Save Them From Themselves, Part I : Staying the Course

Just as our Independence Day weekend came to an end this year, I came across a headline reading “Iraq says may agree to timetable for U.S. withdrawal.” The article quoted Iraq’s Prime Minister Maliki saying, “Today, we are looking at the necessity of terminating the foreign presence on Iraqi lands and restoring full sovereignty (1).” And the next day, the headlines continued. Apparently, the Iraqi government was demanding “specific dates” for U.S. troops and other forces to pullout of Iraq (2). So just a few days after we celebrated the 232nd anniversary of our independence, Iraq’s government seemed to suggest that it was ready for its independence—that it wanted its experience of colonization on fast-forward to come to its end. The timing probably couldn’t have been any better. In the end, not too much was made of that story at that time, but with Obama’s recent visit to Iraq and Afghanistan, the issue has come up again. This time, the spokesman for the Iraqi government said that they “are hoping that in 2010 that combat troops will withdraw from Iraq (3).” Of course, the U.S. response to all of this is that any withdrawal has to be “conditions-based.” And what exactly are those conditions? Well, let’s flashback a few years and look at the course of this war to see if we can figure that out.

On May 1, 2003, George Bush announced that our mission had been accomplished in Iraq; major combat had ended. Yet as the future exposed, the U.S. occupation of Iraq had only just begun. That’s because throughout the course of this “war,” the goals and reasons for keeping troops in Iraq seem to have continuously changed and oftentimes it remained unclear what the ends were and whether any objectives existed at all. The initial rationale for invading Iraq was alleged “weapons of mass destruction,” supposedly harbored by Saddam Hussein. However, no such “weapons of mass destruction” were to be found. Immediately, our focus changed to one of nation-building—installing democracy and deposing Iraq’s leader, Saddam Hussein. This was accomplished in stages with the creation of a U.S.-led interim government in April 2003, the capture of Saddam Hussein in December 2003, the Iraqi general elections in 2005, the formation of a permanent constitutional government in May 2006, and finally the assassination of Hussein on December 30, 2006 (4). However, this being accomplished, one expected warfare to no longer be necessary, that is, if it was necessary to begin with. But, the U.S. again switched its focus to constructing civil unity, eliminating ‘sectarian violence,’ and ensuring stability. Essentially, we decided that our forces were no longer a warring side in this war, but rather a form of law enforcement or police. In effect, the war was not a war but an occupation.

Our constantly changing goals and ambiguous rationale for this war-occupation have served as excuses to allow us to maintain a military and political presence in Iraq and thus remain in effective control of that nation. If this sounds uncannily like the informal or even formal empires of the last century, it should not be surprising. What this means is that we better start reevaluating the way we think of ourselves and our role internationally. Are we a liberating nation or a colonizing one? Are we really any better than our European cousins were? If not, how do we change? It’s time for a self-diagnosis.

Symptom 1: One of the main arguments being made now to justify the continued U.S. occupation of Iraq is that we are needed to provide security for the country because Iraqis, as yet, are unable to do so themselves. In his speech to the nation on September 13, 2007, President George W. Bush said, “America has a vital interest in preventing chaos and providing hope in the Middle East,” and “The premise of our strategy is that securing the Iraqi population is the foundation for all other progress…The goal of the surge is to provide that security and to help prepare Iraqi forces to maintain it (5).” Bush didn’t stop there but went on, at the same time acknowledging our ever-changing “mission” in Iraq: “As terrorists are defeated, civil society takes root and the Iraqis assume more control over their own security, our mission in Iraq will evolve.” Bush even asserted that the Iraqis themselves know that they are incapable of succeeding on their own by saying that the Iraqi leaders, “understand that their success will require U.S. political, economic and security engagement that extends beyond my presidency (6).” Interesting to note that a week later in a press conference, Bush claimed that the U.S. goals in Iraq are not shifting and have not shifted: “the goals are the same.” And what are those goals? “[H]elping Iraqis provide their own security.”

And it’s not just Bush who’s saying these things. General Jack Keane, a former Army Vice Chief of Staff made a similar assertion in a discussion led by ABC News on September 5, 2007, called “Seeking Solutions in Iraq.” Keane said that some of the Iraqi population is “seeking reconciliation, and…they’re using the United States to achieve that for them with the Iraqi government (7).”

So essentially, our argument is that the Iraqis are not capable of governing themselves and that their government is ineffectual at maintaining order; therefore, it is the duty of the United States to do this for them. We may not always put it in those exact terms, but that’s exactly what we’re implying with the words we do use. But wait a minute, we have put it in those exact terms. According to the National Intelligence Estimate, “Iraq's political leaders remain unable to govern effectively…(8)” Maybe it’s just me, but to insinuate and even verbalize that any people don’t know how to govern themselves is demeaning and degrading. Talk about adding insult to injury. First we invade your country and then we suggest that you don’t know how to control yourselves. And we forget that much of the disorder was sparked by the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq in the first place.

So are such statements really a symptom of imperialism? Well, when you look into it, such talk does seem to come from the colonial period. One of the common justifications of British Imperialism was that colonial subjects were not yet capable of self-rule and therefore had to be ruled by Europeans. Europeans needed to keep order in the lands of savages. This ‘civilizing mission’ was frequently employed by apologists of imperialism. Rudyard Kipling’s well-known poem, “The White Man’s Burden,” written to urge the U.S. to do its duty in its newly acquired Philippines, expressed these views disturbingly well.

The Amritsar massacre of 1919 which was discussed in previous posts also brought up rhetoric similar to what we’ve been seeing in the U.S. regarding Iraq. In the words of the Dictionary of National Biography, O’Dwyer, one of the men who led the Amritsar massacre, believed in “the necessity of British control of India for that country’s welfare (9).” Scholar Derek Sayer wrote of the Amritsar incident that its perpetrators Dyer and O’Dwyer saw, or at least claimed, that their duty was to keep order, “and the supreme value placed on order was in turn predicated on their construction of Indians as unfitted to govern themselves…The maintenance of order was justified by Anglo-Indians as being in the interests of their Indian subjects, and it was the Indians whom they would be failing if they ‘shirked’ this duty, however unpleasant (10).” Sound familiar? Back in December ’06, Bush told Shiite parliamentary leader Al-Hakim, “We will fail in Iraq if we pull out our troops before we’re in a position to help the Iraqis succeed (11).” Succeed in what—their goals or ours?

According to Sayer, what permitted the Amritsar massacre to occur and to go without the type of condemnation that would have been present had it occurred in white colonies was the idea of Indians as being children “who once abandoned to their own devices would revert to savagery.” The British did not just have this attitude toward their Indian subjects; a similar attitude was held of their African subjects. Harvard professor Caroline Elkins discusses this with regard to the Mau Mau situation in Kenya as follows: “Despite the fact that these men on the spot, the young members of Britain’s ruling elite who considered themselves to be the protectors of ‘their natives,’ were watching Kikuyu country rapidly deteriorate around them, many continued to believe they had come to Africa to oversee a slow, organic change from savagery to civilization. They were trustees who acted in the best interests of the African, who after all had to be protected from himself…(12)” Likewise, we too are supposedly acting in the best interest of the Iraqi—overseeing a gradual change from a so-called Islamic dictatorship to democracy. During the Mau Mau situation, Britain did not envision granting independence to Kenya for at least another generation. And even after that, like the U.S.’s attitude today vis-à-vis Iraq, the British believed that their settlers would maintain a strong political influence in order to protect British interests and rear Kenyan leaders to likewise protect these interests (13). Maintain a strong relationship?! Bush said the same thing.

It’s obvious that the timetables proposed this month do not sit well with the White House. Press Secretary Dana Perino had this to say on Monday July 21st about the troop withdrawal: “it will not be something that Americans say, ‘We’re going to do—we’re going to leave at this date (2).'” But is this really something that we have the power to decide—to dictate when we’re going to leave someone else’s country? (Well, we did dictate when we were going to invade the country, so I guess you could say, "why not?"). But, if Iraq wants us out by 2010, then let’s get out by 2010. I thought Iraq was a sovereign nation. Or is it only in name?

To conlcude our diagnosis for today, let’s ask a few more questions. How do we measure security? I mean when do we know when Iraq is secure enough for us to leave? If we say our withdrawal will be based on conditions, but the required conditions continue to change, we’re not saying much. The proposal Iraqi officials originally made at the beginning of this month calls for the withdrawal of U.S. forces by at most five years after the U.S. hands control of security in Iraq’s 18 provinces back over to Iraq. But when will that happen? Nine provinces have been handed over to Iraqi control so far; the handover of two other provinces was delayed until further notice, supposedly because of bad weather. It seems that not only does the White House not want to specify a timeline for withdrawal, they don’t even want to specify conditions for withdrawal because that means committing to leaving. But if we really are acting in the best interest of Iraq, let’s take a hint from Iraqis themselves. And according to Shiite lawmaker al-Adeeb, a timeline is “what the Iraqi people want (1).” Or as Prime Minister al-Maliki put it, “it’s the business of Iraqis to say what they want. And that’s where the people and the government are in general agreement: The tenure of the coalition of troops in Iraq should be limited (14).” Or are we going to say that they don’t even know what they really want either?

Next time we’ll take a look at some other symptoms.

1. Yates, Dean and Ahmed Rasheed, “Iraq says may agree to timetable for U.S. withdrawal,” Yahoo! News, 7 Jul 2008, "http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080707/wl_nm/iraq_dc&printer=1;_ylt=AsFy5sCFxqId" ...
2. Abdul-Zahra, Qassim and Sebastian Abbot, Associated Press, “Iraq Presses US on Timeline for Troop Pullout,” ABC News, 8 Jul 2008, http://abcnews.go.com/print?id=5328327
3. Murphy, Brian, Associated Press writer, “Iraq sees hope of US troop withdrawal by 2010,” Yahoo News, http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080721/...
4. Iraq War Timeline-Iraq 5 Years Later. http://www.msnbc.com/id/23694433
5. ABC News.com “Transcript: Bush Addresses Iraq, President Outlines Surge Strategy, Endorses General’s Recommendations,” "http://abcnews.go.com/print?id=3600417". accessed 9/14/2007, p. 1
6. p. 3.
7. “Seeking Solutions in Iraq,” ABC News, "http://abcnews.go.com/print?od=3563247", p.2
8. Quoted in a report on ABC World News on August 23, 2007
9. Sayer, 136.
10. Sayer, 160.
11. Associated Press, “Bush Meets with Iraqi Shiite Leader” published in The Harvard Crimson December 5, 2006.
12. Elkins, 21.
13. Elkins, 60.
14. Reuters, "Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki Backs Obama Troop Exit Plan," 19, July 2008. accessed 26 Jul 2008. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/07/19/iraqi-pm-backs-obama-troo_n_113751.html?v...