Published in Maclean's Magazine, April 14, 2003 (edition date: April 21) Kuwait City Invading armies led the way, followed closely by the spectral forces of political kingmaking, seeking to install the Bush administration's favourite Iraqi sons at the forefront of the country's first post-Saddam governing body. But the failure of American and British authorities to prepare for keeping order in the country, say diplomats and aid specialists here, has seriously compromised what all parties view as the ultimate goal in vanquishing the old Iraqi regime: the creation of a stable, humane and sustainable society. Having swept Iraq with an unstoppable war machine, the Americans and British appear to have overlooked the need to field even the most basic force of military policing specialists. (Belatedly, the Pentagon announced last Friday that 1,200 civil and military police will prepare to travel to Iraq soon.) Lawlessness plagues towns and villages "liberated" even in the first days of the invasion. In Basra, for example, British commanders and their troops displayed patience and tact in taking the city, but they are, almost to a man, combat soldiers. They lack the experience and training required to cope with a volatile populace, who are preyed upon by looters and desperate for clean water and food. Worse, the British Marines who know Basra best are due to be relieved and sent home by the end of the month, with no clear indication of what kind of force will replace them. The Americans, meanwhile, have mainly more war fighting forces in the pipeline: the 4th Infantry Division and the 3rd Cavalry Regiment have begun rolling into Iraq, with the 1st Cavalry Division on the way from Texas all are late arrivals from the initial invasion deployment. As yet, the concept of fielding civilian or military police units hasn't even reached the planning stage. "There was a lot of talk about breaking the grip of the Iraqi regime," one diplomatic observer in Kuwait told Maclean's, "but the (Bush) administration hasn't really got a handle on what to do next. It's a rudderless ship -- the focus was all about removing Saddam Hussein, all about military thrust. The complete lack of a plan for civil control proves that very little thought was given to the law and order issues that would surely follow the war. And what's especially galling, of course, is that American officials talk endlessly about providing a bright new future for Iraqis." Relief groups share these sentiments by the boatload, and not just figuratively. Entire ships' holds of food aid languish in Kuwait's harbours, waiting for security conditions to improve sufficiently to allow delivery to stricken Iraqi communities. This past week, aid organizations became increasingly impatient with U.S. and British authorities, who've shown their proficiency for pouring war resources across the border, but have so far failed to follow up with meaningful shipments of humanitarian supplies. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees appealed to "the occupying forces" to "restore and maintain law and order" in Iraq. Attempting to counter that, American military briefers on Thursday showed journalists in Qatar several video clips, recorded by U.S. forces camera teams, of soldiers delivering water and medical aid. But the projects were on a small, almost token scale, and within hours of the briefing, the U.N.'s spokesman for humanitarian affairs, David Wimhurst, responded on BBC World television with a verbal barrage. The UNHCR, he said, had raised the issue of security with American officers in Kuwait, and "we'll want to know what they're going to do to address this mayhem in the streets." Meantime, agencies as diverse as the International Committee of the Red Cross and Medicins san Frontieres complain that it's impossible to deliver relief in communities without power, water and security for their workers. In at least one confrontation in Kuwait City, the friction between aid specialists and U.S. military authorities erupted into a bitter shouting match, with the head of one non-governmental organization accusing U.S. forces of being too keen to restrict the movement of aid workers between towns and cities, and too lax in enforcing public order. Asked if American and British officials are sensitive to these charges, a member of the foreign diplomatic corps smiles knowingly. "Certainly there's a strong suspicion that the border (from Kuwait into Iraq) is being tightly controlled because they don't want a lot of independent journalists roaming around, reporting on security problems in the south." Finally, the day after Baghdad fell to its forces, the U.S. military announced that assessments would soon be made of the most urgent needs of the country's broken communities. But while the Pentagon played catch-up on that front, its efforts to designate a new governing authority for Iraq appeared, if anything, to have jumped the gun on popular opinion both inside the country and among Iraqis abroad. The U.S. military airlifted Ahmed Chalabi, leader of the anti-Saddam Iraqi National Congress, along with hundreds of his American-trained militia, into the south of the country, even while combat still raged around the capital. Chalabi and spokesmen for the Bush administration insisted that this apparent pre-positioning did not constitute any marked U.S. preference for the formerly exiled opposition leader. But those denials rang hollow, not least because of the increasingly public infighting, within Washington itself, over his suitability to govern. The State department views Chalabi as damaged goods: he hasn't seen Iraq in forty years, and for much of that time he's been dogged by accusations of financial impropriety and unbridled ambition. Yet Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, and, its believed, President Bush, as well, want Chalabi to feature prominently in the Iraq Interim Authority now being assembled under the supervision of retired U.S. general Jay Garner. The Chalabi issue is one on which the U.S. and its key British ally disagree, though not to the same extent as in the debate over exactly when and how the United Nations should be brought into the process of forming the new Iraqi government. That could change, however, if the hawks in the Bush administration go too far in promoting their man Chalabi. "If we could secure greater U.N. involvement in the near future," says a source in Britain's foreign office, "the Chalabi question might balance itself out, because other voices would be heard and presumably compromise would follow. But if the U.N.'s role continues to be deferred, the effect of pushing too hard with Chalabi will set the warning bells ringing. The perception will be that anointing him will be to the disadvantage of other Iraqi figures who deserve a role in the interim authority." Arab leaders, even moderates like Egypt's Hosni Mubarak, renounce the idea of U.S. and British stewardship over the interim Iraqi governing body. Most Arab states will likely refuse to recognize an Iraqi government that doesn't truly reflect consensus among all Iraqis, rather than political gamesmanship among the Bush administration's chosen few. Jordanian foreign minister Marwan Muasher cautioned: "Jordan cannot, naturally, recognize an occupying power. The Iraqi people should rule themselves." Newspapers, like Cairo's mainstream Al Ahram, were more blunt: "The war will not be the final word. Even if the attacking forces win, they will lose politically." This squabbling contrasts sharply with the way an interim government was devised for Afghanistan after the U.S.-led routing of the Taliban. In that case, Washington's championing of Hamid Karzai met with widespread approval among both Afghans and the world at large, largely because the architecture of the government he now heads was designed under United Nations auspices. The Afghan war resonated with grim irony this past week. Only hours before American armour rumbled into central Baghdad, 11 innocent Afghan civilians seven women and four men lost their lives when U.S. warplanes, hunting Taliban gunmen, dropped a bomb off-target. At the Pentagon, there was an apology for the blunder. But there was no mention of how widespread this kind of violence remains in Afghanistan: a week earlier, one of Hamid Karzai's closest friends was assassinated near Kandahar, and late last month the Taliban murdered a captured foreign aid worker. "No one wants to rain on the parade," snipes one former U.S. intelligence specialist. "Baghdad's the victory of the moment, so the administration doesn't want old business from Afghanistan getting in the way, even though the signs are that terrorism will be making a big comeback, some of it from Afghan soil. But like the man says: nothing succeeds like success, and nothing helps cover up mistakes like a flag-waving victory over a bad-guy like Saddam." Aware of the dangers of excess triumphalism, both President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair took pains to stifle hyperbole over their armies' conquest of Iraq, however badly both men need the victory to shore up their political futures at home. They and their advisers realize that the results of the Iraq war will be even trickier to manage than those in Afghanistan: Iraq has higher profile in a much more volatile and widely reported part of the world. The violent aftershocks of the campaign promise not only to be on a larger scale, but more closely scrutinized, too, as evidenced by last week's suicide attack on U.S. troops in Baghdad and the assassination, in Nasiriya, of the Shia leader, Abdul Majid al-Khoel, who had returned from exile to help rebuild his country. For the Bush administration and the British government, a long hot summer lies ahead. It'll be lonely and expensive, too, because until they allow the United Nations an appropriate role in post-Saddam Iraq, neither the World Bank nor the International Monetary Fund can help fund reconstruction. Still, for Bush and Blair, dealing with that challenge is a holiday compared to the mission confronting their soldiers in Iraq. To the grunts and the squaddies goes the task of trying to bottle up the rampaging genies of chaos and destruction. They can be forgiven for wondering if their political masters will ever heed the rising chorus of advice from around the world: it's time to start rubbing the lamps of peace and international co-operation, and rubbing them hard. |