Has Paul Bremer Lost It?

Like most, I have been trying to make sense in my own mind of the raid on Ahmad Chalabi's home in Iraq. There seems to be a number of sides to this story.

Robin Wright, long a darling of the State Dept. and the Iranian Mullahcracy, does her own hatchet work in this report. In the same paper, Jim Hoagland, who has long been on the record as a Chalabi supporter, has this to say:

The idea that this raid had nothing to do with Chalabi's bitter opposition to U.S. policy will be seen as laughable by Iraqis and other Arabs. They know of the long American record of supporting or accepting national kleptocracies in Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and elsewhere. This raid at this time, when police and military power are urgently needed elsewhere, can only further deepen skepticism about America's dedication to the rule of law and basic fair play in Iraq.

Iraq is not Vietnam. But Baghdad is rapidly turning into a latter-day Saigon -- a place where intelligence agents and prison guards are laws unto themselves and take revenge on uppity locals while senior Americans help or look the other way. Is this the "democracy" President Bush promised to Iraq?

Strong stuff. Of course, Hoagland has a great deal of "face" invested in Chalabi, so it is only natural that he would be outraged by this latest turn of events.

Michael Rubin, a former CPA official, expresses a view that takes Hoagland's position and goes even farther:

The raid on Chalabi's house, personally approved by CPA administrator L. Paul Bremer, encapsulates what has gone wrong with the American administration in Iraq. Bremer came to Baghdad and planned to rule by dictate. He scuttled Jay Garner's desire for early sovereignty. In late July, Bremer vetoed a Governing Council proposal to create a prime minister, saying that this might undercut his power. Fearing any challenge to his authority, Bremer gave a series of condescending radio addresses mocked by Iraqis. Rather than promote the new generation of Iraqi politicians, Bremer put himself at the center of press attention. For example, Bremer decided that he, rather than an Iraqi official, would announce the new Iraqi currency. Iraqification became second stage to Bremer's desire to replace Secretary of State Colin Powell should Bush win reelection. There was no room for assertive Iraqis who refused to grovel.

[...]

The situation in Iraq today is dire. Bremer has embarked on a policy which is as damaging in the region as the Abu Ghraib scandal. Across the region, Arabs and Iranians point to the raid on Chalabi's house to show that friendship with America is futile; the United States cannot be an ally and should never be trusted. Democracy is not about crushing peaceful dissent. Across the region, Iraqis and Arabs juxtapose Bush rhetoric and implementation. The gap grows wide.

The only conclusion that can reasonably be drawn from this array of sources is that, while Chalabi is indeed a controversial figure for whom the Iraqis have no great sense of love, the CPA (essentially an arm of the State Department) is screwing up the political transition in very important ways. Perhaps Bremer felt that, due to Chalabi's relative unpopularity among ordinary Iraqis, he had a free pass to take whatever action he wanted to against Chalabi. But this just goes to show that Bremer and the other State Dept. types who think like him have failed to feel the pulse of the region.

One of the bigger problems here, as noted by Rubin, is that this episode tends to prove the widely held belief in the Arab world that the U.S. cannot be trusted, that it is a great power that can and will turn on you if you fail to do its bidding. This is precisely the sort of impression that we should be working hard to avoid.

The picture of Bremer that emerges in the Rubin piece is not a pretty one -- Bremer comes across as a control freak and an egomaniac. According to Rubin, "Iraqi Sunni, Shia, and Kurds — including many Governing Council members — often joke that living in Saddam's palace has rubbed off a little too much on Bremer." This is not good.

Meanwhile, our military continues to perform well under very difficult circumstances, the Abu Ghraid scandal notwithstanding. Their performance in Fallujah and in isolating and undermining Muqtada al Sadr has been impressive, exhibiting subtlety of tact and a better understanding of the country than that which has been exhibited by State and the CIA.

It pains me to write this, but one cannot escape the sense that the Bush Administration is adrift on what to do in Iraq. Bush has allowed the agendas of State, the CIA and DoD to become so alienated and compartmentalized that the acts and omissions of the former are headed toward completely undermining the achievements of the latter. If I were a U.S. soldier or Marine in Iraq right now, I would be very angry at the suits. Hell, I'm not there and I still am angry at the suits. But Bush owes our Armed Forces, who have sacrificed so much, better than this.

It seems that the best we can hope for now is that, after the transfer of sovereignty on June 30, Iraqis will have enough tools to take matters into their own hands and, in cooperation with the newly reorganized U.S. military presence in Iraq, bring some semblance of success to this troubled project.

UPDATE: Michael Ledeen spares nobody:

Shortly after moving to Washington from Rome — we're talking late Seventies — I did a long interview with Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan about the Carter administration's foreign policy. At a certain point, Moynihan elegantly summarized what had happened to us: "being unable to distinguish between our friends and our enemies," he said, "Carter has adopted our enemies' view of the world." So, it seems have many of our policymakers in their panicky and incoherent decisions regarding Iraq.

Read it all. If this is as big a political disaster as Ledeen and Rubin portray it, then Bush does not deserve to win re-election. Again, it pains me to write it, but it's as simple as that.