Mirage
Of Improvement In Iraq
By
Dahr Jamail
18 December,
2007
Countercurrents.org
The
November 19 New York Times announces, “Baghdad’s Weary Start
to Exhale as Security Improves.”
The Washington
Post on November 23 reports, “Returnees Find a Capital Transformed.”
People in
the US are willing to believe the establishment media telling them that
refugees are returning to their homes in Baghdad in an environment of
improved security and new hope.
It is true
that there have been fewer American soldiers killed in Baghdad and the
number of Iraqis fleeing to Syria has declined. However, this relatively
quieter security situation needs to be placed in its proper context,
something the Western media steadfastly refuses to do.
We are proudly
informed that buying off Sunni militias and resistance fighters at $300
per month is among the latest U.S. military tactics, but we are conscientiously
kept uninformed about the implications of such a move. Nor is there
any mention of the growing antagonism it has generated in the US-backed
Iraqi Government under Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. By its own admission,
the U.S. military has paid over $17 million, so far, to recruit 77,000
Sunni fighters, many of whom were launching attacks against the Americans
a few weeks ago (International Herald Tribune).
Post purchase,
the US military has rechristened them “Concerned Local Citizens,”
or “Awakening Forces.” The target is to procure another
10,000.
The current
recruitment has indeed contributed to a de-escalation of violence in
the capital city, and across much of al-Anbar province, which comprises
one third of the geographic area of Iraq.
Reiterated
Strategy
We are proudly
informed that buying off Sunni militias and resistance fighters at $300
per month is among the latest U.S. military tactics, but kept uninformed
about the implications of such a move.
After it
failed to take control of Fallujah during the April 2004 assault, the
US employed a similar tactic. It was a presidential election year in
the US (as is 2008) and in order to save face, the U.S. military “handed”
over security operations in Fallujah to the very people it had fought
in April. Money and weapons flooded the city and strengthened the mujahedeen.
At the time
a much larger battle was in the offing, the November 2004 U.S. siege
of Fallujah, which left thousands dead, and destroyed approximately
70 percent of the city. It is worth noting that the attack was launched
on November 8, 2004, just days after it was determined that George W.
Bush would remain in office.
Under the
“new and improved” conditions, consider the following:
* the fragility
of the political balance in Iraq;
* the Middle
Eastern regional instability;
*the ever
intensifying U.S. threats of an attack against Iran;
* the likelihood
of the “Concerned Local Citizens” staying loyal to their
new masters;
and then let us consider what calamity awaits the occupied country.
Political
Capital
Both the
Maliki government and the Bush administration are using the return of
refugees as political capital. This projection bears little relation
to the ground reality.
To place
an inconsequential fact on record, since the beginning of the US “surge”
earlier this year, the number of people displaced from their homes in
Iraq has quadrupled, and the number of detentions carried out by both
Iraqi and U.S. security forces has escalated astronomically. On November
13, the International Committee for the Red Cross estimated there are
around 60,000 people detained in U.S. and Iraqi prisons around Iraq.
Refugees
returning to Baghdad have been projected in the West as evidence of
the “surge” having brought security to Baghdad. Both the
Maliki government and the Bush administration are using them as political
capital. This projection bears little relation to the ground reality
which indicates a steep decline in the number of returnees.
A recent
UN survey, revealing the modest number of families returning to Baghdad,
shows that “46 percent were leaving [Syria] because they could
not afford to stay; 25 percent said they fell victim to a stricter Syrian
visa policy; and only 14 percent said they were returning because they
had heard about improved security” (The New York Times).
It crucial
to consider, but evidently not by the western media, that as of October
1st the Syrian government has imposed new visa restrictions whereby
Iraqis who can prove they need medical treatment or intend to conduct
business alone are permitted entry into Syria.
Iraqis who
are barred entrance have the option of staying in a refugee camp on
the border in the middle of the desert, or returning home.
Not More
is Not Less
“It
is true that hundreds of fighters were killed or detained by the so-called
Awakening Forces, but there are thousands who will never quit fighting
until this occupation is ended.”
Let us not
discount the fact that the “lower violence rate” being reported
by the Western media establishments imply that violence in Iraq is now
down to 2005 levels, which at the time was considered catastrophic.
A recent Pew Research Center poll found that “nearly 90 percent
of US journalists in Iraq say much of Baghdad is still too dangerous
to visit.” Those surveyed have admitted that the “coverage
has painted too rosy a picture of the conflict” (Reuters).
The not-so-rosy
reality is that the resistance has merely shifted location. As Ali Khamees,
a former major of the Iraqi army, recently told my Iraqi colleague in
Ramadi, Ali al-Fadhily, “it is true that hundreds of fighters
were killed or detained by the so-called Awakening Forces, but there
are thousands who will never quit fighting until this occupation is
ended. I believe it is a new strategy employed by the resistance to
reduce the suffering of people in al-Anbar and move somewhere else to
fight.”
Attacks against
U.S. forces have increased notably in other Iraqi provinces like Diyala,
Saladin and Mosul.
On November
28, a female suicide bomber wounded seven US soldiers in Baquba, the
capital city of the volatile Diyala province, northeast of Baghdad.
The previous day in the same city, another suicide bomber detonated
his explosives filled vest in front of the police headquarters, killing
six people and wounding seven, according to Iraqi police reports.
Speaking
on condition of anonymity, a 32 year old Ramadi resident cautioned my
Iraqi colleague, al-Fadhily, “those Americans thought they would
decrease the resistance attacks by separating the people of Iraq into
sects and tribes. They are going deeper into the shifting sand. The
collaborators are fooling the Americans right now, and will in the end
use this strategy against them.”
Provinces
like Saladin, Diyala and the Kurdish controlled north, now under regular
bombardment from the Turkish military which is threatening invasion,
have become more volatile than ever.
The Bush
administration talks of withdrawing up to 5,000 troops from Diyala province,
but on November 24 US military officials revealed that the overall number
of American troops in Diyala will actually increase since the replacement
brigade for the one being removed is larger and will mean more boots
on the ground.
Crafting
Political Chaos
“Those
Americans . . . are going deeper into the shifting sand. The collaborators
are fooling the Americans right now, and will in the end use this strategy
against them”
The U.S.
policy of propping up the Sunni militias whilst backing the Shia government
has heightened the volatility of an already precarious political situation.
Deep fissures are one fall out of this classic divide and rule tactic.
On November
29, legislators blocked Prime Minister Maliki’s attempts to get
approval for nominees to fill the vacant portfolios of justice and communications
in the cabinet. This was done by getting legislators from several parties
to boycott the session and ensure that parliament did not have the requisite
quorum to vote on the nominations.
The cabinet
and parliament in Baghdad remain paralyzed thereby effectively derailing
US efforts to push legislation for privatization of Iraq’s oil.
Over a dozen ministers have quit Maliki’s government this year.
These include members of the Accordance Front, the largest Sunni block
in the parliament, which withdrew its support in August. The cabinet
is presently composed primarily of Shia and Kurds which only underscores
the sectarian and ethnic battle lines that the U.S. policies have drawn
in Iraq.
Before swallowing
the Bush administration rhetoric of things getting better in Iraq today,
we would do well to cast a glance at the real picture of the calamitous
occupation.
The Just
Foreign Policy group in the US places over 1.1 million Iraqis dead as
a direct result of the US led invasion and occupation. A conservative
estimate of the wounded would be 3 million.
The UNHCR
enlists an approximate 2.2 million Iraqis that have fled the country
altogether, and another 2.4 million that have been internally displaced.
An Oxfam International report released in July found another 4 million
Iraqis who were in need of emergency assistance.
Iraq’s
population at the time of the US invasion in March 2003 was roughly
27 million, and today it is approximately 23 million. Elementary arithmetic
indicates that currently over half the population of Iraq are either
refugees, in need of emergency aid, wounded, or dead.
While the
US establishment media proffers us the assurance of “Baghdad’s
Weary Start to Exhale as Security Improves,” for most Iraqis safe
and secure survival remains a distant dream. For Americans it is perhaps
time to act on the words of Carl Schurz and “cling to the watchword
of true patriotism: ‘Our country — when right to be kept
right; when wrong to be put right.’”
Dahr
Jamail is IPS’ specialist writer who has spent eight
months reporting from inside Iraq and has been covering the Middle East
for several years
Leave
A Comment
&
Share Your Insights
Comment
Policy
Digg
it! And spread the word!
Here is a unique chance to help this article to be read by thousands
of people more. You just Digg it, and it will appear in the home page
of Digg.com and thousands more will read it. Digg is nothing but an
vote, the article with most votes will go to the top of the page. So,
as you read just give a digg and help thousands more to read this article.