WASHINGTON, 1 April 2003 — The first 11 days of the war have brought back with a vengeance the deep splits that have long existed within the Bush administration and the Republican Party over policy toward Iraq.
Already there is a behind-the-scenes effort by former senior Republican government officials and party leaders to convince the president that the advice he has received from Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz — a powerful triumvirate frequently at odds with Secretary of State Colin Powell — has been wrong and even dangerous to long-term US national interests.
Citing past public statements by Cheney and others about the prospective ease with which the Iraq war could be won and the warm welcome US forces would receive from the Iraqi people, one former GOP appointee said he and his allies were looking at “whether this president has learned something from this bum advice he has been getting.’’
Other Republicans and Bush administration officials, some close to Powell, also expressed concern that the Iraq war plan, with its “rolling start’’ using a relatively small force, was based on faulty assumptions that the Iraqi government would quickly collapse. And some officials, especially in the State Department, fear that postwar diplomacy, if handled poorly, could further estrange the nation from allies and international institutions.
President Bush, who appears to value tension among his top advisers, “has been very Delphic on this and hard to read’’ on the emerging internal debate, a Bush adviser said.
Powell has stressed his support for the war plan, and those operating behind the scenes said they were acting without Powell’s blessing. Indeed, among this group, there is criticism of Powell for failing to combat some of the assumptions about the war with Iraq more forcefully. “Powell won’t pick up the fight and won’t represent State Department professionals who are appalled by what is about to happen,’’ a former party official said.
Administration officials officially insist there is unity among Bush’s senior national security advisers. But they also acknowledge that within this administration, disputes among senior Cabinet officials are never really settled. With war now under way, the stakes in the debate over Iraq are now much higher, affecting not only the course of the conflict but the world’s acceptance of the US invasion and its aftermath.
Officials dismissed complaints about the war’s progress as premature. They said that Bush’s entire national security team agreed to the plan, which in little over a week has resulted in control over nearly half the country, troops 50 miles from Baghdad and the initial delivery of humanitarian supplies. During a Saturday teleconference with his senior advisers, Bush endorsed Rumsfeld’s desire to prepare for an advance on the Republican Guard around Baghdad.
“The president has demonstrated strong leadership and has the unified support of his whole team,’’ a senior defense official said. “My concern about this sort of gossip is that it is very important to maintain the unity of this effort. It is not a time to get weak in the knees.’’ The official added that any suggestion of division in administration “plays into the hands of Baghdad’s propaganda.’’ A spokeswoman for Cheney declined comment.
Powell distanced himself from those questioning the war plan and the administration’s unity. “I was briefed regularly on the plan as it was developed,’’ he said Sunday. “I have full confidence in the plan and in the commanders executing it.’’
A subtext of the debate, expressed by people sympathetic to Powell, is that the secretary of state more closely reflects the internationalism of Bush’s father, who as president 12 years ago assembled a broad military coalition to oust Iraq from Kuwait. Indeed, the former president, in an interview published this week in Newsweek, twice defended Powell without prompting.
