Iraq and Afghanistan

The American administration and its generals in Iraq seem more worried than they have been for a long time, and they have good reason to be. Instead of decreasing in number, suicide car bombings have been increasing in the last two months, exacting a terrifying toll. American military commanders have publicly begun to admit that their former optimistic assumptions about how fast the Iraqis were developing their security services and military forces have been wide of the mark. The sense of gloom is heightened by the killing of Sunni Arab clerics and the subsequent accusation that the leading Shiite political organization was behind the killings. Whether true or not, this cannot help. The Sunni Arabs appear to be further alienated by the strong welcome extended to the Iranian foreign minister, a visit that was ended by a statement by the new Iraqi, and Shi'a, Prime Minister that Iraq was responsible for the war of Iran and Iraq in the 1980s. Of course, he said Saddam was the culprit, but the Sunni Arabs interpret this as another slam at them.

The result is that the Americans have begun to talk of remaining in the country indefinitely whether they want to or not. This will give more ammunition to Moqtada al-Sadr, who believes inflaming this issue is good for his Mahdi Army. He has already begin holding new demonstrations against us (and this from within the Shi'a camp). Our open-ended stay will give more credibility to both the Sunni Arabs and the Iranians who already believe in our imperial intentions. (Even if we had such intentions, and some in our government no doubt do, we do not have the money nor the political staying power to bring it off.)

Today, I have no concluding words of wisdom.

Recent riots in Afghanistan incited by a Newsweek reference to flushing a Quran down the toilet reminds us that democracy means something quite different from our understanding in states without long democratic traditions. President Karzai was elected by a large majority of Afghanis. But what did that mean? It meant first of all that many people were asked to vote for him by their local tribal or other leaders. In transitional democracies voting is often not an individual choice. It is a group choice. Many people who voted for Karzai may in fact have no idea who he is. Secondly, many Afghanis voted for Karzai simply because it was a unique experience that they wanted to have a part in. By this act they did not betray any deep commitment to the person of Karzai or the governmental system that he represents. The next week an issue might come up much closer to their hearts, and one which would inspire quite different means to express public power.

Historically, there have been many "democracies" that utilize the processes we are all familiar with, but have populations and occasionally political leaders who are by no means constrained by these processes. This pattern has been especially prominent in Latin America where leadership by "caudillos" has been the historical pattern. Such strong men may or may not come to power by the ballot. Once in power they are unlikely to leave office because of the ballot. The tendency of populations to grant their right to flaunt the law reinforces the pattern, as we saw in the case of Juan Peron. Another example is found in Ecuador and Bolivia where power is expressed by the street as often as by the ballot. Frequent changes of head of state, irregular means to office, and of exit from office are the pattern. In Ecuador we have recently had the example of a government dismissing the Supreme Court and vice-versa. Perhaps Mexico and Venezuela are teetering on the edge of return to such regional patterns.

One can only hope that the majority of the new democracies of the last thirty years will not relapse into such quasi-democratic processes. That we will escape such a reversal in Iraq in the next few years is almost too much to hope.

Once again Robert Pape, a leading authority on "suicide terrorism" contributes an Op-Ed to the NY Times. His presentation of data is the same as in his previous contribution (discussed some months back in this blog). The essential point is that religion has not been the major reason for suicidal terrorism. Whether it be the Muslims in Palestine or the Hindus in Sri Lanka, there seems little connection between religiosity and suicide. (Apparently, you do not need a vision of all those virgins in heaven.) The key issue for most suicide bombers is the fact that their group is not as self-governing within the system they find themselves in as they would like. One can expand on his point by pointing out that when commentators use the word "religion" in such discussions what is referred to is not some set of sacrosanct beliefs but rather a difference in group affiliations. The Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland have not fought one another because they hold different views of the sacredness of the Virgin Mary or of the way to take communion. They are fighting for control because they belong to different social groups. One group says to the other "We are catholics and you are protestants", and vice-versa.

Pape's evidence suggests that democracies or near democracies seem especially prone to developing groups with such suicidal tendencies. This is apparently because the promise of democracy is that all people will have an equal say in how their lives are run. When this promise remains permanently unfilled or is seen to be impossible with the balance of power (or votes) that a people faces, they turn to terrorism and eventually suicidal terrorism.

Pape goes astray, however, when he interprets the situation in Iraq to be primarily an expression of a desire to rid the country of foreigners, especially Americans. Give this interpretation, his solution for terrorism in Iraq then becomes taking the American forces out. This might have worked at some point, but the insurgency and the suicide bombing is now directed mainly against the Shi'a, and one can assume that it will be turned against the Iranians if they continue to increase their influence. I would judge that a better analogy for Iraq is the struggle of radical Tamils against the government of Sri Lanka. They find themselves a "permanent minority". As such, democracy does nothing for them unless the borders of the country are drawn so that they can live in a country of their own. It is true that the Tamils fought effectively against the Indians when they came to the aid of the Sri Lanka government. They did blow up the prime minister of India in a famous suicide event. But this was essentially a side show. Their real enemy was and remains the Sinhalese majority on their island.

In the May 15 New York Times "Week in Review" James Bennet Expounds at some length on the difficulty of understanding why the insurgency continues and even escalates in Iraq. It is hard to understand if one believes that the critical issues for Iraqis are the overthrow of Saddam, the occupation of the country by foreigners and non-Muslims, or the emerging democratic process. Sadly, I conclude that these issues are no longer foremost in the minds of the insurgents if they ever were. Apparently what has happened is that a critical number of Sunni Arabs have concluded that democracy in Iraq does not and cannot work for them. They understand (in spite of Sunni Arab claims that the Sunnis are actually the majority) that the Shi'a have an overwhelming and possibly expanding majority. They understand that most Shi'a believe that they should at last rule the country and that the past behavior of the Sunni Arabs gives them little right to complain. The Sunni Arab understanding is confirmed by the fact that the security forces of the elected government are made up almost exclusively of Shiites and Kurds (who, of course, make calculations of their own).

The fact that this situation leads the Sunni Arabs to fight bitterly and relentlessly against the democratic system that is coming into being in Iraq should not surprise Americans. After all, it was the shrinking minority of white Southerners in mid-nineteenth century America that decided to fight against what they thought would otherwise be an irresistible northern tide. As they saw it, the democratic system of a united country was simply incapable of saving them or what they saw as their essential interests. The result was our bloodiest war.