The Petraeus Hearings faced a critical turning point in a line of questioning from the well-respected Republican Senator John Warner of Virginia on whether the strategy in Iraq will “make America safer.” General Petraeus responded, “I don’t know,” followed by an honest appraisal of the limits of his authority in Iraq. As Spencer Ackerman notes, “This is the first time that any general officer, let alone the commanding general in Iraq, has ever equivocated on whether success in Iraq will contribute to U.S. security.” Petraeus may be limited in scope to dealing with Iraq and not the larger war on terror, but surely you’d think he would believe that the success of his mission would contribute to the betterment of American national security. A simple “Yes” would have been entirely predictable as Petraeus could easily reel off the latest Administration line on the centrality of Iraq to the War on Terror.
But that didn’t happen. Either Petraeus really isn’t confident in the long-term mission of Iraq – and I think that’s a real possibility as I generally think he’s a smarter and more honest man than some of his somewhat misleading slides suggest – or he’s slinking into the role of hyper-bureaucrat who never thinks about the larger mission. I doubt the latter is true. Note that Petraeus’ follow-up remarks indicate serious concern regarding the state of the military and ability to handle other threats. He clearly knows that, even if his plan is allowed to continue well into next year and he were to see substantial gains in security, the benefits for American national security are nebulous at best. This is a rather stunning admission.
I think this moment will prove to be a turning point in these hearings. Liberal bloggers have certainly picked up on its importance, from TPM Muckraker (cited above) to Daily Kos to Joe Sudbay at Americablog. Undoubtedly, the major news media will pick up on this exchange in the next day or two, especially as the White House tries to build off of the testimony.
The reason this exchange matters is because it cuts to the heart of why we are in Iraq. Nearly everybody agrees that any program of withdrawal will come with serious costs – especially for the Iraqi people (and the Sunnis in particular). But the debate over the future of Iraq does not take place in a vacuum. We must weigh the opportunity costs of staying in Iraq with those of leaving. If the commanding general in charge of the overall mission in Iraq has public doubts about whether the opportunity costs of staying are lower for American national security (not just for Iraqi security, which he is more unambiguous on) than they are for leaving, then it is high time for Senators and Representatives from both parties to start asking: what do we really gain from being there? On this anniversary of 9/11, the least we can do is ask whether or not the major policy action purportedly taken in response to the terrorist attacks on New York and the Pentagon are, in fact, making America safer. General Petraeus’ testimony today casts major doubt on that critical score. I suspect we’ll hear more doubts from other erstwhile supporters of the war in the near future too.