Iraq: Mission Impossible

CBS' Fenton: Israelis Fear Consequences Of U.S. Failure

(CBS)  Tom Fenton, in his fourth decade with CBS News, has been the network's Senior European Correspondent since 1979. He comments on international events from his "Listening Post" in London, and other parts of the world as well.

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Wars are not fought in a vacuum. They produce collateral damage, fallout, repercussions that spread far beyond the fields of battle. The American campaign in Iraq, which is clearly not yet over, is no exception.

Iraq is a campaign fought for a much broader goal than the removal of a
nasty dictator and his weapons of mass destruction. Getting rid of Saddam Hussein was the easy part. His weapons of mass destruction are proving more elusive. But it’s the ambition to achieve a long-term strategic goal that could have the greatest impact.

That goal, it is now clear, is to create the first Arab democracy in what Washington planners call the Greater Middle East. The neo-cons see a new “made in America” Iraq as a beacon to illuminate and reform a very tough neighborhood run by repressive regimes that are neither popular nor free. The example of a prosperous, democratic Iraq would be a panacea for the ills of Middle East.

Seen from the Middle East, rather than the ivory towers of Washington, that goal is mission impossible.

Even the Israelis, who have as much to lose as anyone, are pessimistic about the chances of America succeeding in Iraq. And deeply worried about the consequences of failure.

Shlomo Avineri, an Israeli with experience in foreign affairs who is now a professor of political science at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, calls the goal of a democratic Iraq a “pipe dream.”

He notes that President Bush in a recent speech compared the situation in Iraq to Poland in the 1980’s and calls it a “deeply flawed analogy.” Poland and other Eastern European Soviet satellites had charismatic local leaders. Iraq has American-backed exiles like Ahmed Chalabi and Adnan Pachachi, who have no real following or credibility in their own country.

Moreover, Iraq is not a natural entity. British imperial planners cobbled it together in the 1920’s from three different provinces of the Ottoman Empire: Mosul with a Kurdish majority in the north, Baghdad with a Sunni majority in the center, and Basra with a Shi’ite majority in the south. It has been held together ever since by a series of exceptionally brutal Sunni-dominated regimes.

I saw first hand how explosive Iraq can be on Oct. 20, 2002, when Saddam Hussein ordered the release of most prisoners from Iraq’s jails as a prelude to the expected American invasion. At Abu Gharib, Iraq’s largest prison, there was chaos. Guards threw up their hands in despair. Prisoners climbed over the walls. Families of murder victim waited outside the gates and settled accounts by shooting freed prisoners on the spot. It was a glimpse of the violence that can occur in Iraq once the iron hand of the regime is lifted.

Now the Israelis fear that an American policy conceived out of ignorance of local conditions and an underestimate of the number of troops needed to impose order in Iraq may leave the greater Middle East more unstable than before the war.

The Israeli defense establishment is especially concerned. Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz sees a “hot summer” in Iraq and believes American setbacks could have grave consequences for Israeli security. Mofaz and top Israeli officers have begun a reassessment of Israel’s security posture in the event that things get out of hand in Iraq. He is worried that Israel may have acted prematurely when it revamped its defense plans to largely dismiss the possibility of an “Eastern Front” -- a threat from Iraq.

America’s current problems in Iraq are being felt here in other ways. On the streets of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, for one thing. Palestinian protesters, encouraged by what they now call the Iraqi “intifada”, are calling for a holy war against the United States. Some have declared their desire to join the Iraqi insurgents. They see the Iraqi and Palestinian resistance as a common cause, and chant “Death to America” and “Death to Israel.”

All of this comes at a time when Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is about to reach a potential turning point in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Sharon is in Washington this week to present President Bush with his plan for a unilateral disengagement from the Gaza Strip and small parts of the West Bank. From Sharon’s point of view, an Israeli withdrawal will only work if it is not seen by the Palestinians as a sign of weakness.

When it comes to plans for the Middle East, there are so many things that could go wrong. And history teaches us that they usually do.