During the early hours of the 19th of March 2003, president Bush was broadcasting to the world the news that he has ordered the American military to start executing operation Iraqi freedom which was to remove Saddam Hussein from power because of his possible links to the Sept. 11 perpetrators  and to Osama bin laden and  the huge threats his arsenal of weapons of mass destruction was posing to the world and the US in particular and to free the Iraqi people from his tyranny  which has lasted 3 decades and to help the Iraqi people start on the greatly needed reconstruction of their country and the rejuvenation of its moribund infrastructure and institution. The military operation lasted 19 days at the end of it Saddam was toppled, his regime in tatters and the Americans sitting in his presidential palace and within few more days to be in control of the whole country.

When the American military intervention in Iraq ended with the collapse of the Ba’athists regime and the topping of its leader there was a real joy with its outcome and a great deal of appreciation of the American effort for achieving a dream the Iraqis were themselves unable to pull out alone because of the and murderous regime Saddam  has been able to build  during three  decades of tyranny. There was a genuine pleasure with the American operation in this country which the Bush Administration called “operation Iraqi freedom”. Many Iraqis including myself were expecting the military phase which was a perfectly organized, extremely professionally executed and completely successful operation would be followed by a similarly well planed and similarly well executed reconstruction of the already almost totally devastated infrastructure and the country’s institutions. But the Iraqis were to be disappointed. when the Americans were planning operation Iraqi freedom to change the regime of Saddam Hussein they promised and in the words of their highest officials that after finishing the military phase they will immediately start a program of reconstruction and rehabilitation of the country’s infrastructure and the rehabilitation of its moribund and dying institutions something akin to the Marshal plan through which America rebuilt western Europe after the end of the second world war and the fall of the Nazis, but we did not get a Marshall plan we got Orha,

Oraha is an acronym for the office of reconstruction and rehabilitation and Orha arrived after the end of the major hostilities under the leadership of a retired army general who has been involved in the efforts to help the Kurds after the brutal suppression of their 1991 uprising a project called operation provide comfort which was very successful. Garner arrived with a team composed of a handful of ex ambassadors, few defense dept. officials and few more ex generals, but Garner did not last for a very long time he was replaced after three weeks by Paul Bremer  an unknown ex-diplomat who used to work in the antiterrorist office in the state dept. but was recently working in the Kissinger consultancy in New York , the man had no previous experience in nation building and was directly responsible to a small number of very high administration officials to whom he reported and from whom he received his directives, the man was running the affairs of the country like the old imperial viceroys during the hay days of the British empire extremely self assured and very arrogant, it was very clear and from very early on that the administration was not going to honor its promises to the Iraqis which were so repeatedly and eloquently repeated to the Iraqis, it was very clear that what was happening was in fact the execution of a totally different and a secret agenda, all of this helped the emergence and flourishing of a very nasty and tenacious resistance which was to grow into a monstrously violent opposition to the presence of the Americans which would cause them thousands of casualties and hundreds of billions of dollars.

The great disappointment if the Iraqis with the turn of the events and the failure of the Americans to honor their promises created an increasing frustration and bitterness to all of this was added the results of the incredible mistakes of the new civil administration which was led by Bremer and was called the coalition provisional authority – the CPA-the first of which he ordered few days after arriving in Baghdad namely; the banning of the Baath party and the disbanding of the military which left after one stroke of his pen no less than a million young and healthy individuals jobless and open to advances by the opposition, all of this was used by various groups from inside and outside the country to widen the wedge between the Iraqis and the Americans under the guise of fighting god’s war against the infidels which have occupied the land using very often money and weapons which were given to them by their various sponsors, the most dangerous and bloody amongst this plethora of murderers was bin lad en’s al Qaeda which has succeeded in turning the country into its most important theater of operations in the global war against the American infidels and the Christian west.

Bremer reigned for one year in Iraq, a year of mistakes and blunders which created an extremely fertile soil for all the violence and destruction which followed, his first order few days after arriving in Iraq disbanding the army left the country with a serious force to defend the country against its internal and external enemies, the other order dissolving the Bath party left hundreds of thousands of people without jobs, very experienced engineers doctors and teachers and many other professionals and technocrats were thrown in the street he didn’t bother about the fact that that so many people were called Ba’athists only in name who were forced to join,  many more joined to secure a better job or a place for their kids in a university these were forced into the streets leaving them with the single bitter option of having to join the armed opposition against the new regime the people who were using very virulent tactics in what they called a justified fight against the invasion and occupation   the brutal killers  and the very dangerous agents of the old regime have already escaped to neighboring countries  who in due time will resume their activities against the new order.

During the year the viceroy spent in Iraq there was no reconstruction of the country or a rejuvenation of its infrastructure and its moribund institution the man spent most of his time in trying to democratize occupied Iraq, the bush administration in its great wisdom decided that the middle east should undergo an intensive course in democracy and that recently liberated Iraq was an ideal candidate, the viceroy was in total agreement so by the end of his tenure he was able to provide the country with a legal document which he called a provisional constitution and manufactured a 52 member committee which was made of a very diverse group of men and women who were selected mainly from the Iraqi exiles who have lived the many previous years outside their own country , the group was called the governing council and was given the job of running the country and having done his homework like that capably and  efficiently he left the country back to the united states to receive from president Bush one very high and respectable decoration.

Paul Bremer’s year in Iraq was a very bad for Iraq and the Iraqis, every aspect of the life of the country was even before he left including security, the provision of food and medicines, the service ,etc, were showing signs of very rapid degeneration and within a very short time will turn life  into a terrible nightmare, a swamp into which both the Americans and the Iraqis were sucked and both sides are still paying a huge toll in terms of human life and resources, the Americans are planning to withdraw some of their forces by next august and will withdraw all their military in Iraq by 2012. Let us see.

Najeeb Hanoudi
Sunday, 11 April 2010
Southfield/Michigan
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