Ongoing Violence Threatens 'America's Show'

0 Comments | Insight on the News, Sept 16, 2003 | by Jamie Dettmer

Byline: Jamie Dettmer, INSIGHT

British soldiers in the southern Iraqi city of Basra once again are patrolling the streets wearing body armor. The U.K. charity Oxfam, traditionally one of the toughest private relief agencies around, has withdrawn its international workers from Iraq due to the deteriorating security situation.

Was it only in early August that the top U.S. administrator in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer, was waxing optimistic about the progress being made in the country? His list of positive achievements from the reopening of hospitals and schools to the setting up of an Interim Governing Council made for impressive reading, but the dark counterpoint of violence has left many questioning the direction post-Saddam Iraq is taking and doubtful about the ability of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) to administer the country alone.

In the wake of the bombing of the Jordanian Embassy that left 17 dead and the truck-bomb blast that wrecked the U.N. headquarters in Baghdad, some in the Bush administration began arguing that post-Saddam Iraq no longer should remain "America's show." State Department officials, among others, maintained quietly that a review of policy options was needed and that a greater effort was required to encourage other nations, including those in NATO, to share the financial and military burden. One proposal gaining ground was the idea that the United States should accept a greater role for the United Nations in Iraq, if for no other reason than that it would assist in persuading the Europeans and others to provide more on-the-ground assistance.

But as political notebook was going to press, the signs were that neoconservatives within the administration had beaten back that proposal. Caught between their opposition to a wider U.N. role and French and Russian insistence that the United Nations be ceded overall authority in Iraq, the attempt by some, including Secretary of State Colin Powell, further to internationalize the effort to rebuild Iraq appears, for the moment at least, stymied.

Meanwhile, the Bush administration is urging the public to be patient with it's post-Saddam Iraq policies, responding to mounting unease on Capitol Hill by arguing that there is no need for more troops to counter the violence straying beyond Baghdad and Sunni towns to the east and northwest of the capital, where most of it has been focused.

The administration has been quick to blame al-Qaeda or Arab volunteers from neighboring countries for the mounting violence. That explanation fits well into the administration's "war on global terror" but falls far short of understanding the complexity of what is happening on the ground in Iraq, critics say. And it doesn't help to decipher the day-to-day, low-intensity violence. Attacks on U.S. troops, infrastructure and foreigners working for international agencies are running up to 25 a day.

The respected Brussels-based International Crisis Group (ICG) argues that the sources of the violence are, in fact, diverse. It divides the main anti-occupation groups into Ba'athist loyalists, nationalists, Sunni Islamists, tribal members affronted by U.S. and British violation of basic customs and Arab volunteers. Feeding much of the violence is the general despair Iraqis feel with their lack of material well-being and, ironically, safety.

The ICG argued in a report released in late August that while harboring ambiguity about the foreign military presence on their soil, the majority of Iraqis has been willing to give the CPA the benefit of the doubt. But for that to continue the occupying authorities must deliver much more quickly on the things that matter for ordinary Iraqis namely, establishing law and order, creating employment and restoring basic utilities and services such as electricity, clean water and fuel.

Ominously, the ICG warns that while the tipping point against the occupation has not yet been reached, it is looming. Failure to deliver more speedily on the basic needs of Iraqis risks adding to feelings of resentment and wounded national pride and likely will lead Iraqis to question even more the political-transition process. And it could result disastrously in the distinctions fading between the various anti-occupation groups, warns ICG a nightmare scenario that would present U.S. and British forces with a massive security challenge.

Arguing that "it is not realistic to expect the CPA to be capable by itself of adequately caring for the population's essential needs and successfully ruling Iraq," the ICG recommends a new "three-way division of real governing responsibility between the CPA, the Interim Governing Council and the United Nations."

Granting the United Nations a greater role in the political transition and using its expertise in civil affairs while devolving more power to a more representative governing council could overcome the reluctance of other countries to help and strengthen the legitimacy of political change in the eyes of Iraqis. Under the ICG plan the CPA would continue to have the primary security responsibility, with allied forces in Iraq being transformed into a U.S.-led multinational force.