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Putting the pieces together
again
By Jim Lobe
WASHINGTON
- Even as US troops helped bring down Baghdad's most
imposing statues of President Saddam Hussein, the big
question was what lies in store for Iraq and the Middle
East in general, and also for the future of
international relations.
Most immediately, US
and British troops must still root out the remaining
pockets of resistance in the capital and Basra, stop the
looting and chaos that have broken out in both cities
and many others, and consider how they will take, with a
minimum of bloodshed, areas that currently remain beyond
their control, such as Kirkuk, Mosul and Saddam's home
town, Tikrit.
They must also install an
occupation authority, which in the guise of the Office
of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance under Jay
Garner has been cooling its heels in Kuwait since last
month, and address the shortage of medical supplies in
Baghdad, which suffered thousands of casualties in the
past days' fighting. As well, they must attend to the
country's overall humanitarian situation, which has
become increasingly desperate in water-short parts of
southern Iraq that New York Times columnist Thomas
Friedman described as "in a pre-political primordial
state of nature".
"America broke Iraq; now
America owns Iraq, and it owns the primary
responsibility for normalizing it," wrote Friedman, who
had supported the war, albeit with considerable
trepidation over the possibility that the super-hawks in
the administration of President George W Bush would
botch the job.
So far, it's too early to judge,
although policymakers were greatly heartened by what
they described as spontaneous popular demonstrations of
support in the capital for US soldiers and rage against
the fallen dictator, who may have been killed by a
"bunker-busting" bomb attack directed at a restaurant in
an upscale area of Baghdad that he was reported to have
entered two days ago.
On the other hand, reports
that US Special Operations Forces have empowered local
militias, as they did in Afghanistan, who have imposed
their own reign of terror over hapless neighbors in
towns such as Najaf, have created serious embarrassment.
"Whether the administration knows it or not, the war is
now really over hearts and minds," noted one
congressional staffer. "It can't afford to make mistakes
like this, or the occupation is going to be a major
disaster."
Bush is receiving no end of advice
from a variety of sources both inside and outside the
administration. Government hawks appear eager to put the
occupation in place and have tentatively scheduled a
conference of opposition forces for Saturday to
determine membership of an Iraqi Interim Authority (IIA)
that will initially advise and then gradually assume
power from the occupation authorities over a period of
time.
Their favorite is Ahmed Chalabi, the head
and co-founder of the Iraqi National Congress (INC), who
was airlifted with 500 followers to Nasiriyah last
Sunday and immediately began a furious round of
politicking, much to the dismay of other opposition
figures.
The hawks, led primarily by Vice
President Dick Cheney and Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld
and their top aides, are eager to establish "facts on
the ground" before Secretary of State Colin Powell and
British Prime Minister Tony Blair, with whom Bush met
this week in Belfast, can put together a larger
international consensus that would push the United
Nations Security Council into a more central role in
deciding and authorizing the postwar arrangements.
Feeling vindicated by the success of US military
operations, particularly after they were assailed so
strongly by retired military officers and other critics
when US troops appeared to bog down in the face of
heavier-than-expected resistance by Iraqi forces, the
hawks hope to minimize the UN's responsibility for
relief and reconstruction and for screening IIA members.
In remarks on Wednesday, Cheney said that both
reconstruction and the creation of a new Iraqi
government must "reside with the US government. We don't
believe that the United Nations is equipped to play that
central role."
Indeed, both Cheney and Rumsfeld
have appeared very much in triumphalist mode over the
past days as victory loomed. While stressing that the
battle is still not completely over, Rumsfeld has
clearly relished opportunities to hint that the war
could be carried to Syria if Damascus fails to heed US
warnings against supplying Iraqi forces, and even to
Iran.
But the State Department and Blair, along
with a number of influential figures outside the Bush
administration, are still working hard to broaden
international participation and responsibility, if for
no other reason than to begin mending ties, particularly
between the United States and Germany, France and
Russia, which were badly strained during the run-up to
the war.
As in previous intra-administration
disputes, they have the clear backing of the veterans of
the administration of former president George H W Bush,
particularly former national security advisor Brent
Scowcroft, who, in remarks to the Nobel Institute in
Oslo on Tuesday, called for the Security Council to
organize the postwar administration of Iraq.
President Bush's father has himself spoken out
publicly on the need for fence mending with the
Europeans as a top priority after the war, although it
is increasingly unclear whether George W welcomes his
father's advice.
But other voices, some much
closer to the administration hawks, have also put
forward similar counsel. In a notable column on
Wednesday, Robert Kagan of the Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace, but more importantly a co-founder
of the ultra-hawkish Project for the New American
Century (PNAC), offered advice directly at odds with
that of many of his associates.
The column,
titled "Resisting superpowerful temptations", called
explicitly for Washington to forgo promoting Chalabi's
ambitions in Iraq, warning that "if it ever starts to
look as if the United States fought a war in order to
put Chalabi in power, President Bush's great success
will be measurably discredited".
The second
temptation that Washington should avoid, said Kagan, is
punishing Europeans allies, particularly France, Germany
and Turkey, for opposing the war, a course that has been
promoted eagerly by most Republicans and some Democrats
in Congress, as well as within the administration.
"The world's sole superpower doesn't need to
hold grudges, and sometimes can't afford to," wrote
Kagan, whose spouse is Cheney's deputy national security
advisor. In particular, he said, punishing Turkey would
be "politically and strategically insane" in view of
Washington's hopes of building a democratic Iraq.
While Kagan's article did not endorse a major
role for the United Nations, he, as well as a dozen
other influential neo-conservatives, including PNAC
chairman William Kristol, signed a letter late last
month calling for Bush to seek the Security Council's
endorsement of any civilian administration in Iraq.
"While some seem determined to create an ever
deeper divide between the United States and Europe, and
others seem indifferent to the long-term survival of the
trans-Atlantic partnership, we believe it is essential
... to begin building a new era of trans-Atlantic
cooperation," advised the letter, which was signed by
some 31 prominent foreign-policy analysts.
(Inter Press Service)
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