America in the Balance

IRAQ: PROGRESS AND PROGNOSIS

by

Ken Eliasberg

Having gone through at great length (too great, I’m sure, for many of my “friends” on the left) various aspects of the War in Iraq, where are we with that war, and where are we going?

Progress.- Where are we? In a far better place than I’d ever thought we’d be, but, then again, my expectations for progress in the Muslim world, in general, and the Arab world, in particular, were, and are, very modest, to say the least. That part of the world still resides in about the 9^th century, so how much is it reasonable to expect? That said, as noted, our progress, while slow, painful, and costly, has been noticeable—not necessarily enduring (as we shall discuss at greater length later in this colum), but noticeable (and thus encouraging). If you listen to the reports of most of our active military types, many of our Congressmen, and an occasional journalist, you can pick up on a very upbeat reaction to our progress in that area. While the left and most of the mainstream media (MSM) are wont to regale you with the daily casualty reports (which have steadily declined), more objective types report on real progress in rebuilding Iraq’s infrastructure and restoring some measure of vitality to its economy. There is encouraging movement in bringing jobs to the country, while trying to get its oil production up to speed, all while “insurgents” (a euphemism for terrorists) are making life as difficult as possible. For some positive reflections on Iraq, I refer the reader to a few columns that I found interesting: Bullish on Baghdad—The Iraqi economy shows signs of strength, Opinion Journal (the Wall St. Journal’s online publication) for April 11, 2006; a piece by David Ignatius (of the liberal Washington Post) Steps Toward Unity in Iraq on washingtonpost.com for Thursday, March 26, 2006; and Symposium: Iraq: Three Years Later by Jamie Glazov, FrontPageMagazine.com for April 14, 2006

What do I personally find worthy of note? A couple of elections (with a turnout more favorable than our own) midst flying bullets, demonstrating some serious and substantial grassroots concern for freedom; a growing capacity for self protection; and some other indications of an embryonic democracy. Am I wildly optimistic about prospects for peace in the Middle East? Not at all! I have no illusions about the environment we are dealing with in the Arab world, a world that is making a half-hearted effort to climb out of the 9^th century—which brings me to my feelings about the future.

Prognosis.- Will our efforts to Democratize this region take root, and will they have an enduring effect? Possibly, but not likely (at least at any time in the foreseeable future). Here is some of my reasoning.

1. Nation Building is a dicey undertaking, at best, and the Arab world

is far from the best. As noted, these people are living at least a dozen centuries behind the enlightened world, and a substantial number of them—particularly their clerics—seem to want it to remain that way. There is a strong—indeed, militant—resistance to modernity. There are those that make a case for the U.S. to engage in nation building, see, e.g. Colossus by Niall Ferguson, or at the very least, for the U.S. to play a substantial role in world affairs, if something less than nation building, see, e.g. Case for Goliath: How America Acts As the World’s Government in the Twenty-first Century by Michael Mandelbaum, and I certainly believe that the spread of democracy is in our best interest. However, I’m not sure just how much, and for how long, our citizens would go along with efforts to recreate ourselves in the world’s many backwaters.

2. I’m not sure that the U.S. is particularly good at nation building. It takes patience—lots of patience—and lots of money. Of course, one can argue—and do so reasonably—that the cost of nation building may, in the long run, be cheaper than the cost of neglect. It also takes something that the U.S. seems to struggle with—the ability to defer gratification. This isn’t 19^th century England, where the government, in its empire-building efforts, could deploy its civil servants to a career in India. Our people do not want to go abroad to some backwater and spend a significant part of their lives doing missionary work among the less fortunates. It ain’t going to happen!

3. Moreover, when we speak of Democracy, I’m beginning to get the distinct impression that the term, as it is being applied to our Middle Eastern venture, does not mean what we have commonly understood it to mean. To us, it means far more than an election; it conjures up notions of justice, civil rights and liberties, and a whole host of freedoms that I believe are incompatible with what Muslims, in general, and Arabs in particular have in mind. Let me illustrate what I’m talking about. We have just had an election in the Palestinian sector. Who was elected? Hamas, a terrorist organization. Is that what we had in mind when we talked about democratizing the region? Of course, it satisfies Jimmy Carter, who has never met a dictator that he couldn’t embrace, but does it satisfy the rest of us? I don’t think so.

Or take the recent case in Afghanistan, a country into which we have poured blood and treasure to liberate. They have an election, and they speak of democracy. But it is a democracy that employs Sharia Law. As most of you know, one of its Muslim citizens “Abdul Rahman—sought to convert to Christianity. Well, under Sharia law, the penalty for leaving Islam is death (so much for Islam being a religion that practices religious tolerance). The country sought to try Mr. Rahman under Sharia, and the prosecution was seeking the death penalty, a resolution that much of the populace and most of the clerics enthusiastically endorsed. If the U.S. had not pressured the Afghan government to abandon the trial and then helped spirit the accused out of the country to Italy, it is likely that Mr Rahman would have been beheaded by now. I doubt if this comports with your notion of democracy, and it certainly falls far short of my expectations of the term. Moreover, as noted, and more frightenly, it certainly puts the lie to the notion that Islam is a religion which fosters religious tolerance. In short, elections, by themselves, do not produce a democracy—at least not one to which the average American relates.

4. I have serious doubts whether Democracy is, in and of itself, a transferable commodity. That is, it is not like a potted plant that you can just pick up and put down in some other location. It is an organic creation which grows when it is ready to grow, and when it is transpalanted in the appropriate soil and appropriately nurtured. Furthermore, I’m not sure that it is everyone’s cup of tea. I am particularly uncertain as to whether it can take root in Arab soil, a culture that seems better suited for theocracy. In short, with the exception of Israel, I don’t see Democracy taking hold anywhere in the Middle East.

5. Finally, the demographics of some of the countries in this region pose a real obstacle to any sort of harmonious resolution. Here I am talking about the arbitrary division of the Ottoman empire subsequent to the end of WWI, producing in Iraq’s case 3 seemingly incompatible groups of Muslims (Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds) all thrown together in a geographically arbitrary manner.

Can Islam evolve beyond the 9^th century?? Well it hasn’t made much progress in 12 centuries (can you name the Islamic scholars who have won a nobel prize, or any prize, for that matter in the last couple of hundred years??). In short, I have no illusions that there is a Thomas Jefferson or an Alexander Hamilton sitting around in some Mosque in Baghdad or Kabul, and, as consequence, I have serious reservations whether Islam will evolve beyond the primitive state in which it now resides. That said, what to do? Maintain a constant vigil, practice strong diplomacy (the kind that Condi Rice brings to bear; she is a remarkable woman), and, under no circumstances allow an Arab State to secure weapons of mass destruction. Giving these people a nuclear capacity would be like giving an armed hand grenade to a vicious psychotic 10-year old and turning him loose in a crowd of his peers that he doesn’t particularly like.. If we cannot democratize this region—at least at any time soon—we must neutralize it. For these purposes I regard neutralizing as the equivalent of neutering. No Arab (or Persian) State should be allowed to come into possession of weapons of mass destruction!!! Their having a nuclear capacity is inimical to the safety of the world, in general, and the Mideast, in particular.