US launches fire sale of Iraqi assets as occupation problems reach crisis point

Empowering Weak & Oppressed

Ahmad Musa

Sha'ban 05, 1424 2003-10-01

Occupied Arab World

by Ahmad Musa (Occupied Arab World, Crescent International Vol. 32, No. 13 2003-10, Sha'ban, 1424)

The UN’s announcement on September 27 that it is withdrawing its international staff from Iraq for security reasons came as a massive blow to the country’s US occupation authorities, who have been desperately trying to convince the world that they have full control over Iraq and are succeeding in introducing freedom and democracy to a grateful population.

It was only the latest of a series of incidents demonstrating the increasing cracks appearing in the US’s facade that all is well in Iraq. These include mounting operational losses among US and British troops at the hands of resistance fighters, now averaging more than a death a day; the bombing of the UN headquarters in the city in August; the assassination of popular Shi’i leader Ayatullah Baqir al-Hakim on August 29, (see p. 10); increasing criticism even from members of the governing council who had initially felt that working with the US authorities was the best way to secure the interests of Iraqis in the long term; the assassination of governing council member Aqila al-Hashimi, a former Ba’athist; and the bombing of a hotel in central Baghdad on September 26 where foreign journalists are based.

At the same time, the Bush administration is coming under increasing criticism in the US for its Iraq policy, as Americans realise that they were led into war under false pretenses, and that much of what they were told about Iraq before the war, and were led to believe would happen after the war, is a pack of lies. After two years in which critics and political opponents of George Bush’s neo-conservative regime have felt unable to attack him because of the ultra-patriotic mood created by 9/11, the Bush administration’s aggressive foreign policy adventures are becoming a subject for debate. Former NATO commander general Wesley Clarke has become the first Democrat to announce that he wishes to run against Bush in next year’s presidential elections, on a platform built around criticising his foreign policy.

The results of this pressure on the US can be seen in many different ways. One is the increasing belligerence towards the Iraqis, and dissatisfaction towards their own government, of US troops in Iraq. Western observers in Iraq confirm that US troops have virtually abandoned all attempts to win "hearts and minds", treating all Iraqis as enemies. The result has been a massive increase in Iraqi civilian casualties, although no figures are available because US military authorities only record incidents in which US personnel suffer casualties.

Another is the US’s increasing desperation to find international support to share the cost and the burden of the occupation, in terms of both money and troops. The US intended that the ‘liberated’ Iraqis would pay for their own occupation, but the problems in establishing order in Iraq have delayed that possibility. Having initially insisted that the US would brook no foreign interference with its occupation, the US last month also appealed to the UN to authorise and legitimise international assistance to the occupation.

There has also been evidence of the US searching for a way to get out of Iraq with dignity intact. The chatter in Washington has suggested that the US might declare elections early next year and then walk away, saying that it is now up to the UN to ensure order and provide any assistance the Iraqis need. This chatter received some degree of confirmation on September 27, when US secretary of state Colin Powell announced that the US was giving the governing council a six-month deadline for drafting a constitution and announcing elections. This is a considerable about-face, as the US had previously insisted – as a pretext for prolonging its direct rule – that no political progress was possible until security had been restored.

Even while the US has been coming under increasing military and political pressure, meanwhile, it has been frantically working to secure its control over Iraq’s economic assets – including but not only oil – and their long-term exploitation, which was one of their main reasons for going to war. On September 21, Iraqi government representatives at the annual IMF and World Bank meetings in Dubai announced that Iraqi state assets would be made available for sale to foreign investors, and that, contrary to previous promises that majority holdings of Iraqi assets would remain in Iraqi hands, foreign investors would be permitted to purchase 100 percent of Iraqi enterprises. It was also confirmed that this would not exclude oil and gas rights.

Some commentators compared the announcement to the auction of damaged goods after a house fire; a more apt comparison might be with a thief’s selling cheap his stolen goods.

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