My Year in Iraq by Ambassador L. Paul Bremer III & Malcolm McConnell

Author:Ambassador L. Paul Bremer III & Malcolm McConnell
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2006-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

During a meeting of the National Security Council Principals the next morning at the White House, we again reviewed two alternative political approaches.

The CPA option was to stick with the plan to turn sovereignty over to an Iraqi government elected on the basis of a constitution. We proposed an accelerated timetable allowing this to happen by the end of 2004. The Pentagon advocated the earliest possible divestment of power to an Iraqi government, arguing this would abolish the stigma of “occupier” from the Coalition forces.

Abizaid and I each said that no Iraqi, insurgent or not, would be fooled by such semantics. We would still have lots of forces in the country, which would certainly look to most Iraqis like an “occupying” army, whatever we called it.

Abizaid presented the military’s plans to accelerate the recruitment of Iraqi security forces, which provoked Vice President Cheney to wonder how this acceleration would reduce attacks on our people and on the Iraqis. There was no good answer to this question because he had put his finger on the central assumption.

During the meeting, I got the impression that Secretary Rumsfeld had cast me as the odd man out, swimming against the stream. I suppose I was.

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