By: Prof Goran Nowicki

Dec 25, 2005

Kurdish New Year 2003 marked the start of the US Iraq war. The war that I referred to as the April's fool war in [1]. What have been the achievements of this April's fool war and what have been the weaknesses and the strengths of the US policy in Iraq?

PUTTING US POLICY IN CONTEXT

Compared to the British and French, America is a newcomer to the political game of the middle east. A new player who has been trespassing the territory of the British especially in Iran and in Iraq. In [2]-[4], I gave a basic overview of the evolution of the US policy in the middle east with a focus on Kurdish policy. The US Kurdish policy in the last 50 years cannot be studied without an overview of the US policy in Iraq, Iran, Turkey and Syria in that period and the establishment of the US hegemony in
the region in the cold war.

In my past reports, I argued for a competition between US and British in the region and that competition is still going on. In this context, the coalition of a Labour prime minister and a US conservative president in conducting the war is interesting to analyse. It is important to note that the present presence of the British forces in the strategically located Shiite south part of Iraq which is the only gateway of Iraq to the Persian Gulf.

Going back to history, the climax of the US-British competition can be located around the events surrounding the premiership of Mosadeq in Iran and the nationalization of Iranian oil which put an end to the domination of the British in Iran and opened the way for the US to extend its hegemony. The British were so angry that Britain imposed a worldwide embargo on the purchase of Iranian oil and in Sept 1951, Britain froze Iran's sterling assets and banned export of goods to Iran.

The later US coup in Iran that brought Mosadeq down was engineered to suppress a Soviet coup in Iran (ironically with the approval of Mosadeq) and at the same time the oil nationalization diminished the British domination in Iran. This strategic and successful move by the US inflicted major defeat to both British and Soviets in Iran that changed the balance of the power in the region. One should note that the Soviet coups had their success in Iraq and the region that further helped to shatter the hegemony of the British in the region.

The extent of British support for the assassination of pro-US politicians in Iran after Mosadeq is well documented and indicates the degree of the US-British competition in Iran and the region. in this context, the link that the British made to the Iranian clergy (headed by Ayatollah Kaszani at the time) and the later opposition of Kaszani to Mosadeq are worthy to note.

At present in Iraq, the British enjoy this history of cooperation between the Shiite clergy and them which has had the potential to be further extended and strengthened over the past 50 years. One should also note the role of BBC service in the Iranian revolution and the bringing down of Shah, the American key pawn in Iran.

In contrast, the closest contact that the US had with the Shiite clergy was the capture of the US embassy in Iran and the title of "The Great Satan" that Khomaini choose for the American government. The Brits also suffered to an extent by the Iranian revolution that opened the way for the new French terminology in Farsi such as revolutionary "committees", revolutionary guard "brigadiers" and replaced the British made Iranian national car with car products from France.

The Great Satan was out of Iran and the revolution's leader came back on the angelic wing of an airplane from France. The French were the silent winners of the revolution in Iran.

FROM AFGHANISTAN TO IRAQ

Before the US Iraq war in 2003, the US-Iranian relations were not as black and white. It is true that the US supported Saddam during the Iraq-Iran war to contain the expansion of the Iranian revolution, but the US politicians managed to reach good understanding and cooperation with the Iranian Shiite clergies in international
conflicts such as Yugoslavia and Afghanistan.

It is true that Bush enjoyed the support of Iran "the axis of Evil" and the Iranian intelligence in its war in Afghanistan. But the Bush administration's "axis of Evil" rhetoric against Syria and Iran at the time it was preparing for war in Iraq can be considered as one of the mistakes of the US in conducting war in Iraq.

US won the battle of Iraq but afterwards the US forces have been bleeding badly from the proxy war of Iran and Syria in Iraq. A wiser approach would have been and will be to keep the anti-Iran, anti-Syria rhetoric down to prevent the common political mistake of fighting in many fronts.

So far, Iran has successfully managed to bug down the US forces in Iraq and replace an ineffective Iranian president (i.e, Khatami) by a conservative former revolutionary guard (i.e. Ahmadinejad) from the new bread of Savage neo-cons in Iran. In the chess terminology that I used in some of my articles [5]-[6], the US gave this window of opportunity to the conservatives in Iran to move their pawn to the end of the chessboard and replace it by a garnd Vazier.

The US is playing politics as if playing Poker, while the Iranians are playing Chess which looks Greek to the US policy makers. In the Iranian way of thinking, the US forces are "Aczmaz" in Iraq. They cannot simply move to threaten the Iranian king or Vazier (Queen).

Ahmadinejad since coming into power has created a cabinet of former revolutionary guards and Iran is readier to fight the US. During the past two years, Iran has also managed to accelerate its Atomic Bomb program and the US hesitation in Iraq has given yet another golden opportunity to the Iranians. Iranian having A-Bomb may not be a big issue for US, but for Kurds who live right next to Iran is a major deterrent for any prospect of Kurdish-US cooperation against atomic Iran.

Ahmadinejad has also visited with his military cabinet the major potential fronts which US may attack (with the exception of Kurdistan and Azerbaijan). He has also visited the United States, his enemy thanks to some astonish "stupid intelligence" of the US.

I call it "stupid Intelligence" because the same apparatus has been arresting innocent Kurdish and Iranian scholars trying to attend US conferences and damaging US public image and the support for the US among the Diaspora. Just last July one of the Kurdish-Canadian professors was handcuffed/foot shackled and arrested in the US Canada border for attending a conference in the US. Ironically the same apparatus issues US visas for the Ahmadinejad entourage and throws red carpet in front of an international terrorist who has open files for assassinating Kurdish and Iranian political leaders. It was reported that Ahmadinejad's airplane avoided landing in Europe fearing a pending European arrest warrant for him.

It is not comprehensible what is US achieving by having a trade and border war with its northern neigbour at the time it is conducting a major military operation involving hundreds of thousands of personnel, thousands of miles away against axis of Evil?

This is unprecedented in the military history.

These are signs of a bigger problem with the US policy in Iraq and the extent of the mess that the Bush administration is in Iraq.

..... WHAT WENT WRONG IN IRAQ

[End of Part 1]

REFERENCES

[1] Goran Nowicki, April's Fool Gulf War II, Kurdistan Observer, 11 Feb 2003.
[2] Goran Nowicki, Spelling Out US Kurdish Policy I, Kurdistan Observer, 3 Jul 2004
[3] Goran Nowicki, Spelling Out US Kurd Policy II, Kurdistan Observer, 19 Jul 2004
[4] Goran Nowicki, Spelling Out US Kurdish Policy III, Kurdistan Observer, 3 Aug 2004
[5] Goran Nowicki, Chessboard of Iraq, Kurdistan Observer, 24 Mar 2005.

[6] Goran Nowicki, A new chessboard of the Middle East, Kurdistan Observer, 24 May 2005.