Refreshing forum but what next?

December 16, 2004

Refreshing forum, but what next?

PV Vivekanand

The Arab Strategy Forum held in Dubai this week offered a refreshing experience in terms of blunt talk about the Arab situation and shortcomings that impede the pace of development and economic progress.
Debate during the three-day event — "The Arab World in 2020 — brought out subjects that are often taboo when discussed at the national level although they are the focus of discussions in private gathering in almost part of the Arab World.
That indeed was the key to the success of the ASF, where participants aired their views on what is wrong in the Arab region and what should and could be done to enable the Arabs to cope with the challenges posed by the fast-moving international and regional developments as well as the shrinking of the world brought about by globalisation.
The sharp reminder of the tough task facing the Arabs came when they were told that there would not many "Arab tigers" along the lines of the "Asian tigers" by the year 2020.
If there would be any, it would be Dubai, and that was an emphatic tribute to the emirate.
The participants were almost unanimous that Arabs would and should decide what was best for them, and that stability and security of the region that are vital for development were inevitably contingent on resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict in all its dimensions.
Consensus was that the Arabs would miss the train if they did not get their act together by launching immediate measures to adopt reforms. However, the reforms should be homegrown, based on the ground realities of the country concerned, said the experts, who spoke out firms against the US-led drive for imposing its version of reform on the Arab World.
Arab countries were warned that increased flow of petrodollars as a result of high oil prices should be not be an impediment to economic and political reforms.
Indeed, there were even suggestions that the oil wealth has actually been a hurdle in the way of the natural growth and development of oil-producing Arab countries whereas non-oil Arab states are prompted by their own imperatives to work hard and bring in the results.
Everyone agreed that educating the people and developing human resources is one of the keys to sustainable development and there should be no second thought about investing in creating education sytems oriented towards absorbing high technologies and benefiting from the experience of other countries.
Dubai Crown Prince and UAE Defence Minister Sheikkh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum set the tone for the forum's indepth review of the Arab World's future by warning Arab rulers that they risked losing power if they did not introduce wide-ranging reforms in their countries.
"I say to my fellow Arabs in (power): If you do not change, you will be changed," Sheikh Mohammed told the opening of the forum on "The Arab World in 2020."
"If you do not initiate radical changes to restore respect to public duties, uphold the principles of transparency, justice and responsibility, your peoples will resent you, and the verdict of history on you will be severe," he told the gathering.
Sheikh Mohammed said reforms have to come from within the region.
"Reform cannot be realised by foreign projects and ready-made plans. It cannot be realised by tanks and cannons," he said.
In separate comments to the press, Sheikh Mohammed rejected "the importation of the Western-style democracy."
"Our democracy stems from our tradition, culture and religious principles, which are eternal legacies passed unto us by our ancestors," he said.
"We are very proud of our democracy which our people practice in a one family spirit, and which distinguishes our society from others," he said.

While former US president Bill Clinton and several other speakers said the death of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat had opened a window of opportunity to solve the Palestinian problem, Saudi Ambassador to the Britain Prince Turki Al Faisal Al Saud said that there would not be peace in the region unless the US shifted its bias in favour of Israel.
"As long as the world remains passive and America remains a strong supporter of Israel that offers any form of support requested, and accepts anything from any prime minister of Israel regardless of his (or) her extremism, then Israel will never seek to compromise or to reach a settlement," said Prince Turki.
Reviewed during the regular sessions and workshops held on the sidelines of the forum were issues such as future of the Arab oil and gas industry and its international dimensions, political systems, reforms and development, Arab security, fighting terrorism, "clash of civilisations, alignment or conflict," economics and politics, globalisation of economies and business, the Iraq crisis, the Libyan experiment in liberalisation, free trade, family businesses, the impact on the world of the Sept.11 attacks in the US, human development and education in the Arab World, the Arab labour market, and the "rise and fall of countries and corporations."
On terrorism, Prince Turki said organisations like Al Qaeda were exploiting Arab and Muslim youth by brainwashing them and were desparate to prove to the world that they exist in the face of security crackdowns and hence their efforts to stage extremist attacks.
There was almost unanimous opinion that the oil-producing Arab countries should seek to diversify their oil-based economies into industrial production, build funds to sustain themselves in a post-oil era, invest more in developing Arab human resources through well-charted education systems and market-oriented training programmes. Above all in the economic sphere, said the participants, governments should shift focus from themselves to the private sector while retaining its role as a facilitator of economic development and growth.
Speakers after speakers referred to China and India as models that could be emulated by the Arabs in terms of economic development, trade liberalisation and adapation of new technologies.
Political reforms are also vital to development and progress and the people's role in governance should be expanded, they said.
However, heard during the debates were complaints that resolutions and decisions adopted at various Arab forums are either not implemented at all or are implemented at a very slow pace that defeats the purpose. Some commentators said governments felt threatened by adopting changes and hence their reluctance to adopt reforms.
It was predicted that there would not be any "Arab tigers" emerging along the lines of the "Asian tigers" by the year 2020 as Arab countries are not moving ahead with reform and adaptation of new international realities at a pace that is required.
"There might be a few cats but I don't see any Arab tigers in the year 2020," said Dr Ghassan Salameh, former minister of culture of Lebanon, who moderated the concluding session, which was attended by New York Times' Thomas Friedman, Abdul Rahman Rashid of Al Arabiya Television and Fareed Zakaria, editor of Newsweek International.
According to Zakaria, high prices of oil meant increased income for Arab governments and this was a negative factor against economic reforms since regimes could use the oil money to ward off calls for changes.
Friedman said the increased pace of globalisation was "levelling the competitive playing field" and this meant increased challenges to everyone, particularly those who are slow to adapt themselves to the situation.
Friedman cited as an example how Chinese manufacturers have taken over from Egyptian companies, the production of ornate Ramadan lamps, with the added attraction of microchips that sing perfect Egyptian folk songs.
To take advantage of a "world becoming flat," Friedman said that it is important to take good ideas and practices from others, while at the same time preserving one's own culture and identity.
"When the world is flat, it is flat for the bad guys as well," he said. Osama Bin Laden planned the Sept.11 attacks using all the tools of the "flat world", said Friedman.
He emphasised the need to "drill" human resources rather than oil and equip the young people of the region to take advantage of the opportunities of the "flat world." The inability to exploit these opportunities, he warned, will end up in people feeling humiliation and frustration and these are perfect recipes for extremism.
In his comments on the opening day, Sheikh Mohammed expressed confidence that the Arab World would witness in the next decade a vigorous change.
"Reforms are inevitably coming to our Arab societies," he said, adding that reforms and the solving of the region's problems are intertwined. "But crisis should not obstruct our march towards development, modernisation and economic, social and political developments," he warned.
He underlined the need to solve the crises in Palestine and Iraq based on the principles of international legitimacy and through "dialogue to give each and every one his right for peace and stability to reign in the region and for the peoples in the region to live in peace and harmony irrespective of their religion, race or sectarian inclination."
Clinton, one of the keynote speakers, said he did not see a solution to the Palestinian problem or the wider Arab-Israeli conflict in the next four years as promised by his successor George W Bush.
However, he called on all parties involved to continue to work for peace based on a two-state solution in Palestine. He said the US could play an effective role only if both sides to the conflict had confidence in American mediation.
Clinton told the Arabs they need to realise that all are living in an interdependent world and that it is upon them to define what the Arab World would be like in 2020.
"All we know for sure that we live in an interdependent region and in an interdependent world. For example, both Israel and Syria are interdependent – it depends on whether there are attacks or whether their children play together," Clinton pointed out.
He said growth and development do not rely on vision alone. There are other factors that are required. Vision needs a concrete strategy to activate the vision. Systems are needed to implement that vision. Leadership is a key component and support is needed from the friends of the Arab World, including the US.
Hanan Ashrawi, secretary general of the Palestinian Initiative for Promotion of Global Dialogue and Democracy and member of the Palestinian parliament, said the Arab World cannot go forward without reform, but the push for it should come from within the region itself and not from a foreign power.
Ashrawi said: "The Arab World has to transform itself from a system based on the concentration of power to one where power is shared by the people. Power should be directed at establishing collective authority and a pluralistic system that allows free interaction."
However, she said that the power should be legitimised by the people and not by the protection provided by a foreign power.
Fuad Ajami, director of Middle East studies programme at John Hopkins University, also reiterated that reform in the region cannot be a "foreign gift."
"Security can be provided under an American umbrella but not reform," he pointed out.
Ajami's description of the invasion and occupation of Iraq as just and comemnt that it "gives a great chance for political change" in the country sparked a verbal clash.
Ajami said: "There is a real possibility that there will be a pluralistic society in which all communities, including the Sunnis, the Shiites and the Kurds, can participate equally and create a system that will work."' He said many Iraqis are eager to get on with the political process in Iraq and not concerned about questions of the legitimacy of the war.
However, Francis Boyle, professor of international law at the University of Illinois, retorted that the US broke all international laws and had ulterior economic motives in the war against Iraq.
"American policy in the Middle East has been determined by oil and Israel in that order," said Boyle. "The US will seek the domination of Arabs and Muslims until there is no oil. As oil runs out, the US and Israel will become more predatory and genocidal towards the Arab people," he predicted.
The US, he said, could care less about democracy. "What they really want is to establish quisling dictators in the region who will serve their purposes," he added.
Education about democratic norms, human rights and rule of law should be high on the agenda of the Arab World. Education, he said, is crucial to the inculcation of these ideas and practices in the region.
Among others attending the forum were Qatari first Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Sheikh Hamad Bin Jassim Bin Jaber Al Thani, former US secretary of state Madeleine Albright, International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Dr Mohammed Al Baradei and retired North Atlantic Treaty Organisation Supreme Allied Commander General Wesley K. Clark.
Former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Al Hariri blasted the West for its approach to the Palestinian problem and affirmed that comprehensive peace in the Middle East hinges on Israeli withdrawal from Syrian and Lebanese territories.
Hariri ridiculed what he described as efforts by Western powers to link statehood for Palestinians with "good behaviour."
"A Palestinian state should not be a prize for good behaviour," Hariri told the conference. "A state is not a piece of chocolate or the promise to take a child to picnic if he behaves well. Arabs are ready for a just peace. I hear that the US and Europe are convinced of a Palestinian state. But Palestinians should have a country today and not tomorrow."
Even if the Palestinian problem was addressed, he said, Israel will have to withdraw its army from Lebanese and Syrian territories in order to achieve comprehensive and just peace in the region,
Speaking on the theme of "Arab World in 2020," Hariri said that he is provisonally optimistic.
The world has to exert efforts and end the Arab-Israeli conflict. "We have to achieve just peace. We have to end Israeli occupation. This is a focal point that will define our future," said Hariri.
He said the Palestinian people have a right to live in peace and security in their own homeland. "There should be confidence building measures. These cannot be built in one day or two or in one year or ten."
Hariri said another pillar of a better future of the Arab World is democracy. "Reform has not been successful because there was no good base for democracy or freedom," he said.

UAE Minister of Economy and Planning Sheikha Lubna Al Qasimi cited India as a model for development and economic prosperity for the Arab countries while an international expert predicted that there will be 36 million people unemployed in the Arab World by 2020.
"We can learn (from India)," said. Sheikha Lubna. "It has achieved high economic growth despite problems like rapidly increasing population growth."
She said reality does not wait and that she preferred to look five-year chunks ahead rather than 20 years because "Dubai is changing year by year."
Sheikha Lubna identified five key pillars of development: Hard infrastructure (roads, ports, etc.), soft infrastructure (regulation and policy), human capital, transparency and technology.
She said that significant growth requires a government that provides political stability, inspires confidence and injects positive energy. She also called on all governments in the region to measure themselves against a competitive index of technological readiness, macro economic quality, and the international competitiveness of their public institutions.
George T Abed, former director of the Middle East department of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) suggested that investing heavily in English-language education can help the Arab World achieve economic growth.
He also pointed out that India has achieved economic growth and huge successes in the outsourcing industry largely due to its investment in education, specifically English education.
He said that unemployment will continue to be a major problem affecting the Arab World. "With just four per cent growth in the next few years, the inability of paltry economic growth to generate jobs and the competition faced from India and China, the number of unemployed in the Arab World will rise to 36 million," he said.
Abed said that there were four key impediments to economic growth in the Arab World: Bloated governments, a lack of modern institutions, underdeveloped financial institutions and absence of active capital markets.
He said that because the region's population is set to grow at 3.7 per cent the Arab World would need an average economic growth rate of 6.5 per cent. He warned that the region's current and projected growth rates are only four per cent compared to higher rates of growth in India and China. He also noted that the region's performance is declining on a number of key global indicators, including non-oil trade and the use of new technologies such as the Internet. He called on governments in the region to move from being managers and controllers of growth, to become "enablers of growth and guarantors of rights."
He also noted that reforms can not be driven from outside, "by preaching from the United States" that the Arab world must start to reform internally, beginning with the public sector reforms that would create "the moral authority to ask others to reform."
According to Rudiger Grube, member of the board of management of Daimler Chrysler of Germany, the Arab World needs to provide equal opportunities to its citizens to become a political and economic power.
Grube mentioned six "pre-requisites" for development in the Arab World: "Political stability, widespread access to education, inclusion of women in political, economic and social life, reduction of bureaucracy, increase in transparency and a stop to externalisation of the Arab World's problems."
Naguib Sawiris, chairman of Orascom Telecom of Egypt said planned economic integration of the Arab countries will benefit all countries of the region. Although there are great differences among Arab countries, all of them could benefit from integration, he said.
Competitive interests need not prevent effective integration of the Arab region, he said and cited Dubai as a model that the Arab World could emulate.
Sawiris identified a need for three things: Vision, freedom to act, and a government and people prepared to drive reforms. He noted that the children of the Arab World "can compete internationally whenever they are given equal education."
The panelists identified a number of common themes for the Arab World to succeed in 2020: The need for clarity of leadership — that in itself leads to clarity of execution and clarity of governance —  a change in the role of the public sector from control and management to enablement, and a continued focus on international competitiveness.

Knives are out

Dec.13 2004
Knives are out


pv vivekanand

IT IS retribution time for the Bush administration against those who pulled the rug from under the feet of its justification for the unprovoked invasion and occupation of Iraq and its plans for action against Iran. That is why people like UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who stood firm against granting UN legitimacy for the war and called it illegal, and Mohammed Al Baradei, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), who certified Iraq did not have an ongoing programme of nuclear weapons, are finding themselves at the receiving end of allegations and targeted for efforts to remove them.

In Annan's case, the UN chief is facing allegations that his son, Kojo, received upto $150,000 from a Swiss company which had benefited Iraq's oil-for-food programme administered by the UN. Seen against the light of revelations that some senior UN officials had also gained from the same programme, which was allegedly misused by Saddam Hussein to divert funds to illegal beneficiaries, the pressure on Annan was immense. Add to that allegations over a sexual harassment case dismissed by Annan, and of exploitation by peacekeepers in Congo.

For the moment, however, the Bush administration is holdings its horses against Annan after it found an overwhelming majority of world leaders, including American allies such as Tony Blair, rallying behind the UN chief and reaffirming confidence in him and his abilities to lead the world body.

It was a clear volte-face when US Ambassador to the UN John C Danforth said on Thursday that the Bush administration did not want Annan to leave the UN.

"Some have suggested to me that it appears what the US wants to do is to force the resignation of the secretary general," Danforth said. "It is important for us, the United States, to clarify our position. We are not suggesting or pushing for the resignation of the secretary general. We have worked well with him in the past. We anticipate working with him very well in the future for the time to come."

Bush's reticence

Danforth's comment had to be seen against President George Bush's reticence, only a week earlier, to support Annan. Bush had repeatedly declined to issue an unambiguous expression of support. Asked whether he believed Annan should resign, Bush said last week "there ought to be a full and fair and open accounting of the oil-for-food programme" so American taxpayers will "feel comfortable about supporting the United Nations."

Danforth had also defended Bush's stand by asserting that a public expression of confidence in Annan might prejudge investigations into alleged irregularities in Iraq's oil-for-food programme. However, he could not offer any explanation why only the US felt so while almost all other members of the UN expressed confidence in Annan. Those expressions came in the one week between Bush's public statement shying away from voicing confidence in Annan and Danforth's outright statement saying the US "anticipated working with him in the future for the time to come."

Obviously, the world majority's stand on Annan persuaded Washington to publicly freeze its drive to get rid of him.

Some suggest that the neocons are going after the UN through Annan, who has two more years of his second term to serve as UN chief.

Edward Luck, a Columbia University professor who specialises in the UN, said in recent comments carried by the Boston Globe:

"On a strategic level, much of the (Bush) administration rejects what the UN stands for. . . . The secretary general has been a Teflon secretary general and has had a relatively high and positive public profile as a vanguard of multilateralism, while looking for an alternative of American dominance. They haven't had a good way of going after him until now."

No doubt, the neoconservatives of Washington are behind the smear campaign against the UN chief for his firm stand against the war against Iraq. Indeed, Annan has given them additional reasons by calling the war illegal and then denouncing the recent American-led assault against Fallujah.

Annan's warning against the assault was strong. He said: "The threat or actual use of force not only risks deepening the sense of alienation of certain communities (in Iraq), but would also reinforce perceptions among the Iraqi population of a continued military occupation."

He also frustrated Washington by refusing to send more than two dozen electoral workers to help with elections in Iraq

The evidence of the neocon drive against Annan is there. The news that Anna's son received payments from the Swiss company that was a contractor in the oil-for-food programme first appeared in The New York Sun, which belongs to Canadian Conrad Black and which is seen to serve as a mouthpiece for the neocons (according to Jude Wanniski, a former associate editor of The Wall Street Journal).

Conrad is a long-time associate of Richard Perle, the most prominent neo-con in the Bush camp and a director of the Jerusalem Post, one of Black`s many media holdings, Wanniski points out.

Moving against UN

Richard Holbrooke, the US ambassador to the United Nations under president Bill Clinton and an Annan backer, has said: "The danger now is that a group of people who want to destroy or paralyse the UN are beginning to pick up support from some of those whose goal is to reform it."

Annan, like his predecessors, is a bitter critic of Israel and that gives the neocons all the more reason to seek to get rid of him. He has repeatedly condemned Israel's brutal crackdown against the Palestinians and its blatant refusal to abide by UN resolutions and international laws.

In Baradei's case, the Egyptian who assumed the helm of the IAEA in 1997 is facing unofficial charges that he somehow helped Iran escape international punitive measures for developing a programme to make nuclear weapons. However, his real "crime" in the neocons' eyes is that he repeatedly reported the truth to the international community that IAEA inspections had failed to find any sign of Saddam developing nuclear weapons since the 1990s at a time when the Bush administration insisted that he had large stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction.

It was reported on Sunday that the administration had secretly recorded Baradei's phone calls with Iranian diplomats and is scrutinising them in search of ammunition to oust him as IAEA director.

According to the Washington Post, which broke the story, "the efforts against Baradei demonstrate the lengths some within the administration are willing to go to replace a top international diplomat who questioned US intelligence on Iraq and is now taking a cautious approach on Iran."

Baradei an obstacle

Obviously, the US sees Baradei as an obstacle in the way of diplomatic as well as military action for "regime change" in Iran -- a priority for Bush in his second term.

While the taped conservations have not produced "any evidence of nefarious conduct" by Baradei, "some within the administration believe they show Baradei lacks impartiality because he tried to help Iran navigate a diplomatic crisis over its nuclear programmes."

Baradei, 62, who used to teach international law at New York University before becoming IAEA chief, is known to be well-respected inside the UN. A majority of the members of the IAEA board is said to favour a third term for him beginning next summer.

Many analysts believe that Washington found it difficult to convince the required number of IAEA board members to vote against a third term for Baradei and therefore is seeking material to strengthen its argument that Baradei should be retired so that he no longer poses a hurdle in the way of American action against Iran in the name of Tehran's nuclear programme.

That the US is planning military action against Iran was made clear by another prominent neoconservative in the Bush administration.

Under-Secretary of Defence for Policy Douglas J. Feith, one of the most hawkish neocons who orchestrated the invasion and occupation of Iraq citing Saddam Hussein's non-existent weapons of mass destruction, shrouded the warning against Iran in diplomatic jargon.

In an interview with Israel's Jerusalem Post, Feith, who will stay on with Bush in the president's second term at the White House, says Washington hopes that Iran will follow Libya's lead in abandoning its nuclear programme, but nobody should rule out the possibility of military action against Teheran's nuclear sites if it does not.

Follow Libya

According to Feith, the US is now concentrating on "a process to try to get the existing international legal mechanisms -- the (Nuclear) Non-Proliferation Treaty (and) the International Atomic Energy Agency -- to work, to bring the kind of pressure to bear on Iran that would induce the Iranians to follow the path that Libya took in deciding that they were actually better off in abandoning their WMD (weapons of mass destruction) programmes."

However, he added, "I don't think that anybody should be ruling in or ruling out anything while we are conducting diplomacy."

Feith is one of the most controversial members of the Bush administration and is a staunch supporter of Israel. He was co-author of a strategy document drafted for the then Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, advising him to "eliminate" the Saddam Hussein regime first if Israel were to gain domination of the Middle East region against Arab resistance.

Israel is campaigning for military action against Iran's nuclear facilities. However, military strategists say, it would take attacks on at least 300 different sites in Iran to destroy what the US claims as that country's nuclear weapons programme. Tehran denies it is working on developing nuclear weapons, and this position is largely endorsed by the IAEA.

Among those anxious to see Baradei go is Under-Secretary of State for Arms Control John R. Bolton, whose declarations on Iran have been contradicted by the IAEA chief.

According to Robert Einhorn, a former assistant secretary of state for non-proliferation, "however this effort (to remove Baradei) is justified by the administration, the assumption internationally will be that the United States was blackballing Baradei because of Iraq and Iran."

The US State Department has already started tapping potential candidates to succeed Baradei and these include, according to the Washington Post, Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, two Japanese diplomats, two South Korean officials and a Brazilian disarmament expert.

However, Downer is in the shortlist of one, but he is reportedly unwilling to challenge Baradei. The deadline for submitting alternative candidates is Dec. 31.

It is clear that the neoconservatives have pulled out their knives now that Bush has been re-elected, and they are going after anyone and everyone of significance who stand in the way of their designs for American supremacy of the globe in a manner best suited to serve Israeli interests in the bargain.

Annan, Baradei targeted

by pv vivekanand

IT IS retribution time for the Bush administration against those who pulled the rug from under the feet of its justification for the unprovoked invasion and occupation of Iraq and its plans for action against Iran. That is why people like UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who stood firm against granting UN legitimacy for the war and called it illegal, and Mohammed Al Baradei, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), who certified Iraq did not have an ongoing programme of nuclear weapons, are finding themselves at the receiving end of allegations and targeted for efforts to remove them.
In Annan's case, the UN chief is facing allegations that his son, Kojo, received upto $150,000 from a Swiss company which had benefited Iraq's oil-for-food programme administered by the UN. Seen against the light of revelations that some senior UN officials had also gained from the same programme, which was allegedly misused by Saddam Hussein to divert funds to illegal beneficiaries, the pressure on Annan was immense. Add to that allegations over a sexual harassment case dismissed by Annan, and of exploitation by peacekeepers in the Congo.
For the moment, however, the Bush administration is holdings its horses against Annan after it found an overwhelming majority of world leaders, including American allies such as Tony Blair, rallying behind the UN chief and reaffirming confidence in him and his abilities to lead the world body.
It was a clear volte-face when US Ambassador to the UN John C Danforth said on Thursday that the Bush administration did not want Annan to leave the UN.
"Some have suggested to me that it appears what the US. wants to do is to force the resignation of the secretary general," Danforth said on Thursday. "It is important for us, the United States, to clarify our position. We are not suggesting or pushing for the resignation of the secretary general. We have worked well with him in the past. We anticipate working with him very well in the future for the time to come."
Danforth's comment had to been seen against President George Bush's reticence, only a week earlier, to support Annan. Bush had repeatedly declined to issue an unambiguous expression of support. Asked whether he believed Annan should resign, Bush said last week "there ought to be a full and fair and open accounting of the oil-for-food programme" so American taxpayers will "feel comfortable about supporting the United Nations."
Danforth had also defended Bush's stand by asserting that a public expression of confidence in Annan might prejudge investigations into alleged irregularities in Iraq's oil-for-food programme. However, he could not offer any explanation why only the US felt so while almost all other members of the UN expressed confidence in Annan. Those expressions came in the one week between Bush's public statement shying away from voicing confidence in Annan and Danforth's outright statement saying the US "anticipated working with him in the future for the time to come."
Obviously, the world majority's stand on Annan persuaded Washington to publicly freeze its drive to get rid of Annan.
Some suggest that the neocons are going after the UN through Annan, who has two more years of his second term to serve as UN chief.
Edward Luck, a Columbia University professor who specialises in the UN, said in recent comments carried by the Boston Globe:
"On a strategic level, much of the (Bush) administration rejects what the UN stands for. . . . The secretary general has been a Teflon secretary general and has had a relatively high and positive public profile as a vanguard of multilateralism, while looking for an alternative of American dominance. They haven't had a good way of going after him until now."
No doubt, the neoconservatives of Washington are behind the smear campaign against the UN chief for his firm stand against the war against Iraq. Indeed, Annan has given them additional reasons by calling the war illegal and then denouncing the recent American-led assault against Fallujah.
Annan's warning against the assault was strong. He said: "The threat or actual use of force not only risks deepening the sense of alienation of certain communities (in Iraq), but would also reinforce perceptions among the Iraqi population of a continued military occupation."
He also frustrated Washington by refusing to send more than two dozen electoral workers to help with elections in Iraq
The evidence of the neocon drive against Annan is there. The news that Anna's son received payments from the Swiss company that was a contractor in the oil-for-food programme first appeared in The New York Sun, which belongs to Canadian Conrad Black and which is seen to serve as a mouthpiece for the neocons (according to Jude Wanniski, a former associate editor of The Wall Street Journal).
Conrad is a long-time associate of Richard Perle, the most prominent neo-con in the Bush camp and a director of the Jerusalem Post, one of Black`s many media holdings, Wanniski points out.
Richard Holbrooke, the US ambassador to the United Nations under president Bill Clinton and an Annan backer, has said: "The danger now is that a group of people who want to destroy or paralyse the UN are beginning to pick up support from some of those whose goal is to reform it."
Annan, like his predecessors, is a bitter critic of Israel and that gives the neocons all the more reason to seek to get rid of him. He has repeatedly condemned Israel's brutal crackdown against the Palestinians and its blatant refusal to abide by UN resolutions and international laws.
In Baradei's case, the Egyptian who assumed the helm of the IAEA in 1997, is facing unofficial charges that he somehow helped Iran escape international punitive measures for developing a programme to make nuclear weapons. However, his real "crime" in the neocons' eyes is that he repeatedly reported the truth to the international community that IAEA inspections had failed to find any sign of Saddam developing nuclear weapons since the 1990s at a time when the Bush administration insisted that he had large stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction.
It was reported on Sunday that the administration had secretly recorded Baradei's phone calls with Iranian diplomats and is scrutinising them in search of ammunition to oust him as IAEA director.
According to the Washington Post, which broke the story, "the efforts against Baradei demonstrate the lengths some within the administration are willing to go to replace a top international diplomat who questioned US intelligence on Iraq and is now taking a cautious approach on Iran."
Obviously, the US sees Baradei as an obstacle in the way of diplomatic as well as military action for "regime change" in Iran — a priority for Bush in his second term.
While the taped conservations have not produced "any evidence of nefarious conduct" by Baradei, "some within the administration believe they show Baradei lacks impartiality because he tried to help Iran navigate a diplomatic crisis over its nuclear programmes."
Baradei, 62, who used to teach international law at New York University before becoming IAEA chief, is known to be well-respected inside the UN. A majority of the members of the IAEA board is said to favour a third term for him beginning next summer.
Many analysts believe that Washington found it difficult to convince the required number of IAEA board members to vote against a third term for Baradei and therefore is seeking material to strengthen its argument that Baradei should be retired so that he no longer poses a hurdle in the way of American action against Iran in the name of Tehran's nuclear programme.
That the US is planning military action against Iran was made clear by another prominent neoconservative in the Bush administration.
Under-Secretary of Defence for Policy Douglas J. Feith, one of the most hawkish neocons who orchestrated the invasion and occupation of Iraq citing Saddam Hussein's non-existent weapons of mass destruction, shrouded the warning against Iran in diplomatic jargon.
In an interview with Israel's Jerusalem Post, Feith, who will stay on with Bush in the president's second term at the White House, says Washington hopes that Iran will follow Libya's lead in abandoning its nuclear programme, but nobody should rule out the possibility of military action against Teheran's nuclear sites if it does not.
According to Feith, the US is now concentrating on "a process to try to get the existing international legal mechanisms – the (Nuclear) Non-Proliferation Treaty (and) the International Atomic Energy Agency —  to work, to bring the kind of pressure to bear on Iran that would induce the Iranians to follow the path that Libya took in deciding that they were actually better off in abandoning their WMD (weapons of mass destruction) programmes."
However, he added, "I don't think that anybody should be ruling in or ruling out anything while we are conducting diplomacy."
Feith is one of the most controversial members of the Bush administration and is a staunch supporter of Israel. He was co-author of a strategy document drafted for the then Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, advising him to "eliminate" the Saddam Hussein regime first if Israel were to gain domination of the Middle East region against Arab resistance.
Israel is campaigning for military action against Iran's nuclear facilities. However, military strategists say, it would take attacks on at least 300 different sites in Iran to destroy what the US claims as that country's nuclear weapons programme. Tehran denies it is working on developing nuclear weapons, and this position is largely endorsed by the IAEA.
Among those anxious to see Baradei go is Under-Secretary of State for Arms Control John R. Bolton, whose declarations on Iran have been contradicted by the IAEA chief.
According to Robert Einhorn, a former assistant secretary of state for non-proliferation, "however this effort (to remove Baradei) is justified by the administration, the assumption internationally will be that the United States was blackballing Baradei because of Iraq and Iran."
The US State Department has already started tapping potential candidates to succeed Baradei and these include, according to the Washington Post, Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, two Japanese diplomats, two South Korean officials and a Brazilian disarmament expert.
However, Downer is in the shortlist of one, but he is reportedly unwilling to challenge Baradei. The deadline for submitting alternative candidates is Dec. 31.
It is clear that the neoconservatives have pulled out their knives now that Bush has been re-elected, and they are going after anyone and everyone of significance who stand in the way of their designs for American supremacy of the globe in a manner best suited to serve Israeli interests in the bargain,

Iraq elections -- too many questions

December 11, 2004

Iraq elections: Too many questions, too few answers

pv vivekanand
There is an air of superficiality in the run-up to elections in Iraq which Washington and the interim government in Baghdad insist would be held as scheduled on Jan.30. Indeed, there is little doubt that the elections will be held, barring a sweeping last-minute surprise of whatever nature. That much is clear, since both the Bush administration and the interim government are in a bind. They could not delay the elections if only because that would alienate the country's Shiites who are expecting to gain power by virtue of their majority in the population and thus set right what they consider to be as injustice done to them throughout recent Iraq history. Furthermore, delaying elections beyond Jan.31 will be in violation of the UN Security Council resolution adopted early this year, paving the way for some form of recognition of the American role in Iraq.

Political groups representing the Sunnis, who constitute about 18 per cent of the country's population, had called for a deferment of the elections, but some of them have now announced they would take part in the polls. One thing is clear: The Sunnis do not stand any chance of returning to the privileged position they had enjoyed under the Saddam Hussein regime. They are desperately seeking some assurance that they would not be written off as a political force in post-Saddam Iraq. For some of them, disrupting the election is an option.

The northern Kurds were initially seen as enthusiastic about the polls before they would be electing representatives to their own autonomous government in the north where they eventually want to set up an independent Kurdistan. In loose terms, it would not be an exaggeration that the Kurds could not care less what is happening in the rest of the country as long as their interests are not challenged. That is what their bitter history of aspirations and broken promises has taught them.

However, the two major Kurdish parties, the Kurdish Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, joined Adnan Pachachi, a former Sunni minister, who led a group of 17 political parties asking that the vote be delayed by six months because of the violence. Obviously, they are apprehensive that a Shiite victory in the elections under present conditions might impose constraints on their options.

Countering the call for postponement, a group of 42 mainly Shiite and Turkmen parties issued a statement declaring moves to delay the elections were illegal.

Election uncertainties

There are many uncertainties about the election that would see an assembly of 275 members chosen to write a permanent constitution for the country and lead the Iraqis to another election by the end of 2005 if the constitution is approved in a popular referendum.

These uncertainties include questions over how many of the country's 18 provinces will actually vote or where election is possible at all in view of the deteriorating security situation. The absence of any province in the process will immediately raise questions about the credibility and legitimacy of the elected assembly.

One of such provinces is Anbar, which includes Fallujah and Ramadi. where it is illogical to expect people to turn up for voting, given the devastation that they suffered in the recent American military assault aimed at "pacifying" the towns by purging "foreign militants." Mosul and Babil are seen as other "troublesome" provinces.

Writing in The Washington Post, columnist Charles Krauthammer insisted that it would be the Sunnis' loss if they did not vote.

"There has been much talk that if the Iraqi election is held and some Sunni Arab provinces (perhaps three of the 18) do not participate, the election will be illegitimate," he wrote. "Nonsense. The election should be held. It should be open to everyone. If Iraq's Sunni Arabs -- barely 20 per cent of the population -- decide that they cannot abide giving up their 80 years of minority rule, which ended with 30 years of Saddam Hussein's atrocious tyranny, then tough luck. They forfeit their chance to shape and to participate in the new Iraq. "

Then there are questions over "foreign meddling" in Iraqi affairs that, to a large extent, could determine the shape of the region. Regional leaders and analysts are raising the spectre of an Iranian-influenced outcome of the elections that would create new realities in the region.

If indeed Iran is "meddling" in Iraqi politics with a view to having its allies gain power in the elections, then there is little sense or logic in the argument that the Iranians are also helping "foreign militants" undermine security and maintain the country unstable for polls. But that logic is missing from the arguments of many.

Voting process

Iyad Allawi, the interim prime minister, acknowledges that the situation in "three or four" of the country's provinces is problematic for elections and he also suggests that the voting process could be spread over 15 to 20 days to ensure maximum participation.

"I think one could envisage elections spread over 15 days, 20 days, with polling on different dates for different provinces. ... That would allow for adequate security arrangements to be put in place," he said.

However, phased elections might not be an option because the voting process could not go beyond Jan.31. If Allawi's proposal was to be entertained, then it would mean starting voting by mid-January.

Obviously, staggering the election would allow the interim government to move security forces from one place to another.

Initial response from Electoral Commission chief Adel Hussein Al Hinadwi was negative, but on Wednesday he kept silent after interior ministry spokesman Sabah Kazem described the Allawi proposal as "an excellent idea, which we support one hundred per cent."

"This would permit holding the elections on another date in those places where it is not possible to organise them for the planned date. It would also facilitate the work of international observers and guarantee the participation in the election of all regions of Iraq," said Kazem.

Canada is helping the interim government prepare for the elections. It will host a Dec.19-20 international forum in Ottawa on Iraqi election preparation and observation methods.

Among those questioning the viability of elections was UN election adviser Lakhdar Ibrahimi who said elections could not take place in the present circumstances.

"Elections are no magic potion, but part of a political process," he said late last month. "They must be prepared well and take place at the right time to produce the good effects that you expect from them.'

Asked if elections under present conditions were possible, Ibrahimi said: 'If the circumstances stay as they are, I personally don't think so. It is a mess in Iraq."

Russian President Vladimir Putin was asked how elections could be held in a country under foreign military occupation. "Honestly speaking, I cannot imagine how it is possible to organise elections under the conditions of occupation by foreign forces," Putin said during a Kremlin meeting with Allawi.

"At the same time, I don't understand how you alone can remedy the situation in the country and prevent its disintegration," Putin told Allawi, adding: "I hope we will succeed in examining all these complex and contradictory issues."

Security situation

The number of American soldiers in Iraq is expected to go up by 10,000 to 140,000 by mid-January. They are supported by some 20,000 allied soldiers.

In principle, the interim government has some 83,000 policemen and guardsmen, but only 47,000 of them are said to have undergone basic police training in security-linked tasks and crowd control.

Intelligence assessments have shaken Washington's declarations that the situation in Iraq would improve with the January elections.

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has warned that Iraq would descend even deeper into violent chaos unless the interim government asserts its authority and improve the economy. It is a tall order, given the spiralling violence and almost daily attacks on the country's oil lifeline.

Another intelligence estimate prepared for the White House four months ago predicted that Iraq's security situation could remain tenuous at best until the end of 2005. It also warned Iraq faced the risk of civil war.

President George W Bush has sought to portray the increasing violence ahead of the elections as an effort by militants to undermine the polls.

"As election day approaches, we can expect further violence from the terrorists," Bush said on Tuesday. "You see, the terrorists understand what is at stake. They know they have no future in a free Iraq, because free people will never choose their own enslavement. They know democracy will give Iraqis a stake in the future of their country."

However, that assertion was seen in the Middle East as skirting the real issue since the insurgency should be seen in the broader context of anti-American sentiments and not as strictly Iraq-specific since those mounting guerrilla attacks against the US-led coalition forces are not exclusively Iraqis either.

Commentators also say that many Iraqis want the elections postponed. Egypt's Al Akbar daily wrote: "While the military operations are escalating in Iraq, disputes over elections are mounting, too. Different sects of the Iraqi people want to postpone them because their results wouldn't express the true will of the Iraqis ... All Arab and Muslim peoples have got many concerns over Iraq's stability, which will never be resolved except through the US withdrawal from the war-torn country."

Raad Alkadiri wrote in Lebanon's Daily Star: "There is arguably a large plurality -- if not a majority -- of the Iraqi Arab electorate that remains secular and nationalist in political orientation and that opposes the sectarian and ethnic agendas of the large parties, but that has no effective public voice. Without political vehicles to represent the views of these Iraqis, there is a real danger that they will opt out of the election altogether ...

"This is a troubling scenario ... The greatest number of Iraqis need to be brought on board, even if this means delaying elections temporarily ... Otherwise, the elections will simply serve to heighten the sense of disenfranchisement that many Iraqis have felt since the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime, creating a dangerous thorn in the side of successive Iraqi administrations, whose legitimacy they will contest."

Neighbours' pressure

In the meantime, the US and the interim government in Iraq are stepping up pressure against Syria as well as Iran by accusing them of allowing the guerrilla war against the US-led coalition forces in Iraq to be directed from their territories.

The Washington Post reported on Wednesday that American military intelligence officials have concluded that the Iraqi insurgency is being directed to a greater degree than previously recognised from Syria.

The report does not say the Syrian government is directly involved in guiding the insurgency but Damascus is accused of hosting former Saddam Hussein loyalists who are channeling money and other support to those fighting the US-led coalition forces in Iraq.

"Based on information gathered during the recent fighting in Fallujah, Baghdad and elsewhere in the Sunni Triangle, the officials said that a handful of senior Iraqi Baathists operating in Syria are collecting money from private sources in Saudi Arabia and Europe and turning it over to the insurgency," said The Washington Post.

In Washington, Iraqi President Ghazi Al Yawar as well as King Abdullah of Jordan said after separate talks with Bush that external powers were meddling in Iraq.

Yawar said the guerrillas fighting in Iraq were getting help from Syria.

"There are people in Syria who are bad guys, who are fugitives of the law and who are Saddam remnants who are trying to bring the vicious dictatorship of Saddam back," Yawar said. "They are not minding their business or living a private life. They are . . . disturbing or undermining our political process."

King Abdullah said that the governments of both the United States and Iraq believe that "foreign fighters are coming across the Syrian border that have been trained in Syria."

A global positioning signal receiver was discovered in a bomb factory in the western part of Fallujah and this "contained waypoints originating in western Syria," said a US military statement last week.

In Baghdad, the interim deputy prime minister, Barham Saleh, said that he was losing patience with Iraq's neighbours. He did not name Syria, but noted that Iraqi police had arrested a Syrian driving a car bomb packed with artillery shells and other explosives. "There is evidence indicating that some groups in some neighbouring countries are playing a direct role in the killing of the Iraqi people and such a thing is not acceptable to us," Saleh said.

"We have reached a stage in which if we do not see a real response from those countries, then we are obliged to take a decisive stance."

American officials have repeatedly complained that Syria is not doing enough to check the cross-border flow of insurgents to Iraq. The US government has also demanded that Syria either hand over the Saddam loyalists responsible for the insurgency or expel them from Syrian territory.

"The Syrians appear to have done a little bit to stem extremist infiltration into Iraq at the border, but clearly have not helped with regards to Baathists infiltrating back and forth," said a senior US military officer in the region quoted by the Washington Post. "We still have serious challenges there, and Syria needs to be doing a lot more."

Charges denied

Syria has rejected the charges outright. . "There is a sinister campaign to create an atmosphere of hostility against Syria," said Syrian Ambassador to the US Imad Moustapha.

In separate interviews, both Yawar and King Abdullah also said Iran is trying to influence the Iraqi elections with a view to creating an Islamic government that would dramatically shift the geopolitical balance between Shiite and Sunni Muslims in the region.

Yawar charged that Iran is coaching candidates and political parties sympathetic to Tehran and pouring "huge amounts of money" into the campaign to produce a Shiite-dominated government in power in Baghdad.

According to King Abdullah, more than one million Iranians have crossed the border into Iraq since the Saddam regime was toppled and many of them would vote in the election -- with the encouragement of the Iranian government. "I'm sure there's a lot of people, a lot of Iranians in there that will be used as part of the polls to influence the outcome," he said.

He said Iranians are paying salaries and providing welfare to unemployed Iraqis to build pro-Iranian public sentiment

"It is in Iran's vested interest to have an Islamic republic of Iraq . . . and therefore the involvement you're getting by the Iranians is to achieve a government that is very pro-Iran," King Abdullah said.

He predicted that if an Iranian-influenced government assumes power in Baghdad, then a new "crescent" of dominant Shiite movements or governments will emerge, stretching from Iran into Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.

"If Iraq goes Islamic republic, then, yes, we've opened ourselves to a whole set of new problems that will not be limited to the borders of Iraq. I'm looking at the glass half-full, and let's hope that's not the case. But strategic planners around the world have got to be aware that is a possibility," said the King.

He said Washington had communicated its concern to Iran through third parties and "there's going to be some sort of clash at one point or another."

"We hope it's just a clash of words and politics and not a clash of civilisations or peoples on the ground. We will know a bit better how it will play out after the election" in Iraq, he said.

Given that "regime change" in Iran is one of Bush's priorities in his second term, the outcome of the elections in Iraq is all the more important for Washington. But, as King Abdullah warned, the Bush administration might end up with a new Shiite-led axis running from the Gulf to the Mediterranean if Iranian-backed parties were to gain power in Iraq. That axis might indeed prove too formidable for the US to handle.

Too few answers

December 11, 2004

Iraq elections: Too many questions, too few answers

pv vivekanand
There is an air of superficiality in the run-up to elections in Iraq which Washington and the interim government in Baghdad insist would be held as scheduled on Jan.30. Indeed, there is little doubt that the elections will be held, barring a sweeping last-minute surprise of whatever nature. That much is clear, since both the Bush administration and the interim government are in a bind. They could not delay the elections if only because that would alienate the country's Shiites who are expecting to gain power by virtue of their majority in the population and thus set right what they consider to be as injustice done to them throughout recent Iraq history. Furthermore, delaying elections beyond Jan.31 will be in violation of the UN Security Council resolution adopted early this year, paving the way for some form of recognition of the American role in Iraq.

Political groups representing the Sunnis, who constitute about 18 per cent of the country's population, had called for a deferment of the elections, but some of them have now announced they would take part in the polls. One thing is clear: The Sunnis do not stand any chance of returning to the privileged position they had enjoyed under the Saddam Hussein regime. They are desperately seeking some assurance that they would not be written off as a political force in post-Saddam Iraq. For some of them, disrupting the election is an option.

The northern Kurds were initially seen as enthusiastic about the polls before they would be electing representatives to their own autonomous government in the north where they eventually want to set up an independent Kurdistan. In loose terms, it would not be an exaggeration that the Kurds could not care less what is happening in the rest of the country as long as their interests are not challenged. That is what their bitter history of aspirations and broken promises has taught them.

However, the two major Kurdish parties, the Kurdish Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, joined Adnan Pachachi, a former Sunni minister, who led a group of 17 political parties asking that the vote be delayed by six months because of the violence. Obviously, they are apprehensive that a Shiite victory in the elections under present conditions might impose constraints on their options.

Countering the call for postponement, a group of 42 mainly Shiite and Turkmen parties issued a statement declaring moves to delay the elections were illegal.

Election uncertainties

There are many uncertainties about the election that would see an assembly of 275 members chosen to write a permanent constitution for the country and lead the Iraqis to another election by the end of 2005 if the constitution is approved in a popular referendum.

These uncertainties include questions over how many of the country's 18 provinces will actually vote or where election is possible at all in view of the deteriorating security situation. The absence of any province in the process will immediately raise questions about the credibility and legitimacy of the elected assembly.

One of such provinces is Anbar, which includes Fallujah and Ramadi. where it is illogical to expect people to turn up for voting, given the devastation that they suffered in the recent American military assault aimed at "pacifying" the towns by purging "foreign militants." Mosul and Babil are seen as other "troublesome" provinces.

Writing in The Washington Post, columnist Charles Krauthammer insisted that it would be the Sunnis' loss if they did not vote.

"There has been much talk that if the Iraqi election is held and some Sunni Arab provinces (perhaps three of the 18) do not participate, the election will be illegitimate," he wrote. "Nonsense. The election should be held. It should be open to everyone. If Iraq's Sunni Arabs -- barely 20 per cent of the population -- decide that they cannot abide giving up their 80 years of minority rule, which ended with 30 years of Saddam Hussein's atrocious tyranny, then tough luck. They forfeit their chance to shape and to participate in the new Iraq. "

Then there are questions over "foreign meddling" in Iraqi affairs that, to a large extent, could determine the shape of the region. Regional leaders and analysts are raising the spectre of an Iranian-influenced outcome of the elections that would create new realities in the region.

If indeed Iran is "meddling" in Iraqi politics with a view to having its allies gain power in the elections, then there is little sense or logic in the argument that the Iranians are also helping "foreign militants" undermine security and maintain the country unstable for polls. But that logic is missing from the arguments of many.

Voting process

Iyad Allawi, the interim prime minister, acknowledges that the situation in "three or four" of the country's provinces is problematic for elections and he also suggests that the voting process could be spread over 15 to 20 days to ensure maximum participation.

"I think one could envisage elections spread over 15 days, 20 days, with polling on different dates for different provinces. ... That would allow for adequate security arrangements to be put in place," he said.

However, phased elections might not be an option because the voting process could not go beyond Jan.31. If Allawi's proposal was to be entertained, then it would mean starting voting by mid-January.

Obviously, staggering the election would allow the interim government to move security forces from one place to another.

Initial response from Electoral Commission chief Adel Hussein Al Hinadwi was negative, but on Wednesday he kept silent after interior ministry spokesman Sabah Kazem described the Allawi proposal as "an excellent idea, which we support one hundred per cent."

"This would permit holding the elections on another date in those places where it is not possible to organise them for the planned date. It would also facilitate the work of international observers and guarantee the participation in the election of all regions of Iraq," said Kazem.

Canada is helping the interim government prepare for the elections. It will host a Dec.19-20 international forum in Ottawa on Iraqi election preparation and observation methods.

Among those questioning the viability of elections was UN election adviser Lakhdar Ibrahimi who said elections could not take place in the present circumstances.

"Elections are no magic potion, but part of a political process," he said late last month. "They must be prepared well and take place at the right time to produce the good effects that you expect from them.'

Asked if elections under present conditions were possible, Ibrahimi said: 'If the circumstances stay as they are, I personally don't think so. It is a mess in Iraq."

Russian President Vladimir Putin was asked how elections could be held in a country under foreign military occupation. "Honestly speaking, I cannot imagine how it is possible to organise elections under the conditions of occupation by foreign forces," Putin said during a Kremlin meeting with Allawi.

"At the same time, I don't understand how you alone can remedy the situation in the country and prevent its disintegration," Putin told Allawi, adding: "I hope we will succeed in examining all these complex and contradictory issues."

Security situation

The number of American soldiers in Iraq is expected to go up by 10,000 to 140,000 by mid-January. They are supported by some 20,000 allied soldiers.

In principle, the interim government has some 83,000 policemen and guardsmen, but only 47,000 of them are said to have undergone basic police training in security-linked tasks and crowd control.

Intelligence assessments have shaken Washington's declarations that the situation in Iraq would improve with the January elections.

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has warned that Iraq would descend even deeper into violent chaos unless the interim government asserts its authority and improve the economy. It is a tall order, given the spiralling violence and almost daily attacks on the country's oil lifeline.

Another intelligence estimate prepared for the White House four months ago predicted that Iraq's security situation could remain tenuous at best until the end of 2005. It also warned Iraq faced the risk of civil war.

President George W Bush has sought to portray the increasing violence ahead of the elections as an effort by militants to undermine the polls.

"As election day approaches, we can expect further violence from the terrorists," Bush said on Tuesday. "You see, the terrorists understand what is at stake. They know they have no future in a free Iraq, because free people will never choose their own enslavement. They know democracy will give Iraqis a stake in the future of their country."

However, that assertion was seen in the Middle East as skirting the real issue since the insurgency should be seen in the broader context of anti-American sentiments and not as strictly Iraq-specific since those mounting guerrilla attacks against the US-led coalition forces are not exclusively Iraqis either.

Commentators also say that many Iraqis want the elections postponed. Egypt's Al Akbar daily wrote: "While the military operations are escalating in Iraq, disputes over elections are mounting, too. Different sects of the Iraqi people want to postpone them because their results wouldn't express the true will of the Iraqis ... All Arab and Muslim peoples have got many concerns over Iraq's stability, which will never be resolved except through the US withdrawal from the war-torn country."

Raad Alkadiri wrote in Lebanon's Daily Star: "There is arguably a large plurality -- if not a majority -- of the Iraqi Arab electorate that remains secular and nationalist in political orientation and that opposes the sectarian and ethnic agendas of the large parties, but that has no effective public voice. Without political vehicles to represent the views of these Iraqis, there is a real danger that they will opt out of the election altogether ...

"This is a troubling scenario ... The greatest number of Iraqis need to be brought on board, even if this means delaying elections temporarily ... Otherwise, the elections will simply serve to heighten the sense of disenfranchisement that many Iraqis have felt since the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime, creating a dangerous thorn in the side of successive Iraqi administrations, whose legitimacy they will contest."

Neighbours' pressure

In the meantime, the US and the interim government in Iraq are stepping up pressure against Syria as well as Iran by accusing them of allowing the guerrilla war against the US-led coalition forces in Iraq to be directed from their territories.

The Washington Post reported on Wednesday that American military intelligence officials have concluded that the Iraqi insurgency is being directed to a greater degree than previously recognised from Syria.

The report does not say the Syrian government is directly involved in guiding the insurgency but Damascus is accused of hosting former Saddam Hussein loyalists who are channeling money and other support to those fighting the US-led coalition forces in Iraq.

"Based on information gathered during the recent fighting in Fallujah, Baghdad and elsewhere in the Sunni Triangle, the officials said that a handful of senior Iraqi Baathists operating in Syria are collecting money from private sources in Saudi Arabia and Europe and turning it over to the insurgency," said The Washington Post.

In Washington, Iraqi President Ghazi Al Yawar as well as King Abdullah of Jordan said after separate talks with Bush that external powers were meddling in Iraq.

Yawar said the guerrillas fighting in Iraq were getting help from Syria.

"There are people in Syria who are bad guys, who are fugitives of the law and who are Saddam remnants who are trying to bring the vicious dictatorship of Saddam back," Yawar said. "They are not minding their business or living a private life. They are . . . disturbing or undermining our political process."

King Abdullah said that the governments of both the United States and Iraq believe that "foreign fighters are coming across the Syrian border that have been trained in Syria."

A global positioning signal receiver was discovered in a bomb factory in the western part of Fallujah and this "contained waypoints originating in western Syria," said a US military statement last week.

In Baghdad, the interim deputy prime minister, Barham Saleh, said that he was losing patience with Iraq's neighbours. He did not name Syria, but noted that Iraqi police had arrested a Syrian driving a car bomb packed with artillery shells and other explosives. "There is evidence indicating that some groups in some neighbouring countries are playing a direct role in the killing of the Iraqi people and such a thing is not acceptable to us," Saleh said.

"We have reached a stage in which if we do not see a real response from those countries, then we are obliged to take a decisive stance."

American officials have repeatedly complained that Syria is not doing enough to check the cross-border flow of insurgents to Iraq. The US government has also demanded that Syria either hand over the Saddam loyalists responsible for the insurgency or expel them from Syrian territory.

"The Syrians appear to have done a little bit to stem extremist infiltration into Iraq at the border, but clearly have not helped with regards to Baathists infiltrating back and forth," said a senior US military officer in the region quoted by the Washington Post. "We still have serious challenges there, and Syria needs to be doing a lot more."

Charges denied

Syria has rejected the charges outright. . "There is a sinister campaign to create an atmosphere of hostility against Syria," said Syrian Ambassador to the US Imad Moustapha.

In separate interviews, both Yawar and King Abdullah also said Iran is trying to influence the Iraqi elections with a view to creating an Islamic government that would dramatically shift the geopolitical balance between Shiite and Sunni Muslims in the region.

Yawar charged that Iran is coaching candidates and political parties sympathetic to Tehran and pouring "huge amounts of money" into the campaign to produce a Shiite-dominated government in power in Baghdad.

According to King Abdullah, more than one million Iranians have crossed the border into Iraq since the Saddam regime was toppled and many of them would vote in the election -- with the encouragement of the Iranian government. "I'm sure there's a lot of people, a lot of Iranians in there that will be used as part of the polls to influence the outcome," he said.

He said Iranians are paying salaries and providing welfare to unemployed Iraqis to build pro-Iranian public sentiment

"It is in Iran's vested interest to have an Islamic republic of Iraq . . . and therefore the involvement you're getting by the Iranians is to achieve a government that is very pro-Iran," King Abdullah said.

He predicted that if an Iranian-influenced government assumes power in Baghdad, then a new "crescent" of dominant Shiite movements or governments will emerge, stretching from Iran into Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.

"If Iraq goes Islamic republic, then, yes, we've opened ourselves to a whole set of new problems that will not be limited to the borders of Iraq. I'm looking at the glass half-full, and let's hope that's not the case. But strategic planners around the world have got to be aware that is a possibility," said the King.

He said Washington had communicated its concern to Iran through third parties and "there's going to be some sort of clash at one point or another."

"We hope it's just a clash of words and politics and not a clash of civilisations or peoples on the ground. We will know a bit better how it will play out after the election" in Iraq, he said.

Given that "regime change" in Iran is one of Bush's priorities in his second term, the outcome of the elections in Iraq is all the more important for Washington. But, as King Abdullah warned, the Bush administration might end up with a new Shiite-led axis running from the Gulf to the Mediterranean if Iranian-backed parties were to gain power in Iraq. That axis might indeed prove too formidable for the US to handle.

Syria, Iran on spotlight

December 8 2004
PV Vivekanand



THE US and the US-backed interim government in Iraq are stepping up pressure against Syria as well as Iran by accusing them of allowing the guerrilla war against the US-led coalition forces in Iraq to be directed from their territories.
The Washington Post reported on Wednesday that American military intelligence officials have concluded that the Iraqi insurgency is being directed to a greater degree than previously recognised from Syria.
The report does not say the Syrian government is directly involved in guiding the insurgency but Damascus is accused of hosting former Saddam Hussein loyalists who are channeling money and other support to those fighting the US-led coalition forces in Iraq.
"Based on information gathered during the recent fighting in Fallujah, Baghdad and elsewhere in the Sunni Triangle, the officials said that a handful of senior Iraqi Baathists operating in Syria are collecting money from private sources in Saudi Arabia and Europe and turning it over to the insurgency," said the Washington Post.
In Washington, Iraqi President Ghazi Al Yawar as well as King Abdullah of Jordan said after separate talks with President George W Bush that external powers were meddling in Iraq.
Yawar said the guerrillas fighting in Iraq were getting help from Syria.
"There are people in Syria who are bad guys, who are fugitives of the law and who are Saddam remnants who are trying to bring the vicious dictatorship of Saddam back," Yawar said. "They are not minding their business or living a private life. They are . . . disturbing or undermining our political process."
King Abdullah said that the governments of both the United States and Iraq believe that "foreign fighters are coming across the Syrian border that have been trained in Syria."
A a global positioning signal receiver was discovered in a bomb factory in the western part of Falluja and this "contained waypoints originating in western Syria," said a US military statement last week.
In Baghdad, the interim deputy prime minister, Barham Saleh said on Tuesday that he was losing patience with Iraq’s neighbours. He did not name Syria, but noted that Iraqi police had arrested a Syrian driving a car bomb packed with artillery shells and other explosives. “There is evidence indicating that some groups in some neighbouring countries are playing a direct role in the killing of the Iraqi people and such a thing is not acceptable to us,” Saleh said.
“We have reached a stage in which if we do not see a real response from those countries, then we are obliged to take a decisive stance.”
American officials have repeatedly complained that Syria is not doing enough to check the cross-border flow of insurgents to Iraq. The US government has also demanded that Syria either hand over the Saddam loyalists responsible for the insurgency or expel them from Syrian territory.
"The Syrians appear to have done a little bit to stem extremist infiltration into Iraq at the border, but clearly have not helped with regards to Baathists infiltrating back and forth," said a senior US military officer in the region quoted by the Washington Post. "We still have serious challenges there, and Syria needs to be doing a lot more."
Syria has rejected the charges outright. . "There is a sinister campaign to create an atmosphere of hostility against Syria," said Syrian Ambasador to the US Imad Moustapha.
In separate interviews, both Yawar and King Abdullah also said Iran is trying to influence the Iraqi elections with a view to creating an Islamic government that would dramatically shift the geopolitical balance between Shiite and Sunni Muslims in the region.
Yawar charged that Iran is coaching candidates and political parties sympathetic to Tehran and pouring "huge amounts of money" into the campaign to produce a Shiite-dominated government in power in Baghdad.
According to King Abdullah, more than one million Iranians have crossed the border into Iraq since the Saddam regime was toppled and many of them would to vote in the election -- with the encouragement of the Iranian government. "I'm sure there's a lot of people, a lot of Iranians in there that will be used as part of the polls to influence the outcome," he said.
He said Iranians are paying salaries and providing welfare to unemployed Iraqis to build pro-Iranian public sentiment
"It is in Iran's vested interest to have an Islamic republic of Iraq . . . and therefore the involvement you're getting by the Iranians is to achieve a government that is very pro-Iran," King Abdullah said.
He predicted that if an an Iranian-influenced government assumes power in Baghad, then a
new "crescent" of dominant Shiite movements or governments will emerge, stretching from Iran into Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.
"If Iraq goes Islamic republic, then, yes, we've opened ourselves to a whole set of new problems that will not be limited to the borders of Iraq. I'm looking at the glass half-full, and let's hope that's not the case. But strategic planners around the world have got to be aware that is a possibility," said the King.
He said Washington had communicated its concern to Iran through third parties and "there's going to be some sort of clash at one point or another."
"We hope it's just a clash of words and politics and not a clash of civilisations or peoples on the ground. We will know a bit better how it will play out after the election" in Iraq, he said.

Right diagnonis, wrong medicine

December 7 2004

Right diagnosis, wrong medicine


TWO reports published this week underlined the reality that the US is losing its self-proclaimed war against terror as a result of misguided policies and deep flaws in its approach to the Middle East and in the handling of the situation in Iraq.

The first was comments by Michael Scheuer, a former American intelligence agent who used to chase Osama Bin Laden and author of the book Imperial Hubris: Why the West Is Losing the War on Terror. He argued that the US-led war against terrorism is failing because of Washington's policies in the Middle East and the American claims that more than two thirds of Al Qaeda's leadership are destroyed are hollow. If anything, he says, Al Qaeda has grown in concept to a global movement with far-reaching influence through the Internet.

The other was a "strategic communications" report, written by the Defence Science Board for US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. The report says the war on terror and the invasion and occupation of Iraq have increased support for Al Qaeda, made ordinary Muslims hate the US and caused a global backlash against America because of the "self-serving hypocrisy" of the Bush administration over the Middle East.

We don't know whether Scheuer and the authors of the Defence Science Board collaborated with each other. Both have almost identical views and conclusions. But then, there need not be any collaboration to come up with the reality -- two and two always make four no matter who does the calculation.

Scheuer, a former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officer who once led the hunt for Bin Laden, observes that Al Qaeda's domination of the Internet in the Muslim world was leading to the US losing its battle for the hearts and minds of Muslims worldwide.

Scheuer, who wrote the book under the name "Anonymous" with CIA permission and quit the CIA because the agency would not allow him to give media interviews, was speaking to a group of journalists in Washington.

Lost chances

According to Scheuer, the US had at least eight chances to kill Bin Laden before Sept.11, 2001, but did not use the opportunity because of apathy or inaction by American decision-makers.

Today, Bin Laden's Al Qaeda enjoys wide support around the world, he says.

Asked whether the US-led war on terror could be won, he replied. "No. It can't be won. We're going to eventually lose it. And the problem for us is that we're going to lose it much more quickly if we don't start killing more of the enemy."

Among the points raised by Scheuer, Al Qaeda is winning the propaganda war, especially the Internet, with regular political, military and religious discourses and justification for many of its actions. The core of the movement was made up of true believers and it was controlling the debate in the Islamic world. It also had suspected success in infiltrating US military and security services, he said.

Another problem the US faces is the wide support that Bin Laden enjoys among the Muslims and Arabs that make it difficult for governments to take effective action against Bin Laden, he said.

The US-led war against and occupation of Iraq is unpopular in the Muslim world and is blocking American efforts to mobilise world opinion against Bin Laden without seeming to support US policies in the Middle East -- especially backing Israel -- the West's need for low oil prices, he said.

"Unless we change or at least consider changing our policies in the Middle East, the room for Bin Laden or Bin Ladenism to grow is virtually unlimited," Scheuer said.

Not against culture

He rejected Western claims that Bin Laden targeted the United States and Europe because he hated Western culture.

"They're attacking us because of our unqualified support for Israel. They're attacking us because we've helped cement on their heads tyrannies in the Arab world ... for the last 40 years," he said. "They're attacking us because we're in the Arabian Peninsula and it happens to be a holy place for them."

According to Scheuer, Al Qaeda served both as an organisation and as an umbrella for groups with similar ideals worldwide, adding Bin Laden's command and control goes very little beyond Al Qaeda itself.

"His goal is to more or less get everybody moving in the same direction -- moving them away from, kind of a away from, a more nationalist orientation ... and get the focused on the United States," he said. "And frankly he's been only 60 or 65 per cent successful in that."

Compare Scheuer's assertions with the findings of the Defence Science Report.

On "the war of ideas or the struggle for hearts and minds," the report says, "American efforts have not only failed, they may also have achieved the opposite of what they intended."

"American direct intervention in the Muslim world has paradoxically elevated the stature of, and support for, radical Islamists, while diminishing support for the United States to single digits in some Arab societies," it says.

Rejected repeated assertions by American administration officials that those hostile to the US hate "American freedoms" the report affirms: "Muslims do not 'hate our freedoms', but rather, they hate our policies. The overwhelming majority voice their objections to what they see as one-sided support in favour of Israel and against Palestinian rights...."

Muslims also resent the American alliances with unpopular regimes, says the report.

"Thus when American public diplomacy talks about bringing democracy to Islamic societies, this is seen as no more than self-serving hypocrisy. Moreover, saying that 'freedom is the future of the Middle East' is seen as patronising ... in the eyes of Muslims, the American occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq has not led to democracy there, but only more chaos and suffering. US actions appear in contrast to be motivated by ulterior motives, and deliberately controlled in order to best serve American national interests at the expense of truly Muslim self-determination."

The most vital flaw of the American approach to Iraq was underlined by Patrick Cockburn, who, a correspondent for Britain's Independent newspaper, he has written regular reports from Iraq throughout the occupation.

In an interview carried on the website counterpunch.com, Cockburn puts his finger on the pulse when he states that the US has already lost the war to win the hearts and minds of the people of Iraq.

Rejecting the American theory that the US military needed to pacify the town of Fallujah in order to set the ground for elections in January, Cockburn says:

"This connection between the attack on Fallujah and the elections is one of the weirdest things I've heard. You go and smash up a city, you turn all of its population into refugees, you kill quite a number of them -- and somehow they're going to come out and vote? I think that was always kind of an absurdity."

"There should be no mystery about the nature of the resistance in Iraq. The situation is very simple, as it would be in most countries of the world -- when you have an occupation by a foreign power, you have resistance. And that's exactly what's happened in Iraq."

Widening support base

The Defence Science Board implicitly agrees with Scheuer that the way the Bush administration conducted foreign policy after the Sept.11 attacks benefited Bin Laden and Al Qaeda.

"American actions have elevated the authority of the jihadi insurgents and tended to ratify their legitimacy among Muslims." The result is that Al Qaeda has gone from being a marginal movement to having support across the entire Muslim world, says the report, again an affirmation of Scheur's finding.

"Muslims see Americans as strangely narcissistic," the report goes on, adding that to the Arab world the war is "no more than an extension of American domestic politics". The US has zero credibility among Muslims which means that "whatever Americans do and say only serves ... the enemy."

Another fundamental flaw in the American approach is that it has divided the Muslim world in perception to "bad Muslims" and "good Muslims."

"Americans are convinced that the US is a benevolent 'superpower' that elevates values emphasising freedom ... deep down we assume that everyone should naturally support our policies. Yet the world of Islam by overwhelming majorities at this time -- sees things differently. Muslims see American policies as inimical to their values, American rhetoric about freedom and democracy as hypocritical and American actions as deeply threatening."

However, the report also implicitly points out the infamous "neoconservatives" in the Bush administration do not realise that their direction is misguided.

It cites a report made in May by Paul Wolfowitz, the deputy defence secretary and one of the most known neocons, in which he observes: "Our military expeditions to Afghanistan and Iraq are unlikely to be the last such excursion in the global war on terrorism."

Biased policy

Ironically, no where in the report is any suggestion that the administration should address the core problem -- its biased approach to the Middle East conflict and open-ended support for Israel.

Instead, it suggests that in order to correct the situation, the US must make "strategic communication." This should include the dissemination of propaganda and the running of military psychological operations. More importantly, it says, "presidential leadership" is needed in this "ideas war" and warns against "arrogance, opportunism and double standards."

"We face a war on terrorism," the report says, "intensified conflict with Islam, and insurgency in Iraq. Worldwide anger and discontent are directed at America's tarnished credibility and ways the US pursues its goals. There is a consensus that America's power to persuade is in a state of crisis."

The US administration is ignoring the fact that the "image problem" that the US is suffering is linked "to perceptions of the US as arrogant, hypocritical and self-indulgent" and calls for a huge boost in spending on propaganda efforts as war policies "will not succeed unless they are communicated to global domestic audiences in ways that are credible."

As "Al Qaeda constantly outflanks the US in the war of information," the US should adopt more sophisticated propaganda techniques, such as targeting secularists in the Muslim World -- including writers, artists and singers -- and getting US private sector media and marketing professionals involved in disseminating messages to Muslims with a pro-US "brand."

Well, both Scheuer and the Defence Science Board are accurate in their assessment of the situation, but wrong in their suggestions as to how to address it. As noted, Scheuer suggests "killing more of the enemy" while the Defence Science Board recommends a propaganda campaign.

Well, Scheuer as well as the Washington strategists who drew up the Defence Science Board report with fair accuracy have opted to turn away from the minefield of tackling the American bias in favour of Israel as the root of all problems that the administration faces. No killing of militants and/or "propaganda" will work to convince the world Muslims today that Washington has any good in mind for them unless it deals with a firm hand to put an end to Israel's intransigence and arrogance and its refusal to accept international legitimacy as the basis for a solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict, be it on the Palestinian, Syrian or Lebanese fronts. And that would only be a beginning of the treatment to address the American ailment.

Alarm bells ringing for US

By PV Vivekanand

WHY doesn't the CIA's assessment and warning to the Bush administration that the situation in Iraq is deteriorating and is not likely to rebound any time soon surprise us in this region? It is very simple: Commentators and analysts in the Middle East have known this for long and have been saying it at every given opportunity, but few in Washington seemed to care. Obviously, to admit that the US designs in Iraq have gone wrong wholesale and that Washington has a tiger by the tail in post-Saddam Hussein Iraq would not fit in with the schemes of the neoconservatives who orchestrated the invasion and occupation of that country in the first place.
As reported by the New York Times, the CIA warning is "unusually candid" and presented a bleak assessment on "matters of politics, economic and security." It did admit "important progress" in the political process and "credited Iraqis with being resilient."
Again, the reference to political process is indeed linked to the strides made by the US-backed interim government in the broader Arab context rather than within Iraq. And it is no revelation that Iraqis are resilient. After all, the people of Iraq have lived through the suffering of three wars since 1980 and their plight is all the more tough and difficult today than anytime in recent history. They endured the eight difficult years of war with Iran, followed by the Kuwait crisis and the consequent United Nations sanctions that had their economy in a stranglehold since 1990 until last year's US-led invasion that toppled the Saddam regime and installed the US military presence in the country.
Everyone — except those in Washington who do not want to accept it — know that the term "security" has become alien to the people of Iraq.
Reports from Iraq clearly indicate that no one is feeling safe anymore. Let us put together a summary of the reports in our own way:
Even if you have nothing to do with the either side, the US-led coalition force or the insurgents, you are exposed and vulnerable to threats that are very much real and could end up in you being dead.
In every neighbourhood, someone is watching you for signs where you belong, whether you are dealing with the coalition forces and the Iraqi National Guard or the insurgents. If you are siding with the coalition forces, then insurgents put a bomb in your car or your house. If you are seen having any links with the insurgents, then the US forces and the Iraqi national guards would come and pick you up, and lock you up to be subjected to torture to reveal what you might know about the guerrillas waging the war of resistance against the US forces and their allies.
People disappear overnight, and the families do not know who are responsible.
It is as if Saddam Hussein's regime is back where a midnight knock at your door means you are wanted. Your family would have no recourse to know what happened to you once Saddam's forces had taken you away.
It is the same that is happening these days in a much worse manner.
Threats and warnings are written on your house walls asking you to stay away from co-operating with the US forces. You better take the threat seriously or pay the price with your life. If you are a member of the Iraqi National Guards, you could be killed any time, even as you step out of your house to buy grocery. No wonder Iraqi guards mask their faces whenever they are on duty. They don't want to be identified and marked for death. Dozens of Iraqi policemen who had the misfortune of having being filmed at the scene of bombings and seen on television news were killed in less than 48 hours because they were identified by the insurgents.
Such is the level of intimidation and terror that prevails in Baghdad and other Iraqi towns and cities.
No one can protect you, least of all the US forces.
The innocent looking car parked on the kerb as you walk to buy bread could explode as you pass by; or a rocket could fall next to you and kill you instantly. Or your neighbour is an Iraqi guard whose house is attacked and you become part of the victims caught in the crossfire.
No one trusts anyone. All are suspects. Insurgents as well as informers for the US forces are among you and they could determine whether you live or not.
The threats are increasing now, with the January elections approaching. Graffiti is everywhere asking people to boycott the elections of face the wrath of "sons of Iraq" as insurgents call themselves.
Add to that the difficulties of daily life: Water and power supplies are erratic. Jobs are scarce, and those who are indeed employed have to be on constant alert against dangers lurking round the corner. Women are not safe beyond their walls.
We don't know whether CIA warning was explicit on these realities on the ground. According to the New York Times, it does warn that
security in the country is likely to deteriorate unless the Iraqi government makes significant progress in asserting its authority and building up the economy.
We wonder how the interim government would go about consolidating its authority when its security forces are deliberately targeted in the guerrilla war. As to building the economy, one needs to look closer at the systematic attacks that are carried out against the country's lifeline — the pipelines that pump oil to export terminals. Those behind the attacks mark time until each bombing before damages are repaired before striking again. Obviously, they are aware of the importance of the pipelines to any effort to rebuild the country's economy.
The CIA warning becomes all the more significant, given that it was issued after the US military claimed "victory" in overpowering the restive town of Fallujah and touted it as a landmark in efforts to pacify the country.
Obviously, that should also explain why American Ambassador to Iraq John D. Negroponte was said to have objected to the CIA's findings as too harsh. At the same time, the top American military commander in Iraq, General. George W. Casey, is said to have initially offered no objections.
The CIA warning is also said to fit in with a National Intelligence Estimate drawn up by in July and sent to the White House in August by American intelligence agencies which presented a "dark forecast for Iraq's future through the end of 2005."
That assessment outlined three possible developments, with "the best case" being "tenuous stability and the worst case included a chain of events leading to civil war," according to the New York Times.
President George W Bush, who had dismissed that assessment as nothing more than guesswork, should be taking the CIA warning more seriously — that is, indeed, if he has been given an accurate summary of what the intelligence agency had to say. Again, it is a point to be remembered here that those who control the flow of intelligence information to the president are not exactly known to convey bad news; they opt instead to doctor intelligence reports in a way that suits the neocon objective of pressing ahead with the belligerent policies of the administration regardless of American interests based on realities on the ground.
We don't know how detailed the CIA warning to the White House is. However, here are a few pointers — unsolicited, unwanted and undesirable as they might be to the US administration — to the realities in Iraq.
1. To a majority of the Iraqis, the American military presence is not welcome. They might have seen the Americans and allied forces as their liberators when the Saddam regime was toppled, but that euphoria did not last more than a few days.
2. Under the American-backed governance of their country today, Iraqis find themselves in worse shape than they were under the Saddam regime; they have erratic/expensive supplies of basic needs of life such as food, water and power; more than 40 per cent of the work force do not have jobs or the jobs they have are nowhere near their basic expectations; they have no security and live in perpetual fear for their life; many resent that American-backed Iraqis who lived in exile during the Saddam regime are now controlling them while those who suffered the atrocities of the toppled regime because of their political opposition have been shoved aside.
3. Many Iraqis believe that the invasion and occupation of their country was and is aimed at exploiting their country's natural resources, particularly that they know how the US administration of Iraq led by overseer Paul Bremer is said to have misused/diverted proceeds from the country's oil exports while funds allocated by the US Congress for reconstruction of Iraq were left unused because spending that money needed accurate accounting. The Iraqis have also seen how American giants like Halliburton and others are making billions in the name of rebuilding their country while they benefit little from the process.
4. The insurgency against the US-led coalition forces is as much as Iraq-specific it is retaliation for the injustices that American allies — most prominently Israel — have inflicted upon Muslims and Arabs. The brutality with which the US-led forces are handling the insurgency and the US military's shoot-first-ask-questions-later policy has made it impossible for the people of Iraq to accept that Washington means them any good. Tens of thousands of Iraqi families have been turned destitute as a result of American actions, and they would never be able to come to terms with the US role in their country. A classic example is the town of Fallujah, which was shattered beyond recognition in the recent American assault, with the bulk of the killed and wounded being civilians — mostly women and children — while the US military claims it as a victory against insurgents.
5. There might indeed be truth in the American assertion that the stepped-up violence and guerrilla attacks against the coalition forces and their allies aim at aborting elections scheduled for January. But the situation has to be seen in the broader context of the militants' quest to fight Americans anywhere and anytime.
6. The Sunnis of Iraq fear that the political changes in their country would be at their expense and they are determined to put up a stiff fight to make their point, with hopes that something might happen at some point sooner or later that would serve their interests. Surely, they have no idea what that "something" would be, and this makes it all the more dangerous for the US.
7. There are regional players who fear that it would be their turn for "regime change" after the US "pacifies" Iraq. As such, their vested interest is to ensure that the US is not given an opportunity to "contain" Iraq and turn its guns on others; and hence the cross-border flow of militants volunteering to fight the Americans.
No doubt, the American intelligence agencies are aware of the formidable challenge the Bush administration is facing in Iraq. Perhaps the "unusually candid" CIA warning is their way of telling the emperor he is indeed naked.