Hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee - The Situation in Iraq and Progress by the Government of Iraq in Meeting Benchmarks and Achieving Reconciliation

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

SEN JOHN CORNYN (R-TX): Thank you, Mr. chairman.

Ambassador Crocker and General Petraeus, it's good to see you again. I had the honor of visiting you and many of the Texas troops and other men and women in uniform in January, and good to see you then and good to see you here today.

I want to start by asking, General: The purpose of the counterinsurgency strategy, sometimes now called the surge, was to give the Iraqis the basic protection -- to protect the Iraqi population and to give the Iraqi government and the Iraqi people the chance to develop their own political arrangements so that, as in the words of the Iraq Study Group, that we would leave them with the capacity to govern and to defend themselves.

Is that -- would you accept my summary?

GEN. PETRAEUS: I would, Senator.

SEN. CORNYN: Or maybe state it better than I did.

GEN. PETRAEUS: No, I think that's fine, sir.

SEN. CORNYN: And that leads me, Ambassador Crocker, to the benchmarks. And I know there's been a lot of debate, and I seem to recall some of your writing, about whether the benchmarks that the United States government laid down in 2007 -- whether they were really the appropriate measures. But let's just set that argument aside for a minute and just talk about what sort of success the Iraqi government has had in meeting those 18 benchmarks that we identified in 2007.

It's my recollection that they have successfully completed 12 of those 18 benchmarks. Can you either correct me or clarify and expand upon the developments in that area?

AMB. CROCKER: I think that's about right, Senator. We're actually just going through a process now between us out in Baghdad and folks back here in re-evaluating the status of the benchmarks. But clearly, they have gained some real momentum after an admittedly slow beginning.

Amnesty is a benchmark, for example.

The accountability and justice -- de-Ba'athification reform is a benchmark. Provincial powers in its election dimension is a benchmark. So in the space of just a little over a -- one month, we saw them achieve three really significant new benchmarks.

SEN. CORNYN: General Petraeus, I remember General Odierno, who of course has served with you in Iraq, commander of III Corps in Fort Hood, pending his nomination as vice chairman, vice chief of staff of the Army -- I remember him saying that what he thought the American people wanted to see out in Iraq was progress, progress.

Would both of you characterize what we have seen over the last year in Iraq, both from a military and security standpoint, as well as from a political reconciliation standpoint, as progress?

GEN. PETRAEUS: I would, Senator.

AMB. CROCKER: Yes. Yes, very much, Senator.

SEN. CORNYN: I wanted to just ask a question about the consequences of failure in Iraq, because of course we all want our troops to come home as soon as they can. I think, giving both sides of the benefit of the doubt, I would say their disagreement is over whether it's based on a political or -- a timetable, which I would call political, without regard to conditions, and those of us who believe it ought to be conditions-based reduction in our troops.

You touched on this, I believe, a little bit, both of you did, in your opening statement. But I think it's worth repeating, because I think the connection that, as you pointed out, General Petraeus, people -- our troops not only want to know that we appreciate them, but I think their families and they want to understand how their sacrifice is directly connected with our safety and security here at home. And sometimes I think that gets lost in the debates here on Capitol Hill.

So traveling to Afghanistan, as I did in January, before I came to Iraq, I of course was reminded of what happened in that failed state after the Soviet Union left, where the Taliban and al Qaeda basically used that as an opportunity to organize, train and launch attacks, most notoriously on September the 11th, 2001.

Do you see the consequences of a failed state in Iraq, were we to withdraw before conditions would allow it, the Iraqis to govern and defend themselves, giving -- increasing the probability that Iraq could in fact become a similar failed state to Afghanistan, from the standpoint of allowing space, time and opportunity for al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations to reorganize and plot and potentially export similar attacks against the United States or our allies?

GEN. PETRAEUS: Senator, as I mentioned, not achieving our goals, our interests in Iraq indeed could lead al Qaeda to regain lost territory, could see a resumption of the kind of sectarian -- ethnosectarian violence that tore the country apart in 2006 and into early 2007.

No telling what can happen in terms of the Iranian influence piece and then just general regional stability challenges, not to mention the connection with the global economy.

So again there are enormous interests at stake. And that was why I sought to lay those out earlier.

SEN. CORNYN: Well, as you know, we recently hit the 4,000 dead in Iraq as a result of armed combat. 373 of those called Texas home, my home state.

And I recently went to a memorial service for a young, 24-year- old soldier named Jose Rubio who lost his life in Iraq. And at that memorial service, as you would expect, everyone in the family was sad. And of course, we all grieve with them for their loss.

But I think his family took considerable comfort in knowing that Joe Rubio was doing something he believe in, something important and something that contributed to the safety and security of his family back here at home as well as the rest of the American people.

Do you believe that young soldiers like Joe Rubio are making such a contribution to the safety and security of their families back home and the American people?

GEN. PETRAEUS: I do, Senator.

(Cross talk.)

SEN. CORNYN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source