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|  | DECEMBER 16, 2003
By Stan Crock Saddam's End, Bush's New Start The President now has greater freedom to reshape his Iraq strategy, mold that country's future, and ease tensions with Europe The looming specter that the elusive Saddam Hussein somehow, some way, might return to power had cast a pall over the Bush Administration's Iraq operation for months, especially among the Iraqis themselves. But with the former strongman's capture on Dec. 13, the cloud has dissipated. And that gives the White House a phenomenal opportunity to revive its flagging campaign. Washington already has adopted some needed changes in its strategy. It was no accident that the military found Saddam after it decided to crack down on the Sunni area around Tikrit, the heart of his political base. Now U.S. troops and intelligence operatives need to tighten the noose further to nab the operational heads who plan the attacks on coalition forces and their domestic supporters (see BW Online, 11/6/03, "How to Avoid the Vietnamization of Iraq"). Bush & Co. also switched gears and established a timetable for handing over authority to the Iraqis. That's slated to occur this summer. If the security situation improves, and parties have a chance to organize and publicize their platforms, the timing might work out well. Under the rosiest of scenarios, ample progress would have been made on the infrastructure and economy, and preexisting groups would not be the only political machines with clout. A robust and healthy quest for power is a real possibility. But many other issues remain unresolved. Here are just a few: Saddam's Trial. The U.S. shouldn't engage in unseemly forum-shopping for a court with the death penalty, as the Justice Dept. did in the Washington-area sniper case. The Administration would like to avoid the International Court at The Hague because it can't impose the death penalty. The U.S. has the right idea for the wrong reason. I would avoid The Hague, too, but I would do it because it's important for the Iraqis to come to terms with their former leader and his abuses. Giving Iraqis control over the trial would be an important vote of confidence in and test of the new government and its commitment to the rule of law. Justice for the Iraqis' former leader should be left in their hands, with whatever punishment existing Iraqi law permits if Saddam is found guilty. Just as important, Washington should back a reconciliation process modeled on South Africa's. There, the government appointed a panel that thoroughly probed the abuses of the apartheid regime in Pretoria. A similar commission in Baghdad could investigate Iraqi government officials beyond Saddam. Internationalization. Mending strained relations with some of America's most important allies and forging more international cooperation for Iraqi reconstruction got a big boost Dec. 15 when both France and Russia said they would consider restructuring or forgiving portions of Iraq's mountain of foreign debt. Paris and Moscow made their moves in the face of what appeared to be a vindictive Pentagon policy of excluding noncoalition members from more than $18 billion of U.S. reconstruction contracts. President Bush reiterated on Dec. 15 that U.S. taxpayers believed that those who didn't cooperate shouldn't get contracts. He's probably right. Now, the Bush team should try to make it easier for foreign countries to cooperate by expanding the definition of cooperation to include debt forgiveness. Both sides can win on this easily. For the Europeans to forgive debt that they would never collect anyway should be easy -- and may explain why Paris and Moscow are so willing to discuss it. At the same time, the Bush Administration can claim its hard-line policy on contracts prompted other capitals to get in line. In fact, the contract policy by its terms was designed as much to expand the list of eligible countries by prodding them to cooperate as it was to exclude the recalcitrant. Troop Withdrawal. The security situation must dictate whether Saddam's capture leads to an early pullback of U.S. troops. It's far from clear that the violence will stop any time soon, so it's prudent to assume American forces will remain in Iraq for a while. If the bombings abate, however, more foreign countries might be induced to send in forces, especially if Washington plays its cards right, thus easing the burden on American forces. While apprehending Saddam was a significant event -- at the very least for domestic political reasons in both Iraq and the U.S. -- it's not clear what real difference it will make on the ground in the short term. But for the long haul, the search for the despot no longer will consume the time, effort, and manpower that have been devoted to it for months. If those resources now are shifted to Iraq's politics and economy, that by itself will be an important result of finding that spider hole in the ground. Now it's up to the Bush team to capitalize on that discovery.  Crock covers national security and foreign affairs for BusinessWeek from Washington. Follow his views in Affairs of State twice a month, only on BusinessWeek Online Edited by Beth Belton Get BusinessWeek directly on your desktop with our RSS feeds.  Add BusinessWeek news to your Web site with our headline feed. Click to buy an e-print or reprint of a BusinessWeek or BusinessWeek Online story or video. To subscribe online to BusinessWeek magazine, please click here. Learn more, go to the BusinessWeekOnline home page  | | |
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