EN ROUTE TO BAGHDAD -- Someone asked me why should I question J.'s optimism and how many Iraqis kissing me would it take for me to be convinced. There's no question many, many Iraqis (especially the Kurds) are happy that Saddam is gone. But it's not so simple as that.
In Tikrit, and in other places such as Mosul, a lot of people aren't happy to see American forces -- and not just because those forces have failed to provide security. The situation in the cities is volatile, and ethnic hatreds could flare into civil war without too big of a push. Already, we've heard reports that Kurds have begun driving Arabs out of villages around Kirkuk, reclaiming their old lands. The recklessness of the PUK and the KDP in post-Saddam Iraq could bring Turkey into the mix when the United States draws down its forces. No one knows what's going to happen, and the initial giddy optimism I encountered is giving way to guarded anxiety about the future.
I don't believe the United States went to war to make the Iraqis happy. It didn't go to war to free them. The United States went to war for geopolitical self-interest (See "Why Iraq?" on B2I for a look at some of the reasons.) If the question is "Are the Iraqis happy that Saddam is gone?" the answer is undoubtedly yes -- most of them, anyway. But that opens up a host of other questions that will have to be answered in time. It is much, much too early to declare the peace won and the sacrifice in blood and treasure a worthy investment in Iraq's and the United States' futures.
The anti-war crowd (in which I usually include myself) has often underestimated or understated the genuine good that came out of this war, i.e., the removal of a tyrant. But the pro-war crowd has equally underestimated the dangers of the aftereffects of this war: instability in the region, alienation of allies, increased risk of terrorist attacks, etc. Yes, the Iraqis are free -- free to turn on their neighbors and kill them. Yes, the fear of visits from the Ba'ath Party has been removed, but now they fear armed gangs stealing their homes. This is still a nation in terror, and a stable, inclusive government is a long way off.
If the goal is establishing a representative democracy, powdered wigs and all, that's likely to fail. Iraq in 10 years will more likely resemble authoritarian Egypt than friendly, parliamentary Canada. Would that be better than Saddam? Of course, absolutely. Is that what the Iraqis expect and deserve? Emphatically no. Would such an outcome make the region more stable and the United States safer? No one knows, and anyone -- including me -- who says they do is speaking from beliefs and assumptions rather than a possession of data.
I'm en route to Baghdad today (Thursday) and will file back what the situation is there.
Technical Note
Due to a snafu with the sendmail program on my server, two dispatches may have been missed. I believe it's been resolved now. I apologize for the inconvenience.
Chris,
I would like to discuss further with you (in person when you’re home!) why you think Iraq
will resemble authoritarian Egypt. It is my
understanding that Iraq has a solid history
of political and cultural pluralism prior to the Baath party taking power in 1968. According to the NYT on April 16: (pre-1968)the broad core of Iraqi nationalism insisted on the inclusion of all Iraq’s ethnic groups, even as it recognized Iraq’s predominantly Arab character.” I believe this bodes well for the establishment of a solid democracy.
Todays article is excellant. Too bad a major paper wouldn’t print it.Keep up the good work and stay safe. a little ol’retired gramdma in albany or
Todays article is excellant. Too bad a major paper wouldn’t print it.Keep up the good work and stay safe. a little ol’retired gramdma in albany or
I don’t think the government ‘we’ set up will be beneficial to the Iraqis. It seems they know what they want and we should let them have it, though with some guidance maybe… but we do not have the right to decide the fate of their nation.
I suspect the Iraqis would resent even a government they want for themselves if that government is placed and maintained by the U.S. They have made it very clear they do not want one government not of their choosing simply replaced with another government not of their choosing. I would likely feel the same way if some other country’s equivalent to Bush bulldozed across America and deposed Bush. If the U.S. is going to continue to impose its will on Iraq I believe it will require a continuation of the armed force it has taken up to this point. I hope we can resist the (apparent) lure of domination and not continue this.
Hello Chris,
You wrote:
“No one knows, and anyone — including me — who says they do is speaking from beliefs and assumptions rather than a possession of data.”
Excellent point! It captures my ambivalence about this action perfectly and it would be good if more folks would take this thoughtful approach rather than weighing-in with ill-informed opinion and bias. Winning the peace will be very difficult and will require thoughtful, creative, and open minded people. I hope the decision makers are up to the task.
Please keep up the good work!
I would like to (gently) dispute your remark that “the anti-war crowd underestimated the good that this war has done”.
First, it was “the anti-war crowd” that opposed Saddam Hussein beginning in the early 1980s. Had it not been for “the anti-war crowd”, such as Amnesty International, no one would know about Saddam’s crimes. The Bush people certainly weren’t telling us— they were giving Saddam the money and making connections for him to buy chemical warfare precursors. Indeed, in 1991, it was Bush Ambassador April Glaspie who told Saddam, on being informed that he planned to invade Kuwait that “the United States has no opinion on Arab-Arab disputes” thereby giving what many see as a green light for invasion. It was Senators Dole and Simpson who, right up until the moment of the invasion, argued against suspending the food credits that Saddam laundered into weapons. When the “pro-war crowd” lectures, it would be meet if modesty urged them to reflect on what they were doing from 1982-1991.
Second, we have yet to see what good or ill will come from this war. The example of Afghanistan is not encouraging. There is no functioning government outside of Kabul. Warlords and drug smugglers are in control. Human rights are arguably worse (or arguably better) than they were under the Taliban. What this means is that “liberation” has meant at most marginal improvement to the lives of people. Privately funded relief is arriving, but the Bush Administration failed to budget any money for government funding of relief. The scale of the humanitarian crisis is enormous. Civilians are still dying from war. Afghans have no basis for hope that the future will be better.
If the United States and the West could not radically improve Afghanistan over the course of almost 18 months, and if (as seems likely), they cannot radically improve it ever, what makes anyone believe that Iraq will do any better?
The lesson of the reconstruction of Germany and Japan is very different than is widely understood. Both countries had a democratic history prior to the war, unlike Iraq. Japan received minimal aid, and languished for a number of years in dire straits until the Korean War brought in huge sums for the purchase of supplies. West Germany was the beneficiary of the Marshall Plan, and recovered relatively more rapidly. Both countries required 20-30 years to achieve parity with the rest of the industrialized world; East Germany was stripped by the Soviet Union and has not recovered more than a decade after reunification. Both countries still suffer the pangs of ultranationalism. Without the stabilization of massive occupation armies to suppress ultranationalism and without massive amounts of aid, both countries would likely be basket cases.
What makes anyone think that Iraq, which will probably not benefit from a lengthy occupation by international forces and massive amounts of aid, will do better?
The really successful cases of liberation that come to mind are those accomplished largely by the indigenous people— the American Revolution, for example. Being “liberated” from outside never works quite as well as we are led to believe.
At the risk of again soundling like an up-with-Chris cheerleader :-), I have to say this the clearest, most level-headed and most insightful commentary I’ve heard about Iraq. The histrionics of zealots who think they can predict the future on the left and the right clouds the debate. I’m afraid we’ll all just have to wait and see. A thing has been set in motion and even the “powers that be” only have the illusion of control.
Maybe this makes me a fatalist. But I’m also an optimist. Only time will tell.
It’s quite possible that anti-war types are underestimating the amount of good that came from this war.
But it strikes me that everyone else is underestimating the amount of bad that has been done in the two decades before the war. Isn’t it a little bit wierd that the US is liberating Iraq after it a) supported Saddam for ten years, b) bombed the hell out of Iraq’s civilian infrastructure, c) continued to bombs every three days for ten years, and d) implemented sanctions which starved at least 500,000 kids to death, while keeping Hussein in power?
The only way this is “liberation” is if we erase history and start fresh at the beginning of war. Of course, this makes absolutely no sense.
I have to say that I am disgusted by your opinionated bias in this update. I am in J’s camp of optimism in what our government is doing in Iraq. I have seen that most conspiracy theories are only theories and the simplest solution is usually the correct one.
Your views on why the United States went to war are not journalism. They are opinion. My opinion is that Iraq will not look like us, Egypt or Canada. My hope is that they will learn to understand and apply the new freedoms that confront them in this time of change, and form a new nation upon the roots of the world that leaves options open to all. I hope that they will learn to be a form of melting pot of Kurds, Shi’ite, and even the few Christians in the country. I hope they can come together in solidarity to overcome the generations of hate based on differences.
Most of these commenters’ mental processes are simply gross. I mean, these liberal anti-war types are the ones who don’t fight when their neighbors are being shipped off to concentration camps and gulags, aren’t they? Not all, mind you, just most — the movement has been hijacked by wimps and whiners in this decadent age, and is being run by potential ba’ath party members and the pigs from orwell’s “animal farm.”
The average Iraqi will be so much better off after this that it’s not even funny. I hope they throw us out and become more anti-american than France, as long as those famous date palms, killed in a madman’s chemical war, flower again someday soon. That’s my capitalist-imperial ambition — French fried McDates.
Long live the fighters.
RE: I mean, these liberal anti-war types are the ones who don’t fight when their neighbors are being shipped off to concentration camps and gulags, aren’t they? Not all, mind you, just most
I don’t know which anti-war types you know, but the ones I know are doctors, lawyers, teachers, professional people, equipment operators, yard and garden service owners, pharmacy owners, bus drivers, computer geneii, musicians, athletes, students, construction workers, beauticians, waiters, burger flippers, retirees … just about every kind of person you can imagine. What they are NOT is unthinking sheep who blindly follow and obey the most threatening wolf, trusting they won’t be become dinner. I expect the “average” Iraqis are equally diverse, but I can guarantee one thing: those who are now dead, or have their limbs blown off, their backs broken, lost their parents or children or siblings - these “average” Iraqis are not better off in any way.
If history class was correct, those who turned a blind eye and ignored Hitler’s attrocities were the ones who said nothing while others were dragged off to their deaths. They happily waved their little flags and goose-stepped and cried “Hail to the leader!” upon demand like good little patriots. Afterward they feebly whined, “I was only doing what I was told.” Long live who? The victims of war do not.
You know a hell of a lot of people, Jen, or you’re a big fat liar. Just don’t lie to yourself.
How many students were imprisoned in Iran recently, Jen? How many did they take away, there? And what do you care about China, or the entire continent of Africa? Or burning tires stacked around bodies, or people thrown into natural caves and then grenades, or petty thieves having their hands tied down and shorn off by hacksaws without anesthetic? Why don’t you protest something real, little pig?
I’ll tell you why. You protest what you can get away with, and that’s it. The rest of the time you are perfectly silent.
Yeah, American Flag, Swastika, same difference, except you’d be too cowardly to protest Hitler, Stalin, or frigging Ghengis Khan. Go protest McDonald’s, and argue about it with Ronald — that’s where your type belongs; he’s the only conqueror who’ll give you a fair hearing.
Freedom is the annoyance that people such as you provide, and I love her for it. Nice writing, btw.
I meant Jan. Damn I could gone so brady bunch with that whole thing. Teach me to speed read.
Sadly, WNTR, most of the cowards who refuse to fight to protect other people’s freedoms are not “peaceniks” but “chickenhawks”.
Dick Cheney “had other priorities” for Vietnam.
Tom DeLay couldn’t find a berth on the troopship to ‘Nam because minorities crowded him out.
Pat Buchanan had a bad knee.
Rush Limbaugh had a pilonidal cyst
George W. Bush deserted from his champagne unit in the Texas Air National Guard during wartime, an offense that generally earned a man a ticket straight to Vietnam
Many more fake patriots are listed at www.awolbush.com, and also some heroes.
By contrast, many of the “peaceniks” are people who know war, people who have suffered plenty to bring freedom to others. They know an honorable war when they see one. They know a dishonorable war when they see one.
There are good and decent people on both sides of the issue of whether the war against Iraq was justified or not. None of them are going around impugning the patriotism of large groups of people who they obviously have never met. None of them were cutting veterans benefits while men and women were under arms in the Gulf.
You know the Proverb: A word to the wise….
“The really successful cases of liberation that come to mind are those accomplished largely by the indigenous people— the American Revolution, for example. Being “liberated” from outside never works quite as well as we are led to believe.”
I agree with this. Turkey has been a self-liberated democracy for 80 years, and look, it’s still not quite there. If the Iraqi people don’t really know what the democracy and freedom that we’re talking about actually means, how are they going to implement it? Democracy starts with the ‘people’.. It will take them a while.
WNTR: Spead-reading may be a bit rough, si, but your speed-slinging is impeccable!
The bad guy and his sibblings had to go for the good of Iraqi people. I hope the suffering of the people in Iraq will be over soonest. i have travelled up to Basra recently, only to find out what a rich country it is by means of resources both natural and human and yet so poor. The action of the allied forces will be justified even by the hardest sceptics of the war once they see the plight and state of affairs perpetuated on the happless iraqi people- a real living tragedy.
HI
HI
how do think u think the movements of the troops would effect the countries around iraq