WASHINGTON, 28 August 2005 — Deep divisions in Iraq over the country’s draft constitution carry seeds that could finally destroy the Bush administration’s beleaguered strategy for turning the strife-torn country into a unified and stable democracy.
More than any single act, Bush’s telephone call to Shiite leader Abdul Aziz Hakim early Thursday in Baghdad underscored how important the constitution is for the administration. Even if American pressure forces the Iraqis to reach a deal, few who have tracked the negotiations expect that it can hold.
Critics of the constitutional process now include some of those Sunnis the Bush administration has been able to count on in the past, such as Ghazi Ajil Yawer, one of Iraq’s two vice presidents. Respected Middle East specialists, including some who have served the administration in Iraq, worry about Sunni bitterness.
“I see developments on the constitutional side as potentially disastrous,’’ said Larry Diamond, a scholar at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution and former senior adviser in the Coalition Provisional Authority. “I think the Bush administration has miscalculated profoundly by trying to get this constitution done by Aug. 15 at any price.’’
Besides exposing the chasm between Sunni and Shiite Arabs, the debate over the constitution coincides with a darkening of the American public’s mood about the war. Bush’s approval rating fell 5 points in August to 40 percent, the lowest of his administration, based on results of a Gallup survey released Friday. But also worrisome for the administration is that doubts are being voiced more forcefully, although still privately, by some senior military officers, civilian Pentagon officials and US diplomats.
Bush was counting on a constitutional accord as a sign of progress to help counter growing doubts at home and to take a step toward his goal of a stable Iraq. Instead, respected Middle East specialists worry that the bitterness of the battle over the constitution could turn wavering Sunnis toward the insurgents and add to the tensions between Sunnis and Shiites.
A Sunni-Shiite battle over ratification of the draft constitution in an October referendum will only increase the likelihood of such a conflict, experts fear.
However the referendum plays out, there is a sense among experts that America’s endeavor in Iraq is coming to the crunch. It is viewed as a period in which a successful referendum followed by elections two months later for a new national government could either begin to turn the tide against the insurgency or so polarize the country that it sinks into civil war.
“It is an extremely fateful time,’’ said Diamond, whose recent book, “Squandered Victory,’’ is critical of the administration’s handling of post-invasion Iraq.
Experts said it was always unlikely that any constitution could satisfy all three major groups, Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds. The demands of the Kurds and the Shiites had more in common, since both favored autonomy for their regions. And both groups wanted control over how money would be spent in those areas, particularly the oil revenues generated locally.
In contrast, the Sunnis wanted the old order, with power centered in Baghdad.
“The fundamental fight is a Sunni-Shiite one,’’ said Peter Galbraith, the former US ambassador to Croatia, who has closely followed the situation. “The Sunnis don’t want anything for themselves. It’s that they don’t want the Shiites to have autonomy.’’
Kurdish leaders, who are largely secular Sunni Muslims, recognized the importance of Sunni participation but were unsure how to involve them given their complete rejection of regional autonomy, a Kurdish must.
“The state cannot become stable unless the Sunnis are involved,’’ said Barham Salih, Iraq’s planning minister and a leading Kurdish politician.
Joost Hiltermann, an expert on the Middle East and the director of the International Crisis Group’s Jordan office said the Kurds are already poised to separate if they sense that the country is too troubled by sectarian fighting or becoming too dominated by religious factions.
“The Kurds are looking for a way to say: ‘We played the game, we acted in good faith, it’s not working, we’ll set up our separate country,’ ‘’ Hiltermann said.
