Kissinger: Iraq Military Win Impossible

LONDON - Military victory is no longer possible in Iraq, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger said in a television interview broadcast Sunday.

Kissinger presented a bleak vision of Iraq, saying the U.S. government must enter into dialogue with Iraq's neighbors - including Iran - if progress is to be made in the region.

"If you mean by 'military victory,' an Iraqi government that can be established and whose writ runs across the whole country, that gets the civil war under control and sectarian violence under control in a time period that the political processes of the democracies will support, I don't believe that is possible," he told the British Broadcasting Corp.

But Kissinger, an architect of the Vietnam war who has advised President Bush about Iraq, warned against a rapid withdrawal of coalition troops, saying it could destabilize Iraq's neighbors and cause a long-lasting conflict.

"A dramatic collapse of Iraq - whatever we think about how the situation was created - would have disastrous consequences for which we would pay for many years and which would bring us back, one way or another, into the region," he said.

Kissinger, whose views have been sought by the Iraqi Study Group, led by former Secretary of State James Baker III, called for an international conference bringing together the permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, Iraq's neighbors - including Iran - and regional powers like India and Pakistan to work out a way forward for the conflict.

"I think we have to redefine the course, but I don't think that the alternative is between military victory, as defined previously, or total withdrawal," he said.

U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, a Republican member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he disagreed with Kissinger. Graham told CBS television's "Face the Nation" program that more U.S. troops might be needed to help stem the violence in Iraq.

"We do not have security in Iraq," Graham said. "The only way you'll ever get a political solution to the differences that exist among the Iraqi people is to control the violence.

"I am willing to send more American troops to make that happen. I believe in the Iraqi people. But they can't get it done at this level of violence."