by John M. Curtis
(310) 204-8700

Copyright September 1, 2007
All Rights Reserved.

aced with an unending guerrilla war in Iraq, a draft of the Government Accountability Office report indicated that Iraq has not met 13 of 18 benchmarks required for continued funding. With the battle looming over President George W. Bush's latest request for $50 billion, Congressional Republicans are getting nervous heading into next year's presidential elections. Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell signaled that the Pentagon wanted the GAO to revise its critical Iraq progress report. Pentagon officials “made some factual corrections” and “offered some suggestions on a few of the actual grades,” hoping to change the goalposts essential to Iraq's benchmarks. With Iraq Commander Gen. David Petraeus scheduled to report Sept. 15, the GAO report runs counter to his finding that the “troop surge” is actually “working” and needs more time to succeed.

      Modifying the GAO report, the Pentagon wants to move the goalposts, lowering the standards for marking progress. Benchmarks provide an indisputable measurement, above or below which success is measured. Now that the Iraqis can't meet the benchmarks, the White House wants to redefine the criteria as only making progress. “A bar was set so high, that it was almost not to be able to be met,” said White House spokeswoman and soon-to-be press secretary Dana Perino. While Perino doesn't dismiss the GAO report, she wants the press focused on “progress,” not specific goals. Rejecting “pass-or-fail” grades, the White House seeks to reinvent “success” as progress toward verifiable benchmarks. With that standard, there would be no way to measure progress or, hopefully, some day, establish the conditions on which the military can extricate itself from Iraq.

      Playing fast-and-loose, the White House plans to change benchmarks to show that progress is being made. With a 164,000 troops in the Iraq theatre, of course Petraeus can show progress. But the real issue is not “progress,” rather what price in terms of blood and money the U.S. must pay for what outcome. While the U.S. death toll has dropped to pre-surge levels, it remains an intolerable sacrifice while the Iraqi government takes summer vacation. U.S. forces have been stretched to the breaking point, with active-duty, National Guard and Reserves doing multiple tours, causing undo hardship, including reports of increased suicide. “Secretary Gates wanted the Joint-Chiefs to tell the president directly their assessment of the surge and the impact it is having on the forces, and that is what happened,” said a senior defense official, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

      Supporting the troops involves more than supplying Kevlar vests and bomb-proofed Humvees. It involves recalculating the mission that places troops in an untenable situation with a dubious outcome. “The stakes in Iraq are too high and the consequences too grave for our security here at home to allow politics to harm the mission of our men and women in uniform,” Bush repeated the same platitudes that have caused unnecessary harm to the U.S. military. While al-Qaida fights with insurgents to end U.S. occupation, there's not a shred of evidence that terrorists and insurgents in Iraq threaten to launch attacks on U.S. soil or elsewhere. Ignoring the GAO report, the White House hopes to stay the course, committing U.S. forces until Bush leaves office, allowing Petraeus to report minor progress in mid-September. Adding more troops won't resolve politically differences among Iraq's warring factions.

      Bush's monomaniacal focus on fighting the Iraq war without regard to the damage heaped the U.S. treasury, military and GOP heading into an election year. Unless there's a major change of direction, Republican candidates face an uphill battle shoring up support in the House, Senate and the White House. “I think we have said they have not met the benchmarks,” said Perino, selling Bush's new yardstick about relative progress. “I don't see how it would be news for them to come out today and say that they have not met benchmarks,” proving, if nothing else, she's up to the rhetorical gyrations needed to take over for ailing Tony Snow. If the White House gets its way and jettisons benchmarks, then there's no exit strategy for U.S. forces. Carving a bigger perimeter around Baghdad reduces violence and chaos but doesn't deal with terrorist infiltration into Iraq's military and police forces.

      Moving the goalposts buys the White House more time but doesn't change Iraq's failure to take more political and military responsibility. Allowing Petraeus to report on progress gives the false hope that more U.S. blood and treasure will produce a secure Iraq. Talk about al-Qaida and Iran taking over Iraq offers a good excuse but doesn't change the government's cozy relationship with both groups. While some Sunni tribes have opposed al-Qaida, the vast majority of former Baathists and Saddam loyalists fight along side insurgents and terrorists, just as they did in the early ‘80s fighting Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Disputing the GAO report gives the White House and Pentagon more time but doesn't change the untenable mission wasting too many tax dollars and placing U.S. forces in harm's way. While Bush seeks to protect his legacy, Democrats and Republicans must fix the problem.

About the Author

John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He's editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.

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