Moment of Truth
With an interim constitution, Iraqis inch closer to gaining control of their shattered nation. What happens after that is anyone's guess
There is no better place to see Iraq's "complications" than Kirkuk, a city of 800,000 people southeast of Mosul. Here, oil and ethnicity and a brutal "Arabization" program pushed by Saddam Hussein have created a volatile brew. The 4th Infantry Division, under Maj. Gen. Raymond Odierno, held sway in Kirkuk, and so did the U.S. Army's 173rd Airborne Brigade under the command of Col. William Mayville. The colonel appeared to have mastered the ethnicities of this place. It was this command that had captured Saddam last December. But potholes and libraries and job creation for the Iraqis have been central preoccupations as well. The Kirkukis are glad for the protection. At a roundtable assembled for Wolfowitz, it was clear that this was a contested city. The Kurds have come into considerable power here--the demographics have worked in their favor. But the old Turkmen community believes that the history of this city had been Turkic through and through, and the Arabs brought here from other parts of the country--the "10,000 dinar" Arabs they are called, after the subsidy given them by the old despotism to settle in this city atop huge reserves of oil--have their anxieties to match. Away from the agitated street and the false pride, a Sunni-Arab notable told Wolfowitz that the Americans will have to stay. In a clear reference to the Kurds, this notable, Sheik Khalid al-Assi, of one of the great tribes, the Ubaydas, said that "the oppressed have become oppressors" and that the new democracy has become a whip in the hands of one community. This man was removed from the Sunni triangle. Here, the American presence was, for him, a balance to the greater power of the Kurds. The scenarios of doom have not materialized in Kirkuk, Wolfowitz told the notables who had been pulled together for him. But it was their country, he said, and they had to make it work. There had always been deep reformism at the heart of Wolfowitz's worldview, a belief that American power can advance social and political reform in lands that need it. He had come to oversee the rotation and the "relief in place" of the forces in Iraq. On this tour, he was a witness to some of the saving graces of this war.
At times, it seems this American presence is challenged by its very successes: There are nightmarish gasoline lines in this country of oil, and this has become a convenient symbol and target for those at odds with the American stewardship. But the gasoline shortages have come about as a result of some 1 million new cars being brought into Iraq in the aftermath of its liberation. It is the same with electricity: The shortages are due in part to the satellite dishes flooding the place, to the consumer durables denied the Iraqis by the old regime but now in plentiful supply. In his office at the headquarters of the Coalition Provisional Authority, Bremer speaks of the introduction of a new currency: It had taken only three months, in the face of a deadly insurgency, to do so. Some 9,000 tons of new currency had been brought onto the market and 13,000 tons of old paper had been withdrawn and hauled away. It is the burden of success: We had, with ease, toppled an entrenched despotism. It stood to reason that we would be miracle workers, and that with a magic wand we would dispose of this country's age-old troubles.
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