Disclosures made by the Internet site WikiLeaks will come as no surprise to Iraqis, whose plight has now been more fully revealed, writes Salah Hemeid Among the quarter of a million or so confidential US diplomatic cables published by the Internet site WikiLeaks last week, Iraq came high on the disclosure list, with the cables revealing how Washington has really been running things since the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq. While none of the documents unveiled by the site provides earth-shaking news for most Iraqis on how US forces have been allowed to play havoc with their country, they nevertheless remain important because they provide first-hand accounts of how the United States has in fact conducted the occupation, letting the world see what has been happening in Iraq. The documents provide ample evidence of how America destroyed Iraq through its arrogance and ignorance and how it made Iraqis pay a very high price. The documents reveal the US government's lies and expose some of the blood on its hands. Having removed Saddam Hussein from power during the 2003 invasion and then dissolved the Iraqi army and dismantled the government, the Americans failed to impose order in the country or secure the safety of millions of Iraqis, hundreds of thousands of who were killed as a result. The new documents deal with two important aspects of the US occupation of Iraq -- the interference of neighbouring countries in Iraqi affairs and the sectarian politics that the occupation established in the country through its promotion of sectarian politicians and groups. The documents cast light on the intervention by Iraq's neigbours in the country's internal affairs, with Washington failing to prevent this even though some of the countries concerned were US allies. "All Iraq's neighbours are interfering, albeit in different ways, in Iraq: the Gulf countries and Saudi Arabia with money, Iran with money and political influence, and Syria by whatever means it can find," Iraqi President Jalal Talabani is quoted as telling US Defense Secretary Robert Gates in a 19 December 2009 meeting, as revealed by one of the US diplomatic cables revealed by WikiLeaks. Another dispatch from Baghdad dated November 2009 reveals how Iran has employed a full range of diplomatic, security, intelligence and economic means to influence its allies and enemies in Iraq, in order to help shape a pro- Iranian regime in Baghdad. The cable describes how Brigadier General Qassem Suleimani, a commander in Iran's Revolutionary Guards, was the point man directing the formulation and implementation of the Iranian government's Iraq policy, "with authority second only" to the country's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Like the Iranians, the Saudis also used money and political influence in Iraq, this time to support Sunni political aspirations, exert influence over Sunni tribal groups, and undercut the Shias, according to another diplomatic cable. One document reveals that US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton criticised Gulf states such as Qatar, Kuwait and the UAE for failing to staunch the flow of donations to groups such as Al-Qaeda in Iraq. Syria allowed insurgent fighters to enter Iraq, and Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad told a visiting American delegation that Syria was ready to begin security cooperation with the US in exchange for political cooperation, according to another cable. Even Turkey, which has good relations with the Iraqi government, secretly allowed weapons to flow to Al-Qaeda in the country and financed other insurgents and anti-Kurdish Sunni political parties, especially the anti-Kurd Al-Hadba Gathering, a Sunni-led political group that has prevailed in provincial elections in the Nineveh Province in Iraq. Since the 2003 US-led invasion, Iraq has become the centre of a regional power struggle between Shia Iran to the east, the country's Arab Sunni neighbours to the west and Turkey to the north, a struggle that played out during the Iraqi parliamentary elections in March. In addition to efforts to build political bases in Iraq, these countries have dramatically expanded their economic ties with the country, taking advantage of increased insecurity there to extend their influence. Iran ranks second only behind Turkey among countries exporting goods to Iraq, with Iran exporting more than $4 billion worth of products to the country in the first half of this year alone, a 33 per cent increase over the same period a year earlier. Iraq's other neighbours are also making billions of dollars in profits from commerce, transit trade, tourism and investment in Iraq, undermining Iraq's own industry and agriculture and milking its oil revenues. Careful analysis of the documents revealed by WikiLeaks shows not only the ineptitude of the United States and its failure to put an end to such practices, but also how the US intervention pushed Iraq's divided political groups closer to the country's ambitious neighbours. The American failure in Iraq has also loomed large in a central feature of the Iraqi conflict, namely the ethnic and sectarian divisions in the country that have been well-illustrated by the post-invasion and US-orchestrated political process. Many documents shed light on the behaviour of the Iraqi politicians and groups that took charge of the country following the fall of Saddam, thanks to a process the Americans boastfully call "consensus democracy". While information about these politicians is already widely known, the WikiLeaks' revelations have nevertheless reinforced concerns that the US-engineered political process in Iraq will leave the country permanently divided. Some of the reports show Iraqi Shia Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki permitting the abuse of Sunni prisoners, for example, along with other misuses of power. The reports include details of summary executions and attacks with acid and electric drills, as well as beatings and mutilations. Other documents show that Iraq's Shia leaders have been alarmed by the growing relations between Iraqi Sunnis and other Sunnis across the country's borders. One report shows Iyad Allawi, leader of the Sunni-dominated Al-Iraqiya bloc in the country's parliament, thanking the United States for remaining engaged in Iraqi politics and complaining of Washington's "losing muscle" by drawing down its military forces in the country. The same document reveals that suspicions between Iraq's different political blocs have been mutual, with Allawi expressing concern about Iranian influence and calling the Shia blocs "Iran's friends" in Iraq. Such behaviour has deepened the sectarianism in the country that has nevertheless become the norm of post-Saddam Iraqi politics and which many blame for Iraq's present problems. It also shows how deeply Iraq's divided leaders depend on the United States to manage foreign meddling in the country, despite US misdeeds in Iraq and the fact that it is largely responsible for the country's misery. With American troops now preparing to pull out from Iraq by the end of next year, that meddling is likely to increase and to aggravate the existing sectarian divisions in the country. If many governments have been demanding apologies from the United States for the embarrassment and damage the WikiLeaks revelations have done, the question remains of what can be done to make up for the fiasco of the occupation of Iraq.
