BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OF THE AUTHORS
CONRAD C. CRANE is the Director of the U.S. Army Military History
Institute. Before accepting that position, he served with the Strategic
Studies Institute (SSI) at the U.S. Army War College, where he held
the General Douglas MacArthur Chair of Research. He joined SSI
after his retirement from active military service, a 26-year military
career that concluded with 9 years as Professor of History at the U.S.
Military Academy (USMA). Dr. Crane has authored or edited books
and monographs on the Civil War, World War I, World War II, Korea
and Vietnam, and has written and lectured widely on airpower and
landpower issues. Before leaving SSI, he coauthored a prewar study
on reconstructing Iraq with W. Andrew Terrill that influenced Army
planners and has attracted much attention from the media. Dr.
Crane holds a B.S. from USMA and an M.A. and Ph.D from Stanford
University. He is also a graduate of the U.S. Army Command and
General Staff College and the U.S. Army War College.
W. ANDREW TERRILL joined the Strategic Studies Institute (SSI)
in October 2001, and is SSI's Middle East specialist. Prior to his
appointment, he served as a Middle East nonproliferation analyst for
the International Assessments Division of the Lawrence Livermore
National Laboratory (LLNL). In 1998-99, Dr. Terrill also served as a
Visiting Professor at the U.S. Air War College on assignment from
LLNL. He is a former faculty member at Old Dominion University in
Norfolk, Virginia, and has taught adjunct at a variety of other colleges
and universities. He is a retired U.S. Army Reserve lieutenant colonel
and a Foreign Area Officer (Middle East). Dr. Terrill has published in
numerous academic journals on topics including nuclear proliferation,
the Iran-Iraq War, Operation DESERT STORM, Middle Eastern
chemical weapons, and ballistic missile proliferation, terrorism,
and commando operations. Since 1994, at U.S. State Department
invitation, Dr. Terrill has participated in the Middle Eastern Arms
Control and Regional Security (ACRS) Track 2 talks, which are part
of the Middle East Peace Process. He holds a B.A. from California
State Polytechnic University and an M.A. from the University of
California, Riverside, both in Political Science. Dr Terrill also holds a
Ph.D. in International Relations from Claremont Graduate University,
Claremont, California.
iv


PRECEDENTS, VARIABLES, AND OPINIONS
IN PLANNING A U.S. MILITARY DISENGAGEMENT
STRATEGY FROM IRAQ
Hussein is now deposed and no banned weapons were present. So why
don't we leave?
Gregg Easterbrook
The New Republic
It's only complete nonsense to ask the troops to leave in this chaos and
this vacuum of power.
Ghazi al-Yawer2
Iraqi Vice President
As in Palestine, the occupation is the main cause of the current troubles.
Stanley Hoffman
Harvard University
Introduction.
Having invaded Iraq and deposed a tyrannical dictator in early
2003, the United States assumed some important commitments to
the Iraqi population, who were left without a government or viable
security forces following the destruction of Saddam Hussein's
regime. The U.S. administration has defined a central part of its
approach to the situation as “leaving Iraq better than we found it."4
In its maximalist form, this statement calls for empowering a decent
and accountable government and providing strong indigenous
security forces to defend the country and maintain internal security.
At a minimum, leaving Iraq better than we found it requires a stable
government and the continued national unity of Iraq (rather than its
separation into smaller warring territories), as well as the avoidance
of civil war.
So long as Iraq remains unified with an acceptable degree of
domestic stability, security, and harmony, it would be difficult to find
a government worse than that of Saddam Hussein. A government
1


groups. Former Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi has referred to
this process of reaching out to insurgent nationalists as rehabilitating
“the fringes of the insurgents."11 It remains to be seen if Allawi's
successors (and especially Islamist Shi'ites) will maintain his strong
commitment to reaching out to Iraq's Sunni Arabs, while waging
unrelenting war against hard-core terrorists.12 Mixed signals exist
here since the Ja'afari government has included a number of Sunnis
in the Constitutional Convention but has also continued to favor
sweeping de-Ba'athification measures, which have alienated large
numbers of Sunni Arabs.13
Later in this work, the authors will show that exit strategies
following a military intervention often are notoriously difficult
to implement.14 Having shattered the previous government, a
responsible occupying power must seriously attempt to create a new
political system acceptable to the citizens of that defeated power
after the occupier departs. In Iraq, it may be especially difficult to
discern the optimal time to leave. Balancing the goals of supporting
stable Iraqi self-government and leaving Iraq in a timely manner
has emerged as a central challenge of U.S. regional policy. The U.S.
and Iraqi leaderships must decide when the government is capable
of surviving and moving to consolidate its authority without the
presence of large numbers of foreign troops.
The United States must also take special care to avoid leaving
Iraq with a government and security system that will crumble in
the aftermath, even if the disintegration process is not immediate.
Such an eventuality is nothing more than a delayed failure. U.S.
leaders do not have the option of departing Iraq by leaving a failed
state in place, which in turn would become a haven for terrorists
and almost certainly lapse into civil war.15 The only incontestable
reason to accelerate a U.S. departure to a point that would otherwise
seem imprudent would be in response to an official request by the
Iraqi government for the coalition to do so. Such a request could
only reasonably occur if the Iraqi government decides that it can
survive without a substantial U.S. presence or at least that its chances
are better without such a presence.
Additionally, U.S. policy for remaining in Iraq or departing
will not be decided solely on the basis of geopolitical factors
and the dynamics of Middle Eastern politics. There are also
3


important questions of American and coalition domestic political
support for a continued major troop presence in Iraq, including public
acceptance of the casualties and economic expenditures associated
with these policies. 16 Should continuing the Iraq War become deeply
unpopular with the American public, pressure may develop for a
hastily planned scramble from the country, leaving Iraq with a
highly uncertain and frightening future. Thus, to be successful in
Iraq, the United States must help empower a functioning and unified
government, support the effort to build a security force to protect that
government, and help prevent a breakdown in those intercommunal
relations necessary to foster power-sharing and avoid civil war. The
U.S. Government must also do this in a time frame acceptable both to
Iraqis and to U.S. and coalition allies' public opinion. Moreover, these
tasks must be accomplished while coping with an ongoing and highly
adaptive insurgency. The deeply challenging and multidimensional
nature of this effort leaves little latitude for mistakes in future U.S.
dealings with Iraq,
The long-term dilemma of the U.S. position in Iraq can perhaps
best be summarized as “We can't stay, we can't leave, and we can't
fail.” The longer that significant numbers of U.S. forces remain in
Iraq, the more nationalist resentment builds and the more the United
States appears to be an occupier. Additionally, the Army is strained
more and the American public may become more uncertain about
the wisdom of continuing to wage counterinsurgency war in Iraq.
On the other hand, the United States cannot withdraw prematurely
and risk a civil war or a return to unrestrained repression. Such a
failed result would reinforce perceptions of American foreign policy
ineptitude and lack of national will, and compromise the ability of the
world's remaining superpower to wield corresponding international
influence.
Prior U.S. Efforts at Postwar Stabilization
and Political Rehabilitation: The Historical Record.
Historical examples reveal many of the problems that Americans
have with postwar stabilization operations and how quickly they
can become disillusioned with the process of rebuilding foreign
societies. One of the continuing problems with the conduct of
4


does not become undemocratic or oppressive toward Sunni Muslims,
Kurds, or other minorities.41 Religious Shi'ites are currently the
most important leaders of post-Saddam Iraq, and these individuals
already have been able to expand their political power dramatically
through democratic means. Some observers wonder if the religious
leadership of Iraq and its supporters are using democratic institutions
to dominate that country without any deep commitment to those
aspects of democracy that involve rule of law and minority rights.
Moreover, if the Shi'ite religious parties consolidate control over
elected institutions, concerns that they will also achieve control
over the military and internal security organizations of the state
exist. At such a point, very few domestic checks on their behavior
regarding the Sunni Arabs, and perhaps secular Iraqis as well, will
be available.
While there are troubling questions associated with Shi'ite
religious party leadership, the United States cannot allow itself to
be placed in the position of maintaining that too many Shi’ites voted
in the last election or that Washington supports democracy so long
as the countries involved elect leaders favored by Washington. The
U.S. commitment to democracy dictates a relationship with the
Shi’ite parties as long as they also support all of the central features
of democratic government. U.S. support for minority rights and the
rule of law is an important part of this relationship.
It also seems possible that a partially democratic Iraq may emerge
as a perhaps very long interim solution, if a viable Western-style
democracy cannot be created and sustained by Iraqi leaders in the
near term. A potentially acceptable, although not optimal, interim
solution may include some of the same principles of governance as
the current government of Yemen. While Yemen has a very different
social and political history from Iraq, some of its governmental
procedures appear to be at least an interesting source of ideas. Any
comparison between the two countries, nevertheless, must not be
drawn too rigidly, since Yemeni society is much less educated, much
more tribal, and has no recent history of a strong central government
anywhere near the level of Saddam Hussein's regime. Additionally,
while Yemen has large Sunni and Shi'ite elements within the
population, the Yemeni form of Shi'ism often is considered to be
quite close to Sunni Islam.42 Moreover, Yemeni political approaches
14


still be pressured to democratize in order to maintain the flow of
U.S.-supported international aid. A friendly but undemocratic Iraq
that does not engage in massive human rights violations would
look very similar to an array of current U.S. allies in the region, and
this outcome, in most cases, would still be better than a sustained
and bloody civil war should these two alternatives become the only
available choices. Ongoing pressure to democratize could still be
leveled at such a regime, even in the aftermath of a U.S. withdrawal,
since there would be a strong Iraqi interest in maintaining the flow
of U.S. aid for reconstruction.
The Issue of Iraqi Governmental Legitimacy.
As noted earlier, a central issue in establishing a U.S. disengage-
ment policy is that of Iraqi government legitimacy as the basis for
an authoritative government. To move this policy forward, the
United States has the unenviable task of helping to empower
an emerging government, while avoiding the appearance of
dominating that government. Under Saddam Hussein, as well as a
variety of his predecessors, repression was the bond that held the
system together, and public order was maintained through fear and
intimidation. Such an approach is now unacceptable, and a new
system based on the rule of law is the ideal. Such a system requires
a government with a high level of domestic legitimacy, which is
usually based on meeting the needs of its citizens as they define
those needs.
In addressing the issue of Iraqi governmental legitimacy, U.S.
civilian and military intelligence organizations will be forced to
make periodic assessments about the government's progress in
gaining the support of its citizens. Such assessments can be used to
help plan U.S. policy regarding exit strategy. Unfortunately, political
legitimacy is an extremely difficult concept to measure. 53 Often the
degree of legitimacy enjoyed by a government is only demonstrated
when that government either survives or crumbles in the face of a
major challenge to its existence. Nevertheless, it is vital to attempt
to understand the factors that influence whether a government is
viewed as legitimate or not, considering both region-specific and
17


64
the boycott have now expressed regret about doing so in what is
clearly a promising sign.
A figure who might have helped bridge the Shi'ite-Sunni gap
was Interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi (P.M.: June 2004-March
2005), a secular Shi'ite, known for his interest in working with Sunni
leaders including what he calls the “fringe of the insurgency” – that
is, the redeemable supporters of the insurgents. His government
took office with extremely strong popular backing, including an
almost 73 percent public approval rating, partially based on a lack
of any kind of visible subservience to the United States. 65 He thus
presented himself as an Iraqi nationalist, while promising to improve
the security situation. His strong opposition to far-reaching de-
Ba'athification reassured numerous Sunnis, who viewed these
policies as a sectarian-based form of collective punishment and
disempowerment.66
Unfortunately, Allawi, who did not have a strong party
organization behind him, did poorly in the 2005 elections, with his
party taking only 40 seats in the 275 seat assembly. 67 The Sistani-
backed UIA, by contrast, has 140 seats, and the Kurdish parties have
75.68 Allawi seemed to display an excellent combination of firmness
and reconciliationism. His continuing efforts to reach out to the
Sunni community correspondingly has set a high standard which
one hopes the UIA leadership will find informative. At the time
of this writing, Iraq's Kurdish President Jalal Talabani has echoed
Allawi's words, but both the religious and secular Shi'ite leadership
of the UIA continues to favor broad brush de-Ba'athification.69 More
ominously, elements within the UIA, and particularly the Interior
Ministry, may be seeking to mold the security forces so that they are
completely dominated by Shi'ite Islamists.70
Correspondingly, an emerging problem for Iraqi government
legitimacy is that the new leaders may be viewed by some Iraqis
as representing and protecting the rights of only one portion of the
population. The empowerment of Iraqi Shi'ites, including a number
of powerful Islamists, by the election was an important exercise
in democratic process, but the consolidation of Shi'ite power may
only provide legitimacy for such a government within the Shi'ite
community. The new Iraqi leadership has claimed it will seek to
represent all Iraqis, but it is not clear how sincere these claims are
20


non-mechanized infantry with small arms. The Army was at least
initially better trained and somewhat better armed than the National
Guard (particularly with regard to mortars). Strong efforts are being
made to overcome these discrepancies, as the Army and National
Guard are merged into a single force.116
Iraqi forces also are being asked to fight mostly without their own
Air Force and are instead relying on coalition assets. This situation
is acceptable so long as U.S. forces dominate the ground fighting.
Nevertheless, aviation assets are expected to be valuable in fighting
an insurgency, and U.S.-Iraqi efforts to stand up a reliable air force
have been slow.117 A U.S. withdrawal strategy will need to consider
how the airpower gap best may be filled following a departure of
the majority of U.S. forces. Iraqi helicopter gunships and transport
fixed-wing aircraft and transport helicopters would be especially
useful in providing Iraqi forces with both mobility and firepower.118
Iraqi pilots from the Saddam era would have to be rehabilitated and
reintegrated into the new air force to achieve this goal in a timely
manner.
Some concern also exists that Iraqis of military age may no longer
choose to join and remain part of the security forces in sufficient
numbers to fill out the ranks so that a U.S. withdrawal is possible.
Finding recruits is, nevertheless, not a major problem at the current
time. The Iraqi recruits earn about $200 to $500 a month, which is
viewed as a good salary within Iraq, and this contributes to a fairly
large applicant pool.119 Additionally, between 1,500 and 3,000 police
and military recruits join the Iraqi security forces each week.120
Motivating Iraqi soldiers who are already in the service sometimes
appears more difficult. Desertions and overstaying one's leave have
been common until fairly recently, and it is uncertain how the trend
will develop. 121 In the first year following the creation of the new
Iraqi Army, the desertion rates were extremely heavy, especially
during periods of intense combat. Most Iraqi men seem to join as a
way of providing for their families, but it is not clear that the majority
are willing to die to defend the new and evolving Iraqi government.
They have been more likely to focus on keeping out of danger and
staying alive if possible. This kind of mentality is a problem for unit
effectiveness and, not surprisingly, leads to increased desertions
30


at times of heightened insurgent activity.122 It should, however,
be noted that the desertion rate has declined significantly over the
last year, and some Iraqi soldiers do behave bravely. Additionally,
the desertion and AWOL problems may be complicated by the
requirement for Iraqi soldiers to return to their homes to give money
to their families physically in some cases and to deal with family
crises.
U.S. Army Lieutenant General David Petraus, former commander
of the program to train the Iraqi military, has stated that Iraqi units
also have suffered personnel losses “due to severe intimidation."123
At least some members of the Iraqi military wear ski masks to
conceal their identities while on duty and mislead their neighbors
by suggesting they have jobs that having nothing to do with the Iraqi
government. 124 This tactic is generally used to protect the individuals
and their families, but is probably unlikely to lead to solid results.
Insurgents make a strong effort to join the security forces and seem
to have developed an impressive intelligence network about who
else has joined these organizations. Even a relatively few enemy
infiltrators can produce a bonanza of information on other members
of the military and security organizations, despite operational
security measures.
Some special problems were seen with Iraqi security forces and
especially the now renamed Iraqi Civil Defense Corps (ICDC, now
the Iraqi National Guard) in April 2004, when radical cleric Muqtada
Sadr's clumsy and poorly-trained militia forces rose in rebellion
against the Iraqi government. This action occurred simultaneously
with coalition fighting against Sunni insurgents in Falluja. According
to Major General Martin Dempsey, “About 40 percent of the Iraqi
security forces fighting Sadr walked off the job because they were
intimidated. And about 10 percent actually worked against us.
Dempsey described the later group as infiltrators. This description
seems reasonable, but other explanations are also possible. The
soldiers who changed sides may have been Shi'ites who viewed
the mission of fighting the Sadrists as particularly onerous and
unexpected. Many impoverished Shi'ites have joined both the
government's security forces and the Sadrist's “Mahdi Militia.”
Insurgents clearly understand that an effective security force is
essential if the Iraqi government is to survive a U.S. withdrawal.
11 125
31


126
Therefore they have waged strong and continuing war against the
security forces in an effort to prevent their development into effective
units. This struggle is comprehensive and displays a wide range of
tactics to undermine the ability of the security forces to function.
Insurgents have attacked police stations and consistently target long
lines of applicants seeking to join the military and police forces."
The south gate of the Muthanna Barracks in Baghdad, for example,
has been bombed at least five times, and 198 people have been killed
there since it became a recruiting center. Another 465 have been
wounded.127 Overall, more than 1,300 Iraqi police officers have been
killed between Saddam's ouster in April 2003 and January 2005.128
According to March 2005 testimony by U.S. Chairman of the Joint
Chief of Staff General Richard Meyers, Iraqi soldiers are dying at
twice the rate of U.S. soldiers in Iraq.
Like the military, the effectiveness of the Iraqi police has been
subject to disaster when challenged substantially by a serious enemy.
In an especially serious encounter in November 2004, 4,000 out of
about 5,400 Iraqi police in Mosul deserted the force in response to an
insurgent uprising within the city.130 While the forces in Mosul are
assessed to be much more professional now, this crisis is particularly
important in illustrating how an effective enemy can roll back
coalition progress in preparing the Iraqis to defend themselves. The
Mosul battle and its implications for the future of Iraq will therefore
be considered more comprehensively later in this monograph.
The Sustainability of U.S. Military Operations in Iraq.
A number of factors unrelated to progress in building a
functioning Iraqi state may also influence the debate on when and
how the United States will depart Iraq. Foremost is the willingness
of American society to provide a continuous stream of volunteers
to join the Army, Marine Corps, and their reserve components and
accept the likelihood of possible combat duty in Iraq.?
131 Should
the pool of military age volunteers permanently decline or even
evaporate, there is almost certainly no political will to restart
military conscription. Public opinion polls consistently demonstrate
overwhelming opposition to a draft. This opposition will almost
32


9. The Kurds tend to view a U.S. presence as a deterrent against hostile actions
by an Arab-dominated central government. See Adil Mahdi, “Talabani to Al
Hayah: Coalition Force' Presence is not Occupation,” Al Hayah (London), April 26,
2005, p. 3, as translated by Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS), April 26,
2005, internet.
10. “Multifarious Guerrilla Movement Underlies Iraq Violence,” Jordan Times,
July 27, 2004, internet.
11. As cited in Fareed Zakaria, “In Search of the Real New Iraq,” Newsweek,
May 2, 2005, p. 35.
12. Iraq's Kurdish president, Jalal Talabani, has been enthusiastic about
engaging the potentially redeemable insurgents. The leaders of the predominantly
Shi'ite religious parties in the Iraqi government also publicly maintain that they
are interested in such reconciliation, although their commitment to such a policy
is sometimes subjected to doubt. See Ellen Knickmyer, “Talabani Offers Amnesty
to Insurgents," Washington Post, April 8, 2005, p. 22; Jon Lee Anderson, “A Man of
the Shadows: Can Iyad Allawi Hold Iraq Together?” The New Yorker, January 24
and 31, 2005, pp.
64-65.
13. Stanford Professor and former senior U.S. democracy and governance
advisor in Iraq, Larry Diamond had noted that in the early postwar period the
Shi’ite Islamist party, SCIRI, conducted private “de-Ba'athification efforts at the
point of a gun.” SCIRI is an important part of the current government. See Larry
Diamond, Squandered Victory, New York: Times Books, 2005, p. 77.
14. Jeffrey Record, “Exit Strategy Delusions,” Parameters, Winter 2001-02, pp.
21-27.
15. One unclassified intelligence community assessment already maintains
that Iraq has become a haven for terrorists and a proving ground for terrorist
professionalization. See National Intelligence Council, Mapping the Global Future,
Report of the National Intelligence Council's 2020 Project, Washington, DC: U.S.
Government Printing Office, December 2004, p. 94.
16. Bill Nichols and Mona Mahoud, “Support for Iraq War at Lowest Level,”
USA Today, May 4, 2005, p. 1. Also see Peter Grier, “The Rising Economic Cost of
the Iraq War,” Christian Science Monitor, May 19, 2005, p. 1.
17. For more on this issue, see Conrad C. Crane and W. Andrew Terrill,
Reconstructing Iraq: Insights, Challenges, and Missions for Military Forces in a Post-
Conflict Scenario, Carlisle Barracks, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War
College, February 2003, pp. 3-11, 17, 43-47.
18. Ambassador Carlos Pascual, Keynote Address to the Stability Operations
Symposium conducted by the U.S. Army Peacekeeping and Stability Operations
Institute, Carlisle Barracks, PA, December 13, 2004.
19. Quote and chapter titles are from James M. McPherson, Ordeal By Fire: The
Civil War and Reconstruction, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1982, pp. 493-619.
48


the war. Among African American youth, only 36 percent thought the war was
justified, compared to 61 percent of white youths.” Transcript of “News Hour
With Jim Lehrer,” PBS Television, May 12, 2005. Also see Richard Whittle, “ Army
Battling Steep Decline in Black Recruits,” Dallas Morning News, August 2, 2005, p.
1.
140. As cited in Ann Scott Tyson, “Two Years Later, Iraq War Drains Military,"
Washington Post, March 19, 2005, p. 1.
141. Jon R. Anderson,“Army Experiments with Raising the Maximum Age for
Reserve Recruits,” European Stars and Stripes,” March 20, 2005, internet; “Needed:
More Soldiers, More Billions,” Newsweek, July 12, 2004.
142. James W. Crawley, “Commandos Leaving in Record Numbers,” Winston-
Salem Journal, July 30, 2005, p. 1; Dave Moniz, “Soldiers Re-Enlist Beyond U.S.
Goal,” USA Today, July 18, 2005, p. 1.
143. For arguments that the overwhelming majority of the U.S. population is
sheltered from the war and does not really honor military service beyond very
shallow gestures, see Uwe E. Reinhardt, “Who's Paying for Our Patriotism?"
Washington Post, August 1, 2005, p. 17; Mark Shields, “Whose Shared Sacrifice?"
CNN.COM, July 11, 2005, internet.
144. Ann Scott Tyson, “Two Years Later, Iraq War Drains Military,” Washington
Post, March 19, 2005, internet. Also see Andrea Stone and Dave Moniz, “Worn-Out
Army Equipment to Cost U.S.,” USA Today, January 26, 2005, p. 7.
145. Peter Spiegel, “US Sees Coalition Allies Step Up Pace of Pull-Out,” London
Financial Times, January 27, 2005, internet; Associated Press, “Ukrainian Parliament
Wants Force Out of Iraq,” Washington Post, January 12, 2005, internet; Associated
Press, “Poland to Cut its Troops in Iraq in Mid-February,” December 15, 2004,
internet.
146. Nick Childs, “Iraq's Strained Coalition,” BBC News, March 15, 2005,
internet.
147. “Iraq Pullout within Two Years,” BBC News: World Edition, April 17, 2005,
internet.
148. Alan Cowell, “Iraq Backlash May Affect Future Military Moves,” New
York Times, May 4, 2005, internet.
149. “Last Spanish Troops Leave Iraq,” BBC News: World Edition, May 21, 2004,
internet.
150. “Who's Leaving Iraq?" The Christian Science Monitor, April 13, 2005,
internet.
151. Judy Dempsey, “Poland Sets Date for Iraq Pullout,” International Herald
Tribune, April 13, 2005, internet; Warsaw Polish Radio, Text of Interview with
National Defense Minister Jerzy Szmajdzinski, April 12, 2005, as cited by FBIS,
April 12, 2005, internet.
58


U.S. ARMY WAR COLLEGE
Major General David H. Huntoon, Jr.
Commandant
*****
STRATEGIC STUDIES INSTITUTE
Director
Professor Douglas C. Lovelace, Jr.
Director of Research
Dr. Antulio J. Echevarria II
Authors
Dr. W. Andrew Terrill
Dr. Conrad C. Crane
Director of Publications
Ms. Marianne P. Cowling
Publications Assistant
Ms. Rita A. Rummel
*****
Composition
Ms. Gretchen S. Smith
OCT 2 0 2005