The Independent interviews former head of U.S. Central Command.
THE INDEPENDENT: What core criteria should govern US foreign policy?
ZINNI: Well, I think we ought to think in terms of a very changed world from what we knew toward the end of last century.
The fall of the Soviet Union, the rise of globalization, the rise of new powers; things that we’re seeing now happening in terms of the environment, the migrations of people. I think there’s a whole set of things probably over the last maybe two decades that have changed the way the world does business.
I think we’re still operating as if it were the Cold War era in many ways, and we haven’t adjusted to this new environment and understood it very well. And I think we have to think of ourselves on a very shrunken planet where there is more interdependence than independence in the way we do business, whether it’s economically, politically, and make decisions. So I think the core thing is, how do you build partnerships and alliances, and work together, either on an international basis or a regional basis? I think that’s the most important thing for the next president.
THE INDEPENDENT: Do you consider Iraq to be in the midst of a civil war?
ZINNI: I think that they probably went through something akin to a civil war. I think they probably reached a point where they don’t want this to degrade to the point where it is a full scale civil war.
I think they’re struggling with that; I think they’re on the edge. If the government is able to get the issues of reconciliation, revenue sharing, local governance versus. federal governance sorted out as we had hoped they would during this surge, but if they’re able to get that sorted out, I think you can avoid a full scale civil war.
I think the ethnic and religious differences present a problem and are going to be an issue, and unless they deal with those and engage more in forms of conflict resolution and resolve some of these issues, the danger’s going to be there for a while. Some things have happened that are unfortunate.
There’s been a lot of ethnic cleansing of areas, so maybe the areas are more defined now and less integrated at places that might’ve been friction points. Except for maybe Baghdad and a couple places like that.
So, I guess the short answer is, they dipped into a minor civil war; I think they’re kind of out of it and on the edge, but I think mentality is that they don’t want to see themselves into a full scale civil war, and want to find ways to resolve their differences and come out of that.
THE INDEPENDENT: The Iraqi Parliament recently passed legislation addressing de-Baathification. Do you see this as real progress, or what’s your view on that?
ZINNI: Yeah, I thought going in that one of the things we should have insisted on was a reconciliation program. The de-Baathification program that we condoned or sponsored or at least supported was a mistake, because de-Baathification equals anti-Sunni in the minds of Sunnis, and I don’t think we understood that. And so when we advocated de-Baathification, we alienated a major group who felt they were going to be held accountable for Saddam’s faults, and it was deliberately against their religious sect.
So this move now, finally, it’s very late, but this approach to reconciliation I think is critical. It has to be more than just a law, though. They really have to get down and do a lot of work, I think even at the neighborhood level on conflict resolution issues and working cross-communication and rebuilding confidence and trust.
THE INDEPENDENT: What do you think a withdrawal time might look like, and what do you think of the various plans to withdraw?
ZINNI: I don’t think we’re going to see — if withdrawal means there’s not an American boot on the ground, then I don’t think you’re going to see that for quite a while. You’re going to see a presence there that will continue security assistance to the Iraqi Security forces, will continue to train, organize, equip.
I think we will be there on and off to conduct exercises with them. I think you’ll see a military and security presence to protect our embassy and other things there. I think we’ll be postured in the region, maybe even in Iraq, with some kind of force to react if there’s an al-Qaida presence that we determine is there that’s trying to set up a base of operations that could threaten the region or our interests in the region or our embassies and other things in the region. I think in terms of major combat forces, you will probably see a draw-down over a year or two, but I think for quite a while you’re going to see a military presence and a military to military relationship that will be built up.
THE INDEPENDENT: Which presidential candidate would you say has the Iraq plans that are closest to your own views on what should happen?
ZINNI: Well, I mean, I don’t know — I haven’t seen any plans as such from those. I’ve talked to most of the candidates; they’ve asked my views on Iraq, and I’ve given them to them on how it should be structured there in terms of the future.
I think all of them foresee, or will find out once they’re in office, the need to maintain a relationship — a security relationship. I would hope they see, and I haven’t heard any of them talk about this, [is] a need to build a security alliance or arrangement in the region which Iraq would be a part of; I think that’s critical. I haven’t heard any candidate specifically outline an Iraq plan in terms of how this would evolve over the next five, ten years, and what our objectives would be in terms of Iraqi security forces, our presence in the region, our involvement with them in a relationship, their involvement with others in the region and how we would build that, and that’s what I would hope to hear, but I haven’t heard any of the candidates specifically address that.
THE INDEPENDENT: Do you think that’s because it could become a political liability, or something like that?
ZINNI: I guess most of them want to talk in general terms about it because you could get pinned down, and I think they’re going to find once they get into the Oval Office, whoever gets in there, he or she, is going to find that there’s a lot to learn about not just Iraq, and that you can’t look at Iraq in isolation; you have to look at it in a regional context, and that changes the light. You can’t just look at specifically Iraq and either being there or withdrawing in those kind of absolute terms. And I think that their approach to Iraq will be shaped as they become more aware and have a greater depth of understanding.
That’s not to say that they’re not interested, but they’re interested in a lot of things now. As I said, I talked to the candidates, they asked my views, but they’re asking views about a lot of issues as they have to when they campaign, so maybe the depth isn’t quite there for them yet, which I think is natural, because unless you’re in the executive branch making those decisions, getting those briefs, involved deeply in the design of the strategy, you don’t really have that understanding.
THE INDEPENDENT: There have been several retired generals and military officials who have been critical of the execution of the war, but that often doesn’t seem to be reflected in the statements of active personnel. What do you think?
ZINNI: Well, I think, active duty personnel are trying to execute their mission the best they can. Trying to succeed. Whether they agree with the strategy or not, their job is their piece of the action. If the strategy is wrong, then perhaps if they execute well, it could lead to success despite maybe the wrong direction. My own personal experience in Vietnam, I know we felt that way. We felt the strategy was wrong, but we had to sort of believe that if we did our job on the ground, worked hard, did our piece better, then the series of tactical successes would overcome the lack of the best strategic design.
But inside the military, you’re focused on your mission and what you have to do. I think they don’t criticize because they have to appear loyal to civilian leadership, and that’s ingrained in them; and everything they do, they want to execute as best they can. So, though they may have these feelings, they understand clearly what their part of this is and they stay focused on it. My son’s in Iraq and I know he approaches it the way I approached it when I was in Vietnam.
THE INDEPENDENT: Two months ago, you said that you thought al-Qaida might be responsible for the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. Do you think the US could be combating al-Qaida more effectively?
ZINNI: I think we could if we took a different view of al–Qaida. We take a very, I think, effective view at the tactical level. We focused on taking down cells, killing or capturing leadership, breaking their financial networks, and doing those things. So the mechanical and tactical things is where our focus is.
I think we’ve had successes in that area. But when you look at a strategic level, and you have Osama bin Laden who’s still able to — has this endless source of angry young men willing to blow themselves up; still professes to have a movement or ideology that spans the entire Islamic world; is able to preach freely an aberrant form Islam; it leads me to believe we haven’t really touched the organization at a strategic level.
I think our distraction in Iraq really bled us off from bringing the war home to al-Qaida in their backyard, in their source of sanctuary. I do think they tried to find alternative sources, and we effectively cut it off. I think they were trying to move into East Africa and Somalia and elsewhere. Ethiopians and others sort of halted that.
I do think now, implied in your question about Benazir Bhutto, that they see Pakistan as the real next battle ground, and you’re going to see al-Qaida become much more active inside Pakistan. It’s fertile ground, and we’ve got to think through, and we haven’t done a good job, how we approach strategically and how we deal with this and how we work with it.
It’s compounded by the problems of Pakistani politics and other things that go on in the region.
So, I would say, I give us an A+ on tactics, I give us a C maybe operationally dealing with it, and I would give us an F strategically in how we deal with al-Qaida and think about terrorism.
We declared war on a tactic, the “Global War on Terrorism,” and that’s not really — if you declare war on a tactic, you think and act tactically. You have to have a strategic aim or desire or objective here. And to my mind it should be those angry young men. The sources of their anger are either political, economic, or social conditions that lead them that way. Most of the suicide bombers come from secular backgrounds — even fairly well-educated backgrounds, as we saw in 9/11— and I think we need to engage with the rest of the world in changing those conditions or effecting them in some way, rather than just trying to win this from the bottom up.
THE INDEPENDENT: Thank you, General.