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Libya and Iraq: The Price of Success

Released on 2012-10-12 10:00 GMT

Email-ID 4595123
Date 2011-10-25 11:08:58
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Libya and Iraq: The Price of Success

October 25, 2011

U.S.-Pakistani Relations Beyond Bin Laden

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By George Friedman

In a week when the European crisis continued building, the White House
chose publicly to focus on announcements about the end of wars. The
death of Moammar Gadhafi was said to mark the end of the war in Libya,
and excitement about a new democratic Libya abounded. Regarding Iraq,
the White House transformed the refusal of the Iraqi government to
permit U.S. troops to remain into a decision by Washington instead of an
Iraqi rebuff.

Though in both cases there was an identical sense of "mission
accomplished," the matter was not nearly as clear-cut. The withdrawal
from Iraq creates enormous strategic complexities rather than closure.
While the complexities in Libya are real but hardly strategic, the two
events share certain characteristics and are instructive.

Libya After Gadhafi

Let us begin with the lesser event, Gadhafi's death. After seven months
of NATO intervention, Gadhafi was killed. That it took so long for this
to happen stands out, given that the intervention involved far more than
airstrikes, including special operations forces on the ground targeting
for airstrikes, training Libyan troops, managing logistics, overseeing
communications and both planning and at times organizing and leading the
Libyan insurgents in battle.

Perhaps this length of time resulted from a strategy designed to
minimize casualties at the cost of prolonging the war. Alternatively,
that it took seven months to achieve this goal might reflect the extent
of the insurgents' division, poor training and incompetence. Whatever
the reason, the more important question is what NATO thinks it has
accomplished with Gadhafi's death, as satisfying as that death might be.

The National Transitional Council (NTC), the umbrella organization
crafted to contain the insurgents, is in no position to govern Libya by
any ideology, let alone through constitutional democracy. Gadhafi and
his supporters ruled Libya for 42 years; the only people in the NTC with
any experience with government gained that experience as ministers or
lesser officials in Gadhafi's government. Some may have switched sides
out of principle, but I suspect that most defected to save themselves.
While the media has portrayed many of these ex-ministers as opponents of
Gadhafi, anyone who served him was complicit in his crimes.

These individuals are the least likely to bring reform to Libya and the
most likely to constitute the core of a new state, as they are the only
Libyans who know what it means to govern. Around them is an array of
tribes living in varying degrees of tension and hostility with each
other and radical Islamists whose number and capabilities are unknown,
but whose access to weapons can be assumed. It also is safe to assume
that many of those weapons, of various types of lethality, will be on
the black market in the region in short order, as they may already be.

Gadhafi did not rule for 42 years without substantial support, as the
tenacity of those who fought on his behalf suggests. (The defense of
Sirte could well be described as fanatical.) Gadhafi is dead, but not
all of his supporters are. And there are other elements within the
country who may not be Gadhafi supporters but are no less interested in
resisting those who are now trying to take charge - and resisting anyone
perceived to be backed by Western powers. As with the conquest of
Baghdad in 2003, what was unanticipated - but should not have been - was
that a variety of groups would resist the new leaders and wage guerrilla

Baghdad taught that overwhelming force must be brought to bear in any
invasion such that all opposition is eliminated. Otherwise, opponents of
foreign occupation - along with native elements with a grudge against
other natives - are quite capable of creating chaos. When we look at the
list of NTC members and try to imagine them cooperating with each other
and when we consider the number of Gadhafi supporters who are now
desperadoes with little to lose, the path to stable constitutional
democracy runs either through NATO occupation (unofficial, of course) or
through a period of intense chaos. The most likely course ahead is a
NATO presence sufficient to enrage the Libyan people but insufficient to
intimidate them.

And Libya is not a strategic country. It is neither large in population
nor geographically pivotal. It does have oil, as everyone likes to point
out, and that makes it appealing. But it is not clear that the presence
of oil increases the tendency toward stability. When we look back on
Iraq, an oil-rich country, oil simply became another contentious issue
in a galaxy of contentious issues.

The Lesson of Baghdad

Regarding Libya, I have a sense of Baghdad in April 2003. U.S. President
Barack Obama's announcement of a complete U.S. withdrawal from Iraq
gives us a sense of what lies at the end of the tunnel of the
counterinsurgency. It must be understood that Obama did not want a total
withdrawal. Until just a few weeks before the announcement, he was
looking for ways to keep some troops in Iraq's Kurdish region. U.S.
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta went to Iraq wanting an agreement
providing for a substantial number of U.S. troops in Iraq past the Dec.
31 deadline for withdrawal.

While the idea did appeal to some in Iraq, it ultimately failed. This is
because the decision-making structure of the Iraqi government that
emerged from U.S. occupation and the war is so fragmented it has failed
even to craft a law on hydrocarbons, something critical to the future of
Iraq. It was therefore in no position to reach consensus, or even a
simple majority, over the question of a continued presence of foreign
troops. Many Iraqis did want a U.S. presence, particularly those
concerned about their fate once the United States leaves, such as the
Kurds and Sunnis. The most important point is not that the Iraqis
decided they did not want troops; it is that the Iraqi government was in
the end too incoherent to reach any decision.

The strategic dimension to this is enormous. The Iranians have been
developing their influence in Iraq since before 2003. They have not
developed enough power to control Iraq outright. There are too many in
Iraq, even among the Shia, who distrust Iranian power. Nevertheless, the
Iranians have substantial influence - not enough to impose policies but
enough to block any they strongly object to. The Iranians have a
fundamental national security interest in a weak Iraq and in the
withdrawal of American forces, and they had sufficient influence in
Baghdad to ensure American requests to stay were turned down.

Measuring Iranian influence in Iraq is not easy to do. Much of it
consists of influence and relationships that are not visible or are not
used except in urgent matters. The United States, too, has developed a
network of relationships in Iraq, as have the Saudis. But the United
States is not particularly good at developing reliable grassroots
supporters. The Iranians have done better because they are more familiar
with the terrain and because the price for double-crossing the Iranians
is much higher than that imposed by the United States. This gives the
Iranians a more stable platform from which to operate. While the Saudis
have tried to have it both ways by seeking to maintain influence without
generating anti-Saudi feeling, the Iranian position has been more
straightforward, albeit in a complex and devious way.

Let us consider what is at stake here: Iran has enough influence to
shape some Iraqi policies. With the U.S. withdrawal, U.S. allies will
have to accommodate themselves both to Iran and Iran's supporters in the
government because there is little other choice. The withdrawal thus
does not create a stable balance of power; it creates a dynamic in which
Iranian influence increases if the Iranians want it to - and they
certainly want it to. Over time, the likelihood of Iraq needing to
accommodate Iranian strategic interests is most likely. The possibility
of Iraq becoming a puppet of Iran cannot be ruled out. And this has
especially wide regional consequences given Syria.

The Role of Syria

Consider the Libyan contrast with Syria. Over the past months, the
Syrian opposition has completely failed in bringing down the regime of
Presiden Bashar al Assad. Many of the reports received about Syria
originate from anti-Assad elements outside of Syria who draw a picture
of the impending collapse of the regime. This simply hasn't happened, in
large part because al Assad's military is loyal and well organized and
the opposition is poorly organized and weak. The opposition might have
widespread support, but sentiment does not defeat tanks. Just as Gadhafi
was on the verge of victory when NATO intervened, the Syrian regime does
not appear close to collapse. It is hard to imagine NATO intervening in
a country bordering Turkey, Iraq, Jordan, Israel and Lebanon given the
substantial risk of creating regional chaos. In contrast, Gadhafi was
isolated politically and geographically.

Syria was close to Iran before the uprising. Iran has been the most
supportive of the Syrian regime. If al Assad survives this crisis, his
willingness to collaborate with Iran will only intensify. In Lebanon,
Hezbollah - a group the Iranians have supported for decades - is a major
force. Therefore, if the U.S. withdrawal in Iraq results in substantial
Iranian influence in Iraq, and al Assad doesn't fall, then the balance
of power in the region completely shifts.

This will give rise to a contiguous arc of Iranian influence stretching
from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean Sea running along Saudi
Arabia's northern border and along the length of Turkey's southern
border. Iranian influence also will impact Israel's northern border
directly for the first time. What the Saudis, Turks and Israelis will do
about this is unclear. How the Iranians would exploit their position is
equally unclear. Contrary to their reputation, they are very cautious in
their overt operations, even if they take risks in their covert
operations. Full military deployment through this region is unlikely for
logistical reasons if nothing else. Still, the potential for such a
deployment, and the reality of increasingly effective political
influence regardless of military movement, is strategically significant.
The fall of al Assad would create a firebreak for Iranian influence,
though it could give rise to a Sunni Islamist regime.

The point here, of course, is that the decision to withdraw from Iraq
and the inability to persuade the Iraqi government to let U.S. forces
remain has the potential to change the balance of power in the region.
Rather than closing the book on Iraq, it simply opens a new chapter in
what was always the subtext of Iraq, namely Iranian power. The civil war
in Iraq that followed the fall of Saddam Hussein had many dimensions,
but its most strategically important one was the duel between the United
States and Iran. The Obama administration hopes it can maintain U.S.
influence in Iraq without the presence of U.S. troops. Given that U.S.
influence with the presence of troops was always constrained, this is a
comforting, though doubtful, theory for Washington to consume.

The Libyan crisis is not in such a high-stakes region, but the lesson of
Iraq is useful. The NATO intervention has set the stage for a battle
among groups that are not easily reconciled and who were held together
by hostility to Gadhafi and then by NATO resources. If NATO simply
leaves, chaos will ensue. If NATO gives aid, someone will have to
protect the aid workers. If NATO sends troops, someone will attack them,
and when they defend themselves, they will kill innocents. This is the
nature of war. The idea of an immaculate war is fantasy. It is not that
war is not at times necessary, but a war that is delusional is always
harmful. The war in Iraq was delusional in many ways, and perhaps
nowhere more than in the manner in which the United States left. That is
being repeated in Libya, although with smaller stakes.

In the meantime, the influence of Iran will grow in Iraq, and now the
question is Syria. Another NATO war in Syria is unlikely and would have
unpredictable consequences. The survival of al Assad would create an
unprecedented Iranian sphere of influence, while the fall of al Assad
would open the door to regimes that could trigger an Israeli

World War II was nice in that it offered a clean end - unless, of
course, you consider that the Cold War and the fear of impending nuclear
war immediately succeeded it. Wars rarely end cleanly, but rather fester
or set the stage for the next war. We can see that clearly in Iraq. The
universal congratulations on the death of Moammar Gadhafi are as ominous
as all victory celebrations are, because they ignore the critical
question: Now what?

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