Historic Congressional Meddling, Winning Wars and the Iraq Study Group Report

By Mary Mostert

December 10, 2006

The Iraq Study Group Report begins with the observation that there is “no magic formula to solve the problems of Iraq” and by paragraph three states that “No one can guarantee that any course of action in Iraq at this point will stop sectarian warfare, growing violence or a slide toward chaos.” None of the ten civilians who authored the report have any professional recent military experience and, not surprisingly, none of the 79 suggestions they listed even suggest winning the war in Iraq militarily.

In fact, the entire report, as I read it, is a study in Congressional meddling reminiscent of the meddling of the Continental Congress in 1775-1776 that almost lost the American Revolution. Four months after the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the headless government created by the Second Continental Congress under the Articles of Confederation prompted an exasperated George Washington to write the following to his brother: in November of 1776: “I am wearied almost to death with the retrograde Motions of things, and I solemnly protest that a pecuniary reward of 20,000£ a year would not induce me to undergo what I do; and after all, perhaps, to loose my Character as it is impossible under such a variety of distressing Circumstances to conduct matters agreeably to public expectation, or even of those who employ me, as they will not make proper allowances for the difficulties their own errors have occasioned.”

George Washington had been selected by the Second Continental Congress to be Commander in Chief of the combined armies and militias of the 13 colonies in June of 1775 and took command of the approximately 13,000 citizen soldiers gathered in Boston after the battles of Lexington and Concord on July 3, 1775. Washington was hamstrung and controlled by absurd orders from committees of the Continental Congress in Philadelphia. He was ordered to stop the most massive military onslaught of the 18th century by changing the current of the Hudson River to block British ships and to attack Quebec, Canada to stop British ships from using the St. Lawrence River. Also, because Congress feared a “permanent army” nearly all of Washington’s temporary army’s enlistments would end at midnight, December 31, 1776.

Although Commander in Chief of the new Revolutionary Army, Washington was not actually in charge. Congressional committees called the shots. Britain General William Howe drove Washington and his army out of Long Island, then out of Manhattan, New York into New Jersey while the Continental Congress passed resolutions trying to micromanage Washington’s actions from the safety of Philadelphia.

From his appointment to December 1776, Washington had lost every battle so far, due to congressional meddling and the lack of needed weapons, ammunition, food and clothing supplies which Congress had not adequately addressed. Also, due to a lack of hard-surfaced roads, it was impossible to fight a war during the wet weather or winter weather in the 1770s in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Armies took a weather break, and set up winter quarters. General Howe seized Fort Lee in New Jersey on November 20, 1776 and then returned to spend the winter in New York City, leaving only a contingent of German mercenaries in Trenton, New Jersey to maintain their battle position.

By then it was obvious that General Howe intended to seize Philadelphia, when weather permitted, arrest members of the Continental Congress, try them for treason and execute them. That prompted the Continental Congress on December 12, 1776 to pass a resolution adjourning Congress to the relative safety of Baltimore and to declare “until the Congress shall otherwise order, General Washington (shall) be possessed of full power to order and direct all things relative to the department, and to the operations of war.”

Once free of Congressional “advice” on how to fight the war, Washington came up with a daring plan to cross the ice choked Delaware River and attack the German mercenaries on Christmas day, when they would not be expecting any action. In spite of two-thirds of his men being unable to get across the river because of the ice, two battalions led by Washington did get across. He attacked the German mercenaries, who quickly surrendered or fled in confusion.

That amazing military action prompted even the second-guessers in Congress on December 27, 1776 to pass a resolution recognizing Washington’s “wisdom, vigour, and uprightness” and noting that “the very existence of civil liberty now depends on the right execution of military powers, and the vigorous, decisive conduct of these, being impossible to distant, numerous, and deliberative bodies:”

Although it took another seven years to get a peace treaty signed and eleven years for the founding fathers to write the U.S. Constitution that gave the President, not Congress, control over the armed forces, it was George Washington’s decisive military action, not interminable debates in the Continental Congress that enabled the United States to survive. Congress can refuse to appropriate money to fight a war, which is what the Democrats did in the 1970s about the Vietnam War to Republican President Richard Nixon. However, the Constitution does not give Congress the authority to tell the president how to execute a war.

And, based on President George W. Bush’s comments in his weekly radio address to the nation on December 9th, he seemed to be making that crystal clear to the public, the Congress and the media when he stated: “The Iraq Study Group's report also explicitly endorses the strategic goal we've set in Iraq: an Iraq that can ‘govern itself, sustain itself, and defend itself.’

“The report went on to say, ‘In our view, this definition entails an Iraq with a broadly representative government that maintains its territorial integrity, is at peace with its neighbors, denies terrorism a sanctuary, and doesn't brutalize its own people. Given the current situation in Iraq, achieving this goal will require much time and will depend primarily on the actions of the Iraqi people.’

“I agree with this assessment. I was also encouraged that the Iraq Study Group was clear about the consequences of a precipitous withdrawal from Iraq. The group declared that such a withdrawal would ‘almost certainly produce greater sectarian violence’ and lead to ‘a significant power vacuum, greater human suffering, regional destabilization, and a threat to the global economy.’ The report went on to say, ‘If we leave and Iraq descends into chaos, the long-range consequences could eventually require the United States to return.’”

And, I agree with President Bush.