Turning The Iraq Tide, From The Bottom Up

Former Marine, Author Says The Perspective of Grunts On The Ground, And A Visionary Sunni Sheik, Reversed Course Of War

(CBS)  Who TRULY deserves the credit for the turnaround in the U.S. position in Iraq? It's a much-debated question, which our National Security Correspondent David Martin now addresses in this Sunday Journal:

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The wealth and leisure of Newport, Rhode Island are about as far removed from Iraq as you can get.

Bing West lives here among the mega-yachts and mansions, yet it is Iraq which keeps drawing him back.

"I'm a writer," he told Martin. "I wanted to see for myself how this war was unfolding and at my age I had the opportunity to do it, and so I took the opportunity."

"But some people might say: 'Exactly, at your age, you're living the good life, why? Why do you need to do this?'" Martin asked.

"I think somebody should try to tell the story from the perspective of somebody who has fought an insurgency, who understands it," West said.

West was a Marine in Vietnam, and wrote a book about it, "The Village," which is now considered a classic work on counterinsurgency. But his exposure to what happens on a battlefield goes back further than that.

As a toddler he paraded not with a toy gun, but with a captured Japanese rifle.

"I was born during World War II and my uncles were Marines, and whenever they would come back from the islands, Iwo Jima and Okinawa and Guadacanal, my mother used to put me upstairs, playing with them, with the Marines. So to a large extent (laugh) I was raised by Marines!"

So when the U.S. invaded Iraq, West (left)went in with the Marines … shooting a video camera instead of a rifle.

"We were in the middle of the tank column, in a yellow SUV, with a close-up view - too close."

What he recorded was a grunt's eye view of the war, with all its implausibilities.

"We saw bizarre things, like this shepherd and his sheep walking in the middle of a firefight."

His latest book, "The Strongest Tribe: War, Politics, and the Endgame in Iraq" (Random House), is the product of 20 months on the front lines in Iraq. It's a bottom-up view of the war, which West believes is the only view that matters.

"This is not a book about great men," he said. "This is not a book about how terrific or how bad President Bush was, or General Petraeus. They didn't win or lose the war. The war was fought at that people level, at the ground level."

And it tells a very different story from the memoirs and inside-the-Oval Office exposes that have been written so far.

"When I hear people say, 'We just needed more troops,' I'd say, 'What were you gonna do with those troops when you didn't have a plan, you didn't have a strategy, you didn't have a doctrine, and you had poor leaders at the top who didn't "get it," didn't understand the situation?'"

West says the only ones who did "get it" were mid-ranking officers.

"They believed they understood the situation. They were the ones out there, but they weren't listened to."

As an acknowledged expert in guerilla war, West was able to send his own message from the bottom-up to the top, writing this memo to the American commander, Gen. George Casey (left), which said the insurgency was getting stronger.

"Did he agree with you?" Martin asked.

"Yes."

Yet, says West, Casey saw no need to change course.

"From start to finish, Casey's strategy was not victory, not to prevail, but to turn the war over to the Iraqis and have them settle it for themselves."

It was a no-win strategy, but the U.S. stuck with it - even as the specter of defeat loomed over the Bush administration.

"By June of 2006, from the president on down, there was high misgivings whether we were losing. And we were losing in the Baghdad area," West said.

Yet it would take seven more months for the president's war cabinet to come up with a new strategy.

"Could we have lost in terms of the morale of our own soldiers sagging to the point that it would have infected our Congress and everything else? Yes, probably," West said. "It was a close run thing."

"It was in those dark days that the first and perhaps only great leader of the Iraq war stepped forward - and he wasn't an American. He was Sheik Abu Resa Sattar.

"If you look for one national hero in Iraq, it's Sheik Sattar (left)," West said. "He said to his tribes, 'Look, we have to get rid of these guys, these al Qaeda guys.' I mean. this man had courage and vision."

And 99 out of 100 Americans have never heard of him.

"Correct. He was really exceptional."

Sattar was assassinated shortly after this meeting with President Bush. But that didn't stop what became known as the Great Awakening of the Sunni tribes in western Iraq.

"And as the Sunni tribes came over and began to say, 'He's al Qaeda … he's al Qaeda …' it just tilted, and al Qaeda had no place to hide."

It was a stunning turnaround. After three years of fighting against the tribes, the Marines joined forces with their former enemies to hunt down al Qaeda. It was the first inkling of a winning strategy - and once again it came from the bottom-up.

"So we actually were learning," Martin said.

"You can't b---s--- the guy who's out there on patrol," West said. "After a while, he begins to get it, to really get it."

But the eastern front - Baghdad and surroundings - was still in flames. This time the president's national security advisor, a civilian who looks more like an accountant than a warrior, stepped into the breach.

"In my judgment, Stephen Hadley (left), and I've talked to a lot of people about this, more than any other single person, deserves the credit for the change in strategy," West said.

And what does that say about military leadership, that it falls to a civilian to come up with a strategy that turns the tide, Martin asked.

"I believe it said about our military at the time that they were unwilling to look at radical change at a time when they should have looked at the radical change."

That radical change was, of course, the surge - sending five more combat brigades into Baghdad - everything the Army had left - plus a new commander, David Pretraeus.

"He took one look at the changed conditions in Anbar and said, 'What's going on here?' And they said, 'Well, the tribes are now with us.' Just like that, he got it. He said, 'I get it,' and he went back to Baghdad and said, 'What they're doing out in the western frontier, that's what we have to be doing here.'"

"His brilliance was recognizing success and reinforcing it," Martin said.

"Correct, correct."

It took nearly four years, West says, for the leaders to absorb the wisdom of the troops on the ground.

"What this war again showed is, you get into a war, you're getting down to the grunts. You're getting down to these groups of Marines and soldiers who are their own small tribes. I don't know where they come from. They're less than one-half of one percent of our population, but somehow they find each other, pull together."

"They're the same kids that were babysitting for you when you were two and three years old," Martin said.

"Correct, correct," West said. "Somehow, despite all our mistakes, this country still finds them."

[strategist5]

This unyielding adherence to the strategy of trying to enable the Iraqui''s run their own show was disasterous, yet a Sunni Shiek showed the way. This failure illustrates the weakness of top down leadership in not listening to those in the trenches.

[alphaa10-2009]

claydowner said, "The critics of the Iraq war really do not understand that just pulling out of Iraq won''t really change anything ..."
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Critics of the war advocate long-term success as national policy--and invading Iraq is a non-starter. As you point out, if pulling out the troops does nothing to change local politics, we must ask, why have American troops there, at all?

Bush, Cheney and certain advisers, however, are naive neocon militarists with an ulterior agenda, and focused on Iraq well before 911. Cheney acknowledged before his secret 2001 meeting wiith the oil majors (to craft a "national energy policy") that Iraq was the last largely untapped asset in the geopolitical scramble for oil. It was clear Bush and Cheney intended to capture Iraq first-- no matter what means, fair or foul, would be required.

What supporters of the Iraq invasion never understood is military occupation is not a sustainable option for this country. We are not a colonial power, and cannot justify any pretext for the occupation offered by Bush-- especially his bogus claims of national security.

Bush has led the country on a consistent path to disaster. Our blood and treasure have been spent at a profligate rate by the same Bush who inherited a budget surplus in 2001. Bush neary doubled the national debt because he refused to raise taxes to pay for his war. But the costs have been incurred, and must be paid. The cost of Bush''s war will be passed along to the next president (regardless of party).

[jgertzma73kv]

Thanks for the McCain commercial. While Mr West''s credentials as military strategist are strong, your story was about how the war was mismanaged, but finally, b/c we listened to our boots on the ground, we "got it right," and got the better of the evil ones. No mention of how Al Qaeda metastasized to its present power through our unilateralist policy. More, more occupation: a hundred years if necessary. No mention of what happens in a country when its natural resources are appropriated after an invasion built on lies. No mention of the number of young people rounded up and thrown into prison, the number of homes invaded, the chaos that still is Bagdad. That was b/c of bad judgment, not the fact of preemptive invasion. After all, once we "get it right," the benefits are enormous: to Big Oil, arms manufacturers like (hmm) G.E., and military privatizers who train mercenaries to do tasks of occupation that make ordinary young men and women mentally ill. I''m referring to those Americans who, when they return from the dehumanizing tasks imposed on them, wait months and years for treatment while the money goes to fight more battles for the sake of Blackwater, Exxon, and -- yes -- GE.

[kscislaw]

Let me get this straight. CBS and the media desperately refused to acknowledge that the surge was working and that the Iraq war had essentially been won. Now that the media can no longer deny this fact, they are desperately trying to pour yet more propaganda down our throats from any souce they can find. Since Americans learned not to trust you then, why should we trust you now?

[txpatriot4us]

I have a hunch this story was tossed in to counter the Woodward story. Like Oh it''s all good! Not.

[claydowner]

We need to step back and not get too involved with looking at tactics, strategy, and diplomatic efforts in Iraq. The critics of the Iraq war really do not understand that just pulling out of Iraq won''t really change anything. We will just be going back to the Persian Gulf or Africa to fight more wars for oil at some future date. Maybe there will be more terrorism combined with a war that leads to making it nearly impossible to secure our energy supply lines. If Israel strikes Iran maybe the price for oil can get to $200 or more per barrel. I personally wish oil would stay high priced then the country will get smart for a change.

What has to be done to honor the sacrifice of our servicemen in Iraq is to break our dependence on foreign oil forever. We can not drill our way out with only 3% of the world''s oil reserves and 25% of the demand. We need to adopt an Al Gore/T.Boone Pickens approach and invest in huge windfarms on the Plains states, solar in the desert southwest, smart electric grids, and natural gas for trucks with cars going to all electric plugin or plugin hybrid types that get at least 50 MPG plus.

The US Federal Government must make a strategic shift away from imported oil from unstable parts of the globe. The cycle of death, killing, terrorism, and economic boom to bust to bankruptcy will never end until we quit depending on imported oil forever.

[marshall65]

"There was WMD in Iraq. Saddam had used them on his own people." It wasn''t too hard in 2000 and 2001 to see that Hussein put up a front to keep the Iranians misinformed. A lot of folks figured that out. Powell did not show his usual conviction when he went before the UN with Tenet and Negroponte sitting behind him and he has said several times since that appearance is a blot on his record. The pre-invasion excuses were cooked up and that''s behind us. How we leave the field with honor is another question staring us in the face. Hopefully not like when Nixon abandoned South Vietnam.

[marshall65]

"This jerk just signed the Sheiks death warrant. he is nothing but a dead man walking. You were a good man Sheik Abu Resa Sattar. ".............Geez-you scanned the article then jumped to your expert conclusion. Read it again-the Sheik was killed after his interview with Bush...............Claydowner, thank you. You put it as best as it can be stated and I like your comment about Hagel and Kerry. People we should listen to but wind up ignoring at our own peril.

[claydowner]

What David Martin''s interview with Bing West represents is the wisdom of grunts on the ground. Counterinsurgency warfare requires expert diplomatic, cultural awareness, and linquistic skills in order to achieve a political resolution between the parties engaged in combat. You can have all of the firepower and technology that you want but without a longterm strategy that emphasizes political reconciliation between the parties you can never win regardless of how many "battles" you win, you will lose the war.

Guerrilla and counter-terrorist wars need diplomats, foreign area officers, and civil affairs administrators who are all in agreement to a common political goal backed up by a strategy to make it happen. Counterinsurgency warfare is about as complex of a subject that you can find. The benefits of having the local tribes on your side will allow you to destroy terrorists fairly quickly because they have no where to hide. If you fail to win the local tribes over you will be chasing ghosts literally forever because the bad guys will always have a place to hide. George Bush and *** Cheney should have served as infantryman out on patrol in Vietnam. Then they would be like Senators Chuck Hagel and John Kerry. They would actually understand what they bit off when we invaded Iraq in 2003 instead of the bogus neoconservative rubbish they turned out totally wrong.

[edward1975-2009]

andrew693: Hussein used them on the nothern Kurdish villages, he had started his own version of Hitler''s ethnic cleasening, where upwards of 600K people died, he had to be gotten rid of. And the good that has came from our presence in the region is showing today. Nations who haven''t sat and talked peace in over 50 yrs, Isreal and surrounding Arab countries, are now doing so. This region could no longer be left to it''s own devices. Some order had to be restored. Progress is being made in Iraq daily, to the extent that we will be cutting our trops down, though I wish this government ( Iraqi) would quit taking babysteps, they are getting there. It didn''t happen overnight, nothing worthwhile ever does, but they are getting there.

[toolmangler-2009]

This jerk just signed the Sheiks death warrant. he is nothing but a dead man walking. You were a good man Sheik Abu Resa Sattar.

[neo267-2009]

A "war" that would never have happened in the first place without the News Media and sick Liberal Hypocrisy encouraging and supporting the Terrorists. Get rid of the enemies here and we will have a lot fewer enemies elsewhere.

[hbevis]

It''''s still been a waste of our time, money, and has destroyed hundreds of thousands of lives for the military and civilian dead, wounded and their families on both sides.

Posted by gce65 at 07:18 PM : Sep 07, 2008

You are right to some extent. But, hindsight is always 20/20. We are doing a lot of good over there right now. Since some of the Iraqi people got their heads together and went to turning in the trouble makers, things have been coming together for the good of everyone.

[hbevis]

I think that the only way the "tide will get turned" is when the "men" in those countries decide to GROW UP and be MEN! They worry about all the wrong things while what SHOULD be worried about goes to hell in a handbasket. All I see them do is sit on their ***** and make up stupid rules that the WOMEN have to follow. Let''''s get real - beating your wife doesn''''t get rid of the taliban. Shooting a woman in the head doesn''''t build a hospital or fix a home. Selling your 6-year old daughter off in "marriage" doesn''''t get her an education. If they''''re SO proud of being "men" WHY DON''''T THEY DO SOMETHING FOR THEIR COUNTRY?

Posted by Demongirl60 at 06:54 PM : Sep 07, 2008

I feel that you 100% right...

[gce65]

It''s still been a waste of our time, money, and has destroyed hundreds of thousands of lives for the military and civilian dead, wounded and their families on both sides.

[hbevis]

Third, the operation was to find weapons of mass destruction.....there are no weapons anywhere, it''s basically a waste of taxpayers money for a mistake that nobody is being held accountable to this day.

There was WMD in Iraq. Saddam had used them on his own people. How about the Russian Fighter Jets that were found covered with sand in the desert? When we first went into the WAR Saddam%u2019s own Generals thought that they had WMD%u2019s that they could use against us.

I feel that people are being held accountable to a great degree.

[hbevis]

How dare someone say something positive about the American and Iraqi success! The left is very fearful that democracy may take hold in Iraq.

Posted by downsteamjim at 05:21 PM : Sep 07, 2008

YOU HAVE MADE A VERY POSITIVE POINT HERE. I JUST WISH THAT THE LIBERALS WOULD BE QUITE AND LET THE MILITARY DO THEIR JOB.

[hbevis]

Also "not fighting" the war and letting the iraquis take the hits is not exactly winning. Third, the operation was to find weapons of mass destruction.....there are no weapons anywhere, it''''s basically a waste of taxpayers money for a mistake that nobody is being held accountable to this day. Lastly, if the operation was meant to take out Saddam because he was dictator, it''''s totally a lie because there are dictators all over the world, some of them are even our allies and commit barbarities against their own people every day and we don''''t invade them. When you start to see that iraq is the second largest producer of oil in the world, than the invasion makes sense and when you see that the "coalition of the willing" is made up of countries that have huge debts with the US it also makes sense why Bush found some support in commiting this barbarity. They are doing the same thing in afghanistan, if you read, there civilians being bombed by mistake every day by american bombers. They are cleaning up in order to run a pipe line to steal more oil.

Posted by andrew_693 at 05:03 PM : Sep 07, 2008

Sounds just like another "Liberal" to me. We are making progress in Iraq. Listen to the men on the ground and you may be able to figure it all out.

[hbevis]

Start reading instead of going on and on...

[misha128-2009]

cCain says this is Winning?

Sunni regions were considerably less organized than the Shiite and Kurdish regions because of their initial violence levels and non-participation were not aided with the passage of the Reconciliation Law. The Reconciliation Law (a falsely claimed success), intended to reinstate qualified Sunnis excluded in the initial post-war setup of the government, backfired as significant numbers of "previously qualified" Sunnis were disqualified (not expected) and fewer "previously disqualified" Sunnis were reinstated than expected.

Further indications of failure came with the backsliding provincial elections (another claimed success) as first delayed and then canceled for 2008. The Sunnis remain under represented and their regions remain disorganized due to a boycott of the national elections and the cancellation of provincial elections.

The formal sharing of oil revenues between the Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds is only a interim agreement as the Oil Law is not completed.

Sunnis insurgents (most are still disqualified by the government) were paid and guaranteed future jobs (government) by US forces in exchange for their cooperation (the "Anbar Awakening") cannot be satisfied with the proceeding issues. Especially considering the risks associated with the pending withdrawal of US troops, opening the real possibility for civil war a between the factions considering all the unresolved issues.

Does this even sound like success or diplomatic failure?