Agence France Presse  --  Arab News

WASHINGTON, 10 May 2004 — Some senior US military leaders yesterday publicly questioned the once-vaunted US war strategy in Iraq, which brought a speedy invasion but now could leave the United States locked in bloody, years-long occupation without creating a democratic Iraq.

In rare public remarks criticizing the US strategy, top military leaders told The Washington Post that failing to win the support of Iraqis and to stem a mounting insurgency meant the United States could win the military battles but still lose the war.

Army Maj. Gen. Charles Swannack, commander of the 82nd Airborne Division, said the United States was winning on the tactical level.

But asked if he believed the United States was losing the war, he said: “I think strategically, we are.”

“Unless we ensure that we have coherency in our policy, we will lose strategically,” he said.

Army Col. Paul Hughes, who a top planner for the occupation, said the pattern in Iraq was looking more and more like the Vietnam War.

“Unless we ensure that we have coherency in our policy, we will lose strategically,” he told the paper.

“I lost my brother in Vietnam,” Hughes said. “I promised myself, when I came on active duty, that I would do everything in my power to prevent that (sort of strategic loss) from happening again. Here I am, 30 years later, thinking we will win every fight and lose the war, because we don’t understand the war we’re in.”

Other military leaders, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the United States should stay in Iraq but replace the top officials responsible for crafting US strategy there — starting with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and his deputy Paul Wolfowitz.

“It is doubtful we can go on much longer like this. The American people may not stand for it — and they should not,” one senior general told the daily.

Some military leaders called for dramatically slashing the US military presence in Iraq, making the occupation run more like Afghanistan, and set more realistic goals for the country.

“That strategic objective, of a free, democratic, de-Baathified Iraq, is grandiose and unattainable. It’s just a matter of time before we revise downward ... and abandon these ridiculous objectives,” one army general said.