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THE ROVING
EYE
Going mobile in
Iraq
By Pepe Escobar
The
25-member American-appointed Iraqi Governing Council is
widely described in the Sunni triangle as the "imported
government". But just as the Turkish parliament - by 358
votes against 183 - backed its government's decision to
send up to 10,000 Turkish troops to Iraq, the Governing
Council, in a flagrant clash with US proconsul L Paul
Bremer and his masters at the Pentagon, emitted a
resounding "no" to the Turkish decision.
This
attempt to gain real legitimacy on the part of the
"imported government" is moved not only by
self-interest, but also by realpolitik reasons. Iyad
Allawi, this month's rotating president of the council,
is forcefully discussing the move with Bremer. The
council may be deeply unpopular, but its members,
especially the Kurds, know exactly how explosive the
presence of troops from a Muslim country would be at
this juncture of the occupation. Sources tell Asia Times
Online that Kurd council members are no less than
horrified.
It's out of the question to have
Turkish troops, even transit, in Kurdish territory -
which, for that matter, is the only peaceful region in
Iraq at the moment. The Kurds cannot forgive the fact
that for years the Turkish army has repeatedly attacked
forces from the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) which took
refuge in northern Iraq. The PKK agreed to a truce in
1999 after a 15-year separatist war against the Turkish
state - but recently declared that the truce is no
longer valid.
Moreover, the Iraqi resistance in
the Sunni triangle has stressed in the past few weeks
that any foreign troops - even from Muslim countries,
and in this case without a UN mandate - will also be
attacked. The Turkish troops would in principle be
deployed in the Sunni triangle.
Adnan Pachachi,
former Iraqi foreign minister and also a Governing
Council member, laid down the council line: it is
opposed to the intervention of any troops from any of
Iraq's neighbors. Pachachi's reasoning goes beyond the
mere struggle of an illegitimate government trying to
face the whims of a troubled occupying power. He knows
that if the Turks are allowed to go mobile in Iraq,
nothing could prevent Iranians from doing the same in
the Shi'ite-dominated south. This would be the recipe
for a sectarian civil war.
According to Turkish
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the decision to
send troops - for a period of at least one year - will
not take effect immediately. Turkish public opinion is
still opposed - 64 percent - although not as strongly as
before the war. The Turkish parliament voted for the
deployment for a number of reasons. It wants to mend its
relations with Washington after it refused to
participate in the invasion of Iraq, or even allow US
soldiers on its soil. It wants to assert Turkish
influence in the country. It knows that American
counter-terrorism experts are already plotting with
their Turkish counterparts to continue to pursue PKK
guerrillas in northern Iraq. And most of all, it needs
to get a promised US$8.5 billion from the International
Monetary Fund to alleviate Turkey's economic crisis: the
loan will effectively only come through if Turkey
collaborates in Iraq.
Mixed
signals
While Turkey dreams of going mobile in
Iraq, Iraqis themselves also dream of going mobile in
Iraq. Mobile phone licenses were announced this week.
Bremer and his Coalition Provisional Authority wanted to
send a strong message to the world: look how everything
in Iraq is ruled by transparency. Well, not exactly.
Three mobile phone licenses were awarded for a
period of only two years. As the British did, Iraq once
again was divided into three regions: Kurdistan; the
center and the west, including Baghdad; and the south
from Najaf to Basra. According to the rules, each
operator first has to fully equip the region it was
attributed to, before exploring other markets. In late
2005, in theory, everything starts again, because an
elected Iraqi government would then choose its own
operators.
Asia Cell won in Kurdistan, Orascom
in the center and the west, and al-Atheel in the south.
According to the Americans, these are respectively
Kurdish, Egyptian and Kuwaiti businesses. Not really.
The Kuwaitis from al-Atheel are controlled by MTC, which
happens to be a subsidiary of the British telecom giant
Vodafone. MTC had already equipped the British army in
Basra with a small network of mobile phones.
Orascom - which will equip Baghdad (over 5
million people, 8 million in greater Baghdad according
to locals) is indeed an Egyptian company, doing solid
business in many Arab and African countries. But its key
partner is the American Motorola, followed in a very
discreet manner by the French Alcatel. Alcatel will in
fact be responsible for the core system of the Orascom
network (30 percent of the value of the contract).
French sources tell Asia Times Online that Alcatel was
practically invisible during the bidding process: the
Egyptians knew the Americans don't forgive Alcatel for
winning an $80 million contract through which the French
company equipped most of the Baghdad telephone exchanges
later bombed by the Pentagon.
Alcatel, along
with Siemens, Nokia, Ericsson and Lucent, had already
applied when Bechtel - in charge of repairing Iraq's
land-based telephone network - was shopping for
sub-contractors. The American Lucent won this lucrative
contract - without any competition. The Europeans
learned it by reading the papers. According to a
Scandinavian businessman, "they [the Americans] are
managing this country like it's the 51st American
state".
Iraq's mobile transparency is exemplary.
American senators wanted the standard to be American
CDMA. Iraqis were enraged: everybody in the Middle East,
as well as Europe and Asia, uses GSM. The presence of a
major Iraqi stockholder - essential in theory according
to current laws - was also abolished. Everybody had only
three weeks to make their offer. All Iraqi businesses
were discarded by the selection committee, which was
directed by two Britons.
In early September, an
Iraqi minister of telecom - Haidar al-Abbadi, a Shi'ite
exiled engineer who studied in London - was appointed by
the Governing Council. It would be embarrassing for him
to announce the mobile licenses just one week after his
appointment. So the Americans gave him a few more days
to relay the impression he was "supervising" the whole
process. But then the minister tried to disallow the
whole thing. The Governing Council got into the fray.
The Americans played hardball. The result? The Governing
Council "minister" was forced to announce the choices
that were dictated to him. No wonder cynics expect the
Turkish to go mobile in Iraq whenever they - and the
Americans - want.
(Copyright 2003 Asia Times
Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com for
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