“The
Americans will force the new government to do what they want. They have
no choice. Many of the ministers have western passports. How can they
say no?”1 - Ahmed Nuri, Iraqi MA student,
University
of
Baghdad
 |
|
Allawi: “A disastrous choice” |
The
concepts of legitimacy, sovereignty, and authority and how they impact
the process of nation-building have long intrigued scholars of
international politics. Basic political science texts teach that those
concepts are integral parts of political power. History has demonstrated
that when a government’s legal right to rule is contested by important
segments of society, the government’s legitimacy is eroded, and people
feel less obliged to obey a government that has little or no legitimacy.
Erosion
of a government’s legitimacy also occurs when it fails to administer
justice, improve living standards, fairly represent its people, or
becomes a tool in the hands of foreign powers. The result is a loss of
the ability to control the masses, leading the government to seek a
restoration of order through coercion. Consequently, a breakdown of
public order ensues, and a state of perpetual conflict erupts between
the government and its opponents.
Iraq
is a telling example of how a political system created by an occupying
power and out of touch with popular aspirations creates the necessary
conditions for a perpetual state of civil strife and violent conflict.
The Anglo-American invasion of
Iraq
brought about regime change, but more importantly, it lead to the
complete collapse of an already weakened Iraqi state. As a result,
political authorities in
Iraq
have to contend with eroded legitimacy, lack of authority, and a loss of
sovereignty to occupying forces.
The
United States
’ plan for Iraqi “transition” involves the appointment of a new
caretaker government that will assume “sovereign powers” from the
Coalition Provisional Authority on July 1, with
US
troops remaining in
Iraq
with the avowed goal of maintaining security. The caretaker government
is expected to prepare for elections to be held towards the end of 2004,
which will produce a government with a one-year mandate to draw up a new
constitution. The constitution will be put to a vote in a referendum in
October 2005, and new elections will be held three months later for the
election of a permanent government – after which the majority of US
troops are expected to leave
Iraq
.
Despite
this seemingly benign and clear-cut formula for the “transfer of
power,” a complex matrix of interrelated dilemmas will continue to
plague any plan instigated by occupation forces that does not enjoy the
consent of mainstream Iraqis. It is noteworthy that the first survey of
Iraqis sponsored by the US Coalition Provisional Authority after the Abu
Ghraib prisoner scandal shows that an overwhelming majority of Iraqis
would feel safer if coalition forces left immediately, without even
waiting for next year’s elections. In fact, about 80% said that they
have “no confidence” in either the
US
civilian authorities or coalition forces, and only 1% said that
coalition forces contributed to their sense of security.2
The
continued existence of the conditions necessary for serious and
sustained violent conflict make it highly unlikely that the new interim
government or occupation forces will be able to govern a peaceful,
stable Iraq.
The
Future of the Insurgency
A survey of Iraqis shows that the majority would feel safer if coalition forces left immediately. |
|
The
continuing presence of occupation forces in
Iraq
ensures that the current spiral of conflict will continue to outpace
efforts aimed at political dialogue and consensus-building. After the
fall of Saddam’s regime, US policymakers and planners were working on
the assumption that
US
forces would be welcomed as liberators by the Iraqi public. But the
continued lack of basic services, economic and political stagnation,
brutality and humiliation at the hands of occupying forces, and most of
all, the failure of occupying troops to maintain security for the
average Iraqi, has meant that “the honeymoon period of universal
welcome for coalition forces” only lasted a few weeks at most.3
Under
occupation,
Baghdad is now ranked the worst out of 215 cities assessed by Mercer Human
Resource Consulting, with the lowest score based on “detailed
assessments and evaluations of 39 key quality-of-life determinants,
including economic, human and social services, as well as security and
safety.”4
Unofficial
estimates compiled in March put the Iraqi civilian death toll since the
start of the war at 10,000. Hundreds of Iraqis were killed by
United States
and
United Kingdom
forces during the war; the rest died due to the use of excessive force
by coalition forces, unexploded bomblets from cluster bombs, or during
violent house searches that are often accompanied by property damage and
looting.5Thousands more died in the past few months in clashes between
US forces and insurgents in Fallujah, Najaf,
Karbala , Kufa, and other Iraqi cities. Recent estimates suggest that in April
alone, US forces killed as many as 4,000 Iraqis, including Sunni
insurgents and Shiite militiamen.6
For
most Iraqis, liberation would entail both the removal of dictatorship
and foreign presence. The
United States
failed to consider the Arab world’s historical lack of tolerance of
foreign occupation; long, bloody wars were waged against the French
occupation of
Morocco
and
Algeria, the British occupation of
Iraq, and the Israeli occupation of
Palestine and
Southern Lebanon
. Additionally,
Iraq
’s porous borders, the unifying ideology of Islamism, and the
modern-day appeal of jihad continue to provide a very large pool of
recruits willing to fight against a foreign occupier.
 |
|
Al-Sistani sees victory as inevitable |
Recent
tactical agreements reached with insurgents in Fallujah, Najaf, and
elsewhere in
Iraq
reflect recognition by the
United States
that the insurgency is not being carried out by bandits or isolated
remnants of the old regime, but is deeply rooted in the Iraqi population
and hence impossible to defeat militarily.7 In fact, US military
officials recently told the Associated Press that Iraqi guerillas can
deploy loyalists to boost their forces to as many as 20,000, many of
whom are highly-specialized, professional fighters. This is
significantly larger than previous estimates, which put the number of
Iraqi guerillas at around 5,000.8
Steven
Metz, Director of Research at the US Army War College’s Strategic
Studies Institute, eloquently explains the reasons for the ongoing Iraqi
insurgency:
An
insurgency is born when a governing power fails to address social or
regional polarization, sectarianism, endemic corruption, crime, various
forms of radicalism, or rising expectations. The margin of error is
narrower for an outside occupying power than for an inept or repressive
national regime as people tend to find the mistakes or bad behavior by
one of their own more tolerable than that of outsiders. Because
imperialism was delegitimized in the second half of the twentieth
century, minor errors of judgment or practice have provoked armed
opposition against rule by outsiders.9
Another
element that makes the establishment of durable political agreements
difficult is the historically bloody nature of Iraqi politics –
Iraq’s coups and revolutions since the 1950s have been significantly
bloodier than those of its Arab neighbors.10 Perhaps the most vivid
manifestation of this trend is the ongoing assassinations campaign
carried out by insurgents against officials seen as collaborating with
the
United States. The past month alone saw the assassination of three senior Iraqi
officials:
Iraq’s interim Deputy Foreign Minister, Bassam Qubba, Ghazi al-Talabani,
the security chief for
Iraq’s northern oil fields, and most significantly, Ezzedine Salim, leader
of the now dissolved Iraqi Governing Council.
In
some cases where police stations were targeted by insurgents, officers
and civil servants actually joined the insurgents or disengaged from
normal police work to avoid being targeted.11 In addition, the
targeting of oil production facilities and pipelines has seriously hurt
Iraqi revenues. Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi stated that pipeline
sabotage cost the country more than $200 million in lost revenues, with
more than 130 attacks targeting
Iraq
’s oil infrastructure in the past seven months alone.12 More
recently, the bombing of both the
Kirkuk oil fields’ pipelines in the north and
Basra’s southern pipelines resulted in the complete halt of Iraqi oil
exports.13
The
Specter of Civil Conflict
Allawi
is rebuilding Iraq’s repressive security apparatus to expedite detention and interrogation. |
|
One
of the main characteristics of post-Saddam
Iraq
has been the strengthening of primordial loyalties, manifested in
ethnic, sectarian, religious, or tribal affiliations, at the expense of
a unified Iraqi identity. Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds have different
blueprints for
Iraq
, and each group is seeking to maximize its own communitarian-based
interests. This divisive trend was augmented by
America’s “divide and rule” policies and a sectarian-based approach to
Iraqi politics.
Since
the fall of Saddam’s regime, Shiite and Kurdish leaders have been
given widespread international recognition and a much larger share of
power in terms of political authority. Although
Iraq’s Sunni Arabs have historically been
Iraq’s leading political community and enjoyed prominence in the Iraqi
bureaucracy, occupation authorities deliberately marginalized and
sidestepped them, seeing them as the defunct regime’s support base. In
fact, the marginalization of Sunni Arabs in Iraqi politics is one of the
main reasons fueling the anti-US insurgency in Sunni areas – for many
Sunni Arabs, participation in the insurgency is the only means by which
to influence the political life of the country.14
In
addition to Sunni marginalization, there are struggles within the Shiite
community itself that will have definite repercussions in the coming
period. For months, the Shiite community in
Iraq
has been torn between Iranian-born Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani’s
calls for peaceful resistance and Moqtada al-Sadr’s declaration of war
on the occupation, with fighting breaking out between their supporters
during Firday prayers last month.15 In contrast to al-Sadr’s
militancy, the supporters of al-Sistani and the Supreme Council for
Islamic Revolution in
Iraq
are spreading a message of patience and inevitable victory. They seek to
establish, through elections, an Iraqi government dominated by Shiite
clerics.
Iraq
’s Kurds have been the most welcoming of the
US
presence in
Iraq
. Since the fall of Saddam’s regime, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan
(PUK) and the Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP) have strengthened
themselves through the seizure of heavy weaponry from Iraqi army units.
Those weapons could be used for the expansion of Kurdish territory, the
seizure of oil facilities in the north, or improving the Kurd’s
bargaining position vis-à-vis Arab nationalists or Turkomans.16 The
Kurds recently threatened to withdraw from the transitional government
to protest the “failure of the latest UN resolution on
Iraq
to account for Kurdish autonomy and concerns.”17 Tensions had
already been heightened by Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani’s reference
to the interim constitution drawn up in March as “null and void,” a
reference occasioned by the self-dissolution of the Iraqi Governing
Council. Al-Sistani also rejected the constitutional clause granting the
Kurds a veto power over the final constitution.18
Conclusions
 |
|
Firebrand Al-Sadr advocates a more militant path |
Disregarding
the
United
State
’s cosmetic attempts at giving
Iraq
’s new governing authority an aura of legitimacy through the G-8
summit and a UN resolution, popular perceptions of the new government
are what make the difference. The selection of ex-Baathist and former
CIA collaborator Iyad Allawi as
Iraq
’s Prime Minister was a disastrous choice, highlighting the hypocrisy
of the Bush administration’s claims to bringing democracy to
Iraq
.
Iyad
Allawi has a long record of support for
Washington
and championed the US-led invasion of
Iraq
. More disturbing, however, is his alleged involvement in a series of
bombings in
Iraq
in the early 1990s which killed as many as a hundred civilians.19
Currently, Allawi’s main focus is the rebuilding of
Iraq
’s repressive security apparatus to expedite the detention and
interrogation of suspects. His proven record of ruthlessness prompted
CIA analyst Kenneth Pollack to cynically comment on Allawi’s choice as
Prime Minister: “Send a thief to a catch a thief.”20
The
coming months will see
Iraq
enter a crucial stage in its modern history. The viability of US
commitments will be tested, with the stability of the entire
Middle East
at risk. Indeed, the succession of illegitimate governments created at
the behest of occupation forces will generate unrest, resentment, and
more militancy, fomenting uprisings against an unjust political order
protected from abroad. Pervasive insecurity, coupled with fears of a
spillover from a possible Iraqi civil, may encourage neighboring states
to recruit allies inside Iraq, with each state working to tilt the
political equation in its favor.
Iraq
could ultimately be sucked into an unending spiral of violence that
might draw the entire
Middle East
into ceaseless conflict.
While
one can only hope that
Iraq
will regain its former pre-eminence as one of the
Middle East
’s most influential players, free from domestic oppression and foreign
occupation, the continued presence of occupation forces and the rule of
illegitimate governments suggest that prospects of a Hobbesian “war of
every man against every man” continue to loom large on the horizon.
Kareem
M. Kamel is an Egyptian freelance writer based in Cairo, Egypt.
He has an MA in International Relations and is specialized in security
studies, decision- making, nuclear politics, Middle East politics and
the politics of Islam. He is currently assistant to the Political
Science Department at the American University in Cairo.
[1] Jonathan Steele,
“Liberation
Will Only Come When the Americans Leave,” Axis of Logic Year, June 18th, 2004
[2] Michael Hirsh, “Grim Numbers,” MSNBC/Newsweek,
June 15th, 2004
[3] Steven Metz, “Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in Iraq ,” Washington Quarterly Winter 2003-2004
[4] Abdul-Hadi Jiad Tamimi, “Chaos versus hope in Iraq ,” Al-Jazeera (English)
,March 9th, 2004
[5] Nicole Choueiry, “Justice Yet to be Delivered in Iraq ,”
Al-Jazeera (English)
, March 16th, 2004
[6] “Iraq
Insurgency Larger Than Thought,” USA Today Year="2004", July 9th, 2004
[7] Tony Karon, “Letting Go of Iraq ,” Time.com
Year 2004, June 4th, 2004
[8] “Iraq
Insurgency Larger Than Thought,” USA Today, July 9th, 2004
[9] Steven Metz, “Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in Iraq ,” Washington Quarterly Winter 2003-2004
[10] James Dobbins, et al. America’s
Role in Nation-Building: From Germany to Iraq ( RAND , 2003)
[11] Martin Asser, “Iraqi
Insecurity Threatens Progress,” BBC News
[12] “Allawi
Blames Insurgents For Huge Oil Losses,” CNN.com, June 11th, 2004
[13] “Attacks
on Southern Oil Pipelines Brings Iraq’s Production to a Halt,” Jihad Unspun, June 16th, 2004
[14] Gareth Stansfield, “The Reshaping of Sunni Politics in Iraq ,” Al-Jazeera (English) March 15th, 2004
[15] Ahmed Janabi, “Tense Najaf Sparks Division Fears,” Al-Jazeera (English),
June 12th, 2004
[16] James Dobbins, et al. America’s
Role in Nation-Building: From Germany to Iraq ( RAND , 2003)
[17] “Allawi : No Conflict With Kurdish Parties,” Al-Jazeera (English),
June 11th, 2004
[18] Ibid.
[19] Peter Symonds, “Iraq’s
New Prime Minister, the CIA and their Record of Terrorist Bombings,” Axis of Logic June 18th, 2004
[20] Ibid.
