So Much For The Election!

Iraqi Shiite Bloc Splits Over Call for New Premier

President Bush and his gang actually thought that having an election was equivalent to waving a magic wand and "poof," all the problems of a newly forming government would wisp away. Our fearless leader (fearless as long as we are sending troops that do not include his children) actually believed that a free election would resolve centuries-old tribal, ethnic and religious conflicts to a point where a cohesive government could be formed and a democratic regime in the ideals held by ultra-conservative Republicans/Christians would suddenly appear.

The fundamental problem in Iraq is that the Bush administration has ignored the history, sociology and political behaviors of the region, the people and the religion. It is an old military axiom that knowing your enemy like a friend is an essential element of defeating all resistance. In this case the enemy is not the people of Iraq, not the insurgents, not the external elements spreading radical Islam, not even terrorism... The enemy is a lack of experience and education in the field of democracy. Democracy in a Middle Eastern Islamic nation has to begin at the basic level of the village or neighborhood, not at the national level. Until that principle and key element of implementing democratic processes is completely understood--and a willingness to tolerate several relapses--there will not be any hope of democracy in Iraq... or Afghanistan... or Pakistan... or in Palestine... or in any Middle Eastern nation.

Iraq's dominant Shiite political bloc fractured Sunday when its most powerful faction publicly demanded that the incumbent Shiite prime minister resign over his inability to form a unified government. The split came as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Jack Straw, the British foreign minister, paid an urgent visit to Iraqi leaders here to convey in the most forceful terms yet that their patience for the country's political paralysis was wearing thin.

It was not clear whether the joint visit by Ms. Rice and Mr. Straw, the top emissaries of the two countries that led the invasion of Iraq three years ago, played a direct role in the splintering of the Shiite bloc, and whether that schism would lead to forward movement on forming a new government, which has been stalled for months.

The developments suggested that a new phase in Iraq's convulsions might have started by opening a possibly violent battle for the country's top job between rival Shiite factions, which both have militias backing them. The incumbent prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, has said he will fight to keep his job, and his principal supporter is Moktada al-Sadr, a rebellious cleric whose Mahdi Army militia has resorted to violence many times to enforce his wishes.

Ms. Rice and Mr. Straw, who came here unannounced in a driving rainstorm from a meeting in England punctuated by antiwar protests, told reporters they did not want to intervene in the dispute over the prime minister. But at the same time they pointed out that Mr. Jaafari had been unable to win enough political support to form a government since his nomination on Feb. 12.

"They've got to get a prime minister who can actually form the government," Ms. Rice said after a meetings with Iraqi leaders — which included a visibly uncomfortable photo session with Mr. Jaafari — inside the Green Zone, the fortified part of Baghdad that houses the Iraqi government and American Embassy. She added, "I told them that a lot of treasure, a lot of human treasure, has been put on the line to give Iraq the chance to have a democratic future."

Neither Ms. Rice nor Mr. Straw would specify whether they had applied even tougher pressure on the Iraqi leaders. But Ms. Rice's references to the loss of lives — more than 2,300 American soldiers alone have died here since the March 2003 invasion — and the many billions of dollars spent clearly reflected the growing impatience in Washington and London for more progress.

The fracturing of the Shiites became clear in the late afternoon, as a senior official in the leading Shiite party, Sheik Jalaladeen al-Sagheir, said in a telephone interview that his party was putting forward another candidate to replace Mr. Jaafari. "I've asked Jaafari to resign from his job," said Sheik Sagheir, a deputy to the Shiite bloc's leader, Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim. "The prime minister should have national consensus inside the Parliament, and he should have the support of the international body."