BUSH FAILS TO GAIN PLEDGES ON TROOPS OR FUNDS FOR IRAQ

National Guard, Reserve May Plug Holes

  Artículo de Dana Milbank and Colum Lynch en “The Washington Post” del 25.09.2003

 NEW YORK, Sept. 24 -- President Bush ended two days of meetings with foreign leaders today without winning more international troops or funds for Iraq and with a top aide saying it could take months to achieve a new U.N. resolution backing the U.S. occupation.

Bush's failure to win a promise of fresh soldiers in meetings with the leaders of India and Pakistan -- aides said the president did not even ask -- increased the difficulty the United States will have in assembling another division of foreign troops in Iraq, which senior Pentagon officials say is the minimum needed to relieve overstretched U.S. forces.

In testimony on Capitol Hill today, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said, "We're not going to get a lot of international troops with or without a U.N. resolution. I think somewhere between zero and 10,000 or 15,000 is probably the ballpark."

And Peter Pace, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned that more National Guard and Reserve forces could be activated if the third foreign division -- 15,000 to 20,000 troops -- is not secured within the next six weeks.

Bush's empty-handed departure after two days at the United Nations, combined with warnings from the military that it will soon need fresh U.S. troops to relieve those in Iraq, makes it increasingly likely that the U.S. military will have to rely on its own reservists to do the job -- a politically dicey move for Bush, whose domestic support already has declined because of the continuing instability in Iraq.

Compounding the pressure, U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan is considering ordering the total withdrawal of U.N. personnel from Iraq, a step recommended by his top political and security advisers after two bombing attacks against the world body in Baghdad over the past month, according to U.N. and U.S. officials. A U.N. pullout would seriously undercut efforts to assign the United Nations a broader role in overseeing Iraq's political transition.

The White House, when it decided earlier this month to seek a new U.N. resolution, was hoping to quickly pass a measure that would encourage countries such as India, Pakistan and Turkey to send troops and others to provide money to support Iraq's reconstruction. But the administration discovered that other countries are not willing to commit the needed military power and funding unless the United States relinquishes more control than it is willing to give to the United Nations or the Iraqis.

Today, as leaders from Pakistan and Turkey raised fresh concerns about supplying soldiers, senior administration officials sought to reduce expectations for foreign help and an imminent Security Council resolution.

In a meeting with the 10 non-permanent members of the council, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said he would like to see a resolution adopted by Oct. 23, the scheduled date of an international Iraqi donors conference, according to a senior diplomat present at the meeting.

"Nobody's in a particular hurry to get this done, because we're going to do this right," said a senior Bush aide who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity. Asked whether the search for a U.N. resolution backing the U.S. occupation in Iraq could be a months-long process, the official said: "It could be. And I don't think that there is any concern that that would be a problem."

The official said Bush did not specifically ask for troops from Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, adding, "The president did not come here to ask people for troops." There were also no concrete discussions about financial contributions because the donors' conference planned in Madrid is still a month away, the official said.

Musharraf suggested requirements for Pakistan's participation in Iraq peacekeeping efforts that would be almost impossible to meet. At a news conference, Musharraf said that the public in his country is "totally opposed to sending troops to Iraq" and that "President Bush does totally understand" his country's reluctance to commit forces to Iraq. Musharraf said Pakistan would participate only under a U.N. mandate asking for Muslim troops.

Similarly, Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul told a forum in New York today that more control should be turned over to Iraqis if Turkish troops are going to participate. "We want Iraq to be ruled by Iraqis," Gul said.

That sentiment was echoed at the U.N. General Assembly, where foreign leaders continued to press for an expeditious transfer of authority to Iraqis as part of a new Security Council resolution. Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing called for Iraqi sovereignty "at an early date." Chilean Foreign Minister Soledad Alvear, whose country is also serving on the Security Council, said, "We believe it is essential to set a timetable."

The Bush administration remained adamant in resisting what the Bush official called "artificial timetables" for a transfer of power. "I don't think anybody wants to compromise on a transfer of sovereignty that might fall apart," the official said. Still, the aide did not rule out a breakthrough, saying there "is more convergence here in view than might be thought."

Powell, in his meeting with foreign ministers, said that he wanted to hear ideas on how to yield greater authority to Iraqis more swiftly, but, according to a diplomat who attended, he cautioned that his "room for maneuvering is not wide."

In another point of contention, the U.S. administrator in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer, told Congress today that the United States is opposed to giving up control over the $20 billion in reconstruction funds for Iraq that the administration is seeking. Bremer declined to give details about what tasks the administration is willing to surrender.

In one bright spot for Bush, he and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder announced this morning that they had moved beyond their differences over the war in Iraq, which Germany bitterly opposed. Bush, calling the chancellor "Gerhard," declared after the meeting: "We've had differences, and they're over, and we're going to work together." The president said the two allies would cooperate on Afghanistan and stabilizing Iraq.

Schroeder, in reply, said, "We very much feel that the differences there have been have been left behind and put aside by now." The two men did not get into specifics on their agreements or differences, although Bush aides said Germany might provide police training.

But the very fact that they had such a public reconciliation -- the White House originally had planned to allow only still photographs of the session, as it has with Bush's other meetings here -- was noteworthy. Bush did not have a public reconciliation with French President Jacques Chirac, who has led the opposition to U.S. policy in Iraq, after a similar meeting yesterday. Bush aides said the two remain divided on setting what Chirac calls a "reasonable timetable" for giving Iraqis authority. Though France has said it will not veto a resolution, France's backing for a resolution is important because that could encourage reluctant nations to provide troops and funds.

As U.S. diplomats worked to resolve the dispute, military leaders said they are preparing for the possibility of calling up more reserves. Pace, a Marine general, told a group of defense writers in Washington this morning that if more commitments of foreign troops are not secured, the Pentagon will need to begin in the next four to six weeks alerting National Guard and Reserve forces required to sustain troop levels in Iraq.

"We need to be making decisions about alerting reservists over the next four to six weeks," he said, adding that replacements would be alerted "if we don't have specificity by then" on commitments to a third multinational division in Iraq.

Under a Pentagon troop rotation plan announced in July requiring 12-month tours for soldiers in Iraq, the third multinational division would replace the 101st Airborne Division in February or March. The two foreign divisions already there are led by Britain and Poland.

Pace also said that the U.S. Marines, who have just relinquished control of their sector south of Baghdad to the Polish-led division and will be leaving Iraq, will be part of all future rotation plans. "The Marines will be deployed at the same rate as the Army," he said.

There are about 144,000 U.S. forces in Iraq and 22,000 from 32 other countries, including 14,000 from Britain.

Pace said the United States has enough forces on its own to maintain security in Iraq, if necessary. But, he added, "that is not our desire for lots and lots of reasons." The general said that it is "not a given" that more Reserve and Guard forces will be needed and that "we have every hope" more foreign troops will come. "But hope is not a plan," he said.

Staff writers Vernon Loeb and Peter Slevin in Washington contributed to this report.