Foreign Policy

Washington Post foreign policy reporter Peter Slevin comes to the Web to discuss the latest developments in U.S. foreign policy -- from the State Department to the frontlines in Iraq, join Slevin every Thursday to discuss the diverse factors that shape U.S. foreign policy and how it impacts our lives and the world.

Editor's Note: Washingtonpost.com moderators retain editorial control over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.

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Peter Slevin: Hello. Let's get started.

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Lakeland, Fla: If the situation weren't so serious and tragic, our Iraq policy would read like a script to a Monty Python movie. How can the administration make the decision to turn over power in Iraq on June 30 without knowing who or what will be receiving that power? Presumably we are not directly involved in choosing the individuals to take over, and to this day Mr. Brahimi has not completed his work. Am I missing something, or is this crazy?

Peter Slevin: You probably saw that the preferred choice for prime minister said he'd rather do something else. And the reports that the Kurds have been insisting on more cabinet posts in return for an agreement to accept one of the vice presidencies.

Yes, this is going to be a difficult government to put together; its role and responsibilities remain unclear; and time is growing short.

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Raleigh, N.C.: How is the Bush administration's latest U.N. plan faring thus far?

Peter Slevin: The early reaction was not promising for the White House.

Several of the most influential members of the U.N. Security Council are objecting to significant portions of the resolution. It would seem the Bush administration did not have its ducks in a row before it went north.

An important issue will be the power of the incoming interim government and its relationship to U.S.-led military forces, whose commanders are certain to have strong ideas about how to deliver security to a still chaotic situation.

Other countries are not as confident as the Bush administration that giving the U.S. military a virtually free hand is a wise move. Yet the Pentagon, understandably, does not want its own hand weakened or its command to be shared in anyway.

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Silver Spring, Md.: Is the Brahimi mission in trouble? Nobody seems to know who the new Iraqi government will be, the U.S. resolution submitted to the U.N. is being criticized, and even the U.S.-appointed Governing Council is attacking the U.S. for not being willing to give Iraqis enough sovereignty after June 30. This doesn't exactly encourage new Iraqi leaders to step up to the plate. Is there a chance of a new beginning after June 30, or is the post-June 30 situation there likely to be no different than the present?

Peter Slevin: Lakhdar Brahimi has his work cut out for him. The effort to stitch together a workable solution will demand every bit of the wisdom he has accumulated in a career of diplomatic troubleshooting.

You're right, I think, to focus on the question of a new beginning. That's what seems most needed in Iraq -- a change of direction, some fresh thinking, a measure of hope.

It would have been easier to deliver last fall, say, when the summer already had not gone well for the U.S.-run Coalition Provisional Authority, but the insurgency as we now know it was in its infancy.

At that moment, the same Security Council members now objecting to the U.S. proposal were calling on the White House to relinquish more control in return for greater support and involvement from abroad.

The administration had a choice, and it chose control. In many ways, the White House faces a similar choice: How much authority to give the Iraqis.

An added question now is who, if anyone, can quell the insurgency and build a measure of confidence. Another task that has only become more difficult.

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Fresno, Calif.: Peter - Colin Powell appararently remains one of the most (if not the most) respected public figures in America. Can you explain his continued presence in an administration where he has alternatively been used as a figurehead to help Bush get elected, as his stooge at the U.N., and otherwise marginalized by the neocons and other ideologues in the administration? Is it pure soldierly loyalty to the person who chose him to serve? Do you agree that Powell will almost certainly leave the Bush administration if it runs another four years? If so, any idea whom Bush would select to replace him? Thanks

Peter Slevin: Secretary Powell has become an enigma to many people. When you study him in this, the most tumultuous period of his career, it's possible to see him in any number of ways.

Some on the right see Powell as someone trying to have it both ways: A loyal supporter of the president who nevertheless dished about his frustrations to Bob Woodward.

Some on the left see him as an ally who recognized the folly of the Iraq war as the White House and Pentagon fought it, but failed to follow through on his convictions.

Powell, in my view, was troubled less by the decision to go to war than by the way President Bush chose to go about it. Both in failing to build a coalition and in delivering the job of postwar planning and reconstruction to a greatly unprepared Pentagon.

Powell's approach was to give his president his best advice, await a decision and soldier on. I don't think he will return for a second term, though I wouldn't rule out the idea that he would take over the Defense Department, just as George C. Marshall, one of the people in history Powell most admires, did.

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washingtonpost.com: Serving Notice at the State Department, (Post, Nov. 12, 2003)

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Bethesda, Md.: Can the Fallujah compromise accurately be described as a defeat for the U.S.?

Peter Slevin: Too soon to tell.

It's much less than the Americans sought. But I doubt U.S. authorities will stop trying to find and arrest Moqtada Sadr, nor will they take kindly to continued expeditions of the Mahdi Army.

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Portland, Ore.: Several months ago, "The Nation" reported that Chalabi was under indictment for bank fraud in Jordan. However, the Bush administration went blindly ahead using Chalabi as one of its main sources of "intelligence" for Saddam's WMD and the likely reaction of the Iraqi people to an American invasion: greeted with sweets! Now, Chalabi has fallen from grace with the Bush administrtion, and Iraq remains in chaos.

Conflicting reports flood from the media about Iraqi reaction to the occupation. What is the truth? Yankee, go home! Stay the course?

Peter Slevin: On Ahmed Chalabi, it has been well-known for years that he was convicted of bank fraud in Jordan, in absentia. He continues to deny the charges and the case never troubled his many supporters in Washington.

He took to the airwaves on Sunday and said the Iraqi National Congress guided defectors to U.S. intelligence services -- and to many other countries, according to a fine article by Bob Drogin of the Los Angeles Times.

But Chalabi said it was the responsibility of the intelligence specialists who advise the president, after all, to determine whether the defectors had anything of value to say.

He played his cards very effectively before the war, got what he most wanted -- except for a slot as interim leader of Iraq -- and isn't playing his cards badly now. He'll never make for a dull story.

As for stay or go, people I respect who are working in Iraq see no happy endings in any case, but feel the country would implode if the Americans suddenly left.

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Lyme, Conn.: The Connecticut press has reported that one of the alleged abusive prison guards in Iraq had a questionable past as a Connecticut prison guard. Has the national press been running background checks on those alleged to have been abusive, or is that too much work for news organizations?

Peter Slevin: Newspapers, in many cases led by the Post, have been doing just that. And the results have not been pretty, particularly when it comes to the two MP officers believed to have directed much of the abuse.

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New York, N.Y.: What is the real story behind the Chalabi affair? Was it just about corruption, embezzlement, etc. or is there merit to the Iran spying allegations?

Is it safe to assume that Chalabi will not be part of the new government? Or will he somehow find his way in?

Peter Slevin: Good questions all, and I don't know the answers. Stay tuned.

Ahmed Chalabi's ties to Iranian intelligence were well-known before the March 2003 invasion of Iraq. I noted it in my coverage -- not least because I found it a great measure of his skills that he could be close to Iranian intelligence and the Washington neocons simultaneously -- and I imagine others did, as well

Did those contacts cross into spying? No evidence has been made public so far. We'll just have to see.

Will be he part of the new government, or a successor government. Lakhdar Brahimi is no Chalabi fan, but I think many people have learned -- some to their chagrin -- never to count him out.

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Atlanta, Ga.: Any new news on Haiti?

Peter Slevin: Funny how Haiti dropped off the front pages -- virtually out of the paper, in fact -- so quickly. In recent days, the Bush administration announced a large package of aid as the Haitian government still struggled to cobble together functioning institutions and figure out what to do with the thugs who helped topple Aristide and want to run a new army.

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Prague, Czech Republic: The Independent (U.K.) had a story a couple of days ago on how Iran used Chalabi to get the U.S. to take care of Iraq for them.

Any comment?

Peter Slevin: An intriguing idea that has been circulating in Washington, too. It would be wonderfully diabolical to learn that Iran had funneled fraudulent information through Chalabi to help Bush administration higher-ups to build a case for war. The imagined scenes would be worthy of a novel, no matter what anyone thought of Iran, the war, the Bush administration.

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Maryland: So, if I am to understand France's position, they won't send their own troops but they want American troops to be under the control of the new government.

If France wont troops because of security concerns, how can they demand we let a new government control our troops. A compromise would be sending NATO or French troops and letting them take orders from the Iraqi's.

What is France trying to accomplish here? IT seems to me they are just trying to make headlines and ensure that no nation will replace them as the world's most obnoxious and annoying.

Peter Slevin: For more than a year, the Bush administration -- and not a few war opponents -- have been similarly frustrated with President Chirac.

To my mind, the French government, speaking broadly here, has been a decent analyst of the problems of the U.S.-led occupation of Iraq, but much less reliable in creating credible solutions.

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St. Pete Beach, Fla.: The time period after the U.S. election will provide an opportunity for a change of approach on foreign policy regardless of which party wins. What advice would you give to the incoming U.S. administration with respect to their overall foreign policy approach, and are there any specific initiatives you would suggest?

Peter Slevin: I don't know that I could be so bold. But, given that you've asked, I'd start with some basics quite apart from any specific policies. This is something that would be much more difficult to accomplish for a second Bush administration, for obvious reasons.

A new administration should made clear that it does not think it has a unique claim on solutions to the world's problems. It should work to persuade foreign governments that it wants to understand other points of view, that it intends to reach solutions in as collegial a manner as events will allow, and is yet prepared to act decisively.

A measure of humility, grounded in justifiable confidence in U.S. resources and principles, would be a good start.

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Anonymous: Haiti was on the news (public radio) just this morning, regarding the hundreds of lives lost in the floods, natural disasters after all else -- if there is a god, he's not telling.

washingtonpost.com: Toll Climbs in Haiti Floods, (Reuters)

Peter Slevin: Those floods in Jimani, D.R., and across the border in Fond Verrettes, Haiti, were heartbreaking.

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Sonoma, Calif.: There is talk (outside the administration) of setting a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq and turning security over to indigenous forces. While that idea has appeal, my fear is that those forces will be composed of men steeped in long-standing ethnic and religious rivalries who cannot be expected to become ardent nationalists overnight and that civil war may ensue. Have you an opinion on the subject?

Peter Slevin: This is one of the biggest conundrums facing the Bush administration, despite the evident eloquent simplicity of the suggestion by the president and others that Iraqis will be ready to police Iraq once large numbers are trained.

Not only are there serious concerns about the allegiances of Iraqis who don fresh uniforms, but also about the existence of militias beholden to local leaders, as my colleagues in Iraq have written -- most recently Dexter Filkins in the New York Times on Tuesday.

These militias, built along ethnic and religious lines, have tens of thousands of members and they have refused U.S. requests to disarm.

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Rockville, Md.: It is well known that Chalabi was promoted as an Iraqi ally and considered a favorite of Wolfowitz and Chenney (his two best allies in the Bush Administration); how come the media does not point fingers where it belongs? These are the two people responsible for Chalabi's role.

Peter Slevin: News reports in the months before the raid on Ahmed Chalabi's home and in the week since have named Chalabi's strongest backers, who did include include Deputy Defense Secretary Wolfowitz and Vice President Cheney.

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Washington, D.C.: Someone wrote that France seems to try to "ensure that no nation will replace them as the world's most obnoxious and annoying." Too late for that -- the U.S. is way ahead on this count.

Peter Slevin: Maybe there should be an annual contest, with ribbons and trophies.

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Falls Church, Va.: Peter,

Thanks for the chat! Having heard the response of other Security Council members, I would take issue with your statement that their reaction was "not promising." Obviously, you heard the statements about it being a good start, a good jumping off point, and so forth. Can we really assume that these statements are all so much bull, and that France, Germany, Russia, China, etc. don't really think this?

That being said, the real issue seems to be how stubborn the Administration plans to be on the security issue. China's proposal today seems like entirely reasonable language. I would hope the Administration realizes that they are being offered a chance at a U.N. buy-in, which should be of paramount importance given recent difficulties.

Peter Slevin: Reservations are always delivered politely in diplomacy-land. Then the hard bargaining begins.

The need for a U.N. buy-in, as you put it, is more important than ever, and I think the White House is coming to realize that.

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Bethesda, Md.: Why can't we count Chalabi out? Why can't we get real answers on why someone who's so poorly portrayed in the media has such a hold on the Pentagon? There appears to be no accountability in this story. I don't care how wily he is why can't we just stop listening to him, paying him, being friends with him, passing him secret documents? He's not a magician. He can't mind control.

Peter Slevin: Ahmed Chalabi is in Iraq now -- after leaving as a child in 1958 -- and the ability of the U.S. government to call the shots there is steadily shrinking. I believe the links between Chalabi and his supporters in Washington will be well explored in weeks and years to come.

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Peter Slevin: It was great to see all your questions; I'm only sorry I couldn't get to more of them. Have a good Memorial Day weekend. See you next week. Same time, same place.

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