Giuliani Calls Idea of Quitting Iraq ‘Terrible Mistake'

WASHINGTON — Mayor Giuliani resigned from the Iraq Study Group when it became clear that signing the group's report would politicize its findings and conflict with his likely presidential run in 2008.

When asked yesterday by The New York Sun, the mayor said he had not read the report's recommendations but that some of those he had heard about on television sounded "useful."

Nonetheless, Mr. Giuliani's views on the war are in contrast to the Iraq Study Group's conclusions. The extent of Mr. Giuliani's disagreement with the bipartisan group's Iraq policy recommendations, published yesterday, was made clear in remarks he made to a talk-show host, Dennis Prager, on Tuesday.

"The idea of leaving Iraq, I think, is a terrible mistake," the former mayor said. The group's report, however, stresses that America should not make an "open-ended" commitment of troops and links the presence of troops to milestones met by the Iraqi government.

Mr. Giuliani also rejected the panel's recommendation that America tie the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian Arab conflict to stabilizing Iraq. When asked about this linkage on Mr. Prager's radio show, Mr. Giuliani said, "Israel and Palestine is an important issue. Sometimes it's used as an excuse to deal with underlying issues. But the reality here is that the Islamo-fundamentalist terrorists are at war with our way of life, with our modern world, with rights for women, religious freedom, societies that have religious freedom. And all of that would still exist, no matter what happens in Israel and Palestine."

The stark difference between the position of Mr. Giuliani, who left the Iraq Study Group this summer, and that of the rest of the group — which is headed by a former secretary of state, James Baker, and a former congressman, Lee Hamilton — indicates that the greater political world is less agreed on the group's 79 recommendations than are the group's five Republicans and five Democrats.

Indeed, Mr. Giuliani is not the only potential presidential candidate who is dissenting from the report, which was released yesterday. In a conference call yesterday, the incoming chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and a possible 2008 presidential contender, Senator Biden, a Democrat of Delaware, said that while the panel got some big questions right, he would nonetheless hold bipartisan hearings in the next Congress to "complete the work of the Baker-Hamilton commission."

The report rejected Mr. Biden's proposal to allow Iraq to devolve into a federalist system of three states for Sunni Arabs, Shiite Arabs, and Kurds.

"It is no longer a question of whether we stay in Iraq, but when and how we leave," Mr. Biden added yesterday.

Senator McCain, a Republican of Arizona, also offered a critical assessment of some of the group's recommendations. He called the linkage of the Israeli-Palestinian Arab conflict to the violence in Iraq "tenuous at best."

Mr. McCain also rejected the panel's call for a regional diplomatic conference on Iraq involving Iran and Syria. "Our interests in Iraq diverge significantly from those of Damascus and Tehran, and this is unlikely to change under the current regimes," he said. In the report, the group said one of the inducements America should offer Iran is to drop its policy of regime change.

But Mr. McCain appeared most concerned about the panel's placing of a time line of early 2008 to begin redeploying American combat troops stationed in Iraq. "By placing a limited timeframe on our military commitments, we would only induce Iraqis to side with militias that will stay indefinitely, rather than with the U.S. and government of Iraq," he said. "Such a step would only complicate our considerable difficulties."

For his part, Mr. Giuliani told the Sun that he had not read the group's final report. He did say, however, that he thought some of the recommendations were "useful."

"The goal has to be an accountable, responsible government in Iraq that diffuses terrorism rather than promotes it, and if the president keeps that goal the same, then I think maybe not all of these recommendations — I can't imagine all of them will be implemented — but some of them will be very, very useful," Mr. Giuliani told the Sun.

That last point is likely to chafe his former colleagues in the study group, who yesterday urged President Bush to adopt their recommendations in full, stressing that theirs was the only bipartisan set of recommendations he was likely to receive.

Nonetheless, Mr. Baker made clear that the report only represents suggestions that, at the end of the day, are not binding. "This is not legislation or an executive order," he said.

"This does not bind leadership on the hill or the president. But it is the only recommended approach that will enjoy complete bipartisan support."

Another important voice yesterday seemed to be backing away from adopting the report's recommendations completely — that of Mr. Bush. Before a meeting with congressional leaders, he praised the seriousness of the report and its bipartisan process. But he added a caveat: "Not all of us around the table agree with every idea. But we do agree that it shows that bipartisan consensus on important issues is possible."