Unknown quantity

While peoples in the Middle East understand that the war on Iraq had little to do with democracy, Washington appears oblivious still to the backlash it has set in train, writes Ayman El-Amir*

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The US interventionist war in Iraq has so far persuaded no one that the battle-weary country could ever serve as a role model for stable democracy anywhere in the Arab world. If anything, the uncertainty clouding Iraq's future after the US declares victory and starts withdrawing in 2006 will leave many reform-targeted regimes in the Arab region stubbornly opposed to any meaningful change towards democratic rule. A chaotic situation is expected to follow US withdrawal. In addition to the continued destabilisation of Iraq, the militant- cum-Jihadist groups gathered in the country will, in turn, claim victory over the US invasion and pounce on their secondary target -- Arab regimes they regard as US surrogates. This will probably lead entrenched autocratic governments to tighten their grip on civil liberties in the name of fighting terrorism; a policy that would produce a violent backlash against nationalist forces yearning for democratic change and respect for human rights. Moreover, if the delicate Sunni-Shia, religious-ethnic balance that is now envisioned to underlie the federated new state of Iraq should tilt and spill over, the US will have ignited a regional war in the Middle East. The scenario is nightmarish, but by no means far- fetched.

Three perspectives come into focus regarding the aftermath of the US campaign in Iraq: the US, Iraqi and Arab perspectives. US President George W Bush outlined his administration's perspective on the future of Iraq, codenamed "Plan for Victory", in his speech at the US Naval Academy on 30 November. Since it was the commander-in-chief addressing the military, particularly future US marines whose comrades-in-arms suffered most of the casualties in Iraq, he had to offer a vision of military victory in the battle against global terrorism in-gathering in Iraq. Putting a positive spin on the US withdrawal plan, Bush underscored progress in the training of Iraqi troops that will replace US forces which will be reduced by 50,000 men and women next year. He admitted that training Iraqi troops was being undermined by desertions. However, the US president predicted that the forces of global terrorism creating instability in Iraq will be defeated, newly-created Iraqi armed forces will gradually take over from the US, and Iraq will become a stable and prosperous democracy; a positive force for change in the Middle East. Not everyone seemed to agree with the assessment.

As would be expected, a CNN/USA Today Gallup poll showed that 55 per cent of Americans did not believe the president had a plan that would achieve victory for the US in Iraq, while 54 per cent marked President Bush's handling of the war as "poor". Bush nonetheless still insisted there was an analogy between defeating Nazi Germany in World War II and building a liberal democracy there, and the destruction of Saddam Hussein's totalitarian secularist state in Iraq and replacing it with a nominally-federated state of ethnic coalition. The more correct analogy is Vietnam, where the choice, in April 1975, was between falling into the hands of the advancing North Vietnamese and Vietcong forces or finding a foothold in the last helicopter taking off from the roof-top of the US Embassy in Saigon. The Bush administration, overwhelmed with armed resistance and terrorism that is destabilising Iraq, is addressing a complex political situation with a military solution. With the number of US casualties rising, the war is becoming increasingly unpopular at home and a national debate may soon follow.

The predicament of the new state of Iraq is that ethnic partition of the country is aligned with economic interests. In the north, the Kurds are seizing every opportunity to edge closer to their historic dream of an independent state of Kurdistan that will also include Kirkuk and the rich oil fields close to it. Israel is reportedly training and arming the Kurdish militias. In return, the Kurds of Iraq are facilitating Israel's access to and contacts with the Kurdish minorities in Iran, Syria and Turkey, for intelligence gathering and sabotage. In the south, where the Shia majority is concentrated, a scheme of semi- independent government and legislature is being fostered, with close links to Iran. Caught in central Iraq, including Baghdad and its environs, are the former ruling Sunnis, the Baathists and Saddam loyalists who have lost their clout and privileges to the new majority. In a non-secular state, religious and ethnic affiliation becomes more important than state loyalty. This fragile balance can only be maintained by goodwill and a gentleman's agreement, not by the obliging force of birthright, as it would be in a democratic, secular state. It is not guaranteed to work and may often break down into a series of mini civil wars.

From the Arab perspective, the spectre of a new Iraq poised on a precarious ethnic- religious balance can offer nothing better than the Lebanese model. Sunni-dominated states in the Gulf, which have Shia minorities, are apprehensive over the emergence in the region of a major Iraqi-Iranian Shia power. This coalition could polarise other Shia minorities, who are mostly poor and underprivileged, in as far away volatile places as Lebanon. But this will be a political rather than a religious issue. A militant, anti-US Iran, propped up by a Shia majority in Iraq, will pose serious challenge to pro-US mini-states in the Gulf region and beyond. Regional militancy would be further exacerbated by continued Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands and the domination of their population.

This is hardly the recipe for democracy that the US wants to offer to the peoples it would like to win and regimes it wants to reform. Autocratic Arab regimes have fought back the rising domestic demand for liberal democracy by holding up, through their controlled media, the morass in Iraq and the US-supported Israeli military aggression in Palestine as the consequence of the US version of democratic rule. That is why a public opinion poll conducted by Zogby International, in collaboration with Professor Shibley Telhami of the University of Maryland, in six Arab countries, found a majority of respondents deeply suspicious of the US agenda for democracy in the Middle East. Some 69 per cent of respondents believed real American objectives include protecting Israel, dominating the region, and weakening the Muslim world. According to the poll, another 78 per cent believe the US invasion of Iraq has resulted in more terrorism, and four out of five said the war had brought less political stability in the region. Nationalist forces struggling for democracy and free elections have felt betrayed by US reactions (or the lack of it) to vote rigging in national elections. It provided ample evidence of the lack of US credibility in calling for reform and democracy in the "Greater Middle East". The protection of US interests by despotic regimes in the region, not the spread of democracy and reform, is the ultimate US priority.

Political and human rights activists in many Arab countries are confronting implacable governments that are adamantly opposed to ceding power, even at the ballot box. Much as the peoples of the Arab world need a new paradigm for democratic change, US experimentation with Iraq does not offer the best example. Therefore, they are looking for salvation elsewhere, in the unfailing refuge of the Muslim faith. And the ballot box is increasingly reflecting it.

* The writer is former Al-Ahram correspondant in Washington, DC. He also served as director of United Nations Radio and Television in New York.