In October I wrote a column about Ahmad Chalabi and his role in providing false information to the Bush administration that later became their justification for the war in Iraq (“Chalabi makes spy game a reality,” 10/22/04). I wrote, in part:
“When future historians write about this war, I suspect they will sum it up like this: In the year 2003, neoconservatives within the Bush administration were duped by an Iranian double agent into attacking Iraq and removing Saddam Hussein in order to pave the way for a pro-Iran, Shia-controlled Iraq. It was one of the greatest acts of espionage ever perpetrated against the superpower.”
My prediction became a reality this week when the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq tallied the final votes for last month’s election. The Shiite-led United Iraqi Alliance (UIA), backed by Iraq’s most influential Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, received over 4 million votes, nearly half of the Iraqi electorate. By contrast, U.S.-backed interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi and his Iraqi List received a measly 14 percent of the vote, at distant third to the Kurdish alliance. It is official: President Bush has lost an election, and the Supreme Court can’t save him this time.
The UIA will hold 140 seats in the 275-member National Assembly, a majority that will still require them to appease the Kurdish factions in order to achieve the two-thirds majority necessary for most Assembly decisions. Keeping the UIA united is another concern; after all, it is a coalition of several different parties with several different agendas, mainly the Dawa Party, the Supreme Council for the Iraqi Revolution in Iraq, and the Iraqi National Alliance headed by Ahmad Chalabi.
Ahmad Chalabi? The last time we heard from him was when his neocon friends in the White House, who originally fingered him to become the leader of the new Iraq, had abandoned him due to accusations that he passed U.S. secrets to Iran. But now Chalabi is back and in power. In fact, he is in a two-man race to become the next prime minister of the new Iraq.
For what it is worth, Chalabi has my vote. He would make a fantastic leader during this critical transitional period when the Assembly is charged with the lofty task of crafting a national constitution from scratch. He is a shrewd secularist that has managed to ingratiate himself with Iraq’s various religious and ethnic sects. I believe he desires to see Iraq become an inclusive modern democratic state informed, but not controlled, by the Islamic religious elite. And though he is close to Tehran, he is also a vocal supporter of the democratic reform movement currently rising up from the grassroots in Iran.
Unfortunately, it appears as if Chalabi is going to lose the prime ministership to Dawa Party leader Ibrahim al-Jaafari. Gossip has him in front as the Assembly sets to vote in a secret ballot. The final results might not be known until Monday.
Though Jaafari’s rhetoric has been moderate as of late, there is still much fear that he intends to impose Islamic law on Iraq; some even describe him as a cleric in a business suit. It is true that the Dawa Party platform calls for the Islamization of the Iraqi government, but Jaafari backed away from that position in a recent interview with the Associated Press. Others fear that Jaafari is too close to the Iranians. The late Dawa leader Muhammad Baqr al-Sadr was inspired by the Iranian revolution and after membership in Dawa was made punishable by death under Saddam Hussein, many members fled to Iran, where they remained until the American occupation.
Regardless of how secular and democratic Iraq becomes, Americans need to come to terms with this simple fact: The democratization of the Middle East will most likely result in more anti-American sentiment, not less, in the short term. The U.S. installed oppressive dictators in Central and South America for a reason — getting a dictator to push a pro-U.S. agenda at the detriment of his or her people is far easier than a democratically elected leader. I would anticipate the new Iraqi government will push U.S. contractors out of their country in favor of Iraqi ones, especially when the security situation improves. From a U.S. perspective, we have endured much suffering for very little gain. But from an Iraqi perspective, their suffering has resulted in a new hope for long-term freedom, peace and prosperity.
I doubt this is what the neocons in the Bush administration had in mind when they embarked on this war. But I am sure that this is exactly what Chalabi envisioned from day one. He is Iraq’s best hope to avoid falling into a repressive Islamic theocracy, ala the Taliban. Chalabi has done more to bring about the new Iraq than any other Iraqi — who could possibly make a better prime minister?

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