All U.S. Troops Home by April 2004
With one outstretched leg in Afghanistan and the other in Iraq the U.S. occupation in the Mideast looks like a plump roasting hen to the gathering Islamic "jihadis" or holy warriors. Before the U.S. war on Iraq began, the CIA warned that after the invasion and before any government could counter it, terrorist resistance would be the strategy used to embarrass the ruling power and turn it inept and unable to maintain authority.
Right on schedule Islamic extremists began jihad, which they define as holy war, and it gains resentful sympathy from beleaguered Iraqis. Impatient that after four months in power the world's supreme high tech superpower cannot restore basic energy and essential services or provide security, the suspicions over the intent of Operation Iraqi Freedom quickens Iraqi disrespect for the visible grunt on patrol and the invisible U.S. Coalition Provisional Authority and its handpicked Iraqi Governing Council.
Despite calls by many Iraqis for U.S. departure now, it's not a widely held wish - yet. The potential destabilization that would erupt upon the U.S. and Britain vacating the premises today, after destroying Iraq's functioning government, harkens delay. But the vision President Bush continues to hold of military rule there until an open and liberal democracy satisfactory to the U.S. flourishes in Iraq is a prescription for a repetition of a lost cause fought in South East Asia. Its lessons were thought painfully learned by the generation in charge. Relearning them by a new generation was believed unnecessary, yet the sins of the fathers are casually now visited upon their sons.
The recklessly ambitious goal of providing Iraq an elected democratic government in America's tradition is something no significant group of Iraqis wants, and it lures an idealistic America into a blind alley. The fundamental premises of a democracy the White House demands for Iraq are unacceptable to the leaders most Iraqis recognize: for the Shiite majority - their grand ayatollahs; for the Sunnis - their sheikhs and neighborhood leaders; for the Kurds - their tribal heads. These important figures or their representatives would either refuse to compete against one another in free elections or only do so on their own agreed terms.
Turning Iraq into an American style republic on George W. Bush's watch is mission impossible. If this was the president's true mission in Iraq, it was doomed from the start. If it was the bill of goods he was sold by a treacherous group of advisors with the unexpressed goal of securing and controlling Iraqi oil, the jig is up, their gluttonous dreams are dried figs and they should not ignoble their country further by trying to refresh them.
The time to devise a successful and dignified exit strategy before America faces a nightmare is vanishing. Continued sugar 'n spice presentations by Vice President Cheney, ruddy rosy scenarios from Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, obsequious if dignified assessments by Secretary of State Powell, and upbeat 100 points of light speeches by the president belie the reality on the ground and set up Americans for an undeserved disgrace when the administration's feet are finally held to the fire and the truth painfully confronted. Courage and compassion now call on the president to turn and face down his usurpers.
His administration's blind obstinacy distorts the stakes in Iraq's outcome. The defense of U.S. prestige and credibility go up a rung with each absolutist statement to "bear any burden" and "never retreat." By making the stakes a national emblem, the administration makes them so unimpeachable they become the cause for remaining, and original motives forgotten. Their attainment becomes an unbearable burden for Iraq and a heavy trauma for America.
But before national trauma shakes the Bush presidency, there's a way for the brave leader to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. Immediately announcing a seven-month timetable for military departure with a deadline of April 1, 2004 can salvage the incursion and still honor America's dead.
Iraqi impatience is fueled by the deteriorating situation in their country. Open-ended promises are leaving safety, kerosene lamps and bathtubs unfilled. A timetable for ending the U.S. military occupation will stir the interest of European nations, Russia and all who have an interest in sharing in Iraq's oil development, and motivate them to encourage cooperation with the U.S. by any groups, friendly or belligerent to the American cause with whom they have influence. It also de-emphasizes any apparent U.S. interest in exploiting Iraq. With the Bush administration's aspiration to reshape in America's interest Iraq's economy and political order and that of Iraq's neighbors slowly disheveling, the White House can consider a timetable for an orderly military departure as nothing to lose.
As the American presence in Iraq raises the tide of Islamic and national resistance, the pre-war aim of privatizing the Iraqi oil industry should sober. The president may see succeeding in Iraq as the deciding battle against terrorists, but he should consider that Arab nationalism and extremist Islamic groups see the battle the same way - but against the U.S. and its allies.
To begin having a chance at a positive and orderly departure from Iraq, America's best chance is with the most important leaders in Iraq - the grand ayatollahs, in particular Muhammad Baqir al-Hakim and Ali al-Sistani. They are grateful to the U.S. for removing Saddam Hussein's regime and opening the way for full freedom of religious practice in their country. Although they are critical of the U.S. Authority, they have dealt with it and been accommodating of the Provisional Authority's 25 member interim Iraqi Council. They advocate a modern and independent Islamic state that rejects extremism and they claim not to seek an Iranian style Islamist government. They favor free elections. Without U.S. favors, their cooperation is about to cool.
The U.S. approved Iraqi Council, widely considered ineffectual, has the immediate task of preparing a national constitution. However, al-Sistani has issued a fatwa or religious edict, which for his millions of followers practically carries the weight of law, that says delegates to a constitutional convention must be elected by Iraqis for the document to be relevant.
Complicating the council's difficult task, any constitution the council signs off on would require approval from U.S. Civil Administrator, Paul Bremer. The kind of national constitution acceptable to the U.S. representative must among other things guarantee and protect full rights for women, something seemingly fundamental for Westerners but which the senior clerics will not accept as a legal right. Such a document passed by the U.S. administration would mean the months used to draft it would end wasted. It could help the process immeasurably if the White House accepted the idea that a majority of Iraqis feels a constitution already exists. They call it the Holy Quaran.
The White House must play the hand it's been dealt, accept the realities of a culture it cannot force overnight to open to a Western tradition centuries in the making, and instead enable an Iraqi constitution to be drafted acceptable to the only leaders who remain in Iraq respected by their people and willing to work peaceably with the U.S. in stabilizing the country. In order to achieve this the U.S. administrator must allow an immediate increase in the council number from 25 to however many additional members are needed to dilute the voting in order to favor members favorable to the two grand ayatollahs mentioned.
Beginning with an off the shelf constitution, the newly expanded council should immediately hammer out a hybrid suitable to Iraqi culture and schedule a popular referendum for December 2003. It would pass and free elections would be held two months later. The last American boot would leave Iraqi soil by the first of April 2004. An adequate Iraqi security force would by then be in place backed by the authority of the leading clerics and popularly elected government. The United State's place would be reserved as ally and principle trading partner. Whether or not a constitution is drafted, passed, or elections held, the American deadline would still hold. The task of the U.S. Authority and military would be to provide every resource and assistance to aid the process. After departure, the U.S. would offer billons of dollars in aid, intelligence, air cover and security arms - if requested.
Should the Bush administration refuse to accept the failure of their plans for Iraq and continue to forgo such a timetable, they should look to the unraveling situation in Afghanistan, where their most recent attempt at nation building is in the pits. Currently the American mission through NATO is barely propping up a U.S. installed puppet regime powerless in its own capital. Real power and control of the country is held by warring tribes being brought under unity by either the Northern Alliance, armed and directed by Russia, or the Taliban, backed by Pakistan and a jihad movement.
The American Afghanistan victory has ushered back an opium-dominated economy, terrorist bombing, radical Islam, and a lawless country run by outsiders. If that's freedom, handcuffs are liberating. Fast forward Iraq if the U.S. insists on Americanizing that country's legal system. Continuing with the pre-war Operation Iraqi Freedom fantasy presented to the American people, the White House risks being run out of Iraq on a rail and its puppet council scattered like rabbits when they can no longer be protected from the liberated hordes.
The only chance of holding an interim governing council together before the country unhinges is allowing sufficient delegates to an Iraqi constitutional convention to be approved by the senior Iraqi clerics and have their blessings upon the convention. Baring this keeps the U.S. wasting the limited time to hold on before a combination of jihad, nationalist resistance, cleric impatience, and ethnic/religious tensions ignite into popular civil unrest, with mass insurgency directed against U.S. troops and collaborative personnel. The original notion of establishing a pliant government bending to U.S. dictate and allowing U.S. direction of energy production must give way to a power
uncontrollable by U.S. might: Iraqi desire for national liberation and self-determination. President Bush must immediately turn on a dime or his glorious folly of conquest won't be worth a blood-red cent.
August 28, 2003