I have been thinking more about the previous post and have some more ideas on the question of how  we will know if Iraq is a "failure."   The more common approach is to analyze under what conditions Iraq might prove to be a success; but I think there is some merit in reversing the issue: by defining failure, we will have a better basis upon which to draw lessons from Iraq for future foreign policy.

     Let’s think comparatively for a moment.  In Vietnam, the definition of failure was straightforward: if the Communists won, we lost.  They did and we did.  In World War I, the situation was more complex.  Was that war a success?  In military terms (defeat Germany) it may have been, but in political terms is was not.  It failed because it began a process that contributed to the outbreak of world war again after only twenty years.   That failure was defined by both the overly harsh financial terms imposed on Germany, and the political-cultural malaise the wanton killing of Verdun and the Somme engendered among the people and political elites of France and Britain (yes, I am drawing on E.H. Carr here).   

     Thinking in these terms, the current Iraq war may have more in common with WWI than with Vietnam: failure may well be defined in terms of a somewhat longer-term political process unleashed by the actual fighting. 

 But let’s think a bit more concretely for a moment.
One, rather grisly, definition of failure is the body count.
What was the average annual number of political deaths of Iraqis under
Saddam Hussein?  10,000?  20,000?  Obviously the number varies from
year to year but perhaps some average or median could be determined.
Now, how many deaths have been caused by all the violence in Iraq since
the US invasion?  This would include deaths directly caused by US fire
and deaths caused by all the terrorist violence in that same time –
because none of that terrorist violence existed before the US
invasion.  Yes, I know, Saddam was horrible and killed many people.
But many of the people who have died after the US invasion may not have
died under Saddam.  They died as a result of a political process (i.e.
breakdown of central state authority and disintegration of domestic
security) created in the aftermath of the US invasion.  If the US had
not invaded, these people would not have died.  So, I think we have to
count their deaths as part of the definition of US failure.   

     If we had
precise numbers, which I suspect we do not (the US Defense Department
has assiduously avoided counting civilian deaths), we might then be able
to determine if the US has failed in terms of the number of people who
have died unnecessary deaths.  The numbers that do exist, whatever
their weaknesses, at Iraq Body Count and at the Lancet study, suggest that the US may have already failed, if the number of political deaths is equal to or greater than political deaths under Saddam.

     Another possible measure of failure (I am trying to avoid the wonky term "metric" that seems all the rage now) would be drawn in terms of US security interests.  If the Iraq war creates political conditions – and these are multiple (generation of more terrorists; strengthening of Iranian strategic interests; protracted Iraqi civil war; Turkish intervention against an "independent" Kurdistan) – that challenge or undermine other US interests, then we may well have a failure on our hands.  This may take longer to unfold, like the gradual effects of the settlement of WWI, but it could be more dangerous to the US.   Are we at the start of another "twenty years crisis?"

     Let me be clear – and also anticipate one right-wing counterattack to this line of thinking – I do not want any of this to happen.  I want world peace and happiness for all.  But, I have come to realize over the years that it does not matter what I want, or what any Western pundit may want.  What we need to do is think hard about what may actually happen out there, whether it is what we want or not.  And when I think about Iraq now, I think it is time we get serious about specifically defining failure so that we can learn from the many mistakes made.  To learn from an error, you first have to understand exactly how it was an error.