A Coalition of the Willing
AS THE INSPECTIONS dragged on and military preparations accelerated, splits began to emerge within the international community. The President conducted almost daily phone calls with his counterparts and could hear firsthand the divergence among them. Colin reported the same. We had always known that France and Russia harbored deep reservations about action against Saddam. Their policies, quite frankly, had contributed to the weakening of the containment regime against Saddam, and they had been unwilling to strengthen those constraints earlier in 2001. Russia was at least honest in citing its economic interest as a principal rationale for avoiding war. But we were not sure whether Moscow and Paris would actually oppose military action if the United States and Great Britain decided on that course.
We decided to call for an extraordinary session of the UN Security Council on February 5 at which Colin would present the case against Saddam. At first Steve and I proposed two separate sessions: one on WMD and the other on the remainder of Saddam’s behavior in violating terrorism and human rights resolutions. The State Department felt that the world would rally only on the charges concerning his weapons of mass destruction but agreed that there should be a second resolution charging him with the other violations. That resolution never happened, as attention shifted to refining and passing Resolution 1441.
So, with the subject matter chosen, it fell to the CIA to prepare a brief. Colin reviewed it and found it lacking. George Tenet and John McLaughlin presented the case to the President in an Oval Office meeting just before Christmas. He was equally underwhelmed and asked about the strength of the evidence. That was the context for Tenet’s “slam dunk” comment, which was meant to convey, I think, that the intelligence was indeed strong. I didn’t take it as anything more than that, but the President asked me to review the intelligence one more time. I did so with an analyst in a long session in the Situation Room on December 23. Scooter Libby and the Vice President, reacting to the CIA presentation, wrote a “litigator’s case,” which not only focused on WMD but reintroduced a good deal of the questionable evidence on al Qaeda and Saddam.
Colin decided that he had to take the pen and vet the intelligence personally. He devoted several days to sessions at Langley, where he examined every claim, asking about the underlying sources and methods and throwing out a significant portion of what had been written for him. Colin had been the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and he knew the pitfalls of intelligence. I joined him for two nights and couldn’t have felt more confident about the case he would make.
I watched the first part of Colin’s presentation on TV in my office, eventually joining the President in the dining room adjacent to the Oval to view the end of it. I thought at the time that it was a tour de force. The evidence didn’t allow for an “Adlai Stevenson moment,” a reference to the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and his surprise revelation of satellite photos showing Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba in 1962. But it was impressive nonetheless, particularly in light of Saddam’s record with the international community.
The response broke along expected lines, with Spain’s fiery foreign minister, Ana Palacio, and Britain’s Jack Straw calling for action and France and Russia arguing for giving the weapons inspectors more time. When Hans Blix gave a report on February 14 that was more ambiguous than the one of January 27, it was clear that we had our work cut out for us with the world community.
Our sense of urgency was driven by two factors. First, our military forces were approaching levels of mobilization that could not be sustained for very long. We were not on a hair trigger, but a decision was going to have to be made to keep moving forward with the mobilization or start to pull back. It wasn’t possible just to stand still, since doing so would leave our forces vulnerable in-theater without sufficient logistical support. I found it ironic that some diplomats, including Hans Blix, liked the backdrop of U.S. military power as a means to force Saddam’s hand. They seemed to have no idea that we couldn’t stand ready forever while Saddam played cat and mouse as he always did. Second, the President believed that the only way to avoid war was to put maximum and unified pressure on Saddam. That argued for continued mobilization, not pulling back. Maybe he would get the message and decide to save his own skin.
Unfortunately, the international community was starting to send mixed messages. The moment was approaching when we would have to reconcile conflicting views over the admittedly ambiguous language in Resolution 1441 concerning the need for a second resolution to authorize war. Tony Blair came to the White House for a meeting on January 31. He made it clear that he would need a second resolution explicitly authorizing the use of force. It was not a matter of legality but politics: he would have to face the House of Commons in a vote on the use of force that could bring down his government. The President already had congressional authorization, but if the British needed a second resolution, we would seek a second resolution.
Colin believed that we had a strong chance of getting nine or ten votes in the UN Security Council and might be able to persuade the Latin Americans—Mexico and Chile—to go along. Yet if Russia, France, or China voted against the resolution, it would fail due to their veto as permanent Security Council members. Russia had made clear that it was concerned mostly about its economic interests in Iraq. France was more principled if patronizing, viewing the Iraqi dictator as a necessary evil in an area of the world that needed strongmen to ensure stability. China was difficult to read.
Therefore the emergence of a French, Russian, and German triumvirate publicly opposed to action in Iraq was the devastating last straw. The President was particularly shocked at the participation of Germany since, months before, Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder had led us to believe that he might support the United States against Saddam “as long as it was quick.” Needless to say, it was also galling to see the United States’ NATO allies hug Russia in opposition to the United States on a matter of national security. Colin still hoped that we might get a plain-vanilla resolution that would perhaps simply reaffirm the language of “serious consequences” in Resolution 1441.
The President decided to call Tony Blair. They agreed to forge ahead on the second resolution, even though the prospects were dwindling. French President Jacques Chirac had let it be known that “nothing justifies war.” But there was still some hope that the French and Russians might abstain if enough members of the Council could be lined up. The resolution was introduced on February 24 and was almost dead on arrival.
The Latin Americans were proving to be more difficult than we had thought. The Chileans said they could not support a war resolution. When President Bush called Mexico’s president, Vicente Fox, Fox asked, “What resolution?” When his promised return phone call to the President had not occurred some hours later, I checked in with my Mexican counterpart to learn that President Fox had gone in for back surgery and would not be available. The chance of passing a second resolution now seemed very remote.
In early March the President called Blair again. I assumed it was just to review the status of the resolution, but he had something else in mind. He was concerned that the war might bring down Blair’s government and made clear that he would think no less of the prime minister if Britain did not participate in the invasion; perhaps there was some other way for the United Kingdom to be involved later in the conflict. Blair would have none of it, saying that he had promised to be by our side and had not changed his mind.
As I listened to that conversation, I remembered sitting with Margaret Thatcher in the Roosevelt Room in August 1990 as a young aide to President George H. W. Bush. The prime minister had come to the White House to discuss a response to Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait. The President was tied up with a congressional delegation, and Richard Haass, then the special assistant for Near East and South Asian affairs, and I sat with Mrs. Thatcher until he was ready. She would tell the President not to go “wobbly” on Saddam. What irony! I left the President’s office with the deepest respec
t and admiration for Tony Blair and the United Kingdom. It seems that when the chips are down, the British never go wobbly.
The President and Blair agreed to hold a meeting in the Azores for the key Security Council members who supported military action. President Bush, Prime Minister Blair, and Prime Minister Aznar were joined by Prime Minister José Barroso of Portugal, their host, who had offered the Azores as a quiet meeting place.
Aznar and his foreign minister, Ana Palacio, had become stalwart allies against terrorism and tough critics of Saddam Hussein. The Spanish had their own terrorism experiences with the Basque separatist group ETA, and the President’s early support for their cause against the separatists had created a bond between the countries. Aznar’s party would be defeated in 2004, however, after a terrorist attack that many read as retaliation for Spain’s support of the war on terrorism and participation in the Iraq war. His successor, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, reversed course, precipitously withdrawing Spanish forces from Iraq and causing tensions in our relationship that were never overcome.
That Sunday evening in the Azores, we sat rather glumly, realizing that a united international community would not materialize. We would take on Saddam either with a coalition of the willing or not at all. The British had to leave early to prepare for Tony Blair’s moment of truth in the House of Commons. As they bade us good-bye, I turned to Andy Card and said, “I hope it’s not the last time we see them.”
…
TONY BLAIR survived the vote of no confidence in the House of Commons. I watched that Tuesday morning as Blair delivered his case for enforcing Resolution 1441. British parliamentary debates are theatrical. I found myself nodding even when listening to those with whom I disagreed. There is something about the accent and the beautiful way the British use what is purported to be our common language. They just sound so impressive.
In the end Blair prevailed by a larger margin than expected and committed British forces to the initial campaign to overthrow Saddam and liberate Iraq. Prime Minister John Howard of Australia and President Aleksander Kwaśniewski of Poland did the same. While France, Germany, and Canada stood aside, eighteen NATO members (including seven states who gained formal ascension into NATO in 2004) and several other states joined the coalition. Some of “old Europe,” as Don undiplomatically called them, refused to participate. But it was heartening to see the Baltic states, several of the East and Central Europeans, and even Georgia do what they could and with the best possible motive: they were finally free after years of tyranny and wanted to help others to achieve liberty. Japan and South Korea would anchor the effort in the north and south with forces carrying out humanitarian missions and helping to train Iraqi security forces. It was the first “overseas” mission for Japan in the post–World War II period. It was deeply offensive to those countries to see their contributions ridiculed by others as insignificant, and it was annoying to us that the military action against Saddam was dubbed unilateral. In fact, thirty-three countries from the coalition provided troops to support military operations in Iraq in 2003.
Neither was it the first time that the United States had acted without an explicit UNSC resolution. From the 1948 Berlin airlift under Truman to the 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, the coalitions involved were acting without that specific authority. But in this case, we believed that both Resolution 1441 and the sixteen before it were more than adequate to express the international community’s view that Saddam Hussein was a threat to international peace and security. And in our view, “serious consequences” had to mean something.
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48 HOURS
JUST BEFORE OUR DEPARTURE for the Azores, the National Security Council met at Camp David on March 15 to review the situation. We decided that any military action had to be preceded by an ultimatum to Saddam. As had been the case with the Taliban, it was the unified view that decent nations do not go to war without warning. The President addressed the nation on March 17 from the Cross Hall in the White House. Flanked by a row of columns on one side and the flags of the presidency and the United States of America in the distance, the President issued a forty-eight-hour ultimatum to Saddam to leave the country or face attack. And on March 19 the National Security Council met one last time with the military commanders joining by videoconference from the field. The President asked each commander by name if he had everything that was needed. Each in turn answered affirmatively.
The President closed the meeting by saying, “God Bless America.” I could tell that he was emotional, so I did not, as I usually did, follow him back to the Oval. Neither did Andy Card. When you work with the President of the United States, you come to see that being President is a very lonely job. Sometimes there is nothing that even the closest advisors can do or say to change that fact. At no time is that truer than when the commander in chief orders American men and women into battle. I never would have dreamed of encroaching on the moment when the President acknowledges that he, and he alone, is responsible for that decision.
“Maybe We Won’t Have to Go to War”
I RETURNED to my office to review my to-do list. I had a number of calls to make to my counterparts around the world and several meetings scheduled about the war and its aftermath. The covert part of the operation was to commence that night with a lead element composed of British, Polish, Australian, and U.S. special forces.
At about 3:00 P.M. the President called and told me to come down to the Oval immediately. I always went immediately, and the fact that he said it that way was a bit strange. When I arrived, I saw George Tenet hovering over the desk, showing the President a map of a site near Baghdad. The Agency had gotten a tip that Saddam was moving to Dora Farms outside Baghdad. The source had revealed the approximate coordinates of the house in which he would be staying as well as an estimated time of arrival. We had even been told that he’d be traveling in a white vehicle. The question was whether to attack the site and try to kill Saddam before launching the military invasion.
Don Rumsfeld and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Richard Myers were already there, but I looked around and didn’t see Colin. “Get him here,” the President said.
I excused myself, went into the President’s little office adjacent to the Oval, and called him. “Get over here now!” I barked. I didn’t have time to explain why.
The President was perplexed. The military operation had been set into motion a few hours before. How would this fit in with the plan? Were we being lured into a trap? Perhaps Saddam had filled the compound with women and children who would be killed in an air strike, filling the screens of Arab satellite TV with innocent victims of U.S. aggression. The decision was made more difficult by changing reports from the source, leaving George to try to draw the new coordinates on a piece of paper while leaning on the white Oval Office sofa. The President was skeptical, and frankly, so was I—but all of us agreed that it was worth a shot. The President asked Don to make sure Tommy Franks agreed. We all saw the upside: if we could kill Saddam, war could be avoided altogether.
An attack plan had to be developed immediately to give the bombers time to reach the target. Dick Myers ran between the Oval and Steve’s office down the hall, communicating with the Joint Staff as it hastily developed a plan and readied the weapons package. The mission would be unorthodox, with minimal opportunity to suppress Iraqi air defenses before the bombers entered. The pilots would try to slip in and out undetected.
Around eight, I went to my office and woke up David Manning to tell him there had been a change in plans. I explained as best I could what we were trying to do. David in turn woke up the prime minister. The Brits were on board.
We all held our breath until the pilots completed the mission and left Iraqi airspace several hours later. The next day we received initial reports that a white vehicle had been hit and that “somebody important” had been taken out on a stretcher. Unfortunately, whoever it was, it was not Saddam. The planned military operation to liberate Iraq was launched that same day.
The next morning I was surprised to see our executive assistant Major Jen Easterly in her army uniform. The executive assistants at the NSC, which had included Kevin Moran, Michael Ma, Matt Waxman, and my former Stanford student Dave Travers, worked long hours and remained unflappable under great pressure. Steve and I were close to them.
“Jen, why are you in uniform?” I asked.
“We are at war and I am a soldier,” she said humbly.
THE MILITARY CAMPAIGN went swiftly, with the Iraqi forces retreating and ultimately disintegrating. The President received briefings several times a day. We continued Principals and NSC meetings about the aftermath. But there was little for us or for the President to do. The operation was now in the hands of the commanders. In fact, looking back on those days, I am struck by what the President did do. The president of Cameroon made a visit, complete with an Oval Office meeting and lunch on March 20. In retrospect, I can’t help wondering why. Perhaps my not remembering that the meeting even took place (until reviewing my calendar for this memoir) says something about the level of distraction that we really felt, even if on the surface things seemed normal.
Unlike during the early operations in Afghanistan, there was no sense of being bogged down. Coalition forces were making steady, even rapid, progress and were approaching Baghdad. We wondered whether Saddam would indeed make a stand there. He didn’t, and on April 9 U.S. forces entered the capital city. There was pandemonium in the streets. I watched on TV as Saddam’s statue toppled to the ground. Iraq had been liberated. But when a soldier climbed upon the rubble to plant a U.S. flag, he was quickly admonished to take it down. We did not want our presence there to be—or to seem to be—an occupation.
No Higher Honor: A Memoir of My Years in Washington Page 25