CONTENTS
Page
Biden, Hon. Joseph R., Jr., U.S. Senator from Delaware, opening statement ... 5
Prepared statement 10
Hashim, Dr. Ahmed S., professor of Strategic Studies, U.S. Naval War Col-
lege, Newport, RI 36
Prepared statement 39
Joulwan, General George A., U.S. Army, (Ret.), former NATO SACEAUR,
Washington, DC 21
Lugar, Hon. Richard G., U.S. Senator from Indiana, opening statement 1
O'Hanlon, Dr. Michael E., senior fellow, Foreign Policy Studies, The Brook-
ings Institution, Washington, DC 31
Prepared statement 35
Pollack, Dr. Kenneth M., director of research, Saban Center for Middle East
Policy, The Brookings Institution, Washington, DC 11
Prepared statement 15
Sheehan, Hon. Michael A., deputy commissioner for Counter-Terrorism, New
York City Police Department, New York, NY 24
Prepared statement 27
mi)





4
They also spoke to the importance of going forward with the elec-
tions, even if security and registration procedures are imperfect.
Dr. Juan Cole noted that local elections have been successful in
many parts of Iraq already, and often produced a more moderate
result than expected. Dr. Toby Dodge underscored that elections
would force Iraqi factions to enunciate policy choices, and would
stimulate dialog between potential leaders and the Iraqi populace.
In the absence of elections, factions would continue to bid for influ-
ence through violence, cronyism, or anti-American demonstrations.
Until elections can be held, however, we must find a means
through which the various Iraqi factions can share power peace-
fully in an interim government. For more than 30 years, Saddam
Hussein prevented any rival leaders from emerging in Iraq. Reli-
gious leaders had little or no political or governing experience.
They're divided amongst themselves. No secular leader has devel-
oped strong support among any major portion of the population.
Dr. Dodge presented interesting polling data from Iraq, with
questions based on recognition factors, such as "Have you ever
heard of —?" The percentages of Iraqis who have heard of any of
the conspicuous Iraqi leaders, in most cases, were small single dig-
its. In response to questions about confidence in any of these peo-
ple, likewise, there were very, very small percentages of Iraqis who
had heard of the people. This is an important political fact, which,
as politicians, we recognize. If there are candidates who are vir-
tually unknown, and even those who know them have reasonably
little confidence in them, the prospects of their success, to say the
leasf., are chancy. That is the situation that we're heading into, and
maybe we all need to understand that.
We'll continue to examine possible strategies aimed at ensuring
that the new interim government is viewed as legitimate by Shi-
ites, Kurds, and Sunnis. We must think creatively about how the
Coalition and the international community can facilitate the emer-
gence of national leaders in Iraq who are viewed as legitimate and
prepared to govern.
We have asked our experts to provide us with their recommenda-
tions for U.S. policy leading up to this transition and beyond.
Today we are very fortunate to have the benefit of a panel with ex-
traordinary expertise on these questions.
We welcome General George Joulwan, former Supreme Allied
Commander, Europe; Dr. Ken Pollack, director of Research of the
Saban Center for Middle East Policy, and senior fellow at The
Brookings Institution, and author of a book that was very inform-
ative for all of us about Iraq as we prepared for our last debates;
Ambassador Michael Sheehan, currently the deputy commissioner
for Counter Terrorism of the New York City Policy Department,
and formerly the State Department Coordinator for the Office of
Counterterrorism; Dr. Michael O'Hanlon, a senior fellow at The
Brookings Institution; and Dr. Ahmed Hashim, professor of Stra-
tegic Studies at the U.S. Naval War College.
We look forward to your insights and your recommendations. We
thank each one of you for joining us. Before I recognize the wit-
nesses, I would like to recognize my colleague, Senator Biden.


14
Iraqi forces are unlikely to be able to take over significant aspects
of the security mission anytime soon, we must find another source
of competent troops.
These troops can only come from our allies in Europe and Asia
and possibly elsewhere. At the moment, the Europeans are claim-
ing they have no more to spare. I think this is an exaggeration. A
continent of over 300 million people, with some of the most profes-
sional armies in the world, a continent that can scrape together
50,000 security personnel to guard the Athens Olympics, can pull
together several tens of thousands of troops for a mission as impor-
tant as the rebuilding of Iraq, if given 6 months or more to do so.
And if Europe does, our other allies will likely follow their lead.
I believe that Europe simply has no desire to find these troops.
The Europeans lack the desire, because they have made clear that
they will only provide large numbers of troops if the United States
agrees to make the U.N. a full partner in reconstruction, along the
lines of the experiences in Kosovo and East Timor.
I suspect that if the United States were finally to agree to Eu-
rope's terms, terms that are reasonable and under which U.S.
forces have operated successfully before, I think it would be hard
for our European allies to refuse a U.N. request for more troops.
At the very least, I think we ought to put them to the test.
In addition, many European leaders have no desire to put their
troops into the shooting gallery that Iraq has become over the past
12 months. This is ultimate why an increase in U.S. troops and a
change in American military tactics must accompany our request
for more foreign troops. Only when we have diminished the current
levels of violence in Iraq are we likely to receive the contributions
that we need, contributions that should then allow us to scale back
our own presence when we begin to feel the strain from reinforcing
our units in Iraq.
Five, we must remake the Iraqi security forces. The rapid rein-
forcement of American troops, later supplemented, and then, to
some extent, supplanted by foreign troops, should be used to buy
time to create a secure environment in which to properly reform
the new Iraqi security forces. As American and other Coalition
units become available, Iraqi units should be pulled off the streets
and thoroughly re-vetted. Those who were conscientious, those who
showed up for work, those who tried to help their fellow citizens,
and those who stood and fought when there was trouble should be
retained. The rest should be moved into job retraining programs
and, ideally, found new employment before being mustered out so
that they do not simply swell the ranks of the insurgents for lack
of other employment.
These units should then be given thorough and comprehensive
training, without regard for the exigencies of the moment. Before
being redeployed, they should be adequately equipped so that when
they do finally return to service, they will have every chance of suc-
ceeding in this crucial mission.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Pollack follows:]


16
cent of Iraqis felt "not very safe" or "not safe at all" in their neighborhoods, and
virtually the same percentage had either "not very" [sic] or "no" confidence that coa-
lition forces would make their cities safe. Only a little more than a quarter of those
surveyed felt "very safe." Similarly, a February 2004 nationwide poll conducted by
Oxford Research International for ABC News and several other international news
organizations found that, ". . . security at the national level is a vast concern; the
public's top overall priority, by a huge margin, is 'regaining public security in the
country.' Sixty-four percent give it 'first priority' for the next 12 months; out of a
dozen issues tested, no other even breaks into double digits." Similarly, at a local
level, the poll found that more Iraqis cited security as the single greatest problem
in their lives, and this figure was nearly twice that of the next highest problem—
unemployment.
The security situation also hinders reconstruction by crippling the operation of
those foreigners who went to Iraq to try to help the Iraqis rebuild their country.
Too many Americans and other members of the Coalition hide in fortified enclaves
like the Green Zone in Baghdad for fear that they will be killed if they go out into
Iraq proper. As a result, many have little feel for the country and the people they
are supposed to be helping. For the Iraqis, it means too little contact with Coalition
personnel, leaving them angry, frustrated, fearful, and resentful at the seemingly
aloof Americans who sit in the same palaces as the former regime, seem to pay just
as little attention to the fears and aspirations of the Iraqi people, and seem to issue
edicts governing life in Iraq in the same manner as Saddam.
Insecurity has also meant that the non-governmental organizations that have
proven so important to other postwar reconstruction efforts in the Balkans, in East
Timor, in Africa, and in Afghanistan, are generally unwilling to operate in Iraq.
Their absence has been a very important blow to our efforts. When I was in Iraq
in late November, I had U.S. Army Civil Affairs personnel say to me flat out,
"Where is the UN? Where are the NGOs? In the Balkans we just served as liaison
between the U.S. military and them, but they are the ones who did the work of
going out into the people and helping them rebuild their country." Until Iraq is safe,
we will not have those NGOs at our side.
In part for the reasons I have enumerated, and in part for a variety of other rea-
sons also related—directly or indirectly—to our failure to provide security through-
out Iraq, we are losing the battle for hearts and minds. More and more Iraqis are
concluding that either the United States cannot or will not create a more secure
Iraq and so they decide that they should take matters into their own hands. We
have seen this shift in the events of the past few weeks. The CPA was caught off-
guard by how many Iraqis supported al-Sadr's Mahdi Army. Many do not seem to
have been his loyal followers, but instead are average Iraqis expressing their rage
and frustration at our failings. Our failure to secure the country, and the broad
range of secondary problems this creates, is increasingly taking Iraqis who at one
time supported the reconstruction and turning them to the Muqtada al-Sadr's of
Iraq—not necessarily because they want an Islamic theocracy as he does, but be-
cause right now, he is the voice of resistance to the American occupation.
Thus our failure to provide Iraq with security is costing us the two most impor-
tant positive factors we have had going for us from the start. It is eroding popular
support for the U.S.-led occupation, and it is undermining the authority of moderate
Iraqi leaders who urged their followers to cooperate with reconstruction as the best
course of action for themselves, their families, and the country as a whole. The more
we fail to deliver on security, on jobs, and everything else that goes with it, the
more those Iraqis who argued for cooperation with the Coalition look like dupes or
foreign agents, forcing them to tack back toward the extremists or risk becoming
dangerously out of step with the sentiments of their countrymen.
HOW DID WE GET TO WHERE WE ARE?
It is important to acknowledge some of the most important mistakes the United
States made in creating the situation of instability and insecurity in Iraq so that
we can avoid repeating them in the future and try to fix them now.
Most of these mistakes were made right from the start. Indeed, the lesson that
looms largest from our previous experiences at post-conflict reconstruction around
the world is the absolute necessity of establishing absolute security at the very
start. If you can do that early on, everything else becomes easy, and you can usually
start to relax your security presence and procedures within about six months. Un-
fortunately we did not do that.
Of greatest importance and I will say this very bluntly, we invaded Iraq with too
few troops to be able to establish a secure operating environment for ourselves, aid
workers, or the Iraqi people. As General Shinseki and others, including myself,


19
portant mission. Consequently, executing that mission must become the highest con-
cern of U.S. military commanders, and their current prioritization—focusing on
force protection and offensive operations against the insurgents—is misguided. If it
does not change, the reconstruction may fail outright.
3. Reinforce the American military presence in Iraq to establish the conditions for
real security
We are going to need more American troops in Iraq. Few of the current members
of the Coalition can be counted on to provide troops capable of dealing with the full
range of security problems we currently face in Iraq. Indeed, over the past few
weeks, we have seen American forces called on to rescue those of other coalition na-
tions when faced with circumstances beyond their ability to control. At present, we
do not have enough American troops (or other high-quality coalition forces like the
British and Italians) to handle the mission of providing basic security for the Iraqi
people throughout the country. Indeed, this is one reason I find it hard to blame
our military commanders for handling security as they have. They don't have the
forces to accomplish the mission we need them to accomplish even if they were or-
dered to do so. Consequently we must provide them with those resources.
Obviously, American ground forces are limited in number and they are stretched
thin. But they are not yet at the breaking point. By redeploying some units that
just returned from Iraq and freeing up others currently being held back for other
contingencies (like a Korean war) we could probably come up with another 40,000-
60,000 American troops that could be deployed to Iraq for a brief period of time.
But we must recognize that if we do so, we will not be able to sustain that presence
for very long—again 6-12 months at most—and that in doing so we likely will di-
minish our ability to sustain even a smaller presence once our initial surge is over.
In other words, we can still ramp up our presence in Iraq by considerable numbers,
but we must recognize that we can only do so for a short period, after which we
are going to have to decrease the American presence significantly.
4. Seek additional foreign forces
Because the U.S. troop presence in Iraq can only be increased for the short term,
and Iraqi forces are unlikely to be able to take over significant aspects of the secu-
rity mission for something on the order of 12-24 months, the United States must
find another source of competent troops. These troops can only come from our allies
in Europe and Asia, and possibly elsewhere. At the moment, the Europeans are
claiming that they have no more to spare. I think this a bit of an exaggeration.
Surely a continent of over 300 million people, with some of the most professional
armies in the world—a continent that has managed to scrape together 50,000 secu-
rity personnel to guard the Athens Olympics—can pull together another 25,000-
50,000 troops for a mission as important as the rebuilding of Iraq if given six
months to do so. And if Europe does, our other allies will likely follow their lead.
I believe that Europe simply has no desire to find these troops. The Europeans
lack the desire because they have made clear that they will only provide large num-
bers of troops if the United States agrees to make the UN a full partner in recon-
struction, along the lines of the experiences in Kosovo and East Timor—a role that
this Administration has stubbornly and, I would add, gratuitously refused to this
point. I suspect that if the United. States were finally to agree to Europe's terms,
terms that are reasonable and under which U.S. forces have operated successfully
before, I think it would be hard for our European allies to refuse a UN request for
more troops. At the very least, I think we ought to put them to the test.
In addition, many European leaders have no desire to put large numbers of their
troops into the shooting gallery that Iraq has become over the past 12 months. This
is ultimately why an increase in U.S. troops must precede our request for more for-
eign troops: only when we have diminished the current levels of violence in Iraq are
we likely to receive the contributions that we need—contributions that should then
allow us to scale back our own presence when we begin to feel the strain from rein-
forcing our units in Iraq.
5. Remake the Iraqi security forces
The rapid reinforcement of American troops, later supplemented and then to some
extent supplanted by foreign troops should be used to buy time to create a secure
environment in which to properly reform the new Iraqi security forces. As American
and other Coalition units become available, Iraqi units should be pulled off the
streets and thoroughly re-vetted—relying on the actual behavior of the Iraqi soldiers
in their various security missions over the past year as a primary guide. Those who
were conscientious; those who showed up for work; those who tried to help their fel-
low citizens; and those who stood and fought when there was trouble should be re-
tained. The rest should be moved into job retraining programs and, ideally, found


26
tioned before—forensics, special investigations, and internal inves-
tigations.
Fifth, you need to monitor the force. Once you provide training,
you need monitors to make sure the training that you provided in
the academy is properly executed in the field. That requires inter-
national or other types of monitoring forces to mentor them and
bring them along in the process.
Finally, and the last step I want to emphasize, you have to police
the police. And in this regard, I want to mention a great American,
named Chris Kriskovich, who was a veteran of Special Forces in
Vietnam, retired FBI agent, and founder—father of ICITAP. He
taught me about this in the mid 1990s, in Haiti and the Balkans
and other countries we operated in. You have to, from the begin-
ning, create an internal policing of the police force to ensure that
these people that you're empowering with new authorities respect
the rule of law and the democratic institutions they're sworn to
protect.
Let me mention quickly a couple of other key factors involved in
building the police force.
First, political legitimacy. If you do not have a solid political le-
gitimacy, a solid political process moving forward, building a police
force is not going to solve your problem. You should do it anyhow,
because it's going to take you a long time, but don't expect it to
bring security, don't expect it to bring stability, alone, to the situa-
tion. You have to have a viable and legitimate political process or
your police forces will be left to the sidelines. We saw this in Soma-
lia, we saw this in the early parts of the Balkans, we saw it in
many other occasions where, without a political legitimacy, if the
process is broken down and armed factions are going to be fighting,
the police will be pushed to the side.
Second, on the issue of the security gap, this comes up also in
every one of the problems, and again in Iraq. The security gap is
that area where the problem is a violent—generally of violent
mobs, too large to be handled by local police, too civilian to be han-
dled by military problems. Normally the solution best used to deal
with this problem is using paramilitary gendarmerie or
carabiniere-type forces to deal with that gray area of large mobs
that are often orchestrated by troublemakers. And that is an area
that has to be addressed early on. It's an area that overlaps be-
tween police and military. There are forces that are good at doing
that. Work has been done on that in the Balkans that was delayed,
but ultimately fairly successful, and lessons can be learned there.
Time and money. You can't do this overnight. Senator Biden, you
mentioned one of my boss's predecessors, Bernie Kerik. Five years,
that's exactly the timeline. I'd say at a minimum you're going to
need 5 years. Actually, it's a generational process to create a new
police force. And actually a contract between the people of the post-
conflict environment and new judicial and security forces takes a
generation. At a minimum, our presence and international pres-
ence has to be at least 5, more like 10 years.
Let me take a few minutes to talk about the U.S. Government
and make a few recommendations on how to deal with this, and for
Iraq.


34
We all, as a Nation, I think, agree, we have to keep at it. And
there's a good reason to think that if we keep at it, we will do pret-
ty well.
Second, I support the effort to transfer sovereignty on June 30,
if we really can pull it off, but I share, Senator, your questions
about, not only the composition of this new transitional govern-
ment, but the powers of the new government. And I do think we
have to start a debate on this, as well. I hope, if we have the de-
bate, we can actually make the June 30 date possible.
But let me tick off four quick questions I have about that transi-
tional government.
One, if you're in the transitional government, can you also run
for elections next year? Run in the elections, run for office? This
is an important question. Maybe there's already an answer, but I
haven't heard the answer if there is. It's important, because if you
want a technocratic care-keeper government, you perhaps can ban
people who are in this transitional government from running for of-
fice in January. But if you want this to be a very politically conten-
tious and energized body, then you don't want to make that deci-
sion. I would lean toward a technocratic government, that has peo-
ple who cannot run in January, in the interest of having a smooth,
gradual transition process and not having too much controversy
over who's chosen and who's left out of that body. That's one ques-
tion.
Second question. What budget resources will this transitional
government have to obligate itself in the next 8 months when they
are the power-that-be in Iraq? I don't know. I don't know how
much of the $18 billion we're going to ask them for advice on how
to spend. I don't know how much of their own oil revenue is going
to essentially be available to them that's not already obligated. I'd
like to see more discussion of their budget power.
A third question. What's their role going to be in the war-crimes
process? And, in particular, if somehow war criminals are tried and
convicted before January, or whenever elections actually do occur,
will this transitional government be the body that has the power
to grant clemency or to negotiate some kind of a plea bargain with
anybody they want to, perhaps, ask for help in calling off the insur-
gency, defusing the insurgency? Are you going to give this body any
role in the war-crimes process, or are we simply going to try to
hope that the trials last long enough that this transitional body
doesn't have to make any of those tough decisions?
And, finally, if you see future Fallujahs, will this new transi-
tional government make a big part of the decisionmaking on how
to handle them, or is the status-of-forces agreement that we're ask-
ing for going to accord us all the power to handle Fallujah-like situ-
ations? I think we have to wrestle with the issue of who's going to
negotiate with insurgent leaders, and who's going to try to defuse
future Fallujah-like situations, of which there will probably be sev-
eral between July 1 and January.
These are some of the questions I have. But if we do answer
some of these, I'm still hopeful that we can make the June 30 tran-
sition, and that will help the Civil Defense Corps and other Iraqis
feel like they're defending their own country, not just defending our
mission and our vision of what should happen in Iraq.


41
challenge the authority and legitimacy of the coalition if the gap between its prom-
ises and its achievements were too great. And the Shi'i political leader best prepared
or able to undertake that challenge was none other than Muqtada. It was not easy
for the senior and more established Shi'i political leaders on the Iraqi Governing
Council to take a strident role of dissent. As Hasan Zirkani, a pro-al-Sadr cleric in
Madinat al-Sadr bluntly put it in a November 2003 prayer meeting: "We had hoped
that some of the problems might have vanished by now." What were these problems:
lack of law and order, rampant unemployment, lack of basic services in Shi'i urban
areas; and coalition disregard for the cultural and societal norms of the population.
Muqtada's revolt has won support and admiration among Sunni insurgents who
have plastered his picture on the walls of Sunni-dominated towns. This would have
been unheard of just several weeks ago. Members of the Mahdi's Army have begun
to cooperate with the Sunni insurgents and there are rumors that a number tried
to infiltrate into Fallujah. However, there has not yet been a coalescing of the Sunni
movement and that of Muqtada's. Muqtada's poorly-trained and ill-equipped militia
has more to gain from the Sunni insurgents than the other way round.
More importantly, Muqtada has gained traction with many Shi'is because of his
perceived courage in standing up to the coalition. Whether he did this in self-de-
fense or whether he saw it as an opportune time, his act of defiance struck a chord
with many Shi'is because by late March 2004 many within that community had
begun to see the June 30th agreement to transfer sovereignty to Iraqis as bogus and
that Iraq would continue to remain under barely concealed U.S. control beyond that
date. As one Shi'i radio outlet reported: . . . "The supposed restoration of national
sovereignty, of course should be preceded by an end to U.S. occupation. The plan,
however, entrenches the occupation and legitimizes its presence . . ."
Nonetheless, what we need to understand is that Muqtada has not yet been able
to foment a Shi'i-wide revolt. First, many Shi'is are simply terrified of his political
vision of an Islamic government ruled by politicized clerics. Second, while he has
made some headway in becoming a more nationally-recognized leader as a result of
his pugnacious statements calling upon Iraqis to launch a nation-wide revolt and
upon the coalition to leave; this has not been enough. He has yet to transcend the
bounds of his own uncouth constituency. Third, if political power grows out of the
barrel of the gun, Muqtada has the least number of barrels in Iraq. His militia is
the weakest in the country; and it does not even begin to compare with the formi-
dable militias of the Supreme Assembly of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (the Ira-
nian-trained and commanded Back Organization); the Da'wa Party, and Iraqi
Hizbullah. In this context, what can happen in the coming days really depends more
on what further mistakes the Coalition Provisional Authority makes vis-a-vis
Muqtada as much as any moves the Iraqi cleric himself may make.
WHAT IS TO BE DONE?
Before I move on to discuss what we need to do, I must reiterate my starting as-
sumption: we are faced with a phenomenon that is bigger and more dangerous than
a small band of thugs and extremists but somewhat less than full-scale national in-
surgency and terrorism. Alas, we are closer to the latter than the former. Once the
entire Shi'i community rises up in arms, our position in Iraq becomes totally unten-
able and there would be no option but to leave. Our task is to roll back any dynamic
progression of the insurgency. That task should begin now before the transfer of
sovereignty, but it does not end with the transfer of sovereignty. It will take a long
time. But where do we start?
First, we must develop a clear and coherent political goal. If we do not, the result
will be the continuation of reactive ad hoc measures that are simply reactions to
the insurgency. This is a war in which the political is paramount. The insurgents
have a goal and we should have a clearly articulated goal. Our task is to ensure
that the population understands and believes in our goal. To many Iraqis we don't
seem to have a goal that they can believe in. We need to reiterate and to repeat
that the goal is to establish a sovereign, stable and secure Iraq and that this will
proceed in stages; and much of this depends on successfully combating the insur-
gency. And in order to combat the insurgency, terrorism and lawlessness we should
tell the Iraqis that we need their active participation. We can no longer adhere to
the fantasy that we will be able to control Iraq behind the scenes or impose whom
we want on the country, a major reason why April 2004 has been such a bloody
month to date. The spike in the insurgency this month and the greater participation
of the U.N. in smoothing the transition to sovereignty have had the unintended con-
sequence of losing our control over Iraq's political dynamics and future. Nonetheless,
we can still turn this to our advantage by informing the population that what they
seek—stability, law and order, and economic revival—is our paramount goal too.


50
We're not alone. The rest of the world's invested in this. The major
powers, where the muscle is.
Second, training. And I'd like any of you to comment on this, but
probably the two that could speak most directly are Mr. Sheehan
and you, General Joulwan—training the military. I remember dis-
tinctly the French and the Germans, immediately after Saddam's
statue fell on that circle, which we passed by and saw the rem-
nants of, said, "We're ready to help, in a big way. We need some"—
basically, "some cover of a U.N. resolution. We'll train the mili-
tary." I just met with the Hungarian Ambassador when I left here.
He said, "We're staying, by the way, and we're ready to train the
military with you." I don't know whether they are capable of it.
They're a fine army; I don't mean to imply that.
The question is, is it your view that it is possible to get addi-
tional help from major powers in the training piece of the Iraqi
military? How would you go about that, if they offered?
General Joulwan. There is going to be, I believe, a headquarters
with a new U.S. commander that's going to be appointed to this
that's going to be directly involved in the equipping and training
of the Iraqi army. Clearly, other nations can help us do this. We
have created—that's why I keep going back to NATO—over 50
years, NATO procedures and doctrine that can help here. And I
don't know why there is reluctance. Yes, it can be done. We have
excellent countries that can help there. And I think it would, again,
broaden this base that would get us the support we're going to
need for the long run. And we're going to need substantive support
over the next several years.
Senator BlDEN. I agree. And, by the way, unless all these heads
of state and foreign ministers and defense chiefs are lying to me
in Europe, they're all saying they're ready to do that. They're say-
ing they're ready to do it. And I say, "Why not?" And here's the re-
sponse I got, without revealing the source of this one—I'll tell you
privately—a guy you know very well said, "Nobody asks. Just ask.
Don't tell us. Don't invite us. Just ask us."
Now, training the police. Let me tell you the article about the
vetting mission, "Flaws Showing in Iraqi Forces," December 30,
2003, an article in the Washington Post. "Last were 2-minute-or-
so interviews with Mehdi"—he's the guy doing the interviewing we
picked—"who was the head of the student affairs of the police col-
lege before the Americans selected him to oversee the training. The
first candidate for police that came in was a guy named Allah
Abbas, age 22." Here's what he got asked in the total—this is a
total vetting—" 'What do you think of human rights,' Mehdi asked.
'It's good, and it helps humans,' Abbas answered."
Senator BlDEN. '"What do you think of the other sex?'" end of
quote. "'They are half or so of society, and help men in serving the
community.' Mehdi nodded, scribbled some notes in the young
man's file. Abbas was in."
Now, do you have any reason to believe that the vetting proc-
ess—you were involved in the vetting—look what we did in vetting
the Medallin Police Department. It worked. It worked. We essen-
tially knocked out close to, in all of Colombia, 2,000 former police,
vetted them out. The new, vetted police force actually crushed the
Medallin cartel.


52
ing for them. And he said the following to me. He said, "Look at
the expressions"—this was literally what this four-star said to
me—"Look at the expressions on their faces." They're honest men.
They answer the following way. Deadpan, they look and say, "I
have enough troops," and then the operative sentence, according to
this four-star, "for the mission I have been assigned."
Does the mission have to go from troop protection to policing, at
least at the front end of this?
General Joulwan.
General JOULWAN. Well, let me reiterate—I think that you've got
to understand the clarity here that—when we talk about sealing
the borders, you know, that's military and maybe border-patrol
people. Preventing lawlessness, that is a police function. I think
there has to be some act of disarming.
Let me just say that, a year later, it's tough. I went through this
in Bosnia, where we found more stuff than you could ever imagine,
but we disarmed—in 6 months, we disarmed 200,000 armed insur-
gents, and there were no ifs, ands, or buts. That's what we told the
three waring factions they had to do.
And they did it! So I think that if it's only regime change, then
there may be enough troops to do regime change. But if it's to bring
stability—a stabilized environment, we need to say, what does that
mean? And that's the question that I—what is the strategy, what
is the war plan—or the stabilization plan to match the war plan?
And what are the details of the stabilization plan? Once you get
the tasks then ask General Abizaid again, "Do you have enough to
do these tasks?"
If I give you one example—I hate to really bare my soul here a
little bit, but when I was asked to go from IFOR, I used a term
SFOR. I was the one that said we're going to change from imple-
mentation to stabilization, because I wanted the troops to under-
stand that. And I asked three questions of the North Atlantic
Council before I would say what I need to do the mission assigned.
Do you want me to hunt down and arrest indicted war criminals?
Do you want me to do civil police functions? And do you want me
to forcibly return refugees to their homes? Yes or no. Because that
would determine the troop-to-task analysis that would be done. The
answer to all three was "no."
But that's the clarity you need, and I would ask, again, that this
issue of stabilization as a mission, what the hell do we mean by
that? And force the discussion for the clarity here of, what do you
want done? And then say, do you have enough forces to do it?
Senator Biden. Thank you very much.
The Chairman. Well, that is the sort of clarity we need.
General Joulwan. Clarity is my favorite word, Senator.
The Chairman. It's the focus of this hearing.
Senator Voinovich.
Senator VOINOVICh. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
As my colleagues, I remain deeply concerned with the safety of
our men and women in uniform serving in Iraq. And we continue,
in Ohio, to pray for Private Matt Maupin, of Batavia, Ohio, who
is one of the individuals that was taken into custody by the Iraq
insurgents. And I think one of the things that we haven't men-


55
bat hardened, and build the types of international relationships
that were established in Afghanistan and still haunt us today.
That specter of a new swamp, as I referred to Afghanistan sev-
eral years ago, will haunt us for years. And for that reason, we
have to win in Iraq, and we have to establish a presence through-
out the country to drain the swamp of those type of jihadists that
are pouring into the country right now and will take, in incubating
over 2, 3, 4 years, will come back to our shores and attack us, with-
out any doubt. So that's why we need a large presence in Iraq, not
just for the immediate security concerns right now, but for the
longer-term concerns that I have, in the counterterrorism business,
of allowing these jihadists to grow and incubate there and rep-
resent a broad international threat, not only to the United States,
but to freedom around the world.
Senator Voinovich. Dr. Hashim.
Dr. Hashim. Sir, on the issue of Islamic fundamentalism in Iraq,
let me echo some of what Ken Pollack said, and also go a little bit
beyond that.
Iraq has become de-secularized as a result of sanctions, three
wars, a lack of civil society, Saddam's regime, in two ways. He basi-
cally brutalized the country, so people turned more and more to-
ward religion. But, at the same time, beginning in 1995, he encour-
aged the rise of Islamic tendencies, as long as it was directed
against foreigners. Now it has increased as a result of the foreign
presence in Iraq. And what you have here, increasingly, in both the
Sunni Arab and the Shia Arab communities, a fusion of Islam and
nationalism.
Now, a fusion of Islam and nationalism is not jihadism, nec-
essarily. There is a small minority of Sunnis who are jihadists. The
major problem for the Sunni jihadists in Iraq is that they cannot
really take power. They're a minority within a minority of the pop-
ulation. But there is mainstream Islamism, and that has fused
with nationalism.
The other point is that the increase in Islamic fervor or feeling
among the population does not necessarily translate into theocratic
government. The Shia population is not necessarily in favor of a
theocracy, a la Iran. They may be in favor of a more Islamized pol-
ity—as in Ayatollah al-Sistani
Senator VOINOVICH. But what'll
Dr. Hashim [continuing]. And we have to live with that.
Senator Voinovich. It will have to have that kind of a dimension
to it if it's to be successful.
Dr. Hashim. Yes, sir.
Senator Voinovich. OK. And what we're trying for is something
different than what we have in Iran today—take advantage of it—
because we have the environment there. If we do it right, we can,
indeed, have a democracy. It may not be exactly the kind that we
would prescribe, but one that works.
Dr. Hashim. I agree with you, sir. Yes, sir.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, Senator Voinovich.
Senator Dodd.
Senator DODD. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I apologize
being out of the room for a few minutes. We had a conference on
youth involvement, and I wanted to be there and spend a few min-


62
Hashim and I have both been making. The Iraqis are increasingly
unhappy with us. Their leaders, legitimate leaders, are going to
have to be able to show that they can stand up to the United
States and push back on us and get results that Iraqis want. Those
are the only leaders who Iraqis are going to follow.
Senator NelsoN. In January, I had visited with President al-
Assad, and in a friendly but very, very frank discussion over a
number of issues of which he was giving a certain party line, which
I did not believe, and told him so—but he said one interesting
thing when I was talking about the jihadists going across the bor-
der. He said, "I would like to cooperate with the Americans."
Now, I have come back—I mean, right there, our Ambassador sit-
ting with me, and immediately reported that. I also called back to
our Ambassador to Israel, who wanted to know about my visit. I
came back, and I reported to the Secretary of Defense, General
Myers, and the Deputy Secretary of State, all of whom received
that information with considerable interest, except the Secretary of
Defense, who somewhat dismissed it out of hand.
I was curious, because there is an article in a recent Inside the
Pentagon publication, and it says that administration officials have
responded with a stony silence to Syria's Ambassador apparently
giving this same message. Now, I can tell you General Myers
didn't, because I think General Myers saw that anything you could
do to close that border, it's going to help save our men and women
in uniform.
I'd just like your commentary on this. Are the Syrians giving us
a total bill of goods? Do you have any sense that they might want
to have cooperation to help close the border, even though it's a dif-
ficult border to close?
Dr. Pollack. Senator, I think we ought to put him to the test.
Senator NelsoN. What is there to lose?
Dr. Pollack. Exactly. And I think something like border control
is something where you can actually get a real test. If the guys con-
tinue to come through the borders, if our guys on the other side see
the Syrians allowing people to continue to infiltrate, we've got our
answer. But we've shown a willingness to cooperate with this Syr-
ian regime before. This administration has been very cooperative
with this Syrian Government on the global war on terrorism, and
has received all kinds of information from them on al-Qaeda and
other Sunni terrorist groups. Why, in this case, are we not willing
to see that same cooperation?
Senator Nelson. Thank you Mr. Chairman.
The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much, Senator Nelson.
Senator Corzine.
Senator Corzine. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And let me just say
that this hearing and the scope with which the witnesses have ad-
dressed these incredibly difficult issues, I think, is remarkable. I
join with Senator Biden, I wish we could have these folks offering
counsel to the people that are making policy decisions. At least we
would see the wide range of various issues that are at hand, and
might come up with more serious responses and less frequent fail-
ures on some of the strategic decisions that are being made.
I do agree with what Mr. Pollack said, this is more than a bad
month. But I continue to not understand why the central thought