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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Iraq
Index
Entrance to the ruins of Babylon
Courtesy Ronald L. Kuipers
By the beginning of the twentieth century, the Ottoman
territories had become the focus of European power politics.
During the previous century, enfeebled Ottoman rule had invited
intense competition among European powers for commercial benefits
and for spheres of influence. British interest in Iraq
significantly increased when the Ottomans granted concessions to
Germany to construct railroad lines from Konya in southwest
Turkey to Baghdad in 1899 and from Baghdad to Basra in 1902. The
British feared that a hostile German presence in the Fertile
Crescent would threaten vital lines of communication to India via
Iran and Afghanistan, menacing British oil interests in Iran and
perhaps even India itself.
In 1914 when the British discovered that Turkey was entering
the war on the side of the Germans, British forces from India
landed at Al Faw on the Shatt al Arab and moved rapidly toward
Basra. By the fall of 1915, when British forces were already well
established in towns in the south, General Charles Townshend
unsuccessfully attempted to take Baghdad. In retaliation, the
Turks besieged the British garrison at Al Kut for 140 days; in
April 1916, the garrison was forced to surrender unconditionally.
The British quickly regrouped their forces, however, and resumed
their advance under General Stanley Maude in December 1916. By
March 1917 the British had captured Baghdad. Advancing northward
in the spring of 1918, the British finally took Mosul in early
November. As a result of the victory at Mosul, British authority
was extended to all the Iraqi wilayat (sing.,
wilayah-province) with the exception of the Kurdish
highlands bordering Turkey and Iran, the land alongside the
Euphrates from Baghdad south to An Nasiriyah, and the Shia cities
of Karbala and An Najaf.
On capturing Baghdad, General Maude proclaimed that Britain
intended to return to Iraq some control of its own affairs. He
stressed that this step would pave the way for ending the alien
rule that the Iraqis had experienced since the latter days of the
Abbasid caliphate. The proclamation was in accordance with the
encouragement the British had given to Arab nationalists, such as
Jafar al Askari; his brother-in-law, Nuri as Said; and Jamil al
Midfai, who sought emancipation from Ottoman rule. The nationa-
lists had supported the Allied powers in expectation of both the
Ottoman defeat and the freedom many nationalists assumed would
come with an Allied victory.
During the war, events in Iraq were greatly influenced by the
Hashimite family of Husayn ibn Ali, sharif of Mecca, who claimed
descent from the family of the Prophet Muhammad. Aspiring to
become king of an independent Arab kingdom, Husayn had broken
with the Ottomans, to whom he had been vassal, and had thrown in
his lot with the British. Anxious for his support, the British
gave Husayn reason to believe that he would have their
endorsement when the war ended. Accordingly, Husayn and his sons
led the June 1916 Arab Revolt, marching northward in conjunction
with the British into Transjordan, Palestine, and Syria.
Anticipating the fulfillment of Allied pledges, Husayn's son,
Prince Faisal (who was later to become modern Iraq's first king),
arrived in Paris in 1919 as the chief spokesman for the Arab
cause. Much to his disappointment, Faisal found that the Allied
powers were less than enthusiastic about Arab independence.
At the 1919 Paris Peace Conference, under Article 22 of the
League of Nations Covenant, Iraq was formally made a Class A
mandate entrusted to Britain. This award was completed on April
25, 1920, at the San Remo Conference in Italy. Palestine also was
placed under British mandate, and Syria was placed under French
mandate. Faisal, who had been proclaimed king of Syria by a
Syrian national congress in Damascus in March 1920, was ejected
by the French in July of the same year.
The civil government of postwar Iraq was headed originally by
the high commissioner, Sir Percy Cox, and his deputy, Colonel
Arnold Talbot Wilson. The British were confronted with Iraq's
age-old problems, compounded by some new ones. Villagers demanded
that the tribes be restrained, and tribes demanded that their
titles to tribal territories be extended and confirmed. Merchants
demanded more effective legal procedures, courts, and laws to
protect their activities and interests. Municipal authorities
appealed for defined powers and grants-in-aid in addition to the
establishment of public health and education facilities.
Landlords pressed for grants of land, for the building of canals
and roads, and for the provision of tested seeds and livestock.
The holy cities of An Najaf and Karbala and their satellite
tribes were in a state of near anarchy. British reprisals after
the murder of a British officer in An Najaf failed to restore
order. The Anayzah, the Shammar, and the Jubur tribes of the
western desert were beset by violent infighting. British adminis-
tration had yet to be established in the mountains of Kurdistan.
Meanwhile, from the Hakkari Mountains beyond Iraq's northern
frontier and from the plains of Urmia in Iran, thousands of
Assyrians began to pour into Iraqi territory seeking refuge from
Turkish savagery. The most striking problem facing the British
was the growing anger of the nationalists, who felt betrayed at
being accorded mandate status. The nationalists soon came to view
the mandate as a flimsy disguise for colonialism. The experienced
Cox delegated governance of the country to Wilson while he served
in Persia between April 1918 and October 1920. The younger man
governed Iraq with the kind of paternalism that had characterized
British rule in India. Impatient to establish an efficient
administration, Wilson used experienced Indians to staff
subordinate positions within his administration. The exclusion of
Iraqis from administrative posts added humiliation to Iraqi
discontent.
Three important anticolonial secret societies had been formed
in Iraq during 1918 and 1919. At An Najaf, Jamiyat an Nahda al
Islamiya (The League of the Islamic Awakening) was organized; its
numerous and varied members included ulama (religious leaders),
journalists, landlords, and tribal leaders. Members of the
Jamiyat assassinated a British officer in the hope that the
killing would act as a catalyst for a general rebellion at Iraq's
other holy city, Karbala. Al Jamiya al Wataniya al Islamiya (The
Muslim National League) was formed with the object of organizing
and mobilizing the population for major resistance. In February
1919, in Baghdad, a coalition of Shia merchants, Sunni teachers
and civil servants, Sunni and Shia ulama, and Iraqi officers
formed the Haras al Istiqlal (The Guardians of Independence). The
Istiqlal had member groups in Karbala, An Najaf, Al Kut, and Al
Hillah.
Local outbreaks against British rule had occurred even before
the news reached Iraq that the country had been given only
mandate status. Upon the death of an important Shia
mujtahid (religious scholar) in early May 1920, Sunni and
Shia ulama temporarily put aside their differences as the
memorial services metamorphosed into political rallies. Ramadan,
the Islamic month of fasting, began later in that month; once
again, through nationalistic poetry and oratory, religious
leaders exhorted the people to throw off the bonds of
imperialism. Violent demonstrations and strikes followed the
British arrest of several leaders.
When the news of the mandate reached Iraq in late May, a
group of Iraqi delegates met with Wilson and demanded
independence. Wilson dismissed them as a "handful of ungrateful
politicians." Nationalist political activity was stepped up, and
the grand mujtahid of Karbala, Imam Shirazi, and his son,
Mirza Muhammad Riza, began to organize the effort in earnest.
Arab flags were made and distributed, and pamphlets were handed
out urging the tribes to prepare for revolt. Muhammad Riza acted
as liaison among insurgents in An Najaf and in Karbala, and the
tribal confederations. Shirazi then issued a fatwa
(religious ruling), pointing out that it was against Islamic law
for Muslims to countenance being ruled by non-Muslims, and he
called for a jihad against the British. By July 1920, Mosul was
in rebellion against British rule, and the insurrection moved
south down the Euphrates River valley. The southern tribes, who
cherished their long-held political autonomy, needed little
inducement to join in the fray. They did not cooperate in an
organized effort against the British, however, which limited the
effect of the revolt. The country was in a state of anarchy for
three months; the British restored order only with great
difficulty and with the assistance of Royal Air Force bombers.
British forces were obliged to send for reinforcements from India
and from Iran.
Ath Thawra al Iraqiyya al Kubra, or The Great Iraqi
Revolution (as the 1920 rebellion is called), was a watershed
event in contemporary Iraqi history. For the first time, Sunnis
and Shias, tribes and cities, were brought together in a common
effort. In the opinion of Hanna Batatu, author of a seminal work
on Iraq, the building of a nation-state in Iraq depended upon two
major factors: the integration of Shias and Sunnis into the new
body politic and the successful resolution of the age-old
conflicts between the tribes and the riverine cities and among
the tribes themselves over the food-producing flatlands of the
Tigris and the Euphrates. The 1920 rebellion brought these groups
together, if only briefly; this constituted an important first
step in the long and arduous process of forging a nation-state
out of Iraq's conflict-ridden social structure.
The 1920 revolt had been very costly to the British in both
manpower and money. Whitehall was under domestic pressure to
devise a formula that would provide the maximum control over Iraq
at the least cost to the British taxpayer. The British replaced
the military regime with a provisional Arab government, assisted
by British advisers and answerable to the supreme authority of
the high commissioner for Iraq, Cox. The new administration
provided a channel of communication between the British and the
restive population, and it gave Iraqi leaders an opportunity to
prepare for eventual self-government. The provisional government
was aided by the large number of trained Iraqi administrators who
returned home when the French ejected Faisal from Syria. Like
earlier Iraqi governments, however, the provisional government
was composed chiefly of Sunni Arabs; once again the Shias were
underrepresented.
At the Cairo Conference of 1921, the British set the
parameters for Iraqi political life that were to continue until
the 1958 revolution; they chose Faisal as Iraq's first King; they
established an indigenous Iraqi army; and they proposed a new
treaty. To confirm Faisal as Iraq's first monarch, a one-question
plebiscite was carefully arranged that had a return of 96 percent
in his favor. The British saw in Faisal a leader who possessed
sufficient nationalist and Islamic credentials to have broad
appeal, but who also was vulnerable enough to remain dependent on
their support. Faisal traced his descent from the family of the
Prophet Muhammad, and his ancestors had held political authority
in the holy cities of Mecca and Medina since the tenth century.
The British believed that these credentials would satisfy
traditional Arab standards of political legitimacy; moreover, the
British thought that Faisal would be accepted by the growing
Iraqi nationalist movement because of his role in the 1916 revolt
against the Turks, his achievements as a leader of the Arab
emancipation movement, and his general leadership qualities.
As a counterforce to the nationalistic inclinations of the
monarchy and as a means of insuring the king's dependence, the
British cultivated the tribal shaykhs, whose power had been
waning since the end of the nineteenth century. While the new
king sought to create a national consciousness, to strengthen the
institutions of the emerging state, and especially to create a
national military, the tribal shaykhs supported a fragmented
community and sought to weaken the coercive power of the state. A
major goal of the British policy was to keep the monarchy
stronger than any one tribe but weaker than a coalition of tribes
so that British power would ultimately be decisive in arbitrating
disputes between the two.
Ultimately, the British-created monarchy suffered from a
chronic legitimacy crisis: the concept of a monarchy was alien to
Iraq. Despite his Islamic and pan-Arab credentials, Faisal was
not an Iraqi, and, no matter how effectively he ruled, Iraqis saw
the monarchy as a British creation. The continuing inability of
the government to gain the confidence of the people fueled
political instability well into the 1970s.
The British decision at the Cairo Conference to establish an
indigenous Iraqi army was significant. In Iraq, as in most of the
developing world, the military establishment has been the best
organized institution in an otherwise weak political system.
Thus, while Iraq's body politic crumbled under immense political
and economic pressure throughout the monarchic period, the
military gained increasing power and influence; moreover, because
the officers in the new army were by necessity Sunnis who had
served under the Ottomans, while the lower ranks were
predominantly filled by Shia tribal elements, Sunni dominance in
the military was preserved.
The final major decision taken at the Cairo Conference
related to the new Anglo-Iraqi Treaty. Faisal was under pressure
from the nationalists and the anti-British mujtahids of An
Najaf and Karbala to limit both British influence in Iraq and the
duration of the treaty. Recognizing that the monarchy depended on
British support--and wishing to avoid a repetition of his
experience in Syria--Faisal maintained a moderate approach in
dealing with Britain. The twenty-year treaty, which was ratified
in October 1922, stated that the king would heed British advice
on all matters affecting British interests and on fiscal policy
as long as Iraq was in debt to Britain, and that British
officials would be appointed to specified posts in eighteen
departments to act as advisers and inspectors. A subsequent
financial agreement, which significantly increased the financial
burden on Iraq, required Iraq to pay half the cost of supporting
British resident officials, among other expenses. British
obligations under the new treaty included providing various kinds
of aid, notably military assistance, and proposing Iraq for
membership in the League of Nations at the earliest moment. In
effect, the treaty ensured that Iraq would remain politically and
economically dependent on Britain. While unable to prevent the
treaty, Faisal clearly felt that the British had gone back on
their promises to him.
After the treaty had been signed, Iraq readied itself for the
country-wide elections that had been provided for in the May 1922
Electoral Law. There were important changes in the government at
this time. Cox resigned his position as high commissioner and was
replaced by Sir Henry Dobbs; Iraq's aging prime minister, Abd ar
Rahman al Gailani, stepped down and was replaced by Abd al Muhsin
as Saadun. In April 1923, Saadun signed a protocol that shortened
the treaty period to four years. As a result of the elections,
however, Saadun was replaced by Jafar al Askari, a veteran of the
Arab Revolt and an early supporter of Faisal.
The elected Constituent Assembly met for the first time in
March 1924, and it formally ratified the treaty despite strong
(and sometimes physical) opposition on the part of many in the
assembly. The assembly also accepted the Organic Law that
declared Iraq to be a sovereign state with a representative
system of government and a hereditary constitutional monarchy.
The newly ratified constitution-- which, along with the treaty,
had been hotly debated--legislated an important British role in
Iraqi affairs. The major issue at stake in the constitutional
debate revolved around the powers of the monarchy. In the final
draft, British interests prevailed, and the monarchy was granted
wide-ranging powers that included the right to confirm all laws,
to call for a general election, to prorogue parliament, and to
issue ordinances for the fulfillment of treaty obligations
without parliamentary sanctions. Like the treaty, the
constitution provided the British with a means of indirect
control in Iraq.
After the Anglo-Iraqi Treaty was ratified, the most pressing
issue confronting the newly established constitutional monarchy
was the question of boundaries, especially in the former Ottoman
wilayah of Mosul, now known as Mosul Province. The status
of Mosul Province was complicated by two factors, the British
desire to gain oil concessions and the existence of a majority
Kurdish population that was seeking independence apart from
either Iraq or Turkey. According to the Treaty of Sevres,
concluded in 1920 with the Ottoman Sultan, Mosul was to be part
of an autonomous Kurdish state. The treaty was scrapped, however,
when nationalist leader Mustafa Kamal (1881-1938--also known as
Atatürk) came to power in Turkey and established control over the
Kurdish areas in eastern Turkey. In 1923, after two failed
British attempts to establish an autonomous Kurdish province,
London decided to include the Kurds in the new Iraqi state with
the proviso that Kurds would hold government positions in Kurdish
areas and that the Kurdish language would be preserved. The
British decision to include Mosul in Iraq was based largely on
their belief that the area contained large oil deposits.
Before the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the British-
controlled Turkish Petroleum Company (TPC) had held concessionary
rights to the Mosul wilayah. Under the 1916 Sykes-Picot
Agreement--an agreement in 1916 between Britain and France that
delineated future control of the Middle East--the area would have
fallen under French influence. In 1919, however, the French
relinquished their claims to Mosul under the terms of the Long-
Berenger Agreement. The 1919 agreement granted the French a 25
percent share in the TPC as compensation.
Beginning in 1923, British and Iraqi negotiators held
acrimonious discussions over the new oil concession. The major
obstacle was Iraq's insistence on a 20 percent equity
participation in the company; this figure had been included in
the original TPC concession to the Turks and had been agreed upon
at San Remo for the Iraqis. In the end, despite strong
nationalist sentiments against the concession agreement, the
Iraqi negotiators acquiesced to it. The League of Nations was
soon to vote on the disposition of Mosul, and the Iraqis feared
that, without British support, Iraq would lose the area to
Turkey. In March 1925, an agreement was concluded that contained
none of the Iraqi demands. The TPC, now renamed the Iraq
Petroleum Company (IPC), was granted a concession for a period of
seventy-five years.
In 1925 the League of Nations decided that Mosul Province
would be considered a part of Iraq, but it also suggested that
the Anglo-Iraqi Treaty be extended from four to twenty-five years
as a protection for the Kurdish minority, who intensely
distrusted the Iraqi government. The Iraqis also were to give due
regard to Kurdish sensibilities in matters of culture and of
language. Although reluctant to do so, the Iraqi assembly
ratified the treaty in January 1926. Turkey was eventually
reconciled to the loss by being promised one-tenth of any oil
revenues that might accrue in the area, and a tripartite
Anglo-Turco-Iraqi treaty was signed in July 1926. This settlement
was to have important repercussions, both positive and negative,
for the future of Iraq. Vast oil revenues would accrue from the
Mosul Province, but the inclusion of a large number of well-armed
and restless Kurds in Iraqi territory would continue to plague
Iraqi governments.
With the signing of the Anglo-Iraqi Treaty and the settling
of the Mosul question, Iraqi politics took on a new dynamic. The
emerging class of Sunni and Shia landowning tribal shaykhs vied
for positions of power with wealthy and prestigious urban-based
Sunni families and with Ottoman-trained army officers and
bureaucrats. Because Iraq's newly established political
institutions were the creation of a foreign power, and because
the concept of democratic government had no precedent in Iraqi
history, the politicians in Baghdad lacked legitimacy and never
developed deeply rooted constituencies. Thus, despite a
constitution and an elected assembly, Iraqi politics was more a
shifting alliance of important personalities and cliques than a
democracy in the Western sense. The absence of broadly based
political institutions inhibited the early nationalist movement's
ability to make deep inroads into Iraq's diverse social
structure. Thus, despite the widely felt resentment at Iraq's
mandate status, the burgeoning nationalist movement was largely
ineffective.
Nonetheless, through the late 1920s, the nationalists
persisted in opposing the Anglo-Iraqi Treaty and in demanding
independence. A treaty more favorable to the Iraqis was presented
in December 1927. It remained unratified, however, because of
nationalist demands for an unconditional promise of independence.
This promise eventually was made by the new high commissioner,
Sir Gilbert Clayton, in 1929, but the confusion occasioned by the
sudden death of Clayton and by the suicide of Abd al Muhsin as
Saadun, the most powerful Iraqi advocate of the treaty, delayed
the writing of a new treaty. In June 1929, the nationalists
received their first positive response from London when a newly
elected Labour Party government announced its intention to
support Iraq's admission to the League of Nations in 1932 and to
negotiate a new treaty recognizing Iraq's independence.
Faisal's closest adviser (and soon-to-be Iraqi strongman),
Nuri as Said,
carried out the treaty negotiations. Despite widespread
opposition, Nuri as Said was able to force the treaty through
parliament. The new Anglo-Iraqi Treaty was signed in June 1930.
It provided for a "close alliance," for "full and frank
consultations between the two countries in all matters of foreign
policy," and for mutual assistance in case of war. Iraq granted
the British the use of air bases near Basra and at Al Habbaniyah
and the right to move troops across the country. The treaty, of
twenty-five years' duration, was to come into force upon Iraq's
admission to the League of Nations. The terms of the treaty
gained Nuri as Said favor in British eyes but discredited him in
the eyes of the Iraqi nationalists, who vehemently opposed its
lengthy duration and the leasing of air bases. The Kurds and the
Assyrians also opposed the treaty because it offered no
guarantees for their status in the new country.
Data as of May 1988
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