Clive Furness opens up LFIQ Questions and Answers

We have addressed a number of meetings of constituency general committees and council Labour Groups since September 2005. These have always provoked interesting discussions and there are some questions that are often repeated. We include some of them here with our responses.

If you have a question for LFIQ on issues relating to Iraq please email LFIQ

Q Won’t the new constitution and the elections lead to a break up of the Iraqi state?

A Commentators have increasingly suggested that Iraq is heading towards a disintegration based upon religion or ethnicity, (Kurdish north, Arab Shia south and east, Sunni Arab centre and west). This cannot be completely ruled out. However there are strong indicators to suggest that it will not happen.

In a poll conducted for the BBC in December 2005, the results showed that some 70% of Iraqis supported a single unified state and some 60% supported a democratic system as their favoured system of government.

In popular discourse the Shi’ites of Iraq are commonly linked to Iran, understandably because they share a common religious heritage. This does, however, ignore the wide range of opinion within the Shi’ite community, much of which is currently linked directly to religious leaders because of the distrust of politicians.

Some groups are certain to have received overt or tacit support from Iran. Where this is tactical alliance it should not be confused with a desire on the part of Shi’ite Iraqis to become part of a greater Persia.

The Kurds have a long history of oppression under Saddam, but also at the hands of Arab and military rulers in Baghdad pre-Saddam Iraq. Opinion polls in the north have frequently shown widespread support for an independent Kurdistan. However, the political leadership of the two major Kurdish parties have always talked in terms of regional autonomy within a federal state, never of independence. And for very good reason.

UDI would invite the intervention of the Iraqi army to recover land and the oil beneath it. Independence, in the unlikely event that it would be part of a formal treaty would invite the unwanted attentions of two powerful neighbours, Iran and Turkey, both of whom have acted to suppress thoughts of Kurdish nationalism at home and both of which have interfered in Iraqi Kurdistan as their policy needs dictated. Generally, the more remote Iraqi Kurdistan has become from Baghdad, the greater freedom neighbouring powers have had to intervene. Although it would be popular amongst Iraq’s Kurds, it is unlikely to become part of the policy of any of the major Iraqi Kurdish parties.

The Sunni Arab population have consistently shown the greatest desire to remain part of a unified Iraq. They have shown no desire to secede.

The other communities do not have the critical mass to secede.

Q Opinion polls consistently show the widespread hostility of Iraqis towards British and US troops. It is their presence in Iraq that incites the actions of the resistance. If we were to bring the troops back the reason for the insurgency would end.

A The question (or statement) assumes that the insurgency is both unified and aimed purely at the British and American troops. Neither of these assumptions is correct.

It also assumes that withdrawal of British and US troops will lead to a peaceful settlement. This belies the statements of some of the insurgents themselves.

It is always dangerous to simplify, but there are two distinct trends within the so-called resistance. The first is the Baathist/Nationalist, the second the Salafist/Religious.

Within the first are those linked very closely to the old regime, including some at least from within the intelligence services, the mukhabbarat and the istakhabbarat. Whereas there is universal condemnation of the old regime and its systematic use of terror and oppression against its own people there are some who seek to view the worst elements of a fascistic regime as some kind of genuine resistance. (see for example repeated references in The Guardian)

Added to these are elements inspired by Arab nationalism or simply appalled by some of the results of the actions of occupation forces.

Sooner or later a deal will have to be done with this wider group, drawing them into the political process. To recall the famous phrase of LB Johnson, it will be better to have them inside the tent…… The participation of the Sunni Arab community in the December 2005 elections is a welcome sign of progress in this area.

With regard to the smaller in number Salafists, their stated aim is for civil war and the removal of ‘apostate’ Shi’ites from Iraq. They have deliberately targeted civilians, children and worshippers to create the greatest number of casualties. It is difficult to see how any deal could be done with them and there can be little hope or expectation of negotiation or compromise with them. Dealing with them will ultimately become one of the longer term problems that the newly elected government will have to address.

One commentator writing in the left-wing newspaper Tribune recently suggested that the solution was to withdraw foreign troops immediately and let Iraqis sort out their problems (ignoring the fact that the most homicidal elements are themselves non-Iraqis). He gave as a blueprint, the British withdrawal from India in which over one million people were killed in inter-communal violence, suggesting that such a result would be preferable to a continued occupation by foreign troops.

LFIQ draws its support from people both, who opposed and who supported the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The suggestion that massive inter-communal violence was an acceptable price to bring troops home early is one that we reject. Whether one supports the presence of British and US (and other) troops in Iraq, there is a job that needs to be done until Iraqi security forces are in a position to do the whole job themselves. It would be the height of irresponsibility to withdraw before that is possible.

We are equally clear that the time for British troops to begin to withdraw is the day after they are asked to do so by the elected government of Iraq.

Q Would it not be better to remove US troops and replace them with UN peacekeepers?

A The US troops are in Iraq under UN Security Council Resolutions 1546 and 1637, by which the UN Security Council has given a mandate for the multi-national force until December 31st 2006. This is true for all of the British, Polish, Italian, Ukrainian, Australian etc troops who are presently operating in Iraq. The question assumes that there is a role for peacekeepers. Until there is a settlement, there isn’t a peace to keep. After there is a political settlement a changed role for UN sponsored forces cannot be ruled out, but this role is more likely to be done by Iraqi forces.

Q The Sunnis are opposed to the new constitution. How can it work without their participation?

There is a problem with the premise of the question. There are approx 5 million Sunni Arabs in Iraq and around 4 million Sunni Kurds. Whilst Sunni Arabs have been largely hostile to the changes, Sunni Kurds have been overwhelmingly supportive. The use of the term ‘Sunni’ has often been used to ignore or deny the religious heritage of Iraqi Kurds.

In the January 2005 election Sunni Arabs stayed away from the polls. How much this was a matter of principle and how much a matter of intimidation has never been established. In the December 2005 elections Sunni Arabs voted in large numbers for the first time.

The trend is clear. The is a movement from within the Sunni Arab community towards engagement in the new constitution and the democratic process. This does not mean that the insurgency will end, but it is a necessary step toward that end.

Q The elections are a farce. How can you have a free election when the country is under the occupation of foreign troops?

A The assertion at the beginning of the question is stated as a fact, whereas it is only an opinion. In our view, it is an opinion that is quite simply incorrect and it is one that insults the bravery of millions of Iraqis who turned out to cast their votes in the face of considerable personal danger.

The post-WWII elections in Germany and Japan were conducted under the auspices of the occupying forces of the victorious powers, (ironically the US played a major role in these as well). More recently in Bosnia, Kosovo and Afghanistan this was also the case. The evidence is that whilst occupying forces might well invalidate the elections (see for example Soviet troops in Afghanistan) it is not the presence of troops so much as their role in the process and the policy that they are supporting that is determinant. Where foreign troops have operated to promote security and facilitate free elections there has been a genuine and widespread participation. In the recent (December) elections in Iraq there were over 230 parties and 7500 candidates seeking electoral support. There was a turnout of over 70%. There have also been reports of malpractice. Although these do seem to be limited to less than 70 ballot boxes out of a total of 31,000 ballot boxes.

The initial results suggest that the United Iraqi Alliance (Shia) will get 119 seats in the assembly; The Democratic and Patriotic Alliance of Kurdistan will have 47 seats; The Iraqi Accord Front (Sunni Arab) 37; The Iraqi National List (Left/Democrat) 15; Hewar National Iraqi Front (Cross-community coalition of Kurds, Arabs, Yezdis and Christians); Others 4. In addition 45 seats will be allocated to parties that did well nationally but failed to get a large enough number of local seats.

Q Saddam is facing a show trial. It is neither fair nor just.

A It is worth recollecting whence the term ‘show trial’ comes from. It came from the Soviet Union of the 1930’s when the ‘trials’ took on the aspect of theatre over justice. There were no juries and no independence of the judiciary from either Party or State. An accusation was followed by a confession and all too often summary execution or slow death in the ‘Gulag’.

The ‘crimes’ were often that the accused ‘thought’ something, not that he did something. Crimes of the imagination, “thought crimes” were created. Some ‘crimes’ did not have to be thought, it was sufficient that the accused might think them in the future. They were the mechanism whereby a body of potential opposition to Stalin, within the CP of the USSR, was removed and the rest was cowed.

In a time before television, the proceedings were filmed and offered for widespread distribution.

There was neither defence nor appeal.

Compare this with the trial of Saddam. He has a team of hundreds of lawyers; at one time it was over 1000 and from many countries. It is apparent that he has made no confession, indeed he has attempted to refuse to recognise the jurisdiction of the court and in an attempt to allow him to speak he has been able to rail and rant in the attempt to make a political case rather than a legal case in his own defence.

The trial is conducted before a panel of judges and a jury. It is too early to make judgements on the independence of the judiciary, all of whom have suffered death threats against themselves or their families, but some firm evidence should be adduced before they are accused of being in anyone’s pocket.

Saddam’s behaviour in the dock and the judges response is far closer to that of Milosovic and the UN special tribunal in the Hague rather than a of a dissident communist of the 1930’s.

Lastly, great pains have been taken to ensure that the crimes of which Saddam is accused are real and that there is evidence, not simply that the crimes occurred, but which links Saddam to them. The first trial links him directly to the death of between 130-140 Shi’ite villagers. There are other counts pending which link him to the deaths of tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of Iraqis.

If you have a question that you would like a response to please email it to LFIQ. If you would like your name to be quoted, please make that clear in the correspondence.

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