Headlines, Middle East & North Africa, North America

IRAQ-U.S.: ‘Stay the Course’ but Give U.N. Larger Role – Panel

Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON, Mar 9 2004 (IPS) - Almost one year after U.S. forces invaded Iraq, a bipartisan panel of 20 influential foreign-policy experts is calling on both Republicans and Democrats to "stay the course" but to also ask the United Nations to play a "leading role" in the transition to Iraqi sovereignty and beyond.

A report released Tuesday by a special task force of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) calls on both President George W. Bush and his presumptive Democratic challenger, John Kerry, to make clear that Washington has no intention of withdrawing from Iraq in the near term and is committed to maintaining high levels of funding for post-war reconstruction.

"Disengagement would be tantamount now to American failure," declared James Schlesinger, a former Republican defence secretary, who co-chaired the year-old ‘Independent Task Force on Post-Conflict Iraq’.

"The first principle", added retired Ambassador Thomas Pickering, the other co-chairman, "is stay the course".

But at the same time, he stressed Washington should "promote a leading role for the United Nations in the political transition process". Such a move, adds the report, would ensure "a more credible (transition) exercise that is accepted by most, if not all, important Iraqi actors".

Ultimately, the 50-page report emphasises, the chief challenge faced by Washington and its coalition partners in Iraq is more political than military.

If the United States and the United Nations can help produce "a political construct and process that has legitimacy, then the military challenges will be far more manageable. Conversely, if we do not skilfully address the politics, no amount of improved military measures will be able to quell unrest", it says.

The new report comes on the heels of Monday’s signing in Baghdad of an interim constitution by the 25 members of the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council (IGC), a key benchmark in the Bush administration’s timetable for turning over sovereignty to an as of yet undetermined Iraqi authority Jun. 30.

The signing was delayed for three days due to reservations by half a dozen Shiite IGC members who, after consulting with Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani – who has emerged as the most powerful religious and de facto political figure in Iraq – went along with the final draft but suggested afterward they might try to change key provisions, either during the transition or after national elections scheduled for no later than 11 months from now.

Both the unexpected delay in the signing and the reservations voiced afterwards underlined the political difficulties Washington and its Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) continue to face in assuaging the deep-seated anxieties of the various ethnic and religious communities in Iraq – where the U.S. presence has so far played a preponderant role – as they move toward an uncertain future.

Recent assessments by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and other analysts have suggested that civil war in Iraq was still at least as much a possibility as a successful transition to some form of democratic rule, although the commander in overall charge of U.S. forces in the region, Gen John Abizaid, told Congress last week he considered civil war "possible", but not "probable".

The CFR report, which was generally upbeat in tone, insisting that "significant progress" has been made since it issued its last, more pessimistic report some six months ago, is important because its members are foreign policy specialists from within the mainstream of both major parties.

In addition to Schlesinger, participants included internationalist Republicans, such as Edward Djerejian, the primary Mideast specialist in the administration of former President George H.W. Bush (1989-93), and retired senior career foreign service and military professionals, including Pickering, retired Amb Frank Wisner and former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman, Gen John Shalikashvili.

Others included aides to former President Bill Clinton (1993-2001), such as the former director of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) J. Brian Atwood and Middle East specialist Robert Malley.

The chief concern of the task force members, according to the report, was that the scheduled transfer of sovereignty Jun. 30, combined with cuts to U.S. troops in Iraqi cities and uncertainty about Washington’s long-term funding after November’s presidential elections here is creating doubts about U.S. staying power in Iraq.

These doubts should be dispelled, adds the report, which calls on Bush, Kerry and congressional leaders to publicly reassure Iraqis the United States is committed for the long haul "militarily, politically and economically … notwithstanding disagreements on other aspects of Iraq policy".

Providing security should be considered paramount in promoting both the political transition and reconstruction, argues the report, which calls on the administration to review its apparent plans for reducing U.S. troops presence and patrols in major Iraqi cities. Such reductions could open major security gaps that make Iraqi civilians and security forces vulnerable to attack.

The size of deployments, the report adds, should "err on the side of robustness" rather than create a situation where security cannot be assured.

At the same time, U.S. military forces should accelerate partnering with Iraqi security forces and carefully link the pace of any troop reductions to the actual security situation, as opposed to tying them to arbitrary dates or timelines.

Coalition troops and the CPA should unify and standardise training efforts for Iraqi military, civil guard and police with the eventual goal of building unified federal institutions, rather than simply create the most expedient means to provide security in certain regions so that U.S. troops could withdraw more quickly, adds the report.

On the transition process itself, the report says task force members were "sceptical" about current plans to expand the IGC, "given the limited political following of many of its members, as well as the fact that it is viewed as the creation of the CPA". It also raised questions about the benefits of a larger conference, similar to Afghanistan’s ”loya jirga" of traditional leaders.

"We believe that it would be most advisable for U.N. officials, working with the CPA, to promote a smaller roundtable forum, with a view toward establishing a transitional body that could manage basic government functions" as well as coordinate security arrangements with foreign forces and prepare elections.

The task force welcomed what it called indications of growing support within the Bush administration for the United Nations taking a "leading role" in creating a transitional authority in Iraq. But it recommended the U.N. Security Council approve a new resolution that would spell out the world body’s responsibilities.

The report also calls for more emphasis on creating jobs for Iraqis, both to give them a greater stake in the transition and to reduce discontent that is contributing to the insurgency, and to make "much greater efforts to ensure the development and entrenchment of transparency and accountability in the oil industry".

Despite the scheduled Jun. 30 transfer to sovereignty, Schlesinger stressed that Iraqis should be denied any direct control over U.S. military forces, preferably through the negotiation of a Status of Forces Agreement (SoFA) before the transition date.

"The U.S. military is going to have its own serious responsibilities," he said, which include protecting Iraq against foreign aggression, training local forces, and providing "back-up firepower in case of a serious insurgent incident".