By Todd S. Purdum
New York TimesApril 7, 2003
It will probably take the United States more than six months to cede power in postwar Iraq to an Iraqi-led civilian authority that would pave the way for a representative government, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz said today. His remarks, in which he envisioned no central postwar role for the United Nations, came even as senior military officials said that several hundred troops from an Iraqi opposition group had been airlifted into the southern part of the country. They are to help deal with continued skirmishing there and serve as what Gen. Peter Pace of the Marines, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, called "the beginning of the free Iraqi Army."
Speaking to reporters, General Pace also suggested that American and British forces "or those who might volunteer to join us" would "provide the secure environment inside of which the new Iraqi government can build its police force, build its armed forces up to an internal defense-type capability." Mr. Wolfowitz said the process of rebuilding an Iraqi government would take some time. Noting that it took about six months after the end of the 1991 Persian Gulf war for Kurdish forces in northern Iraq to establish effective self-governance, Mr. Wolfowitz said today that it would take more time after the Iraqi president, Saddam Hussein, is ousted for Iraqis to do the same thing. "Six months was what happened in northern Iraq," Mr. Wolfowitz said on "Fox News Sunday," in one of several television appearances and a session with reporters today in which he made similar points. "This is a more complicated situation. It will probably take longer than that."
Pressing another component of the Bush administration's strategy for Iraq's future, President Bush prepared to head to Belfast, Northern Ireland, early on Monday for his third meeting in just over three weeks with Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain, who has pushed for deeper United Nations involvement in postwar Iraq. The United Nations Secretary General, Kofi Annan, has called a Security Council meeting for Monday morning to discuss Iraq.
Like other administration officials in recent days, Mr. Wolfowitz said several times today that there would be a role for the United Nations to play in bringing relief aid to postwar Iraq, if not in political administration as many European countries want. Mr. Wolfowitz said the speed with which an interim Iraqi authority could take over from an American-led military occupation force depended on how quickly Iraqis who have suffered under Mr. Hussein feel free to assume leadership roles.
"The point at which we can establish an interim authority, I think, is going to depend on when there is a feeling, particularly among Iraqis, that those people that are still not yet free to speak up and express themselves — though more and more of them are — can join the ones who have been able to for many years now," he said on the CBS News program, "Face the Nation." Those comments appeared to reflect the White House's determination to open any interim authority to Iraqi from inside the country as well as exiles. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld had urged President Bush to quickly install Iraqi exiles in an interim governing authority as Iraqi territory came under control of coalition forces.
But on Friday, in remarks seen as a message to Mr. Rumsfeld, the national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, said that "Iraqis currently free and Iraqis who will soon be free and Iraqis who have for decades kept alive the hopes of a free Iraq while in exile will all have much to contribute to the interim authority and to Iraq's future." Today. on the NBC News program "Meet the Press," Mr. Wolfowitz, who has been among the administration's most passionate advocates of a postwar Iraq as the vanguard of a new era of Arab democracy, said the goal was not to install any particular group of Iraqi leaders.
"On the one hand, there has got to be an effective administration from day one," Mr. Wolfowitz said. "People need water and food and medicine, and the sewers have to work, the electricity has to work. And that's a coalition responsibility. We have to make sure it gets done." "But our goal is to have a legitimate Iraqi government that represents the Iraqi people. And this interim authority which we've discussed and agreed upon in our government with our coalition partners, and with important elements of the Iraqi opposition, is a bridge to that legitimate government. But the goal is not to install some particular group as the new leaders of Iraq. That absolutely contradicts the whole notion of democracy."
Speaking of the United Nations, Mr. Wolfowitz said on Fox: "The reconstruction of Iraq, I think, is going to be one of the most important projects for the international community in many years. And the U.N. can be a mechanism for bringing that assistance to the Iraqi people. But our goal has got to be to transfer authority and the operation of the government as quickly as possible not to some other external authority, but to the Iraqi people themselves." In the session with reporters, Mr. Wolfowitz said Iraq would be able to contribute to the costs. "The oil revenues of Iraq, now, for the first time in decades will be dedicated to the welfare of the Iraqi people instead of building up the instruments of a tyrannical state," he said.
Senator John Warner, Republican of Virginia and chairman of the Armed Services Committee, told reporters that "right now, we're working out a situation whereby the United Nations can have a role as a partner, but not the managing partner" in postwar Iraq. "I feel very strongly, based on the experience we witnessed in the Balkans and elsewhere, that right now the coalition of forces that have fought this war bravely and borne the sacrifice should take on the major role of managing the overall reconstruction, rehabilitation and putting in place a political structure for the Iraqi people."
But the ranking Democrat on the committee, Senator Carl Levin of Michigan, said it was important to seek United Nations endorsement of any postwar administration, as Mr. Bush pledged at his meeting with Mr. Blair just before the war began. "It would have been better if we had the support of the world community acting through the U.N. going in," Mr. Levin said on "CNN's Late Edition." "It was not obtainable by us. It's important now in the post-conflict area that the world community be deeply involved in the reconstruction of Iraq."
More Articles on the War Against Iraq
More Information on Iraq
FAIR USE NOTICE: This page contains copyrighted material the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Global Policy Forum distributes this material without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. We believe this constitutes a fair use of any such copyrighted material as provided for in 17 U.S.C § 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond fair use, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
