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Federalism, Not Partition
3.10.2007
By Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Leslie H. Gelb
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October
3, 2007
Washington: The Bush administration and Iraqi
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki greeted last week's
Senate vote on Iraq policy -- based on a plan we
proposed in 2006 -- with misrepresentations and
untruths. Seventy-five senators, including 26
Republicans, voted to promote a political settlement
based on decentralized power-sharing. It was a life
raft for an Iraq policy that is adrift.
Instead, Maliki and the administration -- through
our embassy in Baghdad -- distorted the Biden-Brownback
amendment beyond recognition, charging that we seek
to "partition or divide Iraq by intimidation, force
or other means."
We want to set the record straight. If the United
States can't put this federalism idea on track, we
will have no chance for a political settlement in
Iraq and, without that, no chance for leaving Iraq
without leaving chaos behind.
- First, our plan is not partition, though even some
supporters and the media mistakenly call it that. It
would hold Iraq together by bringing to life the
federal system enshrined in its constitution. A
federal Iraq is a united Iraq but one in which power
devolves to regional governments, with a limited
central government responsible for common concerns
such as protecting borders and distributing oil
revenue.
Iraqis have no familiarity with federalism, which,
absent an occupier or a dictator, has historically
been the only path to keeping disunited countries
whole. We can point to our federal system and how it
began with most power in the hands of the states. We
can point to similar solutions in the United Arab
Emirates, Spain and Bosnia. Most Iraqis want to keep
their country whole. But if Iraqi leaders keep
hearing from U.S. leaders that federalism amounts to
or will lead to partition, that's what they will
believe.
The Bush administration's quixotic alternative has
been to promote a strong central government in
Baghdad. That central government doesn't function;
it is corrupt and widely regarded as irrelevant. It
has not produced political reconciliation -- and
there is no evidence it will.
- Second, we are not trying to impose our plan. If
the Iraqis don't want it, they won't and shouldn't
take it, as the Senate amendment makes clear. But
Iraqis and the White House might consider the facts.
Iraq's constitution already provides for a federal
system. As for the regions forming along sectarian
lines, the constitution leaves the choice to the
people of its 18 provinces.
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Delaware senator, chairman of the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee and US presidential Democratic
candidate Joe Biden
“It is not partition, it is not foreign imposition,”
the Delaware Democrat, a contender for the
Democratic presidential nomination, told reporters
in a conference call. “A federal Iraq is a united
Iraq.” |
The White House can hardly complain that we would
force unwanted solutions on Iraqis. President Bush
did not hesitate to push Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jafari
out of office to make way for Maliki, and he may yet
do the same to Maliki.
The United States has responsibilities in Iraq that
we cannot run away from. The Iraqis will need our
help in explaining and lining up support for a
federal solution. With 160,000 Americans at risk in
Iraq, with hundreds of billions of dollars spent,
and with more than 3,800 dead and nearly 28,000
wounded, we also have a right to be heard.
- Third, our plan would not produce "suffering and
bloodshed," as a U.S. Embassy statement
irresponsibly suggested. And it is hard to imagine
more suffering and bloodshed than we've already seen
from government-tolerated militias, jihadists,
Baathists and administration ineptitude. More than 4
million Iraqis have fled their homes, most for fear
of sectarian violence.
The Bush administration should be helping Iraqis
make federalism work -- through an agreement over
the fair distribution of oil revenue; the safe
return of refugees; integrating militia members into
local security forces; leveraging the shared
interest of other countries in a stable Iraq; and
refocusing capacity-building and aid on the
provinces and regions -- not scaring them off by
equating federalism to partition, sectarianism and
foreign bullying.
To confuse matters more, the administration has
conjured a "bottom-up" strategy that looks like
federalism and smells like federalism -- but is, in
reality, a recipe for chaos.
"Bottom-up" seems to mean that the United States
will support any group, anywhere, that will fight
al-Qaeda or Shiite extremists. Now, it always made
sense to seek allies among tribal chiefs to fight
common terrorist enemies. But to simply back these
groups as they appear, without any overall political
context or purpose, is to invite anarchy. Nothing
will fragment Iraq more than a bottom-up approach
that pits one group against another and fails to
knit these parts into governable wholes.
Federalism is the one formula that fits the
seemingly contradictory desires of most Iraqis to
remain whole and of various groups to govern
themselves for the time being. It also recognizes
the reality of the choice we face in Iraq: a managed
transition to federalism or actual partition through
civil war.
Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.) is chairman of the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Leslie H. Gelb
is president emeritus of the Council on Foreign
Relations.
washingtonpost com
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