■"Bush and Kerry Clash Over Iraq in Debate: Both Men Link U.S. Security to the War," by Richard W. Stevenson, New York Times, 1 October 2004, p. A1.
■"The Contrasts: Two Messages, Hope and Fear," by James Bennet, New York Times, 1 October 2004, p. A1.
■"U.S. Pressures Rich Nations to Fill Gap in Iraq Reconstruction Created by Security Needs," by Steven R. Weisman, New York Times, 1 October 2004, p. A6.
Kerry said the right things last night (e.g., the White House "rushed to war in Iraq without a plan to win the peace," "We can win in Iraq, but I don't believe this president can."), but Bush sounded the right mix of steadfastness and optimism.
What's so weird about this exchange is that it's Kerry who's in the scaring business in order to win votes and it's Bush who's in the Pollyanna business in order to keep votes. Usually it's the other way around with the Dem and GOP, but such is the state of this election.
Where Kerry scores well, though, is in pointing out Bush's unwillingness to see the reality on the ground and link it to our poor relations with allies. That's what the third story above is all about. Our allies are very reluctant to spend more on the reconstruction for Iraq primarily because we're botching the security side of the equation and they fear the money will be siphoned off from infrastructure projects to pay for security needs.
So much for unilateralism. As my Dad always said, "You're not exactly in charge if I'm the guy paying for it." Powell got fellow Core states to promise $13B a year ago, but only $1.3 B has been delivered so far. Like it or not, but that's the rest of the Core voting with their wallets on our performance to date in the back-half effort in Iraq. In effect, we wrote a check with our Leviathan force that we can't cash on the basis of our Sys Admin force's performance to date:
"There is some real work being done in Iraq," said an official from an international donor agency. "But it adds up to very little. It's hard to get countries to pony up more money when the money in the bank hasn't been spent."
That's the real failure of this occupation: not achieving enough security and reconstruction success on the ground since "Mission Accomplished" to lure the rest of the Core into helping us out in what will obviously (and was always obviously going to) be a long-term effort in Iraq. Our Leviathan force won the war, but our Sys Admin force (as currently underfunded, underprioritized and unfortunately under-the-gun in Iraq) is losing the peace.
That's what Kerry needs to stress more: I can make the peace turn out okay, and Bush doesn’t seem either able or willing to cut those deals with the players currently missing from our coalition—like Russia, India and China.
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