The Occasional Dissident

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- We Americans on the plight of Iraq’s displaced, today

 

Dear citizens, a few years ago, as I was working to get our military forces out of Iraq, I asked a very dear and very brilliant friend to review an essay I had just written.  She kindly applauded my efforts at describing the imperative of withdrawal before chiding me mildly for ignoring the Iraqi people and all humanitarian concerns. As you can easily see, neither I nor anyone else here succeeded in getting US forces out of Iraq.  It was the Iraqi government that forced President Bush to agree to a withdrawal deadline in 2008.  However, working on the Iraq Transitional Assistance Group proposal did provide me a chance to speak to several classes at American University about the plan and the war in Iraq.  And, these talks provided a chance to answer the very correct criticism of my friend.  I suggested to my audiences that they could do a lot of good for Iraqis and Americans by studying the “right of return” for Iraqis displaced from their homes by the violence that consumed Iraq.  I do not know how many students took me up on my challenge, but I am now joining any who did.

 

Over the next two years and perhaps longer, I will be spending most of my time studying the plight of displaced Iraqis, those still in Iraq but driven from their homes and those who have sought refuge in other countries.  Together, they total nearly 4.8 million.  For those of you wanting a comparison, the permanent population of Washington, DC is about 600,000.  So, imagine our nation’s capital displaced eight times.  Perhaps more relevant, the US Census Bureau lists the 2000 (pre-Katrina) population of New Orleans as a bit over 484,000—about ten percent of the displaced Iraq population.  Regular readers will find essays published here periodically focusing on this issue as it is of great importance to us as well as to the Iraqis and to those nations hosting Iraqis who have fled the violence that we brought forth.  I hope that I can uncover solutions and bring them to your attention.  First, however, I wish to call to your attention the displaced Iraqis and give you some sense of why you should care.

 

Consider the interactions between the United States and the people of Iraq over the past two decades.  This interaction comes in three dominant phases: sanctions, invasion, and occupation.  Following our efforts to drive Iraqi forces out of Kuwait in 1991 and the aborted rebellion by Shi’a in Iraq inspired by the US President, we insisted on sanctions to constrain the regime of Saddam Hussein while United Nations weapons inspectors searched for, uncovered, and destroyed thousands of tons of prohibited weapons.  Sanctions helped—some—to persuade Saddam to cooperate in dismantling the weapons of mass destruction programs that threatened his neighbors and others.  However, sanctions did not do all we hoped.  The inspections were the key in keeping Saddam’s weapons programs in check.  The sanctions also did not stop the dictator from spending money on himself.  While the Iraqi middle class dwindled into near nothingness, more and more Iraqis suffered from lack of medical care, and most were forced to accept food directly from Saddam through a manipulated “oil-for-food” program, Saddam built grand palaces.  The damage done to Iraqis by our sanctions and Saddam’s malfeasance was so widespread and so severe that Osama bin Laden found it an effective recruitment tool, basing his fatwa calling on Muslims to kill Americans on the Iraqi suffering he blamed on us.

 

The Associated Press conducted a careful survey of civilian fatalities following the “shock and awe” bombing campaign and the US-led invasion of Iraq.  Excluding counts from hospitals that did not distinguish between civilian and military fatalities, the AP found that at least 3,200 Iraqis died (http://globalpolicy.org/component/content/article/167/35338.html).  The Iraqi government recently released its official count of the civilians who died from occupation-related violence from the beginning of 2004 through October 31, 2008 (a partial count in that this excludes 2003 and 2009 fatalities along with two months from 2008).  The total is 85,694 (http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2009-10-14-iraq-report_N.htm).  We should find little to be surprised at when we hear often that bin Laden and his al Qaeda affiliates have had great success in recruiting Muslims to attack the United States by citing our invasion and occupation.

 

Dear citizens, I take it on faith that 2 million Iraqis forced out of the country and temporarily settled under tough and often dire conditions in Syria, Jordan, Egypt and other neighbors are a potential destabilizing element.  I further imagine that nearly 2.8 million Iraqis inside Iraq but not in their homes may be a looming danger.  Whether inside or outside Iraq, the displaced are witnessing their personal finances disappear.  Rents—if they have a place to rent—are increasingly unaffordable.  Most refugees are not permitted to work.  Many in Iraq and in the neighboring countries cannot find work.  Too many families cannot afford school for their children.  Some require their children to work to help pay for shelter and food.  Joseph Sassoon notes in The Iraqi Refugees that 26 percent of the 400-500,000 Iraqis seeking refuge in Jordan are less than 15 years old.  There are perhaps 1.2 million or even 1.5 million Iraqis in Syria.  Sassoon cites an estimate that 10 percent of the Iraqi children in Syria are working to help support their families.  A generation of Iraqis is in danger of missing out on the education necessary to secure a successful future.  They may be easy recruits for groups wishing to harm Iraqis or wishing to harm us.  Relatively fortunate Americans criticize the Obama administration for not doing enough to reduce unemployment.  Imagine just for a moment that you are in the situation experienced by these Iraqis.

 

Dedicating a sincere, effective effort to repatriate and resettle Iraq’s displaced is a chance for us to do something to balance the past two decades that have seen our actions visit grave harm on innocent Iraqis.  Certainly, we have done a great deal of reconstruction in Iraq and have contributed to dealing with the displaced, but certainly much, much more must be done.  The United Nations is working with many organizations to resolve this humanitarian crisis.  If they succeed, then we may miss an opportunity to contribute to the welfare of Iraqis in a manner that can be starkly different from our interactions over the past twenty years.  If the United Nations is unsuccessful, then we can expect further chaos in Iraq as people take it upon themselves to force a solution.  The displacement and internal resettlement in Baghdad changed the demographics of most neighborhoods and of the entire city.  The ratio of Shi’a to Sunni went from two-to-one in early 2006 to three-to-one by late 2007.  A returning mass of Sunni homeowners could easily lead to a renewed sectarian conflict.  We would be blamed.  We would be targeted.

 

This is not something about which we can safely remain silent.  It is very much in our national interest that we stay engaged in rebuilding homes and communities and lives in Iraq—that we be seen doing something for Iraqis after doing so much to Iraqis.  At the end of 2011, in compliance with the agreement signed by our last President, the last of our military forces will be going home.  The image for the Iraqi people must not be a view of our backs as we are leaving Iraq.  Rather, they must see an extended friendly hand that will not withdraw until they too are going home.  You must call out loudly for that result, or it will not happen.

 

- Alan Howe, January 2010