'Just World News' with Helena Cobban

Iraq Democrats Disappointed

Back last summer, I got into a heartfelt exchange with a friend of mine who's an Iraqi democrat. His name is Siyamend Othman. He's a wise and good person, an Iraqi Kurd who's lived in exile for many, many years, and who worked for a bunch of them as a researcher for Amnesty International in London.

Understandably, he loathes Saddam Hussein. In our exchange last August or so, I was commenting critically on articles he was writing about how an American military victory over Saddam could usher in an era of democratization in Iraq.

I wrote to him, based on my experience of having lived in a war-zone--in Lebanon--for six years back in the 1970s: "I have never believed that democracy can be brought to any country on the tips of bayonets (or the nose-cones of cruise missiles, come to that). I guess for me it is also, to a major degree a human-rights question, since I consider that war itself constitutes a massive assault on people's rights, and always, always, brings in its train conditions that constitute a continuing assault on human rights for a very, very long time after..."

He wrote back, "I understand where you are coming from and respect the proposition that 'war (I presume you mean any war) itself constitutes a massive assault on people's rights'. However, would you hold the same position regarding World War II - the bloodiest confrontation in the history of Mankind? But that was different, I am repeatedly told. Hitler was a menace to humanity; Saddam is a small-time Third World tyrant who has been effectively 'contained'... Needless to say that establishing the foundations of democracy in post-Saddam Iraq is by no means a foregone conclusion. In all likelihood, it would be a long and painful process with no guaranteed outcome. In my opinion, much will depend on American attitudes. That is why I keep repeating that winning the 'Battle of Washington' is as important as winning that of Baghdad. In this endeavour, Iraqi democrats are in dire need of all the help they can get from their Western counterparts, yourself included."

As I said, Siyamend is a wise and good person. We agreed to disagree-- but not before I warned him that putting any faith in the idea that this U.S. administration might have any commitment to democratization or democrats seemed an improbably long bet.

The most recent message I got from Siyamend indicated that he and his Iraqi-democratic friends feel they may now have lost the 'Battle of Washington'. It included an article his friend Kanan Makiya wrote in the London Observer on Sunday, as well as an Observer article about the growing disillusionment of Kanan and Iraqi opposition boss Ahmed Chalabi over Washington's recent pronouncements for their plans for a post-Saddam Iraq.

"The United States," Kanan wrote, "is on the verge of committing itself to a post-Saddam plan for a military government in Baghdad with Americans appointed to head Iraqi ministries, and American soldiers to patrol the streets of Iraqi cities. The plan, as dictated to the Iraqi opposition in Ankara last week by a United States-led delegation, further envisages the appointment by the US of an unknown number of Iraqi quislings palatable to the Arab countries of the Gulf and Saudi Arabia as a council of advisers to this military government. The plan reverses a decade-long moral and financial commitment by the US to the Iraqi opposition... "

This whole business is truly tragic. It is true that the "Iraqi opposition" is a diverse conglomeration of people. Ahmed Chalabi has been on the lam from Jordan for years for bankrupting thousands of Jordanians through the collapse of his Petra Bank more than 15 years ago. Kanan Makiya got catapulted to fame and fortune in August-September 1990 after he published--under the pseudonym Samir Khalil--a lengthy indictment of Saddam's misrule that was a tad short on documentation if very long on emotion. In addition, there are ayatollahs-in-waiting massed in their hundreds in exile in Iran. There are Kurdish tribal leaders who wouldn't even speak to each other for most of the past decade... And then, there are also among the opposition many serious people who are sincerely committed to building a real democracy in their country.

Why on earth did the Iraqi democrats ever put any faith in George Bush?

Makiya, for his part, may well have grown to love the attention he got from being lionized by some segments of the administration. In his Observer piece, he asks coyly, "Is the President who so graciously invited me to his Oval Office only a few weeks ago to discuss democracy, about to have his wishes subverted by advisers... ?"

Well yes, Kanan, maybe the Prez had any "wishes" he ever had for "democracy" subverted a long time ago.

But seriously: discussing democracy-- with George W. Bush??