Ali Khedery - Special Assistant to the US Ambassador to Iraq, 2003-2009 HARDtalk

aid convoy heading the Ukraine. As heavy fighting continues. It is now

time for HARDtalk. Welcome to HARDtalk. American

warplanes are once again attacking targets in Iraq ` ordered into

action by a president who made it his business to end US military

involvement in Iraq. To Barack Obama's critics, it is one more

piece of evidence pointing to an incoherence of strategy in a region

becoming ever more unstable and dangerous. My guest today is Ali

Khedery, a former adviser to a string of American ambassadors in

Baghdad. Does the United States have the ability to impose its will on

the Middle East? Ali Khedery, welcome to HARDtalk.

Thank you for having me. I just referred to the Middle East being

more unstable, more dangerous than it has been in many decades. How

much of the responsibility for that, do you think, rests with the

United States? Obviously it is a very complicated situation. The

situation we see today across the Middle East is partially due to

American intervention like the war in 1991 in Iraq and again in 2003.

But a lot of the variables are extremely complicated, owing to the

poor leadership under the lakes of Saddam Hussein. And then there are

broader religious, social, economic trends that are all colliding

WriteNow across the Middle East and creating a dangerous situation for

global stability. Nobody would disagree that it is great complex.

But is it not true to say that looking at the span of

administrations covering George W Bush and Barack Obama, there is a

lesson to be learned, and that is whenever the United States tries to

intervene actively, whether diplomatically or a militarily in a

country like Iraq, it tends to backfire? I do not think you can

draw that lesson. The lesson you can do instead is we have to be very

careful, either as the United States for the international community,

when intervening abroad. Particularly in distant lands were

original speak the language for a nosy religion or the history. `` or

know the. One example of positive liberation is the liberation of

Kuwait. There was a dark lining when resident Bush called for the Shia

and the Kurds to rise up against Saddam Hussein. You left them out to

dry. The lesson we have learnt is that intervention without proper

planning was not especially wise. And then a more isolationist posture

under Barack Obama was equally unwise. It has resulted in even more

of a mess than before Saddam Hussein fell. I want to get to the day's

mess shortly. I want to tease out recent history a bit more. It seems

to me that you yourself have a case to answer. I talked about recent

interventions backfiring. You in fact have made a claim that you were

instrumental in deciding that the Prime Minister was the key Shia

Iraqi politician who Americans should invest in to promote as the

leader capable of uniting Iraq from 2006 onwards. Are you prepared to

say sorry for that? I am prepared to detail exactly what occurred in 2006

and 2010. I did so in a recent piece in the Jewish and in post. `` in the

Washington Post. You have to understand the position

we were in in 2006. Iraq was in a civil war. The current Prime

Minister was utterly feckless, indecisive" variant. It was very

clear that Congolese Rice and the British Foreign Minister explicitly

asked the prime minister to step down. As we learned in 2003, when

you ask one leader to step down, you need somebody to fill the vacuum.

After a series of interviews with various Iraqi leaders, Nouri Alma

Key was seen to be the least worst option. In 2006 to thought you were

doing the right thing by promoting him. Right now Barack Obama and his

team think there are doing the right thing by promoting Haider al`Abadi

as the right politician. As they may well find it is simply making

matters worse. It is very well made. But the reality is when George W

Bush undertook the decision to invade Iraq in 2003, many of us,

including myself, were against that decision. But he as the President of

United States conjunction with Tony Blair decided to do so. All of us

collectively had to deal with the fallout. One could have stood on the

sidelines and complained about it, or one could have volunteered to

serve and try and affect things from the inside. That is the position I

took. Those who knew me personally will tell you that I am not an

apologist for America's foreign policy. Either the positive or a

negative things we have seen. I tried to give the best counsel I

could provide two successive ambassadors and generals in Baghdad.

When you are faced with thousands of decisions on a daily basis,

inevitably some of the decisions made are correct and some are

incorrect. I will tell you, it is important to emphasise this, he

proved to be exactly the right Prime Minister during his first term.

Militias for running rampant across Iraq. When he took power, he crushed

al`Qaeda and the militias. The civil war was reduced and violence was

reduced by 90%. That takes us to 2010. By 2010, I stood firmly and

virtually alone in opposing his return for a second term. Having

known him since 2003, it is clear to me that he was taking advantage of

the successes of the search and was cementing a dictatorship, a

theocracy and was increasingly beholden to Iran. You had misjudged

him. You called him a friend. He said the Obama Administration in

recent years has made some key mistakes because they are not versed

in the Middle East. But the fact is, you were very experienced. You

misjudged him. You have to admit it now. We did not misjudged him. If

you look at the 2006 episode against the 2010 episode, the violence was

reduced by 90%. We needed a security minded prime minister in 2006 to

restore order and stability. That is what happened. It is due to a wide

variety of things, including the Sunni awakening and the coalition

efforts. Like the British military intelligence services. But also

owing a lot to the Iraqi unity themselves. But it was clear that

Nouri al`Maliki had a plan to hijack Iraq's democracy. O to the more

specific criticisms you have made of the Obama Administration in the

years since you left it. You say that they have adopted an

isolationist strategy and they have failed to appreciate their friends

and confront their real enemies. I want you to explain, briefly as you

can, you mean about that. When I failed to convince the White House

to oppose Nouri al`Maliki's returning to thousands and, I put my

money where my mouth is. I resigned in protest. Detailing exactly why I

believe that Iraq was set on a path towards civil war, perhaps a

regional holy war, going back to Nouri al`Maliki's policies. Today we

have seen those predictions become a reality. By campaigning on a winning

election, two elections, promising to end the war is across Iraq and

Afghanistan, the president has closed those wars in an

irresponsible manner. He has left our friends across the region

feeling alone and abandoned. Increasingly, emboldened our

strategic allies, even a site in Syria. Thereby giving birth to very

global threats like ISIS. The strategic view of yours is

important, but it does not make much sense. You say Obama has failed to

realise the real enemy, the head of the snake, is Iran. But it is not

Iran that is responsible for the rise of this extreme Sunni, jihadist

a movement that we call Islamic State. That is not Iran. The money

for that sweeping extremism is coming from the Gulf, from cacti,

Kuwait, Saudi Arabia. I could not disagree with you more. Here is why.

ISIS did not exist three years ago. What we were faced with was al`Qaeda

Central in Afghanistan, Pakistan and some franchises in Yemen, North

Africa. ISIS was the direct result of Asad's genocide campaign in

Syria. Who has helped him? It is his own militarily, Hezbollah, Iraqi

militias and also Iran's Revolutionary guard. By killing

hundreds of thousands of Syrian civilians, by displacing millions

more, that created that disillusioned and disenfranchised

Sunni Arabs. And Nouri al`Maliki was doing the same, creating an

environment where we saw al`Qaeda, an entity that was supercharged,

welcomed or created. That is why it it is important not to address the

symptoms, but to address the underlying causes. A recent

investigation by the New York Times which concluded ISIS has the pocket

donors in places like Kuwait and Qatar, Turkish brokers who do

business with these groups. If we are saying that Islamic State

represents a long`term strategic threat to the United States, this is

not really about Iran, it is about some of the countries which we call

partners. about both. It is about Iran, Bashar

al`Assad, Hezbollah, the Shia militia and radicalisation. It is

also about the rude funders of some of these jihadis like wealthy

individuals in the Gulf states or regional allies or individuals in

Turkey. I absolutely conquer that Moore has got to be done. That is

why I recently called for President Obama to appoint a Middle East

co`ordinator to work with both regional allies, with allies like

the UK, the EU, and even pull in potential foes like Russia and

China, because really, this has become a global pandemic that is

spreading, that is becoming uncontrollable. And unless the

international community moves quickly to work together, this

problem will only missed us decides further and endangered the global

Middle East, global energy supplies and the global economy. `` Rob will

only metastasise. You talk about a Middle East tsar to bring about

policy`making in the US. It seems to me that you think that man should be

a senior general to have the heft and the weight to push through

coherent policy`making. Does that suggest you believe there are

military solutions to this? Obama has sent the warplanes back in.

There is some discussion in some quarters contemplating American

troops back on the ground in Iraq. Are you an advocate of that? I'm not

at all an advocate of boots on the ground in the Middle East. I'm very

sceptical even of American air intervention in the Middle East,

even in Iraq. The recommendation I have made in the appointment of a

5`star general is rooted very deep in American bureaucracy. Basically,

having worked for five American ambassadors in Iraq and three.

Amanda is that US Central command, which is the US entity in charge of

the Middle East and South Asia, what I have seen first hand is that the

US military is vastly more resourced than its civilian counterparts. For

example, when I General David Petraeus, he had his own 737, secure

phone lines and so on. The US ambassador, if he was lucky, all he

could rely on was a working blackberry. You are on the record as

saying that the US should develop an overarching coherent Middle East

strategy that must be front and centre of all foreign policy`making.

Given the complexity of the individual challenges in Iraq,

Syria, Egypt, Libya, Bahrain, it is simply superficial now to say that

this must be one coherent Middle East strategic direction. It is not

possible. I think it is imperative that we have a regional strategy in

the Middle East and the reason why is because right now, again,

particularly deep inside the bureaucracy, there are silos. We

deal with Libya as an isolated problem. Egypt and its neighbours.

We deal with the problems in Yemen as isolated problems. Same as Syria

and Iraq. Especially when it comes to Syria and Iraq. What we have seen

is the fusion of those two conflicts into one. Throughout the Iraq War,

we received messages from the commander of the Iranian

Revolutionary guards. He repeatedly told me he was in charge of Iranian

policy from Gaza to Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, Pakistan and

in the Gulf countries. What we were seeing was that the Iranians were

manipulating events across the region, so they would pressure us in

one area where they were not happy and they would reward us in another

area when it was in their interest. What we need again is, whether it is

the US or someone from the UK, what we really need is a global alliance

to confront this transnational phenomenon called ISIS or archived

because throughout the Western world, bureaucracies are geared

towards confronting sovereign actors like the former Soviet Union as

opposed to transnational non`state actors like ISIS or Al`Qaeda.

Frankly, 9/11 and the assassination of Ambassador Chris Stephen in 2012

and more recent events have proven that the current structures are not

capable of handling and addressing those threats. Let me return to the

issue of Iraq, if I may. The administration 's position is can

happen unless there is a government in Baghdad committed to maintaining

the unity of the nation and including all of the different sects

and communal groups in a political future. It seems to me that raises

another awkward question for you. In a different life not so long ago,

just three or four years ago, you worked for Exxon. You pushed Exxon

to draw up specific deals with the Kurdish regional government and oil

into Turkey, to make lots of money for Exxon and the Kurds as well.

That sort of deal is thoroughly disapproved of in Baghdad and

actually is again contributing to the fragmentation of Iraq, not its

unity. Do you agree? I do not agree. In fact, I view that very much as a

glass half empty argument. This is why. Very few individuals can claim

to have helped bring in the world's largest company, literally and

encouraged it to invest $1 billion in Iraq. If we look at Iraq as one

country... With respect, you were not. You were working with the

Kurdish regional government and what we see right now is that the Kurds,

more and more, are exploiting the access to the oil well to develop a

completely independent strategy. Right, again. I completely disagree.

You have to go back to the Iraqi constitution, which explicitly grant

the Kurds the authority, for example, to sign contracts when new

oilfields. It is in the new Iraqi constitution. The entry of the likes

of Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Gazprom and total, former energy giants, into

Kurdistan and Basra in southern Iraq, are a great thing for all of

Iraq because any revenue produced from any part of Iraq, again going

back to the constitution, belong to the population of the entire country

and are to be divided based on the population of each province. And the

Kurds have not to my knowledge ever demanded anything separately. What

they have demanded is the implementation of the Constitution.

May I interrupt because that is obviously not the way it is seen in

Baghdad. They are deeply unhappy with it. But before we finish, I

want to bring things back to where we are today. People around the

world right now are being exposed to the most gruesome video, where an

American citizen, a journalist, James Foley, is beheaded, executed

by a member of the Islamic State movement. It brings home the degree

to which right now, events are spiralling completely out of control

in Iraq. Do you see that the Obama administration has a strategy for

exerting some sort of control? Not at all. And as I have said recently,

President Obama calling ISIS the junior varsity team, which roughly

on global terms means a grade school sports team, in January and then

last week, his deputy national security adviser said that ISIS does

not pose a threat to the American homeland more to American

interests, those statements are astounding frankly and I hope that

events like this vicious murder will help to wake up the White House and

will help to wake up the American population and our global allies

that we have a very serious problem on our hands. Again, you cannot

address Iraq's problems without addressing Syria's Robbins, for

example. And without stopping the genocide being perpetuated by Bashar

al`Assad, Hezbollah, Iran and the Revolutionary Guards, you will never

be able to get hold of ISIS. These tactical pinpoint strikes against

ISIS in Iraq will do nothing towards solving the problems of ISIS and the

region. A full on intervention was tried by George W Bush and many

would argue that did not work. This is my last point. Maybe it is time

to think of what a Harvard professor said the other day: Strategic

disengagement may write now be the best option for the Middle East, for

the United States in the Middle East. Absolutely not. Could not

disagree with him more. Strategic disengagement would result in the

following: It would result in the unravelling of Syria and the death

of potentially millions after the couple of hundreds of thousands who

have already died, it would result in the genocide in Iraq as well, it

would spill over and become a full regional war between major Shia

powers like Iran and the government in Baghdad, between major Sunni

powers like the government in Turkey and potentially Saudi Arabia, and it

would destabilise the entire Middle East and the entire Middle East

would become a breeding ground for transnational jihadi 's, pulling in

further Western citizens who are disaffected youths from London or

New York or purse or other cities from around the world. The absolute

last then you should do is continue to say that this problem does not

exist and ignore it. In an age when you can get on a plane and fly to

New York in 12 hours from somewhere like Istanbul, disengagement is not

an option. We have to end it there. Thank you. Thank you.

The bank holiday weekend for Northern Ireland, England and Wales

is fast approaching and I will give you an indication of what is to come

in just a moment. For today, it will