CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — The damage from the invasion and occupation of Iraq cannot be undone. How must the US adjust its Iraq policy to the challenges it currently faces?
The US faces trouble on three fronts. One, Iraqis are resentful of US presence. Zogby International’s August poll interviewed 600 Iraqis, and over 65 percent wanted the US troops to leave Iraq in less than a year while 25 percent wanted them to stay for over two years. Over 58 percent did not want US or UK support to set up a government in Iraq while less than 36 percent wanted it; and 50 percent believed that the US would hurt Iraq in the next five years while 35 percent said the US would help.
In the Iraqis’ mind the US presence is not linked to Iraqi well-being. Far from it. Iraqi resentment is likely to increase. An Iraq-based commander, Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, recently said that US forces “now face revenge attacks from ordinary Iraqis angered by the occupation.” Reducing accidental killings is not easy when forces are confronting surprise hit-and-run attacks.
The Iraqi resistance profile is complex and changing. US officials and media reports claim that there are also non-Iraqi Muslims linked to Al-Qaeda joining the resistance. US National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice says there are around 2,000 foreign fighters in Iraq. Already there are several hundred “third country” nationals in US custody in Iraq. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld recently told reporters that “the folks that we’ve scooped up have, on a number of occasions, multiple identifications from different countries.”
There are also reports about the first lot of eight US and British citizens suspected of involvement in attacks on US forces. The reports suggest they are the “first Westerners” involved in the anti-US guerrilla operation. This should not be surprising. Within the US there is an active anti-war movement organized under the United for Peace Coalition.
An international coalition of peace and justice groups has organized the Baghdad-based International Occupation Watch Center, which manages the most regularly updated news website called Occupation Watch. It keeps the interested worldwide informed of developments in Iraq.
The second front where the US is facing trouble is the military. Military power, the United States’ most potent tool in its Iraq policy, is not “delivering”. Military power is unlimited in its ability to destroy the concrete and tangible. But military force alone cannot construct the political framework for peace; nor can it always conquer the human spirit by instilling the fear of death.
Military force without moral authority is only a killing tool, not a winning one. In Iraq, US military power evidently carries no moral authority. While the Bush administration believes it is an army of liberation sowing the seeds of democracy in Iraq and beyond, in Iraq US soldiers are confronted repeatedly with guerrilla resistance. US military power in Bosnia and Kosovo was seen as stopping genocidal killings. Military power manifestly decreased human suffering by battling Karadzic, who sought to butcher the Bosnians.
Guerrilla attacks combined with continuing US casualties must be pushing the US forces into a siege mentality. On Sept. 12 it was this siege mentality that caused the US soldiers to fire thousands of bullets at the US-managed police force. The firing killed eight Iraqi policemen in Fallujah. The “pacification” of the Fallujah resistance is still pending. In Fallujah’s main mosque a cleric recently thundered in his sermon that “although unorganized and without leadership, the Iraqi resistance is a ball of fire in America’s face that will bring its end in Iraq.” The third front where the US is facing trouble is the “process”. The main process the US has set in train in Iraq is the interaction between Iraqi resistance and an aggressive US defense. If unbroken, this resistance-aggression defense cycle will inevitably slide into a resistance-repression cycle. Iraqi resentment and the fear and siege mentality of lethally armed US forces will be reinforced. Both will believe in the legitimacy of their respective killing and maiming of the other. The transition of political power will become stalled in increasing warfare.
True, Saddam’s brutal controls have disappeared. Yet politically active Iraqis see simply another “adversary” in the US occupation forces. Despite Saddam’s dictatorship, Iraqis remain an independent-minded and proud people. They reject US occupation. They are also unlikely to allow an occupation force, through a handpicked group of Iraqis, to “engineer” freedom, democracy and development for them. US Secretary of State Colin Powell’s plan for an Iraqi constitution and a functioning administration must be implemented in a framework other than that of occupation.
These are compelling factors requiring reversal in the US’ Iraq policy. On the home front, too, with the beginning of the election process, Bush must seek to cut the political costs of occupation. It has two options to choose from. One is to “stay the course.” The other is to cooperate with the UN, turn the Iraqi reform and reconstruction effort into an authentic international effort, work on an early transfer of power to a more representative Iraqi set up, enter into cooperation with Iraq’s neighbors to tackle the cross-border movement of terrorist groups, retain US control within a UN-led military command and deal with the terrorism threat effectively using a sophisticated and low-key approach.
Significantly, countries like Iran and Syria have already signaled their willingness to cooperate with the US to deal with terrorism and the Iraq situation. The US is showing flexibility within the UN Security Council to draft a resolution acceptable to all the members. These are positive signs. The US must recognize that flexibility and cooperation will play dividends all round. Inflexibility, by contrast, could yield instability and violence for all, including the US.
— Nasim Zehra is a Fellow at the Harvard University Asia Center.
-— Arab News Opinion 22 September 2003