The Handover: Restoration of Iraqi sovereignty - or Alice in Wonderland?

by Robert Fisk

So in the end, America’s enemies set the date. The handover of "full
sovereignty" was secretly brought forward so that the ex-CIA intelligence officer
who is now "Prime Minister" of Iraq could avoid another bloody offensive by America’s
enemies. What is supposed to be the most important date in Iraq’s modern history
was changed ­ like a
birthday party ­ because it might rain on Wednesday.

Pitiful is the word that comes to mind. Here we were, handing "full
sovereignty" to the people of Iraq ­ "full", of course, providing we forget the
160,000 foreign soldiers whom the Prime Minister, Iyad Allawi, has apparently
asked to stay in Iraq, "full" providing we forget the 3,000 US diplomats in Baghdad
who will constitute the largest US
embassy in the world ­ without even telling the Iraqi people that we had changed
the date.

Few, save of course for the Iraqis, understood the cruellest paradox of
the event. For it was the new Iraqi Foreign Minister ­ should we not put
his title, too, into quotation marks? ­ who chose to leak the "bringing
forward" of sovereignty in Iraq at the Nato summit in Turkey. Thus was
this new and unprecedented date in modern Iraqi history announced not in
Baghdad but in the capital of the former Ottoman empire which once ruled
Iraq. Alice in Wonderland could not have improved on this. The
looking-glass reflects all the way from Baghdad to Washington. In its
savage irony Ibsen might have done justice to the occasion. After all,
what could have been more familiar than Allawi’s appeal to Iraqis to
fight "the enemies of the people".

Power was ritually handed over in legal documents. The new government
was sworn in on the Koran. The US proconsul, Paul Bremer, formally shook
hands with Mr Allawi and boarded his C130 to fly home, guarded by
special forces men in shades.

It was difficult to remember that Mr Bremer was touted for his job more
than a year ago because he was a "counter-terrorism" expert ­ this
definitely should be in inverted commas ­ and that what he referred to
as "dead-enders" [Baathist diehards] managed to turn almost an entire
Iraqi population against the United States and Britain in just a few months.

According to Mr Allawi yesterday, the "dead-enders" and the "remnants"
belonged to Saddam Hussein. Those of them who had not committed crimes
could even join the new authorities, he announced. But it had already
been made clear that Mr Allawi was pondering martial law, the sine qua
non of every Arab dictatorship ­ this time to be imposed on an Arab
state, heaven spare us, by a Western army led by an avowedly Christian
government. Who was the last man to impose martial law on Iraqis? Wasn’t
it Saddam Hussein?

No, Mr Allawi and his chums ­ along with the convicted fraudster Ahmed
Chalabi, now dug up from his political grave ­ are not little Saddams.
Indeed, it is Mr Allawi’s claim to fame that he was a Saddam loyalist
until he upped sticks and fled to London. He almost got assassinated by
Saddam before ­ this by his own admission ­ he took the King’s shilling
(MI6) and the CIA’s dollar and (again by his own admission) that of 12
other intelligence agencies.

Yesterday, Mr Allawi was talking of a "historical day". As far as the
new Prime Minister is concerned, Iraqis were about to enjoy "full
sovereignty". Those of us who put quotation marks around "liberation" in
2003 should now put quotation marks around "sovereignty". Doing this has
become part of the reporting of the Middle East.

Perhaps most remarkable of all was Mr Allawi’s demand that "mercenaries
who come to Iraq from foreign countries" should leave Iraq. There are,
of course, 80,000 Western "mercenaries" in Iraq, most of them wearing
Western clothes. But of course, Mr Allawi was not speaking of these men.
And herein lies a problem. There must come a time when we have to give
up clichés, when we have to give up on the American nightmares.
Al-Qa’ida does not have an original branch in Iraq. And the Iraqis
didn’t plan September 11, 2001.

But not to worry. The new Iraqi Prime Minister will soon introduce
martial law ­ journalists who think they can escape criticism should
reflect again ­ and thus we can all wait for a request for more American
troops "at the formal request of the provincial government". Wait, then,
for the first expulsion of journalists. Democratic elections will be
held in Iraq, "it is hoped", within five months. Well, we shall see.

True, Mr Allawi promises a future Iraq with "a society of all Iraqis,
irrespective of ethnicity, colour or religion." But the Iraqis who Mr 
Allawi promises to protect do not apparently include the 5,000 prisoners
held in America’s dubious camps across Iraq. At least 3,000 will remain
captive, largely of the Americans.

There were many promises yesterday of a trial for Saddam Hussein and his
colleagues although, not surprisingly, Iraqi lawyers felt there were
other, more pressing issues to pursue. Paul Bremer abolished the death
penalty in Iraq but Mr Allawi seems to want to bring it back. Asked
whether Saddam might be executed, he remarked that "this is again
something which is being debated in the judicial system in Iraq". He
said, however, that he was in favour of capital punishment.

According to American sources, the United States has been putting
pressure on Mr Allawi for at least two weeks in the hope that his
ministries could ­ in theory, at least ­ function without US support.
American advisers had already been withdrawn from many Iraqi
institutions. Yet when he appeared yesterday, the Prime Minister spoke
with words that might have come from George Bush. He warned "the forces
of terror" that "we will not forget who stood with us and against us in
this crisis". As the new "Cabinet" stepped forward to place their hands
on the Koran, a large number of Iraqi flags lined the podium behind them
­ though not the strange blue and white banner which the former Interim
Council had concocted two months ago.

The real problem for Mr Allawi is that he has to be an independent
leader while relying upon an alien, Western and Christian force to
support his rule. He cannot produce security without the assistance of
an alien force. But he has no control over that force. He cannot order
the Americans to leave. But here is the real question.

If Mr Allawi really intends to lead Iraq, the most powerful
demonstration he could show would be to demand the immediate withdrawal
of all foreign forces. Within hours, he would be a hero in Iraq. The
Americans would be finished. But does Mr Allawi have the wit to realise
that this ultimate step might save him? Who can tell, at this critical
and bloody hour? America’s satraps have been known to turn traitor
before. Yet the whole painful equation in Baghdad now is that Mr Allawi
is relying on the one army whose evacuation he needs to prove his own
credibility.

The Western occupying powers have left behind a raft of dubious
legislation. Much of it allows Western companies to suck up the profits
of reconstruction ­ an issue over which the Iraqis had no choice ­ and
many people in the country have no interest in continuing Mr Bremer’s
occupation laws. No one, for example, is likely to spend a month in jail
for driving without a licence. But why should US and other Western
businesses have legal immunity from Iraqi law? When a British or
American mercenary shoots dead an Iraqi, he cannot be taken to an Iraqi
court.

But Mr Allawi relies upon these same mercenaries. Which is why, sadly
and inevitably, he and his government will fail. The insurgency now has
a life of its own ­ and a plan. If it can continue to maintain an
independence struggle for nationalists within the Sunni Muslim areas
north and west of Baghdad, then the Sunnis may also claim that they have
the right to form Iraq’s first independent, post-American government.

http://www.craigslist.org/sfc/pol/35135496.html

29.06.2004
Bellaciao Collective