Woodward’s War Within: Well Worth the Read
Last night, I finished Bob Woodward’s latest book on the Bush administration. Called, The War Within, it chronicles the reshaping the President’s Iraq strategy and the subsequent implementation of that strategy.
It is, regardless of your political views or your feelings about Woodward’s own perspectives, an absolutely fascinating look at the inner workings, debates, disagreements and processes of the Bush administration and the modern military.
As an aside, it says a great deal about the President’s commitment to preserving this sort of information for historical posterity that administration officials — including the President himself — gave so much time and cooperation to Woodward’s effort.
I have read all four of Woodward’s books about President Bush, and given his access both to information and to senior administration officials, his accounts generally come across to me as credible and generally balanced. Like any author, he has a tendency to sympathize with those sources who have been most helpful. (In The War Within, the beneficiary of Woodward’s predilection in this respect is General Jack Keane, who advised General Petreaus, the Vice President and occassionally the President throughout the period, even though he had retired from the Army.)
It’s telling that observers on both right and left point at elements of Woodward’s work to bolster their partisan arguments about the President’s success or failure.
In the final analysis, Woodward’s review leads me to three major conclusions about the President and the Iraq war:
- The President and the administration were consistently, intentionally dishonest with the American people about their views and their activities throughout the period from 2006 to 2008. Whether it was because they were worried about upcoming 2006 elections or the effect it would have on the Iraqi government or troop morale, the administration consistently refused to provide an accurate picture to the public. For me, this isn’t particularly surprising, though it remains disappointing. For example, the lengths to which the President and his team went to cover up their review of Iraq strategy in the fall of 2006 are, especially in retrospect, particularly shortsighted and damaging.
- The degree to which the military establishment stood in the way both of a new Iraq strategy and then its implementation are each truly shocking. This wasn’t the first time that a president and his military advisors didn’t agree on policy. It won’t be the last. But the extent of the problem in this case suggests that a broader review of military command structure might be in the cards.
- One man can make a difference — especially when backed by 150,000 or so extraordinary Americans who also want to make a difference. Woodward points to a handful of anonymous colonels, the nearly anonymous National Security Advisor, and a now-not-so anonymous four-star general as the architects of a strategy that has stabilized the security situation in Iraq and provided a climate for political progress. Whether that progress actually happens is still an open question. But the contrast between the situation in Iraq in 2006 versus today is genuinely amazing.
I know Woodward takes a lot of heat for more than a few good reasons. But The War Within does, without question, make for excellent reading, and it gets my unqualified recommendation.
Tags: bob woodward, book, iraq, jack keane, the war within