The United States caught in a trap

THE POST-WAR WAR IN OCCUPIED IRAQ
By Paul-Marie de La Gorce

** Candidate George W. Bush is confirming that formal sovereignty over Iraq will be transferred on June 30, 2004, but UN Secretary General is ruling out holding legislative elections before then. So who will be ruling the country? According to a poll published Feb. 21, only 2% of Iraqis accept that this should be the present Governing Council. The parody of "democratization" that seems promised can only strengthen those in the resistance... **

Le Monde diplomatique
March 2004
Pages 8-9

http://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/2004/03/ (This article not available on-line.)

One year after the launching of operations in Iraq, whose end was officially proclaimed last May 1 by President George W. Bush, no day goes by any more without some manifestation of the Iraqi resistance. The American victory, hailed at the time as incontestable and irrevocable, is thus openly called into question. The post-war period has become another war, radically different from the one that has just ended, but its political, military, social, and even international characteristics are such that how long it will last and how it will end are unpredictable. How did it come to this?

From a distance, one can better take stock of the consequences of decisions taken before and also after the war by American officials. What they indicate is far from what the continuing polemics over the pretexts officially invoked to justify the conflict would lead one to believe.

The true political, strategic, and economic objectives of the war were never hidden: to replace President Saddam Hussein's regime with one clearly favorable to American interests, to complete the strategic encirclement of Iran and the Syria-Lebanon-Palestine region, to control directly the production and commercialization of Iraq's immense hydrocarbon reserves so as to reduce an excessive dependence on Saudi Arabia, which, after the September 11 attacks, is no longer considered to be as reliable a partner as was previously thought.

These givens, expressed openly enough by American officials before the war was launched, led as well to conclusions that were just as openly avowed. Iraq would be a largely disarmed federal state, with as weak a central power as possible, divided among the three communities -- Kurdish, Sunni, and Shiite. On this last point, there were ongoing controversies, provoked by the interpenetrating of populations -- for example, Kurds and Arabophones in the north, Sunnis and Shiites in Baghdad. [See, inter alia, the colloquium organized by the American Enterprise Institute that began on Nov. 15, 2002, the seminars held there during January 2003, a report by the Council of Foreign Relations proposing the creation of 18 provinces, and Robert D. Kaplan's report entitled Post-Saddam Scenario.] But American officials clung tenaciously to their objective. They could, in fact, count on the certain support of the two principal political parties of the Kurdish community, which naturally demanded an autonomy as close as possible to independence. And they thought that they would be welcomed by the Shiite community -- "enthusiastically," some even said. A federal solution thus appeared to be the only one apt to satisfy demands on all sides.

The post-war period depended on the success of this enterprise. What immediately happened was nothing other than the destruction of the central Iraqi state. After the immediate and total dissolution of the army, the near-dissolution of the police, the sacking and burning of most of the ministries and central administrative offices -- which a few sentries would have sufficed to prevent --, the political power put in place by American authorities proved unable to bring the country under control.

Principally composed of men returning from a long exile or representing parties that no longer were grounded in Iraqi society, except for the two large Kurdish parties, the Provisional Governing Council had no instrument at its disposal to exercise effectively its functions. Among its members, the most independent and most lucid had no illusions about this.

Thus Mrs. Aquila Al-Hachami, a diplomat and former secretary to Mr. Tariq Aziz when he was minister of foreign affairs, adjunct director of the office for international organizations before the war and a Shiite, accepted membership in order to help reestablish Iraq's foreign relations, and also, no doubt, to protect the personnel of her ministry. On a visit to Paris, she confided that the Provisional Governing Council would have "no authority and no legitimacy" as long as the American occupation lasted, and that the objective of the Council ought to be to obtain as speedy a departure as possible of the occupation forces: she was, of course, herself the victim of an attack upon her return to Baghdad, and died two days later.

Still more important: to twelve years of a blockade, to the deep economic and social regression and the frightful human consequences that resulted from this, were added the destruction caused by the war -- months were needed to begin to lessen the effects of these, and they could not be erased. In most of the country a pitiless triptych erected itself: no gas, no electricity, no work. The slight progress that has been made does not make up for the ordeals that the great majority of the population is still experiencing.

AT THE HEART OF THE RESISTANCE, SOLDIERS

The occupation authorities did not undertake an accelerated reconstruction of the Iraqi economy, and they did not undertake a veritable political reconstruction of the country, either. There was no appeal either to the great nationalist movements that expressed the deep tendencies of public opinion after the 1958 revolution up through the establishment of a monolithic dictatorship, nor to the army command structure, which had suffered from the vigilant repression exercised by President Saddam Hussein's regime but which incarnated Iraqi patriotism, and nothing that evoked the contemporary evolution of society, including what was related to generalized education or the relative secularity of legislation and of the status of women, was taken into account.

It is not an exaggeration to say that the political, economic, and social prerequisites of the development of the Iraqi resistance were thus united just after the first phase of the occupation; it remained to be seen whether the military conditions were also met, as well. The resistance sprung forth in the country at the beginning of the summer, much earlier than expected. According to the analysis that the American services wanted to make, this came from the lingering partisans of the former president, Saddam Hussein, and from groups that came from outside the borders of Iraq, whose origin was in the most extreme Islamist tendencies, that is, in the terrorists linked to the al-Qaeda group.

From the beginning, this analysis did not stand up to examination. If, in the region around Tikrit, where the former Iraqi president was from, his partisans could still find some support among the population, his unpopularity made it implausible that he was able to inspire, much less direct, a national resistance, which, very quickly, spread through a large part of the territory: for the resistance, Saddam Hussein was without a doubt a factor that divided rather than united, a handicap rather than an advantage, and it was not with him that the Iraqi resistance could have found the popular support without which, as with any clandestine resistance, it needed to be able to exist and to act.

As for the groups coming from the exterior, they are indeed present on Iraqi territory: recruited in all the countries of the region, they have crossed the Saudi border, obeying the call from the most radical Islamist tendencies in the Middle East -- "Everybody to Iraq!" -- in order to directly confront the American forces. Since in war one does not choose one's allies, they have usually been accepted as partners by the other components of the Iraqi resistance. But they have had trouble from the beginning in taking root in the country, so little in conformity with Iraqi society are their spiritual points of reference and their behavior. Their presence and above all their mode of action will in all likelihood be strongly contested as the resistance grows stronger.

In sum, the American analysis ought to have been invalidated by events themselves: after the capture of the former president, the resistance grew stronger and developed, spreading into most regions of the country, so that, at the present juncture, we should formally take note of the very broad popular support without which it would not exist.

Its principal component is what could be called the military resistance. Its origins can be situated at the end of the war last spring. When military operations ceased in Baghdad, young Iraqi officers, the most resolute staffs, and the men who obeyed them, dispersed throughout the territory and into the population. They carried with them their light arms as well as their heavier infantry arms: mortars, machine guns, shoulder-fired missiles, etc. They withdrew into regions where they were the surest of finding popular support, which is to say, in practice, into the regions and tribes from which they came. The extension of the Iraqi resistance, both geographically and socially, was thus predictable, like most of the military resistance, in the more or less short term.

What is more, one can measure the strength of the components of the resistance according to their mode of action. That of the military resistance corresponds to its nature and its means. It is the military resistance that is at work in the ambushes against convoys of occupation troops, against columns of light armored vehicles, against the sites of headquarters and command posts, and, naturally, against helicopters or, exceptionally, against low-flying aircraft. These men are the only ones who have the needed training, equipment, and arms.

It has thus become, by far, the most active and most effective component of national resistance; and thus, the component capable of attracting the most combatants, informers, and liaison agents. It is also the component that can most easily plant its own men in the police formed by the American authorities, either to be informed of its activities, or to wage against it, as is regularly seen, operations that are remarkably destructive and dissuasive. And it is this component that, incarnating nothing but the national revolt against a foreign occupation, can find support among all communities and milieus, with patriotism as its sole motivation.

After the capture of Saddam Hussein and the massive arrests that followed, the military resistance was able to integrate the former partisans of the presidents who wished to continue their struggle. Its implantation was able to be all the more durable and deeper in that it is more based in the tribes that, more and more frequently of late, are the setting for its action.

The groups coming from outside act as they have done elsewhere: through deeds that are as spectacular as possible and that take no account of the sacrifices that result for the population. This is how they have acted before, in Nairobi, in Dar es-Salam, and in Bali. This is how they have acted in Iraq, when attacking the Red Cross headquarters or that of the United Nations. With money and munitions probably at their disposal thanks to their foreign connections, they can renew their operations, but, despite the sympathy of Iraqi Islamist milieus with which they have made contact, the human losses they have inflicted are already winning them an unpopularity that may isolate them.

The geographic extension of the resistance was able to find, in the country as a whole, the popular support it needed. It is nonetheless true that it must confront the special problems posed in Kurdish and Shiite areas. Indeed, in the north of the country, the leading political parties, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), are associated with American forces, which have for the past twelve years ensured the total autonomy of their region. But neither party is completely master there: they must deal with the hostility of other groups and that of part of the population. For this is not homogeneous. In Mosul and especially in Kirkuk, Turkmens, Arabs, and Assyrians form a considerable part of the residents, perhaps the majority, and do not wish to submit to a Kurdish power. These form thus the base of the Iraqi resistance. But some Kurds have also associated themselves with them.

The extremist Islamist group al-Ansar al-Islam, which took root toward the end of the preceding regime and which was known for making use of violence against Christian communities, was struck hard by American bombing and attacks by KDP and PUK militias. Also, Iranian authorities denied territorial access to it. It is no longer a significant force. On the other hand, other Kurdish groups have formed with the help of neighboring states -- Iran, Turkey, Syria -- that have managed to keep a clientele on the ground and which, for various reasons, do not accept the authority of the two leading parties. This suffices to enable the Iraqi resistance to count on enough alliances and complicities to maintain an increasing state of insecurity and to conduct spectacular operations like that of Feb. 1, 2004, which took 105 lives in Erbil and was claimed in a message from the extremist Islamist group Ansar al-Sunna in terms that make its authenticity doubtful [AFP, Feb. 4, 2004].

SHIITE CONSERVATIVES WANT POWER

The Shiite community, by tradition, is not politically homogeneous. Its hostility to the regime of former president Saddam Hussein has been almost unanimous since the repression of its revolt after the 1991 war. But the Shiite community was also the cradle of Iraqi nationalism, which has been the basis of the principal nationalist parties, including the Baath Party and even the Communist Party at the height of its influence at the end of the 1950s.

The Shiite community is once again divided among different currents, even if, for the moment, the conservative political and religious groups are dominant. Their inspiration is said to be the ayatollah Sistani, holed up in his house in Najaf, which he never leaves, but who is above all the spokesperson for a group of leaders engaged in the struggle for power within the community and on a national scale. These conservative groups' tactic is to seek a direct agreement with the occupation authorities. Their strategy is to invoke democratic principles by demanding immediate recourse to universal suffrage. Their goal is to head up the Iraqi state, thanks to the numerical superiority of the Shiites. But therein lies their greatest risk of failure. For American politics continues to rule out a strong central power and is thus making use of the hostility of the other communities to any regime in which the Shiite community would have an overwhelming predominance.

For the rest, the conservative currents symbolized by the name of the ayatollah Sistani are not uncontested. Beginning last summer, the young ayatollah Moktada al-Badr called for resistance to the occupation, and, if he was not yet calling for armed struggle, at least not explicitly, the tone of his preaching connected with that of the leading groups of the national resistance, engaging Iraqis in immediate confrontations with the occupiers. As for the Shiite movements linked to the Iranian regime, the Asrii movement and the Al-Dawa group, their strategy, in accord with that defined in Tehran and connecting with that of the currents inspired by the ayatollah Sistani, aimed at a union between communities and the formation of a single national power, whose aim is the final departure of American forces. But this strategy has been revised, and there are many signs that they are moving toward positions of national resistance and are beginning to open a progressive engagement with the armed struggle.

At the same time, the nationalist movements that formerly had their base in the Shiite community are emerging from a long period of silence and clandestinity. Three currents have appeared, linking up with the history of Iraqi nationalism, but as much as possible keeping their activities secret till now: the current called "pan-Arab" or "Nasserite"; a communist current radically opposed to the one represented by one of the leaders of the Provisional Governing Council; and the faction of the former Baathist party that broke away from former President Saddam Hussein, opposed him for having betrayed the ideals of the Baath for the sake of the dictatorship of a single clan and ruining the country with absurd wars, while forgetting the unification of the Arab world, social revolution, and secularity. We are only at the beginning of the return of these old nationalist currents, but the logic of their choice should lead them to join the national resistance.

In this "post-war war" in which we have now entered, who will win? Taking stock of the obstacles it has encountered, the United States seems to have chosen an exit strategy. It is articulated in four points: the withdrawal of its forces to certain principal centers and to the oil-producing regions; the summoning of a constituent assembly whose formation it would control without recourse to universal suffrage; the setting up of a local police; the support of foreign contingents to take the place of units sent back to America.

But these four objectives may be impossible to meet. The evacuation of one part of the country by American forces would leave the field open to the Iraqi resistance in several regions, where it could grow in strength. The new power put in place by the United States would then have all the less chance of establishing its authority. The local police, as is already the case, would be infiltrated by the resistance or isolated from the population. The foreign contingents, lacking motivation, knowing neither the country, nor its inhabitants, nor its language, would tend to remain in their encampments, as can already be observed now.

In this case, everything would lead the American authorities to rely upon the principal force outside of Kurdistan that still advocates reaching an understanding with the occupation forces, namely, the traditionalist, conservative Shiite community. A recent episode was revealing: the abrogation, barely voted by the Provisional Governing Council, of the family law dating from 1959, one of the most advanced in the Arab world, in favor of a more or less strict application of sharia law. Everything depends, here as elsewhere, on the final agreement of the American representative, Mr. Paul Bremer, but all the Iraqi newspapers stated, not without reason, that the vote could never have taken place if it had not been more or less agreed to by Mr. Bremer.

The impasses of the American occupation should not hide the handicaps of the Iraqi resistance. The exhaustion of its reserved of arms and munitions, evoked by several experts, is no doubt not its principal difficulty: clandestine sources of supply exist in the region. What can threaten its future and its success are its internal divisions, which to the observer seem difficult to surmount: between Islamist currents and modernist secular currents; between forces recruited domestically from all sectors of the population and groups coming from abroad inspired by a political and religious ideology that is anything but Iraqi and patriotic; between contradictory currents that divide all the communities, but especially the Shiite community.

The most combative leaders of the Iraqi resistance who have had occasion to express themselves are suggesting that the time is coming for a single resistance front to be publicly constituted: are these leaders the best informed, or merely the most optimistic?

--Paul-Marie de La Gorce is a journalist and the author of Le Dernier Empire [The Last Empire] (Grasset, 1996).

--
Translated by Mark K. Jensen
Associate Professor of French
Chair, Department of Languages and Literatures
Pacific Lutheran University
Tacoma, WA 98447-0003
Phone: 253-535-7219
Web page: http://www.plu.edu/~jensenmk/
E-mail: jensenmk@plu.edu