Redrawing borders in the Middle East could be one solution to political problems that a decade of war has been unable to solve, the Army’s soon-to-retire top officer said Wednesday.
Gen. Ray Odierno, the Army chief of staff, said the Islamic State has been “blunted,” but that the conflict is now at a “stalemate.” Iraqi forces, he said, are gearing up for a military operation “in a few days.”
Still, he stressed that a long-term solution to problems in the region can’t involve military force alone. Instead, it must address political and economic issues that were never solved during U.S. military operations over the past decade.
That fix, he said, could require local leaders to draw new lines between countries, especially as reconciliation between Sunnis and Shiites is “becoming more difficult by the day.”
“Iraq might not look like it did in the past,” he said. “That’s something that could happen. It might be the only solution, but I’m not ready to say that yet.”
He also said Syria is “forever changed in some way” because of ongoing fighting there.
Odierno delivered a wide-ranging, final briefing to reporters at the Pentagon on everything from budget cuts to women in combat to the fight against the Islamic State. He will retire in a ceremony on Friday after almost 40 years of service.
It is “frustrating” to see what’s happening in Iraq today, Odierno said, as areas the U.S. had previously secured fall under Islamic State control. The U.S. pulled all of its troops out of Iraq in 2011, but American-trained Iraqi forces weren’t “prepared to handle” the transition of power, he said.
Instead, political “fissures” developed that the Islamic State exploited to achieve its rise, he said.
When asked to weigh in on current presidential campaigning debates rehashing which party lost Iraq, Odierno warned that it’s not a black-and-white issue. Keeping a residual force in Iraq could have prevented the politicization of Iraqi forces, which ultimately made room for the Islamic State to form. But he said U.S. forces couldn’t legally stay in the country beyond 2011 under the agreement negotiated in 2008 by President George W. Bush.
“What would have happened, then, is you put your soldiers and Marines at risk for being arrested and many other things,” he said. “We would have been there illegally if we didn’t have the agreement.”
He declined to speculate on whether the U.S. should have invaded Iraq in the first place, saying that there’s no way to know what security in the region would look like today if Saddam Hussein was still in power.
In addition to the Islamic State, Odierno said China, the Sunni-Shiite conflict, North Korea and Afghanistan are all “long-term problems” the U.S. will be forced to deal with for “the foreseeable future.”
Still, he named Russia as the top threat facing America today, as did his successor, Gen. Mark Milley, in testimony to Congress this year.
Odierno said Russia is the most mature threat and has proven by its actions in Ukraine that is has the capability to undertake and succeed at sophisticated operations.
“They have some stated intents that concern me,” he said of the Russians.
When asked if the country is prepared for a conflict with Russia after fighting a counterinsurgency war for more than a decade, Odierno said the Army has spent the past 18 months training in “hybrid warfare,” a mix of traditional and counterinsurgency war tactics that could characterize any potential operations against Russia.
He stressed, however, that those preparations can continue only with adequate funding, especially with only about a third of Army brigades prepared to fight at that level.
“We need the dollars in order for us to continue to train,” he said. “If all of a sudden sequestration comes back in ’16, that will have an impact on that, and that is one of the concerns I have.”
In addition to a focus on readiness, Odierno urged the military to take care of its senior leaders who may have lost troops during multiple deployments over the past decade of war. He said the deaths of soldiers will continue to weigh on him even after he hangs up his uniform.
“That’s something that I will live with for the rest of my life, is thinking about that and the sacrifices they made,” he said. “We all understand why we do this and the risks associated, but I had the opportunity first hand to stand side-by-side with these men and women and they really cared about what they were doing. They showed incredible selflessness and courage in what they were doing.”
Someone who may have served as a captain in 2003 is now a colonel or brigadier general, he said. Despite having risen through the ranks during a time of war, where they were likely leading troops overseas, these senior leaders are often left out of discussions about the effects of repeated deployments, including post-traumatic stress, he said.
“I think that’s a long-term problem,” he said. “We have to make sure we have programs in place to take care of them as well as they continue to lead our great soldiers.”
