Abstract

True Sovereignty for Iraq

The author comments on the U.S. plan for handing over sovereignty of Iraq to the Iraqi people. The quagmire in Iraq seems to deepen by the week, with the guerrilla resistance growing stronger and more sophisticated. In response to these events and to a new CIA report warning of the growing disaffection of the Iraqi people, the Bush Administration has unveiled an "Iraqization" strategy that moves up the date for turning over some control to an Iraqi governing body to June and that speeds up the process of training Iraqi police and security forces. Also anticipated is the first withdrawal of US troops next spring, several months before the presidential election. The new Bush policy seems more an exercise in political expediency-an attempt to put an Iraqi face on the US occupation while preparing the way to cut and run if the going gets tough-than a serious plan for fostering Iraqi democracy, stabilizing the country or bringing US troops safely home. The Administration seems to believe it can get more Iraqis to join its efforts without ceding, in the near term, any real sovereignty. The better, and ultimately more responsible, alternative is an immediate restoration of Iraqi sovereignty--ideally through a process overseen by the UN---combined with an orderly but rapid withdrawal of US troops.