in the

many trips by helicopter for hours to different communities, I was

struck by the endless amount of wheat fields and the irrigation.

And I hope you do not take this the wrong way, but I said, ‘‘My

God, this is a real country. It has more than oil. It has tremendous

potential in other ways.’’

At this time the Chair would recognize Mrs. Maloney.

32

Mrs. MALONEY. I thank you for your testimony and really for

your many years of working to promote democracy and respect for

human rights. I am very pleased that you are now in a position

and with the authority to help work toward these changes in Iraq.

You mentioned in your testimony that critical to the future success of Iraq is the support of the international community. I would

say, on both sides of the aisle, we could not agree more. We have

had efforts to involve the United Nations more, the G–7 needs to

be involved more, NATO, I would say the Arab League, and definitely the countries surrounding Iraq that have a great stake in

the stability and future strength of Iraq, and I would say muslim

leaders of other countries, given the fact that 97 percent of the

country is muslim. So my question to you, are there any other

international organizations we should be reaching out to to help

support Iraq? And do you have any direction on how we could be

more successful for the Iraqi people in securing international support? Now the burden is 97 percent on the United States of America. We would welcome more resources in any form to help the

Iraqi people.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Thank you very much. I believe you have mentioned all the organizations I can possibly think of-the United Nations, G–8, NATO, muslim countries, the Organization of the Islamic Conference, and so on and so forth. The U.N. resolution

which was recently passed I believe on June 8th really opens the

door for many more nations to support Iraqi reconstruction and the

political, physical, and economic rebuilding of Iraq. Additionally, I

believe that the transfer of all sovereignty and authority to an

Iraqi government on June 8th will further make it easier for other

countries to help out.

However, I may be mistaken, but I believe you were thinking in

terms of military support.

Mrs. MALONEY. No. All support. Certainly humanitarian, military, NGO’s, financial—support in any form.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Yes. I think with the U.N. resolution and with

the transfer of sovereignty we will be able to solicit assistance from

a much wider range of countries than we have been up until this

moment, and particularly support in reconstruction, financial support through extinction of debts to Iraq, of advancing more grants

and loans to Iraq. We should not forget the enormous support that

we need in training. This is a very big and important field and

training support should come for our own military forces, for our

security forces, but also training in technologies, in professions, and

so on. There is a whole array that I think will be forthcoming.

Mrs. MALONEY. I hope that you are correct because it would be

very helpful. One of the biggest challenges confronting Iraq now is

security. The American military has worked incredibly hard to empower and work with the Iraqi police, the border patrol, the new

civilian defense force. But it seems any country needs security in

their borders in order to move forward with education and all the

other things that a country needs to do to help their people. But

security appears to be the biggest obstacle. Security for the Iraqi

people, for anyone in Iraq, it is very challenging. And your comments on that, I was deeply disturbed to read reports of Iraqi police stations being overwhelmed and really taken by rogue militant

33

groups. This cannot happen in a country. There is no order. And

your comments on what we could do to improve the security, but

it is extremely problematic for your new government if your streets

are not secure. That appears to be the biggest challenge you have.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. It is, in fact, the biggest challenge. The Iraqi Governing Council has long advocated creating a core security force of

Iraqis who are committed to the new order. I think one of the problems we have had in creating the current police force is that we

have sacrificed quantity for quality, both in terms of selecting the

people for the police force and in terms of training. We need to improve the selection process and the training, and we need to put

the police force under Iraqi leadership so that they feel that they

are part of the process of transition and not outside it. This is

going to contribute to improved security, which we need if we are

going to have elections in January.

Mrs. MALONEY. It was my understanding that the Iraqi police

force is under Iraqi leadership. That there is a police chief, whose

life has been threatened several times. That it is under Iraqi leadership. It appears to be that the problem is they are not holding

the line. It is under Iraqi leadership. But if someone overwhelmed

you, taking over your police station and taking over the streets,

they are not being successful. So from what I read in the papers,

it appears that the structure is under Iraqi leadership. Sometimes

the American military has had to come in and restore order because the police force has not been capable of restoring the order.

Now, is that because there is a lack of will in the heart of the people? Why can they not restore order?

Ms. AL-RAHIM. In terms of Iraqi leadership, the Iraqi Ministry of

Interior did not have full authority. The ministries that continue

to function still function under CPA authority and not under Iraqi

authority. The Minister of Interior has no power to make decisions

unilaterally. And I think this is a structural problem. Hopefully, it

will be fixed by June 30th.

Mrs. MALONEY. On June 30th, when the Ministry of the Interior

takes over, has complete authority and then they control completely the police, the border patrol, the civilian patrol, what happens if rogue militant groups are then able to overwhelm the police

force of Iraq? Then you would have chaos I would think.

So it is a tremendous challenge. And, in my opinion, it is more

than a structural problem of who is in charge. All I know is in New

York we have the best and the finest, that is what we call the police force, and when they go out on the streets they are not calling

the Department of the Interior or the police chief, they are out

there on their own restoring order, making sure people are protected, and getting the job done, very much like the American military does. If you are on the front line, you get the job done; you

cannot call central headquarters. And what is happening, from

what I am reading in the papers, is they are not getting the job

done. They are being overwhelmed, they are scattering, they are

not getting the job done. And when you take over complete power,

if they are not able to get the job done, as an Iraqi citizen I would

be extremely concerned because the safety of my children and my

neighbors would be very much at stake. Maybe that is something

we have to look at.

34

But one thing that you mentioned in your statement, you said

that many of the Iraqi people, if I quote you correctly, lived in the

dark, that they were fed rumors, they did not understand the good

intentions of how we were trying to restore the infrastructure, the

schools, the electricity. So my question to you is, how can we, the

United States, countries that come in to help, and the new Iraqi

government, use the tools of public diplomacy in a better way in

Iraq and prevent the people from relying on information that may

be from a very biased source that does not in their goal support the

independence and success of the new Iraqi government? How can

we do a better job in getting that out?

Ms. AL-RAHIM. First of all, there has to be a much better media

in Iraq, television particularly, that features Iraqis. The Iraqi television station or stations have to be content-rich. They have to

focus on the issues and they have to be utilized to inform people

about what is happening, to address people’s concerns, and to be

a forum for people to send their grievances. We have not used any

of that, neither through newspapers, nor television, nor radio. This

is going to be a major responsibility for the new Iraqi government

but I think the United States can help with this. Unfortunately, it

is no longer up to the United States to run—and I do not say unfortunately—but it really will not be up to the United States from

now on to run Iraqi television and the Iraqi media. It has to be the

new government. But these resources must be utilized because so

far they have done a poor job.

I would like to go back, by the way, to the issue of security. I

mentioned the quantity versus quality. There is an important

issue, and that is it is not just a question of confronting these militants or terrorists, it is also of disbanding their cells. That is an

intelligence operation and that has not been done very well by the

Coalition. Iraqis will have to take over that job, and to the extent

they succeed in intelligence, they will succeed in deterring terrorism and security threats.

Mrs. MALONEY. I want to thank you for your testimony. My time

is up. But very briefly, a number of men and women are serving

in Iraq from the district that I represent and they would like very

much to come home. And they would like very much not to have

to go into streets and restore order. They do not want to do that.

They feel they have to do it to restore the order in the streets to

give the new government a chance. So anything you can do through

your government to strengthen the forces and give them the support is absolutely critical. Without security, without order, you do

not have a country. And our military, as one Captain told me, he

said, ‘‘Carolyn, we do not want to go into any towns. We want to

just be here in support of the Iraqi people. But if chaos breaks out

and militant hoodlums are taking over the streets, they do not

have any other choice.’’ So I just want to plead with you to make

that a high priority of your new government. We all wish you all

the best.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. I will certainly relay that. Thank you.

Mr. SHAYS. Your statement is rich with information and most of

it is very easy for me to accept. Some of it, when I think about it,

I weep internally because I think: If only. When I was there in

April a year ago, I met a gentleman named Mohammed Abdul HasVerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:13 Dec 17, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00038 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\96993.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
35

san. He had been in an Iranian prison for nearly 15 years, he did

not make the swap, and he came back at age 55 to marry and start

a family. I marveled at his tough life, and he gave me the feeling

that his life was not too much different than a lot of Iraqis. And

I got the sense that Iraqis are very tough people who have known

a tremendous amount of suffering. But he was very eager to get on

with his life and he had no resentments, which was to me very interesting.

I asked him things that we did that troubled him. He told me,

and they were simple things, but they meant a lot to him. Just

even throwing candy on the ground and seeing children pick it up

as if, as he said, they were dogs or chickens. Just even that was

an image that he did not like to see. An individual soldier extending his hand and a woman going like this, saying thank you but—

what she was saying was we do not shake hands with strangers,

but thank you for honoring me. Things like that. I learned from

some that if an American soldier humiliates a man in front of his

wife, he might as well have put a dagger in his belly and twisted

it.

And I learned, most of all, that you want this to be an Iraqi revolution, not an American revolution. Now I understand that, and I

understand it because we did not want it to be a French revolution

when we depended on the French to block the Brits from coming

in and prevent them from leaving the ports during our revolutionary war.

But I will start with the thing that I find most puzzling about

your statement. You say that declaring an occupation dealt a blow

to Iraqi dignity and national pride. You know, I do not know if we

declared that as much as the rest of the world declared it and we

had to acknowledge it. What I would like you to do is tell me what

was the alternative of an occupation in the first few days and

weeks and months. Maybe you could start by giving me a sense of

what you mean.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Mr. Chairman, my understanding is that indeed

the United States did want the legal label of occupation. If I am

mistaken about that, then——

Mr. SHAYS. Well let us assume it is true. But what I do not understand quite is it the label that troubled you, or it was the reality

that troubled you? Because I do not know even without the label

if we could have prevented the reality. I mean, we overthrew a government. We could have just gotten up and left but that would

have been horrendous. Were we to automatically establish a government right like that? Tell me.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Mr. Chairman, yes. It is my belief, and many

Iraqis share this, that by July when the Iraqi Governing Council

was formed——

Mr. SHAYS. Last year.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Last July, July 2003, by then it was high time an

Iraqi government, not just an Iraqi Governing Council, but that an

Iraqi government be formed, given authority to run the country, to

run the ministries, and for the Coalition to remain in Iraq but to

take a backseat certainly on political decisionmaking, on policies,

and so on. We certainly needed the military forces to remain, and

we still need them to remain, but it is the image of a disempowered

36

Iraqi Governing Council that could not take a single decision and

where the head of the CPA could say I am the ultimate authority

in Iraq, I can veto anything, nobody else has any right to take any

decision, we are the only ones in power.

Mr. SHAYS. Bottom line, you would have liked to have seen last

July, and you believe it could have been pulled off then, you would

have liked to have seen the transfer of power in a sense that we

are ultimately doing this June 30th.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Yes, indeed, sir.

Mr. SHAYS. OK.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. May I finish?

Mr. SHAYS. Sure.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. I also believe that more people should have been

brought into the political process through an Iraqi conference or

through engaging more political parties and more political or social

sectors from Iraqi society in some kind of political process, through

a national assembly, or through consultative councils. One of the

problems is that many Iraqi groups, even the limited political bodies that were created, were not fully representative of the whole

richness of Iraqi society.

Mr. SHAYS. Behind me is Dr. Nick Palarino, and he helped organize my five trips in the last year. What we learned very quickly

were things like Iraqis saying to us, ‘‘My father, my uncle, my cousin is in the army, he is not a bad man. There are bad people, get

them out, but why punish my father?’’ Or ‘‘I have a family member

in the government. Why do they have no future? Why would you

do this?’’ I had many Iraqis say, ‘‘We understand why you have to

do certain things, but why cannot we guard the hospitals?’’ This

was early on. And I remember when the hotel was first bombed

there were 30 Iraqis injured and 6 killed. They did not run away.

They tried to prevent the terrorist and succeeded in preventing the

terrorists from basically imploding the hotel. Were those the things

that we should have been listening to?

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Yes. Absolutely, sir. This must have been in the

early period because, in fact, the determination of Iraqis to deter

terrorists in those early periods were really powerful. All Iraqis

wanted to contribute. I referred in my written statement to the

issue of disbanding the Iraqi army and I called it a hatchet job

where laser surgery was required. What we should have done, indeed I am certainly not in favor of the Baath Party and I think

many people in the Iraqi army had blood on their hands, however,

to simply dismiss both of them, give them no compensation, no pension, no salary, and no prospect of getting any job whatsoever, both

lost us a lot of talent and capability and angered a very large number of Iraqis.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me just interrupt you there. I was listening to

Ehud Barach, the former Foreign Minister of Israel, in his analysis

of the failures, he said, ‘‘The Baathist Party was not the Nazi

Party. There were bad people. But,’’ he said, ‘‘how did you get your

child an education? How did you support your family? That was

one way to succeed in Iraq.’’ And so I am just extending the point

that even a Jewish leader was saying to us what an unfortunate

mistake.

37

Ms. AL-RAHIM. I think the thing about the de-Baathification is

it is much more important to take out the culture of the Baath

than just ordinary individual Baathists. And that is what we

should have concentrated on.

Mr. SHAYS. I want to know if these observations are observations

you agree with. First off, the statistic I have is that two-thirds of

the Iraqi people want us to leave, and two-thirds of them want us

to stay, and they are sticking to it. [Laughter.]

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Yes. Iraqis are schizophrenic about this particular

issue.

Mr. SHAYS. I understand. So, as my staff says, in that respect

they are ready for democracy. [Laughter.]

Many Iraqis told me—they did not even say it, I felt it, they were

suspicious of us as the government because they never had a government they could trust. It is almost by definition that if you are

part of government, you cannot be trusted, and certainly not a foreign power. Does that seem consistent with what you would feel is

out there?

Ms. AL-RAHIM. The problem was that there was no government.

Of course, Iraqis distrust government. All nations distrust government, but perhaps Iraqis distrust government more than others.

The problem, Mr. Chairman, was that there was no government.

The Coalition simply could not substitute an Iraqi government.

Mr. SHAYS. Fair enough. I think you have made your point, and

I think it is an excellent point. Another observation that I had was

that they blamed us for the sanctions, not Saddam. And I had so

many Iraqis tell me of loved ones or neighbors that had been killed

in their effort to rebel against Saddam and blamed us because we

had told them to rebel and yet left the Republican Guard in place.

Are those things that seem consistent with your view, one, that

they blame us for the sanctions, and two, that they blame us for

saying rebel against Saddam?

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Yes. I would qualify that, I do not think this is

universal. The important thing is that the Iraqis were willing to

give the United States the benefit of the doubt after liberation, and

that is really important.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. And then we squandered it.

Let me proceed a little bit longer and then I can go back to you

if you have some questions. Do you have some questions? OK. Let

us go to Mr. Platts.

Mr. PLATTS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Ms. Al-Rahim, thank you

for your testimony and your clear devotion and dedication to your

fellow Iraqis and the liberation of your nation. I want to followup

on the chairman’s question, his initial question was actually what

I was contemplating, is the issue of how quickly sovereignty should

have been turned over to the Iraqis. By your statement, you believe

it should have been and could have been by July of last year. I

think part of the chairman’s efforts here today is to learn from

what has happened and how things maybe could have been done

in a different way and perhaps better way. How would we have

gone about, in those 21⁄2, maybe 3 months between the initial liberation and the establishment of a government, how would you

suggest we would have identified who the government would be,

38

who would be in charge of the ministries? How would the Coalition

authority select those individuals?

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Congressman, it was possible to identify a Governing Council by early July. I am not arguing about the people.

I am saying they were not given any authority.

Mr. PLATTS. Would you acknowledge that identifying a group

that will be given a position of advisory input, to have some working relationship, is different than saying you have full sovereignty

and full decisionmaking power over all of Iraq and all of the citizens?

Ms. AL-RAHIM. In the end, the Governing Council was in limbo.

It was neither an advisory body nor was it a rulemaking authoritative body. In any case, any government that could have been appointed in July would have had to be an Interim Government

awaiting elections. I do not really see where the problem is. The

CPA identified a Governing Council, it identified ministers. It is

just that they had no authority to do anything.

Mr. PLATTS. The process was a little different in the sense of

identifying that Iraqi Governing Council versus the Interim Government that is now going to assume sovereignty and the ability

to bring in the U.N. and have a broader input to who the ones

given the actual sovereignty will be. It just seems that ability

would have been a little challenged to do it in 21⁄2 months.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Congressman, the U.N. was already involved.

Sergio DeMello, the representative of Khoffi Anan, was in Baghdad

and was involved in the formation of the Governing Council. It may

be doubtful whether it would have been formed without his assistance, actually.

Mr. PLATTS. And I certainly appreciate your position, as appropriately it should be, that the sooner the Iraqis have their own sovereignty, the better. It just seems that given the challenges that we

saw especially regarding security in those initial months and continue to see, the ability to so quickly say you have complete authority and responsibility and we are selecting you versus we are going

to try to have input. When I visited Iraq in October and met with

a number of the ministers, they certainly in my personal conversations with them did not convey that they had no input. In fact, they

seemed to have a very positive working relationship with their Coalition Provisional Authority counterparts and conveyed to me and

to I think other members of our delegation that they were appreciative of the input they had in their respective ministries. And

your impression is that they really did not?

Ms. AL-RAHIM. They did not have very much influence. They did

not control their budgets. They did not set policies for their ministries. Now, over time, they did sort of arrest authority from the

CPA. So that by early this year many of the ministers did have a

certain level of autonomy, but certainly not in October.

I also want to go back to the July timeframe and say that I lived

in Iraq from very early May until November, and in July the security situation was far, far better than it was in the fall and later

on. Yes, we were having some sabotage activities and so on, but it

was a manageable situation at that time. So it becomes a question

of a chicken and egg story.

39

Mr. PLATTS. The final area I wanted to touch on was in your assessment of what could have been done better in the area of, as you

talked about in your testimony, expectations and delivery and the

disbelief after the liberation occurred, whether it be electricity,

water, other infrastructure related services that were so behind the

times, of how quickly they were being provided. My understanding

from my visit and other testimony that we have had over the past

year is that was due in part to the lack of investment in the infrastructure by Saddam and the diversion of his resources to military

capabilities and things.

What would be your assessment of the individuals who were selected as part of the Iraqi Governing Council in their public efforts

to try to convey realistic expectations of how long it would take to

rebuild? I visited a power plant, what appears to be technology

probably 40 years old, and it is not something that overnight you

can replace. And although perhaps it was the impression the

United States, Great Britain, the other nations are here and they

are just going to fix everything, it would not be a realistic expectation. So what would be your assessment of the Iraqi leaders, Governing Council members and others such as yourself, in trying to

get the message out to the average Iraqi that they are committing

their time and American taxpayers money to rebuild our infrastructure. It will not happen overnight, to try to lessen those expectations so they are more realistic and not unrealistic?

Ms. AL-RAHIM. First of all, I agree with you that expectations

were unrealistic given the situation. But there was always ‘‘The

man in the moon’’ analogy, what journalists have called it: If the

United States can get a man on the moon, can’t it fix the electricity. I also want to acknowledge that neither Iraqis in the Governing Council nor the Coalition made enough of an effort through

the media and through public outreach to explain to Iraqis why

these expectations were unrealistic, when such expectations could

be met, over what period of time, and when things went wrong nobody explained to the average Iraqi why they had gone wrong. We

had a power outage for 24 hours in Baghdad and nobody came on

television afterwards to explain why. This, by the way, was simultaneous with the brown out in New York and Northeast United

States. Of course, the Iraqis immediately said, ‘‘See, the whole of

New York and Northeast United States browns out, they fix it

right away. We have 24 hours of a blackout, nobody even tells us.’’

Mr. PLATTS. Sort of like being on Amtrak and the train stops and

you do not know what is happening and no one tells you times 100.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Times 100. And the failure was both CPA and

Iraqi, and I do acknowledge that.

Mr. PLATTS. And we heard I think an admission by the CPA

when I was there in October that they were not adequately getting

the message out and communicating to the average Iraqi citizen.

One of the kind of heart-wrenching stories I came back with from

our visit was that of the [Arabic name] hospital in Baghdad and

visiting the maternity ward, the ICU, the NIC unit I call it, and

the gratitude of the Iraqi doctor who was administering the hospital for the technology that the Coalition had brought in and of

our efforts to immunize—I think now we are up to about 85 percent of Iraqi children are immunized—and how dramatically difVerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:13 Dec 17, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00043 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\96993.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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ferent that is than under the Saddam Hussein regime where, from

what he told us, the formula was purposely poisoned for the Iraqi

babies to purposely escalate the infant mortality rate, I think it

was 107 per 1,000. He knew what was done before and how the

Iraqi government was, in essence, killing its own children, how the

Coalition Authority came in and was helping to save the Iraqi children, and he personally knew that. But, clearly, that message was

not being well conveyed and understood and embraced by the average Iraqi, by your comments, and that lack of communication in a

broad sense was hurting the effort.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Lack of communication played a big role I think

in Iraqi perceptions and attitudes. And it is very sad.

Mr. PLATTS. Mr. Chairman, I thank you for the opportunity to

ask questions. And again, Ms. Al-Rahim, I thank you for your leadership and I certainly wish you and your nation and its citizens

great success as you move forward and assume full sovereignty and

embrace the liberties that you now enjoy.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Thank you.

Mr. PLATTS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you very much. I am going to close up here.

I know we need to get to the second panel. My only reference to

Amtrak and being on a train is I think most Americans who have

been in that experience know how irritating even that little simple

inconvenience can be. You want to get somewhere, the train is an

hour and a half late, you want to know why it is late, no one tells

you why, no one tells you when you are going to get there. I just

can imagine what it must be for Iraqis.

But let me just tell you expectations on the side. And it is our

own fault because our intelligence was so bad. We thought all we

had to do was protect the infrastructure so that we could get it operating again, little did we know that it was 30 years old and it

was kept together by gum and rubber bands. It was a shock certainly to Members of Congress to realize that in order to get things

running again we had to provide everything new. And some of it

was a challenge because it was French-and German-made and we

were not getting much interaction from those two countries. So,

lots of expectations I think on both sides. So, welcome to the world

of humanity.

I want to read one statement you said because I think it is the

most frustrating for me because this is where Americans shine. But

it also is important because it seems so obvious. You write, ‘‘In all

spheres of life, Iraqis lived on rumors and urban myths. It is by

now no secret that the television station established by the Coalition was a failure. Whereas it should have been extensively used

by the Coalition and Iraqi officials to communicate with people,

provide information, address concerns, and build confidence, the

station was instead virtually content-free.’’ I can just tell you, to

the extent Members could get there, and quite often we were discouraged from going, that is something we kept asking because we

had Iraqis asking us, particularly even the Queen of Jordan, she

said, ‘‘America, the country that communicates better than anyone

else, with all your expertise and you could not do anything to

counter Al-Jazira and you could not communicate with the Iraqi

people.’’ So it is one of the grand mysteries of our failure. And we

41

have witnesses later that can testify. I do think, though, we have

a local station that has gained some credibility. Is it Al-Iraqiya?

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Al-Iraqiya is the failed one. There is a new one

called Al-Hurra which appears to be gathering momentum.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me just tell you, Al-Iraqiya, I am told, is listened

to by more Iraqis than even Al-Jazira is.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Because most Iraqis do not have satellite. You do

not need satellite for Al-Iraqiya, you need satellite for Al-Jazira.

Anyone who has satellite does not watch Al-Iraqiya. But most people do not have satellite. In the rural areas and in the provinces

they do not.

Mr. SHAYS. My biggest criticism, and I would like you to react

to it, and if you are not comfortable, then that is fine, but the administration had a chance to allow the military to get Saddam’s old

regime members to fight the terrorists and deal with security and

make sure our prisons were obviously run well and properly, and

he had the chance to have the State Department, which is far more

culturally sensitive, run the rebuilding. The administration decided

that the chain of command, and I mean no disrespect to the military, but the chain of the command would go through the military.

I know for a fact, because I remember having dialog with State Department last year, they were saying we need Arabic speakers, we

need Iraqi-Americans, and they told us the reactions that would

happen if we did certain things, which we ended up doing. They

predicted so much of this.

What I feel good about is that on June 30th the military will be

in charge of what they do best—and by the way, they build schools

well, they do all those other things well, but we were asking them

to build schools in the daytime and fight the bad folks at night. We

were asking them to work 18 hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks

a year. And what I am happy about now is that we will have an

ambassador who will answer to the State Department. And he has

said, and he has made it very clear to me, he is an ambassador,

he is not Mr. Bremer, he is a representative of our government to

interact with the sovereign government of Iraq.

I will say one other thing that makes me feel good because I feel

the administration gets it. In a conversation with Condaleeza Rice

a week and a half ago with nine Members, for about an hour and

a half she was very fluent, as she is, but very willing to go wherever the dialog went. In other words, there was a lot of good interaction. And she said something at the end that sent shivers up my

back. She said, and I thought I knew where she was going, she

said, ‘‘We had years before the Declaration of Independence to understand democracy and the idea of minority rights.’’ The Declaration of Independence, 1776, Articles of Confederation, the Constitution. Now I thought she was saying finally, after 13 years, we got

it right with the Constitution. She waited a second, looked every

one of us in the eye, and said, ‘‘And in that Constitution I was only

three-fifths a person.’’ Which has to make Americans be a little

more compassionate, a little more understanding that there may

have to be compromises in this new government that we will not

like and that maybe you will not like.

And so let me end with this. What happens if this new government decides that they do not want a woman representative? What

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happens if they decide they do not want women in the ministry?

What happens if this government decides that girls in school are

not going to get the same education as boys in school? I want to

ask you what happens there, and I know it is a hypothetical, but

I am not sure it is going to be just the way I hope it will be and

maybe not the way you hope it will be. So tell me what you think

about that and how we should react if, in the end, we see a government that simply has lost many opportunities. Will you say, well,

we screwed it up a year, so you are allowed to do the same thing?

Or what will you say?

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Mr. Chairman, first of all, I do not think that this

will happen. Iraqis are very sensitive to women’s rights now. And

by the way, women have had a big role in the Iraqi society, professionally not politically, for many decades. It is unlikely.

What I would want, if they decide they do not want women ministers, I would want the right to advocate for women’s rights. Even

if a government says, no, we do not want women in this position,

I want the right to lobby and speak freely. And I hope that the

United States will support me in maintaining my right to speak,

not in imposing anything on the government.

I want to commend the civil affairs people in the U.S. military,

and I mentioned them, by the way, in my written statement, who

did a stellar job with local citizens groups and local councils. I also

want to say that, indeed, everybody in the Coalition worked 18

hours a day, at least, and Ambassador Bremer worked 36 hours a

day.

Mr. SHAYS. I know that.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. It was phenomenal and we were full of admiration and awe for their energy and for their good will. It is just that

good will was not conveyed in the best way possible. This is the

problem we had. So I really do have a great admiration and appreciation for the work they did. I also admire the fact that you went

over to Iraq five times, four of them with an NGO. That is quite

a statement.

Mr. SHAYS. That is the Peace Corps in me.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Well, as the head of an NGO for a long time, I

really appreciate that.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you. I will just say to you, you have been a

wonderful witness. I have tremendous love and respect for the

Iraqi people. I pray that your new government will succeed. I also

want to say to you that I consider you extraordinarily brave and

courageous people because I know you put your lives at risk, you

put your families at risk, and we just have nothing but admiration

for you and a great deal of love and affection. Thank you very

much.

Ms. AL-RAHIM. Thank you, and same here.

Mr. SHAYS. With that, we will move to the second panel.

I now call on our second panel. Ambassador Ronald Schlicher,

Deputy Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs/Iraq,

Department of State; Mr. Peter Rodman, Assistant Secretary of Defense, International Security Affairs, Office of Secretary of Defense;

Lieutenant General Walter L. Sharp, Director for Strategic Plans

and Policy, Joint Chiefs of Staff; Mr. Gordon West, Senior Deputy

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Assistant Administrator, Bureau for Asia and the Near East, U.S.

Agency for International Development.

Gentlemen, if you would stand, I will swear you in. Let me ask

you if there is anyone else you think you may need to draw upon,

you may ask them to respond to a question, even if we do not end

up doing it, if you would suggest that they stand up and raise their

right hand, that will save us from having to swear someone in

later. You may not be called on but I think it helps. So if you would

raise your right hands, I will swear you in.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. SHAYS. Note for the record that all of our witnesses have responded in the affirmative. If we ask anyone else to come up, we

will make sure that the transcriber has their full name and title.

I want to thank each and every one of you. You honor this subcommittee with your presence. You have honored America for years

with your service. And we are very grateful to each and every one

of you.

We will go in the order I called you. I believe you are, in fact,

sitting in the order I called you. So, Ambassador, you have the

floor. I would like you to stick to the 5-minutes as much as you

can. I will roll over the clock, but I would like you to be as close

to the 5-minutes as you can. And I would like you to feel free to

speak about anything that happened in the first panel either now

or in response to questions.

STATEMENTS OF AMBASSADOR RONALD L. SCHLICHER, DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY, BUREAU OF NEAR EASTERN

AFFAIRS/IRAQ, DEPARTMENT OF STATE; PETER RODMAN,

ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF DEFENSE, INTERNATIONAL SECURITY AFFAIRS, OFFICE OF SECRETARY OF DEFENSE;

LIEUTENANT GENERAL WALTER L. SHARP, DIRECTOR FOR

STRATEGIC PLANS AND POLICY, JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF;

GORDON WEST, SENIOR DEPUTY ASSISTANT ADMINISTRATOR, BUREAU FOR ASIA AND THE NEAR EAST, U.S.

AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Ambassador SCHLICHER. Very well. Thank you, sir. Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, it is my honor today to report to

you on where we stand in the State Department in terms of being

prepared for the upcoming transition to Iraqi sovereignty on June

30, and in preparing to stand up our new Mission in Baghdad in

a way that helps both us and the Iraqis meet the challenges that

lie ahead. We hope in this discussion that we will lay out for you

kind of the institutional manner in which we will approach business in the coming period and give you an idea of where we think

the Iraqi Interim Government starts from as a base in political

terms during this crucial period. Let me thank you in advance for

the interest and support you and the Congress as a whole have afforded to our personnel, both military and civilian, on the ground

in Iraq.

Mr. Chairman, you mentioned Ambassador Negroponte, which

leads me to my first topic of how we are organizing ourselves in

State to better be able to meet the challenge of transitioning to

lead agency on June 30th in managing and representing our country’s interest to a sovereign Iraqi government. Our first AmbasVerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:13 Dec 17, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00047 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\96993.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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sador to the new Iraq, John Negroponte, is, of course, eminently

well prepared for the challenges at had. He is one of our most capable and distinguished diplomats. He is assisted on the ground in

Baghdad by his Deputy Chief of Mission, that is Ambassador Jim

Jeffrey, who was serving as our Ambassador in Albania before he

answered the call to serve in Iraq. Ambassador Jeffrey, by the way,

is already on the ground in Baghdad, leading an advance team to

smooth the transition. Ambassador Negroponte and Ambassador

Jeffrey have put together a superb, very senior new team that collectively features a very impressive mix of regional experience,

which of course includes language skills as well, management

skills, and technical expertise, because all of those things are very

much going to be needed as we pursue our interests and help the

Iraqis in the period ahead. This management team will supervise

a very large Mission that will initially total approximately 900

American staff, and 500 locally employed staff. Our security upgrades for our temporary chancery are proceeding on schedule and

will be ready by July 1. We have also chosen a site for a permanent

chancery and would like to come to agreement with the Iraqi government on the way forward on this project as soon as possible.

In preparing for the transition, there has been a remarkable effort undertaken by DOD and State, by Ambassador Frank

Ricciardone and General Mick Kicklighter, who led a combined

team to work out how State and DOD will work together to make

the transition and work together in the new post-June 30 context.

Thanks to their work, the two agencies have finalized agreements

between each other on respective roles, missions, resources, responsibilities and authorities so that we complement and support each

other as we move ahead.

Inside State, we are also in the process of reorganizing ourselves

to better handle the challenges posed. Inside the near East Bureau,

we are creating an operation called NEA-I, I, of course, for Iraq,

which will entail my office as coordinator, a deputy political office,

an economic office, a public diplomacy office, a political-military office, and an office of a coordinator for assistance in Iraqi reconstruction, which is headed by Ambassador Robin Raphel. This team

in Washington will be responsible for close coordination on a constant basis with Ambassador Negroponte’s team in Baghdad and

with the interagency here.

This new U.S. team will work in partnership with the new sovereign Iraqi Interim Government to achieve our shared goals on security and stability, and improving the delivery of services, and improving economic opportunity, and, of course, in ushering in Iraq’s

first democratic elections no later than January 2005. The U.N.

will also remain an important partner in the effort to organize

those elections.

As the Iraqis begin to exercise their sovereignty, we will find ourselves in a more standard situation as far as the manner of conducting bilateral business goes. Instead of governing and ruling a

country as we have been, we will doing business with a sovereign

Iraqi government which will be looking to make its own decisions.

On the diplomatic side of the house we will be doing business as

a country team. I mention that not as a point of bureaucratic minutia, but actually because we believe the country team approach is

45

an approach which achieves a comprehensive view of a given issue

because it has all of the players in our operation around the table

who can offer their perspectives on whether it is an economic perspective, a cultural sensitivity perspective, a security perspective,

and in that way we come up with a common approach by which we

are able to get the maximum in terms of pursuing our interest on

any given issue.

During the coming period, as you have pointed out, we will work

with the Interim Government and the U.N. to assure free and fair

elections. It is going to be very, very important during that period

that we keep a clear focus on what average Iraqis and the political

class are doing, saying, and thinking about the momentous events

through which they and their country are passing. In this regard,

the new country team will be able to build on the contacts and outreach established by CPA and Ambassador Bremer’s team over the

last 14 months. As someone who was personally involved in that

effort, I can assure you that it was very difficult after over a decade’s absence from the country, but CPA has made great strides in

this regard in its time in Baghdad and the country team has a

solid basis to build on.

I would note also as well that our efforts to keep in touch with

average Iraqis will be greatly aided by the presence outside of regional centers in Mosul, Kirkuk, Basra, and Hillah, and we are also

going to embed State Department officers with military commanders in the field at the division level. We believe that this range of

assets will help Ambassador Negroponte and our military commanders keep well abreast of the local context in which they are

operating.

Thus, with the establishment of a strong new Mission, with clear

ideas about how we will coordinate the achievement of our policy

and security goals, and with the establishment of the security partnership with the IIG, which my military colleagues will no doubt

talk about, we are well placed in institutional terms to meet the

challenges before us.

Now let me switch to the Iraqi side and talk about the political

basis on which the new Interim Government begins its great effort

as well. We are hopeful that the preparations that the Coalition

has made over the course of a year will help assure that the Iraqis

are ready to resume sovereignty and move forward toward democratic elections. Our efforts have been from the ground up and from

the top down.

First, we provided training, advice, equipment, and facilities to

help establish and strengthen local councils, regional councils, and

national governing institutions. As of our last count, we had 16

Governorate councils, 90 district councils, 194 city councils, and

445 neighborhood councils. At the national level, we have already

turned over I believe it is 16, I think that is the number today,

ministries to direct Iraqi control and the rest of course will be

transferred over the course of the next 2 weeks. We will continue

to offer to the Iraqis liaison officers to provide technical expertise

that the Iraqis judge is necessary to run their ministries according

to the required standards. Of course, in March we also supported

the Iraqis as they drafted and adopted clearly defined principles

and targets in the TAL, the Transitional Administrative Law,

46

which will be in effect as of July 1 and will stay in effect until a

constitutionally based government takes office. On June 1, the

former Iraqi Governing Council adopted with Ambassador Bremer’s

full support the Annex to the TAL that reflected the results of extensive conversations by U.N. Envoy Lakhdar Brahimi with Iraqis

from all over the country.

That brings us to the new Iraqi government and the base on

which it starts its efforts over the next several months. And I am

happy to report to you that government is in place. It is led by

President Ghazi al-Yawer and a strong Cabinet headed by Prime

Minister Allawi. We believe that this government is particularly

notable for its competence, its experience, its diversity in all terms,

politically, professionally, geographically, and gender terms. Nearly

two-thirds of the ministers have doctorates, and a preponderance

of the ministers are new faces who have not served previously.

It is our impression that, in spite of the terrorist attacks on Iraqi

civil servants, the overall reception of the Iraqi public to the new

government has been very positive. We hear it in Baghdad, we

hear it back here, also regional support has been very good, all of

the neighbors seem to be responding well, international organizations as well. So with these things institutionally and on the

ground, we feel that we are well poised to move into the coming

period. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Ambassador Schlicher follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. Thank you. It would seem that we are well poised

and I just hope that we make sure we do not lose this opportunity.

You did go 10 minutes but it was important we hear from you.

Thank you, Ambassador. I understand you have a meeting at the

White House at 4:45.

Ambassador SCHLICHER. Yes, sir.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. We will make sure you are not going to be late.

Mr. Peter Rodman, thank you so much for being here.

Mr. RODMAN. Mr. Chairman, I want to commend you for the contribution and the leadership that you have shown on this issue for

a long period of time, and I want to congratulate you and the committee for this timely hearing.

We would be remiss not to acknowledge the serious problems

that remain in Iraq, particularly in the security field. But I welcome this opportunity to discuss what our strategy is and how we

see it unfolding.

There is no doubt in our minds, as the Ambassador in fact confirmed before, that the overwhelming majority of people of Iraq still

welcome the removal of that regime and consider it a liberation.

They have concerns now about how life is now, and we share those

concerns. But those concerns focus on the future, not the past. As

the Ambassador mentioned, the collapse of the old regime left a

vacuum, and the essence of our strategy has in fact been to prepare

Iraqis and to help Iraqis fill that vacuum themselves, to build their

own institutions—political, economic, and security institutions. And

the next milestone, of course, in that process is the turnover of authority on June 30.

In your invitation to me, Mr. Chairman, you listed six questions.

In my prepared statement I have addressed those specifically, but

I want to address one in the brief time I have right now. The

thrust of the question is, what accounts for the change of attitude

among the Iraqis that seems to be producing this insurgency

against the Coalition. With all due respect, I would say that is

maybe not the whole story. It is not only that a change of attitude

may be fueling the violence against the Coalition; it may equally

be that these extremists are targeting the morale of the population.

They are attacking the economy, they are attacking the political

process, they are attacking Iraqi police. They are doing everything

they can to derail the progress that is being made—to demoralize

the population, to discredit the Coalition.

As political leaders, you understand the phenomenon of ‘‘What

have you done for me lately?’’ Fourteen months ago, they considered themselves liberated. So we have two syndromes. We have the

‘‘man in the moon’’ syndrome; we also have the ‘‘what have you

done for me lately?’’ syndrome. It is obvious that 14 months after

liberation hardships still exist, uncertainties still exist, and it is

only natural to be resentful of the people in authority, especially

if those in authority are foreign powers exercising the authority of

an occupier. So it is no surprise to me, therefore, when I read opinion polls showing a lot of people saying ‘‘we want this occupation

to end.’’ The fact is, we share that desire and that is why we are

launched on this timetable to hand over sovereign authority right

away.

52

Now just to elaborate a little bit. I do not accept the premise that

the extremists represent the majority of the people or represent the

aspirations of the people. I think they are applying a kind of Leninist doctrine of ‘‘the worse the better.’’ The more damage they can

do, the more they can undercut us, no matter what hardship they

are imposing on the people of Iraq—that is what I think is going

on.

Most of all, this war is a war against the democratic political

process. It is not just a war against the Coalition; it is an attempt

to derail this democratic political evolution. We have some evidence

of that in the famous letter of Zarqawi, the terrorist leader who is

affiliated with Al-Qaeda, a message of his that we intercepted a

few months ago. He is very candid. He says, ‘‘I am racing against

time,’’ because on June 30 when the Americans have ‘‘stepped

back’’ and the Iraqis, when their own cousins and brothers are in

charge, ‘‘what excuse’’ do I have anymore? And ‘‘how do you motivate Iraqis to kill their own brothers and cousins?’’ So he knows

what our strategy is and I think his most important goal is to derail it.

So one can ask, what is the measure of success? One measure of

our problem, of course, is the casualties, the terrible violence that

continues. But another metric of success is, is he succeeding in derailing this political process? And I submit that the answer is no.

And that is what gives me encouragement, that we have a strategy

that is on track. Legitimacy—and we will have that certainly when

an elective government takes office we hope and expect at the beginning of next year—legitimacy will be our strongest weapon

against the extremists.

So our strategy is not just military. It is partly a political strategy. In fact, the essence of it I would say is political. There is a

lot of legitimate criticism that I have heard, including from the

Ambassador, about, is our message getting through? The bottom

line, I would say, in measuring the effectiveness of our message is

that we believe the Iraqi people still have the same objective we

have, and I think the polls indicate that. This democratic evolution

is their objective and it is our objective. The fact that they want

to see the occupation end soon is absolutely natural and absolutely

correct on their part. And we know, as again we have heard the

Ambassador say, that all of the moderate leaders of Iraq are unanimous in telling us they want the Coalition to stay. The U.N. resolution shows international support for our present course, which is

the course of the Iraqi people as they advance toward a sovereign

government and a democratic government.

In other words, we think that June 30th is going to be the setback for Zarqawi that he is afraid of; even more so, an elected government at the end of the year. The Iraqi people know this, I am

confident of that, and that again is what gives me confidence that

we are on the right track.

We, in turn, should never forget that we have accomplished

something of historic importance in liberating Iraq. The success of

a democratic Iraq will have wider ramifications throughout the

Middle East, as the President has so often declared. And so we are

embarked on an enterprise of great moral as well as strategic significance. It is a vital national commitment that we as a nation

53

need to fulfill. Congress and the President, I am confident, are

united in this task and I am confident that we will succeed. Thank

you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Rodman follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. Thank you very much. I appreciate it, Mr. Secretary.

General Sharp, welcome.

General SHARP. Mr. Chairman, members of the subcommittee, I

would like to thank you for this opportunity to address you on this

important subject today.

Today, Iraqi security personnel, the United States, and 31 Coalition partners are working together to secure, protect, and establish

peace and justice for all Iraqi citizens so that they may enjoy a future of their own choosing. Establishment of a safe and secure environment is the single most important element for improved Iraqi

quality of life because it enables relief efforts, a free political process, economic prosperity, and social opportunity.

And Iraqi people are stepping forward. More than 220,000 Iraqi

citizens have taken positions in the various components of the Iraqi

security forces. Multinational personnel have made significant

progress in recruiting, training, and equipping Iraqi security forces.

This includes about 90,000 in the Iraqi police service, 18,000 in the

department of border enforcement, 35,000 in the Iraqi civil defense

corps, 6,000 in the Iraqi armed forces, and 74,000 in the facilities

protection. Based upon the current training and equipping schedules, we anticipate that the department of border enforcement, the

Iraqi civil defense corps, and the facilities protection service will be

fully trained and equipped by September of this year, the Iraqi

armed forces by December 2004, and the Iraqi police by June 2005.

By the end of this month, over $3 billion will have been committed

to the Iraqi security forces equipping, infrastructure, and training.

By June 30, the United States and its Coalition partners will

transition control to a fully sovereign Iraqi Interim Government.

Our responsibilities will not end with the June 30 transition. Multinational forces will remain in Iraq at the invitation of the Iraqi

people and with the authorization of the United Nations after the

Iraqi Interim Government assumes full responsibilities. These

forces, and increasingly Iraqi forces, will continue to conduct offensive operations to defeat any remaining anti-Iraqi forces and neutralize destabilizing influences in Iraq in order to create a secure

environment in which the Iraqi people can build their own future.

They will also continue to organize, train, equip, mentor, and certify credible and capable Iraqi security forces in order to continue

the transition of responsibility for security from multinational

forces to Iraqi forces. Concurrently, Iraqi and multinational forces

will continue to conduct stability operations to support the evolving

Iraqi government, the restoration of essential services, and economic development. All multinational forces will work in close coordination and consultation with the Iraqi government at all levels.

Sir, if I may divert from my written statement for 1 second. The

discussion that we had earlier about the willingness to become full

partners in this effort after June 30, I would like just to read very

briefly from the letter that Secretary Powell sent to the U.N. Security Council which lays out exactly how we will be partners in

doing that. He stated in that letter, and we fully support this, ‘‘Development of an effective and cooperative security partnership between the multinational force and the sovereign government of Iraq

is critical to the stability of Iraq. The commander of the multinational force will work in partnership with the sovereign governVerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:13 Dec 17, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00067 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\96993.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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ment of Iraq to help improve security while recognizing and respecting its sovereignty.’’ And then it goes on to talk to the mechanisms by which we will do that coordination and cooperation.

I am confident that through this partnership we—the Iraqis, the

Coalition, and the United States Armed Forces—will succeed in establishing a safe and secure environment in Iraq. Sir, I am happy

to take your questions.

[The prepared statement of General Sharp follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. Thank you. I am going to do this, if you do not mind,

Mr. West, because I do not want to rush your statement, and Ambassador Schlicher, I hope we are not letting you go to the White

House so you can go to the White House picnic. I hope there is

more substance.

Ambassador SCHLICHER. It is real work.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. I will be there later so I will check you out.

Ambassador, let me ask you three questions, because we are

going to go vote and you will not be here when we get back. I want

to know what was the worst decision we made. I want to know the

best decision. And I want to know what is the most important

thing we must do in the year to come. So I want to know the worst

decision, the best decision, and what is the most important thing

you think we have to remember in terms of succeeding, and, obviously, succeeding is also winning the hearts and minds of the Iraqi

people. Can you give me an answer to those questions?

Ambassador SCHLICHER. Yes, sir. Let me just take a stab at it,

please. Let me put it in brief context of the big difficulty that we

faced as a Coalition on liberating Iraq and inheriting the

government——

Mr. SHAYS. Do me a favor—we have a vote and I only have about

3 minutes—just give me the answer, and then if you want to qualify it. In other words, I do not want to be unfair to you, but what

is the decision that you think we should regret the most, the best,

and then if we have time I will let you qualify them, OK?

Ambassador SCHLICHER. Yes, sir. Based on my 6 months experience in Iraq where my job was actually to talk to Iraqis and measure their reactions to things, I think that we could have done a

much better job at the beginning in making clear that our attitude

toward de-Baathification needed to be focused on criminal behavior

and not on mere membership.

Mr. SHAYS. The bad guys.

Ambassador SCHLICHER. Yes, sir.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. What is the best decision we made?

Ambassador SCHLICHER. I think the best decision that we have

made is a quick transfer to Iraqi sovereignty, the quickest possible

one, which is what we are approaching on June 30. And I think

that is the point on which Ambassador Rahim and I converge.

I think the most important thing as we move forward is making

sure that we use these mechanisms that are being set up that General Sharp described, make sure that our coordination with the

Iraqi government is as close as it possibly can be and that the

mechanisms on the security side that the General laid out are also

complemented on the economic side with donor mechanisms. That

is what we really have to get right.

And my apologies to Mr. Rodman, General Sharp, and Mr. West.

Mr. SHAYS. The subcommittee will stand in recess while we go

vote.

[Recess.]

Mr. SHAYS. This hearing is called to order.

You have the floor, Mr. West.

Mr. WEST. Chairman Shays, we thank you very much for this opportunity to discuss reconstruction programs, lessons learned, and

how we can look forward. I have submitted my written testimony

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that describes areas of infrastructure, governance, economic

growth, and health and education wherein we have been active in

cooperation with the CPA. I will not go into any detail on that. I

would like to look forward.

Looking at the eyes of the Interim Government come July 1st, I

would propose that what they look out and see, what they see as

their challenges, are our challenges. They will know that Saddam

basically controlled the country by severely limiting the numbers

and the types of institutions, political and social, that existed in

that country in exerting total control through the Baathist Party,

the military, and the police. That is not a model that is going to

be available or attractive to them on how they exert authority. But

the means by which they can exert authority to both secure the

country and to implement the many great ideas they will have is

really the challenge that we face—how does a new government

exert its authority over the country?

I would say, in many senses, the concept of winning individual

hearts and minds really will not be the challenge that the Governor, nor we, face. We have seen many cases. It is not a black and

white situation. I will give you an example. We were working with

the First Calvary in Sadr City and Al-Rasheed. You will see youths

who are out in the day helping clean up garbage and improve their

neighborhoods and at night it will be the same people who are out

shooting at our troops. If you ask them are they grateful for the

assistance, they will say yes. It is confusing. You will see parents

who are thrilled that they have power and electricity and they will

be furious because their daughter comes homes and says I cannot

go to school today, it is unsafe to go through the area. So it is a

mixed picture and I do not think it is going to clear. And I do not

know that it is even the issue. I think the issue will be to what

extent you can, as I say, really govern a country.

I would just like to go over some of the areas. In the area of governance, a tremendous amount of initiative has been done, a lot of

it I believe under-appreciated, by the work of the CPA and the

military and others at the local and provincial levels—development

of village councils, local councils, district councils, provincial councils. Democracy is a bottoms up affair. A lot of that initiative has

really formed what I believe is the future of Iraq, not so much the

central government but the structure of a new society from the bottom up. That initiative has to be preserved and developed further.

You see the councils are the first people who are being targeted in

many of these towns and villages because they are the threats to

those who are opposed to democracy. We cannot let that fail. That

is a very important part of the new institution of Iraq.

Other areas. Political party development. It is going to be very

key to how you develop the ability to exert your authority or to

have dialog with those who control the population.

Civil society. The ability to foster groups who are able to bring

together common and differing opinions throughout the country.

We have seen cases of handicapped societies, of women’s groups, of

college students, the Iraqis are thrilled to have the freedom to get

together and talk to each other openly without fear. And that is a

very important new emphasis that we should build on in Iraq.

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The ability to build again the police and the military. Not just

the issue of actually the force itself, but the fact that they are

strong and potential institutions that will have a major impact on

stabilizing Iraq.

Tribal leaders and religious leaders. Their role in the political development. This has been a lot of the focus of people on the ground

already. Those are key areas or institutions, if you will, to be built

on.

In areas like infrastructure, the infrastructure itself is important, but increasingly the ability for the ministries, the contractors,

local communities to maintain the institutions surrounding the development of services, both economic services and others.

Education. Schools and universities we consider very important.

Not only are they institutions that help influence and shape attitudes, they are also just physically places to get youths off the

street and occupied for a day and believing they have a future.

Similarly in the economic growth area, jobs themselves are important, but also there are many institutions that go along in this

area, whether they are banks, larger businesses, different chambers of commerce, ways to represent private sector interests.

So we are really looking ourselves at ways that we can build into

our programs more of a focus on how the Iraqis implement their

good ideas, how they do their own security. We believe these are

going to be done largely through organizations and institutions

that are going to need to be a focus in the future. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. West follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. Thank you very much, Mr. West.

What I would like is when I ask a question of any one of you,

I want any of you to feel you can jump in. I would love a dialog

like that. Just for continuity’s sake, I would like to ask you the

same question that I asked Ambassador Schlicher; and that is, I

want to know the worst decision we made, and you do not need to

give it too much context, the best decision, and the most important

thing we must do in the year to come.

Mr. RODMAN. I will volunteer. For the best and the worst, I

would really cite one decision that was made that had a bad and

positive implication, and that is the way the war was fought. We

made a decision to emphasize speed rather than mass. It guaranteed the quickness of the result, the thoroughness of the defeat of

Saddam. It helped us avoid a lot of big disasters that we do not

have to worry about—destruction of the oil fields, a protracted conflict that could have destabilized other countries. But the downside

was that regime collapsed so quickly and so thoroughly that it left

a vacuum that may have been more than we anticipated. Maybe

there is a lesson here about the nature of totalitarian regimes.

What we have been struggling with ever since then is to fill that

vacuum. Obviously, we want new Iraq institutions to fill that vacuum. That is precisely what we are doing and what we have to do.

Mr. SHAYS. I am not going to ask you to answer it now, but was

it a vacuum created because we destroyed their military, or was it

because after destroying it, we said we were not even willing to reestablish a viable military? But I do not want you to answer that

yet. Tell me the best decision.

Mr. RODMAN. Well, it is the same one. I think it was the right

way to fight the war. And again, what we need to do now——

Mr. SHAYS. You sound like Alan Greenspan here. The best decision was also the worst decision. But I get you. I understand. What

do we need to do?

Mr. RODMAN. I think we need to continue the political process.

I would put the priority on that as the key to our strategy.

Mr. SHAYS. Can you define ‘‘political process?’’

Mr. RODMAN. Helping the Iraqis build their institutions, have

those institutions get roots in the society. In other words, June

30th is crucial.

Mr. SHAYS. I would say in response to that point that, and Mr.

West, I think you rightfully point out, I was reading in my briefing

that almost 90 percent of the Iraqi communities have some kind of

council representation. Is that an accurate number, somewhere in

that range?

Mr. RODMAN. Almost all have elected municipal councils.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. Exactly. But we are into the 90 percentile. I

think that is something I had not paid enough attention to. I think

that is quite impressive. And I know that a lot of that was done

through the military as well as CPA.

General, the worst, the best?

General SHARP. Yes, sir. The decision, it was not really a decision, but how we trained the Iraqi police and the security forces.

I think, as General Eaton has said, the concentration on leadership

we needed to focus on earlier than we did. And we have made those

changes now. We have established new academies that are working

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at the mid-level and the upper-level leadership of the police, the

ICDC, and the Iraqi army in order for them, as we start this partnership, to be able to take leadership roles within Iraq to be able

to establish a secure environment.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me be clear what you are saying. You are saying

one of the worst decisions was in the beginning how we trained the

Iraqi policy and the quality of the people we were getting.

General SHARP. I will not say quality of people. I will say that

we worked very hard to bring numbers in, quantity in, very quickly, and you saw those numbers grow very quickly. We started

training both in the unit level with a short 3-week course, and then

a longer 8-week course. But the concentration was on the basic

level police skills, not on the mid-level managers or the district

chiefs that could take responsibilities themselves.

Mr. SHAYS. Best decision?

General SHARP. I think the best decision continues to be the support of the commanders that we have over in Iraq. I have made

several trips over also, and I think you would agree, if you ask any

commander on the ground, at any level, he is getting the full support of the Department of Defense, of the U.S. Government, and

Congress. There is not a thing that our commanders over there

have asked for that we have not worked tirelessly, you have not

worked tirelessly, in order to be able to get it to them.

And then the most important thing I think is the partnership.

We have started this partnership with the Iraqis. It is not as if on

June 30 we are standing up something new. We have been doing

joint patrols with Iraqis within the police, within the ICDC, and

within the armed forces. But we will go to a new level come June

30. The mechanisms, the coordination mechanisms that we will establish based upon the U.N. Security Council resolution and the

letters that are attached to that to have full partnership, to share

intelligence even better than what we are doing now, to be able to

work on unity of command arrangements to be able to get after the

security issues, is the most important thing that we get right and

make that a full partnership.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. West?

Mr. WEST. In terms of reconstruction, I guess if I would look

back and try and change one thing, I would have hoped that as a

government we would have had developed more quickly a unique

and a more unencumbered approach to going at reconstruction. We

have tried to use existing structures of development, if you will, in

very extraordinary situations and I am not so sure we really had

all the tools nor the risk-adverse nature to do the things that might

have worked best—of getting moneys directly to Iraqi organizations, of doing more in business and job creation, or governance

that did not come out of the standard toolbox. So, with hindsight,

I would have liked to see a more robust and very specific set of

tools to take on this unique situation.

Mr. SHAYS. Does that mean you would have wanted to see more

NGO’s, like Save the Children, Mercy Corps, and others?

Mr. WEST. I would have thought that would have been a great

way to go. There are those things we can do right now. I am thinking more, for instance, when the Eastern Europe and the former

Soviet Union came on the scene in development terms, we had

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very, very specific legislation and ideas and concepts and were unfettered by a lot of the typical bureaucracy, if you will, to get the

job done. And I think this is equally important and I would have

liked to see very, very new ways of doing business and out of the

box thinking that perhaps we did not do in this case.

Mr. SHAYS. General Patreaus, one of the many generals who did

this, he did not wait for CPA. He had some money they found and

they just went right into it.

Mr. WEST. It is a little easier to do when you are not dealing

with appropriated funds.

Mr. SHAYS. Yes. But next door, we had a hearing on how we

were appropriating funds and the potential speed that superseded

costs, so costs became very high, and so on. I mean, we have some

problems there as well that we are dealing with.

What is the best decision we made?

Mr. WEST. I think the construct in the areas of infrastructure.

I think a lot of what happened we are going to see the benefits of

in terms of the development of the Iraqi capacity in contracting, in

employment generation. I believe there has been a very solid basis

in the infrastructure area. Perhaps it has overshadowed some of

the other areas, but I think there is a very solid——

Mr. SHAYS. I am kind of smiling because the implication is that

it is kind of that the new Iraqi government may get credit for the

infrastructure, the year of trial and tribulation we have gone

through. And maybe that is kind of a good thing. But the implication is you think we have a pretty good foundation of infrastructure

and they can build on it.

Mr. WEST. Absolutely.

Mr. SHAYS. The thing that it is most important for us to do, Mr.

West?

Mr. WEST. Just repeating what I was emphasizing before, I believe a focus on Iraqi capacity particularly in an institutional sense.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Rodman, I had asked a question that I did not

let you answer earlier. Could you just refresh me on your point.

Mr. RODMAN. The best and the worst?

Mr. SHAYS. Yes.

Mr. RODMAN. It was the way we fought the war. It had I think

tremendous advantages and yet the vacuum——

Mr. SHAYS. That is it, the vacuum.

Mr. RODMAN. The army dissolved itself; I would make that point.

More than that we made a decision, these institutions collapsed

and we did not find an army that reported to duty to take on new

assignments from us. It melted away and we were forced to reconstitute these institutions.

Mr. SHAYS. With all due respect though, that is the point I think,

thank you for refreshing me, we did not invite them to come back.

We did not say you have laid down your arms, you have gone, come

back now and let us get you reestablished under new leadership or

something. We did not do that.

Mr. RODMAN. Well, we reconstituted. We started building a new

army and new police forces. In that process we have hired a lot of

the same people who had that experience. On salaries we reversed

ourselves. I think we made a mistake at the beginning to just leave

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these people alone. After a while we realized that these people deserved some help, so we reversed course.

Mr. SHAYS. I would have thought that one of you would have

said the worst decision we made was not to establish security early

on. Allowing some Iraqis, and I want to say ‘‘some,’’ Iraqis to brutalize their country and other Iraqis saw us stand and allow that

to happen. I would have thought one of you might have said that.

Does that rank up pretty high? I mean it was a policy decision to

not have our military engage the looters.

General SHARP. When we moved in to establish a secure and safe

environment in Iraq it was our responsibility to go after, and what

we focused on was, the people at the time that were attacking us.

As you will recall, the Fedayeen, the Saddam folks, were continuing to attack us and that is what our emphasis was to establish

security based upon the folks that were attacking us.

Mr. SHAYS. But we knew, and it had been predicted, that there

would be a lot of looting. So are you defending the decision not to

protect the infrastructures and allow the looting to go forward?

General SHARP. I think as our capabilities allowed us, we

stopped that looting.

Mr. SHAYS. So you think we did not have the capability to prevent the looting?

General SHARP. I think initially, as we moved in, as you recall,

we moved in so quickly as we went throughout the country to be

able to do that, where we saw looting we stopped it as quickly as

we could.

Mr. SHAYS. There was implication that the Turkish government

did not fully engage their legislative body to allow us to come in

from the North because of Turkey’s interest in pleasing the French

and becoming part of the European Union. What was the significance of our not being able to come in? And the reason I am asking

is I have been told by some military folks that had we been able

to come from all directions we might have been able to capture

some people instead of allowing them to kind of just go into the

woodwork.

General SHARP. The military significance was that we had to adjust the plan. I think that General Franks did that very quickly to

be able to move more in toward the South. Would we have liked

to have been able to come in on all fronts? Absolutely.

Mr. SHAYS. I have told every one of my constituents that on a

scale of 1 to 10, the removal of the regime was an 11. So I am not

being critical of this amazing and very quick action which had its

pluses and minuses. But what I have been told, and if it is not a

valid argument I want to get it out of my mind, I was told that

had we been able to come from all directions, we might have been

able to capture some of the armies before they just went into the

woodwork. If you do not think that is true—I do not want to put

words in your mouth.

General SHARP. Sir, I do not believe that is true. I believe that

as they saw how quickly we moved, they just completely dissolved.

And you have to remember, just because we could not come in from

Turkey, there were attacks by air across the country that did a lot

of destruction to the armies both in the North and up Northeast

of Baghdad. When we saw them move we were able to quickly deVerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:13 Dec 17, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00081 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\96993.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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stroy them by air. So I think that immediate mass effect across the

country dissolved them very quickly. If there would have been another front to be able to even more quickly do that, I think we

would have had the same effect.

Mr. SHAYS. All right. A former U.S. advisor in Baghdad, now

with Stanford University, has said, ‘‘If you don’t have security in

Iraq, you don’t have anything. We have to throw everything we

have, everything, into getting the new Iraqi forces operating effectively.’’ First, I took the position, and I was thinking later that I

really did not have the ability to agree or disagree with it, and that

was the issue of how many troops we needed. And the argument

that you seem to be implying as well is we did not have the forces

to protect the infrastructure.

General SHARP. Well, I think we did protect a lot of the infrastructure. There were not any oil fields that were destroyed, or

very, very few that were destroyed. We did not have massive refugee problems as we went throughout the country. Again, as Mr.

Rodman laid out, I think the forces that we had we concentrated

to move very quickly to Baghdad and it caused the insurgents to

go into the woodwork and then came back out, and that is the issue

we are dealing with now. So I would disagree that we did not have

enough forces to be able to do it. I mean, how many days did it

take us to topple the regime and to be able to move to Baghdad?

Unheard of in history. We had the forces both on the land and in

the air to be able to do the mission that was given to General

Franks.

Mr. SHAYS. It is funny, I did not think we would go down this

road because I did not think there would be much disagreement on

this. I would like to be just a little more clear. I was in Basra. I

have been in Baghdad. I have seen the hospitals without not just

the windows, without the frames, without the doors, without anything in them. There was just total looting and destruction of

things that Iraqis would have considered precious to them, and yet

someone looted them. And I have seen pictures of American soldiers standing by as these looters went in. So what I am having

a hard time understanding is why you feel that we did provide security. There is not an Iraqi I know who thinks that security was

provided. And it either was a decision not to provide it, or it was

a decision that we were not capable of providing it. But you are the

first person I have spoken to, General, that has suggested that this

was not a bad thing, that we protected what we had to protect. So

I just have to say that to you. And I am happy to have you make

a comment.

General SHARP. When we moved in and attacked and took out

the regime, you obviously make decisions on what you do first in

order to be able to accomplish your objectives. The phasing of the

attack allowed us to move very quickly to Baghdad so that we

could take the regime down, as we did. Simultaneously across the

country with air attacks and ground attacks, we were able to take

out their combat force so that we were able to topple the regime

very quickly. That was the first phase.

As we moved into the cities then, because of that rapid movement up North toward Baghdad, as we moved into the cities the

first several days after the war, we did not have forces that were

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throughout the country that could stop all of the looting. But again

I would say that I think the ability to be able to move quickly to

be able to take down the regime saved United States, Coalition,

and Iraqi lives because it ended the major combat operations very

quickly. After that was established, we moved into the different regions that we are in right now and worked very closely to try to

stop any of the looting at that time. It was a matter of phasing.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. I will leave it at this. I am the last one who

should judge what your capabilities are, and I knew that you tried

to do everything you were capable of. It just seems to me that we

were not capable of having that security and that it was very costly

in that it sent a message, it seemed to me, as I have been there

these various times and have heard comments from so many Iraqis,

that we were either incapable or chose not to. In either case, it was

very unsettling to the Iraqis. And I think what I am hearing you

say, General, is that because it was so quick, we could not have

done anything different about it. I think that is your message to

me.

I would love, Mr. Rodman, if you have comment in that regard.

I wanted to address the same question to you about ‘‘If you do not

have security in Iraq, you do not have anything. We have to throw

everything we have, everything, into getting new Iraqi forces operating effectively.’’

Mr. RODMAN. My judgment of the military circumstances at the

end of the war, my recollections, are the same as General Sharp’s.

We put a premium on speed and I think that saved lives. If we had

done it differently and blanketed the country with lots of troops, it

would have been a different kind of war and we would have paid

the price in other ways.

The quote you read I totally agree with. Security is the precondition for everything else. It is a vicious circle right now. It is

impeding the economic reconstruction that has so much to do with

the Iraqi people’s well-being and sense of well-being. So that is a

priority. And as your quote said, we want to train and prepare and

equip Iraqis to fill that vacuum and build those institutions.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. Let me just quickly ask all of you, why in your

view did the U.S. authorities disband the Iraqi military? And I

think from your standpoint, General, you think they did not disband it, they just disappeared. But we made a decision to disband

it. That was a decision. We made a decision to disband the government, the army, and the police. My question to you is, why do you

think the authorities decided to disband the Iraqi military?

Let us start with you, Mr. Rodman.

Mr. RODMAN. As I said, we found nothing there when we got

there—no institution that we could recover, retrain, reassign. The

units melted away. The officer corps, we were not sure who was reliable. And I think CPA made a decision to build a new army and

a new police. With respect to the police, I have heard an additional

factor, which is that the Iraqi police in the old days had a different

approach to policing—they were much better at knocking down

doors in the middle of the night than they were about patrolling

the neighborhood. So, too, we really had to rebuild from the ground

up. There were tradeoffs. We did hire a lot of people, we put a premium on numbers. We have had to make sure the training and

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equipping caught up with their numbers. But we felt we did not

have a lot of choice.

In addition, there is a political reason. The Iraqi people hated

that regime. And anything that smacked of, well, we are going in

there, we are just going to take the institutions, particularly the security institutions, as they are and replace a few people at the

top—that would have had very negative political ramifications

among the Shiites, the Kurds. So for that reason too, we wanted

to reassure the Iraqis that the old regime was dead and that something new was about to be built. And, unfortunately, that takes

time.

Mr. SHAYS. General, do you want to speak to this?

General SHARP. I just would like to add to what Mr. Rodman

said as far as the army goes. When you think of the old Iraqi army,

you cannot think of a Western army or an army like ours. It is absolutely, as you know, sir, totally different, where the officer corps

almost across the board was corrupt and punished physically many

times the enlisted soldiers underneath them. Virtually no non-commissioned officer corps whatsoever. It was an army of a dictator

and that permeated throughout the army. And our belief at the

time was a lot of it disintegrated because when the recruits that

were forced into the army saw the opportunity to run home, they

took the opportunity to run home. And to think we would be able

to pull those back together as a unit, it would be very difficult

when it would be asking them to come back to an institution that

they only knew of as one that was corrupt, that they did not get

paid correctly, they were forced to servitude in that organization.

So the tactic that we took, and continue to take, is to start from

the ground level, put a lot of money, a lot of effort into building

up the Iraqi security forces with professionally trained individuals,

as we have been doing really since last summer.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. West, I know it is a little out of your territory,

but you do a lot of thinking about this in your work. So the question about the disbanding the army, the police, and the government.

Mr. WEST. I am actually going to take a bye on that one. I will

just say that I think security, you cannot agree any more, security

is the real issue. And just to note, security is more than just standing up a military and a police force. You cannot have enough police

and military to secure every place, every time, if there is the intent

within the society to undermine the new government. It is going

to take a lot more in terms of earning the respect and the commitment of the people to make Iraq work. That is also part of this lessons learned: How do you build in the issues of security into the

breadth of the programs of reconstruction, not just the police and

the military, because all sorts of factors are going to affect the security and the ability to govern.

Mr. SHAYS. Would you speak to the issue of CPA’s efforts to distribute aid and development funds, rebuild infrastructure, and create a stable economy generating jobs for Iraqis. There has been

concern that the money has not gone out as quickly, that there

have been restraints there that have hampered our effort to succeed.

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Mr. WEST. There has been a lot of money spent and a lot of

money spent well I believe in Iraq. I am not so sure that the

amount of funds that has gone out the door is a measure of success

or failure. I think in a fiscal sense, in a development sense, it is

just amazing what CPA, military, USAID, and other organizations

have done there. I think there really are a different set of issues

and there are long lines of other questions in terms of institutions—the military, the lack of police, other issues. I do not think

it is an issue of doing things more. Eighteen billion dollars is a

mind-boggling number to me in terms of development in anyplace

we have ever worked. The fact that it is taking perhaps a longer

time to spend that amount of money to me has as many up sides

as it does down sides. So I am not of the opinion that slowness in

reconstruction has really been one of the major issues. As a matter

of fact, I believe it is just amazing what the U.S. Government,

broadly, has achieved in Iraq.

Mr. SHAYS. Before I go to the next panel, I would love each of

you to address the issue of your sense of the success or failure of

this new government. In other words, there was a lot of criticism

that we were moving too quickly. I sense you all agree that this

makes sense. Second, are you optimistic, moderately optimistic, not

quite sure, want to wait 2 months to see what is going to happen?

But if you had to make some predictions, tell me how you think

this new government is going to work out.

Mr. RODMAN. Mr. Chairman, first of all, I think the sooner the

better, for reasons I mentioned before. It is deadly for us to be in

the position of an occupier, and the sooner we can shed that mantle

and put an Iraqi face on events the better off we are and the better

that helps us marginalize the extremists and empower the good

people of Iraq.

Second, I think this is a superb group of people. It is a balanced

ticket. These are representatives of all the moderate forces, all the

regions, the ethnic groups, tribal groups. It is a well-constructed,

broadly representative group of people. These are the leaders of

moderate Iraq and I think they represent the majority. And even

better, I am confident that they are going to be able to work together. And I agree with Ambassador Al-Rahim that the Governing

Council was a success. It, too, was a balanced ticket. It included

every group and they stuck together remarkably well in the face

of repeated provocations and attempts by the terrorists to foment

civil war. Those attempts failed. And so here too you see the Kurds,

the Shiites, the Sunni working together. There are disagreements.

The Kurds are making some demands. But this is political bargaining. This is politics. And they have resolved similar disputes over

the past year with great political skill. The Iraqis are learning the

arts of compromise and co-existence.

This group of people includes a lot of talented people, people we

were able to see over the course of a year. We could judge who was

good, who was not so good. So we had that year of experience in

helping to pick the people and a very intensive consultation process

that Ambassador Brahimi participated in, just, again, to see who

was broadly representative in the country. So I think it is a good

group of people, talented people. They are showing cohesion, political skill. They want us there, so they are going to cooperate with

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us in the interests of their own country. We are convinced we can

work with them. And we will treat them with the respect due a

sovereign country. We will behave differently after June 30th. But

this is a group of people that we will be able to work with. We will

respect their judgment. We know that they want us there so we

think any problems that arise are going to be solvable.

Again, we think the symbolism of this is tremendous. It is Iraqis

running their own country. Secretary Powell made a good statement the other day that it puts the terrorists in an impossible position, that they are now attacking their own people, their own country. So I think we are going to be in a better position after June

30.

Mr. SHAYS. I hope we protect them. And I say that because I

think of the police officers in Baghdad who were waiting for weapons and they did not have them and the terrorists got in and went

from room to room and killed them. It makes you want to weep,

because there were some very good officers being trained. Thank

you for your comment.

General.

General SHARP. Sir, I am very optimistic, and for several reasons. Let me read one sentence from Prime Minister Allawi’s letter

to the U.N. Security Council which I think is really indicative of

both him and the entire Iraqi Interim Government and the people

of Iraq as they move toward free sovereignty.

Mr. SHAYS. Sure.

General SHARP. ‘‘Their government,’’ and he is talking about the

new Iraqi Interim Government, ‘‘is determined to overcome these

forces.’’ And he is talking about the forces who would tear down

this government and this country as it move to new sovereignty,

‘‘and to develop security forces of capable of providing adequate security for the Iraqi people.’’ And everything that Prime Minister

Allawi has said, the Minister of Defense has said, the Minister of

Interior has said, they have all been very forward leading as to

saying this is our job, it is our responsibility. We need you there

to help us, but we realize it is our responsibility for security. Sending that signal to the Iraqi people, as you talked earlier, sir, about

the leadership need, it is starting from the top. So I am optimistic

about that.

No. 2, I am very optimistic with what we are doing because of

the lessons learned that we have had on training Iraqi security

forces, all five lines. As you know, we have sent back in one of our

great officers, Lieutenant General Dave Patreaus, who had great

success in the North, he is now in charge, working with the Iraqis

to be able to help train and equip all of the five Iraqi security

forces again. I think that will pay great dividends as we work in

this partnership with Iraqis after June 30.

And I think the last reason that I am optimistic is because of the

U.N. Security Council resolution. The U.N. Security Council resolution, as the Ambassador pointed out earlier, invites member states

to come in to help across the board in Iraq. It mentions specifically

helping to protect the United Nations, critical in their work to be

able to get elections moving so that we can go on the timetable. It

invites member states to come in and help with security across the

board. And this is a hope, but it is a hope that I think our entire

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U.S. Government may ask everybody to continue to work hard for,

is to talk to Coalition countries and make them understand the importance of helping out with this effort in Iraq because it affects

not only Iraq, but the global war on terrorism which none of us can

opt out of, and it is critical that we move forward.

So for all of those reasons, I am very optimistic that we are going

to move forward and that the Iraqis are going to take charge and

move forward with their country.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you.

Mr. West, I just learned to my horror that—I mean, I am grateful that you have a son who is graduating, but I just was told now.

So if you need to leave at this moment not to be late, I want you

to leave. You are the last person I am going to ask this question

and then I will get to the next panel.

Mr. WEST. I will just finish the comment. Basically, I am very

optimistic about the capacity, the intelligence, and the commitment

of the Iraqis. I think it is going to be messy. I think neither the

world nor the Iraqis have particularly the timeframe of what all

the patience and hard work and sacrifice it is going to take. So, up

close, a lot of times I think it will be disappointing. But the fact

is you do not create a great democracy in 12 months or 2 years.

It is going to take decades and a lot of hard work. But I am confident that they are on the right track and the pace of change is

just mind-boggling there. I think a lot of good things are going to

happen and will continue to. So I am an optimist.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. Thank you, Mr. West. And you should get on

your way. Tell me you are not being late to your son’s graduation

or I will feel very guilty. OK.

I just want to ask if any of you want to put anything on the

record before we go to the next panel. Anything else on the record?

OK. Gentlemen, thank you for your service to our country, and

thank you for participating in this hearing. We appreciate it.

And I thank the third, and final, panel for their patience. We

have Dr. Samer Shehata, Center for Contemporary Arab Studies,

Georgetown University; Mr. Richard Galen, former director of Strategic Media, Coalition Provisional Authority, who I think spent 6

months in Iraq; and Ms. Danielle Pletka, vice president, Foreign

and Defense Policy Studies, American Enterprise Institute.

If you would please come to the table, I will swear you in.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. SHAYS. I have a sense of guilt because I have a good friend,

who is in the very middle, Mr. Rich Galen, testifying. So now that

I have gotten that out in the open. I thank all of you for being here.

I am grateful for all of your work and your contribution to this

hearing. Obviously, Mr. Galen, I am very grateful that you would

have spent 6 months of your life without your wife and family in

Iraq. So thank you for that, and thank you for now allowing us to

have the input of your knowledge.

So, Dr. Shehata, we will start with you. Thank you so much.

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STATEMENTS OF SAMER S. SHEHATA, CENTER FOR CONTEMPORARY ARAB STUDIES, GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY; RICHARD GALEN, FORMER DIRECTOR, STRATEGIC MEDIA, COALITION PROVISIONAL AUTHORITY; AND DANIELLE PLETKA,

VICE PRESIDENT, FOREIGN AND DEFENSE POLICY STUDIES,

AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE

Dr. SHEHATA. Mr. Chairman, I am honored to be here and delighted to be asked to share my views with you on this important

topic. My remarks today are only a summary of my longer submitted testimony and address the following questions.

First, what events caused the change in Iraqi attitudes toward

the United States and the CPA from the fall of Saddam’s regime

to the present?

Second, and related this, what factors caused the security environment to deteriorate?

Third, why did Coalition and U.S. Government public diplomacy

efforts fail to influence the Iraqi public?

And finally, and I think maybe I will have an opportunity to talk

about this in the Q&A because I realize I only have a short period

of time here, the overall question of U.S. public diplomacy in Iraq

and the Arab world.

First, it is important to accurately understand Iraqi reactions to

the overthrow of Saddam Hussein and the U.S. presence in the

country. Although the majority of Iraqis were delighted to be rid

of the Hussein regime, and many were and are thankful to the

United States for accomplishing this, Iraqis were, from the beginning, ambivalent about a foreign military presence in the country

and/or an American role in Iraqi politics. The subsequent course of

events—a series of policy mistakes, poor decisions, and the failure

to deliver on promises and meet obligations, as well as high expectations on the part of many Iraqis—have led to the current troubling situation with regard to Iraqi hearts and minds.

As a result, it would not be unreasonable to say today that the

war for Iraqi hearts and minds might already be lost. I apologize

for being direct, but only an honest appraisal of the situation is

likely to be of any benefit to you.

The No. 1 issue in Iraq, as we have heard today, immediately

after the war in April 2003 continues to be the No. 1 issue in Iraq

today, 14 months later—security. Security is key, it is foundational

to all public diplomacy efforts as well as post-war reconstruction,

investment, commerce, civic involvement, education, and everyday

life. Every element of Iraqi society is dependent upon the maintenance of security. And the absence of security acts as a bottleneck

on what can be achieved in all of these fields.

The failure to establish basic law and order is the leading criticism Iraqis make of the CPA and the occupation. There is universal

agreement across a wide spectrum of Iraqis, from those favorable

to the United States to those critical of America, from religious as

well as secular elements, from Sunni, Shiite, Kurd, Turkmen, and

others, that security is the main problem facing the country. This

is demonstrated by both public statements as well as the available

polling data.

We must precisely understand what is meant by security however. When Iraqis speak of security they are not primarily referring

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to attacks on Coalition forces or the targeting of U.S. soldiers. They

are referring to the safety of ordinary Iraqis in the pursuit of their

everyday affairs. The failure of the CPA to provide security against

car-jackings, kidnappings, armed robbery, abduction, rape, and

other kinds of theft and banditry, in addition to the insecurity

caused by attacks on Coalition forces, is the primary complaint

most Iraqis have of the occupation. Iraqis simply do not feel safe

and many, quite possibly the majority, hold the CPA and the

United States responsible for this situation. I experienced this myself in Baghdad last summer.

Let me move to the causes of the present security situation briefly. The unwillingness or inability of the Coalition forces to stop the

widespread looting following the fall of the regime was a terrible

beginning that produced a feeling that no one was in charge, encouraged criminal elements, and made the country’s reconstruction

exceedingly more difficult as a result of the pillaging of public utilities and ministries. The decisions to disband the Iraqi army and

police force after the fall of Baghdad have also contributed to the

continuing security problem in multiple ways.

The disbanding of the army and police produced two negative

consequences: The country was left without the institutions most

capable of maintaining law and order; and second, it produced

thousands of disenfranchised men trained in military and security

operations now without jobs or income, unsure of their future in

the new Iraq, and embittered at the CPA and the United States.

Insufficient troop presence from the beginning coupled with the

wrong types of forces, arguably, combat soldiers as opposed to

trained peacekeepers and military police, has also negatively impacted the security situation.

Let me move to the second most important factor in determining

how Iraqis view the CPA and the United States at the present; and

that is the question of public services.

Many in the CPA have worked tirelessly to improve the situation

in Iraq and much has been accomplished. But the fact remains

that, in terms of public services, the overall picture is mixed. For

example, with regard to the telecommunications sector, there actually has been quite a great deal accomplished. There are now today

more telephone lines in Iraq than pre-war if we include the newly

established cell phone service, for example, although the land line

figure is actually still below, slightly, the figure that existed before

the war.

Though there have been improvements in telecommunications,

electricity remains the greatest obstacle in terms of public service

provision. Electricity is the single most important public service

that directly affects Iraqi opinion of the U.S. occupation as it has

a direct impact on many aspects of daily life. It is crucial for refrigeration, air conditioning, water and sewage, lighting, security, effective hospital operations, commerce, and almost all elements of

everyday life in Iraq. Iraq today has still not reached pre-war levels

of electricity. For some electricity has become the metric for measuring the CPA’s success or lack thereof in terms of delivering public services.

The DOD estimated pre-war levels of electricity production in

Iraq to be 4,400 megawatts daily. The CPA estimated the 7-day avVerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:13 Dec 17, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00089 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\96993.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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erage of peak electricity production for the week of May 22–28,

2004, to be 3,946 megawatts—still well below pre-war levels. This

corresponds to Iraqi impressions revealed through polling data. In

the USA Today/CNN/Gallup poll administered at the end of March

and the beginning of April, which included roughly 3,400 Iraqis,

100 percent of Iraqis surveyed said they ‘‘go without electricity for

long periods of time.’’ This figure is actually up from 99 percent in

2003.

After security, electricity is the second leading criticism of the

CPA and the occupation among Iraqis. And was said previously,

many Iraqis remain incredulous that the most powerful country in

the world cannot restore electricity to pre-war levels in Baghdad

and elsewhere in the country 1 year after the war. Some Iraqis, I

am sad to say, believe this is a deliberate policy on the part of the

United States. I heard this myself when I was in Baghdad last

summer. The failure to deliver electricity at pre-war levels 1 year

later has negatively affected Iraqi attitudes toward the United

States and the CPA.

There is not sufficient time here to compare all the levels of

other public services and infrastructure in Iraq before the war and

at present. Many however see these as small matters which the

United States should have solved by now. Both Iraqis and others

do not make evaluations of the present based on the possibility

that things might, and probably will, be much better 5 years from

now. They base their evaluations on what conditions are like today.

Real people experience and think in days and months. Decades and

generations are the timeframes of historians and academics.

Let me address another very important topic that has not received much attention today with regard to how Iraqis view the

CPA and the occupation, and that is the question of unemployment. Accurate employment figures are difficult to obtain for Iraq.

Mass unemployment, however, continues to be a serious problem

and should be viewed, in part, as a security issue in addition to its

importance for Iraqi public opinion. In addition to fueling frustration and resentment toward the U.S. occupation, large pools of jobless men could become a source of potential recruits for the insurgency.

In March, the CPA estimated unemployment at between 25 and

30 percent, while the Economist Intelligence Unit put the figure

closer to 60 percent for the same month. According to the June 9,

2004 Iraq Index, which is put out by the Brookings Institution, unemployment is estimated to be between 28 and 45 percent in Iraq.

Let me talk about how many Iraqis—and I will be brief—experience the U.S. presence. How some Iraqis experience the U.S. military presence in their country has also negatively affected many

Iraqi hearts and minds. Stories of house raids in the middle of the

night with heavily armed troops kicking down doors, frightening

women and children in the process, circulate in Iraq and have embittered Iraqis who experience such raids and who are neither involved in criminal activity or the insurgency, as well as other

Iraqis.

Long, seemingly arbitrary detentions with little or no information provided to the detainees’ families has been a grievance voiced

by many. On some accounts, Iraqis also resent U.S. military conVerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:13 Dec 17, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00090 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\96993.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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voys in urban areas and checkpoints. Civilian casualties, of course,

are an altogether different matter.

Iraqis have an overall negative impression of U.S. military forces

according to the various polling data. Recent CPA polling found

that 80 percent of Iraqis have an unfavorable opinion of U.S.

troops. The USA Today/CNN/Gallup Poll produced similar findings.

The impact of house raids, wrongful detention, the disproportionate use of force, and civilian casualties goes well beyond the individuals directly involved. Every house raid on law-abiding families

turns an entire street against Coalition forces, every wrongful detention creates a neighborhood opposed to the occupation, and

every civilian casualty produces an extended family embittered

against the United States.

The logic of militarily defeating an insurgency with a foreign

army runs counter to the logic of winning the battle for the hearts

and minds of the general population. Counter insurgency operations necessarily result in urban fighting, damage to neighborhoods, and civilian casualties. The case of Fallujah is particularly

instructive. Because I have run out of time, I am not going to go

through the case of Fallujah. But let me just say——

Mr. SHAYS. I will give you an opportunity in the questions.

Dr. SHEHATA. OK. In brief, that from the perspective of the war

for the hearts and minds, the events of Fallujah were disastrous,

infuriating most Iraqis, galvanizing opinion decidedly against the

United States, and inflaming anti-American sentiment. Almost all

Iraqis viewed it as unjustified, collective punishment and the disproportionate use of force, including our allies in Iraq like the current Prime Minister as well as Adnan Pechachi and others.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me do this. I know you have more in your statement, but let me get to Mr. Galen.

Dr. SHEHATA. Sure.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Shehata follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. I realize I may have erred here as well. You have

been in Iraq since the——

Dr. SHEHATA. After the war.

Mr. SHAYS. After the war. Have you as well, Ms. Pletka?

Ms. PLETKA. Yes.

Mr. SHAYS. So thank you all for doing that. That just shows my

bias to a good friend.

Mr. Galen, you have the floor.

Mr. GALEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to begin this

portion with the conclusion of my written testimony, which is this:

We should remember that the last time the United States was an

occupying power was in Japan. We defeated Japan in 1945. We did

not return sovereignty until early 1952—having signed the Treaty

of San Francisco in late 1951. So we occupied Japan for just under

7 years. Japan was a monolithic society—one religion, one culture,

one history. But Iraq is a multi-religious, multi-ethnic, and largely

tribal in its history.

Japan is a series of islands, easily isolated. Iraq is surrounded

by neighbors who are not particularly thrilled about a non-theocratic, at least semi-democratic, potential economic powerhouse

building up right next door.

We fought a war of attrition against Japan. A significant number

of Japanese young men who could have continued to fight had already been killed in the march across the Pacific. Iraq’s military

disintegrated in about 3 weeks and, indeed, we pointed with pride

to our precision in military action in keeping enemy combatant

deaths to a minimum.

In just 15 days from today, some 14 months, not 7 years, after

the fall of Saddam, we will be returning sovereignty to the Iraqi

people. And we should take justifiable pride in that accomplishment and have an optimistic outlook on what the ripples and

echoes of that accomplishment will mean to the future of the region.

I want to speak for a second, sir, about some of the heroism that

we saw in Iraq, not the least the three of you sitting in front of

me, the chairman having been to Iraq some five times, at least

three times without the cover of a CODEL. And as I put in my

written statement, I have an endearing memory in my mind of

meeting you and I think Dr. Palarino, and I did not know the gentleman from Virginia, Frank Wolf, outside the gate of the Green

Zone—I know this is incorrect in its fact, but it is correct in its

imagine in my mind—not getting out of a Humvee surrounded by

crew served weapons, but crawling out of what appeared in my

mind to be a 1957 Opel with rusted bullet holes in it.

Mr. SHAYS. We were grateful it was dirty.

Mr. GALEN. My point exactly. That is certainly heroism and it is

under-recognized I think to go around the country as you did looking for ground truth, as we like to call it, and coming up with your

own conclusions.

Another hero was here earlier, Ron Schlicher. We sat about 15

feet apart for most of the 6 months that I was in Iraq. I wrote

about this in one of my columns during the explosion in Fallujah.

Ambassador Schlicher and Ambassador Dick Jones went to

Fallujah during the height of the unrest, of the chaos. And as I

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wrote, they did not go dressed in bowler hats and in morning coats.

They went in kevlar helmets and in flak jackets. It was, frankly,

one of the bravest things that I saw while I was there.

The third hero, you pointed to earlier, is the Iraq Representative

to the United States, Ms. Rend Al-Rahim, who at great personal

risk has served her country very well, is clearly a brilliant spokesperson. I did not agree with everything she said, but she says it

beautifully, she says it with passion. And as an example of how

brave she truly is, during the time of the TAL negotiations, the

Transitional Administrative Law negotiations, we were, frankly,

out of security people; we just did not have anymore left, everybody

was used up, and Ambassador Bremer’s special assistant, a young

man named Brian McCormick, called and asked if I was free for

about an hour, and I said, sure, and he said, ‘‘Would you bring your

gun.’’ And to show how brave Ambassador Rahim is, I was her security detail when we transported her from the Ministry to Foreign

Affairs back into the Green Zone. And if there ever was an act of

heroism, I guarantee you, sir, that was it.

Mr. SHAYS. No. I think it was ignorance is bliss. [Laughter.]

Mr. GALEN. I just want to make one last point, sir, before I turn

over the microphone. And that is, as we move through this, it is

very difficult, impossible I suspect, to judge how high a tide will

be by looking at one or a few waves as the tide moves in. It is not

until the tide begins to move back out that we can tell how high

it was. I am extraordinarily optimistic moving forward, having

spent time both with the Americans, with the Coalition people, and

with the Iraqis that these are a people who will not fail, they will

not allow it to fail, their culture will not allow the terrorists to succeed. And I think if we sit here 1 year from today, we will be very

pleased and maybe even surprised at how much progress will have

been made. Thank you, sir.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Galen follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. I would love you, when I come back, to explain to me,

you say, ‘‘their culture will not allow them to fail,’’ I would love you

to talk more about that.

Ms. Pletka.

Ms. PLETKA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am grateful for having

been invited today. I am going to do my best to stay under 5 minutes. I think everybody knows the six questions by heart by now

since we have all been through them.

I do want to digress for a second. I was really happy to hear you,

Mr. Galen, saying really hopeful, really positive things, and recognizing some of the interesting parallels with our previous experiences during World War II. If you go back and you look at some

of the coverage in the first 5 and even 10 years after World War

II, you see a lot of echoes of the kind of criticism you see right now

of the United States in Germany and Japan. There is a famous series in Life Magazine from 1947 by John Duspasov which I commend to you because it has pretty much every single complaint

that you have heard here only you have to substitute——

Mr. SHAYS. Is one of them a headline that says ‘‘Truman Fails?’’

Ms. PLETKA. It is remarkable and I think it is important that we

have some historical perspective. Rome was not built in a day. Democracy is a huge challenge. We have had more than 200 years of

practice and we do not always get it perfect. I think the Iraqis have

done pretty well. And the other thing is that it is enormously

tempting to sit in Washington and dump on people in Baghdad,

and I am going to do that in just a moment. But before I do that,

I want to recognize that they are in an enormously challenging situation. And even for those who make mistakes that we perceive

and criticize, they are serving their country and they deserve great

recognition for that.

And now, now that I have said something positive. We have

made a lot of mistakes. Probably the most fatal mistake that we

made was in not understanding that liberation means liberation.

When you live under someone like Saddam Hussein you want to

be liberated not in order to be turned over to Jerry Bremer. I think

that a lot of Iraqis, and I agree with them, resent that, and rightly

so. In our failure to understand that, we have frittered away a lot

of the political capital that I think we earned in deposing a horrible

dictator.

And if you look at the Interim Government that was just formed

in Iraq to which we will hand sovereignty on June 30, I ask myself

how it is in any way different from a government that would have

been formed more than a year ago, indeed, a day after the statue

of Saddam Hussein fell in the central square. It is governed by an

exile leader with close ties to the United States and not that much

of a constituency within the country, which is a familiar criticism

but it was made of others, and I do wonder why we needed to wait

a year to find him.

We have lost credibility in other ways as well. The CPA, the Coalition Provisional Authority, has reversed itself on key decisions,

such as de-Baathification; it has abandoned the Kurds to the political fates recently; the CPA has announced that we are against

Baath terrorists, but then made deals with them in Fallujah; it authorized the indictment of Muqtada al Sadr as a murder, but then

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made deals with him too. I think that in these reversals, some of

which we can debate about, we have signaled weakness. And terrorists have taken advantage of those weaknesses.

And that brings me to the question of the security environment.

It is safe to say, and many people have, that there are a lot of factors that caused the deterioration in the security environment. But

I think that one of our key mistakes, and one that we continue to

make, was the failure of military authorities to work with and to

trust Iraqis. And you could actually see that even during the period

of the invasion when we did not have Iraqis with our military

troops who could have, in fact, been helpful. We have very little experience in dealing with Iraq and we could have relied far more

heavily on the expertise of Iraqi allies. Instead, we have played a

lone game. We have also allowed the borders to remain largely

open, and that has allowed in all sorts of, shorthand, bad guys that

are causing us and the Iraqis problems.

On the question of political reform, it is really only fair to call

Iraq a work in progress. The Coalition I do not think has done

enough to build civil society, to empower political parties, or to educate Iraqis about the building blocks of democracy. And without

those efforts, it is going to be very difficult for us to help them

maintain a stable political system.

Instead, what we have done is we have relied on known political

quantities, sectarian and tribal leaders, and we have failed to understand that a lot of those divisions that we believe are real inside

Iraq are much more relics of 30–40 years under totalitarianism. If

we allow the United Nations for the future to impose a proportional

representation electoral system on Iraq, as the U.N. has in fact already announced earlier this month, I think we are going to further handicap all but a very few politically savvy Iraqis in Baghdad.

I am going to wrap up quickly and just comment on the question

of how we hand out assistance. As far as the economy is concerned,

it is pretty easy for us to condemn the CPA, and the contractors,

and AID, and the NGO’s, but that really does them a terrible disservice. It is almost impossible to rebuild a country according to

OSHA standards, which is what Congress demands. And with the

kind of oversight, that you rightly demand, over appropriated

funds——

Mr. SHAYS. Surely you jest. We do not have OSHA in Iraq.

Ms. PLETKA. Seriously speaking, if you are willing to put things

together with chewing gum and make them work, they will work

for the necessary period when we are there. And so what if it all

falls apart once we leave? That has been the attitude of many occupiers and it’s irresponsible and we are not doing that. But that

means it costs more and it takes longer. And the Iraqis are frustrated, and we understand that.

Finally, I just want to address the question of hearts and minds.

I think I have a slightly different take on it than some of your previous speakers. You asked us: ‘‘Why did the Coalition and U.S.

Government public diplomacy efforts fail to reach the hearts and

minds of the Iraqi people?’’ I think that misses the question of

what public diplomacy really is about. People are not reached

through hearts and minds campaigns. They are reached through

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deeds. They do not need advertising campaigns. And that has been

one of the biggest flaws in our public diplomacy.

America has done an unbelievable service for the Iraqi people.

We need to remind everybody that what we did was a great thing,

and to understand that if we keep doing the right thing, even in

the face of great challenges, difficulty, and criticism, that 1 day

Iraq will an invaluable ally to us. And that is really what winning

hearts and minds is about. Thank you, sir.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Pletka follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. Thank you all three for your really excellent statements. I am going to ask some questions and then I am going to

invite my staff to ask some questions as well. I do not want to forget about Fallujah, but I would like to ask first what you all agreed

with—in the first and second panel, tell me what you reacted to

that you agreed strongly to, and what you might have disagreed

with. Let us take the disagreed first. In the first panel the Iraqi

Representative, in the next panel, what was said that you thought

I do not buy it, I do not agree, I think they are wrong?

Dr. SHEHATA. Well, what struck me, sir, was what we heard in

the previous panel, actually, panel II, about the sufficient force

presence in Iraq or the day after, as it were, and then the importance of looting. I guess I could not disagree more with those

issues.

Mr. SHAYS. Yes.

Mr. GALEN. Sir, the point on which I would have disagreed with

Ambassador Al-Rahim was on the issue of communications, which,

as it happened, was my job, although not internal to Iraq.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me be clear. You were not in charge of the stations and all that. But this is your expertise.

Mr. GALEN. Yes. The fact is that we did not do a good job in setting up what became Al-Iraqiya, which is to say we asked an engineering firm to be a creative company and it did not work and we

should not be surprised at that. But we did an enormous amount

of work in getting word out to Iraqis as to what was going on to

the best of our ability. Let me take just 2 seconds to explain this.

When I first got there in early December, when we had the briefings with the Iraqi press corps, which in the beginning we did separately, we finally got smart and put them together with the Western press, the Iraqi reporters were remarkably unsophisticated and

they would not ask why is there no electricity in Basra today. They

would ask why is that army vehicle parked at the end of my block.

There was just a lack of sophistication that over time they got

much better at, with our help, by the way, especially General

Kimmett, who, as the military briefer, spent an enormous amount

of time, and still spends an enormous amount of time, one-on-one,

one-on-two, one-on-three with Iraqi reporters helping them ask

tough questions. So the notion that we completely failed in driving

the message out into the Iraqi society I think is incorrect, within

the bounds of the ability to physically move around, which was difficult.

Mr. SHAYS. Before you move on. It is true, though, that we contracted with an engineering firm and so we lost a whole 7 months,

did we not?

Mr. GALEN. But that was not the only mechanism. The Ambassador was correct. The rumor activity in Iraq is fairly remarkable.

Every Thursday—I would get a report from the Iraqi analyst who

looked at the local media everyday—on Thursday they would report

the rumors that they had picked up. Now some of them they made

up just because they had to have something to say. But over time,

the rumors fell into one of three categories: a) It was the Americans punishing us. I remember specifically the 24-hour blackout.

The rumor was that the Americans were punishing the Iraqis because power went out in Cleveland and that was the punishment.

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So either the Americans are punishing us for whatever, or it is the

Mossad, the Israeli Intelligence Service, or both.

But the rumor mill is very powerful. And that is a cultural underpinning not just in Iraq, but throughout the region. It is very

difficult to overcome that. And, frankly, it is not so different here.

Remember 2 years ago when we had those two guys running

around shooting people out of the trunk of their car, we were all

looking for a white panel truck because that was what they were

supposed to have been driving. That was the rumor that was running around rampant. In fact, it turned out to be a burgundy

sedan.

Ms. PLETKA. I was not here for Ambassador Rahim’s presentation. But since she is a very old friend, I am not going to disagree

with her publicly even had I heard what she——

Mr. SHAYS. Let me just tell you one thing she said. She said we

should never have been occupiers; never. And the implication was

that we could do in May or June, I think she said June, what we

are doing 1 year later.

Ms. PLETKA. I said something very similar in my statement, and

I agree with her entirely. In fact, if we were willing to put in an

exile government and a bunch of other exiles——

Mr. SHAYS. I want you to start over again. You spoke so quickly.

Slow down.

Ms. PLETKA. I am sorry. It is because I have said it so many

times. If we were willing to put exiles in power, in the position of

Prime Minister, as we did with Ayad Allawi, and had proposed to

do with Adnan Pachachi as President and subsequently did not,

then I think we could have done it a year ago. And we could have

used the political capital that we had gained in toppling Saddam

to give credibility to that transition in Iraq. Instead, we used up

the political capital in order to give credibility to the Coalition Provisional Authority and they spent more than a year frittering it

away. I think that it is important to understand that it does not

matter how much good will any person has toward your liberator

if, in fact, that liberator becomes an occupier, he will eventually be

disliked.

May I ask your indulgence. This issue of looting has come up

again and again. I have a very contrarian view about this. It is desperately unfair for us to sit here and criticize American troops for

failing to take police action to protect things in Iraq. We need to

remember what was stolen. You commented very accurately about

things like window frames, panes of glass being stolen, and we all

remember pictures of people lugging things like mattresses.

Mr. SHAYS. There was nothing left in the building. Nothing.

Ms. PLETKA. Right. People who steal mattresses are not out joy

riding. People who steal mattresses steal them because they do not

have them, because they have not had anything new or anything

decent in years on end. And to have asked American troops to take

guns to those people and threaten them and possibly injure them

or kill them would have been quite a challenge, and I think we

would have actually lost more hearts and minds in so doing than

in not doing it. So I really think that this requires a little bit more

of a nuanced look.

Mr. SHAYS. Yes.

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Dr. SHEHATA. Could I say something about that, sir?

Mr. SHAYS. Sure.

Dr. SHEHATA. I really could not disagree more. It is not a question of U.S. soldiers shooting Iraqi civilians running out of hospitals with medical equipment or mattresses. Clearly, if there were

one, more troops present at the time, that is the day after, and two,

if they would have had the orders to stop the looting, to stand

guard in front of certain places other than the oil ministries, then

this would have been a deterrent. That is the way these things

work. It does not work otherwise. You do not have to shoot every

single person who has the desire to loot. You only have to create

the desire on their part, change the incentive system, for them not

to be able to loot. So I disagree completely.

Mr. SHAYS. I would say, Ms. Pletka, I do believe that if there

were one or two instances where the looting was not successful, I

do not think it would have necessarily happened elsewhere, but I

understand your perspective. At the time, I did not want to see any

American shoot any Iraqi. But what is interesting is we had the

State Department warn us this would happen. They said iraq is

going to be no different than Watts, and they went through. They

were oppressed people, much like folks in Watts felt they were. But

there was a warning. We were told this would happen.

I am happy, Mr. Galen, if you want to make a comment.

Mr. GALEN. I would like to just look at it from the other side,

because I wrote a column about——

Mr. SHAYS. Which side? We have heard two sides. Do you have

a third side?

Mr. GALEN. The other side from your side. And that is, imagine

the reaction in the United States had we lost a soldier or 5 soldiers

or 10 soldiers protecting mattresses or window frames. I think

there was a real issue of, on the one hand, letting this three decades of pent up whatever to blow off, which some people took advantage of, obviously nobody needed to steal an icon from a museum, that is clearly just criminal behavior. But I think that the

notion of having a pitched gun battle involving American soldiers,

which was fairly likely given the number of AK–47s, as you know,

that exist on the street in any city in Iraq, protecting mattresses

and window frames. I think if we go back in time and think that

through, I think we would see that it may have been an insolvable

situation, but I am not sure that we made the wrong decision.

Mr. SHAYS. What I wonder, though, is are we mixing cultures?

Different people react differently to certain events. I was led to believe that in Iraqi culture a sense of security and protection is

viewed differently than we would view it.

Mr. GALEN. That gets us into that area you wanted to discuss.

I was in Kuwait just a year ago at the behest of the Kuwaiti government to watch their elections, their brand of democracy, which

is only called democracy because they choose to call it that. There

are 2.1 million inhabitants and 130,000 get to vote. But that is

what they do and they seem to be OK with it.

But more to the point here, I was in a discussion with a university professor who was adamant about the fact that stability was

more important than freedom, than democracy. That the notion of

having a stable society under a Saddam was better for the Iraqi

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people, in his view, than going through the turmoil of overthrowing

Saddam and all the things that you and your panels have discussed here today. That is I suppose a legitimate viewpoint from

his point of view. I do not think it is from our point of view because

we have fought wars over the centuries to overthrow stable but unfair governments here and abroad. But that is part of what we are

discussing here today. Is stability more important than having a

society go through the throes of instability to get themselves to an

end state that over the next, not 3 months or 14 months as it has

been, but over the next 14 or 1,400 years will have proved to be

the right direction taken.

Mr. SHAYS. Any other comment on this issue?

Dr. SHEHATA. Well, I would just say that it is not an either/or

question. Also, it is not a question of stability. It is not about the

longevity of a regime and its brutality. It is about maintaining

basic security. Security is a precondition for freedom. If I am supposedly free to voice my opinions but I do not have security, then

that is worthless. So it is not an either/or situation. It is simply

that security is a precondition for freedom.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me ask you, you wanted to talk about Fallujah,

makes some comments? I think you had some questions on that.

I want to just tell you a reaction I had just to start this process

off. First off, with al Sadr, I was told by Mr. Bremer that a year

ago he wanted to deal with this guy when he had 300, and it did

not happen, and then he had thousands. I had this conflicted view.

In one sense, I wanted—talking about security—I wanted to have

our folks get this guy and end his ability to influence. But I kind

of rejoiced in a way that you all of a sudden saw the Iraqi Council

come in to play, the Kurds were coming in, and they were trying

to solve a problem. They did not solve it the way we wanted it necessarily, I am not sure quite how we wanted it, but they put restraints on us, and in the end he is still there. But I felt like there

was a little bit of Iraqi pride that they were given an opportunity

to try to deal with this. And so, I think I was left with the feeling

that, in the end, was a good thing.

So that is my reaction. I want to know what your reaction is.

Dr. SHEHATA. Well with regard to Muqtada al Sadr, I am in complete agreement with you. I think we saw clearly other Shiite clergy as well as other individuals, prominent Iraqis try to intervene

and try to calm down the situation. I think it was a mistake to go

after Muqtada al Sadr in the way that the CPA did. I think the

reason that this got to this terrible point was because Muqtada al

Sadr was completely, or at least he felt, he was actually, excluded

from the political process. But what we have seen, and as a good

general rule, is the fact that inclusion generally produces moderation. So, for example, Muqtada al Sadr quite recently said, just several days ago, that he accepts the legitimacy of the Interim Government as long as they work for the ending of the U.S. occupation

and elections. I think that is a very good thing. I think if you exclude political players, you radicalize them. And that is dangerous.

So what has to be done is inclusion even of those people who we

might disagree with fundamentally.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Galen, given your background in the media, were

you the one who decided to shut down Sadr’s paper?

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Mr. GALEN. No, sir, I was not.

Mr. SHAYS. Were you consulted?

Mr. GALEN. No, sir, I was not. Let me speak to that just for a

second. That al Sadr saying that he accepts this government has

all the import of me saying that I accept this government. The fact

is that al Sadr has been marginalized by his own activities and by

the other Shiites who we were afraid were no more moderate but

in fact have stepped up to the plate, to use an American phrase,

and have begun to assume the mantle of power and the mantle of

democracy and the mantle of diplomacy.

One of the reasons that al Sadr has been marginalized is because

one, we killed a lot of his militia, which is a good thing; and two,

he did not gain the support of the large number of Iraqis. I think

you can make the conclusion that when he went into Najaf and the

area down there that he expected there to be a huge outpouring of

support for his revolt. And, frankly, that did not happen. And so,

in the end, it proved that, not what my friend to my right is saying,

that we should have included him in the first place, but that if you

do take radical action when others are trying to build a democracy,

that you will be marginalized.

Going back to your specific question. I asked the question when

we shut down al Sadr’s newspaper in Baghdad and then arrested

his lieutenant, I was in Riyadh at the time, when I got back I

asked, who was in the meeting, putting aside the military part, because I do not know about that, but who was in the meeting, I

asked, that said these are the potential outcomes from an information standpoint and a communication standpoint, and based upon

those potential outcomes, what does the CPA and CJTF–7, the

military coalition’s response going to be? And I asked that of

enough people because I wanted to make sure that I had the right

answer. And the answer was, that meeting never happened.

Mr. SHAYS. In other words, I want to be clear, a decision to close

down the paper, and you are asking did anyone think of what the

consequences might be of closing down that paper. Is that correct?

Mr. GALEN. Well, I assume somebody did, but if they did they did

not share it beyond my guess is the three star and Ambassador

rank. That was a problem. Not that we would have changed the direction, not that we could have influenced it at all, but I think it

was a failing on the part—you are going to ask later what is the

greatest failing, and in my mind the greatest failing is having a pro

council. It runs against my conservative grain to have centralized

planning of any nature. And I think this is the sort of situation you

get yourself into when you begin to close down the decision process

to one or two people. And then when events spin out of control you

find yourself unable to respond quickly enough because the response mechanisms are not in place.

Mr. SHAYS. Ms. Pletka, do you want to respond?

Ms. PLETKA. I do not quite know what to respond to. I agree with

a lot of what Mr. Galen said. I think that the consequences of shutting down the paper were manifest. There was a decision made to

take on Muqtada al Sadr. The reason was, as far as the paper is

concerned, that he was using it to incite violence against American

and allied forces and against Iraqis with whom he disagreed. The

idea that somehow a person who is excluded from a political procVerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:13 Dec 17, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00135 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\96993.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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ess has somehow a right or that it would be natural for them to

turn to violence is really I think unacceptable. There are plenty of

people who are excluded from the political process in lots of places

and they do not generally kill their opponents as a response. So I

think we need to recognize that Muqtada al Sadr is someone who

embraces terrorism, someone who embraces murder as a political

tool. He is not a part of the political process and he was not driven

to it because he was excluded. We have a long record of his speeches saying terrible things, exhorting people to violence long before

he was ‘‘excluded.’’

Mr. SHAYS. It would be interesting and the thinking now—my

general reaction was a pretty big mistake to get rid of the paper

because, in essence, it gives it more credibility. But the proof would

be is there a paper now that has replaced it. In other words, have

we made that paper more significant, or does it simply not exist

anymore?

Ms. PLETKA. It no longer exists.

Mr. GALEN. It no longer exists. And I do not disagree at all with

what you were saying. I was not suggesting that we should not

have shut down the paper.

Ms. PLETKA. Oh, no, no.

Mr. GALEN. But your point, sir, I think is correct, that the proof

is that no paper, to my knowledge, has arrived to take its place.

Now you could make the case that people are afraid to start such

a paper. But there are a lot of newspapers, they do not all publish

every day, but there is no shortage of public discourse, at least in

Baghdad, in terms of varying points of view. We do draw the line

even in our country at shouting fire in a movie theater. That does

not fall under free speech.

Mr. SHAYS. Great observation. I will let the staff ask a question

here. Our subcommittee is doing hearings on the whole issue of oil

for food and the outrage, frankly, of some of our allies who were

involved in allowing Saddam to get $10 billion out of this process.

But what I love is that this story was outed about the U.N. from

the Iraqi press. Our people were not covering it well, the Europeans were not covering it well, and the Iraqi press, and even if

we determine it was Chalabi and whatever we think about him,

the bottom line is the press got the story, the press ran with the

story, they pointed out 200 names, and the rest is history. So I

think that is kind of an encouraging thing that you actually saw

this initiative.

Mr. GALEN. And something, sir, that we did not see 7 or 8

months ago. They would not have had the sophistication, they

would not have understood that they were permitted to do that.

Mr. SHAYS. So you leaked this story?

Mr. GALEN. No, no. No. I was in the same briefing as you were,

sir. But the fact is that it is another one of those hopeful signs that

a free Iraqi press, not an al Sadr press, not a medium that is inciting to violence, but the notion after three decades—look, independent thought was not a positive idea in Iraq for three decades. It got

you at least some body parts cutoff or got you killed. And that is

one of the things I was discussing earlier, that as we moved

through time a more sophisticated level of activity on the part of

the Iraqi press led to that whole notion of the oil for food program

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story, which, in fact, led to a requirement that every governate go

through all of its paper and preserve all the documents dealing

with oil for food, which probably would not have happened without,

as you say, the Iraqi press bringing it up.

Mr. HALLORAN. Thank you. We have read the section of your testimony on Fallujah. I want to center some questions for all of you

on that. It is portrayed as an instance of heavy-handed military

tactics in response to a provocative incident which then kind of galvanized Iraqi political support and political debate about a response, which then prompted a U.S. tactical response in terms of

how to deal with the security situation on the ground, which to

some became a whole kind of strategic shift on how we deal with

security in Iraq—that it is an Iraqi problem, not an American issue

or problem. That politically, when the United States decides security is our No. 1 mission, a lot of people with a lot of different motives suddenly make it their No. 1 mission to prevent that, whereas

if it is an Iraqi priority or Iraqi mission, a lot of Iraqis with the

same motives have an interest in making that mission succeed.

So I want to ask all three of you, if Fallujah was a paradigm

shift, as it were, not in its provocation but in its response and that

perception of security?

Dr. SHEHATA. I am not sure I understood the question, actually,

I am afraid to say.

Ms. PLETKA. I would be happy to answer it and then everybody

can disagree with me. I think Fallujah was a paradigm shift and

I think it was a terrible one, actually. I know that people disagree

with that. We made a decision to confront a problem that we had

with insurgents in Fallujah. This was not just Baathists and Saddam loyalists heavily armed, but also outside terrorists. And we

went in. We were I think moderately heavy-handed. We did not

bring enough troops to bear in the beginning, but we added additional troops. At a certain moment, we decided that we should embrace a different model, which is now being called the Fallujah

model. We brought in briefly a former general in the Revolutionary

Guards, General Jasamsela, another hideous mistake on our part,

to head up an Iraqi brigade.

Yes, everything is quiet right now. But what kind of a compromise has brought that quiet? The Washington Post had a very

interesting article about this last week that made very clear that

once you go into Fallujah, the terrorists and the Baathists are in

power. Now that means that for the moment they have decided to

remain quiet. What will happen when they decide they no longer

wish to be quiet? Will we have to go back in? Will there be another

compromise? And what kind of compromises should we make with

local warlords, with terrorists, with Baathist recidivists? I am not

sure. But we are opposed to making those kind of local compromises from place to place in Afghanistan. And I think we should

be opposed to doing it in Iraq. Either you are someone who is opposed to the government, you are a terrorist and you must be gotten rid of, or you are not. But we need to decide which is the model

that works. And for me, we are just delaying the pain by going

with this latter Fallujah model.

Mr. HALLORAN. Dr. Shehata.

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Dr. SHEHATA. Sure. I think I understand the question now. I

think, clearly, from the perspective of the U.S. military and how we

deal with these kinds of things, Fallujah probably did signify a paradigm shift. At the same time, we are getting close to the handover

of sovereignty, so this might be, hopefully will be, a mute question.

I disagree significantly with Ms. Pletka that it was a moderate

use of force. Clearly, in the English press as well as in the Arabic

press, the number of civilian casualties was well over 600. But it

is not important, and this is the key point that I want to make,

how any of us view Fallujah. What is important is how the Iraqi

public viewed Fallujah. And what I am saying is simply that

Fallujah was a crucial moment. It was at that moment after

Fallujah that I started telling my students that I was afraid that

the war had been lost. Because everyone in Iraq reacted negatively

to the way the United States handled it. For them, it was four contractors were killed and, as a result, the disproportionate use of

force, a whole city was under siege, a city of 300,000, and over 600

people, many of them civilians actually, and the pictures show that,

killed as a response. So that clearly did a tremendous amount of

damage for how many Iraqis view us and view the occupation.

I do not know and I am not qualified to say what the military

reaction should have been. But I think it is clear that it should

have been significantly different than that. And you are right,

Iraqis, and Iraqis who think more closely to Ms. Pletka and all of

us here, would probably have an interest in dealing with the situation in some way. And I think that any imaginable way that they

would have come up, that is, Iraqis of authority, would have been

better than the way that Fallujah was handled.

Mr. GALEN. It was not just a matter of four contractors being

killed. The manner in which they were killed, the manner in which

their bodies were mangled afterwards, and the fact that what was

left of their bodies was hung from a bridge for all to see was the

issue at hand. And I will tell you, I do not know how angry the

Iraqis were afterwards, but as far as the Coalition civilians and the

Coalition military were concerned, an appropriate response, I will

speak for myself, not for anyone else, would have been to flatten

Fallujah, make it into a parking lot, we would have known it was

over when the paint in the lines dried. That is how angry everybody was about the horror that had happened. And not just the

horror that it happened, Mr. Chairman, but the fact that there was

so little reaction against that kind of senseless brutality. These

were guys that were protecting a food convoy. They were not out

there gunning down women and children in the street, they were

protecting a food convoy. And it was the lack of any kind of remorse, other than the very narrow statements that desecrating a

dead body is anti-Islamic, and I am not Islamic so I can only take

that as read. But that I think was the part that infuriated more

people.

This happened, let me just say from a tactical standpoint, this

happened to occur, to use an American basketball phrase, during

a transition. The 82nd Airborne was moving out, there headquarters had been up in Ramadi, and the 1st Marine Expeditionary

Force was moving in and they were setting up headquarters much

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member, between the marines and the airborne and the army

about how they had handled things in the Western provinces and

there was some reason to suspect that this may have been the

work of agents provocateur just to see what we had, what do the

new guys have. The marines, for their part, although this is lost

in the reporting, the marines held off for a long time. It was not

like the four contractors were killed and that night we started

bombing. The fact is that the marines held off for many days,

maybe a week or so, before they decided on what the response

would be. And their reasoning was they were trying to get the best

possible intelligence so that when they did go in and kill people,

which they were going to do, that they could kill bad guys with

some reasonable expectation that they were hitting the right targets.

So I disagree with Dr. Shehata that this was an unmeasured response. It was a very measured response to an act of brutality that

almost belies description.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you.

Dr. SHEHATA. Can I just say one small thing about the question

of Fallujah.

Mr. SHAYS. Sure. This is a very interesting panel. I like the disagreement, and I agree with both of you. Mr. Greenspan speaks.

[Laughter.]

Dr. SHEHATA. Certainly, what happened to the four contractors

was horrific and I could not get myself to actually watch the footage on television. But I think that we have to understand Fallujah

actually in its historical context. So, for example, if we go back to

immediately after the end of the war, in April 2003, there was an

incident which really set us on the wrong track in Fallujah to begin

with, which was the American soldiers who had taken over the

school and there was a demonstration, from all press accounts a

peaceful demonstration of residents of Fallujah outside in which 13

Fallujans were killed. So, clearly, from the very beginning there is

a context here that differentiates Fallujah from other parts of the

country as well and it has to be understood if we are to understand

the mutilation of the bodies, which cannot be in any sense rationalized. And then before the four contractors were killed——

Mr. SHAYS. That statement confuses me. Because you say you

have to put in context—I cannot put it in context with anything.

I can put in it context but it is hard for me to.

Dr. SHEHATA. Sure. What I am saying is not the way that they

were killed but the anti-American feeling in Fallujah, putting that

in context. Not to justify it but just so that we can understand it.

So in April 2003, there were the 13 civilians killed. And then before

the incident with the four contractors, there was a search operation

in Fallujah a week or so before which, it was not intended to end

this way, but resulted in the killing of 15 Fallujans. So if we are

to understand the anti-American feeling in Fallujah, we have to

understand that.

But there was another larger point about what has been called

the Sunni Triangle that I think needs to be made that possibly

would help steer us in a different direction with regard to the

Sunni community. No one understood, it seems, that the people

who had the most to lose and therefore we would have an interest

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making them buy-in to the new Iraq were the Sunnis. I mean, of

course, the Shiites have an interest in a post-Saddam Iraq, and the

Kurds it is not clear and so on, depending on what they get, but

the losers in this game were going to be the Sunnis. And therefore,

we should have gone out of our way to make sure they do not exit

the process by including their leaders, by using money as ammunition in Sunni areas and so forth just from a strategic point of view.

Ms. PLETKA. I am sorry. May I just give one quick word. First,

I agree with you, Mr. Chairman, there is no context; 13 deaths, 20

deaths, 68 deaths, 500 deaths do not really excuse the mutilation

of four civilians. So I do not think there is much context for that.

But as far as the Sunni Triangle is concerned, I was with General Patreaus in September of last year and actually objected a little bit to his strong outreach to the Sunni community. To suggest

that the forces that were in place in the Sunni Triangle were not

reaching out to moderate community leaders, to tribal leaders,

were not spending money wherever possible does them a terrible

injustice. To the contrary, he used an expression which I disagreed

with strongly. He said, ‘‘There can be no losers here.’’ For my part,

I thought there should be losers there. But that said, he bent over

backward, as did everybody subordinate to him, to try and find

Sunni leaders and Sunni community members who could be helped,

who could be made part of the process, and who could be empowered as part of the new Iraq.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you. Yes, sir?

Mr. GALEN. Mr. Chairman, could I just make one last point with

respect to Fallujah?

Mr. SHAYS. Sure.

Mr. GALEN. This did not get any publicity so I am not sure anybody knows that it was going on. There was an ongoing effort that

was called the Fallujah Project and it included, oh, I do not know,

I would say 20 fairly senior people and then me around the CPA

and CJTF–7 and we were specifically charged with looking for

projects in Fallujah to which we could bring to bear civil affairs,

cultural affairs, building. There was a big argument should we

build a hospital or should we build another school. But there was

an ongoing and real effort to use positive influence of money and

of civil affairs projects in Fallujah. We got shot at once when we

were over there, because we had told them we were going to come

and meet with them, and we never went back.

Mr. SHAYS. Interesting. We are going to conclude. I do want to

know what you think is the worst thing we did, the best thing we

did, and what is the most important thing we need to do in the

months to come. Also, and I wish I had asked the others, and so

I am not going to be able to do some comparison here, but there

are 150 tribes, some obviously more important than others, there

are religious leaders. It is my sense that we were reaching out to

the religious instead of the tribes. Should we have been reaching

out to the tribes? If you have no opinion, that is OK too.

Dr. Shehata, let me start with you.

Dr. SHEHATA. Sure. Certainly, there are going to be losers, and

those are the Saddamists. But I think you are right that we did

not reach out enough to tribal leaders. But to be fair, up until quite

recently we did not reach out really to Grand Ayatoliah Ali AlVerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:13 Dec 17, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00140 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\96993.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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Sistani. He was the bad guy, the spoiler. But nevertheless, I agree

with you completely, sir, that tribes should have been focused on.

In terms of the mistakes, I think insufficient troops the day

after, allowing the looting to spread, disbanding the army and police, the blanket de-Baathification, the inability to get basic services, public services, electricity, up and running again.

Mr. SHAYS. If you give me a long list of mistakes, you have to

give me a long list of successes.

Dr. SHEHATA. OK. I think the handover on June 30 is hopefully

going to be a success, and it seems like, as I mentioned before, and

I am thankful that this is the case, that there is buy-in on the part

of many Iraqis. Certainly, including Lakhdar Brahimi and the

United Nations I think was a wonderful thing and hopefully that

will continue. And, hopefully, we will see more success with the

deliverables because that is what really, as Ms. Pletka said, I agree

with her completely, that is what determines public opinion in

hearts and minds; that is, product, performance, delivery. So hopefully security and electricity will see some improvements in the

days to come.

Mr. SHAYS. Was not another success, an obvious one, the monetary policy, being able to change the currency. There was no collapse, there were no epidemics. So there were a lot of things.

Dr. SHEHATA. Sure. There were all kinds of things that we

thought might happen that did not happen, the million refugees,

for example.

Mr. SHAYS. But they did not happen in part, though, because of

what we did.

Dr. SHEHATA. I think that is true. And I think that the currency

conversion and the strength of the Iraqi dinar actually is another

thing that has been surprising. So I put those among—I mean,

there are all kinds of accomplishments and I go through some of

them in my testimony, including some of the waterwork that has

been done by USAID, including the telecommunications which I

mentioned, and so on.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. Thank you.

Those two questions.

Mr. GALEN. First on the tribal issue, sir, I think if you have the

opportunity you might want to bring Ambassador Schlicher back in

just for a chat. That was his brief. He was responsible for outreach

to the governate. And my understanding from him is they spent a

good deal of time dealing with tribal leaders, not from Baghdad but

actually from where it counted, out in the governate. So you may

want to chat with him about that.

Mr. SHAYS. Do you think some of the effort to provide these local

government bodies was through the tribal process?

Mr. GALEN. Yes. Well they were brought into the process at the

governate level, at what we would call the county level. That was

Ambassador Schlicher’s principal role so he might be the right one

to talk to about that.

Mr. SHAYS. Best and worst?

Mr. GALEN. The worst, as I said, is the centralized decisionmaking process. I am not sure there was a good way out of that

but it certainly did lead to decisions that had to be made and then

had to get unmade because, as we all know, part of the way of sucVerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:13 Dec 17, 2004 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00141 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\96993.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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cessful decisionmaking is having strong opposing views that are

fully aired and then letting the decisionmaker choose from those.

But when you only have one person and a very small cadre of people around him, as we did with Ambassador Bremer, who, by the

way, is brilliant and to the extent that there has been any success,

and I think there has been great success, he gets all the credit. If

he is going to get any of the blame, he has to get the credit because

he literally works 20 hours a day, 7 days a week. But I think from

a policy standpoint having a pro council was a mistake, it did not

work with General Gardner, and I am not sure it was as successful

as it might have been.

Mr. SHAYS. Best?

Mr. GALEN. The best thing, clearly, was the decision last November to set a date certain, which happens to be June 30, for the

handover.

Mr. SHAYS. Which was criticized pretty strongly by a lot of folks.

Mr. GALEN. Well, again, that goes back to my earlier statement,

sir, is you do not know how high the tide is going to get until it

goes back out again. But I think as we move through time we are

going to find that rather than having uncertainty and having new

roadblocks and having people like Mr. Brahimi and the United Nations decide one thing while we are deciding something else and

the French deciding something else again about what constitutes a

time when we could actually hand over sovereignty, setting a hard

date certain and forcing everybody—I mean everybody in the palace in the Green Zone has been absolutely focused on that June 30

deadline ever since November 15th.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. And you left out one thing. Biggest need in the

months to come?

Mr. GALEN. I think the biggest need is for everybody to step back

and give this thing a chance to ripen. This business of on an hourly

basis deciding on whether we are succeeding or failing is destructive beyond any measure. You cannot do it that way. We have to

let the situation ripen. We have to let the new government, the Interim Government actually get their feet on the ground to deal

with the ins and outs. The Transitional Administrative Law is a

brilliant document and if they use that as at least a guideline for

how they build the future of Iraq, it is going to have a huge impact

moving forward through the region.

Mr. SHAYS. That is a strong word, a ‘‘brilliant’’ document. I am

happy to hear you feel that way.

Mr. GALEN. Happily, I got to sit in on some of the negotiations

and it was really interesting to watch.

Mr. SHAYS. Ms. Pletka.

Ms. PLETKA. Tribes, yes? It is very important to understand how

Iraq is made up and that it is in many ways a tribal society, it is

a sectarian society, but it is also a very urbanized, highly educated

society. We should reach out to tribal leaders but we should not

have a cartoonish view of how Iraqis think and feel. Under a dictator when there is no political freedom, the natural tendency is to

turn to your family members, your village leaders, your tribal leaders, and your co-religionists, to use a dreadful word, for political allies. But that is not a natural political or democratic order. Ideas

are what should be what organizes the Iraqi people, whether it is,

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if I can start on an extreme, communism-liberal democracy, different ideas about how to organize themselves politically, and that

should not be based on who my family looks like, where I go to

mosque, or what my great-great-grandfather’s last name was. So I

think that is very important as we look forward.

In terms of our successes and failures, one of our greatest failures, as I think has been made clear, is in our failure to trust the

Iraqi people to govern themselves, to trust them to make the mistakes that they needed to make to learn how to be responsible leaders, to believe in them in the way that justified their liberation.

And so that was a terrible mistake. And insofar as we continue to

denigrate Iraqi leaders, usually anonymously in the press, I think

that we do them a huge disservice.

Our greatest successes are a reflection on the United States, and

it sounds simplistic to say it, but it is that we believed that the liberation of 25 million people from tyranny was something important

enough to sacrifice American lives, to fight for in the international

community, and to stick with to this day even when people continue to snipe at us.

The future. One of the greatest mistakes I think that we can

make, and I alluded to this in my testimony, is if we allow the imposition of a system of proportional representation on Iraq for their

election process which concentrates power in the center, in the

hands of established political groups. We will exclude different regions, we will fail to vest all of the people of Iraq in the political

process, and we risk creating a political system that brought us 50

governments in post-war Italy and I do not know how many governments but I know they did not work very well in Israel, the two

places that have proportional representation systems. So I think

that will be a huge mistake and we should be very vigilant as we

move forward.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you all very much. I really have enjoyed this

panel and I have enjoyed the hearing that we have had today. I

have learned a lot. I was struck by—and I am reacting, Ms. Pletka,

to your comment, because I was trying to sort out what I felt about

Fallujah. Because I happen to agree, that if we could have acted

the way we wanted, we would have taken the kind of action I think

needed to happen. But I rejoiced in the fact that we were trusting

Iraqis to kind of have their day. And even though I thought they

made the wrong decision, I rejoiced in that we were starting to try

to trust them and they were getting some confidence. So that is

why I said I agreed with both sides. You by your last answer

helped me realize that I did agree with both sides. Bad mistake,

but we trusted them and that was a good thing. Thank you all very

much. Is there any one last statement that needs to be put on the

record? Sometimes that is usually the best. If there is not, this

hearing is closed.

[Whereupon, at 6:30 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned, to

reconvene at the call of the Chair.]

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