To The Rescue

• Share

Wanted: troops to patrol Iraq. experience thwarting terrorist attacks and guerrilla insurgencies a plus, but not required. Political control remains with U.S. Those seeking broad U.N. mandate strongly discouraged. Apply to G.W. Bush, The White House, Washington, D.C. Sound like an offer you can't refuse? France, Germany and some others in so-called old Europe didn't think so — they're having no difficulty staying out of postwar Iraq as long as the U.S. remains the top authority there. Last week a top State Department official suggested that Washington might consider a United Nations-sponsored multinational force as long as it was led by an American commander. That trial balloon was proof that an overburdened U.S. hasn't entirely given up on luring old Europe aboard. And success isn't out of the question: a TIME/CNN poll last week found that 62% of French citizens surveyed would support their troops being sent to Iraq; 44% of Germans questioned would support a deployment of German soldiers. Nothing of the kind will happen, though, without delicate negotiations to calibrate a level of American control acceptable to Paris and Berlin. But in the meantime, some help is on the way.

This week, some 10,000 soldiers from more than 20 countries — many of them in "new Europe," that loose amalgam of young, hungry, former Soviet-bloc states planning to join the E.U., and those in the West who are uncomfortable with the Gaullist tilt of the Franco-German axis — will be fully mustered in Iraq under the command of Polish General Andrzej Tyszkiewicz to help the Yanks and Brits shoulder what looks like a long and hazardous occupation. Serving alongside 2,300 Polish soldiers will be 1,600 soldiers from Ukraine, 1,300 from Spain, 470 from Bulgaria, 300 from Hungary, 220 from Romania and 100 from Latvia, as well as about 1,200 from countries in Central America. The Multinational Division Central South will control — nominally, at least — 80,000 sq km and 3 million people in south-central Iraq.

Will the force make a difference? The Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza called it "Babel in Babylon." Common military doctrine, equipment, even a shared language in this disparate "coalition of the willing" won't be possible. The numbers are a drop in the bucket compared to the 150,000 troops already deployed by the Americans, and don't pack the wallop of the 10,500 British troops. NATO is organizing the headquarters and communications. The Americans will provide airlift, sealift, training and equipment to many of the troops, and cold cash to make the whole thing work. And the folks back home in many contributing countries are actively hostile. So what's the point?