THE WEEKEND INTERVIEW
The Voice of Iraq
"Nobody is for a withdrawal, even a timetable," says the foreign minister.
BY ROBERT L. POLLOCK
Mr. Pollock is a member of The Wall Street Journal's editorial board.
Saturday, June 24, 2006 12:01 a.m.
NEW YORK--"That was the center of all that happened in Iraq after the war. The people who were meeting there are the new leaders of Iraq, but nobody took them seriously in those days."
So says Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari. He's talking about an unassuming little hotel in central Baghdad called Burj al-Hayat, where his Kurdistan Democratic Party set up headquarters in the heady days immediately following Saddam Hussein's fall from power. And his recollection of the period is vivid enough to include the hour or two he spent with your humble correspondent in early May of 2003. Perched on bar stools, we drank only water then to combat the heat of a sweltering afternoon. And Mr. Zebari held forth expansively and optimistically about the future of Iraq.
Portly, with penetrating eyes and a kind smile, he exuded intelligence and decency. And with leaders like him waiting on the wings, it was hard to imagine that things wouldn't turn out pretty well in the months and years ahead. On the streets of Baghdad, too, there were good reasons for hope. Not only was the tyrant who had tried to wipe out Mr. Zebari's Kurdish people gone, there was also a genuine feeling of liberation in the air. The looting--always exaggerated in any case--was done, and Americans (journalists and soldiers alike) mixed freely with Iraqis at kebab stands and ice-cream shops. The main worry was not avoiding a kidnapping or roadside bomb but how to politely turn down the day's sixth invitation for tea.
But even those of us who suspected that such peace--which former U.S. regent Paul Bremer remembers as "chaos" in his recent memoir-- would be challenged by extremists have been shocked by the extent of the violence that grew and grew after the U.N. headquarters was attacked that August.
Now at least the perpetrator of that evil deed is dead. Not enough people understand that what's just happened is a "breakthrough," Mr. Zebari tells me. It shows "that Zarqawi's terror network was penetrated, that those groups are not invincible, especially through hard work and patient work. Fighting this terrorist insurgency really in the end is an intelligence operation."
"That was the difference between many of us Iraqis and our American friends," he adds, suggesting the coalition has too often preferred to try "overwhelming force." In fact, the fundamental flaw in our approach, he says, was our reluctance to let Iraqis get on with political reconciliation and their own security and intelligence efforts earlier than we did.
This time we're meeting on another sweltering day. It's only 9:30 a.m. and the thermometer is headed toward what will be a muggy 90. But we are much more comfortably ensconced in a room at the Council on Foreign Relations on East 68th Street in Manhattan. He's just addressed a breakfast meeting of the group. And the day before saw him in meetings with the U.N. secretary-general and The Wall Street Journal's editorial board, among other commitments.
Mr. Zebari has established himself as the great survivor of postwar Iraqi politics, holding his post through four governments--the Bremer period, and prime ministers Ayad Allawi, Ibrahim al-Jaafari and, now, Nouri al-Maliki. That alone bespeaks a great deal of diplomatic skill--though Mr. Zebari is hardly afraid to offend where justified. Just ask the likes of Arab League head Amr Moussa, or others with whom he has publicly tangled. But neither does Mr. Zebari seem to delight in contrarianism like his friend and longtime colleague in opposition, Ahmed Chalabi. Perhaps that's why the same criticisms of U.S. policy that would put Mr. Chalabi on President Bush's bad side starting in late 2003 never seemed to hurt Mr. Zebari's standing.
Mr. Zebari's critiques, it should be emphasized, are always offered with a liberal dose of thanks for the coalition's "sacrifice" in "a noble cause." But he also seems eager that Americans and others learn the right lessons from what's happened over the past three years. And he clearly doesn't buy the lazy journalistic trope that the main mistakes were the failure to stop the looting, disbanding the Iraqi Army, and excessive de-Baathification. Instead, he seems to think many problems could have been mitigated had Iraqis been allowed to move toward self-government much, much sooner.
"The biggest mistake, honestly, if you go back, was not entrusting the Iraqis as partners, to empower them, to see them do their part, to fill the vacuum, to have a national unity government," he says. According to Gen. Jay Garner, who briefly ruled Iraq before he was peremptorily replaced by Mr. Bremer in May 2003, that was exactly the plan. His provisional government probably would have included Kurdish leaders Massoud Barzani and Jalal Talabani, secular Shiites Ahmed Chalabi and Ayad Allawi, religious Shiite Ibrahim al-Jaafari and Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, and the Sunni Adnan Pachachi. The idea was that free elections would soon follow.
But "if you read Bremer's book ["My Year in Iraq"], when he came, one of his tasks was to stop these 'exiles,' " Mr. Zebari says. "I think the biggest sin was to change the mission from liberation to occupation. That is the mother of all sins, honestly."
With his use of "exiles," Mr. Zebari is deploying--with some irony--the derogatory term many U.S. diplomats used to refer to the leading anti-Saddam opposition figures. Never mind that the term hardly fit the Kurdish leaders, who had already built what amounted to an autonomous state in Northern Iraq under cover of a U.S. "no-fly" zone. But there was an idea that the group was somehow too "unrepresentative" to serve even as a temporary government.
Where did Mr. Bremer get the idea to slow things down? I ask. "Many people collaborated. It wasn't his idea as such. There was Security Council Resolution 1483 that changed the whole thing. The Americans and British collaborated on that, relying on advice from international lawyers that one way to rebuild this country is to free it from the sanctions--from the U.N.-imposed sanctions--and sanctions can only be lifted when you have an Iraqi authority to negotiate. There isn't. And these bunch of people sitting in that hotel are not up to that job, so let's make ourselves the authority. . . . I think that was the big mistake."
Mr. Zebari is reluctant to name names. But the drivers of the anti-"exile" policy included Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, Richard Armitage and former Bremer aide (and current deputy national security adviser) Meghan O'Sullivan. In the end, U.S. attempts to empower "indigenous" Iraqis proved worse than a failure. Not only were the "exiles" overwhelmingly victorious in Iraq's two elections (all three prime ministers have been "exiles"), but our attempts to "level the playing field" needlessly delayed the development of Iraq's institutions of self-government.
No doubt this has slowed security-forces development. Which brings us to the next topic: the continuing necessity of coalition forces in Iraq. Mr. Zebari's primary mission in New York, in fact, was to review the U.N. mandate of coalition forces. He tells me about a fascinating discussion among Iraqi political leaders shortly before he left for New York. He told them, he says, that the new government was perfectly within its rights to ask for the departure of foreign troops. But he says he found no takers. In fact, the loudest objection to the idea came from Adnan al-Dulaimi, who represents a Sunni community generally thought to be most hostile to the "occupiers." They know only too well that coalition troops are their best protection against shadowy Baathist thugs who would like to lay claim to the Sunni leadership mantle. "Before the Sunnis were raising the flag for a withdrawal of all occupying forces immediately, that they are the sources of all the ills. Now they are the ones asking that they should stay," Mr. Zebari says.
Intimidation "is a problem," he continues. "That is, an intimidation campaign carried out primarily by the Baathists." He also says he believes the Baathists are behind the majority of terrorist attacks: "Identifying the enemy is very important. I personally believe the incubator of this so-called 'insurgency' is the Baath Party, is the remnant of Saddam's regime. Even with Zarqawi and al Qaeda, who are very lethal. But without them [the Baathists] providing the infrastructure, the support, the intelligence, the hideouts--then the attacks would not happen."
What about the war debate here in the U.S., I ask him. Are Iraqis worried that U.S. troops will leave too soon? Does the Iraqi press pay attention when people like Congressman Jack Murtha call for troop withdrawal?
"It does. Yes, it does. This is one of things actually. The freest media in the world I think is in Iraq. Honestly. There is no censorship or restrictions or restraint whatsoever. Now you have about 15 or 16 satellite channels run by Iraqis and I don't know how many hundreds of newspapers." So "people have become more politically conscious and aware. . . . Nobody is for a withdrawal, even a timetable, for the troops."
I decide to move the topic back to Mr. Zebari's own experience on the job. How did he get it? "We were active in the Iraqi National Congress," he tells me. "I was then the person responsible for the foreign relations. It became very natural when the first government happened. I was recommended by many friends, by Ahmed [Chalabi], by Allawi, by Mr. Talabani."
What's surprised him most about the job? "We've learned many, many things. In the opposition we were struggling to open doors and to get to decision-making people in governments. Now you look from inside out it's a different world. It's much easier to work officially in a government than to work in the opposition."
Is he perplexed that international attitudes haven't been more helpful? Particularly the U.N., where he's just seen Kofi Annan? It was actually "one of the most amicable, friendly atmospheres," he tells me. "We've come a long way." But I can well remember Mr. Zebari's withering criticism of the Oil for Food program in 2003, long before the scandal ever broke. I guess he is a diplomat now, after all. And he does understand there's still a long way to go in Iraq--and that the country needs all the support it can get.
As we part ways, he offers a message for those in the international community and in the U.S. who would give up on the mission while there's still everything to play for: "There is too much at stake. Failure in Iraq means reversal of all democratic reforms throughout the region. Failure in Iraq means the power of the United States and the coalition cannot be used elsewhere in the same manner. Failure for democracy here would suggest that really these people are not used to this so its better to have one-man, one-party rule, a strong man to control this bunch of Kurds and Shia and militias and so on. Failure is a reversal of everything we've built."
Over to you, Mr. Murtha. |
