Author’s war views point to victory

When magazine journalist James Fallows takes on a topic, he tackles it with a seriousness that would make most of us blanch.

While researching “Declaring Victory,” his article in the current issue of Atlantic Monthly magazine, he talked to some 60 experts “about the current state of the conflict that (Osama) bin Laden thinks of as a ‘world jihad.’ “

Fallows has been a staff writer for the Atlantic Monthly since 1979 and is the author of several books, including the just-released “Blind Into Baghdad: America’s War in Iraq” (Vintage, 256 pages, $13.95 paper).

He talked to a range of Middle East specialists: military or intelligence agencies, academics, members of “think tanks” and even some business types.

From those interviews, Fallows builds a case for what he calls “the underappreciated advantage on America’s side.” He also insists that the countries targeted by al Qaeda, “especially the United States, (have) more leverage and control than we have assumed.”

Putting it simply, Fallows thinks that we should just say that we defeated al Qaeda and get on to other issues (not the least of which would be what to do about ending the Iraq war).

Doing otherwise, he says, just plays into the hands of bin Laden and his followers.

On Thursday at 7:30 p.m., Fallows will speak at Whitman College in Walla Walla. The title of his speech: “The U.S. and the Islamic World: Victory, Defeat, or Coexistence.”

Contacted in China, where he is researching another Atlantic Monthly piece, Fallows answered a number of e-mailed questions about his upcoming talk.

First of all, he makes a case for his contention that “America is succeeding in its struggle against terrorism.”

“(T)he struggle against ‘Al Qaeda Central’ itself – the group that has been run by Bin Laden and (Ayman) al-Zawahiri and that was responsible for the 9/11 attacks – has been surprisingly effective,” he said. “These people are on the run. They can’t easily meet or train. They can’t easily transfer money.”

One mistake the Bush administration is making, he wrote in Atlantic Monthly, is not taking advantage of the fact that al-Qaeda’s “hopes for fundamentally harming the United States now rest less on what it can do itself than on what it can trick, tempt or goad us into doing.”

In other words, Fallows said, the policies the U.S. government has followed since shortly after the events of Sept. 11, 2001, have “given Islamic groups – from violent extremists to average citizens – a unity and coherence they would otherwise lack.”

The result of all this? “(B)ecause of the post-invasion chaos in Iraq, and the increasingly stark tones in which the president and vice president have described America’s showdown with ‘Islamic fascism,’ I suspect that the main legacy will be an us-or-them outlook from the other side as well,” Fallows said.

The main problem is the ongoing conflict in Iraq – one that is not only killing American soldiers but is resulting in the deaths of Iraqis, most of whom are Muslims who, more and more, are coming to see the U.S. as the enemy.

“(T)he Iraq war has become the main impediment to America’s larger efforts to deter, contain and discourage Islamic extremists,” Fallows said.

He stresses, though, that an immediate pullout isn’t the answer.

“Asking people who opposed the war to have ‘good’ plans for resolving it now is like smashing up crockery with a hammer and then saying, ‘OK, what’s your plan to fix it?’ ” Fallows said.

“The main point to recognize, both in political debates and as an operating reality, is that we don’t have any good choices. It’s a matter of finding the least-destructive alternative at this point.”

As for why the administration isn’t willing to declare the war on terrorism over, and then adopt the position that we won, Fallows offers two explanations.

“The high-road explanation for their unwillingness to do so might be their fear that the threat remains so acute that they can’t let down their guard in any way,” he said.

“The lower-road argument would be that ‘security’ in various forms has been the main political strength of the Bush administration and they don’t want it to seem as if that is any less important than before.”

Either way, Fallows said, the Bush administration’s war in Iraq and ongoing “war on terrorism” may not have the long-lasting negative effect that some critics think. Even so, he added, much of the administration’s policies have been wrong-headed from the start.

“For better or worse, a nation’s interests always outlast the policies of any one administration,” Fallows said. “So whatever this administration does will not prove decisive – it’s a long-term interaction. In my view, though, the administration has set up the conditions for a result that is the opposite of its stated intentions.”