Editorial: Iraq needs stability before democacy

The beginning of Ramadan is said to be a time of heightened emotion in the Islamic world. Perhaps that has contributed to the bloodshed that has beset Iraq in the past week, leaving a New Zealand soldier among the injured. Whatever the seasonal influence, there is no denying the underlying cause of discontent: the United States has blundered into a country it scarcely understands and there is no clear way out.

It is six months today since President George W. Bush flew to an aircraft carrier and declared the end of major combat in the Iraq War. That proved to be just the beginning of a more bloody "peace". The death toll among the occupying forces has since exceeded the casualties of the war.

Over the past three months the insurgents have resorted to using exploding vehicles and lately suicide bombers to strike at the foreign presence. And they have not confined themselves to US-occupied buildings, which are more closely guarded than others. The bombers' targets began with the Jordanian embassy in August and have included the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad.

This week, car bombs exploded at the Red Cross headquarters and three Iraqi police stations, as well as a hotel where US Deputy Secretary of Defence Paul Wolfowitz was staying, killing an American soldier and wounding 17 people. Mr Wolfowitz is well-known as one of the prime strategists behind the decision to invade Iraq, and harbours the hope that the country can become a democratic example to the Middle East.

He put a brave face on the carnage around him this week, blaming it on "bitter enders". Bitter, undoubtedly, but there is no end in sight for American soldiers and taxpayers, nor for Iraqis caught between the devil of infidel rule and the deep blue sea of their own disunity.

Self-government for Iraq is simply unthinkable until the divisions between Sunni and Shia Muslims, Arab and Kurd and other ethnic minorities are reconciled to some form of constitutional arrangement. The route to that reconciliation has yet to appear. In the meantime, gratitude for deliverance from the tyranny of Saddam Hussein remains equivocal as Iraqis still await the restoration of order and the revitalisation of economic life. These things are undoubtedly more urgent to them than the democracy of American dreams.

The restoration of order recedes further with each bomb. Attacks on the UN or the Red Cross make no sense except that they present lightly guarded targets and the bombers are out to demonstrate the limits of US protection. The attacks on police stations are more insidious. They are a clear warning to the police - and by implication other officials - that those who act under American authority are regarded as collaborators.

Meanwhile, the occupying forces still have no idea who is behind the attacks and how they are organised. Mr Bush sounds certain that they are infiltrators from Syria and other nearby states, not Iraqis who, he believes, welcome the US unequivocally as liberators.

The best Mr Bush can do for the moment is to dispel any notion that the US is about to quit - and that he has done. But his political stocks at home are suffering as the casualty list climbs in Iraq. A CNN-Gallup poll this week found 50 per cent disapproved of the President's handling of Iraq since the war and 47 per cent approved. Americans' support for the war stood at 71 per cent in April; it is down to 54 per cent now.

The mood will probably not deflect Mr Bush. His re-election next year will ride on his fortunes in Iraq whatever he does. But he appears to have lost some confidence in his defence advisers and shifted responsibility from the Pentagon to the National Security Council. He might be wiser for stumbling into the Iraq mire. But that will not help him find a way out.

Herald Feature: Iraq