E-mail a friendSen. Jack Reed
airdate September 5, 2007
Jack Reed was elected to the U.S. Senate from Rhode Island in '96. He's a senior member of the Armed Services Committee and serves on seven of the 12 subcommittees of the Appropriations Committee. He served three terms in the House, where he championed child health care and campaign finance reform. A West Point graduate and former Army Ranger and paratrooper, he holds a law degree from Harvard and spent a year with a Washington, DC law firm. Reed also served three terms in the state senate.
Sen. Jack Reed
Tavis: Senator Jack Reed sits on the Senate Armed Services Committee and in that capacity has made more trips to Iraq than any other member of Congress. He and his Senate colleagues will hear from General Petraeus next week on the progress of the recent troop surge. Senator Reed joins us tonight from Capitol Hill. Senator, nice to have you back on the program, sir.
Sen. Jack Reed: Great to be back, Tavis, thank you very much.
Tavis: Before I go forward to what we are going to hear from General Petraeus on Monday, let me start by asking whether it's just my read - I'm not the brightest cat in the world - but is it just my read or has the news of the last few days been conflicting about Iraq? Is the surge working or not working, are things better or worse?
The president goes over there but he basically goes to a safe area, what are we to take from that? Is it just me - is his message changing, is his strategy changing? I'm getting conflicted and confused over the last few days about this whole Iraq situation. Is that just me?
Reed: I don't think it's just you, Tavis. I think it's an inherently complicated situation, but with respect to the surge, the premise of the surge is that it would have military effects that would allow the political leaders in Iraq to make tough decisions and start the process of reconciliation. In fact, the basic governing. That hasn't worked.
So there are those who can point - and I was there and saw some tactical momentum, but that hasn't translated into political progress that's necessary, and without that political process I think the tactical successes will quickly be reversed once our forces draw down. And they have to draw down next spring. So it is not only a complicated picture, it's a picture which is mixed in terms of tactical success but not the strategic and political success we need.
Tavis: Let me try to break this down into smaller parts, then. Let me start with President Bush's midnight trip - eight hours he goes in and comes out. What should the American public, aside from what the White House wants us to get, what should we take from the president going to Iraq for eight hours?
Reed: Well, I think he clearly wanted to show that he's engaged. He also wanted to go to the place where he could point to local success. And I think although unstated, he wanted to distance himself from Baghdad, from the central government which is dysfunctional, at best.
And I think it might, as you suggest in your overall question, indicate a shift - not a strategic shift, but a shift in terms of policy, which is they're going to concentrate on local areas that they can have some success because of local tribes, but again that doesn't resolve what is the basic dilemma in the country, this tremendous rift, this tremendous chasm between the Shi'a and the Sunni communities. But for him, it was an effective way to try to suggest that there was some limited military progress.
Tavis: And yet we're told that he went to a relatively safe area to begin with, though.
Reed: Yes, I've been out to Al Asad. It's a fairly secured area in the western part of the Anbar province, but frankly, I don't think the president would be foolish enough and reckless enough to endanger himself unnecessarily. I think he should be credited for going to Iraq, frankly.
I think he deserves credit for that. But the reality here is not the one trip of the president; the reality is the continuing inability of the government in Baghdad to function and the fact that this is, in many respects, a civil war - a low-level civil war - and our presence there I don't think is effectively dampening that progress in the long run.
Tavis: Pardon the pun here but you said a moment ago the president deserves credit. I guess the question is whether he deserves cash. Does he deserve another $50 billion that he's asking you all for with regard to Iraq?
Reed: Well, I believe that we have to, in the Congress, start stepping up more decisively and change the policy. Change the policy so that the mission today of force protection, demonstrated by the increase in our troops there, can't be sustained on the ground anyway.
But we have to have new missions and I think counterterrorism and training Iraqi security forces and protecting our troops are valid missions, but the real issue here is not so much the bottom-line money, it's what are we doing there and what's within our capacity and what's within the capacity not just militarily but politically. I think we have to support the troops, but we have to give them missions that make sense for them and make sense for the long-term stability of that country.
Tavis: With all due respect to you and your other Democratic colleagues, every person that comes on this program pretty much says the same thing, and at the end of the day what I can't square that with is why, then, when all the talk is done, Democrats included, sign these checks to give the president what he wants. You keep making these distinctions without a difference because at the end of the day you're giving the guy the money that he wants.
Reed: Tavis, that goes to the heart of the dilemma we all face, is that I think the American people reflect this also. It's not just the politicians in Washington or anyplace else. They are keenly interested in making sure our troops, the young men and women that we send in harm's way, have everything they need. And they're very sensitive to the notion that they would in some way be, because of financial barriers, not being able to perform their missions.
But at the same time, they want those troops drawn down; they want the process of redeployment and the process of really ending our significant engagement militarily in Iraq.
Tavis: But that's the argument, Senator, as you well know - you're there and you know more than I do. That's the argument of those who say cut off the money. If you cut off the money, the president's got to bring the troops home.
Reed: Well, yeah, that is the argument, and that argument is frankly picking up momentum. Because as the president resists, I think rational, sensible policy direction, as we try our best to require him to change the direction and he refuses, I think there's a growing sentiment that that might be the only instrument we have.
It's a pretty blunt instrument, though, and you have to recognize that. And again, I think he is capitalizing on this tension, which is not just the political actors but in the people of this country between overwhelming support for the troops and an overwhelming desire that we're just growing, to lessen our involvement in Iraq.
But we have to work our way through that. I hope we can - in the next several weeks when we debate this legislation again and this policy again - that we can make changes in the policy and the funding will follow those changes.
Tavis: Is there anybody in Washington - I've asked this question any number of times over the last few weeks leading up to the report from General Petraeus on September the 10th - is there anyone in Washington who really doesn't know what this report is going to say? The president goes for an eight-hour trip, Katie Couric of "CBS News" just happens to be there, General Petraeus is walking Katie around, showing her all the progress they've made.
Is there anybody watching who does not expect that come Monday, what you and your colleagues are going to hear is that the surge is working and that's why the president has already floated this trial - not even. It's not a trial balloon; he's already said, "I want $50 billion more." So are we really to believe that we don't know what this report is going to say? I just hate being jerked like this.
Reed: I believe Tavis, for weeks - indeed, months - I was in Iraq in July with General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker, and I get the sense right then that they were able - they would report on that day in July just what they're going to report next Monday. And the report will be, in my view, something like this - and in fact, it echoes exactly what the president said a few days ago in Iraq.
They'll claim success - tactical success for the surge - and will also say that provides a condition for reducing our forces. That's something we all want to do, I believe. And then they'll ask for sort of additional support to go forward into the spring. And the reality on the ground is come next April, unless they take draconian measures to extend deployments, we're going to have to end the surge anyway.
So yes, I think you're absolutely right. I think it's pretty clear what's going to emerge from the General Petraeus report. I'd be shocked if he said anything diametrically opposed to what the president said in Iraq just a few days ago.
Tavis: So the bottom line here is we're going to hear the surge is working. Because the surge is working, part A; part B, give us the money that we need in the short run to do what we want to do, and then part C, the compromise is that somewhere in the not-too-distant future we're going to start redeploying, bringing some troops home. Is that how this thing is going to work out?
Reed: I think that's a pretty good sketch of what I anticipate. Now I could be wrong, but what I anticipate - which is basically, as you said, they will claim success and what they'll point to the tactical success, the military success, they'll jump over the political failures of the Iraqi government, the inability of this government, really, to function, and then they'll talk about because now we can begin to draw troops down.
But in my view, that's kind of - the reality is they have to draw the troops down. We can't support that number of troops in Iraq indefinitely, so they're trying to put a good face on what's going to happen anyway, which is we're going to have to draw our forces down. And then they're also going to ask for additional resources because in this new strategy they're talking about of going to localities - not the central government but the local governments - they like to bolster the reconstruction teams and our military presence.
But that's about it. I think the report - I would be surprised if General Petraeus differed very much from that outline.
Tavis: I got just a quick minute here before I lose your feed from Washington. Let me ask you right quick, if, in fact, that's going to be the compromise that's going to get worked out in the days to come, the Democrats then, it would seem to me, would have to hold the line on when that draw-down begins. If they're going to give the president the money, let him get away with saying the surge is working, skip past the politics inside of Iraq, the line has to be held at when the troops come home. When will that be?
Reed: Well, the troop surge ends next April, because of force considerations. I think that's probably an appropriate point to begin a transition to other missions, to begin a significant - in fact, I would suggest we begin bringing the troops out certainly before the end of this year. But by next April we should be well below the 160,000 troops we have on duty there today and looking at different missions which require a smaller force in Iraq. And hopefully make additional progress with their own security forces so that we can bring out our troops as quickly as possible.
Tavis: Senator Jack Reed, Democrat of Rhode Island. Been to Iraq more than any other member of Congress. Senator Reed, it's always nice to have you on. Thanks for your insight, sir.
Reed: Thanks, Tavis.
Tavis: My pleasure.
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