War in Iraq: Planning and Execution (review)

The guns are not yet silent and American soldiers can expect to spend much of their military careers rotating in and out of Iraq. The government's irrational penchant for classifying almost everything ensures that many details of this conflict will not be available for analysis for decades to come. Yet, the host of books, articles, and videos published so far on this unfinished war staggers the imagination. As a result, thanks to insiders who want to tell their stories, a substantial narrative of the causes and conduct of both America's war against Saddam Hussein and against the postwar insurgency is now part of the developing historical record. Thomas G. Mahken and Thomas A. Keaney's War in Iraq: Planning and Execution is a major contributor to this process. The editors have long careers rotating through governmental, military, and academic postings. Both contributed to the Gulf War Air Power Survey following Operation Desert Storm and both have published extensively on military, especially aviation and intelligence, topics.

The book's thirteen essays provide insider views of the planning for Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF) and the attempt to respond to the developing insurgency. Most of the authors are either serving officers or military academics from various service schools or defense-oriented think tanks. The best essays are by those who participated in the planning. For example, Major Isaiah Wilson III's introductory essay "America's anabasis" is a ringing condemnation, presented from the planner's perspective, of the process. A graduate of the School for Advanced Military Studies (SAMS), Wilson argues that the United States government got the political aim wrong. The goal should not have been the removal of Saddam Hussein, but "achieving a sustainable and legitimate quality of stability and peace in Iraq" (p. 17). In another especially powerful essay, Nora Bensahel, a political analyst at RAND, helps to explain why the "mission (was) not accomplished." Her argument is that the resulting postwar insurgency was the result of a "dysfunctional interagency process, overly optimistic assumptions, and a lack of contingency planning for alternative outcomes" (p. 129). In an important article that every officer and military educator should read, Kalev I. Sepp examines U. S. Army counterinsurgency doctrine and describes just how unprepared the service was for this kind of warfare. He indicts the Army for being so enamored with "mass and power and speed" (p. 219) that it failed to understand that the nature of insurgency has not fundamentally changed in the last century. Even more serious is his indictment that very few American officers knew anything about the nature of these wars in spite of the Army's extensive experience with this form of war. Distinguished military historian Eliot A. Cohen ties these essays together in his conclusion with a sense of déjà vu, citing the article by renowned counterinsurgency expert, Robert W. Komer, titled "Bureaucracy Does Its Thing" (p. 254).

This essay collection is an important contribution to the current Iraq War's developing narrative. It provides insight for those wishing to understand the various challenges faced by the people who mapped out military operations designed to eliminate Saddam Hussein's government but ended up by triggering civil war and confusion in the northern Persian Gulf region. A conclusion one should draw from these essays is that American military and civilian planners still do not understand that war is a continuation of politics. In the words of soldier-theorist J. F. C. Fuller: "The Object of War is not victory, but a better peace" (p. 225). Routledge should republish this book in paperback form and significantly reduce its price so it can be used by those who need to study how not to go to war.