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- Volume 2, Issue 3, 2009
International Journal of Contemporary Iraqi Studies - Volume 2, Issue 3, 2009
Volume 2, Issue 3, 2009
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The invasion of Iraq and the mythology of international law
More LessAlthough opposition to the Iraq war often relies on legal argument, the illegality of the invasion is not always easy to prove in international law. The sense of the war's illegality was fuelled by the failure of the United States and the United Kingdom to obtain Security Council sanction prior to the invasion. However, this argument is too simple, and the interpreters of law have generally fallen into two camps; those who supported the invasion tend to see the war as legal, and vice versa for opponents of the invasion. This essay examines the legal arguments for and against the war, and comes to the conclusion that international law is often given a normative status in political debate that it does not deserve. Despite its shortcomings, the author argues for a commitment to the utopian potential of international law, even if this potential is not realizable.
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Political and moral myths in American foreign policy: the neoconservative question
More LessThe United States, under the two presidential terms of George W. Bush, entered in two major wars and saw enacted a series of controversial anti-terrorism measures (warrantless wiretapping, military prison at Guantanamo Bay, the use of enhanced interrogation techniques [torture]). In light of these extreme policies in post-September 11 America, much attention has been paid to the neoconservative ideology and its shaping of Bush Administration policy. Appropriately, opponents of the policies of the Bush administration including John Kerry in 2004 and Barack Obama in 2008 have suggested a return to a traditional American foreign policy, emphasizing military restraint and multilateral cooperation. Underlying these appeals is the notion that neoconservatism represents a break from American foreign-policy tradition, an aberration that can be reversed. The approach in this essay instead treats neoconservatism not as an aberration in American thought, but as a virulent strain of the enduring American ideology, chiefly exceptionalism. The recurring moral motifs in America's foreign policy are examined, with particular focus on the Cold War era and the subsequent post-Soviet era, which culminated in today's War on Terror. It is further argued that the recurring rhetorical themes of US foreign policy its moral example, its democratic mission, permanent threats to democracy were drawn upon to justify the War on Terror, and more particularly, the Iraq war. Because of the nature of the enemy in this case (Islamofascists in their parlance), this American narrative took on interesting mutations, stressing the supposed medievalism and backwardness of the enemy which drew upon well-established Orientalist motifs and stereotypes; the selling of the war was hence facilitated by these cultural reference points, which characterized America's War on Terror as a struggle between modernity and the premodern.
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The United States and Iraq at cross purposes a historic overview
More LessThe United States and Iraq have alternately been good friends and enemies. In the 1980s, after the overthrow of Iran's Shah, the United States encouraged Iraq to wage war against the Islamic Republic. This was followed by arms, intelligence information and money. When the IranIraq war ended, tensions between Baghdad and the Arab states increased. Some Arab states, especially Kuwait, demanded that Hussein should repay the wartime loans. Iraq argued that the money was not loaned but a gift to help fight the Persians. The United States was apparently neutral until Iraq invaded Kuwait. Alarmed by the loss of Kuwaiti oil and perhaps even the fall of the Saudis, the United States launched the 1991 Gulf War. This was followed by 12 years of sanctions against Iraq and the Second Gulf War in 2003. For the last 5 years, the war on Iraq has resulted in the destabilization of the Middle East. The author draws attention to the report of George McGovern and William Polk and agrees with its conclusions. Withdrawal of US armed forces from Iraq, positioning of an international police keeping force, reconstruction aid and the closing down of detention centres. Also, the author believes that there will be no peace in the Middle East until there is a resolution of the Palestine/Israel conflict.
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Britain's democratic vision for Iraq: strategic interest or contingency?
More LessThe British government claimed that one of the objectives of the Iraq war 2003 was to establish democracy and to protect human rights. This article tracks the manner in which Iraq features in successive Foreign and Commonwealth Office annual Human Rights Reports, before and after the war. British initiatives at the United Nations were carefully choreographed so that British policy on Iraq would appear consistent with the international community. After the war, Britain's commitment to building a human rights culture in Iraq was much trumpeted but its actual policies were thin on the ground. This was a war in which both Iraqis and human rights were to be the losers.
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Defying the hegemon: Syria and the Iraq War
More LessWhat are the explanations for and consequences of Syria's defiance of the United States over the Iraq war? Although President Bashar al-Asad had sought to realign Syria westward, the failure of the SyriaIsrael peace process and Syria's oil deals with Iraq soured USSyrian relations while Syria's opposition to the invasion of Iraq created a crisis in which US threats and sanctions targeted Damascus. Syria's Arab nationalist identity made regime acquiescence in overt aggression against an Arab state is impossible. The regime adapted to US pressures with a mix of concessions and counter-pressures. It held stubbornly to its regional cards, bending when pressures were maximized, but seemingly outlasting the US campaign against it.
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Interregional rivalry cloaked in Iraqi Arab nationalism and Iran secular nationalism, and Shiite ideology
More LessTo understand the contemporary IranianIraqi connection, it is important to look at their relationship dating back to the Classical Era. With Iran (the Achaemenid Persia) extending its control over the territory today known as Iraq since 550 BC, and with Iraq trying to influence Iranian politics since General Qasim's nationalist coup in 1958 and Saddam Hussayn's invasion of Iran in 1980, the two neighbours show a constant aspiration for more hegemony in the region. This article argues that Iran influences Iraq for its own political, cultural and economic gains, while Iraq influences Iran because of a general failure of Arab nationalist ideologies and the desire to become a power broker in the Persian Gulf region. To do that the following examines Islamic political activism in Iraq; focuses on Ayatullah Khomeini's connection with his Iraqi counterparts during his exile there; and takes a look at the Shah's surveillance of Iranian Communists and their support by the Iraqi government after 1958, as evidenced in the newly released SAVAK documents.
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Living through war, sanctions and occupation: the voices of Iraqi women
Authors: Jacqueline S Ismael and Shereen T IsmaelWhat is the impact of almost a decade of war (IraqIran war), followed by 13 years of sanctions and then an occupation that is now in its fifth year? Ask women, as we did in a research project initiated in 2004 that asked Iraqi women to reflect on the course of turbulence and change in Iraq over their lifetimes. Invariably, we found, they focused on the Iraqi household, a level of analysis seldom addressed in all the literature on Iraq generated over the last decade or so which generally focuses on the macro level of institutional change, not the micro level of household change. Because of the centrality of the household in the social and cultural construction of Iraqi society, the assessment of change at the household level is central to any assessment of the impact of turbulence on Iraqi society. This essay is based on analysis of interviews with Iraqi women conducted between 2005 and 2007. Nested in a grounded theory methodology, the interviews were conducted face-to-face. Intended to be in-depth, unstructured and open-ended, the interviews focused on exploring significant events in the women's lives.
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Failures (and successes?) of neoliberal economic policy in Iraq
By Samer AbboudArguments for the total overhaul of the Iraqi economy were grounded in neoliberal justifications and erroneous claims that the economy was moribund, inefficient and burdened by endemic corruption and thus, in need of rapid liberalization. The transition to a fully liberalized economy was implemented by Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) officials with little regard for how decades of war and sanctions had shaped the Iraqi economy and the consequences this would have on post-invasion economic policy. The multiple failures of the CPA's neoliberal economic policies originate in this fundamental misreading of the economy and the disregard of specific economic patterns that had developed over the previous decades. Critical evaluation of these phases suggests that economic policy has largely failed to initiate sustained development, reconstruction or rehabilitation of the economy as a result of economic planners' fundamental misunderstanding of the Iraqi economy at the time of the invasion. These failures are the consequences of ideologically-driven policies that emasculated existing state structures, institutions and policy capacities. Furthermore, economic policy has perpetuated and, indeed, deepened the structural dependency of the Iraqi economy on oil revenues rather than generating economic diversification.
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The disintegration of Iraq: the manufacturing and politicization of sectarianism
Authors: Tareq Y Ismael and Max FullerSince the Anglo-American invasion in 2003, Iraqi politics and society have been interpreted through the lens of sectarian division and strife. Iraq under occupation has been beset by sectarian violence; however, contrary to standard belief, this sectarian violence has no significant precedent in Iraqi history, the politicized sectarianism that now dominates Iraq is argued to be the intended result of a deliberate Anglo-American occupation policy that has had at its foundation, the goal to carve Iraq into sectarian enclaves and to engineer a weak, pliable, state. The purpose of this article is thus two-fold: first, this article delineates social folkloric forms of sectarianism in Iraq from the militarized sectarianism that now constitutes Iraqi political culture. This, centred on folk practices, is argued to have been mitigated through a long process of state-building and social secularization. Today's political sectarianism, as reflected in militia activity and religious chauvinism, is presented in terms of Anglo-American occupation strategy, including: the empowering of sectarian militia parties which had no natural constituency in Iraq; the stripping and destruction of Iraq's national symbols; and the imposition of an American-written constitution drained of any national content that only reinforced sectarian division in Iraq. Second, against this backdrop of politicized sectarianism, outposts of genuine Iraqi nationalism are considered, with a particular focus on the populist Sadrist current. This current, an Iraqi national force informed by Islamic notions, represents an uneven but nevertheless genuine resistance movement, who might portend the emergence of further national movements in occupied Iraq.
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