Pittsburgh Tribune-Review : Gen. Abizaid: No draft please

Gen. Abizaid: No draft please

By Mike Wereschagin | TRIBUNE-REVIEW | November 1, 2007

America's presence in the Middle East will be measured in generations, not tours of duty, and people need to prepare for "the long war," retired Army Gen. John P. Abizaid said Thursday.

Abizaid, 56, a former top commander in the Middle East and Central Asia, told Carnegie Mellon University students and the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review that Iraq is but a slice of a decades-long struggle in the region. He cautioned, though, that it will not be won by America's strained military.

"I would characterize what we're doing now as 80 percent military, 20 percent diplomatic, economic, political, educational, informational, intelligence, etc.," Abizaid said. "You've got to take that equation and change it. Make it 80 percent those other things."

Though he didn't suggest decreasing the number of troops in Iraq, Abizaid's suggestion of relying less on the military surprised some.

"You could definitely tell he was a general, but ... he wasn't completely for the conflict, at least in the way we usually talk about it," said Adam Young, 22, a senior at Carnegie Mellon majoring in policy and management. "It was interesting to hear that from him."

Abizaid graduated from West Point in 1973 and studied at Harvard and the University of Amman in Jordan.

Fluent in Arabic, he commanded the U.S. military's Central Command for a record four years. The Central Command stretches from the Horn of Africa to Kazakhstan, on Russia's southern border, and includes Iraq, Afghanistan, Sudan and the Saudi peninsula.

When he was promoted in 2003, he was the youngest four-star general in the Army.

He retired from the Army in May and owns an international security consulting firm. He is a visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.

Four main problems are keeping the United States in the region, Abizaid said:

• The rise of Sunni extremists, such as al Qaida;

• The rise of Shiite extremists, such as Iran's leaders;

• The Arab-Israeli conflict;

• America's dependence on the region's oil.

"It would be easy if it was really a question of staying or leaving, but it's much more complex than that," Abizaid said. "It's a region that needs help to begin to shape its future, so that extremists aren't mainstream. If that ever happens over there, then we'll start moving towards that clash of civilizations that many people talk about."

None of it will be solved soon, he said, likening the duration to the 40-year Cold War with the Soviet Union. Iraq likely won't be stable by the time the next U.S. president takes office in 2009, Abizaid said.

"Maybe in two to three years," Abizaid said of the prospects for the Iraq war calming down.

Looking only at Iraq, however, is like looking at the region "through a soda straw," Abizaid said. He cautioned against letting politicians talk only about that piece of what he sees as a larger, longer war.

"We need to demand the debate happen in a way that's greater than staying in Iraq or leaving Iraq, and we need to prepare ourselves for the struggle ahead," Abizaid said. Even after Iraq stabilizes, the United States will have to figure out how to maintain a presence in the region. "We can't turn our back on the world. It's too small."

One way to prepare is to figure out what to do with a tired military, he said.

"Our Army is under a tremendous amount of strain after having been at war for six years," Abizaid said. The country's options are increasing the military's size, bringing troops home or continuing the multiple deployments that might cause experienced soldiers to leave the military.

"If you don't keep that level of professional excellence on the team, then it becomes less and less capable," said Abizaid, noting that his son-in-law has deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan four times. "While it hasn't really started yet, it's inevitable -- at this pace -- that it will. So we've got to start asking ourselves some hard questions."

He encouraged the 170 or so college students in the standing-room-only crowd to "figure out how to serve the country."

He suggested that students learn about the culture, language and politics of the Middle East to prepare for jobs in the diplomatic corps or to help in humanitarian efforts.

"There needs to be a call for patience, sacrifice and service," Abizaid said. He praised Carnegie Mellon's Qatar campus for "making a huge contribution to the long-term peace and stability of the region."

Though the theater of operations in this "long war" is the same size as it was in World War II, the battles will not be as dramatic and the consequences don't have to be as dramatic, he said.

"In World War II, we were fighting for our national survival -- literally, our national survival. It was fight or die," he said. "This struggle, it hasn't come down to that yet. It could, eventually, if we do everything just wrong. But it doesn't need to."

Mike Wereschagin can be reached at mwereschagin@tribweb.com or 412-320-7900.