US scales back expectations on gains during Iraq transition

Officials now say goals unrealistic

By Robin Wright and Ellen Knickmeyer, Washington Post  |  August 14, 2005

WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration is significantly lowering expectations of what can be achieved in Iraq, recognizing that the United States will have to settle for far less progress than originally envisioned during the transition due to end in four months, according to US officials in Washington and Baghdad.

The United States no longer expects to see a model new democracy, a self-supporting oil industry, or a society where the majority of people are free from serious security or economic challenges, US officials say.

''What we expected to achieve was never realistic given the timetable or what unfolded on the ground," said a senior official involved in policy since the 2003 invasion. ''We are in a process of absorbing the factors of the situation we're in and shedding the unreality that dominated at the beginning."

Administration officials still emphasize how much they have achieved despite the postwar chaos and escalating insurgency. ''Iraqis are taking control of their country, building a free nation that can govern itself, sustain itself, and defend itself. And we're helping Iraqis succeed," President Bush said yesterday in his radio address.

Iraqi officials yesterday struggled to agree on a draft constitution by tomorrow's deadline so the document can be submitted to a vote in October. The political transition would be completed in December by elections for a permanent government.

But the realities of daily life are a constant reminder of how initial US ambitions have not been fulfilled in ways that Americans and Iraqis once anticipated. Many of Baghdad's 6 million people go without electricity for days in 120-degree heat. Parents fearful of kidnapping are keeping children indoors.

Barbers post signs saying they do not shave men, after months of barbers being killed by religious extremists. Ethnic or religious-based militias police the northern and southern portions of Iraq. Analysts estimate that in the whole of Iraq, unemployment is 50 percent to 65 percent.

US officials say no turning point forced a reassessment. ''It happened rather gradually," said the senior official, triggered by everything from the insurgency to shifting budgets to US personnel changes in Baghdad.

The debate over a new constitution has particularly driven home the gap between the original US goals and realities after almost 28 months. The US decision to invade Iraq was justified in part by the goal of establishing a secular and modern Iraq that honors human rights and unites disparate ethnic and religious communities.

But whatever the outcome on specific disputes, the document on which Iraq's future is to be built will require laws to be compliant with Islam. Kurds and Shi'ites are expecting de facto long-term political privileges. And women's rights will not be as firmly entrenched as Washington has tried to insist, US officials and Iraq analysts say.

''We set out to establish a democracy, but we're slowly realizing we will have some form of Islamic republic," said another US official familiar with policy-making from the beginning, who like some others interviewed would speak candidly only on the condition of anonymity. ''That process is being repeated all over."

US officials now acknowledge that they misread the strength of sentiment among Kurds and Shi'ites to create a special status. The Shi'ites' request this month for autonomy to be guaranteed in the constitution stunned the Bush administration, even after two years of intense intervention in Iraq's political process, they said.

In the race to meet fall deadlines, the process of forging national unity behind the constitution is largely being scrapped, current and former officials involved in the transition said.

The goal now is to ensure a constitution that can be easily amended later so Iraq can grow into a democracy, US officials say.

Meanwhile, the US military reported today that three US soldiers were killed and another was wounded when their patrol struck a roadside bomb in northern Iraq, according to the Associated Press. The attack at Tuz, about 110 miles north of Baghdad, occurred late on Friday, the military said in a statement.