It has been tough to settle on a definitive name for this war America is fighting, but deciding what to call it is a minor concern. Half a decade into it now, how goes the war? Opinions ran the gamut from unreservedly pessimistic to cautiously optimistic at the fifth annual Defense Forum Washington, presented in September by the U.S. Naval Institute and the Marine Corps Association. Leading lights from government, military, and journalism convened in Arlington, Virginia, for a series of panel discussions to attempt an assessment of the global war on terrorism—the Long War.
The subject matter seemed to act as a Rorschach blot, inspiring a range of responses, from virulent critiques of blind adventurism to hopeful praises of ground gained and lessons learned. But there was consensus, at least, on one sobering point: this is a clash that is going to last for many years.
"We are engaged in an all-hands fight—sometimes I wonder if our country and frankly if some portions of our government remember that," said Navy Admiral Edmund P. Giambastiani Jr., Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, in his remarks as the Forum's kickoff speaker.
Admiral Giambastiani described how the Navy has risen to the challenge of taking on "less traditional roles" in the war against terrorism. Beyond the "kinetic" fronts of Iraq and Afghanistan, there is an ongoing war of ideas, a struggle against a Muslim-extremist worldview, he said. The non-extremist majority of the world's Islamic population is caught in the middle of this ideological conflict, and "we have a tremendous opportunity and a real duty to dispel the perception" that the West is the evil entity the extremists would have the world believe.
The U.S. military in general, and the Navy and Marine Corps in particular, can be most effective ambassadors in this struggle for hearts and minds, Admiral Giambastiani pointed out. He cited recent examples-the 2004 tsunami relief effort in the Indian Ocean, and the 2005 Pakistani earthquake airlift—in which massive humanitarian-aid undertakings by the military reminded the world of America's recurring role as rescuer or deliverer. "These missions . . . reinforce very positive impressions of America and Americans," said the admiral, and are "an important contribution to winning the Long War."
The sea services need to make the humanitarian-mission concept a more ingrained part of their cultural fabric; therefore, "I would urge a fairly broad conception of what it means to be expeditionary," said Admiral Giambastiani. He noted that the Quadrennial Defense Review has instructed the Navy and Marine Corps "to shift our weight to meet disruptive, catastrophic, and most relevant here, irregular challenges." These challenges (humanitarian missions included) "are key tasks that we face in the days ahead."
"The Protracted Nature of Our Conflict"
The Forum's opening panel asked the question, "The Long War: Where Are We Now?" Acting as moderator, retired Marine Corps lieutenant Colonel Frank Hofrman, Research Fellow at the Center for Emerging Threats and Opportunities at Quantico, prefaced the discussion by offering an epitaph for the phrase "Global War on Terror," which all along was arguably a case of faulty nomenclature. "All we did in essence was declare war against a tactic," he said.
The emerging accepted name, the Long War, "captures the protracted nature of our conflict," he added, noting that the current fight has now outlasted World War II, and that this time around, "it's not going to end on the teak decks of a battleship with a treaty signed." Lieutenant Colonel Hoffman also painted an admittedly negative picture of where the war effort now stands: staggering national debt, Osama Bin Laden still at large, al Qaeda enjoying enhanced prestige, Iraq unresolved, U.S. popularity declining worldwide.
In contrast, panelist Army Colonel Gary H. Cheek, Chief of the Joint Staff's Strategic Planning Division, War on Terrorism Directorate, offered a more upbeat view.
"What the U.S. has done on the strategic level over the past year is significant and positive," he said. Attempting to dispel the criticism that the United States has no real strategy, the colonel delineated the three key elements of said strategy: protection of the homeland; attacking terrorists and diminishing their capacity to operate—not only militarily but logistically, financially, etc.; and countering the ideological support for terrorism—the classic winning-hearts-and-minds goal. "This is really the key," said Colonel Cheek, "and is where victory truly lies."
Colonel Cheek, who put forth one of the most optimistic overall war assessments during the conference, asserted that while the enemy has not been incapacitated, "generally, our military is being effective in the areas where it is operating ... A lot of good things are happening, but there's still a lot to be done."
"Different Spanks for Different Ranks"
"I don't think Iraq was a part of the war on terror to begin with, but I think it is now," said the Washington Post's Thomas E. Ricks, in a provocative keynote address based on his incendiary new best-seller, Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq.
The crowd's reaction to the speech-some vociferously hostile, some supportive, some respectfully in-between-reflected the diversity of opinion on the touchy subject the Iraq War has become.
As its in-your-face title indicates, Fiasco chronicles military-political blundering on an epic, tragic scale. Heading off those who would dismiss the exhaustively researched book as mere Monday-morning quarterbacking, Ricks said, "In order to do better, we need to look at where we ran off the tracks, and how ... I think the clock is running, both in terms of the patience of the American people and the patience of the Iraqi people."
While he has drawn alarmingly grim conclusions, Ricks declared, "I don't think the fiasco in Iraq was inevitable." He outlined five causes of the botched Iraq effort: the Bush administration, which "systematically overstated the threat of Iraq while systematically underestimating the difficulty of the post-invasion occupation"; pre-war intelligence-if it didn't support the ramp-up it was "suppressed, neglected, and ignored" as the intelligence worked its way up the chain; the journalism community, which failed in its investigative mission and helped overstate the weapons of mass destruction threat, fanning the flames of war-hype; the U.S. Congress ("probably the single most damning failure of all," said Ricks), which has failed in its historic duty to question the conduct of an on-running war; and the military establishment, caught unprepared for the counterinsurgency mission that arose.
Ricks, who said, "I'm tired of different spanks for different ranks," pointed out that there's not enough leadership-failure accountability when things go awry in the field. While the enlisted troops end up taking the heat for missteps and transgressions, a similar punitive scrutiny does not apply up the chain of command. "For reasons I don't understand, general officers seem to be above criticism in today's military."
He added that sometimes, "the best way to support the troops is to criticize the generals."
"Ruthless Realism" Needed
Ricks' bitter-pill analysis was echoed in the final Forum panel discussion, "Fighting on the Terrorists' Turf: Lessons Learned in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the Gap Between Expectations and Realities." Dr. Anthony Cordesman, Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, offered more tough-love advice: "You have to approach these issues with ruthless realism about what you can and cannot do ... and if you don't, you will blunder into campaigns for which you are not properly prepared. . . and you will commit yourself in failed states without having prioritized whether this is the place to fight or whether this is the way to fight."
Dr. Cordesman also spelled out just how daunting a task it is to export ideals, lofty though they may be. "We are fighting in an area which is Muslim, which is culturally different . . . which does not see us as liberators ... [to Muslim populaces] we are crusaders ... we are imperialists. . . above all, we are not Muslims. . . One of our greatest defects in going into this war was the assumption that somehow our values, Western values, are universal and would be welcomed into these countries."
Mr. Mills, an acquisitions editor with the Naval Institute Press, is the author of
Chesapeake Bay in the Civil War, Chesapeake Rumrunners of the Roaring Twenties , and forthcoming in 2007, The Spectral Tide: Great True Ghost Stories of the U.S. Navy.