On cherche toujours un “Czar war”

Cela fait près de cinq mois que l’administration GW Bush cherche un “tsar” pour ses guerres en cours. Le Observer fait le point, ce 6 mai, sur cette affaire absolument et totalement surréaliste.

On argumente effectivement sur l’intérêt désormais évident d’avoir un coordinateur pour toutes ces guerres, —principalement l’Irak et l’Afghanistan, — qui durent depuis 3, 4, 5 ans et plus. On se demande pourquoi maintenant un tel personnage, à une telle fonction, est-il nécessaire ? Après tout, les guerres vont bien assez mal sans lui et il suffirait de laisser aller. Mais non, il semble bien qu’une impulsion supplémentaire soit nécessaire pour que les choses aillent encore plus mal.

La palme de l’explication revient sans doute au conseiller de la sécurité nationale et directeur du NSC, Stephen Hadley, qui observe (cette fois, nous traduisons, pour la bonne cause et pour quelques lecteurs) : «Nous en sommes arrivés au point où nous avons maintenant un plan. L’essentiel, désormais, c’est l’exécution de ce plan.» Nous renouvelons notre question à propos du plan, — magnifiquement mis au point après 3, 4, 5 années et plus de guerre-sans-plan, plan plan plan : pourquoi un plan est-il nécessaire aujourd’hui, alors que les guerres marchent suffisamment mal sans plan et qu’il semble bien que cela pourrait encore aller de mal en pis? Mais non, il semble qu’il faille un plan pour faire empirer les choses. On n’est pas un empire pour rien.

De l’article cité, quelques détails sur les délices bureaucratiques…

«“The problem is not broad strategy and policy, it's that the bureaucracy is so inefficient and there's been so little follow-up that the machine doesn't work,” former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said. He believes red tape in Washington is the biggest obstacle to winning in Iraq.

»Gingrich has joined others in suggesting that a single person report directly to Bush — and perhaps the next president — and ask: “What are the choke points? What regulations do we need to fix?”

»The new job comes as Bush's combat troop buildup is trying to bring a degree of calm in Iraq so political reconciliation and rebuilding can take root.

» “We're at a point now where we've got a plan,” Hadley said. “Execution of that plan is now everything.” Hadley said he wants to make sure that if any request from the war zone bogs down among agencies, there is someone who can speak for the president to get it solved quickley. “That's the kind of thing that I do, but I can't do it full time,” said Hadley, who must monitor hot spots around the world.

»Hadley interviewed several candidates in the past few days. He has contacted at least six retired military leaders — either to learn what they think about the job or to try to persuade them to take it.

»“This is really more of a head cracker than a czar ¬— a bureaucracy cracker,” said Michael O'Hanlon, a foreign policy analyst for the Brookings Institution who likes the idea.

»“They want one point person to contact everyone else to tell them that we need these 17 things by Tuesday to comply with the president's top foreign policy priority,” said O'Hanlon, a former adviser to the Iraq Study Group. The panel concluded that duplication and conflicting strategies at federal agencies were undermining confidence in U.S. policy. So far, there have been no takers for the job.

» “It's the nuttiest idea ever,” said James Carafano, a defense expert at Heritage Foundation. He said a war coordinator at the White House would be outside the regular chain of command. “It confuses lines of authority. It's like adding a fifth wheel on a car.” Trying to integrate government operations inside the White House is a prescription for disaster, he added.

«“You're too far from the battlefield. You're in the wrong time zone. You can't make timely decisions. You don't have the staff,” he said. “The administration will be over before they even have the communications and everything in place to do this.”»

Mis en ligne le 7 mai 2007 à 08H48