Posted on 02/05/2005 5:30:16 PM PST by saquin
BAGHDAD, Iraq — Through 22 months of occupation and war here, the word "America" was usually the first word to pass through the lips of an Iraqi with a gripe.
Why can't the Americans produce enough electricity? Why can't the Americans guarantee security? Why can't the Americans find my stolen car?
Last week, as the euphoria of nationwide elections washed over this country, a remarkable thing happened: Iraqis, by and large, stopped talking about the Americans.
With the ballots still being counted here, the Iraqi candidates retired to the back rooms to cut political deals, leaving the Americans, for the first time, standing outside. In Baghdad's tea shops and on its street corners, the talk turned to which of those candidates might form the new government, to their schemes and stratagems, and to Iraqi problems and Iraqi solutions.
And for the United States, the assessments turned unfamiliarly measured.
"We have no electricity here, no water and there's no gasoline in the pumps," said Salim Mohammed Ali, a tire repairman who voted in last Sunday's election. "Who do I blame? The Iraqi government, of course. They can't do anything."
Asked about the American military presence here, Mr. Ali chose his words carefully.
"I think the Americans should stay here until our security forces are able to do the jobs themselves," Mr. Ali said, echoing virtually every senior American officer in Iraq. "We Iraqis have our own government now, and we can invite the Americans to stay."
The Iraqi focus on its own democracy, and the new view of the United States, surfaced in dozens of interviews with Iraqis since last Sunday's election. It is unclear, of course, how widespread the trend is; whole communities, like the Sunni Arabs, remain almost implacably opposed to the presence of American forces. But by many accounts, the elections last week altered Iraqis' relationship with the United States more than any single event since the invasion.
Since April 9, 2003, when Saddam Hussein's rule crumbled, Iraqis have viewed themselves more or less as American subjects. American officials ran their government, American soldiers fought their war, American money paid to rebuild Iraq.
Indeed, the American project to implant democracy in Iraq often seemed to be in danger of falling victim to the country's manifest political passivity, born of a quarter-century of torture centers, mass graves, free food and pennies-a-gallon gasoline. The more the Americans tried to nudge the Iraqis towards self-government, the more the Iraqis expected the Americans to do.
As the insurgents wreaked more and more havoc, and sabotaged more and more of the country's power supply, the Iraqis, not surprisingly, blamed the people in charge. Day by day, many Iraqis' gratitude for the toppling of Saddam Hussein seemed to harden into bitterness and contempt.
After June 28, when American suzerainty here formally ended, not many Iraqis bought the notion that the interim government of Ayad Allawi was anything other than a caretaker regime, hand-picked by the Americans and the United Nations.
All that seemed to change last Sunday, when millions of Iraqis streamed to the polls. Few if any Iraqis had ever voted in anything approaching a free election, yet most seemed to know exactly what the exercise was about: selecting their own representatives to lead their own country.
"Our dilemma is solved," said Rashid Majid, 80, who wore his best jacket to the polls. "We will follow our new leaders, because we have chosen them."
Some Iraqis saw in the election their own liberation, one that many did not feel on April 9, 2003. Mr. Hussein's regime was not toppled by Iraqis but by the American military, a fact that has lingered in Iraqi minds.
Yet after casting ballots in a free election, conducted by more than 100,000 Iraqi poll workers, many Iraqis said they finally felt free - not only from the terrors of the old regime, but also from acute feelings of humiliation about the American occupation.
"The election was a victory of our own making," said Mowaffak al-Rubaie, the national security adviser. "The Iraqi people voted with their own blood."
The newfound self-respect that Mr. Rubaie believes the election conferred on ordinary Iraqis seems to have had an immediate impact on their view of the United States. Suddenly empowered with the vote, Iraqis no longer seem to view America as all-powerful, or themselves as unable to affect events. A result has been a suddenly more accepting view of the United States.
The realism among Iraqis was evident on election day itself. Amid the euphoria of voting, America, which had almost always been the first topic of conversation, was suddenly evanescent, unmentioned in a score of interviews unless a reporter raised it first. And when Iraqis did talk of America, it was with a reasonableness and patience that had seemed missing, a willingness to balance good with bad, to give credit where it is due.
This transition seemed all the more striking for the fact that Apache helicopters roared over the polling centers every few minutes with American troops manning checkpoints only a few blocks away.
Hachim Shahir, an 83-year-old bricklayer standing in line for hours to vote, was asked how it had been possible for somebody like him to arrive at such a late stage in life without ever having voted, and now finally to have cast a ballot. He thought for a long while, then answered: "America - it was America that did it."
And how did he feel about that?
"America will be good if it completes what it came here to do, to bring us democracy, and then it goes home," Mr. Shahir said. "The main thing now is that they keep their promises, and leave. Personally, I believe they will do it."
The new mood appears to have continued since election day. The calls by candidates for a timetable for American military withdrawal have died away. Even a group of Sunni politicians decided last week that they would take part in the drafting of Iraq's new constitution without insisting on a timetable.
Getting Iraqis to take charge of their own affairs, whether by fighting insurgents or taking over government ministries, has been the goal of American leaders here since the fall of Saddam Hussein. After 22 months of trying to persuade the Iraqis to stand on their own, while doing everything for them, the Americans may be finding that Iraqis, now fully sovereign, don't want them to go home so soon after all.
Often we wait for events and pre-analyze them--when THIS happens we will be happy, for example--but I think now many are seeing that while last Sunday was just the first step, it's like saying you can't overhype a baby's first step, that the first step doesn't mean the baby will walk.
That's nonsense. This election was a historic moment.
"I think the Americans should stay here until our security forces are able to do the jobs themselves," Mr. Ali said, echoing virtually every senior American officer in Iraq. "We Iraqis have our own government now, and we can invite the Americans to stay."
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I loved this! I think Iraq really turned the corner.
Right. Who really cares what these known A-holes have to say? Their credibility is non-existent. They are finished.
You should take an acknowledgement from the New York Times that the election had a positive effect (just like Bush said it would) and declare victory. Carping about the editorial bent of the Times will only result in ulcers.
I will carp all I friggin' want to, until I've got gefilte fish coming out my ears. IMO this was an attempt to downplay the triumph of the elections. And I am SICK of the media over-reporting the negatives in Iraq and downplaying the positives.
I wouldn't play poker with him either!!
Whatever dude. Don't get a hernia.
dirt boy.......I think you are missing the big picture here IMO.......I thought the article was bringing clear the fact that the Iraqi's are now realizing it is not the Americans that are either at fault nor the saviour......it is themselves that have to fix the problems that Saddam left. The article was not intended to address the election itself but the aftermath and the thinking that is changing
Well, then, by doing what it takes to defeat the Baathist Sunni thugs that are still trying to re-enslave them, the Iraqi people have a wonderful opportunity to demonstrate their newfound power.
Sorry, I'm sick of the Slimes. They have tried for months to make it seem like we weren't wanted in Iraq. Now, all of a sudden, we are now just a non-factor.
Quite frankly, we are at war with the the MSM. This country lost Vietnam because the left ended up winning the battle of images and impressions. We cannot let that happen again in Iraq. And a key part of the left agenda is to downplay the triumphs so that the bad days don't seem worth the trouble.
I don't disagree with that part of the article. My point is, suddenly it went from the fault of the Americans to the fault of the new Iraqi government. And no stop for credit for positive achievements in between.
I guess some people don't know surrender when they see it. Open your eyes. Some on the left are admitting they were wrong. This is about as big a concession as you'll get from the Times.
I gotcha on that........I really really think they are just learning how to think for themselves after 30 years of being "thought" slaves.......sometimes we are the same griping about the negatives in life and taking for granted the good things.........but I see the point you were making
Well, half-way decent. Let's not forget the Iraqi woman who hugged the American woman who lost her son in Iraq.
Iran is next.
I'll drink to that!
Dexter Filkins better watch his back. This is the second upbeat article he's written on the Iraq elections. If he's not careful, the NYT will send him to the gulag for reprogramming.
Is Dexter Filkins going to be fired from the NYT for writing this article?
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