[casi] Three sets of reflections on recent events

[Glen Rangwala <gr10009@DELETETHIScam.ac.uk>]

Below are three pieces by CASI discussion list members, to be printed in
the May edition of Labour Left Briefing:

Kamil Mahdi, "Iraq will never forget the brutality" (8 April 2003)

Mike Lewis, "Hearts and Minds" (9 April 2003)

Glen Rangwala, "Chasing phantoms?" (9 April 2003)

---------

"Iraq will never forget the brutality"

Iraqi exile Kamil Mahdi examines the reality of the Anglo-American invasion.

In Afghanistan, US aircraft dropped food rations after cluster bombs. In
Iraq, the British equivalent is "raid and aid", augmented by a message from
Tony Blair saying that the raiding troops are there to stay. This British
approach is both brutal and bizarre, and it assumes that people only have
very basic instincts of fear, hunger and survival. The reality is that the
military first tries to reduce the entire population to this pitiful state,
and then to play on people's fears for their families and loved ones. It is
a blatantly racist tactic, and there is little to choose between it and the
murderous American equivalent. The British military tactic assumes that
because Iraqis have lived under dictatorship, they would co-operate with
anything short of being killed and tortured. On earlier occasions when
British invaders deluded themselves in this way, they were soon
unceremoniously kicked out by Iraqis.

This time, Blair has sent British troops to do the bidding of an American
empire that has gone berserk, while British propaganda drums up the idea of
a softer British approach and of greater understanding borne out of longer
experience of the region. Nothing is further from the truth. The British
were last in Iraq 45 years ago, and they have since lost their former
dominant positions in the Gulf to be replaced by the US. On the ground, a
special British role in gaining the confidence of Iraqis is a ridiculous
notion which the British military and government like to parade in front of
their chauvinistic supporters.

The differences between British and US military tactics in the current war
might have more to do with the different tasks set for each side. It is the
Americans who have been more mobile and open to attack, while the British
have relied more heavily on deliberate and prolonged collective punishment
of an entire civilian population in order to gain military advantage.

The British knocked out Basra's electrical power lines and incapacitated
the main fresh water and sewage pumping capacity that caters for two
million people in the area. Iraqi engineers were denied safe passage in
order to carry out repairs until the military was ready to move into Basra,
and British spokespersons continued to dismiss warnings of a humanitarian
crisis. Major grain storage facilities in the Basra area were bombed and
destroyed, and Arab television pictures have shown evidence of the use of
cluster bombs inside the city. Civilian and military casualties in Basra
were extremely high, and the city was taken by brutal force.

The future does not bode well for peace under British control. British
forces are conducting widespread detentions, and detainees are maltreated
even in front of cameras. Anonymous informers are used to lead troops on
raids into homes, when people are taken away hooded and bound. British
occupation forces are openly encouraging the looting of public
establishments. British commanders were rebuked by UN officials for urging
local residents to loot buildings belonging to the Iraqi Army and the
ruling Ba'ath Party. However, the looting is prevalent and seems to be part
of the British policy of creating civil strife. One British commander
(interviewed on television on 6th April) was clearly delighted that
industrial plant, educational establishments, office equipment and
commercial stock was being looted as his troops moved into Basra. On 7th
April, Geoff Hoon was shown on the BBC World making the claim to the
Commons that British troops were providing security in Basra while
background television pictures were showing looting going on. In one
incident on 7th April, troops shot dead a thief in a stolen hospital jeep
for fear that he was a suicide bomber. Earlier, we were told that British
troops distributed "thousands of boxes of children's medicines seized in a
raid on militia headquarters in Zubayr" (The Guardian, 3rd April). Similar
looting of public food stores was also reportedly carried out by US troops
in Nasiriyya where Iraqi grain stocks were distributed to tribesmen as food
"aid".

If the American "hearts and minds" campaign seems impulsive, the British
one is more calculated. Both, however, are destructive of civil
institutions and designed to create an atmosphere of conflict and chaos.
The British practised this during their 1941 occupation of Baghdad, when
the looting turned into a pogrom against Baghdad's Jewish community. At
that time, British forces deceived Iraqi Jewish community leaders into a
public display of support for the occupation without giving the Jewish
community any protection. This time round, Tony Blair has been calling upon
Shi'as to rebel in a further disgraceful incitement to communal conflict.
The reason why Iraqis have failed to rebel this time is not because they
are afraid that US and British forces will leave, but because they know
that a rebellion is the surest way to help US and British forces to stay.

If, as seems likely, British forces are to be charged with a major role in
the occupation of Iraq, the outcome would not be any more peaceful or
benign than under any other occupation. The lesson of the past three weeks
of resistance is that the Iraqi people will not play roles set for them by
others. As the myth of liberation was debunked, occupation forces will
increasingly be relying on collective punishment and on the humanitarian
disaster they are creating. The job of "soft cop" allotted to the British
has become superfluous, especially since the American right-wing seems
unwilling to acknowledge the significance of Iraqi resistance and to alter
its plans for the control of Iraq.

Iraqis will never forget the brutality of British and US troops, and they
will be aware that international vultures from oil companies and others are
picking at the flesh of this deeply wounded nation. With the bloodbath that
this war has already been, the task for Iraqis is to rise above the
divisions left by Saddam Hussein's tyranny. In all cases, Iraq will be a
very uncomfortable place for occupation forces and for uninvited foreign
business executives and political officers.


---------

Hearts and Minds

Mike Lewis of the Campaign against Sanctions on Iraq looks at aid and
reconstruction there and the balance between humanitarian responsibility
and political control.

The onset of war has brought a flurry of humanitarian pledges. Tony Blair
insists: "We are also determined in the wake of military success to bring
humanitarian relief to the people of Iraq."

In contrast to the political sensitivities which impeded funding and
humanitarian coordination prior to war, over half of the UN's Flash Appeal
for $2.2 billion to cover aid for Iraq over the next six months had been
pledged within a week of its launch. This included £65 million from the UK,
and $260 million to the World Food Programme (WFP) from the US. Other
countries have pledged aid items or NGO funding totalling at least $676.5
million, the UK's own contribution standing at £210 million. This
humanitarian concern is not a beneficent bonus: the Fourth Geneva
Convention places primary responsibility for the welfare of the civilian
population on the occupying power.

Nonetheless, governments will need monitoring to ensure they fulfil their
promises, and direct them flexibly towards needs whose scale and nature
changes daily. At present, food supplies, at least in southern Iraq, will
probably last until the end of April. But water is a much more urgent need,
exacerbated by electricity disruption across Baghdad and the south. Robin
Mardini, regional coordinator for the International Red Cross said on 7th
April that the water situation "is extremely critical, everywhere." Funding
may need to be diverted from refugee assistance to water, sanitation and
medical supplies for static populations, assuming disorder in major cities
does not force more people to flee.

But the immediate aid problem now lies in execution. An army bearing both
bombs and bread risks not only manipulating aid as a tool of war, but
damaging its effectiveness. Several NGOs, including Oxfam and Médecins Sans
Frontieres, have declined to accept money directly from "belligerents".
This independence is not simply a high moral principle. The safety and
effectiveness of personnel on the ground relies upon their visible
neutrality. It is threatened for instance by the insistence that they wear
US military identification badges, losing the neutrality which would be
available were the aid effort coordinated by the UN rather than the US.

In places the military has monopolised aid provision itself. At its worst,
lacking the skills to assess local needs effectively, food is shifted off
the back of lorries and the strongest and fittest receive aid that may
subsequently be sold, beyond the means of the poorest and weakest.
Inexperience is exacerbated by the US impeding access and funding to
non-American NGOs without "security clearance", but with extensive
experience in Iraq.

Aid needs to be provided not only by international organisations, but Iraq
itself. The most effective provision of food beyond April lies in reviving
the local network of Food Distribution Agents which has provided 60% of the
population with rations under the Oil for Food (OFF) Programme. An initial
UN assessment at Umm Qasr found many of these agents willing to work. Where
possible, aid should support reconstruction in this way, using local
expertise and buying local goods. Encouraging US and UK forces to trust
these Iraqi institutions will be both difficult and vital.

But these mechanisms are no panacea. Although $2.4 billion in food supplies
remains in the OFF 'pipeline', only $270 million is available for shipping
within its 45-day timeframe, a quarter of the WFP Iraq appeal. Nor does the
Programme's temporary revival allow for new contracts to be negotiated
beyond essential medical items. And crucially, the OFF programme is not
aid: it uses Iraq's own wealth to provide for its population. If its funds
are used to repair damage caused directly by war, or the economic
deterioration from twelve years of sanctions, then the US and UK
governments will be sidestepping their responsibilities once again.

Nor is the current Programme viable for long-term reconstruction and
support for the Iraqi population. Tony Blair recommends effectively
continuing the Programme after the lifting of UN sanctions, continuing to
place Iraqi oil revenues in a UN account. If UN paternalism is to be the
lesser evil to US control of oil revenues for reconstruction, then major
structural changes need to be made to a Programme which currently provides
only 50 cents a day for each Iraqi: a starvation ration. These changes
should include permitting the local purchase of goods rather than expensive
foreign contracts; shelving reparations payments to the Compensation Fund
established after the First Gulf War; returning Iraq's frozen foreign
assets, currently being corralled into a US Federal Reserve account of
dubious legality; and, crucially, dropping at least some of Iraq's immense
national debt, which at $383 billion would consume a generation of oil
sales.

These changes will require financial sacrifices by the UK and US
governments and a foregoing of the political benefits which control over
the humanitarian effort brings. At present a Gordian knot ties genuine
humanitarian responsibilities to "hearts and minds" operations; and
reconstruction to the economic interests of the US and UK. Insisting on
these responsibilities without ceding to political control will be key to
the effectiveness of relief and reconstruction.

Contact: http://www.casi.org.uk

---------

Chasing phantoms?

Glen Rangwala reminds us of the supposed reason why Iraq was invaded

In his first press conference after the launching of the invasion, General
Tommy Franks, the war's commander, declared: "There is no doubt that the
regime of Saddam Hussein possesses weapons of mass destruction." Tony Blair
expressed the same certainty in his first major press conference of the
war: "We have absolutely no doubt at all that these weapons of mass
destruction exist." He told Parliament during the debate that led to a vote
for war that the idea that Iraq had disarmed was "palpably absurd."

Over three weeks into the war, and with most of Iraq captured by
Anglo-American forces, the only reliable signs of illicit weapons in Iraq
are the cluster bombs that have been dropped from US jets.

With so much personal credibility staked on finding these weapons in Iraq,
their discovery has been a high priority since the start of the conflict.
Hans Blix said when the invasion began, "If they don't find something then
you have sent 250,000 men to wage war in order to find nothing." Even
before the first missiles struck Baghdad, special operations teams were
raiding four sites in western Iraq that were considered to be likely stores
of weapons. But the anticipated propaganda victory was not to be had: the
searches revealed no prohibited items.

Every new discovery by the invading armies of a vat or vial inside Iraq has
led to trumpeting about how the "smoking gun" may have now been found. As
Iraq has several petrochemical and pharmaceutical industries still
functioning in the country, the feverish headlines have been frequent. In
each case, the results of tests have been quietly released after a few
days: always negative.

Three days into the war, US forces claimed to have come across a "huge"
chemical weapons factory near Najaf, 100 miles south of Baghdad. It turned
out to be a cement factory that had been disused for a number of years.
Next, claims were being made about the presence in Nasiriya of chemical
protection suits, gas masks and antidotes. According to Geoff Hoon, these
items "show categorically that Iraqi troops are prepared" to use "weapons
of mass destruction". When told that the suits were of the same type that
Iraq had in the 1980s during the war with Iran, Hoon relented; now the find
was "obviously not conclusive". Indeed, the suits may well have been twenty
year-old leftovers. US officials confirmed that there was no indication
they were freshly worn or issued.

Similar false alarms were raised over vials of white powder found in the Qa
Qaa factory complex on 4th April, which turned out to be common explosives,
and over fourteen barrels of chemicals at Hindiya in central Iraq which US
officials claimed on 7th April contained nerve agents - in reality
insecticide. Given that the barrels were found at an agricultural
warehouse, the contents should not have been particularly surprising.

In the face of no evidence of Iraq's prohibited weapons, and with no use of
those weapons by Iraq, the flag of disarmament under which this war has
been fought has fallen away. As a result, many - including the Russian
foreign minister - have speculated that if the evidence is not there, it
would have to be invented. Secretary of State Colin Powell has said US
military commanders would be responsible for identifying and destroying any
prohibited weapons that are found. The US military has also started to set
up its own weapons inspectorate, and have attempted to poach UN staff for
this purpose. This would give the US administration free rein to exaggerate
or falsify any material that might retrospectively legitimise the military
campaign.

In taking this course of action, the US is clearly in violation of the very
Security Council resolutions that it claimed justified the war. Under
Security Council Resolution 687 that ended the 1991 Gulf War, the
destruction of all chemical, biological and nuclear material and missiles
must take place under the supervision of UN inspectors. These were
obligations imposed on Iraq, not the regime of Saddam Hussein, and are
binding on any successor government. As the US has become the occupying
power, the Security Council obligations transfer to it. By failing to
freeze any sites that are found, and allowing UN inspectors in as soon as
safety allows, the US has committed exactly the same breach that it accused
Iraq of.

The UN has confirmed its role in verifying any claims that Iraq has
retained prohibited weapons. Kofi Annan said on 24th March that "UNMOVIC
still has the responsibility for the disarmament of Iraq?they will be
expected to go back to Iraq and inspect." Mohamed El-Baradei, the head of
the IAEA, added that only international inspections could provide credible
information on Iraq's weapons.

Without independent verification from UN inspections teams that Iraq did
retain prohibited weapons, the US and UK will be judged as having a
launched a war on the basis of deceit. If this war was for the disarmament
of Iraq, as Blair told us, then unless prohibited weapons are found and
destroyed, it can only be judged a failure.




_______________________________________________
Sent via the discussion list of the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq.
To unsubscribe, visit http://lists.casi.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/casi-discuss
To contact the list manager, email casi-discuss-admin@lists.casi.org.uk
All postings are archived on CASI's website: http://www.casi.org.uk