Mattis discusses war in Iraq and the media's moral bye for enemy war crimes

North County Times:

Lt. Gen. James Mattis told the North County Times during an exclusive interview this week that while a lot of work has been done in Iraq and Afghanistan, there is much to do to defeat the extremist threats to Middle East stability and long-term U.S. security.

"The problem of violent extremists existed long before 2003, and it is going to exist long after the next presidential election," said Mattis, who also commands Camp Pendleton's 25,000-member I Marine Expeditionary Force. "We are going to have to confront it and come up with a national policy."

The slightly built, 57-year-old combat veteran said he understood that the unconventional nature of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and their sustained lengths, are testing American resolve.

"We have to recognize that our electoral process may not provide the patience consistent with fighting this sort of war," he said. "Sincere, patriotic Americans can disagree with where we are going, but we have got to come up with an understanding and build consensus for how we are going to address it."

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The increasing Sunni tribal cooperation with U.S. troops in Iraq's Anbar province has al-Qaida-linked insurgents on the run, Mattis said.

"I caution people that this is not irreversible," he said. "But at the same time, we are winning and the enemy is losing."

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Iraqis who had been sympathetic to the insurgency became disenchanted as al-Qaida forces carried out murders of young boys and a local sheik who didn't respond to their overtures, Mattis said.

"These were mistakes," he said of those killings and how the incidents created an opportunity for the U.S. to make new alliances. "And war, at times, is decided by whoever makes the fewest mistakes."

Marines in the vast Anbar region, where more of their forces have been killed and injured than any other in Iraq, now routinely get tips to the location of roadside bombs.

As a result, a majority of the deadly devices are now being discovered before they are detonated, resulting in sharp reductions in troop deaths. Anbar residents also routinely report where the insurgents can be found, calling in the information to telephone tip lines that the military has established, Mattis said.

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Sitting on one of two high-backed chairs that face a sofa inside his office, Mattis expressed repeated frustration over media portrayals of the war.

Insurgent attacks are reported as "a car bomb went off in Baghdad today," he said. The general said the reports all too often do not actively pin the deadliness of the bombs on enemy forces.

But when civilians are mistakenly killed by U.S. forces, the media portrays such incidents as examples of severe ethical failings, he said, citing recent examples of inadvertent civilian deaths from U.S. bombs and small-arms attacks.

"A (insurgent) bombing is reported like it was an act of God," said Mattis, whose job includes being the authority over two ongoing prosecutions of Camp Pendleton Marines accused of murder in the deaths of Iraqi civilians. "You can see the moral bye ---- the passive voice given to the enemy's intentional murder."

The insurgency counts on negative portrayals of U.S. forces in Iraq and in the U.S., he said, adding that he believes the battle for hearts and minds is being played out in news reports.

"This enemy has decided that the war, the real war for them, will be fought in the narrative in the media." (Emphasis added.)

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And many in the media are doing their worst for the enemy. The failure to note the enemy war crimes in attacking non combatants while criticizing our forces for not stopping it results in a very unleveled playing field in the media battle space. The focus on violence as a metric of success in the war is misplaced.

His mention of the treatment received by our forces for accidentally killing civilians is encouraging for those of us who think the Haditha investigation has unfairly attacked the Marines who were responding to an enemy that camouflages himself as a civilian and who uses human shields. When that is considered, the enemy has already committed two war crimes before the Marines ever pulled a trigger at Haditha.