Known and Unknown - Donald Rumsfeld [364]
Nearly 60 percent of registered Iraqis had cast their ballots in defiance of al-Qaida threats and attempts at intimidation. Many Sunnis had not turned out, but they soon came to regret it, as they realized they would have little say in the formation of their new government. They resolved to participate in greater numbers next time.
Nine months later, Iraqis overwhelmingly approved the national constitution their elected representatives had drafted. The successful referendum belied the proposal that Iraq should be split into separate Sunni, Shia, and Kurd autonomous zones, an unhelpful idea some in Congress, Senator Joe Biden prominent among them, had been advocating.23
In the late autumn of 2005, we approached the third free election in Iraq, one that would establish a permanent Iraqi government. President Bush held an NSC meeting on November 2 to discuss the security strategy for the election and the perennial issue of U.S. troop levels. Did we need more? In the White House Situation Room, President Bush held forth, with General Casey and others joining on the secure video screen from Baghdad. We discussed ramping up troop levels with additional brigades to secure polling stations for the elections and to deal with any instability in the weeks after. We planned to increase troops to 160,000 and were considering sending two more brigades, as many as 10,000 additional troops.
“My recommendation is don’t deploy these two brigades,” General Casey said. “None of my commanders believe we need the force.”24
Casey and Abizaid would not fail to let their superiors in the chain of command know when and if they believed they needed to increase troop levels. They knew well that having too few troops could result in violence that might have been deterred. But like them, I was aware that if we added more troops at the wrong time and in the wrong places, we could weaken Iraqi leadership and stunt the development of a sovereign nation still in its formative stages. It was not a simple issue.
“We need to avoid dependency syndrome,” I added, supporting Abizaid and Casey’s view. “We need to take our hand off the bicycle seat.”
President Bush replied, “Drawdown is the right thing. The announcement before the election is the problem.” The President had put his finger on the crux of the issue: If we signaled a drawdown before the December 2005 Iraqi elections, it might discourage people from coming out to vote for a new parliament. Ultimately, Bush decided to hold back one of the two brigades we were considering sending and to deploy the other only as far as Kuwait, to stand by in reserve in case violence in Iraq spiked during the election period.
On December 15, 2005, more than twelve million Iraqis voted for their national legislature, as provided for by the constitution the Iraqi people had ratified. The 70 percent turnout included many Sunnis. A quarter of those elected were female, as mandated by the new Iraqi constitution.
I had sent a memo to President Bush in November 2005 listing some signs of progress in Iraq. The Iraqi Security Forces were beginning to show signs of promise. The Iraqis had a new constitution they had written and approved, and were forming their own governmental institutions. There were tentative, early, and still modest efforts to bring Sunnis, Shia, and Kurds together. In the memo, I also called the President’s attention to some of the remaining difficulties: “bursts of violence, including assassinations and attempts to intimidate Iraqi leaders; Iran and Syria continue to be unhelpful, and US casualties.” I concluded that there was cause to be somewhat optimistic. “The central question is whether the U.S. will be safer by succeeding in Iraq or by precipitously withdrawing. The answer is clear. Quitting is not an exit strategy. Victory is the only acceptable exit strategy.”25
The Iraqis were moving forward toward a free, self-governed future. The majority of them showed they were willing to defy the insurgents. But the foreign