Nick Smith, May 16, 2004

With the pictures in the news of prisoner abuse from Abu Ghraib and the decapitation of Nick Berg by terrorists, people are rightly concerned that we’re taking steps backward. However, neither of these media sensations - which are driven by dramatic pictures - changes the basic situation or goals in Iraq. More important is our work with Iraqi security forces, religious leaders, and civilian leaders to begin to form a unified country.

Fourteen months ago in March of last year, I told Secretary of Defense Don Rumsfeld that there were two battlefields in this war: military and political. We were going to have to win the support of the Sunni, the Shia, and the Kurds. We were going to have to defeat an insurgency with some popular support in both Iraq and America. We see today that the Iraqi people are going to have to work together in a way that is completely alien to their previous experience. In the end, Iraqification will have to cover all aspects of the Iraqi government. Iraqis will have to control the political apparatus, the security apparatus, and the economic apparatus.

On May 13, my International Relations Committee reviewed the progress in Iraq toward the handover of sovereignty set for June 30. There has been significant progress. Oil and power production have been increasing. Half of the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps - over 200,000 people - has been trained and several government functions have already been completely turned over to Iraqi officials. Iraqis are beginning to experience participatory government through local councils. Wages are rising, and prices are stabilizing. The architecture of a normal life is coming together for Iraqis.

While this progress is important, it does not address some of the largest problems that must be overcome. Before an Iraqi government can do anything else, it must provide basic security. The assassination of Iraqi Governing Council President Abdel-Zahraa Othman on May 16 shows both how far terrorists will go to disrupt Iraq and how shaky the security situation remains. The selection and training of Iraqi security forces is critical to long-range success of a democratic Iraq. The second problem is creating a constitution providing Iraqi legitimacy and identity that balances the interests of the Shia, Sunni, and Kurds. Successful democracies help hold multiple regional, ethnic, and ideological groups together by making sure they have a stake in the government. That way, groups get ahead more by playing by the rules than taking up arms.

One of my concerns is that the entity to which the CPA will pass authority on June 30th will lack legitimacy within Iraq. The U.N. envoy, Lahkdar Brahimi, is putting together a transitional government, but the danger is legitimacy in the eyes of the Iraqi people. Can these officials make difficult decisions and have them accepted? Similarly, if representatives of important religious and ethnic groups are excluded, those groups will not feel invested in the Iraqi state. Official elections are critical and the sooner the better.

Without denying the many achievements of the last year, we are entering an even more complicated phase of the reconstruction of Iraq. American influence will appropriately be less and less direct. However, success establishing stability, security, and democracy in a country that has known all too little of these will go far to assure peace throughout the Middle East.

Congressman Nick Smith, a Republican, represents Michigan's 7th Congressional District, which includes Battle Creek and the counties of Branch, Eaton, Hillsdale, Jackson, Lenawee, Calhoun, and Washtenaw in south-central Michigan.