Lessons from Saddam

A WRITER in a Lahore newspaper (January 5, 2007) interprets Saddam Hussein’s execution as the Bush administration’s signal to Muslim rulers that if they do not submit to American hegemony, they will meet the same fate. This is poetic exaggeration. Moreover, the message, if it was intended to be sent out at all, need not be taken seriously, for Mr Bush simply does not have the capacity to implement it.

Saddam Hussein’s execution followed America’s conquest and occupation of Iraq. The adventure has been extremely costly in terms of both military casualties and treasure. The Bush administration has made no political gains as a result. Awareness that it has landed the American military in a bottomless pit from which no honourable exit is in sight and the way the war has gone, have greatly lowered the president in public esteem both at home and abroad.

Saddam Hussein was doubtless a tyrant and a despicable murderer. Yet, while the Shia in Iraq may have welcomed his execution, it has enraged its Sunni population. Many Arabs and non-Arab Muslims have been incensed, particularly by its manner and timing. Some of them, including his former detractors, are now calling him a “martyr” and his execution an assassination. There is no satisfaction for Mr Bush anywhere in the aftermath of Saddam Hussein’s death. Indeed, it has backfired on him and his administration.

But it should be noted also that Saddam’s fate was not decreed by the United States alone. The Iraqi government was a full participant in determining how he was to be dealt with after his capture. The judges who heard, convicted, and sentenced him to death were all Iraqis. American officials claim that they tried, but failed, to persuade Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to defer Saddam Hussein’s hanging. It is therefore not right to say that his execution was entirely America’s doing.

Let us now return to the observation that the Bush administration intends to impose Saddam’s fate on any Muslim ruler who chooses to disregard its wishes. Even if we assume that Saddam was hanged upon America’s direction, we have to ask whether America can repeat its Iraqi

performance (invasion and occupation) every time a Muslim ruler or, for that matter, one in a developing country, ignores its advice.

The CIA engineered the ouster and assassination of President Salvatore Allende of Chile in 1973, and certain quarters suspected that it might have had a role in the killing of President Diem of South Vietnam. But the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba, which it had sponsored to dislodge Fidel Castro, failed, and so did subsequent covert attempts to bump him off. I am not aware of any other developing country whose government it has been able to oust and replace with one more solicitous of its concerns.

The United States would like to bring about regime changes in the three countries that it calls the “Axis of Evil,” namely North Korea, Iran, and Syria. It has made no move to accomplish this kind of change in North Korea. That is a tightly ruled communist state, and despite the many deprivations that afflict its people, its government appears to be well entrenched. Invasion and conquest as a way of effecting a regime change in this country can be ruled out.

This strategy failed in 1950 and the war it brought on ended in a stalemate. American forces fought the Vietcong and North Vietnam for 10 years to sustain a regime of their choice in South Vietnam, but eventually they had to give up.

There was a time when American policymakers looked to Iraqi dissidents living abroad to foment a popular revolt against Saddam Hussein. That did not happen. Many westernised and prosperous Iranians, opposed to the Islamic republic, fled their country and have been living in the United States and Europe. These men and women are likewise incapable of arousing the masses in their country against its present rulers.

The United States government and the clergy who govern Iran have been adversaries for the last 25 years. The former was sceptical of the latter’s assumption of power to begin with. Scepticism changed to anger and hostility when the new Iranian government’s agents took the American embassy personnel as hostages and kept them in detention for almost a year. The late Ayatollah Khomeini called America the “Great Satan” and remained intensely opposed to its government and policies.

There was a brief period of softening of attitudes and some of us expected the two sides to find a modus vivendi. But the hardliners returned to power in Iran and defiance of the United States has continued to be the Iranian norm. More recently, its government has rejected the American-sponsored UN Security Council demand that it halt its uranium enrichment operation and the Council, again upon America’s insistence, has imposed sanctions against Iran. But its government remains unperturbed and defiant. Past experience shows that sanctions have rarely, if ever, forced the targeted government to abandon the course to which others had been objecting.

Some political observers have been saying that the United States intends to attack Iran sometime in the foreseeable future. What kind of an attack might it be? Considering the country’s large territorial dimensions, an old-fashioned invasion and occupation, involving American ground forces, can be ruled out, for it would be even more troublesome and unyielding than the same experience in Iraq.

Another interpretation has it that America will bomb, or get Israel to bomb, and destroy Iran’s nuclear installations, industrial plant, and the more vital infrastructure.

There can be little doubt that, with the possible exception of Saudi Arabia and one or two of the emirates, such an attack will be denounced in much of the world. It is conceivable that the resulting miseries would estrange the Iranian people from their government. But the greater likelihood is that these will make the people angrier at America than ever before, and that they will rally behind their government, which, instead of falling, will stand firm.

How great is the danger that if General Musharraf, or any other head of government in Pakistan, wants to serve the national interest as he sees fit and, in the process, resists unwanted American demands and pressures, he will meet Saddam Hussein’s fate? In my reckoning, this danger is minimal and it resides mainly in the minds of Pakistani officials and commentators.

Pakistan has had an atypical relationship with the United States. The men who followed Liaquat Ali Khan at the helm, being novices in international politics, looked for external advice in this area. They turned to the United States not only because it was a superpower but also because its advice came together with a bundle of money. In return the United States expected services, which initially did not amount to much more than verbal support for American stances and participation in two rather inactive American-sponsored alliances. It was understood that as an ally, and as a recipient of substantial American military and economic assistance, Pakistan would not make major foreign policy decisions without first consulting Washington.

Pakistan negotiated and signed border, trade, and air travel agreements with China in late 1962 and early 1963 as a result of which the two countries came close together. These agreements were made without the prior concurrence of the United States, and they came in the wake of India’s humiliating defeat in its war with China in of 1962, a situation that greatly annoyed the United States and Great Britain. Unhappy with the emerging “entente cordiale” between Pakistan and China though it was, the United States did not penalise Pakistan for its initiatives. American military and economic aid continued to arrive.

Pakistan went to war with India in September 1965 without any prior consultation with the United States. This action aggravated the latter to the extent that it suspended its military assistance to Pakistan. American military supplies on a gratis basis were not resumed but limited sales were allowed a few years later. Ayub Khan remained president, and there is no evidence to show that American instigation had anything to do with the mass movement that ousted him more than three years later (March 1969).

Henry Kissinger, the American secretary of state, told Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto that his government would “make an example” of him (Bhutto) if he continued to proceed with Pakistan’s nuclear programme. Mr Bhutto kept the programme going and Mr Kissinger’s government did nothing to penalise him. It was General Ziaul Haq’s unmitigated ambition and deceitfulness, not an American plot, that caused Mr Bhutto’s removal from office four years later.

Ziaul Haq was willing and happy to provide services in helping the Afghan resistance against the Soviet army. The United States compensated Pakistan well for its role. During these eight years Ziaul Haq would seem to have had no occasion or reason to defy Washington.

Following the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, DC, American officials are said to have urged General Musharraf, in the strongest possible terms, to become a key partner in their war against terrorism. He accepted this assignment right away, but no harm would have come if he had said he needed a few days to consult his cabinet and political allies.

It is likely that had he declined to assist the American campaign, additional sanctions would have been imposed on Pakistan. But I doubt that he would have suffered adverse personal disadvantage or injury.

Past experience tells us that Pakistani leaders who made policy choices independently, disregarding American preferences, did not meet Saddam Hussein’s fate. Nor is there any real danger that those who come to power in future will meet such a fate. Those who expect to be guided by America will be so guided, but those who choose to use their own heads should not have a whole lot to fear.

That all roads to Islamabad pass through Washington is more a Pakistani, than an American, assumption.

The writer is a visiting professor at the Lahore School of Economics for the spring semester, 2007.
Email: anwarhs@lahoreschool.edu.pk

Autonomy before reforms

THE World Bank is prepared to give money to Pakistan to strengthen its institutions for good governance providing it reforms its civil services first. The proviso must leave Gen Musharraf wondering what he and his National Reconstruction Bureau had been doing all this while. To him governance along with the salvaging of the economy had been at the centre-stage of his seven-year rule.

The NRB, created by Musharraf soon after he took control of the government, proceeded on the populist assumption that the civil services, despite more than half a century of freedom, were still steeped in feudal imperial traditions in which the will or welfare of the people found no place. Headed first by a general and later by a member of parliament, the NRB had plenty of boffins and consultants on its rolls but no administrator worth the name.

The NRB has been at work for seven years promulgating new laws and amending existing ones wholesale in all aspects of governance. Centuries-old institutions have been abolished and new ones created, all adding up to what Musharraf in his memoirs describes as a silent revolution. It was accompanied, though, by a lot of noisy protests and cynical reactions.

Isn’t it then somewhat mortifying that the World Bank should be asking for more reforms? Perhaps it isn’t. The bank seems to be driving home the point that the reforms made have been counterproductive. The bank’s view finds strength from the concern expressed the other day by the president and the chief justice of Pakistan on the rising crime and worsening law and order situation. The chief justice went out of the way to offer protection to the police officers against growing political pressures.

Imagine, the NRB’s chief purpose in promulgating a new and complex police code replacing a 150-year old simple law was to make the police force answerable to independent public commissions instead of ministers and bureaucrats. If the Karachi police chief is transferred every three months instead of the three years assured to him by the new law, obviously it is the politician and not the commission at work, and even the chief justice cannot help.

The president, despite his total commitment to the NRB scheme, must have seen its reforms foundering and was thus persuaded to form a commission on government reforms. This commission, unlike the mammoth of an NRB, consists of 10 members who possess extensive knowledge and experience of management both in the public and private sectors. The only lingering doubt is whether they would be forthright in giving their opinion.

The reformation of the civil service (in a broader sense the term includes the minders of all activities in the federal and provincial governments) cannot be considered independently of the laws and institutions under which civil servants have to function. The two are interlinked. The commission will be handicapped in proposing reforms in the civil service if, alongside, it cannot suggest changes in the laws and institutions to make the reforms work and serve the objective which, according to the government notification, is to “provide a modern, efficient and accountable system of governance on a sustainable basis”.

This objective is, however, instantly negated by a stipulation in the notification itself which binds the commission to make its recommendations “within the ambit of the provisions of the Constitution”. Now all laws relating to crime, local government, police, accountability, etc., either form part of the Constitution or are protected under it. If the commission is to stop where the Constitution begins its exertions will be futile and its recommendations not worth waiting for.

Mumtaz Bhutto, who besides being a politician is an administrator and a feudal lord too, has come up with a more fundamental point. He wants the reforms — whether legal, administrative or financial — to accompany and not precede autonomy for the provinces. Greater provincial autonomy is agreed on all hands in principle. Only its quantum remains to be determined. It is essentially a political issue which has to be decided by the elected representatives of the people and not by the NRB as it is reportedly doing though under the guidance of a minister. Not that the NRB botched the administrative and police reforms but the issue doesn’t at all lie in its domain even if now it is staffed by more sensitive and less dogmatic people.

Further, the ideas on autonomy cover a wide spectrum. The government’s intention to do no more than to assign some subjects in the Concurrent List to the provinces is at one end. At the other is the demand of Mumtaz Bhutto and other nationalists of Sindh, Balochistan and the NWFP that the centre should control only defence, foreign affairs, communications, currency and customs (in fact some would concede even less). Secondly, in the services dealing with these subjects they insist that the smaller provinces should be given equal or greater representation.

The decision on the degree of autonomy which is as controversial as it is critical must lie with the parliament and the provincial legislatures — the next lot after the elections in fresh vigour and not the existing assemblies squabbling and limping to their end. The current constitutional transition imposes a responsibility on the commission to propose reforms that work now in the centralised system and can also be easily adapted to serve the needs of the autonomous provinces.

The reforms should also clearly draw a line between the social and regulatory roles of the state. Both would be, of course, under the policy control of the federal or the provincial government, as the case may be. But the execution of social, civic and developmental works should be supervised by the representatives of the people and the regulatory functions performed by career civil servants — whether general administrators or technocrats. Secondly, the civil services in all important disciplines should be organised into national cadres in which all provinces are equitably represented.

The federal parliament and the national cadres of civil servants would, thus, bind the provinces that are otherwise fully autonomous in one cohesive federation. Reforming the civil services for good governance is important but a constitutional accord on the rights of the provinces and powers of the centre is a prerequisite.

Art Buchwald’s demise

THIS EDITORIAL would have been better if Art Buchwald had written it: shorter sentences, sharper insights and definitely a better punch line. Mr. Buchwald, who died Wednesday at the age of 81, was a master. He wrote a column for well over a half-century, and he kept writing — writing well, writing funny — to the end. Last winter, Mr. Buchwald took himself off dialysis and moved into a hospice. But five months later, he was still alive. And all that time he socialised and joked and filed his column. Finally last summer, he moved out of the hospice and resumed his busy life.

It’s a sad day, not for the manner of Mr. Buchwald’s death, which he took on with what can only be described as humorous heroism, but because of what is passing with him. Art Buchwald’s laugh lines could score a political point, and his opinion wasn’t hidden, but he brought to daily commentary a touch of wit, a gentle kind of humour and a brave willingness to launch himself occasionally into flights of utter absurdity that produced some of his best moments.

Unfortunately, the Buchwald touch, the ability to use humour deftly, pointedly and yet without cruelty to thoroughly deflate some pious politico or misguided movement, is pretty much a thing of the past in everyday public discourse. There is some wit to be found on the Internet and among the angry cable-TV talkers and the various thoroughly predictable opinion-mongers, but not a lot of it, and not often. Mr. Buchwald kept things civilised, and he had a huge following across the country.

But mostly he kept you laughing. A sample for the uninitiated, from a 1990 column:

“I came back to Paris a few weeks ago to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the running of the Six-Minute Louver. Yes, I know it’s hard to believe that 40 years ago a young American student named Peter Stone broke the Six-Minute Louver and brought glory and honour to American tourists everywhere.

“For those of you who weren’t around, this is the story.

“It is common knowledge that there are only three things worth seeing in the Louver. They are the Venus de Milo, the Winged Victory and the Mona Lisa. The rest of the stuff is all junk. For years tourists went to see those three works and then rushed out to continue their shopping in Paris.

“Before World War II, the record for going through the Louver was seven minutes and 30 seconds held by a man known as the Swedish Cannonball. After the war an Englishman, paced by his Welsh wife, did it in seven minutes flat — and pretty soon everyone started talking about a Six-Minute Louver.

It goes on, though not much longer, since Mr. Buchwald wrote tight. Look it up sometime, along with many of the other columns of his that have stood the test of time. You’ll get more than a few laughs out of them, which would more than please Art Buchwald.

— The Washington Post