www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110003156
EST IRBIL, Northern Iraq--It is hard to imagine another place where Americans are more popular these days. Others--young and old, Kurdish or Turkmen, shopkeepers and politicians--echo similar sentiments about ending the reign of brutality in Baghdad. Why are the Iraqi voices still so distant for the chattering classes in the West? Iraqis once exiled in various corners of the world met here last week to launch their long-awaited opposition conference. With or without American participation, the Iraqis here say they are ready to reclaim their country in the final war of liberation. After all, these people were effectively fighting Saddam Hussein and designing a democratic transition long before Washington warmed to the idea. The roughly seven million Iraqis who live outside the regime's control--in exile, or in the Kurdish safe havens in the north--have developed strong democratic traditions which they now want to transplant inside the country. In the smoke-filled meeting rooms, conferences and workshops in London, Washington or northern liberated Iraq, they have been discussing Iraq's new constitution, the "de-Baathification" of its institutions, truth and reconciliation, and disarmament. One exile admits that they are looking at Germany's de-Nazification, and even at the Federalist papers. Makiya is one of the architects of the transitional period. Here in the northern part of the country where he has been living for a month, it is amusing to watch the Cambridge intellectual interact with Shiite clerics, resistance fighters, and tribal leaders. But everyone has a unique role within the resistance and Mr. Chalabi's leadership skills, are apparent to a passing observer. An exuberant force exudes from the Iraqis braving for the final push. At the main conference hall in the Kurdish town of Selahaddin, where the opposition meeting is taking place, all talk is of post-Saddam life. The other day, there was a homecoming party for resistance fighters who are secretly returning from Detroit, London, and the Netherlands for the final day of reckoning. Outside Baghdad's reach, the two self-governing Kurdish enclaves here have established relatively free societies. There is all you cannot find in Baghdad--freedom from Iraqi intelligence, satellite TV, Internet cafes, cell phones and a lively media environment. Yet so long as Saddam remains in power, the experiment here will remain vulnerable. There will also be no justice done for the millions killed or scarred by Saddam's aggression. The images of antiwar demonstrations across Europe could not look more meaningless in this context. Every conversation beyond a few pleasantries ultimately unearths the story of a lost brother, or son, or relatives killed in one of the regime's many purges--or a brush with death during a chemical attack. The level of violence once unleashed here, and currently endured by many Iraqis in government areas, is surreal by Western standards. The Anfal campaign of 1988-89 alone claimed more than 100,000 lives in a year of organized ethnic cleansing. Last week in Suleimaniyah, the former headquarters of the Iraqi secret police reopened as a museum dedicated to human rights. There, a Kurdish woman in her 30s whispered that she does not want Americans to liberate Baghdad. I visited a Turkmen family, forced to leave its ancestral hometown of Kirkuk in 1991 as part of Iraq's "Nationality Correction" campaign, ethnically cleansing the city of Turks and Kurds. The couple and their nine kids live in a shack with a plastic sheet for a roof. Once well-off, the family has secured their property deeds with relatives who managed to escape deportation by either agreeing to be registered as Arabs or having sons enter the Baath Party. The steadfastness and yearning for freedom here may not make its way into the news stories, but it will ultimately reshape this nation. Policy makers in Washington should stop worrying about every little detail that might go wrong in the war or post-Saddam period; Aydintasbas, a writer for the Turkish daily Sabah, is an adjunct fellow at the Western Policy Center in Washington.
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