In the first insider account of Pentagon decision-making on Iraq, one of the key architects of the war blasts former Secretary of State Colin Powell, the CIA, retired Gen. Tommy Franks and former Iraq occupation chief Paul Bremer for mishandling the run-up to invasion and the subsequent occupation of the country.
Douglas Feith, in a massive score-settling work, portrays an intelligence community and State Department that repeatedly undermined plans he developed as undersecretary of defense for policy and conspired to undercut President Bush’s policies.
Among the disclosures made by Feith in “War and Decision,” scheduled for release next month by HarperCollins, is Bush’s declaration, at a Dec. 18, 2002, National Security Council meeting, that “war is inevitable.” The statement came weeks before UN weapons inspectors reported their initial findings on Iraq and months before Bush delivered an ultimatum to Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. Feith, who says he took notes at the meeting, registered it as a “momentous comment.”
A copy of the nearly 900-page manuscript — midway through the editing process — was obtained by The Washington Post. Reached at his home Saturday evening, Feith declined to discuss its contents.
Although Feith acknowledges “serious errors” in intelligence, policy and operational plans surrounding the invasion, he blames them on others outside the Pentagon and notes that “even the best planning” cannot avoid all problems in wartime. While he says the decision to invade was correct, he judges that the task of creating a viable and stable Iraqi government was poorly executed and remains “grimly incomplete.”
Powell, Feith argues, allowed himself to be publicly portrayed as a dove, but while he “downplayed” the degree and urgency of Iraq’s threat he never expressed opposition to the invasion. Bremer, meanwhile, is said to have done more harm than good in Iraq. Feith also accuses Franks of being uninterested in postwar planning and writes that Condoleezza Rice, Bush’s national security adviser during most of Feith’s time in office, failed in coordinating policy on the war.
He describes Bush as having wrestled seriously with difficult problems but being ill-served by subordinates, including Powell and Rice. Feith depicts former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld with almost complete admiration, questioning only his handling of subordinates.
Feith says that Franks, who commanded the U.S. invasion force, treated him disrespectfully, sometimes rolling his eyes when Feith asked a question. But he indicates that Franks’ disregard grew partly out the general’s lack of interest in planning for the postwar period. When Feith tried to talk to him about one aspect of that, Franks leaned over and said, “Doug, I don’t have time for this [expletive].” He concludes that Franks failed in part because of advice he received from his advisers at the CIA and State Department.
Feith left the administration in mid-2005 and is now on the Georgetown University faculty. He was investigated early last year by the Pentagon’s inspector general for his office’s secret prewar intelligence assessments outlining strong ties between Iraq and Al Qaeda. His reports, deemed “inconsistent” with the intelligence community’s, were judged “inappropriate” but not illegal.
