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Berlin, 1989; Baghdad, 2003. What
next?
By Marc Erikson
Berlin, November 9,
1989, 6:53pm
Baghdad, April 9, 2003,
6:48pm
I had
come to (West) Germany in early October 1989 - on little
more than a hunch. Throughout the summer of that year
and into the autumn, East Germans had fled their
"socialist paradise" in droves through Hungary and
(then) Czechoslovakia; others had stayed, holding
candlelight vigils for freedom. When chants at
demonstrations in Berlin and Leipzig against the
dictatorial communist regime changed from "Let's get out
of here" to "We shall stay here", "regime change" - as
it's called now - seemed near. Then I saw a news report
that former West German chancellor Helmut Schmidt was
asked when he expected German unification. "Some time
between 2010 and 2020, in Berlin," he replied.
I
went to Berlin. In the evening of November 9, out late
with a group of friends, I sat in a coffee shop on West
Berlin's "main street", the Kurfuerstendamm. Shortly
after 11pm, groups of people, small at first, but fast
growing into a crowd, came running down the street,
celebrating. What they were celebrating we didn't know -
until they told us: "The Wall is open; we're from the
East." At 6:53pm, the East Berlin Communist Party chief
had told a news conference that he saw no reason why
people shouldn't be able to travel wherever they wanted.
Within hours, East Berliners had taken him at his word
and busted through border crossings. Border guards just
stood by and watched. The next day I joined thousands,
chipping away at the wall with any implements at hand.
TV pictures from Baghdad late on Wednesday (East
Asian time) conveyed much the same sense of liberation
and abandon. At 6:48pm Baghdad time, the city's main
12-meter statue of Saddam Hussein came down. Chipping
away at it by Iraqis didn't do the trick. A US Marines
M-88 rescue tank did the honors; Iraqis dragged the
severed head of the symbol of a quarter-century of
brutal oppression through the streets, took off their
shoes, and whacked it with a venom.
That noted,
it pays to remind ourselves that the war isn't over just
yet, that Saddam and top government and Ba'ath Party
leaders remain unaccounted for, and that more than just
sporadic military encounters may lie ahead around Tikrit
(Saddam's home base) and farther north. Militarily, this
is not much of an issue. The US 4th Infantry is now
rapidly pushing north from Kuwait, vaunted Republican
Guard troops are nowhere to be seen (except the
carcasses of some 800 of their armored vehicles), and
equally vaunted Fedayeen Saddam and foreign suicide
commandos are either dead or have turned tail. But for
many Iraqis, there won't be "closure" until the fate of
Saddam and his close circle is determined, looting and
revenge actions are over, and a modicum of civil order
is restored.
In East Germany in late 1989, only
the East Berlin headquarters and local offices of the
hated state security service ("Stasi") came under attack
and were ransacked by an outraged population. There was
no looting. Police forces and the civil service
continued to function under new leadership. By March
1990, free elections were held and the new government
quickly negotiated terms for the October 3, 1990,
accession of the East German states to the German
Federal Republic. Internationally, the unified new
Germany was greeted with near unanimous acclaim. Only
the French for a while had their misgivings.
Restoring order in Iraq, putting in place a
broadly accepted transitional authority, and securing
regional and international support will prove
incomparably more difficult. And yet, the way the war
played out - fast, with limited casualties and
destruction of infrastructure - has created a more
advantageous starting point than most expected. No
Baghdad "Mogadishu" scenario has come to pass. The
city's population, at first passive while uncertain
about the outcome, is coming out to celebrate in larger
numbers where relative safety has been secured. Looting
is subsiding. The "Arab street" in neighboring countries
must be bewildered by what it sees. Certainly bewildered
are the French and German press (and governments) whose
dire forecasts have not come true and whose selective
and unprofessional reporting has bordered on the
pathetic.
As sporadic fighting in Baghdad and
elsewhere around the nation continues, the most daunting
task for coalition forces and gradually established
local and national transitional civilian authorities
will be prevention of infighting and vengeful
retribution between different religious and ethnic
groups. One million Kurds live in Baghdad. The rest of
the population is relatively evenly split between
Shi'ite and Sunni Muslims. It's in the Shi'ite quarters
that coalition forces met with the most boisterous
welcome. Sunni Muslims continue to lie low; Kurds
continue to live in fear. Historically, Iraq does not
have a record of pronounced religious strife. Except for
Baghdad, Sunnis and Shi'ites live in geographically
separate areas. But as repressive authoritarian rule
comes off, sharp conflict in the capital city cannot be
ruled out. Much as speed was of the essence for the
military campaign, so will be preventive and even-handed
new civilian authority action to forestall internecine
civilian conflict.
I am less concerned about the
regional/international front. Turkey, unless
deliberately provoked, will stay out of Kurdish Iraq. It
has too much to lose from further getting on the wrong
side of the US and the European Union, which at least in
this respect see eye to eye. Syria has been firmly
warned by the US not to interfere or intervene and its
Ba'ath rulers will have their hands full containing any
spillover effect from the demise of the Iraqi Ba'ath
Party. As for Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia,
governments there will initially be sighing in relief
that the war is over and a shocked Arab street will take
time to regroup. If they are wise, they'll rapidly push
ahead with reforms before examples of budding democracy
in Iraq encourage local political factions to seize the
agenda.
(©2003 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd. All
rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com
for information on our sales and syndication policies.)
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