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Bush Hints at Intervention in Liberia
President Cites 'Unique History' and Says Country's Leader Must Leave
By Michael Dobbs and Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, July 4, 2003; Page A01
President Bush yesterday appeared to pave the way for a U.S. military intervention in Liberia by declaring that America has a "unique history" with the troubled West African country, but he linked the dispatch of U.S. troops to the departure of Liberian President Charles Taylor.
Although Bush's top national security advisers said he has yet to decide about committing troops to Liberia, officials said they envisage a U.S. force of as many as 2,000 troops, probably mainly Marines. They said they believe it would be possible to limit any peacekeeping mission to several months, after which the United Nations would take over.
Speaking to a group of African journalists four days before he leaves on his first trip to Africa as president, Bush referred to the close historical ties between the United States and Liberia, which was founded in 1822 as a homeland for freed American slaves. He said this "unique history" has created "a certain sense of expectations" about the U.S. role in restoring stability to a country beset by civil war for most of the last 13 years, at a cost of a quarter-million lives.
"But I also want to make sure that there are certain expectations [that have to be] met, as well," the president added. "And one expectation is Mr. Taylor has got to leave."
The dispatch of U.S. troops to Liberia on an essentially humanitarian peacekeeping mission would mark a significant political departure for Bush, who denounced the concept of "nation-building" during a 2000 presidential election debate. At that time, Bush said that U.S. military interventions in foreign countries had to meet three tests: "It needs to be in our vital interest, the mission needs to be clear, and the exit strategy obvious."
Asked about those comments yesterday, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice said the president was still "considering his options." She said Bush believes the stability of West Africa is "important to U.S. interests" as well as being "vital" to progress on a continent to which the president has "devoted a lot of time and energy."
Another factor influencing the administration, Rice said, was the realization after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States that "failed states" can spawn "so much instability that you begin to see greater sources of terrorism." She described Washington's relationship with Liberia as "unlike any place else on the continent," and said the United States has an obligation to act with regional powers to prevent "humanitarian disasters."
"There was never a sense that you simply stand back and say we aren't going to touch a situation like this," Rice said. "The president believes in trying to be proactive."
U.S. officials and foreign diplomats said the emerging U.S. strategy to restore stability to Liberia includes a mixture of political and military components, including working with neighboring West African countries to create a transitional administration for the country of 3.5 million people. Negotiations are underway through U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan for the departure of Taylor, the descendant of a freed American slave, who was elected president in 1997 after mounting a seven-year armed rebellion against the Liberian government.
U.S. officials blame Taylor's cruel and erratic style of leadership for much of the suffering and chaos experienced by Liberia over the past decade, and say that it is impossible to end the country's civil war as long as he is in power. They note that he has stirred up rebellions in other West African countries, and was indicted last month for crimes against humanity by an international war crimes tribunal after numerous allegations of rape, mutilation, sexual slavery and use of child soldiers.
Officials said Secretary of State Colin L. Powell has emerged as a strong advocate of intervening in Liberia, as long as a suitable exit strategy can be worked out, whereas Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has expressed caution at a time when the U.S. military is feeling stretched by continuing operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Balkans. They added, however, that Rumsfeld fell into line after Bush made clear earlier this week that some limited military intervention would be necessary.
Rumsfeld's position is that "the Defense Department is pretty well occupied elsewhere on the globe, and we don't need anything more to do to keep us entertained," said a Pentagon official deeply involved in the military planning. The official added, however, that "the president has made his position pretty clear. And everybody understands he's going to Africa next week."
Military officials said that the peacekeeping force, which would also include several thousand soldiers from African nations, would establish order in Monrovia, the capital, which has been under the control of soldiers loyal to Taylor. It would also help create the conditions for a transitional administration, probably under the auspices of the United Nations, leading up to new elections.
The force would be endorsed by the United Nations but not overseen by it. This would allow U.S. soldiers to remain under U.S. command, avoiding the much-criticized dual chain of command that some historians contend led to the disastrous U.S. mission to Somalia a decade ago, culminating in the "Black Hawk Down" firefight that left 18 U.S. soldiers dead.
The incident in Somalia is one reason the administration is insisting that Taylor depart before it commits U.S. troops to Liberia, officials said. But they contend the situation in Liberia is quite different from that in Somalia, where U.S. troops got bogged down in a fruitless and costly hunt for Somali warlord Mohamed Farrah Aideed.
"These guys aren't like [Somali] warlords," said an official familiar with the discussions in the government.
An African expert in the government said Bush's five-nation trip to Africa, which will begin Tuesday in the West African state of Senegal, has been an important factor in the internal administration debates about whether to commit troops to Liberia.
"If we don't do something, George Bush is going to have a very, very ugly meeting in Senegal," the official said, referring to a "mini-summit" with Africa leaders that the president is scheduled to attend at the beginning of his trip.
Another defense official said both airborne and seaborne operations were under discussion, but the seaborne option was more likely. He said such an operation would probably involve Marines from the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit currently aboard the USS Iwo Jima, a helicopter and Harrier jet carrier. That ship is in the Persian Gulf, and will take at least a week before it can move into position off the Liberian coast.
In the Pentagon's division of the globe, responsibility for operations in West Africa rests with the U.S. European Command under Marine Gen. James Jones, who has drawn up a series of options for Rumsfeld. A spokesman for Jones noted that last month 450 U.S. troops were temporarily dispatched into Liberia with little fanfare to help evacuate about 200 U.S. citizens and other foreigners from the country as rebel forces closed in on Monrovia.
Many Africa experts welcomed the administration's apparent decision to commit U.S. prestige to resolving the Liberian situation, while noting that it was "a 180-degree turn from where Bush was in the [2000] election campaign," in the words of Susan Rice, assistant secretary of state for Africa under the Clinton administration. Some cautioned against what they described as the "minimalist option" in which the U.S. role would be confined to airlifting African troops into the country.
"The U.S. needs to take charge in order to stabilize the country, and get everyone to put down their arms," said Herman Cohen, assistant secretary of state for Africa in the administration of George H.W. Bush.
A cautionary note was struck by Anthony H. Cordesman, a military analyst with the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. He said any U.S. intervention should be based on a "very clear assessment" of the risks involved. "This will not be the first time the U.S. has tried to fix Liberia," he said. "We have been at this for more than a century, with negligible results."
"Liberia is not going to be like Somalia," predicted George Kun, a former Liberian refugee now working for Refugees International, a Washington-based humanitarian group. "Liberians are holding their breath for U.S. soldiers to arrive."
President Cites 'Unique History' and Says Country's Leader Must Leave
By Michael Dobbs and Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, July 4, 2003; Page A01
President Bush yesterday appeared to pave the way for a U.S. military intervention in Liberia by declaring that America has a "unique history" with the troubled West African country, but he linked the dispatch of U.S. troops to the departure of Liberian President Charles Taylor.
Although Bush's top national security advisers said he has yet to decide about committing troops to Liberia, officials said they envisage a U.S. force of as many as 2,000 troops, probably mainly Marines. They said they believe it would be possible to limit any peacekeeping mission to several months, after which the United Nations would take over.
Speaking to a group of African journalists four days before he leaves on his first trip to Africa as president, Bush referred to the close historical ties between the United States and Liberia, which was founded in 1822 as a homeland for freed American slaves. He said this "unique history" has created "a certain sense of expectations" about the U.S. role in restoring stability to a country beset by civil war for most of the last 13 years, at a cost of a quarter-million lives.
"But I also want to make sure that there are certain expectations [that have to be] met, as well," the president added. "And one expectation is Mr. Taylor has got to leave."
The dispatch of U.S. troops to Liberia on an essentially humanitarian peacekeeping mission would mark a significant political departure for Bush, who denounced the concept of "nation-building" during a 2000 presidential election debate. At that time, Bush said that U.S. military interventions in foreign countries had to meet three tests: "It needs to be in our vital interest, the mission needs to be clear, and the exit strategy obvious."
Asked about those comments yesterday, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice said the president was still "considering his options." She said Bush believes the stability of West Africa is "important to U.S. interests" as well as being "vital" to progress on a continent to which the president has "devoted a lot of time and energy."
Another factor influencing the administration, Rice said, was the realization after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States that "failed states" can spawn "so much instability that you begin to see greater sources of terrorism." She described Washington's relationship with Liberia as "unlike any place else on the continent," and said the United States has an obligation to act with regional powers to prevent "humanitarian disasters."
"There was never a sense that you simply stand back and say we aren't going to touch a situation like this," Rice said. "The president believes in trying to be proactive."
U.S. officials and foreign diplomats said the emerging U.S. strategy to restore stability to Liberia includes a mixture of political and military components, including working with neighboring West African countries to create a transitional administration for the country of 3.5 million people. Negotiations are underway through U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan for the departure of Taylor, the descendant of a freed American slave, who was elected president in 1997 after mounting a seven-year armed rebellion against the Liberian government.
U.S. officials blame Taylor's cruel and erratic style of leadership for much of the suffering and chaos experienced by Liberia over the past decade, and say that it is impossible to end the country's civil war as long as he is in power. They note that he has stirred up rebellions in other West African countries, and was indicted last month for crimes against humanity by an international war crimes tribunal after numerous allegations of rape, mutilation, sexual slavery and use of child soldiers.
Officials said Secretary of State Colin L. Powell has emerged as a strong advocate of intervening in Liberia, as long as a suitable exit strategy can be worked out, whereas Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has expressed caution at a time when the U.S. military is feeling stretched by continuing operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Balkans. They added, however, that Rumsfeld fell into line after Bush made clear earlier this week that some limited military intervention would be necessary.
Rumsfeld's position is that "the Defense Department is pretty well occupied elsewhere on the globe, and we don't need anything more to do to keep us entertained," said a Pentagon official deeply involved in the military planning. The official added, however, that "the president has made his position pretty clear. And everybody understands he's going to Africa next week."
Military officials said that the peacekeeping force, which would also include several thousand soldiers from African nations, would establish order in Monrovia, the capital, which has been under the control of soldiers loyal to Taylor. It would also help create the conditions for a transitional administration, probably under the auspices of the United Nations, leading up to new elections.
The force would be endorsed by the United Nations but not overseen by it. This would allow U.S. soldiers to remain under U.S. command, avoiding the much-criticized dual chain of command that some historians contend led to the disastrous U.S. mission to Somalia a decade ago, culminating in the "Black Hawk Down" firefight that left 18 U.S. soldiers dead.
The incident in Somalia is one reason the administration is insisting that Taylor depart before it commits U.S. troops to Liberia, officials said. But they contend the situation in Liberia is quite different from that in Somalia, where U.S. troops got bogged down in a fruitless and costly hunt for Somali warlord Mohamed Farrah Aideed.
"These guys aren't like [Somali] warlords," said an official familiar with the discussions in the government.
An African expert in the government said Bush's five-nation trip to Africa, which will begin Tuesday in the West African state of Senegal, has been an important factor in the internal administration debates about whether to commit troops to Liberia.
"If we don't do something, George Bush is going to have a very, very ugly meeting in Senegal," the official said, referring to a "mini-summit" with Africa leaders that the president is scheduled to attend at the beginning of his trip.
Another defense official said both airborne and seaborne operations were under discussion, but the seaborne option was more likely. He said such an operation would probably involve Marines from the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit currently aboard the USS Iwo Jima, a helicopter and Harrier jet carrier. That ship is in the Persian Gulf, and will take at least a week before it can move into position off the Liberian coast.
In the Pentagon's division of the globe, responsibility for operations in West Africa rests with the U.S. European Command under Marine Gen. James Jones, who has drawn up a series of options for Rumsfeld. A spokesman for Jones noted that last month 450 U.S. troops were temporarily dispatched into Liberia with little fanfare to help evacuate about 200 U.S. citizens and other foreigners from the country as rebel forces closed in on Monrovia.
Many Africa experts welcomed the administration's apparent decision to commit U.S. prestige to resolving the Liberian situation, while noting that it was "a 180-degree turn from where Bush was in the [2000] election campaign," in the words of Susan Rice, assistant secretary of state for Africa under the Clinton administration. Some cautioned against what they described as the "minimalist option" in which the U.S. role would be confined to airlifting African troops into the country.
"The U.S. needs to take charge in order to stabilize the country, and get everyone to put down their arms," said Herman Cohen, assistant secretary of state for Africa in the administration of George H.W. Bush.
A cautionary note was struck by Anthony H. Cordesman, a military analyst with the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. He said any U.S. intervention should be based on a "very clear assessment" of the risks involved. "This will not be the first time the U.S. has tried to fix Liberia," he said. "We have been at this for more than a century, with negligible results."
"Liberia is not going to be like Somalia," predicted George Kun, a former Liberian refugee now working for Refugees International, a Washington-based humanitarian group. "Liberians are holding their breath for U.S. soldiers to arrive."
Before you go on about how "bush is at it again", notice that the Liberians were rioting for US intervention.
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