January 12, 2004

By Phebe Marr

British General Frederick Stanley Maude, occupying Baghdad after a very difficult battle in 1917, told Iraqis: “Our armies have not come into your cities and lands as conquerors and enemies but as liberators. It is the wish not only of my king and his people, but also of the great nations with whom he is in alliance that you should prosper as in the past when your lands were fertile, when your ancestors
gave to the world literature, science, and art, and Baghdad was one of the wonders of the world.” Sound familiar? There are other uncanny similarities between the earlier British occupation and the situation in Iraq that prevails today. Iraq in 1920 was characterized by isolation, political turmoil, economic backwardness and, above all, uncertainty
about its future. In England, Whitehall had no clear policy for administering the Arab parts of the Ottoman Empire, including Iraq. And there were differences of opinion in the bureaucracy among the Foreign, India, and War Offices. Military elites on the ground were in charge of political decisions and they were resisting direction from London.

There were differences of opinion within the alliance as well. The “realist” policymakers of “old Europe” such as Clemenceau and Lloyd George, planned to follow policies based on national interests. From the U.S., an “idealist” and radical vision of the future appeared in Wilson’s Fourteen Points. Educated Arabs, including Iraqis, were confused and rather distrustful of British aims. What followed was a multiyear process of trial, error, and muddling through. The Iraqi constitution, which incorporated the mandate system, was not ratified until 1925—some seven or eight years after the occupation.Frankly, it provided the domestic Iraqi political configuration which lasted essentially until 1958. It is interesting to look at this process because it may provide some clues as to what we are likely to face in Iraq despite the obvious and profound changes that have taken place there since the British mandate.

Phebe Marr

The parallels between Iraq in the early part of the 20th century and the situation today are many, but I will select just a few. In the period between the occupation of 1917 and the award of the mandate in 1920, Britain faced numerous thorny decisions. One was the question of how to deal with the Kurds; whether to integrate them into an Arab Iraq or provide them with autonomy and their own Kurdish leadership. The Kurdish leader in question, Mahmud Barzinji, refused to be subservient to the British and was exiled. The Kurds were then brought into Iraq and have been an unsettling element ever since.

Even more difficult was the process of identifying local Iraqi leadership willing to
work with and under the British. There were “outsiders” such as the eventual Hashemite king, Faisal, and his supporters in Damascus. And there were “insiders” like Talib Naquib, a member of a Basra family of notables. In the end, the outsiders won and Naquib was packed off to India. The intent was to replicate British institutions like the monarchy an to enthrone Faisal in Baghdad to provide the British with a focal point to control the system. But in fact, possibly because it was brought from the outside, the Hashemite monarchy did not establish deep and lasting roots in Iraq.

Most important was the decision on to govern Iraq under the mandate. Initially this decision was made in favor of direct, as opposed to indirect, administration. In the early phases of the occupation and even after the end of the war, Arnold Wilson, a British officer of the Indian school, was in charge. He doubted the capacity of the
local Arabs to govern themselves and felt that a long period of tutelage would
be necessary to bring Iraq the benefits of western government. British soldiers,
mainly young and with little knowledge of the local language and culture, were put in charge of administration throughout the country. They brought efficiencies but also burdens, such as taxes, which were not appreciated locally. Indian and Ottoman legal codes were used and the Indian rupee was even introduced into Iraq as the medium of exchange. Local tribal leaders were relied on to keep order in their districts, but few educated Iraqis were employed in this first administration.

U.S. Army Staff Sergeant Nausadis conducts drill and ceremony training for new Iraqi recruits at the Iraqi Civil Defense Course held near Baghdad, Iraq.

Not surprisingly, opposition to this British policy mounted. Gertrude Bell, aswell as others in the Foreign Office, protested, calling for a shift in policy and more reliance on local Iraqis. But little changed on the ground. The result was the 1920 revolt, which the Iraqis have always regarded as their first national uprising. The revolt was poorly organized, but it included Shi’a religious leaders, tribal leaders, both Sunni and Shi’a intellectuals, and military officers. The revolt was very costly for
Britain. Lasting about three months, it spread over about a third of the country and cost Britain four hundred lives and over forty million pounds. Not surprisingly it caused the British taxpayer to raise questions about the purpose of British occupation in Iraq and its costs.
In Iraq, the revolt became part of Iraq’s national myth. As a result, Foreign Office views finally prevailed over those of the India office and the British shifted to indirect administration. British troops were withdrawn and British personnel
reduced. The British then recruited a localforce of Assyrians, who were loyal
to them, and placed Royal Air Force squadrons in four bases. With this minimal
force, they controlled Iraq until 1932, when Iraq gained independence.
In attempting to cope with the aftermath of the revolt and rising expectations
for self-government, the British foreign office turned to those Iraqis they deemed capable of running a more modern government and willing, at least initially, to cooperate with them.

This group turned out to be the same class of individuals on whom the Ottomans had relied, mainly Arab army officers and lawyers like Nuri Sa’id and others representative of tribal notables, like the Sa’duns, a name you can find in Saddam’s previous administration. In this way, Arab Sunni army officers and
lawyers and their tribal and landowning associates in the countryside came
to dominate the political system. While Kurds and Shi’a were eventually
brought into these cabinets, the dominance of the Arab Sunni element tended
to remain thereafter. British indirect rule was based onseveral pillars. The mandate was applied by means of a treaty in which the British promised to protect Iraq
while its army was being trained and equipped. The British placed advisers behind most Iraqi cabinet ministers. In a dispute, the word of the British advisers prevailed. Eventually, through a concessionary agreement, they also came to control the oil industry. These mechanisms allowed the British to govern Iraq from behind the scenes for a considerable period of time with minimal resources. It was a classic example of empire on the cheap.

To support this structure and fulfill its mandate, the British introduced a variety of democratic institutions. Theseincluded a constitution ratified by an elected Iraqi assembly, a parliament, an election law, provisions for freedom of the press, formation of political parties, and so on. These institutions were hedged throughout by provisions which ultimately kept power in the hands of the British. In fact, the British faced the same challenge as we do today—to prepare Iraq over an unspecified period for self-government through democratic institutions.

But the British had not gone to the expense of war and occupation solely to bring the benefits of democracy to Iraq. Rather, these burdens had beenassumed to protect what they considered to be British interests. Primary among these were securing the route to India, the crown jewel of their empire, protecting access to oil—mainly in Iran but soon to be developed in northern Iraq—and securing the Gulf where they had agreements with Arab Shaikhs. In order to protect these interests they required a friendly local government.

This meant continual manipulation of the parliamentary system and its democratic institutions. It also meant an overwhelming voice in Iraq’s economy. This paradox, in my view, explains why parliamentary institutions did not take root in Iraq.
Perhaps the most important outcome and lesson for us is that this dilemma, called “the peculiar situation” by the Iraqis, gave rise to a vigorous Iraqi nationalist movement. The nationalists focused first on ending the mandate and then on eliminating foreign political influence in Iraq.

Opposition to the British arose among Shi’a, some of whose clerics were sent
into exile across the border into Iran; it arose among the Kurds whose leaders
were suppressed. Opposition also arose among intellectuals and the middle
class. Nationalist opposition to foreign control and influence persisted during
the entire period of the mandate and right up to 1958 when the regime was
finally overthrown.

This strand of anti-colonialism did finally achieve independence for Iraq, but it left a negative legacy as well. It embedded in Iraq a strong strand of political thinking among the intelligentsia that was opposed to foreign interference—especially from the West—and distrustful of cooperation with it. It also distracted Iraqis. Instead
of developing the institutions put in place by the British, gradually removing their controls, and creating broadly-based support for these national institutions, the Iraqis focused on getting rid of the British. As a result, neither the parliamentary institutions —associated in many minds with foreign control—nor the liberal foundations of the system—elections, political parties, an open press—took root.
Instead, the political dynamics of traditional society and reliance on the Ottoman institutions of the army and the bureaucracy prevailed. Indeed, they still prevail today.

There are more lessons. The British were not successful in controlling two key Iraqi institutions: education and the army. Early on, education was put in the hands of an outstanding but controversial figure, Sati el-Husri, an Ottoman-educated Syrian who was a late but committed convert to secular Arab nationalism. He played a profound role in shaping Iraqi education and setting it in a secular, nationalist
direction. This approach alienated a number of the Kurds and Shi’a, creating
problems within the education system that persist today.

The British also lost control of the army. They began by training a new Iraqi army led by former Ottoman officers. However, a divide soon opened between the nationalists who wanted to use the army as a school for their cause, and the British who feared exactly this outcome. It is not surprising that, as soon as the British relinquished some control of Iraq in 1932, the army was greatly enlarged and quickly became the premiere political institution in the country. In fact, the Middle
East’s first military coup took place in Iraq in 1936 and the military intervened
in politics constantly behind the scenes thereafter. In 1941, army officers engineered a nationalist coup which almost succeeded in overthrowing the pro-Western regime. It took a second British occupation from 1941 to 1946 to restore the previous system. These measures proved only temporary. In 1958, this system was overthrown for good by the Iraqi military.

The last decade of the old regime— from the end of World War II to 1958—
represents the epitome of the British legacy. It is a good place to measure how much change the British were able to accomplish. Considerable progress had been made in one areathat we hear a lot about today—the integration of Shi’a and Kurds into the political structure. While the Sunnis definitely had an edge, postwar cabinets did much better in incorporating Kurds and Shi’a. There were several
Shi’a prime ministers, a Kurdish prime minister, and a Kurdish minister of the
interior. It is no accident that in this period we did not hear much aboutethnic and sectarian communities and ethnic and sectarian strife.

Liberalism also made some headway. The constitution was revised in a more liberal direction. Two mainstream political parties, the nationalist Independence Party and the liberal left National Democratic Party, tended to dominate the intelligentsia and the middle class. The Iraq CommunistParty made considerable headway, articularly
among minorities, the Shi’a, and the lower classes. Unfortunately, this liberalism and its institutions were shallow. The parties did not have mass support, elections
were manipulated, newspapers were frequently closed, and martial law was often instituted to prevent street violence. The middle class, thesupport base for the political parties, was incredibly small. Since British education policy was based on educating only the number of people who could be employed, only a little more than a thousand students graduated from higher education establishments
in1958. As a result, the system functioned on the basis of patrimonialism,
personal relations, family and tribalties. The institutions which underpinned
the state—the army and the bureaucracy—were increasingly staffed by competent professionals, technocrats, and functionaries. The economy was underdeveloped and there was a maldistribution of wealth and privilege.

Nevertheless, I think most people today would agree that this period was certainly healthier politically than those which followed. In fact, the older generation looks back on it with considerable nostalgia. If we have to draw one lesson from
this era for the future, it is that the British did not leave strong underpinnings of a democratic system in Iraq. In the end, the British preserved their interests—not without some trouble— for 38 years at minimal cost. This is no small achievement. The Iraqis, too, are not without blame. They failed to build on the political structures and outside help they received. So, both the Iraqis and the British left Iraq with a rather poor foundation for a more democratic future.

Where are we today? The Baath Party and Saddam Hussein were in power for thirty-five years, almost as long as the British. That is a long period of time. The Baathist system relied on a familiar mix: tribalism, family, and technorats, in addition to Baath party machinery and oil money. The first pillar was the tribal and
kinship system. Not only did Saddam Hussein rely on his family, clan and tribe—the Albu Nasir—but allied tribes and clans in the Sunni triangle, an area of Arab Sunni cities and towns north of Baghdad along the Tigris to Mosul, and west along the Euphrates to the borders of Syria. He put his half-brothers in the intelligence services. The Talfah family, which included his maternal uncle and father-in-law, played a role in the ministry of defense. His fatherin-law was a mayor of Baghdad (and a very corrupt one) for years. Related clans like the Duris, Dulaimis and the
Juburis, were deeply embedded in the military intelligence, the special security
organization, and the Republican Guard.

Saddam also re-tribalized Iraq. In the period after the British mandate, tribalism diminished. In the 1960s and 1970s, as the educated middle class grew and as Iraq became an urbanized society (75 percent of Iraq today is urban), tribal ties and tribalism declined. But in the past decade, after a Kurdish uprising in the north and a Shi’a uprising in the south in 1991, Saddam could not rely as much on his
bureaucracy, so he depended increasingly on tribes in the countryside to keep order in return for privileges. Even in the cities, tribal ties became more important and tribal values, law, and customs returned. Today this tribalism is a legacy of Saddam’s era. The second pillar of his regime was the Baath Party. In fact, there is a nexus between tribal and kinship ties and a mass political institution. When
Saddam came into power, there were only a few thousand members of the party. By 1980 some 1.8 million people— one out of ten Iraqis—were in the party. The military was Baathized, education was Baathized, the diplomatic service was Baathized. By the 1980s, it was perfectly clear that one could not get ahead without joining the party.

These members were there for opportunistic reasons. We can work with these people; we really cannot work with the ideologically motivated Baathists. In addition to the Baath Party, Saddam’s regime relied on other institutions: the military (especially the Republican Guard), the intelligence services, and the bureaucracy. Saddam put special emphasis on education. He trained specialists in all fields—science, technology, and politics—to support the regime. He concentrated on high school teachers. The Higher Teachers Training College trained teachers to
spread Baath doctrine. Saddam filled the bureaucracy with competent technocrats.
In fact, he divided his loyalists into two groups: Ahl al-Thiqqah, the people of trust, and Ahl al-Khibra, the people of expertise. The people of trust were family and kin; they filled the top posts in the security mechanism. The people of expertise were the technocrats, on whom he relied to run the government.

The third pillar of Saddam’s rule was an economic “mafia”, which was fed by oil money from the state. Though money was not very copious under sanctions, the flow of money increased after the Oil-For-Food program initiated in 1996. Oil money flowed from government hands to contractors and builders, all of whom had
to have some relationship to the regime. During the last decade, the Kurds in
the north, with some ten percent of the territory and thirteen percent of the
population, had virtual self-government. For the first time in their history, the Kurds were virtually free of government control. Their experience in semi-democracy is very interesting and is worth examining because it does give some hope for the future in Iraq. It could become a model of what we might expect in southern and central Iraq. The two main Kurdish parties are the Kurdistan Democratic Party under Massoud Barzani and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan under Jalal Talabani. The Kurds held one election in 1992 but could not agree on power sharing between a government and an opposition so they split the Kurdish territory in two: Barzani governs one portion and Talabani governs the other.

But both parties are relatively open, secular, pro-Western, and moving in a more liberal direction. The Shi’a population, particularly the thirty percent who live in the
south, was neglected and alienated under Saddam. The secular Shi’a do not have any outstanding leader representing them. Instead religious leaders have moved into the vacuum and have become the dominant leaders and voices of the Shi’a. Some are moderate. Ayatallah Sistani believes in a separation between mosque and state.

Muhammad Baqir al-Hakim (now deceased) headed an umbrella group with the initials SCIRI—Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq. Ultimately SCIRI favors an Islamic state but recently has said it supports democracy. A very disturbing newcomer, Muqtada-l-Sadr, a young man who is the son of a former leading cleric killed by the regime, has also moved into the void and is taking a very radical position. But, not all Shi’a are religious. Only a minority want a clerical
theocracy on the Iranian model. The overwhelming bulk of Shi’a, to say nothing of Sunnis, do not want that model. The Sunnis, approximately seventeen percent of the population, did not necessarily support Saddam but they benefited most from his rule and were most heavily Baathized. We have heard of particular groups
that do have spokesman and leaders: the Kurds and the two Kurdish parties,
the Shi’a and their religious leaders, and the Baath, which is giving us such
problems. But there is, I believe, a substantial “moderate middle” in Iraq who
consider themselves Iraqi. They include a number of Kurds, most Shi’a and
many Sunnis. Most of these people are probably more secular than religious
and they want normalization, prosperity, and freedom. They say they want
democracy, but without much experience they may not know exactly what
democracy is. The problem is that they have no outstanding leadership or
organization. Many, especially among the middle class, will have to disentangle
themselves from the Baath Party.

How do we mobilize this group? How do we empower them? How do we get them into government? This is the conundrum facing the United States today. Will the moderate middle be willing to cooperate with the U.S.? In short, the U.S. faces the same dilemma in a somewhat different form as did the British. The occupation has
raised questions. Why are we there? What are the goals? In the run-up to this war, essentially two broad goals were advanced. One can be defined as U.S. security interests. It was said that this was a part of the war on terrorism, that there was a connection between Saddam’s regime and Usama Bin Laden. Bin Laden may have controlled a slice of territory in the north of Iraq. But no real link has so far been established between Iraq and Bin Laden. There was also the question of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Saddam had a WMD program. How far advanced it was is still a question. What would he do with nuclear weapons if he acquired them? Was he on the verge of using them? All of this is part of the debate. A second set of
goals, very much like Wilson’s visionary Fourteen Points, were based on correcting human rights abuses and the need for democracy. This, it was asserted, would change the whole dynamic of the region. Unfortunately, the neoconservatives
who espoused this ideology oversold it. The United States assumed that we only needed to remove a repressive regime and we would be greeted by Iraqis dancing in the street. There would be willingness to cooperate. There would be a collapse of the regime and we could rapidly revive thebureaucracy, bring in the exiles and the
outside leaders, and establish the process of democracy. Clearly these visions have not materialized. They were based on insufficient knowledge of Iraq and what we would find when we arrived. To be fair, however, nobody really knew because Iraq has been very isolated.

There were three assumptions made before the war that have not been realized. One, that there would be a hard battle to defeat Saddam Hussein and the Baath Party. Second, that the population would welcome the U.S. and cooperate with it. Third, that the bureaucracy minus the Baath and Saddam collaborators could be quickly reconstituted.

In my view, we did not defeat the Baath. They are still there. They are starting Plan B. Plan A was to fight in the cities; Plan B was to take off one’s uniform, melt into the population and, when possible, start a guerilla war. Concerning the assumption of cooperation, we do have some cooperation in Iraq. But it is also clear that the welcome was short-lived, the reaction ambiguous, and there is considerable
fear over the return of the Baath. An organization calling itself al-Awdah, “the return,” has emerged. As far as the Iraqis are concerned there are still many Baath agents around and how long the United States will stay is uncertain. We have not done a good job in the post-occupation phase. The lack of electricity, the looting, and the absence of jobs is really incomprehensible to people. That discontent is certainly fueling a lot of the attacks and anti-American sentiment. Moreover,
there is a dislike of occupation which should have been expected. Lastly, we have destroyed the government. That is what we said we were going to do and we have done it with a vengeance. We have eliminated all of the top level of the Baath, and we have abolished the army and the diplomatic service. Unfortunately, it has been difficult to replace.

Once again we return to the old British dilemma: direct versus indirect rule. If indirect, who should govern? Outsiders or insiders? If insiders, then who are they? Above all, what is the U.S. aim in Iraq? To protect its interests? To achieve a peaceful, nonaggressive Iraq without weapons of mass destruction? Or is it to undertake a visionary remake of Iraq, preparing Iraq for democracy? Like the British, the U.S. initially relied on those who did not know Iraq, and is learning as it
goes along and adjusting policy as needed.

The first post-occupation stage of direct administration, led by Bremer and the military, not surprisingly generated an opposition. It is not yet a 1920 revolt, but we do not want it to become one. The major problem remains one of governance. Iraq needs a period of security, peace, and economic revival. The Iraqis themselves need to sit down with outsiders and insiders—especially the insiders—to
talk about a constitution and how they are going to reconcile differences. With
some help from the outside, they need to come up with a constitution that will
transfer authority to them.

To keep Iraq together, the U.S. now needs to buy time. It needs some combination
of a firm hand on security and an Iraqi administration. There are three priorities. Law and order is first. Without it, nothing else can be accomplished. This includes a rule of law that includes not only the police system but courts and codes of law. Second is economic prosperity: an open, active economy will strengthen the middle class and provide a vision for the future which every Iraqi shares. Third, Iraq
must be reintegrated into the outside world. This is a race against time against the forces who are opposed to occupation. We need to see results in Iraq quickly.

What sort of outcome might we expect in Iraq in the medium- to longterm? One scenario, particularly in the face of the insurgency, is that the American taxpayer becomes very unhappy about the situation in Iraq. We draw down or we draw back. It is quite likely if we draw down too much that Iraq will slip into civil war. The result would be a failed state. Iraq will not break up into three parts: the Shi’a
in the south, the Sunnis in the center, and the Kurds in the north. None of these communities is homogeneous; they are all mixed and they can not agree among themselves. But Iraq could break down.

A weak central government could lead to even more Kurdish self-government,
Shi’a religious control over the holy cities, and a central government in Baghdad with little reach. Afghanistan comes to mind. This would be a temptation for neighbors to meddle and would be the worst possible scenario with respect to the war on terrorism. An ongoing guerilla war would make this scenario more difficult
to prevent. However, this is an unlikely scenario. It would be a huge failure for the United States and I cannot imagine that we are going to let that happen.

A second outcome would be localism, perhaps a variant of the first scenario.
The U.S. might find it difficult to create a strong central government. The single most difficult thing for the U.S. and the Iraqis to do is to find national political leadership. In its absence, decentralization may occur in the form of elected municipal councils and provincial administrations. Such efforts are already underway. This approach will satisfy the Kurds in the north, the Shi’a in the south, and maybe even some of the Sunnis in the center. It will be more democratic and
could provide a base from which to build a national leadership. But, a good strong central government will be needed eventually to control the oil and its revenues. Hopefully, such a government will be more open and accountable.

The last two variants are the most likely. One is that the U.S. decides it must turn over power to Iraqis and step back to protect its interests, as did the British. It will draw down its forces and share the responsibility with the international
community or turn over power to Iraqis. The U.S. will keep a minimal presence behind the scenes and not let Iraq collapse, making sure that Iraq does not acquire weapons of mass destruction or threaten its neighbors. But in this scenario, the U.S. does not do much to change Iraq and develop its institutions. We will know this is happening when we start to reemploy the Baathist technocratic class that
knows how to make things run despite the fact that they are Baath.

The other scenario is one in which we proceed with the more radical agenda of permanent institutional change in Iraq. This agenda would engender continual opposition for those dispossessed. This transition would take a minimum of eighteen months to two years, depending on the degree of stamina, diligence, and support from the United States and the international community.

The British experience proved that there is no such thing as empire on the cheap. In Iraq, we will get results only to the extent that we are willing and able to absorb the costs, including the cost of political opposition. The more long-term change we want, the more time, effort, and personnel we will have to apply. If we decide that we need only to protect U.S. interests, and we rapidly turn power over to Iraqis
without much of a support system, we may not even get as much as the British did, which was 38 years of their interests protected at very minimal cost.