Can Iraq shape its own destiny?

There are thousands of brand new rifles and machine guns for sale never been used, still under guarantee, and they have only 'dropped' once. It sounds like an ad for E-bay, but such is the state of the Iraqi army its reputation has taken a beating.  The Army will somehow need to live this down to stand any chance in regaining its self-respect if only among its people.  Such was the exodus of a supposedly highly trained fully equipped army that fell apart in farcical disarray in the face of a religiously impassioned but well organised Sunni fundamentalist ISIS forces.  That said, the latest news is Iraqi forces have been unable to launch any strategic counter-offensives against ISIS insurgency.  Moreover, sympathies for ISIS controlled Sunni Iraq most probably growing out of frustration has further complicated the political landscape.

Emboldened by the recent popular vote Prime Minister Maliki, rejected the idea for the government of reconciliation or as ex-Prime Minister Ayad Allawi calls a Government of “national salvation” in response to such rising tide of Sunni-supported jihadist’s forces.  Enjoying the limelight of democracy, according to Maliki, allowing such concessions would be tantamount to a coup in the constitution, which would greatly demean the seat of his government. That democratic mechanism of one man one vote that brought him to power has proved a blunt instrument: ironically working against its intended national audience.  By and large, it allowed the Shia majority to cultivate fertile grounds sanctioning Maliki’s sectarian rule. It also consolidated his influence among Iraqi Shia to centre stage with little regard for what happens to the Sunni and Kurdish parts of the country.  Such will be the unavoidable divide despite appeals for concessions to accommodate minority rights towards an equal society a product that produced the Sunni political underclass.  While Iraq burns Maliki twiddles his fingers mistakenly believing his ideas of democracy does not engender fractious policies.  He has clearly abandoned tolerance and wisdom that normally fledgling Democracies desperately needs. Such divisive approach created two vital and pivoting obstructions. One it encouraged a fertile ground for the Sunni Jihadist still in Iraq, a legacy of American confrontations, for increased radicalism and hostilities to the regime. Two it encouraged a coalescing among these separate jihadists weakening the overall desire of rapprochement as well as further distancing the parties; a result of such government polarising policies.

As in Syria ISIS will prove, aside from its military might and disinterest in overreach, it has power to consolidate and sustain itself for the long term. It is now self-financing with a staying power that is   hope  that without clearly defined border intentions, ISIS remains aimless, eventually exhausting its expanding power if not its fire power. Conversely, it is recognised, that for now at least, ISIS will be engaged in strengthening its central command considering that today it controls bigger territories and sphere of influence than many countries.  ISIS has enough to build a new Islamic state or Emirate that would mainly subscribe to Wahhabi Sunni Muslims advocating radical interpretation of Islam poised at the gates of Shia heartland.  Judging from recent events it stands ready to destroy Najaf and Karbala as easily as the Taliban’s destruction of Bamiyan statues.
generally accepted, in new won territories. With continued alleged help from the Sunni Saudi cash cow, a source economically and financially immensely more powerful than Shia Iran, it can afford a long drawn out aggressive spread of ideologically inspired control of the region. Controversially, America’s non-interference in the meantime might be seen to let such a scenario burn itself out in the  the

So, what now Maliki or better still what options remain for a stable Iraq? Since nothing was left even for contingency, the stark reality is that there a very few to choose from an almost barren landscape and they are all bad and complicated. In the event one can only pick the least bad from the truly awful.  Any choice would be obfuscated with contradictions which may yet include options that ISIS, led by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, may want to exercise resting on valid ideas that success breeds legitimacy. In amongst all that we need to look at the Syrian options as well as the Iranian options and of courses how all that relates to what people for now increasingly consider the Kurdish trump card.  It is Time to consult the Oracle!

Option one: Maliki must go but then who is there to replace him? Especially when this proposed transition is considered at this late stage as efforts to unify the country.  As far as I can see there are three main candidates: Adel Abdul Mahdi is one of the favourite but a Franco-file for over 30 years, although a secularist by reputation is one who supports Maoist economics is I find hard to favour. There is of course Hussein Al-Shahristani, a man who spent 10 years in solitary confinement under Saddam Hussein's government must know a thing or two about suffering.  We cannot rule him out of contention although he has repeatedly voiced his opposition to Prime Ministerial office.  Lastly and in my opinion favourite is Ayad Allawi, the previous Prime Minister who must be the favourite by the Americans. He can tick most of the squares authentically attesting to all ‘western’ credentials.  Whether he can be enticed to return to the job and leave his beloved Kingston on Thames in England is another matter. On the other hand he is the one individual who is secularist enough and has the diplomatic skills to work with both Washington and Tehran, despite the lingering tensions between the United States and Iran.

Option two: is for Kurdish realignment embodying into a one new Iraq Nation. Having recently grabbed oil rich Kirkuk, would the Kurds respond to American efforts for their aggrandisement and join in a new United Iraq? Wishful thinking at best as there are far too many self-interest centrifugal forces pulling to disband such ideas.  John Kerry, United States Secretary of State, recently visited the Kurdish leadership trying to entice them towards a united new Iraq unfortunately found lukewarm response. The Kurds would drive a hard bargain to win further concession from the Iraqi authorities as well as positive concessions in exercising their polar moment from Iran as well as on behalf of the Kurdish Turks who have for centuries been under the yolk of Turkish domination. For now at least apparently the head of the Kurdish regional government was decidedly non- committal describing the situation in Iraq, it is "facing a new reality and a new Iraq".

Option three: is the disintegration of Iraq into three separate Kurdish, Sunni and Shia regions. Faced with internal and external threats added to internal upheaval and in efforts of avoiding a civil war I increasingly advocate dismembering as a solution.  Historical precedents justifying such ideas are there in abundance.  Austro-Hungarian Empire at the end of WWI and more recently some would recall the former Yugoslavia after years of internal struggle ‘collapsed’ into several Balkan states. The resulting smaller states proved the ideal solution for peace among different nationalist and religious allegiances.  As for population displacement we can also look into historical chapters that concern India and Pakistan partitions in 1947 at the time of India’s independence or post Ottoman Turkey and Greece in 1923.  Kurdish, Shia and Sunnis may have ethnic as well as religious differences but I believe eventually they will be able to put aside those differences for the sake of trade and other economic common interests ultimately establishing full cooperation. It is high time to restore New Iraq into an Organic state to firmly establish it along agreed and real borders that can sustain validity in the notions of tolerance to disengage from entrenched self-defeatist ideas and to live in peace with one’s neighbours. 

These points and more are very complex and any political leader who does not respect their complexity is asking for trouble.  It will, however, be difficult for any impartially minded secular leader to unite those who believe in faith over reason.  As a rule, such beliefs have habits of incessantly encapsulating the spiritual nuclei that often enough dismisses or at best marginalises the rational thought. Casting such ideas aside, the answer must be yes, Iraq can shape its own destiny.

Arab Nationalism

“Don’t fear the tears from our maternal eyes.

Away from us grief-making cowards!

When you take up arms we must triumph;

It is for Kings to shed tears.

We gave you life;

Warriors, that life is no longer yours;

All your days belong to the Motherland,

She is your mother before us”

 This extract from Le Chant du depart (The Song of Departure) c. 1794 after the call of Levee en Mass in Revolutionary France.

Arab Nationalism is dichotomies of religious, ideological and geopolitical forces that could have come together towards the end of the First World War but instead it imploded by its internal struggle.  Such considerations added to selfish interests and totally bounded by lack of coherence and near total absence of common national interest that today still cries out for an Arab motherland.  Far from a heartfelt call to French solidarity at nation building, the result of The Arab Revolt of 1917 saw a furthering degeneration of the Arab cause towards an intended pan-Arabian nationalistic unity.   By contrast, the effect fastened itself to one of greater dominance; British and French colonialists’ forces in the shape of a Mandatory power (held in trust with curtailed sovereignty),  granted to them at The Treaty of Versailles in 1919.  It was to be the new chapter of the Middle East subaltern state but subsequently caused one of the severest damage to territorial and human loss the region would experience for many years and does so to this day.  The damage further increased after WWII by planting Israel, a Zionist State, marginalising the Palestinians to build homes for the displaced European Jews.  The revolt, in the meantime, proved a watershed in Arabian political thinking that went to disengage the Arabs from Ottoman hegemony that had until then chained them for almost 500 years in exchange to one sourced from Imperialist forces – Imperial Britain and France.

Having encouraged the formation of the Arab League in 1944-45 the hope was this would serve in keeping the Arab states together and also to act as a vehicle for Arab cooperation to contain the influence of outside powers such as American and Russian forces as much as from potentially predatory neighbours.  

 For many young Arabs, this post-war age promised to be a new ‘national age’.  “The false dawn of freedom from Ottoman power after 1918 – which had led instead to Britain’s regional overrule – might, at last, give way to the glorious morning of full Arab nationhood.”   Having secured a political friendship with the Hashimite kingdoms of Iraq and Jordan and securing the rights to the oil that came with Iraq and Persia, the British were able to lever their way over the Egyptian people. At the time comprising more than a third of Middle East population,  further validating, in their view, their hold on the Middle East. 

The Arab revolt in 1917 was not only to remove the Ottoman yoke of domination over the Arabs but also to help the British forces in their continued break-up of the remaining remnants of the multi-ethnic Ottoman Empire. At the time, the Ottoman Empire allied itself with Germany as part of the Central Powers declaring a ‘Jihad’ (Holy War) against Britain, France and Russia.   Despite the victory, Britain reneged on its promise for Nationalist and Independent Arabia.  The colonialist insisted that Arabia was not only unfit for self-government but went on a carving spree like the Sykes-Picot agreement, dividing Arabia at will but with an additional conciliatory promise of British assistance against internal revolt and external attack.  In the event, it bestowed kingdoms to those most cooperative and least inflexible.  Those kingdoms were to no other than satisfying the narcissist greed of the Hashimite tribe.  In the process, it was the Saudi Monarch who seized the holy places of Mecca and Medina from their Hashemite guardians and turned Hashemite Hejaz into a province of what became Saudi Arabia.  As a consequence there developed a rivalry between Egypt, the Hashemites and the Saudis which focused on Syria; a fertile ground even then for religious and regional conflict and prone to outside influences.  Since then there has been a separation of powers void of a centralised or dominating structure resulted in an ever-widening schism among the Arab nation; increasingly individualistic and egotistical in ideology.   

Soon after Egypt asserted its position as first place among the Arab states it suffered a shock defeat in 1948 Arab – Israeli conflict consequently led to the overthrow of its King Farouk in 1952.  The revolution that ensued brought with it the Republic of Egypt with young nationalistic officer Gamal Abdel Nasser shortly after that succeeding as its President.   The defeat was also a crushing humiliation but had an added effect to galvanise Pan-Arab sentiments provoking a nationalistic cause in the leading Arab states.  The struggle with the British was becoming increasingly violent none more so than the nationalising of the Suez Canal by Nasser in 1956.  The canal was constructed in 1859 and was jointly owned by the French and British. The British had purchased its share from Muhammad Sa'id Pasha, son of Mohamed Ali Pasha, ruler of Egypt under the suzerainty of the Ottoman Empire.  The purchase had an added value of saving Egypt’s economy from going bankrupt.  With the help of the Americans, by exerting pressure on the British pound sterling, the British ended its short but at the time destructive foray into Egypt.  To exert Egypt influence on the Arab world, Nasser mobilised his nationalistic ideas for Pan-Arabism succeeding in Uniting Egypt and Syria under the banner of United Arab Republic but unfortunately that was short lived.  That, in fact, was the nearest any Arab nation came to unite with another.

Arab countries gained independence separately, with varying anachronistic timing.  Such was the 

Disjointed social and geopolitical nature of the Middle East.  Reflecting on the whole region including Egypt and the Arabic-speaking North African countries one wonders whether there could ever be a social cohesion to an Arabised nation. To put it more simply at times it seems there is so much divergence in Arab culture and ideology that even Islam seems unable to bridge those differences. Although this, however, may be hemmed in the difficulty of defining an ‘Arab’, regional majority religions, nevertheless, fails to prove a unifying force but ultimately aimless and helpless in cohering what an otherwise a typical Semitic race is.  One sometimes wonders whether heritage, history or language can ever be the wellspring of weighted ideas to influence Arab ideological unity.  It points to the contrary, however, that divisional religious ideology with Tribal ethno-heritage background is instead igniting the catalyst; fuelling the diversity and sectarian violence we see today in the Middle East. Moreover, what is happening in Syria and elsewhere is evidence that Arab national identity is hollow; a clear evidence, therefore, that Arab Nationalism and civilisation has finally been exhausted.  Generally speaking Arab society, chiefly its leadership is proving effortless and incapable to exercise its rational stance to override Religion. We are, however, left with a conundrum to draw a typology of what is an Arab because many severely entrenched in the confusion of Islamic and Tribal nationalism for Arabism and holistic approach to nationalism remains totally defunct of a mother country.

Happiness

"Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness" are the immortal words that are enshrined by the people of the United States of America and are the axiom of the US declaration of independence.  When Thomas Jefferson in 1776 was draughting the US constitution plagiarising but immortalising that “all men are created equal” he left some unhappy people behind - The Black and indentured slaves categorised then as ‘subhuman’, they were left to live in misery.  The Americans listened to their ‘elders’ and leaders, or they did at the time although many are still in a state of desire waiting for to be gratified.  But this is not an exclusive club we all seek happiness and the desire to be happy.  We can also acknowledge that desire of happiness is itself, in the long term, a happy state they find.  The first step to happiness is the step itself but carefully avoiding the preference of happiness to virtue.  We construct our life to be happy so we seek happiness wherever we can find it.  In a way, it is the constitution of our consciousness.

From a historical perspective, happiness was, in Roman time, symbolised by and gave rise to the

Penis of Pompeii firmly directs humankind where happiness lies.  “Hic Habitat Felicitas”, “Here dwells happiness” clearly demonstrated at the National Archaeological Museum, in Naples. It is a symbol of prosperity, fertility, life, power and luck.  The Penis of Pompei was also the symbol of life placed on many doorways of Bakeries bidding bread and other living things to rise and fill with life.  A little like the mythological horseshoe until recently.  The ‘Fascinum’ also used to grace the entryways of many residences of nobility and plebeians alike “Felicity lives here” type of thing warding off bad spirits but encouraging security, bounty and fecundity radiating outward as a life-giving symbol.  Towards 150 BCE when Rome was becoming an Empire, Felicitas was worshipped as a goddess and wealthy officials, including Julius Caesar later, were building temples in her honour. Festivals of Felicitas were iconized by cornucopia bursting with fruits of the harvest that symbolised bounty. 

Staying with the world of Ancient religions, we realise all their formats built around happiness; lack of it, the fear of it or even seeking after it by promises in the after-life.  In the Christian, religion happiness was competing for centre stage as the central attraction in its pull into the Transcendental Spiritual world.    Although things didn’t reach fever pitch where the need or desire to die overpowered reason, Christian martyrs, so long as they were baptised, they were happy to die.  Although, it is not pleasurable to be fed to wild lions or subjected to a hopelessly uneven gladiatorial combat, their belief was constituted in their happiness: gates of the promised Heaven was the beginning of life. Joy became the ‘it’ word; happy to be born, glad to die and happy to be happy.  A promise of Utopia- how beautiful!  Incidentally, those who were watching the happiness of death (cruelty was part of festivals), were also happy in the knowledge of seeing real life drama of torture.  What was torture for some was happiness for others?  Also, the mode of death or torture of some was the measure of happiness for others; it apparently enhanced the spectators' life; they were not much squeamish at the sight of blood. 

Happy are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Happy are the meek for they will inherit the earth.
Happy are those who are persecuted for righteousness’s sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven

Source: Matthew (5:3-11)

Fast forward a couple of millenniums, give or take a century; we are in the modern era of

Revolutionary France.  By now they have done away with the Catholic Church and in Rochefort, west of Paris in 1791, a particular sermon by a Joseph-Marie Lequinio was being preached. He was appealing to the ‘unfaithful’ to kill the king (Louis XVI) instead of condemning him to life in the galleys.    “We all dream of happiness; we want only to be happy[…]do not wait for me to tell you of angels[…]and paradise[…]So Don't frustrate your enjoyment here and now by being fooled with eternal happiness”.  In other words, enjoy it while you can, not realising of course that he destroyed all happiness of hope clung to by those happy in the thought they were going to heaven.   

Which, I hope neatly brings me to neuroscience; how the mind interprets or triggers happiness within the mind/body partnership.  We need to ask how it happens that for an external physical thing can cause feelings to stir the consciousness.     How does the brain interprets happiness and whether happiness is measurable, if so, by what increments?    Where does this elusive happiness hide? On the other hand, there could be no such thing as experiencing happiness but only a perceiving mind.  Sharing, caring, singing, laughing and so on, as a physical reaction that can affect the chemical balances in the brain produced to cause positive emotions.  The brain responds to a pleasure stimulus by activating a reward system, translated as happiness.  Just like crying caused by the external world, is promoted by a negative emotion that is in turn evoked by a physical experience.  Because happiness is relative and subjective, it can only be explained by examples.  This is similar to something fascinating called Qualia; body sensations that translated by the mind.  Examples of Qualia such as the pain of a headache, the taste of wine, or the perceived redness of an evening sky or even the smell of a Rose for instance.  We can, after all, find comfort in the thought that the psychology in the ability to be happy is partly what it is to be human.   

Sharing, I believe, is the single most effective experience that can lead to happiness, even more, evident when contrasted with Unhappiness, which we tend not to share with others. Sharing is above all other actions that characterise the quality and quantity of happiness. The mere act of sharing is part of the happiness projected by those that are participants in that act- including socialising. Good news such as "won a contract",  or "passed my exam" or sharing a "Happy Birthday" is what exhilarate and realise a true state of happiness.  It is not much fun hogging a Birthday cake all to oneself.  For example; experiencing happiness being rich is mainly attributed to the fact of sharing material possessions.  A diamond ring, a 'Dolce and Gabbana' dress, a new car, expensive holidays with friends; sharing in one's pleasure;  in a sense, sharing evaluates the realisation of one’s happiness - how poorer other feels we leave for another argument!. Even in the world of social media sharing a post and knowing that someone acknowledges the contribution by reading it, or better still liking it, is a boost to happiness.  Also the very beautiful remain living in fool’s paradise; the truth of what one sees in the mirror is when someone acknowledges it to be so; even if that 'truth' is a lie! 

Happiness then is central to lay people’s beliefs, longing and ambitions about what makes life worth living for a radiant tomorrow.  Happiness is in the desire to eat, shop, holiday, sex, be wanted, work or whatever ‘turns’ one on as much as happiness lying in the good moral one does.  We all have different desires with different values attached to those desires.  Sometimes it is the fun of the chase, and of course the chase of the fun. Equally, just in the thought of hope; when that desire is satiated happiness can dissipate. Hopes and expectations run in tandem. When the expectation is low so is the aspirations and, concomitantly, the level of happiness; desire in the object equals the desire for it.  We could easily desire something to happen in the next century so the hope will remain in the pleasure of thought, well-being and desired. 

On that theme here is a thought I am 'happy' to share…

"Our happiness is not in what we are but in what we are becoming."                                                                                                                                me!