Iraq’s Non-Election
By Robert
Jensen and
Pat Youngblood
ZNet
Predictably, the U.S.
news media are full of discussion and debate about this weekend’s election
in Iraq. Unfortunately, virtually all the commentary misses a simple
point: There will be no “election” on Jan. 30 in Iraq, if that term is
meant to suggest an even remotely democratic process.
Many Iraqis casting
votes will be understandably grateful for the opportunity. But the
conditions under which those votes will be cast -- as well as the larger
context -- bear more similarity to a slowly unfolding hostage tragedy than
an exercise in democracy. We refer not to the hostages taken by various
armed factions in Iraq, but the way in which U.S. policymakers are holding
the entire Iraqi population hostage to U.S. designs for domination of the
region.
This is an election
that U.S. policymakers were forced to accept and now hope can entrench
their power, not displace it. They seek not an election that will lead to
a U.S. withdrawal, but one that will bolster their ability to make a case
for staying indefinitely.
This is crucial for
anti-empire activists to keep in mind as the mainstream media begins to
give us pictures of long lines at polling places to show how much Iraqis
support this election and to repeat the Bush administration line about
bringing freedom to a part of the world starved for democracy. Those media
reports also will give some space to those critics who remain comfortably
within the permissible ideological limits -- that is, those who agree that
the U.S. aim is freedom for Iraq and, therefore, are allowed to quibble
with a few minor aspects of administration policy.
The task of activists
who step outside those limits is to point out a painfully obvious fact,
and therefore one that is unspeakable in the mainstream: A real election
cannot go on under foreign occupation in which the electoral process is
managed by the occupiers who have clear preferences in the outcome.
That’s why the
U.S.-funded programs that “nurture” the voting process have to be
implemented “discreetly,” in the words of a Washington Post story, to
avoid giving the Iraqis who are “well versed in the region’s widely held
perception of U.S. hegemony” further reason to mistrust the assumed
benevolent intentions of the United States.
Post reporters Karl
Vick and Robin Wright quote an Iraqi-born instructor from one of these
training programs: “If you walk into a coffee shop and say, ‘Hi, I’m from
an American organization and I’m here to help you,’ that’s not going to
help. If you say you’re here to encourage democracy, they say you’re here
to control the Middle East.”
Perhaps “they” --
those well-versed Iraqis -- say that because it is an accurate assessment
of policy in the Bush administration, as well as every other contemporary
U.S. administration. “They” dare to suggest that the U.S. goal is
effective control over the region’s oil resources. But “we” in the United
States are not supposed to think, let alone say, such things; that same
Post story asserts, without a hint of sarcasm, that the groups offering
political training in Iraq (the National Democratic Institute for
International Affairs, International Republican Institute, and
International Foundation for Election Systems) are “at the ambitious heart
of the American effort to make Iraq a model democracy in the Arab world.”
Be still my heart. To
fulfill that ambition, U.S.
troop strength in Iraq will remain
at the current level of about 120,000 for at least two more years,
according to the Army’s top operations officer. For the past two years,
journalists have reported about U.S. intentions to establish anywhere from
four to 14 “enduring” military bases in Iraq. Given that there are about
890 U.S. military installations around the world to provide the capacity
to project power in service of the U.S. political and economic agenda,
it’s not hard to imagine that planners might be interested in bases in the
heart of the world’s most important energy-producing region.
But in mainstream
circles, such speculation relegates one to the same category as those
confused Middle Easterners with their “widely held perception of U.S.
hegemony.” After all, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has dismissed
as “inaccurate and unfortunate” any suggestion that the United States
seeks a permanent presence in Iraq. In April 2003, Rumsfeld assured us
that there has been “zero discussion” among senior administration
officials about permanent bases in Iraq.
But let’s return to
reality: Whatever the long-term plans of administration officials, the
occupation of Iraq has, to put it mildly, not gone as they had hoped. But
rather than abandon their goals, they have adapted tactics and rhetoric.
Originally the United States
proposed a complex caucus system to try to avoid elections and make it
easier to control the selection of a government, but the Iraqis refused to
accept that scheme. Eventually U.S. planners had to accept elections and
now are attempting to turn the chaotic situation on the ground to their
advantage.
Ironically, the
instability and violence may boost the chances of the United States’
favored candidate, U.S.-appointed interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi.
While most electoral slates are unable to campaign or even release their
candidates’ names because of the violence, Allawi can present himself as a
symbol of strength, running an expensive television campaign while
protected by security forces. He has access to firepower and
reconstruction funds, which may prove appealing to many ordinary Iraqis
who, understandably, want the electricity to flow and the kidnappings and
violence to stop.
Of course the United
States can’t guarantee the favored candidate will prevail. But whoever is
in the leadership slot in Iraq will understand certain unavoidable
realities of power. As the New York Times put it -- in the delicate
fashion appropriate to the Times -- the recent announcement by Shi’a
leaders that any government it forms would not be overtly Islamic was
partly in response to Iraqi public opinion. But, as reporter Dexter
Filkins reminded readers, U.S. officials “wield vast influence” and “would
be troubled by an overtly Islamist government.” And no one wants troubled
U.S. officials, even Iraqi nationalists who hate the U.S. occupation but
can look around and see who has the guns.
The realities on the
ground may eventually mean that even with all those guns, the United
States cannot impose a pro-U.S. government in Iraq. It may have to switch
strategies again. But, no matter how many times Bush speaks of his
fondness for freedom and no matter what games the planners play, we should
not waver in an honest analysis of the real motivations of policymakers.
To pretend that the United States might, underneath it all, truly want a
real democracy in Iraq -- one that actually would be free to follow the
will of the people -- is to ignore evidence, logic and history.
As blogger Zeynep
Toufe put it: “All these precious words have now become something akin to
brand names: “democracy,” “freedom,” “liberty,” “empowerment.” They don’t
really mean anything; they’re just the names attached to things we do.”
http://www.underthesamesun.org/
Right now, one of the
things that U.S. policymakers do is to allow Iraqis to cast ballots under
extremely constrained conditions. But whatever the results on Jan. 30, it
will not be an election, if by “election” we mean a process through which
people have a meaningful opportunity to select representatives who can set
public policy free of external constraint. The casting of ballots will not
create a legitimate Iraqi government. Such a government is possible only
when Iraqis have real control over their own future. And that will come
only when the United States is gone.
Robert Jensen is
on the board and Pat Youngblood is coordinator of the Third Coast Activist
Resource Center in Austin, TX. http://thirdcoastactivist.org/
They can be
reached at rjensen@uts.cc.utexas.edu and
pat@thirdcoastactivist.org.
Jan. 28, 2005
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