Rene — Naomi Klein — Mutiny in Iraq
Topic(s): Iraq | Comments Off on Rene — Naomi Klein — Mutiny in IraqMutiny in Iraq
by Naomi Klein
May 17, 2004
The Nation
Can we please stop calling it a quagmire? The United States isn’t
mired in a bog or a marsh in Iraq (quagmire’s literal meaning); it is
free-falling offa cliff. The only question now is: Who will follow the
Bush clan off this precipice, and who will refuse to jump?
More and more are, thankfully, choosing the second option. The last
month of inflammatory US aggression in Iraq has inspired what can only
be described as a mutiny: Waves of soldiers, workers and politicians
under the command of the US occupation authority are suddenly refusing
to follow orders and abandoning their posts. First Spain announced it
would withdraw its troops, then Honduras, Dominican Republic,
Nicaragua and Kazakhstan. South Korean and Bulgarian troops were
pulled back to their bases, while New Zealand is withdrawing its
engineers. El Salvador, Norway, the Netherlands and Thailand will
likely benext.
And then there are the mutinous members of the US-controlled Iraqi
army. Since the latest wave of fighting began, they’ve been donating
their weapons to resistance fighters in the South and refusing to
fight in Falluja, saying that they didn’t join the army to kill other
Iraqis. By late April, Maj. Gen. Martin Dempsey, commander of the 1st
Armored Division, was reporting that “about 40 percent [of Iraqi
security officers] walked off the job because of intimidation. And
about 10 percent actually worked against us.”
And it’s not just Iraq’s soldiers who have been deserting the
occupation. Four ministers of the Iraqi Governing Council have
resigned their posts in protest. Half the Iraqis with jobs in the
secured “green zone”–as translators, drivers, cleaners–are not
showing up for work. And that’s better than a couple of weeks ago,
when 75 percent of Iraqis employed by the US occupation authority
stayed home (that staggering figure comes from Adm. David Nash, who
oversees the awarding of reconstruction contracts).
Minor mutinous signs are emerging even within the ranks of the US
military: Privates Jeremy Hinzman and Brandon Hughey have applied for
refugee status in Canada as conscientious objectors and Staff
Sgt. Camilo Mejia is facing court martial after he refused to return
to Iraq on the grounds that he no longer knew what the war was about
[see Christian Parenti, “A Deserter Speaks,” at www.thenation.com].
Rebelling against the US authority in Iraq is not treachery, nor is it
giving “false comfort to terrorists,” as George W. Bush recently
cautioned Spain’s new prime minister. It is an entirely rational and
principled response to policies that have put everyone living and
working under US command in grave and unacceptable danger. This is a
view shared by fifty-two former British diplomats, who recently sent a
letter to Prime Minister Tony Blair stating that although they
endorsed his attempts to influence US Middle East policy, “there is no
case for supporting policies which are doomed to failure.”
And one year in, the US occupation of Iraq does appear doomed on all
fronts: political, economic and military. On the political front, the
idea that the United States could bring genuine democracy to Iraq is
now irredeemably discredited: Too many relatives of Iraqi Governing
Council members have landed plum jobs and rigged contracts, too many
groups demanding direct elections have been suppressed, too many
newspapers have been closed down and too many Arab journalists have
been murdered while trying to do their job. The most recent casualties
were two employees of Al Iraqiya television, shot dead by US soldiers
while filming a checkpoint in Samarra. Ironically, Al Iraqiya is the
US-controlled propaganda network that was supposed to weaken the power
of Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya, both of which have also lost reporters
to US guns and rockets over the past year.
White House plans to turn Iraq into a model free-market economy are in
equally rough shape, plagued by corruption scandals and the rage of
Iraqis who have seen few benefits–either in services or jobs–from
the reconstruction. Corporate trade shows have been canceled across
Iraq, investors are relocating to Amman and Iraq’s housing minister
estimates that more than 1,500 foreign contractors have fled the
country. Bechtel, meanwhile, admits that it can no longer operate “in
the hot spots” (there are precious few cold ones), truck drivers are
afraid to travel the roads with valuable goods and General Electric
has suspended work on key power stations. The timing couldn’t be
worse: Summer heat is coming and demand for electricity is about to
soar.
As this predictable (and predicted) disaster unfolds, many are turning
to the United Nations for help: Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani called
on the UN to support his demand for direct elections back in
January. More recently, he has called on the UN to refuse to ratify
the despised interim constitution, which most Iraqis see as a US
attempt to continue to control Iraq’s future long after the June 30
“handover” by, among other measures, giving sweeping vetopowers to the
Kurds–the only remaining US ally. Spanish Prime Minister José Luis
Rodríguez Zapatero, before pulling out his troops, asked the UN to
take over the mission from the United States. Even Muqtada al-Sadr,
the “outlaw” Shiite cleric, is calling on the UN to prevent a
bloodbath in Najaf. On April 18, Sadr’s spokesman, Qais al-Khazaali,
told Bulgarian television it is “in the interest of the whole world to
send peacekeeping forces under the UN flag.”
And what has been the UN’s response? Worse than silence, it has sided
with Washington on all of these critical questions, dashing hopes that
it could provide a genuine alternative to the lawlessness and
brutality of the US occupation. First it refused to back the call for
direct elections, citing security concerns. In retrospect, supporting
the call back then might have avoided much of the violence now
engulfing the country. After all, the UN’s response weakened the more
moderate Sistani and strengthened Muqtada al-Sadr, whose supporters
continued demanding direct elections and launched a vocal campaign
against the US transition plan and the interim constitution. This is
what prompted US chief envoy Paul Bremer to decide to take Sadr out,
the provocation that sparked the Shiite uprising.
The UN has proved equally deaf to calls to replace the US military
occupation with a peacekeeping operation. On the contrary, it has made
it clear that it will only re-enter Iraq if it is the United States
that guarantees the safety of its staff–seemingly oblivious to the
fact that being surrounded by American bodyguards is the best way to
make sure that the UN will be targeted. “We have an obligation since
[the attack on UN headquarters] last summer to insist on clarity and
on what is being asked of us,” Edward Mortimer, a senior aide to
Secretary General Kofi Annan, told the New York Times. “What are the
risks? What kind of guarantees can you give us that we are not going
to be blown up? And is the job important enough to justify the risk?”
Even in light of that horrific bombing, this is a stunning series of
questions coming from a UN official. Do Iraqis have guarantees that
they won’t be blown up when they go to the market in Sadr City, when
their children get on the school bus in Basra, when they send their
injured to a hospital in Falluja?Is there a more important job for the
future of global security than peacemaking in Iraq?
The UN’s greatest betrayal of all comes in the way it is re-entering
Iraq: not as an independent broker but as a glorified US
subcontractor, the political arm of the continued US occupation. The
post-June 30 caretaker government being set up by UN envoy Lakhdar
Brahimi will be subject to all the restraints on Iraqi sovereignty
that sparked the current uprising in the first place. The United
States will maintain full control over “security” in Iraq,
includingover Iraq’s army. It will keep control over the
reconstruction funds. And, worst of all, the caretaker government will
be subject to the laws laid out in the interim constitution, including
the clause that states that it must enforcethe orders written by the
US occupiers. The UN should be defending Iraq against this illegal
attempt to undermine its independence. Instead it is disgracefully
helping Washington to convince the world that a country under
continued military occupation by a foreign power is actually
sovereign.
Iraq badly needs the UN as a clear, independent voice in the
region. The people are calling out for it, begging the international
body to live up toits mandate as peacemaker and truth teller. And yet
just when it is needed most, the UN is at its most compromised and
cowardly.
There is a way that the UN can redeem itself in Iraq. It could choose
to join the mutiny, further isolating the United States. This would
help force Washington to hand over real power–ultimately to Iraqis
but first to a multilateral coalition that did not participate in the
invasion and occupation and would have the credibility to oversee
direct elections. This could work, but only through a process that
fiercely protects Iraq’s sovereignty. That means:
Ditch the Interim Constitution. The interim constitution is so widely
hated in Iraq that any governing body bound by its rules will
immediately be seenas illegitimate. Some argue that Iraq needs the
interim constitution to prevent open elections from delivering the
country to religious extremists. Yet according to a February 2004 poll
by Oxford Research International, Iraqis have no desire to see their
country turned into another Iran. Asked to rate their favored
political system and actors, 48.5 percent of Iraqis ranked a
“democracy” as most important, while an “Islamic state” received 20.5
percent support. Asked what type of politician they favored, 55.3
percent chose “democrats,” while only 13.7 percent chose religious
politicians. If Iraqis are given the chance to vote their will, there
is every reason to expect that the results will reflect a balance
between their faith and their secular aspirations.
There are also ways to protect women and minority rights without
forcing Iraq to accept a sweeping constitution written under foreign
occupation. The simplest solution would be to revive passages in
Iraq’s 1970 Provisional Constitution, which, according to Human Rights
Watch, “formally guaranteed equal rights to women and…specifically
ensured their right to vote, attend school, run for political office,
and own property.” Elsewhere, the constitution enshrined religious
freedom, civil liberties and the right to form unions. These clauses
can easily be salvaged, while striking the parts of the document
designed to entrench Baathist rule.
Put the Money in Trust. A crucial plank of managing Iraq’s transition
to sovereignty is safeguarding its national assets: its oil revenue
and the remaining oil-for-food program money (currently administered
by the United States with no oversight), as well as what’s left of the
$18.4 billion in reconstruction funds. Right now the United States is
planning to keep control of this money long after June 30; the UN
should insist that it be put in trust, to be spent by an elected Iraqi
government.
De-Chalabify Iraq. The United States has so far been unable to install
Ahmad Chalabi as the next leader of Iraq–his history of corruption
and lack of a political base have seen to that. Yet members of the
Chalabi family have quietly been given control in every area of
political, economic and judicial life. It was a two-stage
process. First, as head of the De-Baathification Commission, Chalabi
purged his rivals from power. Then, as director of the Governing
Council’s Economic and Finance Committee, he installed his friends and
allies in the key posts of Oil Minister, Finance Minister, Trade
Minister, Governor of the Central Bank and so on. Now Chalabi’s
nephew, Salem Chalabi, has been appointed by the United States to head
the court trying Saddam Hussein. Anda company with close ties to
Chalabi landed the contract to guard Iraq’s oil
infrastructure–essentially a license to build a private army.
It’s not enough to keep Chalabi out of the interim government. The UN
must dismantle Chalabi’s shadow state by launching a
de-Chalabification process on a par with the now abandoned
de-Baathification process.
Demand the Withdrawal of US Troops. In asking the United States to
serve as its bodyguard as a condition of re-entering Iraq, the UN has
it exactly backwards: It should only go in if the United States pulls
out. Troops who participated in the invasion and occupation should be
replaced with peacekeepers–preferably from neighboring Arab
states–working under the extremely limited mandate of securing the
country for general elections. With the United States out, there is a
solid chance that countries that opposed the war would step forward
for the job.
On April 25 the New York Times editorial board called for the opposite
approach, arguing that only a major infusion of American troops and “a
real long-term increase in the force in Iraq” could bring
security. But these troops, if they arrive, will provide security to
no one–not to the Iraqis, not to their fellow soldiers, not to the
UN. American soldiers have become a direct provocation to more
violence, not only because of the brutality of the occupation in Iraq
but also because of US support for Israel’s deadly occupation of
Palestinian territory. In the minds of many Iraqis, the two
occupations have blended into a single anti-Arab outrage, with Israeli
and US soldiers viewed as interchangeable and Iraqis openly
identifying with Palestinians.
Without US troops, the major incitement to violence would be removed,
allowing the country to be stabilized with far fewer soldiers and far
less force. Iraq would still face security challenges–there would
still be extremists willing to die to impose Islamic law as well as
attempts by Saddam loyalists to regain power. On the other hand, with
Sunnis and Shiites now so united against the occupation, it’s the best
possible moment for an honest broker to negotiate an equitable
power-sharing agreement.
Some will argue that the United States is too strong to be forced out
of Iraq. But from the start Bush needed multilateral cover for this
war–that’s why he formed the “coalition of the willing,” and it’s why
he is going to the UN now. Imagine what could happen if countries keep
pulling out of the coalition, if France and Germany refuse to
recognize an occupied Iraq as a sovereign nation. Imagine if the UN
decided not to ride to Washington’s rescue. It would become an
occupation of one.
The invasion of Iraq began with a call to mutiny–a call made by the
United States. In the weeks leading up to last year’s invasion, US
Central Command bombarded Iraqi military and political officials with
phone calls and e-mails urging them to defect from Saddam’s
ranks. Fighter planes dropped 8 million leaflets urging Iraqi soldiers
to abandon their posts and assuring that no harm would come to them.
Of course, these soldiers were promptly fired when Paul Bremer took
over and are now being frantically rehired as part of the reversal of
the de-Baathification policy. It’s just one more example of lethal
incompetencethat should lead all remaining supporters of US policy in
Iraq to one inescapable conclusion: It’s time for a mutiny.
Naomi Klein is the author of ‘No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand
Bullies’ (Picador) and, most recently,’ Fences and Windows: Dispatches
From the Front Lines of the Globalization Debate’