A Dec. 1 article said incorrectly that during a September offensive in Tall Afar, Iraq, each Iraqi army platoon was led by a U.S. Special Forces officer. Most of the Special Forces personnel were not officers but enlisted soldiers and, according to the military, some worked only in an advisory role.
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President's 'Strategy for Victory' Does Not Address Problems
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"So the consequences of the war are all negative from their point of view," Telhami said.
Bush's emphasis on military strategy also "violates" the first rule of counterinsurgency, which is politics first, said Brookings Institution analyst Michael O'Hanlon. "I didn't see much effort to improve the constitution, where things like equitable oil revenues are critical and are not yet in the constitution or assured. . . . The president seems to dwell on the technical military training issue, which is important but is not enough to constitute the core of a strategy."
On Iraq's economic future, the document says reconstruction of a country battered by war and starved by a dictatorship and international economic sanctions is key to winning over Iraq's 25 million people to the U.S. vision of a new Iraq.
But in a striking rollback from an earlier, more optimistic position, the administration says Iraq has the "potential" to become prosperous and self-sustaining -- without specifying a time frame. In 2003, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz said Iraq's oil revenues "could bring between $50 and $100 billion over the course of the next two or three years. . . . We're dealing with a country that can really finance its own reconstruction, and relatively soon," he told a House committee.
Oil production is slightly down from a year ago, the new strategy acknowledges.
On issues that affect daily life, unemployment is 25 percent to 40 percent, while the average amount of electricity output is lower than in October 2003 because insurgents have been able to repeatedly destroy cables and distribution stations, according to the International Crisis Group.
"If you don't have sufficient security to find out what the reconstruction needs are and deploy security teams to protect engineers, you can't do the work to rebuild the country," said International Crisis Group Vice President Mark Schneider.
Bush's strategy report cites International Monetary Fund figures that Iraq's per capita gross domestic product rose to $942 in 2004 and is expected to rise to more than $1,000 this year.
But in its September World Economic Outlook, the IMF also notes that Iraq's new government "faces daunting medium-term challenges, including advancing the reconstruction of the country's infrastructure, reducing macroeconomic instability and developing the institutions that can support a market-based economy."
Staff writers Bradley Graham in Washington and Jonathan Finer in Baghdad contributed to this report .
