THE 5 TOUGHEST CHOICES IN ATTACKING IRAQ

  Artículo de Hugh White en “The International Herald Tribune” del 21.03.03

War tactics

CANBERRA Victory alone will not be enough in Iraq. It is how the war is won that will count. Everything depends on a quick, clean outcome. Such a result is vital to public support in the United States, Britain and Australia, the three countries contributing most troops to the campaign. A quick, clean outcome is also essential for successful post-war reconstruction in Iraq, rebuilding the United Nations consensus and the Western alliance after the war is over, and avoiding a surge of anti-American feeling in the Middle East.

The best outcome, of course, would be for Saddam Hussein to fall within a matter of days. That is possible, but General Tommy Franks, the operational commander of U.S. and allied forces in Iraq, won't be counting on it. He will be planning a campaign that will last at least for some weeks before Saddam is deposed and Iraqi forces stop fighting.

Franks has a complex task. He must neutralize Iraq's armed forces; even if they don't fight, they can't be left on the loose. He must protect Iraqi oil fields and keep the peace in those areas of Iraq under his control - which will probably be most of the country by the end of next week.

U.S.-led forces must find Iraq's weapons of mass destruction as quickly as possible, before Saddam can either use them or pass them on to others. This may be the most demanding challenge. The risk that Saddam's chemical and biological weapons may get into Osama bin Laden's hands will be highest over the next few weeks.

The often-quoted figure of 300,000 soldiers in the coalition looks impressive. But to start the campaign, Franks will have the equivalent of only about two divisions of heavy land forces, and perhaps two and a half divisions of lighter forces on hand to push across the border into Iraq. That is less than 100,000 personnel.

Of course another three divisions are on their way, and they are backed by a lot of airpower. Even so, Franks will need to make some tough choices. Much of the way the campaign unfolds over the next few days and weeks will be shaped by the way he makes the five toughest choices as follows.

Target the Iraqi regime or the army first? In the early days of the war, it would make sense to direct air strikes against Saddam and his ruling elite. If Franks gets lucky, that might topple Saddam and deliver the best outcome: an end to the war in days. But Franks must also plan on the assumption that Saddam's Republican Guard divisions, mostly deployed around Baghdad, will need to be targeted too. It will be much better to hit them from the air in the countryside around Baghdad, than to let them slip into the city where they can hide from air strikes and inflict heavier casualties on coalition ground forces.

The much-quoted figure of 3,000 precision-guided munitions to be delivered in the first few days of the war looks a very small number in comparison to the number of targets that need to be hit.

Deploy to the north of Iraq or not? Turkey's refusal so far to allow U.S. forces to invade Iraq from the north poses a real dilemma for Franks. The forces he was going to use there are still in ships off Turkey, or at their home bases. So he must either divert forces from the south to insert in the north, or he must let the north go, at least for the first phase of the invasion.

Neither option is attractive. Deploying and supporting airborne troops into northern Iraq would weaken Frank's push for Baghdad, and they would risk being isolated and mauled by Iraqi forces in the capital. But if the U.S. does not put forces into northern Iraq there is a risk that Kurdish and Turkish forces might clash, especially if the Kurdish forces try to take control of the Kirkuk oilfields. That would greatly complicate America's already daunting task of postwar political reconstruction.

Go in hard, or take it gently? The U.S. military is designed to deliver overwhelming firepower to shock and annihilate an adversary. The Bush administration hopes that many of Iraq's forces can be persuaded to surrender, and its commanders have been told to offer their Iraqi counterparts every chance to do so.

The fewer Iraqis killed, the easier it will be for America after the fighting stops. But the U.S. preference for delivering massive and lethal fire from a distance must be balanced by the need to make complex judgments about whether an adversary is willing to surrender or not. In the field, it will boil down to choices between saving Iraqi lives and risking American, British or Australian ones.

Race to Baghdad, or build up slowly? Unless Saddam goes in the first few days, the focus of the war will be the city, and the Iraqi forces in and around it. Franks will face a choice about whether to race forces to Baghdad - perhaps dropping them in by air in the first few days - in the hope of getting a quick surrender there, or to build up forces more slowly for a big push later.

The first option promises a quicker outcome, but carries more risks. Smaller, lighter forces thrown into Baghdad might shock Saddam's troops into capitulation. But without heavy weapons or much logistic support, they could be vulnerable to Iraqi counterattack if the Republican Guards hold their nerve.

What to bomb? The toughest battlefield choices may well be about the selection of targets. Minimizing civilian casualties is an overriding imperative. Saddam will be aiming to maximize civilian casualties. His forces will shelter in civilian areas.

U.S. intelligence is very good, but there will be many uncertainties about which targets are legitimate and which are not. Franks cannot allow such uncertainties to paralyze an air campaign that is vital to success. But he cannot afford many targeting mistakes either.

The writer, a former senior official of Australia's Defense Department, directs the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. This is a personal comment.