Handover of Power to Iraqis
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The long-awaited handover of power from the U.S.-led forces to Iraqis eventually happened just before the expected June 30, 2004 deadline. However, the apparently limited nature of the sovereignty handed over, as well as some insights into key figures in this issue reveals what may still be a difficult future for Iraq if real democracy and freedom is to be considered.
On this page:
- Transition to Iraqi Control
- Only Limited Sovereignty for Iraqis?
- Fears before handover that sovereignty would be limited
- Iraqi Sovereignty handed over early and quickly
- Iraqi Sovereignty indeed turns out to be very limited
- Sovereignty Under Continued Occupation?
- U.S. Retains Real Control; U.N. Role Unclear
- Real Legitimacy
- Media handling of handover
- U.S.-led Coalition Cannot Account for Billions of Iraq's Dollars
- Who is Iyad Allawi?
- Who is Ahmed Chalabi?
- Chalabi provides detailed insights into world propaganda campaign to gain support for a war against Iraq
- Propaganda and lobbying to convince a people to go to war
- U.S. Government funnelling lots of money to agitators
- Support in future Iraqi government
- U.S. Government out-sources creation of opposition
- Chalabi’s own agendas
- Pitting American Politicians and institutions against each other
- Iraq and September 11 link for Bush
Transition to Iraqi Control
Transition to Iraqi control is proving controversial to say the least.
At the beginning of August, as Associated Press reported (August 5, 2003), Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa said that Arab League members will not recognise Iraq's US-appointed Governing Council1 and instead will wait until post-Saddam Hussein Iraq is led by an elected government. (An irony, also noted by AP, was the Arab League members themselves are hardly democratic!)
As mentioned further below and in more detail in the rebuilding Iraq2 part of this web site, the U.S. is less willing for the United Nations to take the leading role in Iraq's rebuilding and transitioning of power away from the occupying forces. But, as Jim Lobe of the Inter Press Service notes, the reasons may be due to a wider geopolitical strategy:
The Guardian reported (May 18, 2003) that U.S and U.K. officials had
indefinitely scrapped plans for a transitional government4
and Spain revealed a gaping hole in funding for reconstruction.
In addition, US and British diplomats
announced they would remain in charge for an undisclosed period.
This fueled more anger at the U.S. and U.K.
with more concerns of occupation and imperialism. To their defence, the U.S. and U.K. say that transition would
take time and happen gradually and that security needs to be restored first.
In the end, the original June 30, 2004 deadline for handover was actually early by a couple of days. But, the nature of the handover and the level of sovereignty that Iraq actuall appears to have seems limited:
Only Limited Sovereignty for Iraqis?
Both before and after the handover, it was feared that handing over sovereignty to Iraq might not be as simplistic as what the Bush and Blair governments would like to present to the whole world. With the various geopolitical interests at stake as discussed elsewhere on this site, the nature of the sovereignty would likely allow the U.S. to have continued influence.
Fears before handover that sovereignty would be limited
For a long time the Bush administration was unclear on when and how power would be transitioned to the Iraqis. Under pressure Bush announced that by June 30, sovereignty would be transferred to Iraqis. However, this has been met with concern that given the security situation and the various power factions, this time scale might be difficult. Yet on the other hand, the longer it was delayed, the more instability it would cause.
Nonetheless, the type of sovereignty is also coming under criticism. Marc Grossman, U.S. Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs had revealed that Iraqi sovereignty would be severely limited and the U.S. would retain law-making and military decisions. Citing the New York Times analysis of this at length:
Iraqi Sovereignty handed over early and quickly
When sovereignty was handed over, it came very quickly -- some two days before it was meant to. The U.S.-led Coalition forces and the new Iraqi Prime Minister, Iyad Allawi (who was the one that suggested the early handover) implied this was to prevent resistance and terrorist groups from foiling a handover6 and catching them off guard, while critics suggested this may be because the U.S. still did not have full control of the security situation7 and if it was difficult enough to provide security in general, then providing security during an official handover ceremony would be impossible. (The quick and early handover was also done in secret and finished before it was announced to the world, and even some of the new Iraqi ministers!)
The demand of tougher security and increased stability may prove to be a double-edged sword8, Inter Press Service (IPS) noted, because on the one hand this was an opportunity for a government to prove itself, though on the other hand, those who want to sabotage any democracy may increase terrorist attacks.
The same IPS article also noted that an advisor to the new minister of the interior was relieved
that Coalition head Paul Bremer was leaving so quickly and that power had transitioned, because they were always
afraid if Paul Bremer would have overruled their decisions. While Bremer was around he still exercised ultimate
authority,
the advisor said. We never knew when one of our instructions would be countered by him.
Iraqi Sovereignty indeed turns out to be very limited
Win Without War, an antiwar coalition in the U.S. summarizes why the hand over of power to Iraq is controversial and how the U.S. retains a lot of indirect control:
In addition, the antiwar coalition feared that U.S. actions were making Americans less safe by
- Fueling the insurgency in Iraq and terrorism world-wide;
- Weakening America by diminishing its credibility even further while continuing to isolate the U.S. from allies.
The above was a press release for a full page ad they had taken out in the New York Times. The copy of the ad on their own web site10 provides sources for their claims and points.
The Washington Post noted how U.S. Administrator for Iraq until the handover, Paul Bremmer, had curbed the powe of Iraqis in various ways, and is quoted at length:
While a number of other rules Bremer has drafted also sound positive, many, when considered in the backdrop of
insecurity and violence may be met with stern resistence. The above Post article also ended with
comments from Juan Cole, a University of Michigan professor who is a specialist on Iraq. Cole, the Post
said, noted that the appointed electoral commission's power to eliminate political parties or candidates for not
obeying laws would allow it to disqualify people someone didn't like.
Cole likened the power of the commission to that of religious mullahs in Iran, who routinely use their
authority to remove candidates before an election.
In a way, Mr. Bremer is using a more subtle form than the
one used by hard-liners in Iran to control their elections,
Cole said.
The Associated Press made a number of observations. For example
There are at least two additional interesting things to note from the above:
- The Post article implied that some of Bremer's orders will remain in effect
unless overturned by Iraq's interim government
, while AP noted that the interim government would not be able to amend the transitional law or interim consitution. If AP is right, then it would strengthen critics' argument of U.S. control, and even if the Post is right that the interim government can overrule all the laws, then it still shows U.S. intentions. - Perhaps an interesting observation for those who see all forms of Islam as a threat to the world in some
way is the note AP made that it was the influential Shiite clergy that sought to limit the
powers of an unelected administration picked by the current U.S. administration. (As an opinion piece in
the Baltimore Sun notes (July 4, 2004), democracy may come from a different source than expected13.
Someday there may be real democracy in Iraq. If that day comes, it may be because a legitimate Iraqi leadership was inspired by the nobility and eloquence of America's founding fathers, the common sense and decency and honesty of their motivations. Not much of that exists among their political descendants in Washington today.
)
Associated Press also noted an example of a controversial law that Bremer had signed which gave U.S. and other Western civilian contractors immunity from Iraqi law while performing their jobs in Iraq. The idea outraged many Iraqis the AP noted, as the law allows foreigners to act with impunity even after the occupation.
Sovereignty Under Continued Occupation?
The issue of remaining U.S. forces under U.S. command presents a dilemma. On the one hand some argue that they are needed to help with security. On the other hand, others argue that it is because of their presence that there is worse security and instability.
A commentary by M. B. Naqvi in IPS argues that
transfer of sovereignty is fiction, while occupation remains fact
14. What kind of sovereignty will [Iraq] have if there are foreign armies in the country and under foreign
command - an arrangement it cannot change?
Naqi Asks.
Long time political commentator, Tariq Ali also weighs in saying that this is not sovereignty:
Painting a far bleaker picture and looking at Iraq in an international context, Francis Boyle, professor of
international law says that many of the more powerful countries in the U.N. Security Council are only interested in carving up Iraq for their own interests16.
The peoples of the world are now witnessing the rapid decline of the United Nations itself along the lines of
what happened to the League of Nations in the 1930s. Can World War III be far behind?
he asked.
U.S. Retains Real Control; U.N. Role Unclear
At the beginning of June, 2004, United Nations (UN) resolution 1546 was unanimously passed endorsing the June 30 transfer of sovereignty in Iraq and giving authorization for a U.S.-led multinational force. The unanimity came because there was enough ambiguity and compromise in the resolution. Amongst many other things, the resolution:
- Would allow the multinational force to serve
at the request of the incoming interim government of Iraq
and the force can be asked to leave at anytime. - Allow the force to take
all necessary measures to contribute to maintenance of security and stability
in Iraq allowing a 12-month deadline for the force to be reviewed. - Leave the interim government in power until national elections are held preferrably on December 31, 2004 though no later than January 31, 2005.
As CSM noted (in anticipation of the resolution), this would be good for both the U.S. in its international relations, and for Iraq, that will be given some world legitimacy even though it is a hand-picked interim government.
However, as Christian Science Monitor also added
- There was a lack of any real definition of a UN role;
- Along with continuing limits on the abilities of a new Iraqi government, the US will remain largely in charge of Iraq17;
- The
multinational
force would comprise of 158,000 foreign troops, under U.S. command, 138,000 of which are American.
CSM also spoke to Lee Feinstein, a security expert at the Council on Foreign Relations and former
official at the State Department, who indicated the preference of the U.S. to have some control and influence in
Iraq: The Bush administration could have made getting more international participation - troops and money - a
larger focus of its diplomacy, and it would have used the resolution to do that,
says Mr. Feinstein, But
that would have required real bargaining, whereas they preferred the large American embassy that's being set up
working pretty much alone with the Iraqi government.
Due to the continued U.S. presence and command in this way, some criticize the U.N. resolution of, in effect, legitimizing the occupation.
Real Legitimacy
Perhaps Iraq's real legitimacy will come from the U.S. truly leaving Iraq, eventually. As so many have pointed out, not all the resistance is terrorist and Islamic militancy in nature. Some resistenence appears to be because of the want to get rid of foreign occupation from their land. No doubt, some non-Islamic militant/extremist groups also want to fill in power vaccums themselves, and may not be democratic either, but not all resistance can be characterized that way, either.
On Friday July 2, 2004, Channel 4 news (I think -- it could have been the BBC) in U.K. broadcast a piece on Iraq looking at the torture legacy of Saddam Hussein. They intervied someone who claimed to have been tortured by Saddam for many years in prison. Yet, almost surprisingly, when questioned about his views on the current occupation forces, he said that while he was happy the U.S. got rid of Saddam, at his earliest opportunity he would like to join forces with others who are violently trying to eject the U.S. from their land. One of the things that had convinced him of this cause was the torture U.S. troops were committing on Iraqi captives. Ironically, having suffered torture for many years under Saddam Hussein, this person was now equating the U.S. occupation forces with Saddam.
Professor of History, William Marina offers an interesting parallel in history:
Media handling of handover
Many mainstream media outlets have presented a sort of idealistic view of what the handover represents, though a few have noted various ironies, some, such as Channel 4 in the UK even suggesting that the transfer of sovereignty may still be viewed as occupation. David Edwards, co-editor of media watchdog MediaLens, surveys a lot of mainstream media responses and notes:
U.S.-led Coalition Cannot Account for Billions of Iraq's Dollars
At the end of June 2004, just when the new interim government was to be announced, the British charity and development organization, Christian Aid noted that:
However, as Christian Aid also notes, they themselves highlighted in October 2003 that some $4 billion were unaccounted for then. That this is Iraq's money and being handled by the U.S., and still not being accounted for, is perhaps as scandalous as Sadam Hussein's lavish spending on weapons and palaces.
Iraq starts off with a lot of its own money missing as a result, which is a big problem in a country with a lot of instability and violence, unemployment and urgently needing to show credibility and effort to get things moving.
IPS also reporting on Christian Aid's report also adds that lack of transparency is leading to unaccountability:
Who is Iyad Allawi?
The country's new interim president and prime minister don't rate highly with Iraqis22, Time magazine noted (June 1, 2004).
The Iraqi Prime Minister chosen was Iyad Allawi (a Shia Muslim), and the President, Ghazi al-Yawer (a Sunni Muslim). Because there will not be proper democratic elections for Iraq until 2005, these two and the rest of the interim government were handpicked by the 25-member Iraqi Governing Council (which itself was mostly handpicked by the U.S.) The Council had also picked a team of people to write Iraq's new constitution.
Time noted that The two men at the top of the list ... were just last month ranked bottom of a
list of potential leaders - by their own countrymen.
Allawi provided the claim that Iraqi WMDs could be operational in 45 minutes 23.
As well as concerns about U.S. handpicking members of the interim government, it was also implied that the U.N.
Envoy Lakhdar Brahimi also had a questionable hand in this, though many point out that he too was constrained by
U.S. interests. (In May 2004, the U.N. Special Representative in Iraq Lakhdar
Brahimi described Bremer as the dictator of Iraq
24.
Nothing happens without his agreement in this country,
Brahimi said, as IPS noted.)
Yet Allawi has three major things going against him:
- His CIA connections (despite some criticism from him of the U.S-led Coalition), as well as former connections to the British MI6;
- Being a former Ba'athist; and
- Being a returning exile
Time highlights this, too:
Al-Yawer is virtually unknown and was not an active political figure during Saddam's reign, though he is a leading figure of a northern Iraqi tribe who had kept a low profile until only recently.
Because Allawi will be really running the government, his past and the concern it raises with many Iraqis may make things even more difficult.
Who is Ahmed Chalabi?
As The Guardian article mentioned above also noted, Huge divisions are now apparent within Iraq's
opposition, not least between returning Iraqi exiles, like Ahmed Chalabi, who have been demanding prominent positions
in any transitional government, and the grassroots movements, many of them focused on local Shia leaders who are
demanding an Islamic state.
This also implies the divisions within Iraq's opposition groups could mean that
long term occupation by the U.S. and U.K. (which may also be
illegal
26, according to the British Attorney General, without further U.N. resolutions) could fuel more hostility.
Since writing the above, Chalabi fell out of favor with the U.S. but looking at his background and some of the details he reveals about how the Iraq war came about is very instructive.
Some such as Ahmed Chalabi (head of the Iraqi National Congress INC) are controversial. The neo-conservative and right-wing hawks in the Pentagon and Vice President Dick Cheney's office for a long time had been resting their hopes on Chalabi for a transition that will protect Washington's many interests in Iraq27, as noted by Jim Lobe for the Inter Press Service (February 20, 2004).
The above report noted that Chalabi had shrugged off accusations that his group had deliberately misled the Bush administration for providing misleading information to go to war on Iraq. He has long been known to be friendly to neo-conservatives in the U.S. administration, and the way he shrugged off the accusations led to more concerns about the Bush administration going to war on false pretenses:
Lobe also notes in the same article that Chalabi's family has extensive interests in a company that has
already been awarded more than 400 million dollars in reconstruction contracts.
After years of collaboration (detailed below), into May of 2004, Chalabi appeared to fall out of favour with the Bush Administration. Reasons implied include:
- A lot of discredited claims of proof that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction came from sources that Chalabi provided. The poor intelligence has caused major embarrassment with the Bush Administration and fury elsewhere.
- Claims (which Chalabi denies) that he passed classified U.S. government information to Iran (something related to informing Iranian intelligence that the CIA had broken some of their codes.)
In addition, he was hardly popular with Iraqis, as he had worked with the Americans and was a returning exile, both of which are not looked on favorably.
Chalabi provides detailed insights into world propaganda campaign to gain support for a war against Iraq
Ahmed Chalabi may no longer be Washington’s most favored Iraqi and may not, for now, hold any of the top positions in the Iraq government, but the lessons from Chalabi, his background, his long relation with the U.S., and how he helped the U.S. in creating the climate for a war are very important to understand how some aspects of power, foreign policy and propaganda work. The following summarizes a report from The Manipulator 29 by Jane Mayer, in The New Yorker, May 29, 2004:
Propaganda and lobbying to convince a people to go to war
Chalabi followed very closely the example of how U.S. President Roosevelt, who abhorred the Nazis, at a time when isolationist sentiment was paramount in the United States, managed to persuade the American people to go to war. (Chalabi lobbied for the Iraq Liberation Act, which Congress passed in 1998, making regime change an official priority for the U.S.)
Chalabi succeeded in getting the U.S. to invade Iraq. Judith Kipper, the Council on Foreign Relations director, said that, [in the mid-1990s] Chalabi made
But subsequent political fallouts and problems for the U.S. can’t solely be blamed on Chalabi, for that would be scapegoating and by-passing accountability.a deliberate decision to turn to the right,
having realized that conservatives were more likely than liberals to back the use of force against Saddam.
U.S. Government funnelling lots of money to agitators
The U.S. government, from 1992 until Chalabi fell out of favor, funnelled more than 100 million dollars to the INC, 39 million of which came from the current Bush Administration. This was used to create the false and exaggerated claims to help rouse an opposition and justify war.
Support in future Iraqi government
In the case of Chalabi, Mayer reported that a U.S. State Department official told her that Every list of Iraqis they wanted to work with for positions in the government of postwar Iraq included Chalabi and all of the members of his organization.
U.S. Government out-sources creation of opposition
A technique to avoid direct implication in something is to get others to do it, and help them if needed. Sometimes this is covert (where a lot of conspiracy theories come from, or, when real leaks about darker operations from CIA and others are revealed, they can easily be dismissed as conspiracy nonsense, if needed).
With Iraq, as Mayer noted, In addition to generating anti-Saddam news stories and creating a travelling
atrocity exhibit,
which documented the human-rights abuses of Saddam’s regime, the Rendon Group — a public relations firm, specializing in perception management
, was charged with the delicate task of helping to create a viable and unified opposition movement against Saddam.
This involved out-sourcing the global propagana and media campaigns using expert public relation companies and planting false stories as part of a disinformation campaign:
Out-sourcing global propaganda campaign
Chalabi’s key lobbyist in Washington was Francis Brooke. During the 1990s the company Brooke worked for, the Rendon Group, received funding from the C.I.A to help create an external opposition movement to Saddam Hussein. Rendon Group, set out to influence global political opinion against Saddam.
The C.I.A. could’t do this directly due to scandals surrounding similar things in previous decades, so they out-sourced the propaganda operation. (This technique also serve to distance a government from claims of direct involvement.)
Out-sourcing global media management
Planting stories (some true, some false, some exaggerated or twisted), is a common technique. In the case of Iraq, The [Rendon] group began offering information to British journalists, and many articles subsequently appeared in the London press. Occasionally, [Brooke] said, the company would be reprimanded by project managers in Washington when too many of those stories were picked up by the American press, thereby transgressing laws that prohibited domestic propaganda. But, for the most part, Brooke said,
(Emphasis Added)It was amazing how well it worked. It was like magic.
Disinformation campaigns
Mayer notes the length that the INC went to, with the knowledge of the U.S:
While the above were in the mid-1990s, in the lead up to the 2003 war, the I.N.C. were planting many stories (products
as they called it) in the mainstream media. Some outlets reported fake stories as front-page items.
And consider the following:
Noting how information can become propaganda
, Mayer told of how the Iraqi nuclear scientist who defected wrote the influential memoir Saddam’s bombmaker, even though he had not been involved in Iraq’s nuclear program for nearly a decade, and even then did not have a prominent role, and had made various false claims. Furthermore, Chalabi’s people helped Hamza to promote his story to the media, and the tale became widely known. Cheney began giving alarmist speeches about the imminent Iraqi nuclear threat. On August 26, 2002, he declared that Saddam had
For a population that had suffered its worst terrorist attacks on U.S. soil just under a year earlier, such scaremongering would likely be effective.resumed his efforts to acquire nuclear weapons,
and might soon be able to engage in nuclear blackmail
with his enemies.
Indeed, for those wondering why the Bush Administration simply didn’t build the case for war on humanitarian grounds (no-one could seriously deny Saddam’s ruthlessness), it seems that the Bush Administration felt the really effective way to try and build the case would be to play on fears of American citizens by asserting claims of rogue/terrorist links and weapons of mass destruction. As a result, Mayer concluded, the war was largely marketed domestically as a scare campaign, and the I.N.C. was enlisted to promote the danger posed by Saddam’s regime.
The huge list of things the U.S. claimed regarding Iraq has been discussed at length in other parts of this site, so is not repeated here, other than to say that many of the claims fed to the media, the Security Council, and, as it seems to appear, to other governments, were part of a campaign to get support for war. (Mayer’s report also lists many examples of disinformation that have not been mentioned on this site.) Some of the techniques used are highlighted a bit further below.
Chalabi’s own agendas
In the case of Iraq and Chalabi, Mayer details Chalabi’s rise, numerous connections to top world politicians, and a lot of corruption and manipulation that Chalabi was capable and accused of. Adding an interesting perspective, Mayer describes in detail that Chalabi came from a family that was extremely wealthy and powerful in Iraq (and somewhat ruthless according to some accounts). When Saddam Hussein came to power, the previous ruling elite (which his family was part of) lost out immensely. Democracy and freedom might be words used for the general public, but since then, Mayer implies, Iraq regime change has been a personal agenda for Chalabi.
Pitting American Politicians and institutions against each other
Chalabi had made many close political ties but had a falling out with the CIA and the Clinton Administration. Brooke and Chalabi used this to bring the neoconservatives into the picture:
More manipulation was evident:
Iraq and September 11 link for Bush
The Bush Administration were keen from the beginning to address the Iraq issue, and September 11 provided an opportune moment:
(As an aside, the intelligence community appears to be taking the brunt of criticisms for failure in finding weapons of mass destruction. For a while many have thought the Bush Administration is trying to deflect criticisms of political accountability to technical issues of intelligence. The above would suggest that the President did know of the CIA’s reservations. If so, the decision to go to war seems less based on intelligence, more based on political decisions. Consequences should likely be political in nature too. Some are considering war crime charges against Bush, Blair and others, though these types of ramifications of their decisions are less discussed in the mainstream media.)
Some readers will point out that Saddam Hussein was a tyrant (true), so this criticism of Chalabi or the Bush Administration is unfair because of what they achieved. However, the point here is that the reasons they cite to the public versus the real goals can be wide off the mark, and so, questioning the motives of Chalabi, the Bush Administration and others is important. Fundamentally this is also about government accountability in deciding to go to war, because so many lives on all sides are affected. If concerns were truly humanitarian, it is likely that the massive global opposition would not be as large. Chalabi’s past suggests he is less than democratic, and the Bush Administraion is constantly being criticized for taking more draconian measures and being less and less democratic, especially in the international arena. Using human rights and democracy as the reason to invade Iraq from people who appear not to be so themselves is therefore a concern.
His popularity amongst Iraqis might be very limited, but Chalabi’s political acumen suggests he will be around for a long time.
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