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Was It Worth It?
Three years into the Iraq war, TIME posed the question to a wide array of experts and thinkers. The answers may surprise you
Mar. 27, 2006
Was it worth it, of course, is only one of the questions. What were the alternatives? What could have been done differently? Are things getting better or worse? And however we got here, what do we do now?
As the Iraq war's third anniversary approached, the news fed both doubts and hopes. Saddam Hussein took the stand in his trial for the first time, reminding people of what they were missing. Meanwhile, the brand-new Iraqi parliament met in a capital under curfew to pull together some kind of future amid warnings of civil war. U.S. forces launched Operation Swarmer, the biggest air assault since the invasion, to root out insurgents north of Baghdad. President Bush embraced realism: "We will see more images of chaos and carnage in the days and months to come," he warned as he argued why that was a price worth paying.
This war has brought division from the start, not just among but also within us. In between those who were always against the war and those who are still for it lie the shifting ambivalents who want this whole massive gamble to work but increasingly fear that it won't. Among the more ardent critics these days are pundits and policymakers who favored the strategy three years ago, even helped shape it, and are now doing a kind of public penance for their failure of foresight. Defense hawk Richard Perle, for example, has declared that the U.S. got the war right and the postwar wrong.
There has been a pattern for modern American wars going back to Korea: broad public support at the outset, growing concern as casualties rise or progress stalls and then a new resolutioneither do what it takes to win or get us out. In Vietnam, nine years passed after the first U.S. servicemen were killed and more than 20,000 others died before a majority of Americans concluded we were on the wrong course. Opinion swung more quickly this time, as the cost-benefit analysis changed. When the weapons of mass destruction (WMD) weren't found and the Saddam-9/11 connection was discredited, the sense of urgent threat receded. However generous and idealistic Americans may be, a half-a-trillion-dollar nation-building venture is a harder case to make.
So support for the war thickens and thins as events unfold. While polls showed that 68% of Americans were in favor of the invasion three years ago, that figure fell as what looked like a quick victory stalled, rose when Saddam was pulled from his spider hole, sank with the sickening pictures from Abu Ghraib, but then rose a bit again as Iraqis defied threats and went to the polls, setting an example for a region where free elections are about as common as leprechauns. In recent weeks the bombing of a Shi'ite shrine, the bodies dumped in shallow graves, the girls blown up on the way to school, the dwindling faith not in U.S. abilities and intentions but in Iraq'sall drove down support for the war again.
So was it worth it?
In a Gallup poll last week, 60% of those surveyed said no. In the pages that follow, a diverse and international group of thinkers give their opinions. Many people approached by TIME refused to answer. Perhaps they share the view expressed last week in Sydney by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice: "I think the outcome, the judgment, of all of this needs to await history."
WILLIAM F. BUCKLEY JR. No. Emphatically no. Were we wrong to undertake what we did? The objectives were sound, but our reach proved insufficient to realize them.
> Buckley is a conservative author and syndicated columnist
TOMMY FRANKS Yes. America remains very proud of and very thankful to our sons and daughters serving in Iraq and around the world in the cause of freedom. The events of 9/11 taught us a valuable lesson: ignoring terrorism will not make the problem go away. The sacrifices of our military members and their families are giving Iraqis a chance for freedom. And a free Iraq serves not only Iraqis. It will stand as a model in the Middle East, a model that represents to millions of people that there is an alternative to terrorism.
> As chief of U.S. Central Command, General Franks, now retired, oversaw the invasion of Iraq
FRANCIS FUKUYAMA I believe that the balance sheet for the war at this moment is quite negative. The war foreclosed the possibility of Saddam restarting his WMD programs and replaced his dictatorship with Iraq's new democracy--both real gains. Balanced against these gains are costs that go well beyond the direct human and financial ones. The occupation of Iraq has served as a tremendous stimulus for Arab and Muslim anti-Americanism and thus has made radical Islamist terrorism significantly worse than it would otherwise be. America's reputation around the world has taken a huge hit among ordinary people who are now more likely to associate our democracy with scenes of prisoner abuse than with the Statue of Liberty. We, of course, do not know what the future will bring, but the upside potential of Iraq's post-Saddam order looks more and more limited. The central state will remain weak for years to come, and where the Shi'ite parties have established their rule, we get not a liberal democracy but an Iranian-style rule by clerics.
> Fukuyama is a professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and the author of America at the Crossroads: Democracy, Power, and the Neoconservative Legacy
HISHAM KASSEM Sadly, I have to say yes. It is difficult to commend such a bloody scene. But it achieved something useful. Parallel to the chaos and bloodshed, there is a political process evolving in Iraq. Bloodshed is the price of the transition from Saddam's psychopathic dictatorship. The losses would have been higher had Saddam stayed on. You could easily see that regime lasting another 30 years, under his sons and top generals. Negotiating with Iraq was not an option. There had to be a military intervention. You have a bloc of 22 countries in the Arab world dominated by authoritarianism and dictatorship. It is not a bloc you could engage politically and pressure for reform. By military intervention, the U.S. is able to pressure the region into adopting the reforms we are beginning to see across the region that might avert many countries from becoming failed states. The world cannot put up with state failure in the backyard of the world's oil fields, Israel and Europe.
> Democracy activist Kassem is vice chairman of the Egyptian daily newspaper Al-Masry al-Youm
Three years into the Iraq war, TIME posed the question to a wide array of experts and thinkers. The answers may surprise you
Mar. 27, 2006
Was it worth it, of course, is only one of the questions. What were the alternatives? What could have been done differently? Are things getting better or worse? And however we got here, what do we do now?
As the Iraq war's third anniversary approached, the news fed both doubts and hopes. Saddam Hussein took the stand in his trial for the first time, reminding people of what they were missing. Meanwhile, the brand-new Iraqi parliament met in a capital under curfew to pull together some kind of future amid warnings of civil war. U.S. forces launched Operation Swarmer, the biggest air assault since the invasion, to root out insurgents north of Baghdad. President Bush embraced realism: "We will see more images of chaos and carnage in the days and months to come," he warned as he argued why that was a price worth paying.
This war has brought division from the start, not just among but also within us. In between those who were always against the war and those who are still for it lie the shifting ambivalents who want this whole massive gamble to work but increasingly fear that it won't. Among the more ardent critics these days are pundits and policymakers who favored the strategy three years ago, even helped shape it, and are now doing a kind of public penance for their failure of foresight. Defense hawk Richard Perle, for example, has declared that the U.S. got the war right and the postwar wrong.
There has been a pattern for modern American wars going back to Korea: broad public support at the outset, growing concern as casualties rise or progress stalls and then a new resolutioneither do what it takes to win or get us out. In Vietnam, nine years passed after the first U.S. servicemen were killed and more than 20,000 others died before a majority of Americans concluded we were on the wrong course. Opinion swung more quickly this time, as the cost-benefit analysis changed. When the weapons of mass destruction (WMD) weren't found and the Saddam-9/11 connection was discredited, the sense of urgent threat receded. However generous and idealistic Americans may be, a half-a-trillion-dollar nation-building venture is a harder case to make.
So support for the war thickens and thins as events unfold. While polls showed that 68% of Americans were in favor of the invasion three years ago, that figure fell as what looked like a quick victory stalled, rose when Saddam was pulled from his spider hole, sank with the sickening pictures from Abu Ghraib, but then rose a bit again as Iraqis defied threats and went to the polls, setting an example for a region where free elections are about as common as leprechauns. In recent weeks the bombing of a Shi'ite shrine, the bodies dumped in shallow graves, the girls blown up on the way to school, the dwindling faith not in U.S. abilities and intentions but in Iraq'sall drove down support for the war again.
So was it worth it?
In a Gallup poll last week, 60% of those surveyed said no. In the pages that follow, a diverse and international group of thinkers give their opinions. Many people approached by TIME refused to answer. Perhaps they share the view expressed last week in Sydney by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice: "I think the outcome, the judgment, of all of this needs to await history."
WILLIAM F. BUCKLEY JR. No. Emphatically no. Were we wrong to undertake what we did? The objectives were sound, but our reach proved insufficient to realize them.
> Buckley is a conservative author and syndicated columnist
TOMMY FRANKS Yes. America remains very proud of and very thankful to our sons and daughters serving in Iraq and around the world in the cause of freedom. The events of 9/11 taught us a valuable lesson: ignoring terrorism will not make the problem go away. The sacrifices of our military members and their families are giving Iraqis a chance for freedom. And a free Iraq serves not only Iraqis. It will stand as a model in the Middle East, a model that represents to millions of people that there is an alternative to terrorism.
> As chief of U.S. Central Command, General Franks, now retired, oversaw the invasion of Iraq
FRANCIS FUKUYAMA I believe that the balance sheet for the war at this moment is quite negative. The war foreclosed the possibility of Saddam restarting his WMD programs and replaced his dictatorship with Iraq's new democracy--both real gains. Balanced against these gains are costs that go well beyond the direct human and financial ones. The occupation of Iraq has served as a tremendous stimulus for Arab and Muslim anti-Americanism and thus has made radical Islamist terrorism significantly worse than it would otherwise be. America's reputation around the world has taken a huge hit among ordinary people who are now more likely to associate our democracy with scenes of prisoner abuse than with the Statue of Liberty. We, of course, do not know what the future will bring, but the upside potential of Iraq's post-Saddam order looks more and more limited. The central state will remain weak for years to come, and where the Shi'ite parties have established their rule, we get not a liberal democracy but an Iranian-style rule by clerics.
> Fukuyama is a professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and the author of America at the Crossroads: Democracy, Power, and the Neoconservative Legacy
HISHAM KASSEM Sadly, I have to say yes. It is difficult to commend such a bloody scene. But it achieved something useful. Parallel to the chaos and bloodshed, there is a political process evolving in Iraq. Bloodshed is the price of the transition from Saddam's psychopathic dictatorship. The losses would have been higher had Saddam stayed on. You could easily see that regime lasting another 30 years, under his sons and top generals. Negotiating with Iraq was not an option. There had to be a military intervention. You have a bloc of 22 countries in the Arab world dominated by authoritarianism and dictatorship. It is not a bloc you could engage politically and pressure for reform. By military intervention, the U.S. is able to pressure the region into adopting the reforms we are beginning to see across the region that might avert many countries from becoming failed states. The world cannot put up with state failure in the backyard of the world's oil fields, Israel and Europe.
> Democracy activist Kassem is vice chairman of the Egyptian daily newspaper Al-Masry al-Youm