CNN.com: U.S. officials
rethink hopes for Iraq democracy
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
U.S. officials rethink hopes for Iraq democracy
From
Michael Ware and Thomas Evans
CNN
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Nightmarish political
realities in Baghdad are prompting American officials
to curb their vision for democracy in Iraq. Instead,
the officials now say they are willing to settle for
a government that functions and can bring security.
A workable democratic and sovereign government in
Iraq was one of the Bush administration's stated
goals of the war.
But for the first time, exasperated front-line U.S.
generals talk openly of non-democratic governmental
alternatives, and while the two top U.S. officials in
Iraq still talk about preserving the country's
nascent democratic institutions, they say their
ambitions aren't as "lofty" as they once had been.
"Democratic institutions are not necessarily the way
ahead in the long-term future," said Brig. Gen. John
"Mick" Bednarek, part of Task Force Lightning in
Diyala province, one of the war's major
battlegrounds.
The comments reflect a practicality common among
Western diplomats and officials trying to win hearts
and minds in the Middle East and other non-Western
countries where democracy isn't a tradition.
The failure of Iraq to emerge from widespread
instability is a bitter pill for the United States,
which optimistically toppled the Saddam Hussein
regime more than four years ago. Millions of Iraqis
went to the polls to cast ballots, something that
generated great promise for the establishment of a
democratic system.
But Iraqi institutions, from the infrastructure to
the national government, are widely regarded as
ineffective in the fifth year of the war.
U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker and Gen. David
Petraeus, the top American commander in Iraq,
declined to be interviewed for this story, but they
issued a joint statement to CNN that reiterated that
the country's "fundamental democratic framework is in
place" and that "the development of democratic
institutions is being encouraged."
And, they said, they are helping Iraqi political
leaders find ways "to share power and achieve
legislative progress."
But Crocker and Petraeus conceded they are "now
engaged in pursuing less lofty and ambitious goals
than was the case at the outset."
Maj. Gen. Benjamin Mixon, commander of Task Force
Lightning, also reflected a less lofty American goal
for Iraq's future.
"I would describe it as leaving an effective
government behind that can provide services to its
people, and security. It needs to be an effective and
functioning government that is really a partner with
the United States and the rest of the world in this
fight against the terrorists," said Mixon, who will
not be perturbed if such goals are reached without
democracy.
"Well, see that all over the Middle East," he said,
stating that democracy is merely an option, that
Iraqis are free to choose or reject.
"But that is the $50,000 question. ... What will this
government look like? Will it be a democracy? Will it
not?" he asked.
Soldiers, he said, are fighting for security, a goal
Mixon described as "core to my mission."
But security is far from complete in Iraq, where the
government seems dysfunctional and paralyzed.
Seventeen of the 37 Iraqi Cabinet ministers either
boycott or don't attend Cabinet meetings. Parliament,
now on a much-criticized month-long summer break, has
yet to pass key legislation in the areas of energy
resource sharing and the future roles of former
members of Hussein's Baath Party. U.S. officials,
including President Bush, have said there is
frustration with efforts by the government of Prime
Minister Nuri al-Maliki to promote political
reconciliation.
The government is unable to supply regular
electricity and at times running water in the
capital. The health care system is run by one
Iranian-backed militia and the national police are
dominated by another. Death squads terrorize Sunni
neighborhoods.
Sectarian cleansing is pushing people into segregated
enclaves, protected by Shiite or U.S.-backed Sunni
militias, and spurring the flight of thousands to
neighboring countries.
Thousands of innocents are dying violently every
month in cities and villages across the country.
Iraqi government officials concede things aren't
working, but they say that's because the United
States doesn't allow Iraq to really control its own
destiny.
While the Iraqi government commands its own troops,
it cannot send them into battle without U.S.
agreement. Iraqi Special Forces answer only to U.S.
officers.
"We don't have full sovereignty," said Hadi al-Amri,
the chairman of parliament's Defense and Security
Committee. "We don't have sovereignty over our
troops, we don't have sovereignty over our provinces.
We admit it."
And because of the very real prospect of Iranian
infiltration, the government doesn't fund or control
its own intelligence service. It's paid for and run
by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency.
Abdul Qarim al-Enzi, director of the parliamentary
ethics committee, asks whether it is "reasonable for
a country given sovereignty by the international
community to have a chief of intelligence appointed
by another country."
One senior U.S. official in Baghdad told CNN that
"any country with 160,000 foreigners fighting for it
sacrifices some sovereignty."
The U.S. government has long cautioned that a fully
functioning democracy would be slow to emerge in
Iraq. But with key U.S. senators calling for
al-Maliki's removal, some senior U.S. military
commanders even suggest privately the entire Iraqi
government must be removed by "constitutional or
non-constitutional" means and replaced with a stable,
secure, but not necessarily democratic entity.