In this season of conflict, the United States once again finds itself rebuilding a failed state, a process that has occurred with disturbing regularity since the end of the Cold War. In spite of the declaration that “major combat operations” have ended, it is clear that the struggle in Iraq will not be over for some time. Since the president triumphantly spoke to the nation onboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, 132 additional American soldiers have lost their lives.
Nearly two weeks ago, 17 people were killed by a car bomb at the Jordanian embassy, and riots broke out around Basra over fuel shortages. This is just an example of another bad week in a series of bad months for the U.S. administrators of the country. The recent bombing of the UN compound in Baghdad, which killed 20 and wounded 100, has awakened much of the world to the reality that the current top-down state building approach is doomed. Whether terror originates from Ansar al Islam, the local branch of al-Qaeda, or disgruntled members of the Ba’ath Party, these murderous groups will continue to flourish until the Iraqi people are made true stakeholders in their future. The writing has been on the wall, and until the U.S. reads it, expect horrific episodes like this to dominate the front pages.
Ambassador L. Paul Bremer said in a recent news conference, “Freedom matters, it is important to remember this … and remind ourselves of the range of rights that Iraqis enjoy today because of the coalition’s military victory.” What Bremer fails to recognize is that while the Iraqi people are free, they do not own their newfound freedom.
If we are to salvage this increasingly dire situation, the administration must not succumb to the tired pattern of state building pursued by both the first Bush and the Clinton administrations following the failure of central government in Somalia, Haiti, and the former Yugoslavia. In every case, Washington tried to re-impose central control without assessing why there was a collapse of top-down authority. Instead, the Bush administration must pursue a model that recognizes the unique political realities in the country—realities that call for a looser governmental structure.
Rhetoric and Reality
On Feb. 26, 2003, President Bush said,
The United States has no intention of determining the precise form of Iraq’s new government. That choice belongs to the Iraqi people. Yet, we will ensure that one brutal dictator is not replaced by another. All Iraqis must have a voice in the new government, and all citizens must have their rights protected.
The administration should continue to seek an optimal political outcome, but it must allow the Iraqi people to reach their own political decisions. Ignoring this reality risks the classic “imperial trap” that succeeds only in creating illegitimate winners and vengeful losers. For if the U.S. is seen to impose a political solution on the Iraqis, any subsequent government would be viewed as an American puppet. We would then be faced with two very unpalatable policy options: staying indefinitely to bolster an unpopular government or leaving and watching the imposed regime be replaced by a radical nationalist intent on developing nuclear weapons. Empire or failure: an autocratic approach will yield one or the other.
There are those who argue that Iraq’s U.S.-appointed Governing Council is the first step in this complex evolution. Its recent progress in the creation of a constitutional committee has come to the delight of many in the administration, but it has moved at far too slow a pace in turning over genuine political power to Iraqis. For at the end of the day, it is not the administration that will be living in Iraq. The able servant Mr. Bremer has acknowledged the importance of self-governance, but actions have yet to match rhetoric. Washington’s anointing of 22 men and women as Iraq’s “representatives” in the Governing Council damages the credibility of the process and places the onus on any future government to prove its independence from the United States.
The best hope for sustainability is the immediate pursuit of a decentralized confederal system. With Iraq’s streets still unsafe, unemployment mounting, a black market thriving, and basic services lacking, restoring order—much less a viable self-sustaining government —remains a difficult proposition. But we are obliged to attempt it, and under the circumstances, a decentralized confederal system is the most plausible blueprint for Iraq’s future.
A Workable Model: The Confederal System
Iraq, which the Ottoman Empire divided into three provinces based on the regional primacies of the Kurds, Sunnis, and Shi’ites, was united into a state in the interest of British bureaucratic simplicity. It is not a cohesive nation in the Western sense. The Sunni Arab elite has historically treated the more numerous Shi’ites and Kurds as second-class citizens, enriching themselves at the majority’s expense. The challenge is to establish a system that offers the leaders of each group a large degree of local autonomy and a fair share in the country’s resources.
To ensure that power is devolved to the lowest possible level and that centralized power is diluted in recognition of the primacy of the regions, the Iraqi people should develop their own version of America’s Great Compromise. Struck during the Constitutional Convention of 1787, this agreement called for representation based on both the number of states—the Senate—and overall population—the House of Representatives—so that larger states enjoy political strength and smaller states have an effective check over their more populous neighbors.
Such a solution suits the conditions in Iraq. The legislature should have an upper chamber in which power is evenly distributed among the three regions, with representatives of the chamber parceled out equally by sub-national grouping; the lower chamber’s members should be elected based on overall population.
The administration should persuade the leaders of Iraq’s Sunni Arabs, Shi’ite Arabs, and Kurds that this confederal system is the best means of assuring local autonomy, protecting against the return of a tyrannical central government, and assuring them an equitable share in the disbursement of Iraq’s oil and tax revenues. Rebuilding the country along decentralized lines would leave fewer opportunities for the central government to finance and undertake a threatening military buildup and menace its neighbors. At the same time, such a system would be cohesive and legitimate enough to guarantee Iraq’s territorial integrity. Each of Iraq’s major groups wants something different from a post-Saddam political settlement. The good news is that a loose confederation can accommodate their most essential interests.
Benefits for the Kurds
The traditional homeland of the Kurds, who constitute around 20 percent of the total population of Iraq, contains about 15 percent of the country’s proven oil reserves. But under Saddam, the Kurds shared proportionately little of Iraq’s immense oil wealth. A confederal system would give them a greater share of oil revenues, as well as a constitutional guarantee of regional self-government and a voice in the national government. Such benefits would prove far more attractive than the temporary, and tenuous, economic gains they had received as the middlemen in the smuggling trade between Baghdad and Turkey.
Using Iraq’s 2001 total revenue on oil products of $21.16 billion, for example, and splitting revenues from an 8 percent overall tax on petroleum products so that 30 percent goes to the national government and 70 percent to the three major ethnic groups, would mean the Kurds would receive $462 million, which they could use to reconstruct their ravaged region. The United States must impress upon the Kurdish leaders that this mammoth economic consideration, which suits both their interests and those of the United States, is theirs to gain by advocating a decentralized confederal system.
In return for these monetary benefits, the Bush administration should insist that the Kurds abandon their dreams of an independent Kurdistan. Such a separatist state would destabilize postwar Iraq and could serve as a powerful magnet, polarizing many of Turkey’s 10 million Kurds and possibly re-igniting a bloody separatist war in eastern Turkey. Thus, an independent Kurdistan would also undermine America’s most important ally in the region.
Benefits for the Sunni Arabs
Iraq’s Sunni Arab minority has long dominated the state and controlled its disbursal of oil revenues, even though the predominantly Sunni central region accounts for little of Iraq’s oil reserves. As Saddam and much of his power elite come from the region near his home village, Tikrit, which is located in the center of the country, the Sunni Arabs are the most pro-Saddam and the least amenable to a new postwar government.
Nevertheless, the administration should stress the tangible rewards that the Sunnis would receive for agreeing to a new political settlement. First, the United States would help them rebuild Baghdad, where the new government would take up residence. Second, in a loose confederation, with taxation of oil revenue occurring at the national as well as regional levels, the Sunnis will guarantee themselves economic stability, despite their own relative lack of oil reserves. Third, by acquiescing in such a settlement, the Sunnis can hasten the end of the occupation of Iraq.
Benefits for the Shi’ite Arabs
The Shi’ite Arabs probably have the most to gain from this post-Saddam political settlement. Although they account for the majority of the population of Iraq and form the predominant group in the southern oil fields that provide the bulk of Iraq’s oil production, the Shi’ites have had almost no say in how Iraq is governed or in the distribution of oil revenues.
Unlike the Kurds who gained considerable autonomy, the Shi’ites continued to suffer under Saddam’s repressive rule. Iran’s brand of radical Islamic revolution has considerably less appeal for Shi’ites in Iraq, who see the growing political, economic, and social problems that the aging ayatollahs are unwilling or unable to address in Iran. For example, Iraqi Shi’ites spurned the calls of Iran’s Shi’ite ayatollahs to rise up against Saddam during the Iran-Iraq war, even when the Iranians appeared to be winning the conflict. Washington has an opportunity to anchor the Shi’ites within a revived post-Saddam Iraq by stressing the political inducements and economic benefits that a decentralized system could bring the south. By embracing a confederal solution for Iraq, the Shi’ites will for the first time gain genuine political representation in Baghdad, receive a large economic boost from the income generated by local taxation of their oil reserves, and enjoy a large degree of local autonomy.
Representation for the Stakeholders
A loose confederal approach based on the Great Compromise model has the advantage of making each of Iraq’s major sub-national groups stakeholders in the final constitutional settlement. All three will find themselves with local political autonomy but without the threat of repression from the central government; each region within this confederal system would receive an equitable distribution of Iraq’s immense oil reserves, sufficient to reconstruct its geographical stronghold. And each group will be part of Iraqi national decision-making. This newfound stability will enable Iraq to provide security for its people without threatening its neighbors. But in the end, it will be up to the Iraqis themselves to establish their government. They must take ownership of the constitutional outcomes for their respective polities rather than hide behind the notion of an American or UN diktat, as so often happened under the vague nation building policies of the Clinton administration.
In fact, the approach recommended in this article differs dramatically from the cookie-cutter approach that is commonly known as nation building. While there are many moral and practical flaws to that approach, perhaps its greatest failing is that it ignores the facts on the ground. The world is a diverse place, and local political, economic, ethnic, religious, and cultural conditions can vary so greatly that a simplistic Western-imposed edict that ignores these realities will be doomed to failure. It is imperative the Bush administration remember this as it grapples with the difficult days ahead. 
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John C. Hulsman, Ph.D. is a Research Fellow at The Heritage Foundation. William L.T. Schirano is a research assistant to Dr. Hulsman. The views expressed are the authors’and in no way reflect the policy of the Heritage Foundation.
