Y 4.AR 5/2 A:
2007-2008/82
[H.A.S.C. No. 110-82]
A THIRD WAY: ALTERNATIVES FOR
IRAQ'S FUTURE (PART 4 OF 4)
HEARING
BEFORE THE
OVERSIGHT AND INVESTIGATIONS SUBCOMMITTEE
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
HEARING HELD
JULY 31, 2007
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OVERSIGHT AND INVESTIGATIONS SUBCOMMITTEE
VIC SNYDER, Arkansas, Chairman
JOHN SPRATT, South Carolina
W. TODD AKIN, Missouri
LORETTA SANCHEZ, California
ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland
ELLEN O. TAUSCHER, California
WALTER B. JONES, North Carolina
ROBERT ANDREWS, New Jersey
JEFF MILLER, Florida
SUSAN A. DAVIS, California
PHIL GINGREY, Georgia
JIM COOPER, Tennessee
K. MICHAEL CONAWAY, Texas
HANK JOHNSON, Georgia
GEOFF DAVIS, Kentucky
JOE SESTAK, Pennsylvania
SUZANNE MCKENNA, Professional Staff Member
THOMAS HAWLEY, Professional Staff Member
ROGER ZAKHEIM, Professional Staff Member
SASHA ROGERS, Research Assistant
(II)


CONTENTS
CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF HEARINGS
2007
Page
HEARING:
Tuesday, July 31, 2007, A Third Way: Alternatives for Iraq's Future (Part
4 of 4)
APPENDIX:
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
.......
............
TUESDAY, JULY 31, 2007
A THIRD WAY: ALTERNATIVES FOR IRAQ'S FUTURE (PART 4 OF 4)
STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS
2
Akin, Hon. W. Todd, a Representative from Missouri, Ranking Member, Over-
sight and Investigations Subcommittee .
Snyder, Hon. Vic, a Representative from Arkansas, Chairman, Oversight
and Investigations Subcommittee ..........
WITNESSES
Benjamin, Daniel, Director, Foreign Policy Studies, Senior Fellow, The Brook-
ings Institution .....
Keane, Gen. Jack, (Ret.), Former Vice Chief of Staff of the Army, U.S. Army ..
McCaffrey, Gen. Barry R., U.S. Army (Ret.), Adjunct Professor of Inter-
national Relations, United States Military Academy .........
Newbold, Lt. Gen. Gregory S., Ret.), Former Director of Operations (J-
3) for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, U.S. Marine Corps .....
O'Hanlon, Dr. Michael E., Senior Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies, The Brook-
ings Institution ..........
E o own
APPENDIX
PREPARED STATEMENTS:
Akin, Hon. W. Todd
Benjamin, Daniel .......
McCaffrey, Gen. Barry R., (Ret.) ................
Newbold, Lt. Gen. Gregory S., (Ret.)
O'Hanlon, Dr. Michael E., joint with Edward P. Joseph .......
Snyder, Hon. Vic .....
DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD:
[There were no Documents submitted.]
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD:
[There were no Questions submitted.]
(III)


cussion amongst yourselves. And we have been pleased over the
last few weeks of how that has occurred.
For today's hearing we have another distinguished panel, includ-
ing Retired General Jack Keane, who has been actively involved in
advising the White House and the civilian and military leadership
at the Pentagon and in the field, and who appeared before the full
committee just last Friday; Retired General Barry McCaffrey, who
has been traveling to and reporting on Iraq in his capacity as an
adjunct professor at West Point for several years now, and was a
cliffhanger because he had jury duty this morning, but we wanted
him, and he wanted to be here, and that worked out fine; Retired
Lieutenant General Greg Newbold, former Director of Operations
for the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Dr. Michael O'Hanlon of the Brookings
Institution, who just returned from eight days in Iraq, and recently
had a publication in one of the major papers; and Mr. Daniel Ben-
jamin of the Brookings Institution, whose scholarship in the field
of counterterrorism can give us important insights in considering
the future of Iraq.
Welcome to all of you.
I also wanted to acknowledge the presence of Mr. Saxton, and by
unanimous consent he will be allowed to participate in this hearing
today, along with the other Members.
And I will now turn to Ranking Member Mr. Akin from Missouri.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Snyder can be found in the Ap-
pendix on page 41.]
STATEMENT OF HON. W. TODD AKIN, A REPRESENTATIVE
FROM MISSOURI, RANKING MEMBER, OVERSIGHT AND IN-
VESTIGATIONS SUBCOMMITTEE
Mr. AKIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I wanted to likewise
thank the witnesses for joining us, and welcome you all here.
I won't repeat what the Chairman has said, but the whole pur-
pose of running a good number of hearings now week after week,
and hearing from
ng from a quite a number of various witnesses, has been
to say, well, what are the different alternatives? And are there spe-
cific alternatives different than what we are currently doing? And
after reviewing our witnesses' testimonies, it is clear that some ad-
vocate departing from the current strategy; that is, you do not en-
dorse a planning or a plan that emphasizes U.S. combat forces
going door to door, performing a counterinsurgency mission aimed
at securing and holding Iraq neighborhoods.
In light of the increasing reports that the surge is succeeding, I
would like our witnesses to comment on how we in the Congress
should view these developments. And particularly, Mr. O'Hanlon, I
am interested in understanding how the significant changes taking
place in Iraq that you described in your New York article affects
your proposal for a soft partition. Particularly I want to get into
the logic of what is a soft partition.
Those who advocate departing from the current strategy empha-
size the need for improving the readiness of the Army and Marine
Corps. General McCaffrey's testimony is heavily focused on this
issue. While I think all Members agree this is an important issue
and a vital priority, I am curious how your alternative will allow
U.S. Troops to carry out the following military roles and missions:


one, training Iraqi forces; two, deterring conventional militaries
from intervening in Iraq; three, supporting al Qaeda's enemies;
and, four, conducting direct strike missions.
Almost all of the experts who have testified before this sub-
committee on this subject agree that continuing with these roles
and missions in Iraq is important.
Finally, according to previous witnesses, and there have been
many, increased violence, humanitarian tragedy, a failed state,
emboldened terrorists, and regional actors will all result in the
wake of the withdrawal or significant drawdown of American
forces. I would like to know how our witnesses will ensure that
their plan will not make the situation worse. For those concerned
about readiness, how will we ensure that subsequent to withdrawal
the U.S. will not find itself in a situation where U.S. forces will
have to return to Iraq in five or ten years?
I would also appreciate if you would take some time this after-
noon to discuss how the U.S. should manage the consequences of
withdrawal.
Thank you all for joining us and for giving us a chance to chat
today.
Dr. SNYDER. Thank you, Mr. Akin.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Akin can be found in the Appen-
dix on page 43.]
Dr. SNYDER. Mr. Akin laid down an agenda there, and I wanted
to discuss the five-minute rule and our limitations on time. We will
begin today with General Keane, who will at some point stand up
somewhere between 2:15 and 2:30 because he has to leave, and we
really appreciate him being here despite that constraint. We will
put on our little clock that will turn red at the end of five minutes.
If you have more to say, you say it. It is more just to give you an
idea of where you all are at. When it comes to our turns, we will
try pretty strictly to follow the five-minute rule. And so because of
the number of you, when we ask a question, we want to hear a re-
sponse from everyone. If everyone takes five minutes, we will be
here for a half an hour per questioner, which won't work.
So let us begin today with General Keane, and then we will just
start it and go down the other ways.
General Keane.
STATEMENT OF GEN. JACK KEANE, (RET.), FORMER VICE
CHIEF OF STAFF OF THE ARMY, U.S. ARMY
General KEANE. Mr. Chairman, Congressman Snyder, Mr. Akin,
fellow members of the subcommittee, thank you for the invitation
to provide some testimony to you today. And I will make, I guess,
a five-minute opening statement.
I welcome the opportunity to discuss the way ahead in Iraq. As
we all know, it is a tough, complex problem, and truly must be ap-
proached as a regional issue with global implications. I understand
the frustrations of Congress, as I said last week before the full
committee, because I have been there myself, because we struggled
and failed for three-plus years with our strategy in Iraq.
The President made a tough decision to change the strategy to
conduct a counteroffensive. That operation began in February, and
it is now in full stride with the arrival of our last forces in June.


As I said before, this counteroffensive from its inception is tem-
porary. It is not designed to keep those force levels indefinitely.
The time frame, generally speaking, is 12 to 18 months, with the
intent to stabilize Baghdad, create the conditions to permit move-
ment toward reconciliation, and buy time for the growth and devel-
opment of the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF).
Based on my own observations, I want to share some facts with
you and repeat some of those that I mentioned the last time, and
I will do that very briefly. One is we have seized the initiative. We
are on the offensive, and we have momentum over what we had in
2006, which was the opposite. Security has definitely improved. Mi-
chael O'Hanlon's article lays that out. And clearly sectarian vio-
lence is down, June being a one-year low. Suicide car bombings are
down. And most importantly, down on the street, which I visited
twice in the last few months, schools are open; markets are teem-
ing with people, most are operating at full capacity; and the cafes,
pool halls, and coffee houses are crowded. And most importantly,
people believe things are improving.
The grass-roots movement among the Sunni, number three, is
fundamentally a political movement in rejecting the al Qaeda, and
their willingness to fight the al Qaeda, and also move toward rec-
onciliation with the Shia government. This is a huge turnaround,
with very significant ramifications. And people in Washington, I
think, are just beginning to understand the magnitude of what this
is. And I think it surprised all of us to the extent and the speed
at which it is moving. But it should be instructive to us when local
leaders decide to change because their people are pressuring them
to change, how quickly that situation can dramatically change. And
that is to the speed of it.
The al Qaeda, in my judgment, are being defeated in Iraq in
2007. And when we look back at it from 2009, I think we will see
that. Their strategy to use suicide bombers exclusively against the
Shia population has failed to provoke the Shia militia, as they had
done so successfully in 2006. They lost two key sanctuaries in
Diyala and Anbar provinces, and they are on the defensive, while
we attack them simultaneously in every province that they have a
presence, something we have never done before. The Shia militia,
while still killing U.S. troops, are fragmented, with many of their
special group leaders either dead or captured. Sadr has fled Iraq
to Iran, frustrated and depressed, in terms of our intel sources, by
the changing events in Iraq.
Economic progress, we have some, albeit not what it should be,
but there are essential services, microloans, and opening of state
factories beginning to take hold. Much, much more has to be done.
On the political side, no major piece of landmark legislation has
been approved, and it is a disappointment, make no mistake about
it. But the conditions are in place, and they are going to be
strengthened, to achieve political reconciliation as we move down
the road. It remains to be seen whether this government is up to
that task.
So where do we go from here? In my judgment, we have to con-
tinue the plan that the President announced in December to grow
the Army and the Marine Corps.


Number two, we must continue to cement the security gains that
have been achieved in Iraq. The counteroffensive must continue, in
my view, at least until the spring of 2008 before we begin to return
to presurge force levels during 2008. That is about a 30- to 35,000
force reduction. During 2008, the trends will continue, violence
down, suicide car bombs down, U.S. and Iraqi Forces casualties will
continue to come down, and people will be more secure. More
Sunnis will move toward reconciliation and further isolation of the
al Qaeda. In my view, we will see some central government rec-
onciliation. If we do not, and it is not achievable until the new elec-
tions in 2009 with a prospective new coalition, then we will con-
tinue to reduce our forces anyway, probably in a more deliberate,
methodical manner, because we will be doing it under fire.
We need to develop a long-term security relationship with Iraq,
which should be solidified in 2008, which contains the following:
one, a recognition that Iraq is defenseless against its neighbors,
and does not have a military organized, trained, and equipped for
external defense.
Two, from 2008 through 2009, continue to increase the size of the
Iraqi Security Forces from the 360,000, 390,000 by the end of this
year, to 625,000 topped out by 2009. And the mission remains the
same: internal defense. Most important, we have to properly equip
this force, and it is not properly equipped.
Number three, continue to expand the quality and quantity of
the U.S. advisory program to meet this need.
And number four, from 2010 plus, assuming internal defense is
no longer a military issue, begin to transition the Iraqi military
from internal defense to external defense. Enter into the Status of
Force Agreements (SOFA), with the Iraqis, which will permit sta-
tioning of troops for advisory purposes and force protection in Iraq.
The timeline, as I see it, for this reduction, in summary, is 2008,
down to the presurge levels and possibly beyond will hold Baghdad
and the belt around it, and then reduce from out to the inside; es-
tablish long-range security arrangement with the Iraqis.
2009, continue force reduction and transition to the ISF. Based
on ISF capability and security, we will go down below 100,000 for
sure, close bases as required. We may as well be able to reduce
from the four star command to the three star command, but that
will remain to be seen.
2010, bring the force down to advisory only, with the appropriate
force protection. Transition the Special Operation Force role to the
Iraqi Security Force role, and for sure if we haven't reduced the
headquarters in 2009, then take it down in 2010.
And then from 2010 on, transition to external defense forces,
while operating a minimum of two or three bases, whatever the
command feels is necessary to do that mission.
In conclusion, as we have always believed, if the counteroffensive
works, you can reduce forces more rapidly because the level of vio-
lence goes down significantly, particularly after Sunni reconcili-
ation. If it doesn't work, the force reduction should be slower, be-
cause you are withdrawing an Army under fire, and it must be
done much more methodically and deliberately, but nonetheless
must be done.


to see some initiative, but four and a half years into a war is five
years is too late.
Beyond those elements, I would say that the support of Congress
is essential to prosecution of the war. And the fact is the momen-
tum is very strongly moving against that, and it is likely to be ex-
acerbated by upcoming elections.
And finally, I want to spend a moment on the Iraqis. The United
States cannot impose stability and a political solution on Iraq. It
can help to do that, but the Iraqis must take the lead themselves.
While there have been some heroic instances of sacrifice by individ-
ual Iraqis or by groups of Iraqis, the fact is that it is still driven
apart rather than driven together. And the factions have not seen
enough way to forming a nation than they have to looking out for
sectarian interests.
I would note one thing. Since the modern State of Iraq existed
since largely about 1934, Iraq has had mandatory conscription
until now. The greatest crisis in the history of the modern State
of Iraq, and they have not seen fit to bring young people out of
their neighborhoods, away from their sectarian mullahs, into a na-
tional entity, which would help the unemployment, which would
guard their economy, which might even be a civilian conservation
corps. But national service for a nation, that would indicate to me
a commitment on the part of the Iraqis. It would indicate to me a
commitment on the part of the Iraqis if they were willing to solve
the oil problem, a division of the oil.
But as I said in the beginning, we cannot impose stability and
a settlement on the Iraqis. They have to be willing to do it. And
I think they need an impetus stronger than they have received so
far.
My view is that the Nation, the U.S., is tired, that our people
have grown exhausted by the war and by the debate over the war.
They are tired of shouldering a burden largely with the British,
and they wonder when it will ever end. The political nature of the
debate in the United States has become more divided and divisive.
The military is strained and stressed in ways that probably can't
sustain this surge level beyond next February or March, and they
deserve everything we can give to them. And I think the Iraqis
need the impetus I have talked about before.
One caution before I make my recommendation. For those that
would recommend a quick withdrawal, I think they also ought to
sign on for the consequences. And the consequences are obvious. If
we do not want local genocides and a civil war, then we shouldn't
argue for a quick withdrawal. If we don't want a destabilized re-
gion, we shouldn't argue for quick withdrawal. If we don't believe
that the free flow of oil is critical to the world's economy, then we
ought to pay attention to the follow-on forces that will be required.
If we don't want an unstable region and an Iraq that may foment
terrorism, then we ought to be able to commit the resources in sup-
ne assets of the United States that are necessary to quell
that.
Now, my view. My view is we need a more modest set of goals
than we have had as part of our national strategy. Setting new
benchmarks and then achieving them would go a long way to being
able to claim that we achieved what we wanted in Iraq.


I also think that the U.S. and our allies have paid a very dear
price for what we have done not only in the young lives of Ameri-
cans and how much we have committed of our national coffers. It
is time for us to at least call for other nationals to be held account-
able, those that pledged so much money at the beginning of the
war and have yet to ante it up. The U.N. has been, in the Army
term, absent without leave for years, and it is time to hold them
accountable.
I think the U.S. has to pledge that whenever the withdrawal is
completed, that we will not tolerate Iraq being a basis for terror-
ism. And I think we ought to also combine with the other nations
of the region and the world to indicate that the world's economy
depends on oil, and that that coalition of nations will ensure that
it happens.
I think we ought to also commit publicly to the world that when-
ever the withdrawal takes, it ought to not signal a lack of U.S. re-
solve; that the U.S. is committed to our national security, to re-
gional security, and the world's security, to play a role of leader-
ship, and we intend to do that now and into the future.
I think we need to indicate a timeline for the withdrawal of
forces. I am a strong minority opinion in that regard. I would not
indicate an end date, but I would indicate a start date. And I would
indicate that as the beginning of next spring. I would preserve the
flexibility of our commanders and the flexibility of our national
strategy in determining the speed of that withdrawal. And frankly,
I would make it a point of leverage on the Iraqis for standing up
their own capability.
And finally, I recommend that the U.S. Congress craft legislation
similar to Goldwater-Nichols, that would create an interagency
process that is a parallel to what has been done for the U.S. mili-
tary. It is long past due time to have an efficient, interagency na-
tional security process with all the incentives and disincentives
that made Goldwater-Nichols effective.
The only reason I agreed to appear before this subcommittee is
this subcommittee has a reputation for bipartisanship and sincerity
in approaching this issue. It is, as General Keane said, an impos-
sibly complex, nearly theological problem. And not only do I ap-
plaud what the subcommittee is trying to do, but I urge them to
be as active as they can in trying to reach out and gain a center
of our national opinion so that we can move forward on this.
That is my comments, Mr. Chairman. .
Dr. SNYDER. Thank you, General. We appreciate your thoughtful
comments. My wife's a minister. She likes theological problems.
[The prepared statement of General Newbold can be found in the
Appendix on page 52.]
Dr. SNYDER. General McCaffrey, we understand you are here
today because some attorney downtown decided that the former
drug czar was not the best person to have on a jury on a drug pos-
session charge, and they dismissed you from the pool. General
McCaffrey.


STATEMENT OF GEN. BARRY R. MCCAFFREY, U.S. ARMY (RET.),
ADJUNCT PROFESSOR OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS,
UNITED STATES MILITARY ACADEMY
General McCAFFREY. No comment on that case.
Let me thank the committee for the opportunity to appear before
you. I am very proud to be associated with the people on the panel.
I have known them all for years. Michael O'Hanlon is one the most
objective, astute observers of the situation in Iraq that I follow. I
certainly would associate myself with General Newbold's com-
ments. That was right down the line, to be blunt, of what I believe.
Let me add some viewpoints. In my written testimony I spend a
good bit of the time talking about resourcing the military to carry
out the national security strategy we have chosen, or alternatives
in the coming years. Let me turn directly and solely to Iraq.
A couple thoughts. First of all, we are in there. We have got
160,000 troops involved. We have had 32,000 killed and wounded.
We are spending $12 billion a month. Oil is at stake. Our allies'
safety and security, the Saudis, the Kuwaitis, the Gulf Coast
States, the Jordanians, there is a lot at stake. And I could not
agree more that the consequences of failure will be monumental to
the American people for the coming 10 years or more. So we
shouldn't be unmindful of that. And certainly one option I would
immediately take off the table, we do not, in my view, in a respon-
sible way have the option to walk away from the table. As General
Colin Powell said, if you break it, you own it.
I also think the whole notion of bringing David Petraeus, who,
I might add, probably is the most talented person I ever met in my
life, but bringing him home in September to articulate where we
are, why it is going in the right direction, and gaining the support
of the American people is a grievous mistake. There is no reason
why in September a bitter civil war in Iraq will be substantially
changed. Yes, there are international terrorists there. Yes, there
are 500 or so al Qaeda terrorists, most of them, I might add, who
are Iraqi. But the bottom line is we are engaged right now in try-
ing to tamp down a terrible struggle to the death for political sur-
vival in a bitterly divided nation. It seems to me we have to give
General Petraeus a year to see if this so-called new set of tactics
and approach will work, or I don't see any particular pay-off.
Second, it seems to me we now have not only a new, brilliant,
modest, experienced, team-playing Secretary of Defense, we have
got to give Dr. Rice and her ambassador Ryan Crocker the oppor-
tunity to start arguing for regional dialogue. That isn't an AAA
conference, that isn't two one-day meetings. It seems to me you set
up a forum, probably in a safe zone, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait or wher-
ever, and you get the parties talking for the next five years. We
have got to give her a year to engage regional dialogue.
Third, and the thing that I banged away at from the start, here
we are losing 1,000 or so marines and soldiers killed and wounded
a month, quite happily putting almost half of our combat power on
the ground in Iraq, but we have not adequately resourced the Iraqi
Army or Police from the start. It is immeasurably better today than
it was a year ago. Petraeus, Dubik are now starting to get the
kinds of resources they need.


10
But at the end of the day, we are out of Iraq in 36 months or
less unless the Iraqis turn this around. When we leave, will we
leave a force that has the potential to maintain internal order? And
if the answer is it is 500 Cougars instead of 5,000 armored vehi-
cles, if the answer is it is 70 junk Soviet helicopters when we have
got 900 helicopters on the ground, if it is 3 Č 130's when we are
using a huge piece of our Air Force lift assets to sustain this war,
then we are not in the right ballpark. We cannot allow the Iraqi
Army and Police to try and confront the situation on the ground
with the anemic resourcing we have done to date.
Fourth observation, it seems to me, and this would be, you know,
an almost antistrategic note, that we have got to draw do
force in Iraq. The Army, and to a lesser extent Marines, Air Force
lift, Special Ops are starting to come apart. I would actually tell
the Commander of CENTCOM, when this Administration leaves of-
fice, you have this force down to ten brigades, and you tell me what
you are going to do with those ten brigades. But it is unmistakable
in my mind that starting in April, the U.S. Army starts to unravel
at an accelerated rate. It is already severely degraded. This is the
first time since World War II that we are strategically as a ground
combat force in such a vulnerable position. If the other shoe drops,
Castro dies, a half million Cuban refugees, miscalculation on the
Korean Peninsula, a whole series of potential vulnerabilities, a
major strike on the homeland, with millions of refugees in flight,
we have left the U.S. Armed Forces, the U.S. National Guard, the
central load-bearing institution of domestic security, ill-equipped to
move forward. So we have to draw down the force. We have got to
tell the force providers, get on with it.
Fifth, it seems to me we have to get out of the cities. Now, I have
ent. I think Petraeus has come up with a committed
engagement strategy. I personally do not believe we are in Iraq to
fight a counterinsurgency battle or to win the hearts and minds of
the Iraqi people. We are there strictly to stand up a government,
stand up a security force, ensure there isn't regional mischief that
would knock the Iraqis off track, and then to largely disengage. So
I think we ought to get out of the city. I don't understand why
30,000 U.S. combat troops in the city of Baghdad with 5-, 6 million
Arabs murdering each other with electric drills, car bombs and 120
mortars, why are U.S. GIs door to door the solution to an underly-
ing bitter sectarian struggle?
Seventh, we got to resource our failing military. And when I say
resource, I don't just mean manpower. You know, we got this al-
most ludicrous notion that we are going to build the Army at 7,000
people a year. For God sakes, there are 300 million of us. We would
have come apart already were it not for our Reserve components
and National Guard. The Army should be 850,000 people. The Ma-
rines are short 25,000 at a minimum. We have 124,007 contractors
on the ground in Iraq, without which communications doesn't work,
logistics doesn't work. Almost no military function can be carried
out except maneuver warfare because we lack the uniform capabil-
ity to carry out these operations.
I might also add that 20 years from now when this committee
has a hearing, the question will be, as the PRC legitimately
emerges as a giant economic and military power in the Pacific re-


11
gion, do we have a high-technology Air Force and Navy two genera-
tions in advance of the threat as a deterrent to mischief in the Pa-
cific region? And I would argue we are draining modernization dol-
lars out of the Air Force and Navy to spend on consumables to
fight the short-term war.
We can't forget about the next tier of countries, Saudi Arabia and
Pakistan. I went in for General Abizaid, spent a week in Saudi
Arabia looking around. These people are drowning in money. They
send their kids to our schools. They bank here. They had three U.S.
Senators visit Saudi Arabia in three years. We have shunned them
in the international community. They are vulnerable to what they
see as the Persian threat to the east, and now, given the mess we
have made of Iraq, to the north. The Pakistanis are vital to our
continued prosecution of the operation in Afghanistan. So we got
to pay some attention to the next line.
And finally, and I am echoing General Newbold's comments here,
I actually don't think, notwithstanding the incredible leadership we
now have, thank God, engaged in this, Secretary Gates, Rice,
Petraeus, Crocker and others, I don't think we are going to decide
the outcome in Iraq. I think this is an Iraqi issue. It bothers me
intensely when I hear the great pride all of us have at battalion
and brigade commanders with CERP funds picking up garbage, fix-
ing sewage systems. That is not why this war is happening. These
people aren't murdering each other because they are out of work
or there is trash in the streets. They are fighting over something
quite logical, power and survival, and the world that will exist
when we come out of Iraq. So I think we ought to have a more-
as General Newbold already articulated, a more modest view of
what is possible. This is going to be an Arab country and an Arab
army when we leave in three years.
Thank you.
Dr. SNYDER. Thank you, General McCaffrey.
[The prepared statement of General McCaffrey can be found in
the Appendix on page 46.]
Dr. SNYDER. I wanted to acknowledge the presence of Adam
Smith of Washington State, who is a member of the full committee,
like Mr. Saxton, but is also not a member of this subcommittee.
And we appreciate him being here today, and, without objection,
will be allowed to participate.
Dr. O'Hanlon.
STATEMENT OF DR. MICHAEL E. O'HANLON, SENIOR FELLOW,
FOREIGN POLICY STUDIES, THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION
Dr. O'HANLON. Thank you. It is an honor to be here. I appreciate
the opportunity.
The previous witnesses have already talked a lot about condi-
tions in Iraq, and I would agree with General Keane and others
that a number of trend lines are in the right direction at the tac-
tical military level against certain of our enemies.
But, Congressman Akin, you asked me to talk about my trip and
the concept of soft partition. I want to hone in right on that, be-
cause I think that overall we are seeing greater progress against
the extremist militias, al Qaeda in Iraq and related Salafist move-
ments, some of the more extreme Shia militias; less progress, how-


12
ever, in dealing with the sectarian war, the civil war. And I think
if I was going to summarize our progress so far, we are actually
making a fair amount of headway annihilating al Qaeda in Iraq
and other Salafist movements, especially since the Sheiks have
started to switch sides and work with us. But all we have done
with the civil war is suppress it. We haven't solved it. And it is
mostly because of the Iraqi political leadership not having done
their part, whether at the top down or even at the bottom up so
far.
Let me, if I could, begin with an image of a neighborhood. I know
a lot of you have been to Iraq, and a lot of you have studied the
different neighborhoods. A couple neighborhoods in Baghdad where
the problem was vivid for me. Both of them were sort of along the
airport road, from the Green Zone toward the west of the city, al
Mansur to the north of the road, west Rashid to the south.
In the al Mansur area, and this is Ghazaliya specifically, what
you are seeing is you have got Shia up in the northeast part of that.
neighborhood, and it is probably half a million people or more in
this overall sector of town. It is a large part of Baghdad. And you
have got Sunnis sort of to the southwest. And what we are doing
is putting up a lot of concrete barriers and allowing a lot of Iraqi
forces to man checkpoints, protecting their own neighborhoods. And
there is a real good logic to that as long as we are there.
But what is the transition strategy? Which Iraqi units are going
to be able to replace us in that objective, nonsectarian way? Now,
you could say that the Shia can patrol their neighborhoods, the
Sunni can patrol theirs. And that works as long as no one decides
to rock the boat too much. But then they can start blocking each
other's access points into their neighborhoods. They can start get-
ting in mortar fire into each other's zones. You can imagine that
coming undone. So that is a hard problem.
Even worse is West Rashid to the south of the airport road, be-
cause there, again, remarkable progress of our forces in essentially
freezing in place the current situation, suppressing the violence.
But what you have got is a checkerboard, Sunnis here, Shia there,
Sunnis here, Shia there, all over that district. And there is not an
economically viable subunit you can create that is all or mostly
Sunni, and then another one that is all or mostly Shia. You can't
even begin to put up concrete barriers and checkpoints, because if
you try, you cut these people off, little urban ghettos of a few,
blocks on a side, and it doesn't work.
So this, for me, is the challenge. I don't think we have got this
solved. I wrote an optimistic, overall positive op-ed yesterday with
Ken Pollack about a lot of our progress, but this piece of it is going
to require some major headway if we are going to be seeing our
way toward a viable outcome in Iraq, and also some kind of an exit
strategy.
So are what are the various ways you could see that happen?
Well, one of them, of course, is if current strategy can really suc-
ceed on the political front in a way that it so far has not at all.
And the Iraqi leadership is going to have to come along and start
making compromises at the top. Over time you can try to build a
nonsectarian military. General Keane quotes the total numbers. I
am actually even more interested in the numbers that we think are


14
And there are a lot of things that you have to mitigate in terms
of people's fears before this plan can work, but I think if you share
oil equally, which, you know, on a per capita basis, which has to
be part of any future concept for Iraq, soft partition can actually
offer something to each major ethnic group. For the Kurds, it is not
much change from what they have got. For the Sunnis, it allows
them to institutionalize policing themselves and get the Shia mili-
tias to agree to stay out of their neighborhoods and give them some
more defensible front lines. For the Shia, it allows them to finally
build the democratic Shia-led state that, frankly, they have wanted
for a long time, and for two and a half years after the invasion they
were willing to try to build without much violence, until things just
got out of hand.
So I am happy to go into this in more detail later, but my trip,
as much as it made me optimistic about the tactics that we are
using and the military progress, it led me to think that we have
not yet solved the ethnic problem or the sectarian problem. We
have to get a solution to that. One piece of it could be the current
strategy, and we finally see reconciliation and compromise among
the different leaders in Iraq. But another strategy might be for
them to agree, listen, we better agree on one thing if we can't agree
on other things, which is we are better off living somewhat apart
and preserving a limited state rather than pretending we can actu-
ally stitch it all back together.
Šo I still stand by soft partition as my preferred political frame-
work. Unfortunately, right now I don't have enough converts to
have that be the main proposal. So Senator Biden and a few others
and I are going to keep pushing it. I don't think it has to be the
framework. I think you might be able to pull it off with the current
strategy, but I am dubious, even after my generally inspiring trip
of last week. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Dr. O'Hanlon joint with Edward P.
Joseph can be found in the Appendix on page 57.]
Dr. SNYDER. Mr. Benjamin.
STATEMENT OF DANIEL BENJAMIN, DIRECTOR, FOREIGN POL-
ICY STUDIES, SENIOR FELLOW, THE BROOKINGS INSTITU-
TION
Mr. BENJAMIN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Represent-
ative Akin, members of the committee, I want to thank you for the
opportunity to testify today, and especially to be in here in such
distinguished company.
The previous speakers have all addressed the very largest issues.
I would like to narrow my focus a little bit here and discuss really
just the different sort of scenarios we might envision in terms of
the terrorist threat as it might develop, depending upon how we
pursue our policy in the region.
Let me restate the obvious and say that prediction in this envi-
ronment is especially hazardous, and we have all paid a price for
overly optimistic scenarios over the last several years. Let's begin
dging a fact that I think now is beyond dispute. There
were no jihadist terrorists in Iraq before the U.S. invasion of 2003.
Today there are probably several thousand. Some are undoubtedly
foreigners, including most of the suicide bombers. Nonetheless, this


16
as worse than the Americans. And the rise of Iran is viewed as a
deplorable event.
Let me emphasize I do not consider withdrawal from Iraq and
leaving the Shia militias to take on al Qaeda to be an attractive
course, but I am skeptical, as I suggested before, that we can
achieve the, quote, complete victory that the President has called
for in his speech in South Carolina referring to al Qaeda.
Let me try to summarize some of the other points in my testi-
mony and move us right along. If we do depart Iraq, we will need
to devise a reliable covert capability for dealing with the problem
of terrorist safe havens in largely ungoverned space. The problem
already exists in Pakistan and may well materialize in Iraq. My
own view is that our senior military commanders have been averse
to using Special Forces on counterterrorism missions for which
they are very trained. And I argued in a recent New York Times
op-ed with Steven Simon that it is time to look at deploying the
CIA and giving them more responsibility in this area.
Another Administration argument is a U.S. departure from Iraq
will embolden the terrorists. Well, obviously there is a great degree
of truth in this, but I would add that the terrorists to a large de-
gree already believe that they have been victorious, and one need
only read their comments on their Web sites and the like. And I
think we need to ask what are the implications of the sense of
achievements that they have developed?
Well, it is often suggested that leaving Iraq before the destruc-
tion of AQI will lead to an enhanced jihadist threat to the United
States homeland. Undoubtedly, if there are more jihadists out
there, then there is a greater aggregate threat. However, most of
AQI's fighters are going to be incapable of participating in any kind
of direct attack on America because they lack the cultural abilities
to navigate in Western societies. A few may try to carry their vio-
lence to the West, and the possibility that one of the doctors in-
volved in the recent car bomb conspiracy in the United Kingdom,
that he was an Iraqi jihadist, is certainly an ominous hint. But if
the U.S. forces depart, I suggest the more direct threat will be off-
shore to American interests, and especially to the regimes of the
Muslim world, which are still viewed as apostate and deserving of
overthrow.
The dangers associated with this are evident from the recent up-
rising at the Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon, where fighters
from Iraq reportedly played a key role. We can also look at Saudi
Arabia, which recently announced the arrest of 172 militants, a
very striking event. Terrorism is a game of small numbers, and 172
in this context is a very large one. The return of only a couple of
hundred jihadists to Saudi Arabia could prove a challenge for the
Interior Ministry and its forces. Other countries that face serious
domestic terrorist problems include Jordan and Syria, the two
major recipients of refugees from Iraq's turmoil.
Farther away, we can also see that there may be some spillover
from Iraq, particularly in Europe. The number of Muslims who
have traveled from Europe to Iraq appear to be relatively small,
and many of those have been killed in action. It is also true that
Abu Mussab al Zarqawi was building a network in Europe. But I
think a consideration of the European dimension of the problem


21
General McCAFFREY. I don't want to accept the premise of your
argument. I think that where we are is, we are involved in a strug-
gle in a country of 28 million people. We have got 160,000 of our
terrific kids in there. It is overwhelmingly a civil war between two
of the three factions. There will be a second fight between the
Kurds and the Arabs in the coming five years. And interlaced with
that, we had a huge failure of governmental institutions in Iraq al-
lowing massive criminality, men who threaten Iraqi mothers and
business people. And then, on top of that, we have got elements of
an international jihadist movement throwing kerosene on fire. So
I think that complexity is what we are trying to deal with.
Mr. BARTLETT. They hate each other you would place very high?
It is a civil war?
General MCCAFFREY. I think the dominant challenge right now
is—but I am not sure it is hatred. It is fear, fear of the future. It
is, where am I going to be five years from now when the Americans
are gone? And that is really the crux of it. And they are logical to
be fearful of the future.
Mr. BARTLETT. One of our witnesses described—if you had to use
one word to describe the climate over there, it is fear was the word
he used, if you had to limit it to one word.
General Newbold, do you have numbers down by yours?
General NEWBOLD. Sir, I am with General McCaffrey on this in
one sense, and that is, I am reluctant to give precise numbers. I
would say overwhelmingly the two reasons for the violence in Iraq
are: They perceive us as an occupying power in their country; and
the other one is the bitter sectarian issues and the fear, as General
McCaffrey described, to cause them to want to defend or attack.
Overwhelming it is those two, and there is some fighting with al
Qaeda now.
Mr. BARTLETT. So problems with each other and with us are the
two major reasons from your perspective.
Do the other two have numbers down?
Dr. O'HANLON. I will go quickly if you allow me to modify, as
General McCaffrey has, from hatred to fear. I will say 50 percent
for that; and then 35 percent al Qaeda; 15 percent U.S.
Mr. BARTLETT. And one last.
Mr. BENJAMIN. I think I am going to duck on the numbers as
well. But I would note that if you simply break down the number
of casualties, then it is overwhelmingly sectarian. But if you were
looking at the amount of ordnance that is being spent on attacking
the United States, you might come up with a very different sort of
figure. So, you know, it is a very confusing sort of situation. In
terms of the big picture, I think there is relatively little violence
that involves their hatred for al Qaeda. But that is simply because
of the numbers that are involved.
Mr. BARTLETT. That has been pretty consistent with all of the
you would put down problems with each other and
problems with us are the two major reasons for the violence?
Mr. BENJAMIN. Yes. And sometimes it is hard to disentangle
them, too; in other words, that our presence may be providing an
opportunity for sectarian violence by providing a shield of some
kind or—it is simply a profoundly complicated dynamic that is un-
folding. And in fact, even to say it is sectarian is often confusing


22
because we have lots of violence between Shia, for example, and
lots of violence between different groups of Sunni. So, very often,
it is criminality; it is turf protection. I think that what we are get-
ting at here is the concept of a civil war is in some ways not appro-
priate for this. There is a civil war going on, but there is also a
war, as Thomas Hobbes would have called it, a war of all against
each other. And that is part of the reason why bringing a pacifica-
tion strategy to any kind of successful conclusion is so difficult.
Mr. BARTLETT. I understand the problem, Mr. Chairman, giving
a quantitative answer to a qualitative problem. But thank you all
very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Dr. SNYDER. Ms. Davis for five minutes.
Ms. DAVIS OF CALIFORNIA. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair-
man.
Thank you all for being here. Let me just catch my notes for a
second. One of the things that was said earlier is that I think,
maybe as General Keane said, that he was perplexed by the fact
that we hadn't really spoken about our intentions, had not been
clear about where we were going. And on the other hand, you
spoke about the need for regional strategies, a strategic plan. I
would like you to talk a little bit about the capacity issue because
I have always been concerned that we didn't really have the inter-
agency infrastructure. We know that. It was mentioned that we
should provide the military resources, too.
I think, General McCaffrey, you mentioned that we ought to be
giving the Iraqis better equipment, more equipment. Why aren't we
doing that? This whole issue of whether we are able to develop the
capacity to do what we want to do right now, where do you see
that? If that is something we should be doing, why aren't we? Is
that a problem of the Congress? Is it something that, again, in the
capacity that we ought to be doing more in terms of oversight?
Where do you see that? How would you grade that, and how would
you grade it in the next six months? I mean, how is it going to im-
prove?
Dr. O'HANLON. I can begin with an anecdote from my trip which
is that we met a number of Iraqi security forces complaining about
how Baghdad was not providing them the equipment that they
were due. And this gets to the point General McCaffrey was mak-
ing, and I will defer to him and others in a second. But there is
the question of whether the U.S. should be doing this now or the
Iraqi central government. Unfortunately, if the Iraqi central gov-
ernment won't, that doesn't happen. So you could conclude, if they
are not doing it fast enough, we really have to step in even though
it breeds a certain dependency in them. That is the conundrum I
think. It is not for sure lack of attention to the issue. But they are
complaining that, for example, some of the Sunni units are not get-
ting help from the Shi'a dominated ministry of the interior. And
that is a big part of the challenge. And just also Baghdad not hav-
ing the capacity to administer properly. It is one of the reasons
that those of us who favor decentralization or regionalization be-
lieve that you have got to lower the role for Baghdad in some of
these decisions.


25
to start sending one of my sons, a fellow entry battalion com-
mander in the 82nd airborne, had a battalion that was home for
48 days; they sent them back on 6 months, extended it to a year,
extended it to 15 months. We are going to have our staff sergeants
and our captains are going to walk on us. So the leadership-our
most precious asset isn't our equipment, our marvelous technology;
it is our leadership. And I gave a talk yesterday, a couple of days
ago, in the Army-Navy Club. One of the dads came up and said,
my son is now deploying on his seventh tour as a JASOČ operative.
We have allowed this tiny military force and an undermanned CIA
and Defense contractors to fight the war. And the rest of us aren't
in the war.
Dr. SNYDER. Mr. Johnson for five minutes.
Mr. JOHNSON. Thank you.
I was struck with some of the testimony or by some of the testi-
mony today having to do with the anguish in not being able to
make things happen with the Congress; in other words, Congress
not being able to come together to kind of work on something
that come to a consensus as far as our strategy for going forward.
And it just seems to me that we have to take into consideration the
fact that Congress is elected by the people, and Congress is a co-
equal branch of government to the executive branch.
And in the Congress, you have got two Houses; someone elected
every two years. That is us, the House. And it makes us very in
tune with the people. We are subject to the people. And the people
were at one time in favor of this war, but they have now lost con-
fidence, and the American people want to see this war come to an
end. They want to see us redeploy our troops and get them out of
harm's way in the midsts of a civil war in Iraq. And I think that
that is the reason why Congress and the military leadership, along
with the executive branch, were unable to come up
sus. It is because of the American people, and that is to be re-
spected, and that is really an admirable part of our system of gov-
ernment.
And I respect the people, the collective wisdom of the people. And
I don't fear what will happen in Iraq when we come out because
come out is somethin hat we will have to do. And I think you all
agree with that. It is just a matter of when. And certainly how is
emely important. And as soon as we can re-enlist the con-
fidence of the American people in terms of how we exit from Iraq,
that is going to be the best thing that I think we can do.
And so I have a hard time, General Newbold, with this concept
of winning the war in Iraq or victory. Many people in America feel
like that is not possible. What is your definition of winning the
war?
General NEWBOLD. Well, sir, you will recall the way I character-
ize that is that, having gotten into a fight that we should not have
entered into, then it was important to win. And using that very
general term, because the consequences of disruption to the region
and et cetera were so grave. But following that, I then outlined the
reasons why I don't think that is any longer possible and that it
is important to have a strategy of more moderate aims to sustain
America's leadership in the world community and to conduct the
withdrawal in a way that may allow the Iraqis to assume their re-


32
that, presumably, if you—if the fear for your own security is great
enough and justified-
Dr. SNYDER. If half the neighborhood leaves and the police say,
you can stay here, but we are going with these folks, that is not
very voluntary.
Dr. O'HANLON. I agree with you. It would be hard for people to
stay behind. But you would have to work out security procedures.
And we try to spell them out in the report where you would actu-
ally promise people a certain amount of residual security in the
neighborhood they remained. And one last point, very quickly, on
the issue of mixed marriage, people can choose if they want to go
or not. But our presumption is, if you get up in the range of 90-
plus percent of ethnic homogeneity, you have much less sectarian
strife. Because it is not so much hatred that drives it; it is fear.
If you have 90 percent dominance of one group in one area or an-
other, it is clear who is in charge, and therefore we think there will
be less violence.
Dr. SNYDER. Gentlemen, I am cognizant of the time. You have
been very patient with us with the votes. Mr. Akin and I kind of
shorted ourselves just before the vote. I took five minutes. We'll let
Mr. Akin see if he has any further questions, and then we better
call it a day so you all can get on with your lives.
Mr. Akin.
Mr. AKIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I wanted to probe a little
bit further on a couple of things that you had said, Dr. O'Hanlon,
that struck me as interesting. And that is that we are having—the
successes are the most optimistic things you hear. The first things
you were hearing almost a year ago was there has been some
þreakthroughs in a few areas with a few sheiks in the Anbar prov-
ince. And then the thing seems to be expanding. We seem to
capitalizing on the mistakes of the enemies. And at a local level,
we are achieving some successes, apparently. I guess my question
is this, why don't we just capitalize on that? Why don't we drive
that? Why don't reward the local communities that meet certain
basic parameters and further guarantee them maybe by whatever
coercive force we can bring to bear on the central government to
say, look, there are a lot of things that are going to go on here that
are not the jurisdiction of the Federal Government. I am talking
like kind of a Republican conservative. Bear with me.
For instance, education and your local police force and food dis-
ion, et cetera, et cetera, the Federal Government has nothing
to do with that, and you are going to be in charge of that right here
in your town, and it is time for you to start putting your own
neighborhood together, your own province or state or whatever you
want to call it together and basically—because what I am hearing
is the military may be having some modicum of success. But the
State Department and the political piece of it, we don't have a lot
of confidence the politicians in Baghdad are going to solve their
own problem. Why don't we instead say, look, why don't we build
Iraq the way America was built? Why don't we start with the local
towns and the local states and build them up and give them certain
basic rights under themselves and use that as pressure to help
bring the centralized thing more into focus and approach it from
that point of view. I guess my question is, then, is that practical?


33
What would be the political obstacles to doing something like that?
And do we have enough influence to basically start driving a local
solution and put local—and then I think the political piece—this is
the American public. Americans love to keep score. We are sick of
always seeing that the bad guys have got four more runs on us,
and we never see what we are getting done.
It seems like if we put a list together—these are parameters of
a successful community. There is a minimum amount of violence.
We have got this, this and this, and all these pieces in place. If we
start coloring the map in, which communities have gotten in and
which ones haven't, and when you do, we create rewards. Is that
a possible way to move forward, Dr. O'Hanlon, to start with?
Dr. O’HANLON. Congressman, great set of questions. And in fact
a lot of the benchmarks that we have not talked as much about as
the oil law or the debaathification process have to do with empow-
ering the regions. There is the regional powers that—there is the
idea of having the regional elections so they can be a more re
resentative government. I think Governor Tommy Thompson has
put forth a plan that tries to argue for this idea of empowering the
provinces. I think Ken Pollock and Tony Cortisman, my two col-
leagues on this trip, both have some sympathies there.
The main thing that will not achieve, that soft partition would-
because soft partition I distinguish from what you are saying as
creating three autonomous regions and rebuilding the security
forces along those lines. The soft partition is more if you worry
about the security problem. Your approach I think is more of a way
to try to do bottom-up politics and hope that the security problem
might actually diminish on its own if governance capacity and the
confidence with which services are delivered improve and then peo-
ple have more stake in the system. So I think it is a very interest-
ing proposition.
The bottom line—I won't say who said this to me in Iraq. It is
not super sensitive anyway. Frankly, what we need is for one of
these kind of Plan Bs to be become Plan I, where if the Iraqis
would enthusiastically get behind either soft partition or your ap-
proach similar to Governor Thompson's or another approach of de-
centralization, I think it would be great. And If it doesn't happen,
of course, there is only so much we can push.
It raises the question, should we be more actively trying to con-
struct a new political arrangement with them? And I would say
yeah. I mean, I think you try to work in this current approach for
a couple more months, let everyone know that the surge is achiev-
ing some military goals, but it cannot continue to do so unless
there is political help from Baghdad. If that doesn't happen in the
course of this fall, let's say, then we've got to find a Plan B or give
them an ultimatum, Plan B or get out. I think that is the conversa-
tion we may need to have with them within let's say six months.
Mr. AKIN. I guess the way I was thinking of packaging it wasn't
so much that it was a Plan B, but it is one more step forward. And
the first step was to create some level of peace on the street. But
I think the leverage is you say, look, Mr. Sunni, we understand
this town is 60 percent Sunni and you guys will have a lot of influ-
ence running the local police, but you have got to understand that
there is another town over here that is 60 percent Shi’a. And





APPENDIX
JULY 31, 2007


PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
JULY 31, 2007





Opening Statement of
Chairman Dr. Vic Snyder
Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations
Hearing on “A Third Way: Alternative Futures for Iraq"
July 31, 2007
The hearing will come to order.
Good afternoon, and welcome to the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations'
fourth hearing on alternative strategies for Iraq.
My colleague, Mr. Akin, and I entered into this series of hearings because we were
frustrated by the tone of the discussion about Iraq this year, and the polarization that
has occurred. The political debate on the U.S. strategy for Iraq has too often been
framed by two extreme positions: “precipitous withdrawal" or "stay the course"
indefinitely. These hearings are an effort to bring in smart, experienced people who
can help us identify and develop alternative approaches for Iraq. Our intent is not to
critique current or past policies, but to focus on the future. Through these hearings, we
hope to enhance the public debate and inform full committee deliberations.
Over the last three weeks, we heard from retired senior military officers, defense policy
experts, and academics who specialize in Middle Eastern affairs. Last week, we had a
highly productive session with the Honorable Bing West, Major General Paul Eaton,
Colonel Paul Hughes of the U.S. Institute of Peace, and Dr. Stephen Biddle of the
Council on Foreign Relations. The full committee has also held hearings on trends and
recent security developments in Iraq and the implications of the recent National
Intelligence Estimate with respect to Al-Qaeda, and has passed legislation requiring the
administration to report on a comprehensive strategy for the redeployment of U.S.
troops from Iraq.
These sessions make clear that we are focused on the future, and not merely intent on
rehashing how we got to where we are. Our witnesses have been asked to address
alternative strategies, and have been given guidance that should allow the
subcommittee and the public to draw comparisons in key areas. Some of the specific
things we are looking for are:
•
The financial and personnel requirements to implement a given
alternative;
The impact on the people of Iraq;
The impact on regional stability;
The impact on U.S. national security generally; and
The impact on the U.S. military.
•
Each witness today was selected because of his unique background and perspective.
(41)


44
After reviewing our witnesses' testimonies, it is clear that some
advocate departing from the current strategy - that is you do not endorse
pursuing a plan that emphasizes U.S. combat forces going “door to door”
performing a counterinsurgency mission aimed at securing and holding Iraqi
neighborhoods. In light of increasing reports that the “surge is succeeding”, I
would like our witnesses to comment on how we in the Congress should
view these developments. In particular, Mr. O'Hanlon, I'm interested in
understanding how the “significant changes taking place” in Iraq that you
described in the NY Times yesterday affects your proposal for soft partition.
Those who advocate departing from the current strategy emphasize
the need for improving the readiness of the Army and Marine Corps.
General McCaffery's testimony is heavily focused on this issue. While I
think all members agree that this is an important issue and a vital priority,
I'm curious how your alternative will allow U.S. troops to carry out the
following military roles and missions: (1) training Iraqi forces; (2) deterring
conventional militaries from intervening in Iraq; (3) supporting al Qaeda’s
enemies; and (4) conducting direct strike missions? Almost all of the experts
who have testified before this subcommittee on this subject agree that
continuing these roles and missions in Iraq is important.


46
Adjunct Professor of International Affairs
31 July 2007
TESTIMONY OF GENERAL BARRY R. MCCAFFREY (USA, Ret.)
ADJUNCT PROFESSOR OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
UNITED STATES MILITARY ACADEMY
BEFORE THE HOUSE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE
July 31, 2007
1. THE CONGRESS MUST STEP UP TO YOUR CONSTITUTIONAL DUTIES:
•
Let me begin by saying this statement is the same argument I was privileged to make to the Senate
Armed Services Committee on 17 April 2007. I thank you for the opportunity to testify today. This
House Committee is a vital part of America's defense. Thanks to all of you on this committee for
your intelligent oversight, your commitment to our Armed Forces, and for upholding Article 1 of the
Constitution to raise and support an Army and maintain a Navy.
America has a lot at stake in the coming 24 months. The war in Iraq is going badly. The under-
resourced war in Afghanistan is now starting to turn around for the better despite the growing Taliban
violence and the massive drag of opium production which has turned the nation into the largest narco-
state in history. The consequences of failure in Iraq will be a disaster to the American people and our
allies if we cannot achieve our objective to create a stable, law-based state which is at peace with its
neighbors. Iraq must create enough consensus among the three major warring factions of Shia, Kurds,
and Sunni to govern without the continuation of the bitter civil war which now has engulfed the Iraqi
people.
We have 160,000 US troops in combat in Iraq and 22,000 fighting bravely with our NATO allies in
Afghanistan. These are the finest, most courageous military men and women we have ever fielded in
battle. Our commanders -- almost without exception at company, battalion, and brigade level have
served multiple combat tours. They are the most capable battle leaders that I have encountered in my
many years of watching our Armed Forces with admiration.
Our new leadership team in Iraq - our brilliant new commander General Dave Petraeus and the
equally talented and experienced Ambassador Ryan Crocker---are launched on a new approach to use
political reconciliation, new tactics, more equipment to strengthen the Iraqi Security Forces, and
enhanced US combat protective power to stabilize the situation. We must give them time and space.
They deserve Congressional political backing to push this one last chance at success in Iraq.
•
However, the purpose of my testimony is not to talk about the ongoing tactical operations in
CENTCOM - but instead the disastrous state of America's ground combat forces. Congress has been
missing-in-action during the past several years while undebated and misguided strategies were
implemented by former Secretary Rumsfeld and his team of arrogant and inexperienced civilian


47
associates in the Pentagon. The ICS failed to protect the Armed Forces from bad judgment and illegal
orders. They have gotten us in a terrible strategic position of vulnerability. The Army is starting to
crack under the strain of lack of resources, lack of political support and leadership from both the
Administration and this Congress, and isolation from the American people who have now walked
away from the war.
No one is actually at war except the Armed Forces, their US civilian contractors, and the CIA. There
is only rhetoric and posturing from the rest of our government and the national legislature. Where is
the shared sacrifice of 300 million Americans in the wealthiest nation in history? Where is the tax
supplement to pay for a $12 billion a month war? Where are the political leaders calling publicly for
America's parents and teachers to send their sons and daughters to fight "the long war on terror?"
Where is the political energy to increase the size of our Marine Corps and US Army? Where is the
willingness of Congress to implement a modern "lend-lease program" to give our Afghan and Iraqi
allies the tools of war they need to protect their own people? Where is the mobilization of America's
massive industrial capacity to fix the disastrous state of our ground combat military equipment?
We are fortunate that we now have Bob Gates as the Secretary of Defense. He is experienced, a
patriot, and open to pragmatic logic on dealing with the perils we now face. Secretary Condi Rice is
immensely experienced and now using the leverage of her powerful office to exert America's essential
"goodness" in the diplomatic arena. The White House Chief-of-Staff Josh Bolton has now opened a
frank dialog with many in the public policy arena to begin to build the unity that we will need to deal
with the international menaces we now face. We are not going to successfully deal with the many
national security problems we now encounter unless the Congress and the Administration can hammer
out a new strategy going forward which depends on international dialog, political and economic
nation-building, and strong military determination and power.
2. THE CURRENT ARMY IS TOO SMALL:
•
Our Army has 44 brigades - but 24 are deployed. We cannot sustain the current rate (22+ brigades to
Iraq; 2+ brigades to Afghanistan) of deployment. The Army will unravel.
We will not be able to handle possible missions to Korea, the Taiwan Straits, the Balkans, Cuba (death
of Castro), Syria, Venezuela, Darfur, and possibly Iran. We may be attacked by terrorists here in the
continental United States. We may suffer from natural disasters - massive earthquakes or major
hurricanes such as the devastation caused by Katrina in the Gulf Coast States,
The Secretary of Defense recently announced a 3-month extension on all Army deployments - a 25%
increase. This was a good call by Secretary Gates for Army families. We have been piecemealing out
these extensions to an enormously over-committed force at the last minute. However, this is just
another indication of inadequate Army manpower.
3. THE HOUSE SHOULD CONCLUDE THAT WE DON'T HAVE ENOUGH TROOPS:
•
The combat overload on the Army is having a negative effect on readiness. First time active-duty
soldiers will spend more time at war than at home.
We are encountering a negative effect on the retention of mid- and senior-grade noncommissioned
officers. We also are already seeing the impact on the retention of company-grade officers.


49
Deployment-to-dwell ratio is currently 1:1; DOD policy states that stateside training and recovery
time should be 1:2. We do not have enough Marines. The numbers speak for themselves.
This increase in deployment-to-dwell ratio means a direct decrease in the readiness of deployed units
to carry out the full range of missions required for our global fighting force.
Over 70% of the proposed Marine Corps end strength increase will be comprised of first-time Marines
- challenging recruiting and retention efforts.
6. WEAKENING OF THE ARMY NATIONAL GUARD:
•
The mathematics of our extended deployments suggest that we will be forced to call up as many as
nine National Guard combat brigades plus required support forces in the coming 12 months for
involuntary second combat tours ---if we are to re-set the force and create a strategic reserve. (Note
that DOD Assistant Secretary Chu states that this is 'no big deal.")
The second round of involuntary call-ups may begin to topple the weakened National Guard structure
which is so critical to US domestic security.
• 88% of non-deployed Army National Guard units are rated as not ready or poorly equipped. The
readiness of our National Guard forces is at a historic low.
However, the Washington Post has reported that the Pentagon is still planning to rely on these unready
forces to meet surge requirements.
•
The Army Guard/Reserve is anticipated to grow to 20-30 percent of deployed combat forces.
We are now seeing a high loss rate in both active and reserve components of senior NCOS, West Point
graduates, and many other highly qualified battle leaders.
7. RECRUITING STANDARDS ARE COMPROMISED; TROOP BASIC TRAINING
STANDARDS ARE COMPROMISED:
•
The Army is lowering standards to meet enlistment goals and initial entry training standards in order
to make manpower requirements. Recruitment will continue to be challenging as the Army tries to
power up to add 65,000 permanent troops.
In 2006, there was almost a 50% increase in waivers of enlistment standards from 2004 - waivers for
moral turpitude, drug use, medical issues and criminal records.
Recruitment from least-skilled category recruits have climbed eight-fold over past 2 years; the
percentage of recruits who are high school graduates dropped 13% from '04 to '06.
• We are increasing the age of first-time enlistees - we are now enlisting 42 year old soldiers. We
should only want soldiers in superb health – from age 18 to about 30 years old. The Army is not push-
button warfare -- this is brutal, hard business.


50
•
The Promotion rates for officers and NCOs have skyrocketed to replace departing leaders. We are
short thousands of officers. We have serious mismatch problems for NCOs.
We have been forced to use US and foreign contractors to substitute for required military functions.
(128,000 contractors in Iraq -- includes more than 2000 armed contractor personnel.) Thousands of
these brave and dedicated people have been killed or wounded. They perform most of our logistics
functions in the combat zone. (Transportation, maintenance, fuel, long-haul communications, food
service, contractor operation of computer based command and control, etc.) Under conditions of great
danger such as open warfare caused by Iranian or Syrian intervention--they will discontinue
operations. Our logistics system is a house of cards.
8. A LOT OF US ARMY COMBAT EQUIPMENT AND TOO MANY AIR FORCE AIR LIFT
ASSETS ARE BROKEN:
The shortfall on Army equipment is $212 billon to reset the force and its reserve stockpiles - as well
as buy the required force modernization for the additional troops.
The National Guard Bureau Chief - LTG Steven Blum in House testimony stated that the Army Guard
has only 40% of its required equipment. (Generators, trucks, communications, helicopters, tentage,
modernized fighting vehicles, medical equipment, etc.) We are compromising the quality of National
Guard force training and limiting the Guard's ability to respond to domestic disasters; fundamentally
the National Guard is in a “degraded state back at home.”
About 40 percent of Army/Marine Corps equipment is in Iraq or Afghanistan or undergoing
repair/maintenance. We are now drawing down gear from prepositioned stocks of major equipment.
(i.e., Humvees, tanks) The situation creates a US strategic vulnerability since rapid deploying units
will find their equipment is unavailable for other conflicts.
LTG Blum has stated that even if the National Guard receives the funding currently pledged by the
Army and Air Force - the equipment accounts will still be short $40 billion required to bring units
back to 90% level of readiness.
Equipment shortages mean troops train on outdated equipment - or equipment which is not identical
to the material they will be using in combat.
The nature and pace of operations in Iraq and Afghanistan is wearing out critical equipment much
faster than expected. In some cases, equipment is being used as much as nine times the intended
peacetime training tempo.
The DOD Inspector General concluded that U.S. troops are being sent into combat without the
necessary equipment - troops are forced to delay operations while they wait for the right equipment to
become available. (DoD/IG, Equipment Status of Deployed Forces.)
The required number of late model Improved Humvees will not reach Iraq until the end of year. The
latest models of up-armor Humvees will better protect against the advanced roadside bombs which
currently cause about 70% of all US casualties in Iraq. Only MRAP vehicles will have the armor to
defeat current attacks.


52
WRITTEN TESTIMONY OF GREGORY S. NEWBOLD, LTGEN USMC (RET)
BEFORE THE HOUSE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE, SUBCOMMITTEE
ON OVERSIGHTS AND INVESTIGATIONS
JULY 31, 2007
INTRODUCTION
The traditional opening remark is that I am pleased to appear before the Subcommittee in
testimony today. The truth, though, is that it is with some reluctance that I am appearing.
My discomfort flows from two personal observations. The first is that I can state with
fair certainty that I have no insights that will uncover what has eluded both those in
authority and those whose habit is to offer opinions. My second observation is that, as
sincere as this subcommittee's goals and actions are acknowledged to be, my sense is that
positions from the relevant actors in our capital are generally already deeply set and that
hearings don't contribute to solutions, but only provide the veneer of a search for them. .
Current rhetoric in the Iraq debate is not to illuminate and solve, but to defend or to
blame. If this is understandable, it is also sad, because we are confronted with the most
complex, vexing, and consequential problem of the post Cold War era, and a closed mind
is a recipe for amplifying failure. Despite my misgiving about appearing, I concluded
that a request from one of the few committees truly focused on finding solutions to our
nation's best interest ought to be given due credit. And also because I did not also
remove my sense of duty when I took off my uniform.
You have asked for thoughts on a “Third Way” in Iraq. I will summarize my points in
this introduction and elaborate on them only briefly in the body of my testimony. My
logic is that, if the thoughts are to be of little consequence, they ought to at least be brief.
sing the elements of the problem, I'll attempt to offer some advice on how to
address these elements in an approach that may contribute to A Third Way.
My first and strongest counsel to you is that we won't solve Iraq without a
compelling and practical national strategy. Until then, we're playing checkers and
our enemies are playing chess.
My second most urgent point to you is to argue that we have militarized a
problem that is without military solutions. We are occupying a proud country of
25 million Muslims, that has 40% unemployment, a dysfunctional government,
with ancient and bitter sectarian animosities and neighbors who are aggravating
unrest. How is it that we think that the solutions to those problems will be
developed by those who carry weapons? Where is the diplomat, the economist,
the Information Agency official, and the expert on the rule of law on this panel or
when General Patraeus is to appear in September?
Third, it is past time that the US recognized and appreciated (or held accountable)
other actors in this drama. Iraq is not an isolated state at war, but a region in


54
supporting those who align with occupiers, or joining gangs and factions. Were we more
thoughtful, we would not name, as War Czar, a very fine military officer, but rather a
seasoned diplomat experienced in crisis management. We wouldn't call for a summit to
review the progress of the war, to be shown only key figures from the Defense
Department. As I questioned in my introduction, why aren't the panels testifying now
and in September composed of oil and infrastructure experts, or experienced observers on
the cultural underpinnings and tribal instincts of the host nation, or diplomats who are
called to task for the failure to enlist broader regional support?
Broadening Accountability. To be sure, the United States is living with a problem of its
own making, and is now paying the price. We have spent over $360B dollars, lost over
3600 lives, and suffered in excess of 26,000 casualties. Our tough experience is shared
most notably by our British allies, but few others. Meanwhile, the Iranians provide direct
support to those who kill our patriots, the Syrians take comfort in our losses, and the
Saudis and North Africans provide strong cadres of the zealots who inflict such grievous
losses on the innocent population of Iraq. The world, in general, turns a blind eye. Most
notably, the UN is abjectly failing in their global responsibilities. To be sure, the US
earlier isolated and dismissed them, but the time for recovering from bruised feelings
ended years ago. It's time for them to show some leadership, and individual countries to
declare their position for the future.
More than all of that, though, the Iraqis have created or tolerated the nightmare that is
current Iraq. To put it in terms that I highlighted earlier, the political, economic,
diplomatic, and "hearts and minds” issues that are at the heart of the turmoil in Iraq are
overwhelmingly their problems, but are largely considered to be problems to be solved by
the US. To illustrate the point, the Iraqis have had national conscription from the early
1930s – the beginning of their modern era - until now. With the most significant crisis
the Iraqis have faced in the last seventy years, they apparently don't feel obligated to
compel service to their country. While incredibly high unemployment exists, their
economic lifeblood (the pipelines) suffer frequent attacks, and the infrastructure of their
country is in decay, the nation refuses to implement what was not only the engine for low
unemployment, but also probably the single greatest entity in Iraq for dissolving
prejudice among factions. We cannot impose peace and prosperity on the Iraqis - they
have to want it, and want it so desperately that they will fight for it, or compromise
deeply held positions to achieve it. At the moment, they don't care enough. As long as
the United States is carrying the load, don't expect the mass of Iraqis to sacrifice enough
to solve the problem.
US Resolve to Further Prosecute the War. The US population is weary of a war that has
uncertain benefits, but great cost in resources and lives - with no end in sight. In truth,
the difficulties of this war are compounded by a steady drumbeat of almost exclusively
negative reporting. Particularly troubling to me is that the US Armed Forces are often
heroic, always at risk, and rarely given due credit for their generosity and compassion in
a country 10,000 miles from their home. They are an afterthought in the conscience of a
nation pre-occupied with Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, and Michael Vick.


57

THE SABAN CENTER
for Middle EAST POLICY
ar THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION
ANALYSIS PAPER
Number 12, June 2007
THE CASE FOR
SOFT PARTITION IN IRAQ
EDWARD P. JOSEPH
MICHAEL E. O'HANLON


58

THE SABAN CENTER
for MIDDLE EAST POLICY
ar THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION
ANALYSIS PAPER
Number 12, June 2007
THE CASE FOR
SOFT PARTITION IN IRAQ
EDWARD P. JOSEPH
MICHAEL E. O'HANLON


TABLE OF CONTENTS
NOWLEDGMEVTS,
ABBREVIATIONS .......
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY .....
THE AUTHORS.........
THE CASE FOR SOFT PARTITION.........
IMPLEMENTING SOFT PARTITION ........
......... V
................. VII
..............
........ IX
.........XII
..........1
.........
...............
.................
....................
CONCLUSION..................
APPENDIX ......
MAPS .......
THE SARAN CENTER AT THE BROYKINGS INSTITUTION
UIT


60
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The authors are grateful to a wide range of scholars
I and political leaders in the United States and
Iraq. Most of the political leaders cannot be named,
although the authors owe a special intellectual debt
to Senator Joseph Biden and Leslie Gelb, a former
President of the Council on Foreign Relations, who
first articulated the basic contours of a plan similar to
the soft partition concept developed here. The authors
also wish to thank Antony Blinken, Staff Director of
the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Prof. Chaim
Kaufmann of Lehigh University and Jonathan Morrow,
formerly of the United States Institute of Peace. At the
Saban Center for Middle East Policy at Brookings, the
assistance of Bruce Riedel, and most of all Martin Indyk
and Kenneth Pollack, has been extremely important. In
Foreign Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution we
are very grateful to Molly Browning, Jason Campbell,
Roberta Cohen, Elizabeth Ferris and Carlos Pascual.
THE SARAN CENTER AT THf. BROOKINGS INSTITUTION


ABBREVIATIONS
IDP
INTERNALLY DISPLACED PERSON
IOM
INTERNATIONAI. ORGANIZATION FOR MIGRATION
METT
MISSION-ENEMY-TERRAIN-TACTICS
NIE
NATIONAL INTELLIGENCI. ESTIMATE:
SIIC
SUPREME ISLAMIC IRAQI COUNCIL (FORMERLY THE SUPREME COUNCIL FOR THE ISLAMIC
REVOLUTION IN IRAQ)
UNHCR
UNITED NATIONS HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR REFUGEES
UNPROFOR
UNITED NATIONS PROTECTION FORCE
THE SARAN CENTER AT THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION
VU


63
Soft partition has a number of advantages over other
“Plan B” proposals currently under discussion. Most
others focus on a U.S. troop withdrawal or on the
containment of civil war spillover to other countries,
rather than the prevention of a substantial worsening
of Iraq's civil war. Soft partition could allow the United
States and its partners to preserve their core strategic
goals: an Iraq that lives in peace with its neighbors, op-
poses terrorism, and gradually progresses towards a
more stable future. It would further allow for the pos-
sibility over time for the reestablishment of an Iraq in-
creasingly integrated across sectarian lines rather than
permanently segregated. If carefully implemented, it
would help end the war and the enormous loss of life
on all sides.
sectarian identities are hardening as ethno-sectar-
ian separation is increasing. In short, Iraq today in-
creasingly resembles Bosnia-Herzegovina (hereafter
Bosnia) in the early 1990s, where one of us worked
extensively. While Iraq may not yet resemble Bosnia
in 1995 in which ethnic separation had progressed to
the point where fairly clear regional borders could be
established, it is well beyond the Bosnia of 1992 when
the separation was just beginning. Moreover, while
Bosnia eventually wound up as a reasonably stable
federation, as many as 200,000 may have lost their
lives before that settlement. A comparable per capita
casualty toll in Iraq would imply one million dead.
It should be the goal of policymakers to avoid such
a calamity by trying to manage the ethnic relocation
process, if it becomes unstoppable, rather than allow
terrorists and militias to use violence to drive this pro-
cess to its grim, logical conclusion.
Such a plan for soft partition (as opposed to hard-
partition which involves the outright division of Iraq)
is consistent with the plan of Senator Joseph Biden
(D-Del) and Leslie Gelb, a former President of the
Council on Foreign Relations. Our plan builds upon
their proposal, setting out the full rationale for such
an approach as well as the means by which this new
regionalized political system would be implemented
through soft partition. Those means include creating
processes to help people voluntarily relocate to parts
of Iraq where they would no longer be in the minor-
ity, and hence where they should be safer. This is not
an appealing prospect to put it mildly. However, if the
choice becomes sustaining a failing U.S. troop surge or
abandoning Iraq altogether, with all the risks that en-
tails in terms of intensified violence and regional tur-
moil, then soft partition might soon become the least
bad option. The question will then be less whether it is
morally and strategically acceptable, and more whether
it is achievable. Accordingly, the latter portion of this
paper focuses on the mechanisms for implementing a
viable soft partition of Iraq.
To make soft partition viable, several imposing practi-
cal challenges must be addressed. These include shar-
ing oil revenue among the regions, creating reasonably
secure boundaries between them, and restructuring
the international troop presence. Helping minority
populations relocate if they wish requires a plan for
providing security to those who are moving as well as
those left behind. That means the international troop
presence will not decline immediately, although we
estimate that it could be reduced substantially within
eighteen months or so. Population movements also
necessitate housing swaps and job creation programs.
Soft partition cannot be imposed from the outside. In-
deed, it need not be. Irag's new constitution, approved
by plebiscite in October 2005, already permits the cre-
ation of “regions.” Still, a framework for soft partition
would go much further than Iraq has to date. Among
other things, it would involve the organized movement
of two million to five million Iraqis, which could only
happen safely if influential leaders encouraged their
supporters to cooperate, and if there were a modicum
of agreement on where to draw borders and how to
share oil revenue.
Sunni and Shi'i Arabs have traditionally opposed par-
tition, whether hard or soft. However, with 50,000 to
100,000 persons being displaced from their homes
and several thousand losing their lives every month,
THE CASE FOR SOFT PARTITION IN IRAQ


64
As noted, unless the U.S. troop surge succeeds dramat-
ically, a soft partition model may be the only hope for
avoiding an all-out civil war. Indeed, even if the surge
achieves some positive results, the resulting political
window might best be used to negotiate and imple-
ment soft partition. As of writing, it is too soon to
know exactly how the current approach will fare. We
are highly skeptical of its prospects. But one need not
have a final assessment of the surge to begin consid-
ering which “Plan B” might succeed it in the event of
failure or even of a partial but insufficient success.
THE SABAN CENTER AT THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION
XI


65
THE AUTHORS
EDWARD P. Josiph is Visiting Scholar and Professorial
Lecturer at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced In-
ternational Studies of the Johns Hopkins University as
well as a career professional in conflict management,
democracy and elections. He served for a decade in the
Balkans, including nearly throughout the entire war in
Bosnia-Herzegovina as a peacekeeper with the United
Nations, on post-war active duty with the Army, as a
senior official with the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe, and Project Director for the
International Crisis Group. In July 1995, contempo-
raneous with the massacres in Srebrenica, Joseph and
one United Nations colleague coordinated the evacu-
ation of Muslim civilians from the neighboring Zepa
"safe area.” In the fall of 2004, based in Baghdad's civil-
ian areas, the “red zone”, Joseph coordinated the United
States Agency for International Development-funded
governance program for the Interim Iraqi government.
He is a frequent commentator on the Balkans and has
published articles on both that region and Iraq. He
earned a bachelors degree and masters degree in in-
ternational studies from Johns Hopkins University and
from the School of Advanced International Studies of
the Johns Hopkins University respectively. Joseph also
has a law degree from the University of Virginia. He is
a helicopter pilot in the U.S. Army Reserve.
MICHAEL E. O'HANLON is a Senior Fellow at the Brook-
ings Institution, where he holds the Sydney Stein, Jr.
Chair and specializes in U.S. national security policy.
He is the Director of Research of the Brookings Institu-
tion's 21st Century Defense Initiative, and he directs the
Brookings Institution's Opportunity08 initiative to pro-
vide independent input into the debate over America's
future. Since 2003 he has been the senior author of the
Iraq Index with Jason Campbell. His recent books in-
clude Hard Power: The New Politics of National Security
(with Kurt Campbell, 2006), and A War Like No Other:
The Truth About China's Challenge to America (with
Richard Bush, 2007). O'Hanlon was a Peace Corps vol-
unteer in the former Zaire for two years. He received
his Ph.D. from Princeton University's Woodrow Wil-
son School of Public and International Affairs before
working for the U.S. Congress from 1989 to 1994, after
which time he joined the Brookings Institution.
THE SABAN CENTEK AT THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION XII!


67
tually have to leave (a phenomenon known as the “se-
curity dilemma").
leader of the most prominent Shi'i Islamist Party, the
Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council (SITC, previously the
Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq).
Yet they seem less confident in the prospect of main-
taining a multi-ethnic, diverse Iraq. Few Shi’i Arabs,
other than former Interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi
whose support has dwindled, offer an alternative that
is other than a Shi'i Arab-dominated Iraq.
Ardent defenders of Iraqi unity, like those of Bosnian
unity before them, argue passionately against the no-
tion that “ethnic differences are an insurmountable
barrier to national concord.” It is true that (as in Bos-
nia) there is nothing inherently incompatible about
Iraq's peoples, tribes and sects, particularly, the Sunni
Arab and Shi’i Arab communities. Unlike in the Bal-
kans, achieving ethno-sectarian “purity” is not itself a
driving ideological imperative for political parties and
armed groups in Iraq. However, it is also true that the
Sunnis and the Shi'ah have clear identities and long-
standing group grievances that are part and parcel of
a self-sustaining civil war which U.S. forces are being
asked to referee.
As for the wider ramifications, a carelessly conceived
and implemented partition could potentially cause
regional destabilization and conflict. Indeed, this is a
crucial difference between Iraq and Bosnia. In the lat-
ter's case, its neighbors, Serbia and Croatia, were uni-
fied in their ambition to divide Bosnia and achieved a
common approach. By contrast in Iraq it is precisely
the ongoing civil war that presents the worst risk for
regional stability. Rather than mitigating this internal
conflict, the current insistence on maintaining the fa-
çade of a centralized government in Iraq is fuelling the
conflict and perpetuating the security dilemma that
each community feels. Given the depth of mistrust be-
tween ethno-sectarian groups and the nearly complete
polarization of the security forces, exhortations to the
government to “reform” and “reconcile" are likely to
faileven if they are worth a final try,
Most Iraqis today still do not favor soft partition. Yet
the country's political attitudes on this point are more
complex than usually understood. Of course, the Kurds
are nearly unanimous in their demands for maximal
sovereignty. The deeply splintered Sunni Arabs tend to
oppose soft partition, out of fear that it will be a prelude
to hard partition, a consequent loss of oil revenues and
excessive Iranian influence in Iraq. However, the pre-
ferred outcome of many Sunni Arabs is the restoration
of their previous dominance in Iraq, an entirely unre-
alistic goal. They will have to find a new model and as
good as any other approach is soft partition involving
reliable guarantees for equal sharing of oil revenues. As
for the Shi'i Arabs, many oppose the plan for regional
autonomy promoted by 'Abd al-Aziz al-Hakim, the
This paper explores how a soft partition plan would
be implemented in Iraq. Among other elements it
details how voluntary population movements could
be executed. This process would require large num-
bers of U.S. forces, comparable to past levels, for the
first twelve to eighteen months, Substantial, albeit
? Drawn from the realist school of international relations, the underlying theory of the security dilemma is that in a state of anarchy, one state's defensive
acrion makes everyone less secure, Barry Posen of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology applied the concept of security dilemma to ethnic conflict,
arguing that as multi-ethnic entities (such as Tito's Yugoslavia or presumably Saddam's Iraq) collapse, a situation of anarchy emerges among competing
ethnic groups. The search for security then motivates these groups to seek either to control the state or resist it (given that the new state is "biased
against them.") Today's Iraq evinces examples of both phenomena as Sunni Arabs resist Shi'i Arab domination of the state. In addition, as the displaced
seck security through homogeneity, they are unintentionally accelerating inter-communal anxiety and the security dilernma. See Barry Posen, "The
Security Dilemma and Ethnic Conflict," Survival Vol. 35, No. 1, Spring, 1993, pp. 27-47. See also Carter Johnson, University of Maryland, "Sovereignty
or Demography? Reconsidering the Evidence on Partition in Ethnic Civi) Wars," DC Area Workshop on Contentious Politics, University of Maryland,
Spring 2005, available at Shtip://www.bsos.umd.edu/gvpt/davenport/dcawcp/paper/DCAWCP_Clohnson_Partition.pdf>.
'Eric Davis, Rutgers University, “Ethnic-Religious Divisions and Prospects for a Democracy in Iraq" at "The Middle East in 2005", International
Conference at the University of California, Los Angeles, May 19-21, 2005, available at <http://www.international.ucla.edu/article.asp?parentid=24920>.
THE CASE FOR SOFT PARTITION IN IRAQ


68
reduced, numbers would be needed for several years
afterwards. However, the number of expected U.S.
fatalities should decline dramatically fairly soon after
the beginning of the soft partition process. Some will
find the ethics of assisting Iraqis in the segregation of
their own country problematic. To be sure, the idea is
distasteful. Nonetheless, the mass movement of popu-
lations is far preferable to insisting that people at risk
stay put or return to their homes to prop up an il-
lusion of political co-existence. As for the propriety
of population movements, no less an organization
devoted to human dignity than Human Rights Watch
stated that the willingness of Arab settlers in Kirkuk to
give up their homes to Kurds in return for assistance
in finding new homes and livelihoods elsewhere "of-
fered great hope of peacefully resolving the crisis in
northern Iraq."
sample of all of Iraq's major ethno-sectarian groups,
with the exception of the Kurds of whom only modest
numbers have been forced to move.' Despite repeated
appeals from Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki for all
those displaced to return to their homes, particularly
in Baghdad, there are scant indications of willingness
to do so. To the contrary, rather than any imminent
reversal of the ethno-sectarian flight, a recent report of
the International Organization for Migration (IOM)
concluded that “these large movements will have long-
lasting social, political and economic impacts in Iraq."8
As of June 2007, there was only a slight reported slow-
ing of the displacement process despite the effort to
improve security in Iraq through the new U.S. troop
surge strategy.
IRAQ's SECTARIAN Civil WAR AND THE
SECURITY DULEMMA
Iraq's descent into civil war has had a corrosive effect
on the country's demography. According to January
2007 data from the United Nations High Commis-
sioner for Refugees (UNHCR), there are 2 million ref-
ugees (Iraqis fleeing across the international borders),
and 1.7 million internally displaced persons (IDPs).
Another 50,000 to 100,000 are being driven from their
homes each month.' UNHCR anticipates a possible
increase of one million displaced persons in Iraq over
the course of 2007.* The displaced are a representative
The IOM monitors the movements of the displaced
in fifteen of Iraq's eighteen governorates (provinces)
and confirms that in general, IDPs are moving to ho-
mogenous communities, sometimes within the same
city (such as Baghdad), sometimes to different re-
gions. According to the IOM: “Shias tended to move
from the center to the south. Sunnis tended to move
from the south to the upper center, especially al-An-
bar. Both ethnicities moved from mixed communities
to homogenous ones in the same city, especially vola-
tile Baghdad and Baquba. Christians primarily fled to
Ninewa and Kurds were usually displaced to Diyala
or Tameem/Kirkuk."'° Echoing this view, Refugees
International explained the consequences of ethno-
sectarian flight in this manner: “as Iraqis race to es-
seg
* Human Rights Watch, "Claims in Conflict: Reversing Ethnic Cleansing in Northern Iraq". Summary, August 2004, available at <http://hrw.org/
reports/2004/iraq0804/2.htm>,
S UNHCR data cited in Sudarsan Raghavan, “War in Iraq Propelling a Massive Migration,” The Washington Post, February 4, 2007, p.A-1, available at
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/03/AR2007020301604.html>. The IOM, infra, cites a figure of 1.5 million
internally displaced, with 200,000 displaced between 2003 and 2005.
* Refugees International, Iraq: The World's Fastest growing Displacement Crisis, March 2007, p. 10, available at <bttp://www.reſugeesinternational.org/
content/issue/detail/9915%,
. By one recent count, the displaced in Iraq are 90 percent Arab, 7 percent Assyrian Christian, 2 percent Kurdish, i percent Turkomen, and less than 3
percent Chaldean Christian. Broken down differently, 64 percent were Shi'i Muslim, 28 percent Sunni Muslim, and 7 percent Christian. See IOM, Iraq
Displacement: 2006 Year in Review, Geneva, Switzerland, January 2007, p. 5, available at <http://www.iom-iraq.net/library/
2006%20lraq%20Displacement%20Review.pdf>.
* IOM, op.cit., p. 2.
Ibid.
10 lbid.
THE SARAN CENTER AT THE BRO)(IKINGS INSTITUTION
3


69
cape sectarian violence and de facto ethnic cleansing
in southern and central areas(,) Iraq is becoming
Balkanized as formerly mixed neighborhoods disin-
tegrate into Sunni and Shia redoubts, all afraid of one
another,"??
safe as it is possible to be in Baghdad.”+ She added
that despite the promise to protect their house, their
erstwhile Shi’i Arab neighbors did nothing as a Shi'i
Arab family quickly moved in to take the place of the
displaced Sunni Ubaid family.
The Iraqi government does not approve of such
movements, and recently demanded that recent set-
tlers leave occupied housing promptly unless they
can prove a legal right to the premises, such as a
lease. This demand sparked a furor among Sunni and
Shi'i Arab IDPs who insist that it is too dangerous
to return home. “The government can say whatever
it wants, but if it tells me to leave, I will not," a Shi'i
Arab man who had fled his home in a Sunni Arab
neighborhood in Baghdad told National Public Ra-
dio, “Where can I go?"\
The data from refugee experts confirm that the im-
petus for ethno-sectarian flight comes from the eth-
no-sectarian nature of the killing, rather than armed
conflict per se.'? Put otherwise, those with the best on-
the-ground intelligence and the most at stake, Iraqi
civilians, are not simply fleeing the violence. Rather
they are seeking security and they define security in
large part through ethno-sectarian demographics. If
they lack the means to escape Iraq or to move to rela-
tively quiet areas such as Kurdistan, Basra or Karbala,
then instead they move to nearby locations where
they are part of the ethno-sectarian majority, and
where militias of their own group tend to be in con-
trol. To illustrate, a Shi’i Arab family profiled by The
Washington Post fled the predominantly Sunni Arab
neighborhood of Ghazaliya in western Baghdad af-
ter receiving threatening leaflets. They chose to move
to the mostly Shi’i Arab Kadhimiyah neighborhood.
Although still in Baghdad, vulnerable to violence and
facing material hardships, the family now feels a sense
of security as explained by one of the daughters: “we
were living in constant anxiety (in the old neighbor-
hood. ) Here we at least feel comfortable. We are liv-
ing as one (with our new Shi’i Arab neighbors.)"}3 A
Sunni Arab family interviewed by Time had a simi-
lar experience. Fleeing from Baghdad's mostly Shi'i
Arab Shualla neighborhood to Sunni Arab Adhamiya,
Ayesha Ubaid stated that, after the move, “she feels as
U.S. forces have been pulled into the dispute over squat-
ters' rights. In Ghazaliyah in western Baghdad, Sunni
Arabs appealed to the U.S. Army to have the Iraqi gov-
ernment suspend its demand to expel those without
legal proof of occupancy. U.S. forces have begun to as-
sist IDPs in legalizing their new status and swapping
homes. In Bosnia, the international community set up
post-war property commissions to regularize the sta-
tus of the massive number of homes and apartments
that changed hands during the war. In the vast major-
ity of cases minorities who recovered the legal right to
their property in Bosnia quickly sold it. No such sys-
tem exists in Baghdad and residents have to attempt to
strike deals on their own, or to appeal to U.S. forces for
a reprieve. If these approaches fail, they turn to militias
and other enforcers to find ways of “convincing" own-
" Refugees International, op.cit., p. 1.
“? Ibid, p.7. The fcast likely reason provided by displaced persons for their flight was “armed conflict."
" Joshua Partlow, "For Baghdad's Uprooted Girls, Schools Offers a Hard Haven," The Washington Post, February 17, 2007, p. A-18, available at
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/16/AR2007021602195.html>.
14 Bobby Ghosh, “Bchind the Sunni-Shi'ite Divide", Time Magazine, February 22, 2007, p. 40.
15 The man acknowledged that his home was provided to him by representatives of Muqtada as-Sadr, whose Mahdi Army in all likelihood knew of its
availability as they had expelled the Sunni Arab owners. Ann Garrels, "Baghdad Squatters Face Deadline to Leave," National Public Radio, Morning
Edition, February 20, 2007, available at <http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyid=7492225>.
THE CASE FOR SOFT PARTITION IN IRAQ


70
ers to give them the permission that they need to stay
in their new-found homes, '6
surrounded by hostile majorities, such as the Sunni
Arab communities in Doura or Adhamiya.
As Baghdad has succumbed to the Balkanization of its
neighborhoods, the United States has acknowledged
the value of ethno-sectarian separation. Segregating
communities, according to the U.S. commander in
Doura, a south Baghdad neighborhood, is a regret-
table but “necessary interim step to allow the situation
to calm down." In the most visible endorsement of
separation, U.S. troops have controversially begun to
create so-called gated communities in at least ten of
Baghdad's most violent neighborhoods. In Adhamiya,
American commanders began erecting a three-mile
wall “to break contact between Sunnis and Shites."!
The proposal has been hotly contested and there has
been a backlash, particularly from Sunni Arabs in Ad-
hamiya. The Iraqi reaction to the Adhamiya plan il-
lustrates the difficulty of dividing up mixed popula-
tions while leaving them essentially in place. Physical
separation boosts security, but keeping the communi-
ties cheek-by-jowl makes residents angry and resent-
ful. One Sunni Arab resident chaſed that the barriers
imprisoned him and his fellow Sunni Arabs." At some
point soon, U.S. and Iraqi officials may have to reas-
sess the viability of maintaining vulnerable minority
populations in their current locations where they are
To summarize, the manner in which Sunni and Shi’i
Arabs seek security is part and parcel of the increasing,
accelerating emergence of largely homogenous ethno-
sectarian regions in Iraq. The internal displacement in
Iraq has become an accelerant of the conflict, creating a
self-sustaining momentum. The flight of refugees across
international borders has also robbed the country of a
core, moderate middle class needed for reconciliation,
Not only are extremists on both sides making the civil
conflict “self-sustaining," in the words of the National
Intelligence Estimate (NIE), the movement of victims
is further widening the sectarian divide,2It will be very
difficult to reverse this, if indeed it is even possible.
Both the Iraq Study Group and the Bush Administra-
tion expressly oppose devolving power to semi-au-
tonomous regions. Instead, both advocate maximal
support for, as the Iraq Study Group puts it, “central
control by governmental authorities in Baghdad.”21 To
stem sectarian violence they logically advocate goading
Iraq's dominant Shi'i Arabs and Kurds to meet a num-
ber of “milestones” that will foster “reconciliation."22
Resistance to this approach so far has not been surpris-
ing, however, given the strong sectarian sympathies
* The National Public Radio report quoted a Shi'i Arab man who fled his house, yet refused to give the Sunni Arab occupants legal rights. He is now
worried that relatives of his who are still living in his old neighborhood will be threatened unless he complies. Ann Garrels, op.cit. A property
commission exists for Kirkuk, but as discussed infra has had incomplete results because many of the Kurds expelled from the city by Saddam have no
documents to establish their ownership rights.
" Colonel Jeff Petersen, commander in the South Dora neighborhood of Baghdad, quoted in Ann Garrels, op.cit.
"* Edward Wong and David S. Cloud, "U.S. Erects Baghdad Wall to Keep Sects Apart," The New York Times, April 21, 2007, available at <http://www.
nytimes.com/2007/04/21/world/middleeast/2liraq.html?ex=1334808000&en=b08d5548fcllec02&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss>.
Is Wong and Cloud, op.cit. For other Iraqi reactions to the wall, see Alissa J. Rubin, "Outcry Over Wall Shows Depth of Iraqi Resentment," The New York
Times, April 23, 2007, available at <http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/23/world/middleeast/23cnd-Iraq.html?ex=1334980800&en=391a7d54196691dc&
ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss>.
* The NIE states that “Extremists--- most notably the Sunni žihadist group al-Qa'ida in Iraq (AQI) and Shia oppositionist Jaysh al-Mahdi (IAM) (Muqtada
as-Sadr's Mahdi Asmyl-continue to aci as very effective accelerators for what has become a self-sustaining inter-sectarian struggle between Shia and
Sunnis" (emphasis added). The NIE adds that "Significant population displacement, both within Iraq and the movement of Iragis into neighboring
countries, indicates the hardening of ethno-sectarian divisions, diminishes Iraq's professional and entrepreneurial classes, and strains the capacities of the
countries to which they have relocated. The UN estimates over a million Iraqis are now in Syria and Jordan." National Intelligence Council,"Prospects for
Iraq's Stability: A Challenging Road Ahead," National Intelligence Estimate, January 2007, Washington, D.C., p. 7, available at <http://dni.gov/press_
seleases/20070202_release.pdf>,
21 The Irag Study Group, op.cit., p. 39.
22 The main difference between the Iraq Study Group and the Bush Administration is on how to achieve the milestones. The Iraq Study Group advocates a
comprehensive regional and international diplomatic approach in conjunction with strict conditionality toward the ruling Iraqis. If the government does
not meet the milestones, continued U.S. military and economic support will be cut. The Iraq Study Group also advocates a transition in the U.S. military
role from security to training and support, along with a progressive drawdown of forces, The Bush Administration is committed to using U.S. troops in a
primary security role while attempting to goad the Iraqis into meeting largely similar milestones. Both approaches envision a unitary Iraq without regions.
THE SARAN CENTER AT THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION
5


71
and motivations of most in al-Maliki's government.23
The abject bias of Prime Minister al-Maliki, a Shi'i
Arab from the Da'wa party, and his government is well
documented. This bias was detailed in a leaked memo
written by National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley
which described “an aggressive push (in government]
to consolidate Shia power and influence.” Hadley's
memo suggested that al-Maliki himself is either ig-
norant or duplicitous or weak. 2* However, al-Maliki
is only the tip of the iceberg. The Iraqi government is
split almost wholly along ethno-sectarian lines. Based
on the parliamentary seat allocation from the Decem-
ber 2005 election, less than 10 percent of Iraqi par-
ties in the Council of Representatives (the unicameral
parliament) are simply “Iraqi"—in the sense that they
represent more than one ethno-sectarian group. The
Iraqi National List of Iyad Allawi, the main non-sec-
tarian party that ran in the most recent parliamentary
elections, holds 13 percent of ministry or leadership
positions. 25 All the other ministries have been allocated
along ethno-sectarian lines.
Arab whose portfolio includes oversight of security af-
fairs, is deliberately kept in the dark. They say that they
"cannot share details about security operations with
Sunni leaders (like az-Zubayi) because of fears that the
Sunnis will disclose the plans to insurgent groups."26
For their part, Sunni Arab leaders suspect that the
government makes only half-hearted efforts to rein in
Shi’i Arab militias, while deploying forces vigorously
against the Sunni Arab insurgency. U.S. Army Gen.
David Petraeus and other American officials are cur-
rently quite focused on this problem, but it is not yet
clear how much improvement will be possible.
In other words, the rational Shi'i Arab concern that
sensitive information would be leaked to insurgents
has reinforced the equally rational Sunni Arab convic-
tion that central government is biased against them.
Hadley captured the problem of the systematic anti-
Sunni Arab exploitation of the tools of government
with this blunt assessment in his memo:
The most sensitive function of government, provid-
ing security, is also contaminated by ethno-sectarian
mistrust at the highest levels. Shi'i Arabs openly admit
that Deputy Prime Minister Salam az-Zubayi, a Sunni
Despite Maliki's reassuring words, repeated
reports from our commanders on the ground
contributed to our concerns about Maliki's
government. Reports of nondelivery of ser-
vices to Sunni areas, intervention by the
13 Two sage Iraqi observers, the former Iraqi Representative to the United States, Rend al-Rahim and Lailh Kubba, of the National Endowment for
Democracy and a former Spokesman for Transitional Prime Minister Ibrahim Ja'fari, each cite fundamental flaws in the strategy to obtain progress on
"benchmarks" or "milestones" through pressure. Writing in The Washington Post, al-Rahim argued that "[t]he paramount problem in Iraq is the
disagreement among Iraqis themselves and their reluctance to compromise, and what is needed first and foreinost is an agreement among Iraqi social
and political groups. Only then will regional and international agreements be relevant. Similarly, the attention the United States pays to the legal
aspects of national reconciliation puts the cart before the horse: Laws and constitutional revision must be outcomes of a national agreement, not
conditions for one.” Rend al-Rahim, "A Dayton Process for Iraq," The Washington Post, May 10, 2007, p. A-23, available at <http://www.
washingtonpost.com/wp-dyntcontent/article/2007/05/09/A R2007050902447.html>. Kubba, speaking publicly at the United States Institute of Peace
on February 6, 2007, maintained that neither the threat of withdrawal, nor cutting back on assistance, would achieve the political accommodation
sought by the U.S. for the simple reason that each of three main groups (Shi'i Arabs, Sunni Arabs and Kurds) believes in the main that it can light on
without U.S. help.
** Hadley's memo statcs (with added cmphasis): "While there does sccm to be an aggressive push to consolidate Shia power and influence, it is less clear
whether Maliki is a witting participant. The information he receives is undoubredly skewed by his small circle of Da'wa advisers, coloring his actions
and interpretation of reality. His intentions seem good when he talks with Americans, and sensitive reporting suggests he is trying to stand up to the
Shia hierarchy and force positive change. But the reality on the streets of Baghdad suggests Maliki is either ignorant of what is going on, misrepresenting
his intentions, or that his capabilities are not yet sufficient so turn his good intentions into uction." Michael R. Gordon, "Bush Adviser's Memo Cites
Doubts About Iraqi Leader," The New York Times, November 29, 2006, p. A-l.
15 Phebe Marr, "Iraq's New Political Map," USIP Special Report, January 2007, p. 23, available at <http://www.usip.org/pubs/specialreports/sr179.html>.
Allawi's nationalist slate did only marginally better in the January 2005 elections, getting 13.82 percent of the vote.
* Ernesto Londono, “For Eminent Sunni, Lessons in Weakness: Maliki Deputy Describes Marginalization." The Washington Post, February 10, 2007, p.A.
1, available at <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/091AR2007020902344.html>.
? Partition theorists maintain that this perceived "biased nature of the state”, drives groups in divided societies to seek to mobilize either to control the
state or wage a violent secession (or insurgency.) See Johnson, op.cit., pp. 6-7.
THE CASE FOR SOFT PARTITION IN IRAQ


72
primo minister's office to stop military action
against Shi’i targets and to encourage them
against Sunni ones, removal of Iraq's most ef-
fective commanders on a sectarian basis and
efforts to ensure Shi'i majorities in all minis-
tries when combined with the escalation of
Jaish al-Mahdi's (Muqtada as-Sadr's Mahdi
Army] killings-all suggest a campaign to
consolidate Shia power in Baghdad. 28
lice, local leaders and local militias alike. And
while most Shiites and Kurds think members
of Iraq's National Assembly are willing to
make needed compromises for peace, 90 per-
cent of Sunni Arabs don't buy it {Emphasis
added).
The disparity in services afforded Sunni Arabs in Bagh-
dad cited by Hadley plays into the hands of Sunni Arab
insurgents. According to Maj. Guy Parmeter, the op-
erations officer for the U.S. battalion that operates in
the Sunni Arab areas of west Baghdad: “When the gov-
ernment is denying services to Sunnis, they are push-
ing them toward the Sunni extremists who attack the
Shiite-dominated security forces ... (making) it harder
to deliver services in those areas."29
If Sunni Arabs needed more evidence of the intrinsic
government bias against them, it came on December
30, 2006 with Saddam Hussein's execution. Bending
to the palpable eagerness of Shi'i Arabs to hasten Sad-
dam's demise, the U.S. handed the former dictator over
to al-Maliki's government which promptly carried out
the execution on the day that Sunnis began the Id al-
Adha holiday. The rushed selection of the date, which
was one day before the Sh’iah begin Id al-Adha, rein-
forced Sunni Arab conviction that Shi'i Arab political
dominance means constant humiliation. As media
analyst Kadhim al-Mukhdadi said, “It was their way
of telling us (Sunnis), 'We're in charge now, and you
are so weak that even your holy days have no meaning
anymore.""}Not surprisingly, according to the Brook-
ings Iraq Index, 85 percent of Sunni Arabs express dis-
like for al-Maliki."
The anti-Sunni Arab bias in the security forces has
not been lost on the Sunni Arab public, 56 percent of
which, according to a recent ABC News-led poll, re-
ported experiencing violence from the Iraqi Police or
Iraqi Army forces. By contrast, only 7 to 8 percent of
Shi’i Arabs reported similar experiences. Virtually no
Kurds were on the receiving end of security force vio-
lence. According to ABC News.
As in many of these measures, there's a night-
and-day difference between Sunni Arabs and
other Iragis in their trust in institutions—the
national government, the Iraqi Army and po-
Is PARTITION THE SOLUTION?
Many commentators oppose the soft partition of Iraq
because there is no longstanding enmity between Sun-
ni and Shi’i Arabs.” Democracy advocates cite polls
taken in Iraq showing that despite the violence and
separation, Sunni and Shi'i Arab populations continue
to have a strong “Iraqi national identity" and oppose
** Hadley memo quoted in National Public Radio, "Hadley's Memo on Maliki Reveals U.S. Analysis." All Things Considered, November 29, 2006, available
at <http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyld=6556440>. See also Michael R. Gordon, op.cit., p. A-l.
*Alissa J. Rubin, “Sunni Baghdad Becomes Land of Silent Ruins: Strife and Neglect Cut Access to Life's Basics," The New York Times, March 26, 2007,
P.AI,
* Poll conducted on March 5, 2007. See ABC News-USA Today-BBC-ARD, “Iraq: Where Things Stand," March 19, 2007, p. 10, available at
<http://abcnews.go.com/images/US/1033alraqpoll.pdf>.
Kadhim Al-Mukhdadi quoted in Ghosh, op.cit., p. 39. In addition, the harassment of a seemingly dignified Saddam on the gallows (principally by
supporters of Muqtada as-Sadr) was photographed and sent around the world, further outraging Sunnis. Sce Anthony Shadid, "Across the Arab World,
a Widening Rift; Sunni-Shiite Tension Called Region's 'Most Dangerous Problem." The Washington Post, February 12, 2007, p. A-l.
** Jason Campbell and Michael E. O'Hanlon, The Iraq Index, Brookings Institution, June 4, 2007, p. 50, available at <http://www.brookings.edu/iraqindex>,
» Phebe Marr quoted in Peter Beinart, "We Broke It", The New Republic, December 18, 2006, available at <http://www.inr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20061218&
sætrb121806>. See also Rend al-Rahim, op.cit.
THE SABAN CENTER AT THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION
7


73
partition.** Despite this, there is strong evidence that
violence is steadily eroding national unity)s In addi-
tion, there are demonstrable roots to Sunni-Shi'i ten-
sion, such as the longstanding Sunni Arab dominance
of the oppressive Ba'th Party, common scorn among
Sunnis for Shi'ah whom they view as “Persian” and
lower in class standing, and Saddam's pogroms
against the Shi'i Arabs in the early 1990s, 36 According
to Vali Nasr of the Naval Postgraduate School: “When
(Saddam} killed a Sunni, it was personal—because
of something that person had done; when it came to
killing Shi'ites, he was indiscriminate. He didn't need
a specific reason. Their being Shi'ite was enough."33
Although Shi’i Arabs profess support for an Iraqi na-
tional identity, they also have a shared memory of op-
pression and a widespread feeling of an entitlement
to rule. This has left Iraq in the grips of an insidious
form of “identity politics.")*
cent) believes that Iraq will be divided in one of these
two manners at some point in the future—the person-
al preference of the respondents notwithstanding. The
number of Iraqis now saying that the country should
remain unified has dropped from 79 percent in Febru-
ary 2004 to 58 percent in March 2007. Almost the exact
same number (57 percent) also says that regardless of
their personal preferences Iraq will be divided either
into regions or separate states.99
In any event, whatever Iraqis say in surveys about re-
jecting division of the country, what they do at elec-
tions suggests they are embracing it and hastening its
arrival. Secular and religious Shi'ah alike heeded Aya-
tollah Ali al-Sistani's fatwa and streamed to the polls in
December 2005 propelling heavily sectarian, religious-
oriented parties into power. The parade of Shi'i Arabs
wagging their purple fingers at the polls elicited deep-
set Sunni Arab anxieties. For the Sunni Arabs, "the of-
ficially sanctioned emergence of the Shiites as the rul-
ing element in Iraq was a massive psychological blow
(confirming their worst fears about the Shi'ah.) **)
When Sunni Arabs decided to participate in the sec-
ond parliamentary election of the year they emulated
their Shi'i Arab counterparts and voted overwhelm-
ingly for sectarian parties. At the December 2005 poll,
The most recent ABC News survey provides important
evidence for the growing acceptance of regionalism.
Although all polling in Iraq must be read with caution,
the figures are striking. The poll shows that a solid ma-
jority of Shi'ah (59 percent) believe that Iraq should
either be reconstituted into regions or divided outright
into separate states. An even larger majority (73 per-
"International Republican Institute Executive President Judy Van Rest said, referring to her organization's June 2006 poll, “Through everything that's
gone on, there's a strong feeling that the country should stay together," quoted in David R. Sands, “Iragis Dismiss Split, Approve of al-Maliki," The
Washington Times, July 19, 2006. The poll reported 78 percent of respondents disagreeing with the suggestion that Iraqis should be segregated
according to religion or sect. Survey of Iraqi Public Opinion, International Republican Institutc, July 19, 2006. Poll material cited in The Three-State
Solution: Examining the Option of Partitioning Iraq, Angela Stephens, January, 2007, unpublished paper, Johns Hopkins School of Advanced
International Studies.
35 "The complex webs of tribal affiliations and social stalus that rule everyday life in tray do not always line up as simply Shi'ite against Sunni. But
increasingly, despite the urging of some Shi'te religious leaders and Sunni politicians, the attacks have been." Sabrina Tavernise, “Sectarian Hatred
Pulls Apart Iraq's Mixed Towns," The New York Times, November 20, 2005 cited in Chaim Kaufmann, "Living Together After Ethnic Killing: in Theory,
in History, and in Iraq Today" paper presenled at “Iraq: The Approaching Endgame," conference organized by the Mortara Center for International
Studies, Department of Government, Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, Center for Peace and Security Studies, Georgetown University, February 16,
2007, p. 39, available at <htip://mortara.georgetown.edu/includes/20050901/TextFiles/Kaufmannl.pdf>.
** Yitzhak Nakash, The Shi'is of Iraq (Princeton, NJ; Princeton University Press, 1994), p. 76; and Vali Nasr, “When the Shiites Rise," Foreign Policy, July/
August 2006.
• Vali Nasr quoted in Ghosh, op.cit., p. 35.
** Iraqi-American academic Kanan Makiya, an erstwhile fervent supporter of the U.S. invasion, in an interview broadcast by National Public Radio on
April 18, 2007. Makiya, a Shi'i Arab, lamented that beginning in the immediate wake of the invasion even enlightened, exiled Iraqis "began thinking of
themselves of Shites first and Iraqis second." Makiya believes that the country's majority Shi'i Arabs “are trapped in their victim-hood. The abused has
hecome the abuser." See Kanan Makiya, "Changing Assumptions on Iraq," National Public Radio, Moming Edition, April 18, 2007, available at
<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyld=9635035>.
* Respondents were offered a choice of "One unified Iraq with central government in Baghdad", or "A group of regional states with their own regional
governments and a federal government in Baghdad", or "Dividing the country into separate independent states." ABC News et al, op.cit., pp.23.4.
** Ahmed S. Hashim, “Iraq's Civil War”, Current History, January 2007, p.7.
THE CASE FOR SOFT PARTITION IN IRAQ


75
linked the pursuit of such a regional autonomy con-
cept with the Shi’i narrative of oppression at the hands
of Baghdad which had imposed an “artificial unity' on
the country."
constitution might need to be modified to allow Bagh-
dad, in whole or part, to join autonomous regions.
Al-Hakim is not necessarily representative of most
Shi’i political thinking on soft partition, and his own
views have been in flux. The fact remains that realities
on the ground are supporting the argument for divid-
ing Iraq up whatever the theoretical and constitutional
arguments might be.
Moreover, it is hard to know if the opposition of other
Shi'i leaders to federalism has arisen primarily out of
ideology or out of simple rivalry with al-Hakim. Es-
tablishing a “region” would consolidate SIIC's power
in the central-southern governorates such as Babil,
Najaf and Karbala, as well as provide it with control
over fractious Basra governorate's oil. This would
threaten Muqtada as-Sadr, whose strongholds are in
the poor neighborhoods of Baghdad (the constitu-
tion excludes Baghdad from any autonomous region)
and the southern provinces of Maysan and Dhi Qar. 46
Yet few of SIIC's principal opponents on the matter of
federalism, most notably Prime Minister al-Maliki and
as-Sadr, have demonstrated serious commitment to an
alternative that cedes Sunni Arabs a meaningful place
in government. To the contrary, aside from former
Prime Minister Allawi and a few others, Shi'i politi-
cians largely seem to share the objective of preserving
a Shi’i-dominated ruling structure. A soft partition
arrangement that did not consolidate SIIC's power
might find favor among Shi'ah opposed to the concept
at present.“ To make soft partition more attractive the
Iraq's Sunni Arabs bitterly and categorically reject soft
partition. However, it is not clear what they want, since
they have withheld strong support for the new Iraqi
political system. The Sunni Arab insurgency reflects
a widely shared Sunni Arab hostility to a constitution
stacked in favor of the Shi’ah and Kurds and to any or-
der that will not restore Sunni Arab primacy. U.S. Am-
bassador Zalmay Khalilzad learned this lesson first-
hand. Remembered for his signature efforts to bring
disenfranchised Sunni Arabs into the political process
during the fall of 2005, Khalilzad was “never able to
find people who could reduce the violence."** So while
it is hard to argue that enhanced regionalism would
find any initial Sunni Arab support, there is no viable
alternative for this large group of embittered Iraqis. A
credible commitment by other Iraqis and the interna-
tional community to share oil revenues equally across
all communities, to maintain the capital in Baghdad,
rule out hard partition or secession by any group, and
to retain a significantly smaller U.S. troop presence to
assist such a process might soften Sunni Arab opposi-
tion to soft partition. Admittedly, winning Sunni Arab
acquiescence for such a plan—without which it could
not be safely implemented will be difficult. Howev-
er, if no other solution becomes apparent in the com-
ing months, many Sunni Arabs may conclude there is
no alternative.
Several key countries in the region oppose soft parti-
i on. As the Iraq Study Group noted, there are conspir-
acy theories in the wider Sunni Arab world (that the
* Abd al-Aziz al-Hakim speech at the United States Institute of Peace, December 4, 2006, available at <http://www.usip.org/events/2006/ Alhakim_
speech.pdf>.
** Marr, op.cit., p. 9.
"As Iraq Constitutional expert Jonathan Morrow states: "Yet there has been no concrete formulation of an Iraqi nationalist or centralist constitutional
position within the Shia camp, perhaps because Shia leaders know how hard such a position will be to sustain, A 'Sadrist' constitutional position has
not been articulated, and no meaningful alliances have been forged to date, as some international commentators predicted, between the nationalist
agendas of the Shiite Sadrist and the Sunni Arab parties." Morrow, op.cil., p.8.
** Edward Wong, "Departing U.S. Envoy Says He Met With Iraq Rebels," The New York Times, March 26, 2007, p. A10, available at <http://www.nytimes.
com/2007/03/26/world/middleeast/26zal.html?ex=1332561600&en=69714bf2c7bb95be&ei=5090&partner=rssuscrland&emc=rss>,
10
THE CASE FOR SOFT PARTITION IN 1840)


76
settlers in Kirkuk to give up their homes to Kurds and
move out meant that the crisis over the city could be
settled in a peaceful manner. S2
Iraq Study Group fears would spread under a partition
of Iraq) that the United States invaded Iraq “to weaken
a strong Arab state.""However, the main reason Iraq is
weak is because of its own internal chaos. To a consid-
erable extent, measures to mitigate the violence should
make Iraq stronger, not weaker, in comparison to its
current state. The most pressing problem for Iraq's
neighbors, apart from the specter of a worsening Iraqi
civil war, is the enormous and potentially destabilizing
refugee flow stemming from the escalating violence
within the country.50
The Balkan wars of the 1990s revealed that warring
parties, even amidst brutal ethnic cleansing campaigns,
can sometimes agree on population movements. The
mass exodus of Serbs from Croatia in 1995, though
triggered by a Croat military assault, was actually
part of a tacit deal between Zagreb and Belgrade. The
population movement and expulsions created condi-
tions for the final recognition of Croatia's borders, but
happened well before there was any overt Croat-Serb
agreement. Although certainly not free from violence
(the Croat commander of the operation is now on trial
in the Hague for alleged war crimes), the forced move-
ments of Serbs from Croatia in 1995 was nevertheless
far less traumatizing and ultimately more stabilizing
than the ferocious, unagreed ethnic cleansing meted
out by the Serbs in Bosnia during 1992-5.
To some it is immoral to contemplate even the volun-
tary, organized departure of populations. However, in-
sisting that people remain in danger to prop up an il-
lusion of political co-existence presents an even larger
moral problem. If offered reasonable alternatives and
secure passage, there are indications that many Iraqis,
currently living in fear as vulnerable minorities, would
willingly leave their homes. Baghdad is the main place
where this holds true, but it is not the only such lo-
cation. Kirkuk is the site of deeply contentious claims
between Kurds, expelled en masse by Saddam Hussein,
and Arabs who were settled into the Kurds' homes by
Saddam and his predecessors. Human Rights Watch
conducted interviews which revealed that “many of the
Arab settlers (in Kirkuk) ... recognized Kurdish claims
to their properties (and) ... many stated) that they
were willing to give up their homes in Arabized vil-
lages in return for humanitarian assistance in finding
new homes and livelihoods for their families. "S' Hu-
man Rights Watch stated that the willingness of Arab
It may be difficult to talk about trading territory in Iraq
anytime soon. However, it might be possible for lead-
ers to agree to limited population movements, perhaps
starting in parts of Baghdad and Kirkuk.” This would
have to be handled carefully, to be sure. Attempts to
implement such population movements in the absence
of agreements on core political issues could also stoke
conflict-for example by increasing the stakes of hold-
ing onto land where oil is drilled, if there is no prior
agreement on oil revenue sharing. Under such an ap-
proach, Iraqi officials would set up a mechanism that
** The Iraq Study Group. op.cit., p.31.
Sudarsan Raghavan, "War in Iraq Propelling A Massive Migration," op.cit.; Shadid, op.cit.
s! Human Rights Watch, op.cit. According to the International Crisis Group, some 8,000 mainly Shi'i Arab settlers or "wafidin" (newcomers) have
departed Kirkuk voluntarily, even transferring their residency registration to their new govenorates (vital for Kurdish aims to consolidate control of
Kirkuk). Rather than express bitterness at the Kurds for forcing them out, the former Shi'i Arab residents expressed sympathy and criticized the
presumably Sunni Arab and other “wafadin" who remain, International Crisis Group, op.cit., p. 7.
“? Human Rights Watch Report, op.cit.
* As noted above, the U.S. tactic of crocling barriers around "gated communities" reflects increasing bclict in the merits of a form of ethno-sectarian
separation. In Kirkuk the International Crisis Group, op.cit., has warned of a "looming crisis” caused by Kurdish determination to move forward with
the Constitutionally-mandated referendum on the future of the city and has called for a "new mechanism prioritizing consensus" instead of the
provocative referendum. Although not cited as a recommendation, facilitating the voluntary departure of Arabs settled in Kirkuk under the Ba'thist
regime could help to achieve such a consensus.
THE SAHAN CENTER AT THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION


77
later than 31 December 2007. Arab groups in
Kirkuk continue to resist violently what they
see as Kurdish encroachment.54
would allow property swaps to be negotiated and then
recorded legally (which U.S. troops are already being
asked to do in isolated cases). Mixed Iraqi and U.S. se-
curity units could, if requested, provide security. Iraqi
government officials would assist those whose em-
ployment is affected by the relocation to obtain work.
Subsidies and stipends could be provided as well (dis-
cussed further below). At a minimum such an infor-
mal, localized, gradual option should be retained.
Perhaps the most persuasive argument for soft parti-
tion, or regionalism, is to consider the alternatives:
In summarizing the state of Iraq today, we cannot do
better than the authors of the January 2007 NIE. They
write of a "hardening of ethno-sectarian identities, a
sea change in the character of the violence, ethno-sec-
tarian mobilization, and population displacements.”
The NIE also states that:
The U.S. troop surge may soon fail, at least given
current and likely future constraints on Ameri-
can resources;
• A complete withdrawal of U.S. troops from the
country could lead to genocide within Iraq and
perhaps even outside intervention by regional
parties;
A partial withdrawal of U.S. troops (leaving be-
hind trainers) along with redeployment of the
rest to Iraq's borders, might reduce the risks of
regional war resulting from the Iraqi civil war,
but would do little to prevent a radical worsening
of civil strife within Iraq.
Decades of subordination to Sunni political,
social, and economic domination have made
the Shia deeply insecure about their hold on
power. This insecurity leads the Shia to mis-
trust US efforts to reconcile Iraqi sects and
reinforces their unwillingness to engage with
the Sunnis on a variety of issues, including
adjusting the structure of Iraq's federal sys-
tem, reining in Shia militias, and easing de-
Baathification... Many Sunni Arabs remain
unwilling to accept their minority status,
believe the central government is illegitimate
and incompetent, and are convinced that
Shia dominance will increase Iranian influ-
ence over Iraq, in ways that erode the state's
Arab character and increase Sunni repres-
sion... The Kurds are moving systematically
to increase their control of Kirkuk to guar-
antee annexation of all or most of the city
and province into the Kurdistan Regional
Government (KRG) after the constitutionally
mandated referendum scheduled to occur no
Some argue that such an all-out civil war is needed to
produce stable internal borders and to convince Iraqi
players that peace is preferable. Whether or not they
are right, this option would nonetheless be a stark hu-
manitarian tragedy and an utter failure for the over-
all U.S. effort in Iraq. Moreover, there is no guarantee
a peace would emerge from such a civil war anytime
soon. Just as likely there would be a period of genocide
followed by warlordism and ongoing civil strife, with
some Iraqi actors welcoming al-Qa'ida and Iran into
their areas to provide assistance,
Strategies focused as much on Iraqi politics as U.S.
military options have a better chance of avoiding the
necessity for soft partition, yet they also have impor-
tant downsides. A regional peace process could help
if regional states truly want peace. However, Iran in
National Intelligence Council, op.cit., p. 5.
11
THE CASE FOR SOFT PARTITION IN IRAQ


78
All of this implies that soft partition may soon become
the best option available for Iraq. Soft partition is also
consistent with core American strategic interests in
the region. The question is, can soft partition really
work? Reportedly, officials in the U.S. government
who have examined the idea have doubted its practi-
cality. Alas, their assessments were made largely in the
fall of 2006, and since then another extended period
of ethnic cleansing has made a form of enhanced fed-
eralism in the shape of soft partition more feasible.
Nonetheless, many questions remain. To address the
doubts of those who might countenance soft partition
in theory, but doubt its practical viability, we now ex-
amine several concrete questions that would need to
be answered for a soft partition plan to be adopted
and implemented.
particular may be more intent on dealing the United
States and its partners a decisive defeat, which is best
accomplished by sustaining the violence within Iraq.
Another approach is a “Musharraf option" in which
a secular Iraqi leader like former Prime Minister Iyad
Allawi and a small junta of others rules by decree and
martial law for several years. This could dictate the
resolution of some key political issues. However, it is
unclear how such a junta could enforce its decisions
or create security on Iraq's streets given the degree of
chaos and sectarianism in the country (and the chaos
and sectarianism within the security forces). Finally,
outright partition of Iraq into three separate states,
as some advocate, could indeed produce the regional
conflagration that critics like the Iraq Study Group are
so worried about.55
55 Among the ncighbors most neuralgic to outright partition is Turkey. However uneasy selations between Kurdistan and Turkcy are, experts agree that
Ankara clearly sees a difference between an autonomous Kurdish region and sovereign, independent Kurdistan.
THE SAHAN CENTER AT THE BRITIKINGS INSTITUTION


19
IMPLEMENTING SOFT PARTITION
heads without requiring an elaborate new political
arrangement to be negotiated in advance. Depend-
ing upon the future course of events, the new politi-
cal arrangement could then be negotiated on a more
comprehensive and formal level. Most of this section
assumes such an official accord, including a revised le-
gal and constitutional framework for the country, but
does not prejudge the means of reaching these goals.
The advocates of soft partition must answer a series of
significant questions. Where should the boundaries
between the new Iraqi regions be drawn and who
should draw them? How can security and services, such
as new houses and jobs, be provided for those relocated
by soft partition? Will the new regional institutions be
able to carry out responsibilities previously assumed
by Baghdad? How should oil revenues be shared?
How will electricity and other utilities be provided
and shared? How can extremists seeking to thwart the
plan be identified and stopped? Finally, what military
missions would remain for the U.S.-led coalition forces
to perform? Each of these matters requires voluminous
implementation plans. Our goal here is not to write
such an operational manual but to address the broad
questions and key challenges.
DRAWING REGIONAL BOUNDARIES
In an Iraq of autonomous regions, it is natural that one
largely autonomous region would be primarily Shi'i,
one primarily Sunni Arab, and one Kurdish. Creating
regions is more advantageous than working through
the 18 existing provincial governorates because it
simplifies the security challenge and creates a smaller
number of internal borders between different sectari-
an groups that need to be patrolled. It would also allow
for larger entities to be the chief governing structures
in Iraq, which should translate into greater capacity for
creating strong bureaucracies and security forces and
finding talented politicians to lead.
The core element of our plan is the proposal to allow
and facilitate the voluntary relocation of populations,
to help those who feel unsafe where they are now to
move. Mechanisms would have to be developed to
help them relocate to parts of the country where they
would feel safer and where they could start over. It is
important to note that this ambitious idea might be
tested on a "pilot basis” first, if that proves more ap-
pealing to Iraq's political leaders. Housing swaps and
facilitated population movements could be arranged
for some neighborhoods as a trial run. As in the Bal-
kans, this idea could respond pragmatically to the re-
alities of Iraq-and keep more people alive, and help
those relocating to ensure they have a roof over their
In any case, these new regions will not and cannot be
ethnically pure zones. The number of inter-sectarian
marriages alone precludes it. The fact that some people
will want to stay where they are, even while remaining
in the minority, should also be respected. Some Iraqis
presently displaced may wish in the future to return
to their original homes--almost half of those recently
THE SAHAN CENTER AT THE BROKINOS INSTITUTION
15


81
of the country as well. For example, the Turkomen
would have some role in decisions affecting the north.
departure route. Nothing about the relocation process
would necessarily be easy.
Addressing these dangers is vital. Most countries do not
have good doctrine or training for their armed forces on
how to protect civilians in general. The specific task of
convoy escort creates its own additional challenges. 59
Several principles would guide efforts to create the new
regions. First, borders could not affect oil revenue dis-
tribution as all Iraqis would have to share equally in
their country's petroleum wealth. Second, any person
who felt the need to relocate would have to be compen-
sated fairly and assisted in finding a new life elsewhere.
Third, minorities would require protections for their
rights in the new regions. The regional governments,
as well as the federal system, would provide individuals
with legal review procedures, backed up by advice and
help from the international community, to address in-
dividual grievances promptly and fairly.
PROTECTING POPULATIONS DURING RELO-
CATION: GENERAL PRINCIPLES AND LESSONS
FROM BOSNIA
In a polarized environment like Iraq, once people of
a given ethno-sectarian group decide to move, their
neighbors from other groups ought presumably to let
them go. In reality, it may not be so simple or safe. U.S.-
led Coalition forces and Iraqi security units should
plan for population movements that are fraught with
danger. Those relocating might be targeted by hateful
neighbors seeking a final chance to settle scores and
to ensure that those departing never return. The dis-
placed individuals themselves might be tempted to
take revenge on their oppressors, with parting shots
and burning of the homes of their enemies. Further-
more, as some members of a local minority relocate,
those minority members remaining behind might feel
particularly vulnerable and might be targeted for ex-
pulsion by thugs from the local majority. Finally, even
after moving out of their neighborhoods, convoys of
relocating individuals might be attacked along their
Several principles should guide the convoy escort mis-
sion. One is to use substantial combat capability with
any convoy, involving units trained in proper convoy
escort tactics. A second is to develop a broad strat-
egy that goes beyond just the tactical movement of
populations. Security forces should gradually build
up around a given neighborhood in the days before a
major population movement is due to occur, patrol-
ling to discourage and detect any ambush prepara-
tions. On the actual day of the relocation operation,
Iraqi and U.S.-led Coalition forces would deploy in
sufficient numbers to look for snipers, cover the flanks
of the civilian convoys, inspect suspicious vehicles for
explosives, and conduct similar tasks. Convoy routes
would ideally be made at least somewhat unpredict-
able to further complicate any terrorist, militia or in-
surgent ambush plans. After the convoy's departure,
some forces would then have to remain in place in
larger than usual strength for least several days to help
the neighborhood stabilize.
We might not want U.S. forces to participate directly
in what some might see as sanctioning a form of seg-
regation, even though it would be more accurately de-
scribed as protecting people as they started new lives.
However, U.S. troops would have to, if for no other
reason than the difficulty and sheer magnitude of the
task. Already U.S. troops are being pulled into the fray,
sought after to assist persons in Baghdad find new
housing or avoid eviction in the first place.
** Thomas E. Ricks, Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq (New York: Penguin Press, 2006), pp. 115.332; Victoria K. Holt and Tobias C.
Berkman, The Impossible Mandate?: Military Preparedness, the Responsibility to Protect and Modern Peace Operations (Washington, D.C.: Henry L.
Stimson Center, 2006). pp. 188-96; and Lt. Gen. David H. Petraeus and Lt. Gen. James F. Amos, Counterinsurgency, Field Manual 3-24 (Washington,
D.C.: Headquarters, U.S. Army, December 2006), available at <http://www.us.army.mil>,
THE SABAN CENTER AT THE BROKINGS INSTITUTION


82
they can safely handle. This will require some flexibil-
ity as the aggregate scale of this effort will be much
larger than anything attempted on an organized basis
by the international community in the recent past.
These operations should be feasible, however, with
some experiences from Bosnia and elsewhere inform-
ing the planning.
U.S. forces would have to remain involved for the mis-
sion to succeed. Select Iraqi units could assist in cer-
tain population relocation operations. The composi-
tion of these Iraqi Army units would reflect the ethnic
mix of the areas where movements would occur, Since
most operations would be small scale, units could be
of relatively small size. U.S. and British officers would
only call upon those Iraqi units that had proven their
fidelity in combat. For example, in the movement of
Sunni Arabs from a Shi'i Arab neighborhood, a select
Shi’i-dominated army unit would provide perimeter
security, while a Sunni Arab unit would provide close
protection for those Sunni Arabs leaving. The reverse
would be the case in movements from Sunni Arab to
Shi’i Arab neighborhoods.
Once a movement from a given neighborhood had be-
gun, it might take on a life of its own and accelerate.
Those from a minority population who had planned
to stay put might find this harder to do than they had
imagined. Majority population militia fighters might
try to pressure them to leave. Indeed, this moral haz-
ard is perhaps the single strongest argument against a
population relocation program-although in the end
it has to be balanced against the fact that such behav-
ior is already occurring on a widespread basis. Security
forces will need to remain after relocation operations
to counter such thugs to the extent possible. However,
they also might need to escort more people out of the
neighborhood than originally expected.
For example, although the vast majority of Muslim
civilians were brutally expelled by the Serbs, there
were exceptions. The United Nations Protection Force
(UNPROFOR, the UN peacekeepers) evacuated ap-
proximately seven to eight thousand Muslims (mostly
women and children) from the Zepa “safe area", there-
by saving their lives, while a similar number (nearly all
men) were being massacred in nearby Srebrenica, The
UNPROFOR decision to evacuate Zepa was so contro-
versial that the UNHCR refused to participate. How-
ever, UNHCR's officials did not witness the shrieks of
terror from the huddled Muslim women as Serb jeeps
rolled by—a sound that erased any qualms that one of
the authors, Edward P. Joseph, had about the propriety
of the mission. Although still traumatic for the families
of victims and survivors, the United Nations acknowl-
edged in its widely-respected report on Srebrenica and
Zepa that the loss of these two enclaves helped pave the
way for the territorial settlement that ended the war.60
Timing is also important. People should not be prom-
ised help in moving safely until Iraqi and U.S.-led
Coalition forces are ready to assist them. Population
transfers will have to be carefully scheduled and se-
quenced. If possible, the schedules should not be made
public until shortly before they are implemented. Iraqi
and U.S.-led Coalition forces will have to be diligent to
ensure they do not commit themselves to more than
The key is to have the parties in Iraq accept the reloca-
tion policy at least informally-again, with the caveat
that it will be essential to strike an agreement on the
over-arching issues of oil production and revenue-
sharing. With an informal understanding among the
belligerents, ethnic relocation can be less traumatic
and destabilizing. As noted above, the vast majority of
Croatia's Serbs were expelled during two military op-
erations (in May and August 1995) that had at least
tacit acquiescence from Belgrade. Likewise, thousands
of Serbs left western Bosnia after the war was over,
10 As the United Nations stated in its seminal report on Srebrenica, "there is no doubt that the capture of Srebrenica and Zepa by the Serbs made it easier
for the Bosniacs and Serbs to agree on the territorial basis for a peace settiement." See Report of the Secretary-General pursuant to General Assembly
resolution 53/35, “The fall of Srebrenica," November 15, 1999, para. 485, p. 104, available at <http://www.un.org/peace/srebrenica.pdf>,
18
THE CASE FOR SOFT PARTITION IN IRAU


84
people might choose to relocate under our proposal, if
it were fully implemented on a national scale.62
While these numbers are huge, the lowest is compa-
rable to what has already happened in Iraq since the
invasion of 2003. This rebuts the argument of those
who say Iraq is too mixed ethnically for soft partition.
The Iraq they are referring to is already disappearing.
Tragically, but unmistakably, the unmixing of popula-
tions is already well underway, and the question may
soon be whether the process continues via violence or
in an organized and humane manner.
program is necessary to assist with relocation. Such a
program has long been a good idea for Iraq as a means
of lowering the high unemployment rate and thereby
reducing the pool of possible recruits for insurgent or
militia groups. In the context of relocation, the state
should offer modest-paying employment to individ-
uals who are willing to move. The economic value of
many of these jobs would admittedly be quite limited.
However, the purpose of such employment is more to
enhance security and to facilitate the relocation pro-
cess than to act as a form of economic stimulus. The
cost of an Iraq-wide job creation program might be
$2 billion to $3 billion a year (2 million to 3 million
jobs with a $1,000 annual salary), with only a fraction
of that paying to create jobs for the relocated.
HELPING PEOPLE START OVER AFTER
RELOCATION
For individuals who fear for their lives and their fami-
lies, relocation can be an entirely welcome prospect
despite all the attendant difficulties. Refugees Interna-
tional recounted that despite the grave hardships that
a woman who had fled Baghdad for Kurdistan had en-
dured, she was grateful, because: “Here at least, we are
safe."63 Any plan that seeks to be humane, and to create
the basis for long-term stability, must do better than
that. It must exceed the essential tasks of protecting
people as they relocate. It must help them to start new
lives, meaning access to services such as health care,
government food assistance and education for their
children. Such a package of relocation assistance also
requires providing housing and jobs.
Housing is a daunting task, but is easier to address.
One method is to create a federal housing swap pro-
gram that would involve a registry of homes. This
swap program would have to be managed by a body
that represented all ethno-sectarian groups and was
under strong UN oversight. The current Shi'i leader-
ship of the Ministry of Housing should not manage
the process. The program would create different price
categories of housing. The goal of the program would
be to assist families obtain new homes with compara-
ble value to those they had felt the need to evacuate. An
alternative approach would be to assign a simple dinar
value to each home in an assessment process, with in-
dividuals relocating given a corresponding number of
credits (or cash) to acquire a new home elsewhere.
Job creation is the more difficult of these two tasks.
Ideally, a vibrant private sector should create the nec-
essary jobs. However, Iraq lacks a sufficiently dynam-
ic, growing private sector. Nor is such a private sector
likely to emerge anytime soon, especially given the
current levels of violence and the resulting paucity
of investment coming in from Iraqis or foreigners.
In the short-term, therefore, an official jobs creation
Some new construction would of course be needed
under this plan to ensure an adequate stock of hous-
ing, as some homes would have been destroyed in the
warfare and violence. Even if the assumption is that a
new home costs $10,000 and that 100,000 to 250,000
dwellings for 500,000 to 2 million persons are required,
the costs would be bearable at around $1 billion to $2.5.
^2 For good demographic information and maps on Iraq, see the University of Texas Perry-Castaneda Library Map Collection, available at <http://www.
lib.utexas.edu/maps/iraq.html>
"! Refugees international, op.cit., p. 2.
20
THE CASE O SOFT PARTITION IN IRRO


87
leverage in subsequent negotiations over power shar-
ing and resource allocation.
An additional measure that would make sense would
be the installation of meters on individual homes using
- electricity, gas, and water.“? Much of the reason would
be to encourage efficiency and conservation, and to
ensure supplies were not wasted. A utilities oversight
board would also be a sensible addition, to ensure fair-
ness across regions. It should include representatives
of the international community to build Iraqi confi-
dence in the integrity of the process.
Additional steps could reinforce the sense of security
that comes from separation and soft partition. The
main goal should be to make it hard for dangerous in-
dividuals to cross internal borders. This runs the risk
of punishing innocents of course, but the only pun-
ishment that is being proposed here is a restriction on
a person's movements. This is a significant risk to be
sure, but it does not imply imprisonment or physical
harm to the person in question. It is a price worth pay-
ing for improved security.
TRACKING PEOPLE: CHECKPOINTS AND
IDENTITY CARDS
Carrying out a soft partition of Iraq to create three au-
tonomous regions and helping people relocate will not
alone guarantee stability. There will be numerous other
potential challenges and problems. Some minorities will
stay behind regardless (indeed, given mixed marriages
and other considerations, that is not only inevitable but
desirable), allowing for the possibility of ongoing eth-
no-sectarian strife. Some extremists, including certain
ly al-Qa'ida, will attempt to challenge any arrangement
that promises greater stability in Iraq. Some insurgents
and militia members will also likely challenge an accord
that would codify their loss of given neighborhoods
and regions to other ethno-sectarian groups. They will
fight militias from other groups and their own ethno-
sectarian groups. In short, there will be systematic and
serious efforts to sustain the violence, even after a deal
is reached and largely implemented.
Valuable lessons to help citizens in transition are al-
ready available from the experience of IDPs and from
the U.S. military's increased efforts to control access to
volatile neighborhoods in Baghdad. As Refugees In-
ternational has reported, many IDPs are struggling to
obtain vitally-needed government assistance because
they do not have ration cards. Iraqi ration cards have
a political significance as they serve as the basis for
the voter registration system, which is why some Iraqi
towns make it difficult to transfer the cards. Many dis-
placed families also lack other important documents,
such as school records, complicating the entry of their
children into new education systems. The record of the
Ministry of Displaced and Migration on assisting IDPs
is not good. But specific problems can by now be
identified, making it easier to address some of them.
This reality is not a fatal blow to the soft partition
proposal. For two main reasons the levels of violence
should be less than they are today in any event. First,
there will be less reason for Iraqis to kill and cleanse
members of other ethno-sectarian groups out of para-
noia and fear, since if afraid they can relocate. Second,
uncertainty about the future nature of Iraq's political
system will be reduced, giving major sectarian groups
less reason to fight to improve their position and their
The rapid issuance of identity cards and the setting up
of checkpoints, linked together by computer systems,
are vital measures for a system of autonomous regions.
(The computer systems should use wireless commu-
nications and have their own dedicated power sources
to minimize dependence on vulnerable infrastructure
and grids.) Identity cards have shown themselves to be
an important contributor towards achieving greater
security and stability in violence-plagued states.69 Stu-
6 Government Accountability Office, op.cit., p. 77.
** Refugees International, op.cit., pp. 5-6.
THE SABAN CENTER AT THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION
23


88
The challenges would begin with trying to convince
major political leaders to accept the essential notion
of soft partition, working out arrangements on inter-
nal borders, and figuring out how to compensate those
who relocated
dents of counterinsurgency have recommended their
use in Iraq, but this advice has not been taken up. For
one thing, this policy is expensive; a national identity
card system in Iraq might cost $1 billion. However, a
soft partitioned Iraq would have a strong incentive to
introduce such a system to improve security. The new
ethno-sectarian borders could be monitored more ef-
fectively with identity cards and with checkpoints in
place. Biometrics are already assisting U.S. military and
Iraqi security forces in controlling access to neighbor-
hoods that militants have targeted locally; the policy
could be broadened throughout Iraq."
This control system would place some burdens on
Iraq's internal trade and other aspects of its economy.
It would complicate the efforts of individuals to cross
from one region to another to visit family and friends.
For the most part these burdens would be bearable.
For individuals or businesses that need to make fre-
quent crossings across Iraq's new internal borders, or
those willing to pay for the privilege, an EZ pass system
might be developed to expedite movements for those
with important and regular business to conduct.
There would also be major operational challenges.
These would include protecting people as they relo-
cated from one region to another, as well as protecting
those who chose to stay put. U.S, and other Coalition
forces might have to pay particular short-term atten-
tion to towns and neighborhoods that remained heav-
ily mixed ethnically, out of fear that such places would
continue to remain the most vulnerable to the ethnic
cleansing that is today so prevalent in Iraq's diverse ar-
eas. In addition, Iraq's security forces, weak as they are,
would temporarily become even weaker as they were
reconstituted into regional police and paramilitary or-
ganizations. These realities, together with the ongoing
challenges of training Iraqi forces, would surely pre-
clude any major reductions in U.S. force levels dur-
ing the first twelve to eighteen months that would be
needed to implement soft partition.
Certainly, some infiltration of dangerous individuals
into the security forces manning the checkpoints could
occur, resulting in illicit crossings. Still, this problem
could be mitigated by having the Shi'i Arab sides of
checkpoints manned by Shi'i Arabs, the Sunni Arab
sides mostly by Sunni Arabs, and the checkpoints on
the Kurdish zones by Kurds.
After soft partition is enforced, the situation should im-
prove considerably, Forces levels can be gauged relative
to the population and the strength of the Iraqi security
establishment. Iraq, with a population of twenty-five
million, would need almost 500,000 police or peace-
keepers if one insisted on applying one-size-fits-al]
force planning rules and using the Balkans experiences
as models. Even if one optimistically assumed that all
Iraqi regional security forces could be counted towards
this goal, and that their total is the 350,000 personnel
in current Iraqi Army and Police units, that would im-
ply a requirement for 150,000 foreign peacekeepers.
That in turn would likely necessitate over 100,000 U.S.
REDUCING AND REDEFINING THE FOREIGN
MILITARY ROLE
As noted above, the process of soft partitioning Iraq
into three autonomous regions would be demanding.
** David Galula, Counterinsurgency Warfare: Theory and Practice (New York: Praeger, 2005), pp. 116-121.
7Kenneth M. Pollack et al., op.cit., p. 41.
7) "In some sealed-off areas, troops armed with biometric scanning devices will compile a neighborhood census by recording residents' fingerprints and
eye patterns and will perhaps issue special badges, military officials said." Karin Brulliard, “Gated Communities' For the War-Ravaged: U.S. Tries High
Walls and High Tech To Bring Safety to Parts of Baghdad," The Washington Post, April 23, 2007, p. A-1, available at <http://www.washingtonpost.com
wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/22/AR2007042201419.html>.
24
THE CASE FOR SOFT PARTITION IN IRAQ


90
Iraqi regional security forces, maintain rapid strike ca-
pabilities to help in attacks on any al-Qa'ida cells that
were uncovered, and help protect the Green Zone (or
whichever part of Baghdad became the protected fed-
eral and diplomatic neighborhood).
ployment began with 60,000 NATO troops for a coun-
try of 5 million). This simple extrapolation from the
Bosnia experience assumes too much about the degree
of scientific and military precision with which that
deployment was drawn up. In fact, one of the reasons
why these missions used so many troops was because
NATO, at that relatively quiet moment in its history,
had many to offer. While it would be imprudent to go
to the extremes that former Secretary of Defense Don-
ald Rumsfeld went and discard previous missions as
possible guides for force strength requirements, it is not
axiomatic that a future Iraq deployment would need to
achieve similar ratios of peacekeepers to population.
Such an approach certainly entails risks. Even if it suc-
ceeded in quelling most of the civil violence across
ethno-sectarian lines, it would by design do little to
foster reconciliation within ethno-sectarian groups.
The militia conflicts that have been prevalent in Bas-
ra and elsewhere even within a largely homogeneous
population (the Shi'ah in Basra) demonstrate the dan-
gers of such an approach. Furthermore, in an optimal
world it would probably be best to have enough forces
to intercede frequently in such fighting—with the
goal of forcing militias to disband and allowing time
for regional security structures to become established.
Unfortunately, U.S. Iraq policy is no longer made in
anything like an optimal world of resource availabil-
ity. Low-to-medium grade violence, in the context of a
broad political architecture for the country that is gen-
erally acceptable to major political forces, has become
an acceptable outcome. The United States and its for-
eign partners will need some rapid-response forces to
help deter militias from becoming too strong and to be
capable, along with local Iraqi forces, of tackling them
should they stray badly out of line. However, policing
and patrolling the streets of Iraq, within homogenous
ethno-sectarian zones, would no longer be the main
mission of U.S. forces, with consequences that would
have to be recognized and accepted from the beginning.
Again, soft partition is not an ideal or risk-free solution;
it is simply becoming the only option we may have left,
short of abandoning Iraq to an all-out civil war.
Rigorously determining proper troop requirements to
stabilize an Iraq of autonomous regions is difficult. The
U.S. military has method for doing such calculations
based on “mission-enemy-terrain-tactics” (METT)
procedures. These METT guidelines essentially build
force requirements from the ground up. For example,
one postulates a certain number of checkpoints each
manned by a certain number of U.S. soldiers, and
then allows for troop rotations and logistical support
and military backup. That leads to an estimate of how
many troops are needed for this job.
In the case of force requirements for soft partition,
we take a simpler and more approximate approach.
Imagine that the task of U.S. troops in Baghdad after
soft partition will largely consist of patrolling the area
on either side of the Tigris River, the presumed line of
demarcation. Doing so would require manning check-
points and so forth, and patrolling throughout a secu-
rity perimeter extending out at least several hundred
meters in each direction from the border separating
the two main Sunni and Shi'i Arab regions from each
other. Notionally speaking, once coverage of the Green
Zone was included, and allowance made for backup
capabilities, the United States might in effect share re-
sponsibility for roughly 20 to 30 percent of the city.
If 100,000 forces were needed for all of Baghdad, that
would then imply 20,000 to 30,000 U.S. troops for the
reduced area. With U.S. forces in other parts of Iraq
after soft partition concentrated mostly in areas where
So returning to the question of troop sizing, and try-
ing to be more precise, how many U.S. forces would
such missions require? This list of tasks would be more
demanding than what NATO troops performed in
Bosnia, even if it would be easier than what U.S.-led
Coalition forces are presently attempting in Iraq. By
that logic, 300,000 troops might be needed in Iraq in
the early years after soft partition (as the Bosnia de-
26
THE CASE F(*SOFT PARTITION IN TRAQ


93
Some aspects of governance are complex enough that
federal resources are helpful. Whether it is a matter
of building modern hospitals or universities, writing
laws to protect and encourage investment, develop-
ing a sophisticated infrastructure plan, or luring in-
vestors from abroad, central governments are often
best prepared for the task. In today's Iraq, widespread
violenci: means that hospitals and universities are un-
able to function properly, infrastructure is sabotaged
even if it is being built to conform with a carefully de-
signed plan, and investors have little reason to put their
money at risk. This is not an argument to retain Iraq's
current system of government. Rather, the logic of this
argument is that Baghdad will still have to play an im-
portant role, albeit a more limited and targeted one, in
a structure based on regional autonomy.
rather than federal ones. There will have to be at least
one parliamentary body in a new federal government
in Baghdad composed of members of regional govern-
ments to ensure a certain level of competence, and co-
operation between ethno-sectarian groups. The same
applies to members of the cabinet and probably the
posts of prime minister and president. Bosnia provides
a model here, if not of great efficiency, then at least of
a system that can preserve peace.
Of course, civil war is not Iraq's only problem. There
are battles within ethno-sectarian groups. The Kurds
have faced a serious problem in the past, but their
two major groupings have cooperated in recent years.
However, the Sunni and Shi’i Arab communities each
have many centers of power that have often been will-
ing to fight for their interests against each other. 43 In
the words of the January 2007 NIE: “The absence of
unifying leaders among the Arab Sunni or Shia with
the capacity to speak for or exert control over their
confessional groups limits prospects for reconcilia-
tion."#4 It also increases the prospects for violence.
Rules on foreign investment will presumably need to
be overseen by Baghdad, as will procedures for carry-
ing out international banking and trade. Many training
institutes for judges, prosecutors, administrators, phy-
sicians, and others might be retained in the capital. Bor-
der police and customs will need to be conducted, or at
least overseen, by the federal government. A small Iraqi
national army will presumably be needed for territorial
security even if most police and paramilitary functions
devolve to the regions. Diplomatic activities will be
conducted most efficiently out of the capital as well.
This problem will not be easy to solve. But it also needs
to be kept in perspective. As bad as the violence within
Iraq's individual ethno-sectarian groups has been, it
has been far less severe than violence between ethno-
sectarian groups. It is for this reason that, despite the
reports of ongoing problems in places such as largely
Shi’i Arab Basra, 96 percent of Iraqis in the south of
the country (including Basra) report feeling safe in
their neighborhood-in contrast to only 26 percent in
Baghdad and 40 to 45 percent in most other mixed ar-
eas of Iraq.45 Polls can be deceptive, but these numbers
are nonetheless striking.
On balance, however, under this soft partition model,
the overall assumption will be that, if the regions can
do it, they should do it. At least 75 percent of govern-
ment activity and spending should occur at the re-
gional level.
For this reason, Iraq's best and most ambitious poli-
ticians will often prefer to pursue regional positions
*3 Daniel ... Byman and Kenneth M. Pollack, Things Fall Apart: Containing the Spillover from an Iraqi Civil War, Saban Center for Middle East Policy at
the Brookings Institution (Washington, DC: The Brookings institution, 2007), p. 16, available at <http://www.brook.edu/ſp/saban/analysis jan 2007
iraq_civilwar.hım>.
84 National Intelligence Council, op.cit., p. 5.
85 Department of Defense, op.cit., p. 25.
THE SAHAN CENTER AT THE BROOKNS INSTITUTION
29


94
CONCLUSION
There is a strong case that regional governments will
do better than the federal government has been do-
ing in Iraq. Whether or not they will function well
enough to hold the country together under a system
of regional autonomy is less clear. For this reason, and
for all of its virtues, the soft partition of Iraq could fail
during its implementation. However, just as in Bosnia,
there are powerful reasons to think that such a scheme
will work—at least well enough for the United States
to reduce its force levels substantially after a transition
period, reduce its casualties dramatically, and work
toward the day when a relatively stable country can
emerge from the current conflagration.
Soft partition could fail. It could fail because Iraqis
simply refuse to consider it or change their minds af-
ter they have initially decided to adopt it. It could fail
through poor implementation, with violence acceler-
ating as populations start to relocate. It could come too
late to save many lives, and it would require the cre-
ation of major Iraqi institutions largely from scratch.
Leaving aside the unsavory aspects of having the in-
ternational community help relocate people based on
their ethnicity or confession, soft partition is not an
option to turn to lightly or happily. But it may soon be
all we have left.
The core elements of soft partition, beyond those al-
ready usefully articulated by Senator Joseph Biden,
Leslie Gelb, and others, should feature a mechanism
to help people relocate to places where they would feel
safer. This is actually a complex task, involving secu-
rity for those leaving as well as those left behind, and
help for the displaced with new housing and jobs. Yet
it has been successfully carried out in the recent past
in Bosnia, and it might begin on a small scale in Iraq
with “pilot programs.” Soft partition also requires bet-
ter checkpoints along the internal borders that will be
drawn between ethno-sectarian groups, and major ef-
forts to build up regional governance capacity. Most
importantly it requires a system that will fairly share
Iraq's oil wealth equally among all of its peoples and
disburse most oil revenue directly to the people and
the regions.
Ultimately, only Iraqis can choose this new political
architecture for their country. However, the United
States has an important role to play in any such deci-
sion. The U.S. political system may soon reach a point
where it is unwilling to sustain the current strategy. At
that point, not as an ultimatum but as an expression of
political and strategic reality, a U.S. President may have
to inform Iragi leaders that they have two choices: try
to sustain the current strategy on their own, or adopt
a “Plan B” such as soft partition that the United States
would be willing to help support, albeit with Gls play-
ing a more limited role than at present, Regional play-
ers will certainly be critical in the implementation of
any plan as will European Union states and the United
Nations and its various agencies. The key players, how-
ever, are in the United States and Iraq. It is in these
two countries where a new policy for trying to build a
stable Iraq may soon have to be fashioned.
THE SABAN CENTER AT THE BROO KINGS INSTITUTION


95
APPENDIX
A SYNOPSIS OF THE HISTORICAL AND THEORETICAL
DEBATE OVER PARTITION
Partition has a long history, and has been tried many
times. Many cases were the consequence of the era of
colonialism and world wars, such as Treaty of Versailles
following the First World War that carved up much
of the Middle East (including Iraq) and the Balkans,
the Greco-Turkish population transfers, and the Brit-
ish departure from the Indian subcontinent after the
Second World War. Most recently, questions of au-
tonomy, federalism, and partition have focused on the
Balkans. Other modern cases have been important as
well, ranging from Nigeria to the Horn of Africa to the
Indian subcontinent to Indonesia, including the new
state of East Timor.
ventional wisdom was that multi-communal states
that had torn themselves apart by war should be put
back together by means such as power-sharing be-
tween communities ... electoral reform ... and third-
party party aid or intervention to assist these efforts."86
However, after three and a half years of war, U.S. and
Western officials gradually realized that “pre-Bosnia
prescriptions like state-building and power-sharing
would not work. Peace for Bosnia required engaging
seriously on the logic of communal wars themselves
- especially ... population geography and hardening
of identities. (In Bosnia's case), this meant accepting
a very loose federal arrangement that amounted to de
facto partition."87 Americans also seemed to realize that
the moral imperative to stop the Bosnian war trumped
concerns about the unrealistic goal of restoring a truly
multi-ethnic society.88
The international community has traditionally op-
posed partition when it would lead to multiple inde-
pendent states. This opposition has been rooted in the
very nature of the United Nations system, based on a
compact among sovereign states that have an inter-
est in preserving their own prerogatives, powers, and
territories. However, this normative objection largely
faded after the fall of the Berlin wall and the wars it
unleashed between the ethnic groups of former Yugo-
slavia. As one scholar put it, “before Bosnia, the con-
Put otherwise, the case of Bosnia, as well as the re-
lated ethnic conflict in neighboring Croatia, widened
acceptance of mass population movements and par-
tition as a means of managing conflict. In Bosnia,
massive ethnic flight was codified in a territorial
and constitutional settlement known as the Dayton
in Chaim Kaufmann, "What We Have Learned About Ethnic Conflict? What Can We Do In Iraq" paper presented at "Iraq: The Approaching Endgame,"
conference organized by the Mortara Center for International Studies, Department of Government, Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, Center for
Peace and Security Studies, Cieorgetown University, February 16, 2007, p. 1, available at <http://mortara.georgetown.edu/includes/20050901/
TextFiles/Kaufmann2.pdf>.
* Ibid. p. 3.
** ]vo H. Daalder, Getting to Dayton: The Making of America's Bosnia Policy (Washingion, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2000), pp. 173-8.
THE SABAN CENTER AT THE BROOKINGSINSTITUTION
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96
a threshold of mutual mistrust and ethnic flight, a du-
rable peace can come only from separating the parties
into homogenous regions capable of self-defense and
partitioning the state. 92
Agreement.89 Paradoxically, the agreement succeeded
in keeping Bosnia as a single (though highly decentral-
ized and federal) state, with nominal right of all refu-
gees to return." Driving the belief in the utility of par-
tition for Bosnia and other similarly afflicted countries,
according to the political scientist Chaim Kaufmann
of Lehigh University, was “a new theory centered on
'security dilemmas.'99' The theory explained Bosnia's,
as well as Croatia's, relentless spiral of violence as the
consequence of a divided society's breakdown in order.
With groups vying either to dominate the new order
or to secede from it, the result is a situation in which
no ethnic community can provide for its own security
without threatening the security of others. In this con-
text, isolated minorities (or even vulnerable majorities)
are expelled or flee, further separating communities
and hardening their separate identities. Partition theo-
rists conclude that when an ethnic civil war has crossed
A number of thinkers have challenged this approach,
arguing that it ignores other explanations of ethnic
conflict (such as opportunistic élites manipulating the
masses) and other means of resolving mutual mistrust
besides partition (like power-sharing guarantees). Fur-
thermore, they argue that the historical record shows
that partitions fail to resolve “underlying grievances”
and therefore do not prevent later conflict between the
newly formed states. 9? While it certainly did fail or has
failed in places such as the Levant and the Indian sub-
continent, it has achieved at least a measured success in
much of the Balkans in recent times.
** The Framework Agreement for Peace negotiated at Dayton and signed formally in Paris in December 1995 “gives” the Serbs their ethnically
predominant "entity" (the Republika Srpska) while "giving" the capital Sarajevo to effective Muslim control in the Croat-Muslim Federation. At the
same time, the Dayton Agreement created a new, federated, highly decentralized state of Bosnia-Herzegovina, with full rights of return to all refugees.
Implementation of an accord that creates few incentives for the secessionist Serbs to cooperate with the central government has unsurprisingly been
difficuh. However, there has been no serious outbreak of violence since its signing.
* In the event, only Muslims have returned in substantial numbers to their former residences in "foreign" territory, and then only with great difficulty
that still leaves a majority of formerly displaced living in new homes. Both Serbs and Croats have overwhelmingly elected to settle in their new,
homogenous locations.
" Kaufmann, "What We Have Learned About Ethnic Conflict?" op.cit., p.1.
** See lohnson, op.cit., p. 7. Chaim Kaufmann stresses that both separation of populations and formal political separation are both essential. “At one
time I believed that separation of warring populations into defensible regions was a nearly sufficient condition for reducing inter-communal security
dileinmas and suggested that so long as this was done, minor differences in governing arrangements between loose autonomy, de facto partition, and
de jure partition would not matter much.... I was wrong: sovereign states receive a variety of advantages in international law and practice that make
then less vulnerable to future revanchism, thus further reducing future inter-communal security dilemmas." Chaim Kaufmann, "Living Together After
Ethnic Killing." op.cit., p.7.
" Amuing the leading skeprics on partition is the Yale political scientist Nicholas Sambanis. See Nicholas Sambanis, “Partition and Civil War Recurrence",
paper presented at “Iraq: The Approaching Endgame," conference organized by the Mortara Center for International Studies, Department of
Government, Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, Center for Peace and Security Studies, Georgetown University, February 16, 2007, available at
<http://pantheon.yale.edu/-ns237/index/research/Partition2.pdf>. See also Nicholas Sambanis, “Partition as a solution to ethnic war: an empirical
critique of the theoretical literature," World Politics Vol. 52, No. 4, pp. 437-83. Johnson provides a compelling rebuttal to Sambanis' claims about the
empirical record, arguing that in his data Sambanis also included partitions that did not result in ethnic separation. “While Sambanis does look at
partitions, he does not test the claims set forth by partition theorists (in that his data does not address the issue of demographic separation.]" Johnson,
op.cit., p. 16. Johnson reviews Sabmanis's empirical data anew, concluding that the results here are unequivocal: partitions that have separated warring
ethnic groups have terminated low-level violence for at least five years.... The numbers suggest that a good partition' is the best choice, if the goal is to
prevent low-level violence." Johnson, op.cit., p. 27 (emphasis in original].
THE CASE FOR SOFT PARTITION IN IRAQ


MAPS

IRAQ GOVERNORATES
Dahuk
Erbil
Ninawa
Tamim
Sulaimaniyyah
Salah ad-Din
Diyala
Anbar
Baghdad
-
Karbala | Babil
Wasit
Qadisiyyah
Maysan
Najaf
Dhi Qar-
Basra
Muthanna
THE SABAN CENTER AT THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION
37


98

38
OIL INFRASTRUCTURE
Iran-Turkey pipeline the
Caynan terminal, Turkey
Washion
S
1-28
alt
Bilgisayah
Supergiant oilfield
(5 billion barrels in reserves)
Mosul Demir
Staiva
7-2
Kirkuk
Desat
Tratto
Other oilfield
Oil pipeline
Pump station
Operational refinery
0
THE CASE FOR SOFT PARTITION INTRAO
(23723
Chasta
Sudid
Tanker terminal
Warkuk
Kuban
Sacian
3
100 Kilometers
100 Miles
Hoyrin
e Padanan
Bayi -
X-20
Sexk
Bad
n
an)
to Baniyas, Syria
/
Exuales
casi
Praca Karmigia
Tikiti
Kastan
mama
Hadithart
AMAS Iraq-Syria
Store
pipeline
Mansuriya
Balas
BAGHDAD
East Baghdad
Bawrah
De Facto
Boundary
datia
B
als
Dharts
Malo
2222
farhad Alko
PS-3 1 went
type
WH
Aaliter
Halfaya
Catel
As
Sarnawah
Majnun
As Samawah
Iraq Strategic Pipeline Top
A Natal
West Quran
Punyaylab
Subba North
Nah, tozar
Diwan
As flatar
Basca
Salman
AL33
Tuban
Az Zubay
Artak
jerishan
Humaylani
Souto
PSA 2
al bary Khay
Are
Klein
Anaya
{closed
re
Bundan topilation is
fut secas y arnonalin
Tradi Pipeline through a
Saudi Arabia (FSA) to.
Al Mu'afiz, Saudi Ara
(closed)


99

SECTARIAN MAP OF BAGHDAD. CIRCA 2006
SYRIA
IRAN
LAL-KURYAT
Baghdad
QUDS
SADR CITY
JORDAN
Shii
Sunni
Christian
communities - I
Turning
Shi'i.
Turning
Sunni -
KHADAMIYA
ADHAMIYA
SAUDI ARABIA
Note: White area is mixed Sunni/Shi'i Arab
STREAM
HINDWI
AL-AMAL
NIDAL
GHAZALIYA
SI
MANSUR
KHUD MANSU
C RE
RIYADH
GREEN
ZONE
ABU GHRAIB
LABU GHRAIE
YARMUK
AMARIYA
BAGHDAD-JADIDA
KHADASIYA
BEBELUMALABASIYA
KARADA
KARADA
VARMUK
AMARIYA KHADASIVA
ZUWAYAMAT
(KARADA
Rashid
Airport
UMAL
THE SABAN CENTER AT THE BROOXINGS INSTITUTION
DOURA
AL-QADAWI
GHUBABAH
1


100
THE Saban CENTER FOR Middle East POLICY
"he Saban Center for Middle East Policy was
I established on May 13, 2002 with an inaugural
address by His Majesty King Abdullah II of Jordan. The
creation of the Saban Center reflects the Brookings
Institution's commitment to expand dramatically its
research and analysis of Middle East policy issues at a
time when the region has come to dominate the U.S.
foreign policy agenda.
economic development; Shibley Telhami, who holds
the Sadat Chair at the University of Maryland; Daniel
Byman, a Middle East terrorism expert from George-
town University; Steven Heydemann, a specialist on
Middle East democratization issues from George-
town University; and Ammar Abdulhamid, a Syrian
dissident and specialist on Syrian politics. The center
is located in the Foreign Policy Studies Program at
Brookings, led by Carlos Pascual, its Director and a
Brookings vice president.
The Saban Center provides Washington policymak-
ers with balanced, objective, in-depth and timely
research and policy analysis from experienced and
knowledgeable scholars who can bring fresh perspec-
tives to bear on the critical problems of the Middle
East. The center upholds the Brookings tradition of
being open to a broad range of views. The Saban Cen-
ter's central objective is to advance understanding of
developments in the Middle East through policy-rel-
evant scholarship and debate.
The Saban Center is undertaking path breaking re-
search in five areas: the implications of regime change
in Iraq, including post-war nation-building and Per-
sian Gulf security; the dynamics of Iranian domes-
tic politics and the threat of nuclear proliferation;
mechanisms and requirements for a two-state solu-
tion to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; policy for the
war against terrorism, including the continuing chal-
lenge of state-sponsorship of terrorism; and political
and economic change in the Arab world, in particular
in Syria and Lebanon, and the methods required to
promote democratization.
The center's foundation was made possible by a gen-
erous grant from Haim and Cheryl Saban of Los An-
geles. Ambassador Martin S. Indyk, Senior Fellow in
Foreign Policy Studies, is the Director of the Saban
Center. Kenneth M. Pollack is the center's Director of
Research. Joining them is a core group of Middle East
experts who conduct original research and develop
innovative programs to promote a better under-
standing of the policy choices facing American deci-
sion makers in the Middle East. They include Tamara
Cofman Wittes, a specialist on political reform in the
Arab world who directs the Middle East Democracy
and Development Project; Bruce Riedel, who served
as a senior advisor to three Presidents on the Middle
East and South Asia at the National Security Coun-
cil during a 29 year career in the CIA, a specialist on
counterterrorism; Suzanne Maloney, a former senior
State Department official who focuses on Iran and
The center also houses the ongoing Brookings Proj-
ect on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World, which
is directed by Stephen Grand. The project focuses on
analyzing the problems in the relationship between
the United States and Muslim states and communi-
ties around the globe, with the objective of develop-
ing effective policy responses. The project's activities
includes a task force of experts, a global conference
series bringing together American and Muslim world
leaders, a visiting fellows program for specialists from
the Islamic world, initiatives in science and the arts,
and a monograph and book series. As part of the proj-
cct, a center has been opened in Doha, Qatar under the
directorship of Hady Amr,
THE SARAN CENTER AT THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION


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23


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Daniel Benjamin
Senior Fellow, The Brookings Institution
Testimony before the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee
The House Armed Services Committee
Washington, DC
July 31, 2007
Mr. Chairman, Representative Akin, Members of the Committee:
I want to thank you for the opportunity to testify today on some of the potential
developments that may confront us in the Persian Gulf, the Middle East and the wider
world as a result of the war in Iraq. It is no exaggeration to say that the set of challenges
that we have encountered in Iraq since 2003 have defied our powers of prediction over
and again. The sad fact is that we should not expect that to change anytime soon. Iraq
today is the center of a series of conflicts -- some full-blown, others nascent -- that are at
once interlocking and overlaid. There is a bewildering array of drivers behind these
conflicts and a panoply of triggers that might accelerate or decelerate certain trends.
Prediction, in this environment, seems especially hazardous.
With that caveat, I would like to address some issues related to the terrorist threat and
how it might develop in Iraq and how it will affect Iraq's neighborhood and our own.
We should begin by acknowledging a fact that should now be beyond dispute: There
were essentially no jihadist terrorists in Iraq before the Unites States invasion of 2003.
The Jordanian terrorist, Abu Mussab al Zarqawi, who would eventually emerge as the
leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, may have traveled in and out of that part of the country that
was ruled by Saddam Hussein, but his base was in the Kurdish zone to the north, which
was protected by the U.S. and the no-fly zone. Today, there are probably several
thousand jihadists in the ranks of al Qaeda in Iraq. Some of the leaders are undoubtedly
foreigners. Most of the suicide bombers themselves come from Saudi Arabia and
elsewhere. Nonetheless, this is a primarily Iraqi group, and it will comprise a significant
security threat for some time to come.
What is the future of al Qaeda in Iraq? Much, obviously, depends on the success of U.S.,
coalition and Iraqi forces currently in the field. Recently, there have been indicators that
some analysts interpret as encouraging. If there is indeed a positive turn of events
underway, we should all be grateful. Given the relentless deterioration in conditions of
the post-invasion period, we should, however, be prepared for more of the same. The
perils of overly optimistic thinking about Iraq are too well known to require further
recapitulation here.
Al Qaeda in Iraq: The Question of Targets and the Myth of a Jihadist Takeover


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The first question to be addressed about al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) regards the group's
orientation - its targeting priorities -- and this is a matter of some debate. Over the last
few years, it has focused its attacks overwhelmingly on targets inside Iraq: U.S. forces,
Iraqi forces and the Shia civilian population. It has also managed to kill a significant
number of Sunni leaders who have banded together to oppose AQI. The most recent
instance of this involved the suicide bombing that claimed the lives of several al Anbar
sheikhs who were meeting in Baghdad. We have also seen attacks outside the country,
such as the bombing of American-owned hotels in Amman, Jordan in the fall of 2005,
which appears to have been orchestrated by AQI. We have seen as well a “bleed-out”
phenomenon begin in earnest with the uprising in the Nahr el-Bared refugee camp in
Lebanon, which reportedly involved fighters who had seen action in Iraq.
It seems a reasonable surmise that as long as the security situation in Iraq remains
unsettled, AQI will continue to devote the greatest part of its energies to operations
within the country's borders. There are, of course, different scenarios for the future in
Iraq, and it is worth examining each. For the time that U.S. forces remain in country, we
can be confident that AQI will continue to target them; it is, after all, the aim of AQI to
demonstrate its valor in opposing the occupation to the Muslim world. The videos of its
killings of "Crusader" forces are among the most valuable and successful propaganda
productions in memory, and they have played a critical role in motivating and recruiting
radical Islamist terrorists around the world. We should also expect AQI to continue
attacks designed to cause large numbers of Shia casualties with the aim of stoking
sectarian strife. This has been an AQI strategy from early on, and there is no reason to
believe it will cease any time soon.
And if the United States withdraws from Iraq? A central argument of President Bush and
his Administration has been that a U.S. departure from Iraq could lead to a jihadist
takeover of the nation. I do not find this to be a credible scenario. First, as we have seen
in al-Anbar province, there is growing Sunni antipathy to al Qaeda, and what has been
true in the province that was most dominated by al Qaeda is likely to be true in other
provinces. Al Qaeda has grown considerably in Iraq, but it has failed to mobilize the
population behind it. A force that numbers in the few thousands will never be able to
take over the entire country. Even if all other Sunnis stood aside and the Iraqi military
were to dissolve, al Qaeda has nothing like the manpower to defeat the Shia militias. The
group has thus far shown itself incapable of holding territory over a sustained period of
time. While it doubtless will continue to be capable of carrying out mass casualty attacks,
much more is required to take Baghdad. In short, jihadist Iraq is an extremely
improbable outcome.
Indeed, one could argue that a more likely result of a U.S. departure would be that the
Shia militias would be energized to take on al Qaeda directly. That is, those sectarian
groups that have been sitting back and watching while the U.S. has done them the favor
of fighting Sunnis would be mobilized into action; those that have been confronting U.S.
forces militarily would redirect their fire at Sunni insurgents and the hated AQI. We
should not have any illusions about what this would look like: It would occur within the
context of considerable sectarian violence. AQI, it should be added, will not shy from


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this fight. The group's strategy of targeting Shia reflects not only an understanding of
how to keep Iraq destabilized but also a powerful anti-Shia animus. Jihadist
communications have described the Shia as "worse" than the Americans, and the rise of
Iran is viewed as a deplorable event. AQI will seek to strengthen its claim of leadership
of the anti-Shia cause in Iraq and throughout the Muslim world, especially if a U.S.
withdrawal turns the conflict in Iraq into a primarily sectarian one.
Let me emphasize: I do not consider withdrawal from Iraq and leaving the Shia militias
to take the lead against al Qaeda to be an attractive course. The costs will likely be high
in terms of civilian suffering. But I am skeptical that the United States can achieve in the
near term the "complete victory" that President Bush called for in his speech in South
Carolina just last week. However positive the recent news out of al- Anbar has been,
AQI has shown itself to be an adaptive and mobile organization. It has can move
operations to areas of greater opportunity, it is resilient and it has demonstrated the ability
to penetrate the Iraqi forces and regime, undermining our ability to comer it. Absent a
broader political agreement that creates a framework for nationwide security, we may
reduce the group, but it is difficult to imagine eliminating it. The tool we have used
against al Qaeda - our military - is far from the ideal one for combating terrorism. Until
we have a strong Iraqi intelligence service working in the country, we will continue to
face considerable difficulties.
We should understand that this will remain the case however our forces are configured in
the next phase of the war. Much has been said about withdrawing Army and Marine
units into garrisons to remove them from the midst of the sectarian strife, reserving them
instead for missions primarily against al Qaeda. Another camp argues for redeploying
U.S. forces to the periphery - either inside or outside Iraq - and keeping them on call for
counterterrorism missions. There will be some utility in this, especially when
intelligence indicates that centralized bases are appearing or even large centers of jihadist
activity. But the military remains a poor instrument for dealing with small, highly
dispersed and widely distributed terrorist cells. Moreover, the use of military force
against such cells often results in the kind of collateral damage that spurs anger and
further radicalization.
Let me add that if we do depart Iraq, we will need to solve the problem of devising a
ert capability for dealing with the problem of a terrorist safe haven in largely
ungoverned spaces. This problem already exists in Pakistan, and it may well materialize
in Iraq. Our senior military commanders seem chronically averse to deploying Special
Forces on counterterrorism missions. I have recently argued, together with Steven Simon
of the Council on Foreign Relations, that it is time to take another look at these kinds of
missions and to build up the CIA's capabilities and responsibilities in this area. I am
submitting our article in The New York Times on this subject for the record.
An Emboldened Enemy
Another Administration argument is that a U.S. departure from Iraq will embolden the
terrorists. This is, to a significant degree, true. But it should be noted that the jihadist


105
movement has already declared victory in Iraq and appears to be delighted by its
accomplishments. No doubt there is some bluster in these statements. But there is also
plenty of genuine satisfaction at the role AQI has played in foiling our effort
a democratic and friendly regime in Iraq and to pacify the country, We need to ask what
the implications of this sense of achievement will be.
It is often suggested that leaving Iraq before the destruction of AQI will lead to an
enhanced jihadist threat to the U.S. homeland - this is the clear sense of President Bush's
repeated remarks to the effect that the al Qaeda group that attacked the United States on
September 11, 2001 and AQI are the same. We are also all familiar with the argument
that we must fight the terrorists “over there" so that we don't have to “over here.” There
is an element of truth here insofar as more jihadists means a greater aggregate threat to
the United States, and this is not to be taken lightly.
It is worth considering, however, the nature of the AQI threat. Most of the fighters in the
group are not going to be capable of participating directly in attacks on the U.S.
homeland because they lack the cultural capabilities to navigate in Western societies.
Many and perhaps most will continue to fight for the upper hand in Iraq. As suggested
ical that they will make much headway in this regard, but they will, at a
minimum, continue to carry out spectacular bombings against military and civilian
targets. A few may try to carry their violence to the West, and the possibility that one of
the doctors involved in the recent car bomb conspiracy in the United Kingdom was an
Iraqi jihadist, is an ominous hint of that fact. But if U.S. forces depart, the more direct
threat will be offshore to American interests abroad - especially in the Muslim world.
Indeed, the Muslim world itself, already roiled by the effects of Iraq, looks to be the
region most threatened in the coming years. Those who have honed their skills in Iraq
will want to continue to employ them. A reasonable conclusion about their likely targets
would point to U.S. and other Western interests in the Middle East and Persian Gulf
regions and the regimes of Muslim world, which the militants continue to view as
"apostate” and deserving of overthrow. I have mentioned those fighters who appear to
have made their way to Lebanon. Others may return to Saudi Arabia, which is widely
believed to be the number one exporter of radicals to Iraq - and the work of the Israeli
scholar Reuven Paz and the Saudi analyst Nawaf Obeid has supported this contention. It
is difficult to judge the extent to which radicalism is on the rise in Saudi Arabia at the
moment. But the fact that Saudi authorities recently announced the arrest of 172
militants was a striking event. Terrorism is game of small numbers, and 172 is a large
one. We don't know much about the offenses that these individuals were involved in, but
if they were serious --and not merely the voicing of "deviant” beliefs - their arrests
should be seen a significant event. The return of only a couple of hundred jihadists to
Saudi Arabia could prove a challenge for the Interior Ministry and its forces. Those who
return, it should be remembered, will return as victors, and that will give them an aura
that will help them as they seek to promote their cause.
Other countries that face serious domestic terrorist problems include Jordan and Syria,
the two major recipients of refugees from Iraq's turmoil. Refugee populations are


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