US Viceroy Paul Bremer’s Neoliberal Fatwas at Root of Iraq Crisis

[unhappycamper]

http://www.juancole.com/2014/07/viceroy-bremers-neoliberal.html



The roots of the most recent crisis in Iraq can be traced to the US-led invasion of 2003 and western meddling in Syria. At stake, is the neoliberal blueprint of post-invasion Iraq, now defended in an effort coordinated between the Baghdad government and its western backers.

US Viceroy Paul Bremer’s Neoliberal Fatwas at Root of Iraq Crisis
By Juan Cole | Jul. 2, 2014

What today is ISIS, the self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS), was founded as an Al-Qaida´s franchise in Iraq in direct response to the US-led invasion. The group thrived in the security vacuum the invaders created by dismantling the Iraqi security apparatus. At the time, Amnesty International criticized the US for not sufficiently investing in the security of civilians, while guarding oil fields around the clock. Needless to say, oil was the primary motive behind the invasion.

Dismantling Iraq´s security infrastructure entailed the dismissal of over 400.000 soldiers and intelligence personnel. With one stroke of the pen, Paul Bremer, who headed the occupation forces in Iraq, granted jihadi groups the ultimate recruitment ground: an ´army´ of jobless men who know their way around weapons. It was only a matter of time before various armed groups were rampaging through the country. Among those, the Islamic State of Iraq, ISIS before expanding to Syria, won most infamy for targeting Shia.

Then, as now, western designs for Iraq were at the root of the sectarian logic of the violence. From his office in one of Saddam´s former palaces, Bremer issued his first ´order´, which banned all public sector employees affiliated with Saddam´s Bath party from current and future employment by government, including a majority who had party membership forced upon them.

Although victimized like all other groups, Sunnis were favoured by the Saddam regime and thus disproportionately targeted by ´de-Bathification´. In fact, according to the International Crisis Group (ICG), a Brussels-based think tank, Sunni Arabs were ¨treated (…) as representatives of an oppressive state structure in need of dismantling¨ which ¨sent the message that de-Bathification was tantamount to de-Sunnification.¨

[bemildred]

1. Yep, that was when I first knew they were really going to fuck it up.

That was not the thoughtful move of people who were planning to leave anytime soon. It was the flippant move of another bunch of dumb-ass utopian ideologues. They chose to attempt to build their free-market utopia on the bones of the birthplace of Western civilization, like it was a blank slate, wiped clean by our noble invasion.

[Squinch]

2. Yep. Let's not forget that.