The Shia Revival

The Shia Revival How Conflicts within Islam Will Shape the Future, Vali Nasr, W.W. Norton, New York, 2007.  310 pages, index, end notes.

The subtitle is really the essence of the book: the 1300 year old conflict between the two main divisions of Islam will shape the future of not only Islam but also that of much of the rest of the world.  Events in the Middle East as well as the “War On Terror” (such as it is) have brought Islam to the attention of many in the West.  Until recently, in this country Islam was only vaguely known. There is still much that is unknown by westerners about Islam, and much of what is known is not well understood.  The divisions within Islam are as profound and deep as any in Christianity.

Nasr begins the book with a survey of Islamic history.  It seems that Islam was designed to divide.  The founder of Islam, Mohammad, did not leave any instructions as to how his successor should be chosen.  Nor did he leave any surviving male heirs.  The only direction Mohammad gave was that the Muslim community would not err when it collectively decided upon something.  It seems that Mohammad erred in this belief.  The community was very divided about the succession of Mohammad.  This division resulted in the major division of Islam into the rival Sunni and Shiite camps.

The issue of succession is only the beginning of the differences between the two groups.  It seems that the Shia are much more given to pageants, shrines and ceremonies than the Sunnis.  These practices have lead the Sunnis to regard the Shia as either misguided brothers to be gently corrected and brought back to the pure Islam of the Sunnis or arrant apostates and heretics to be destroyed.  This has lead to periodic pogroms of the Shia in the area dominated by the Sunni.

There is little chance of a major reconciliation between the Sunnis and the Shia, the two major sects.  Their differences are severe, their customs too diverse.  The Shia seem to tolerate the Sunnis better than the Sunnis tolerate the Shias.  In the history of Islam, the Shia have always been the minority.  The Shias have always been considered not pure Muslims.

It is the major goal of the author to present the Shia as not representing the major threat to the West.  The author believes that it is the Sunnis who will be the real problem the West must face.  He points to the only elected government in the region of Iraq: Iran.  Iran is the Shia’s stronghold.  Iran is the only major country where Shia dominate.  It also the only country where a President stepped down at the end of his term in office and lives in peace in his own house inside Iran.

As the book’s title implies, the Shia are poised for a major revival.  The author thinks that the three major factors in this revival are the emergence of Iran as a major (i.e., the major) regional power; the Shia majority in Iraq; and the empowerment of the Shia in Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Kuwait, and the UAE.  He is probably right.  Just what this does for the stability of the region, Western interests (oil, what else?), and “the war on terror” is not mentioned.

This book will be useful to all who seek to understand the events in Iraq and Iran.

Author, an Iranian (a Shia, perhaps?) educated in U.S. (Ph.D. Harvard), teaches at the Naval Postgraduate School and is an Adjunct Fellow at CFR.

Our Former Employee, R.I.P.

Saddam Hussein is now dead.  He is almost forgotten.  This is some legacy for a man the U.S. government used to love, sorta.

If today you ask people in the U.S. about Saddam, what will you get in reply?  Do you think that anything will be said of his being on the U.S. payroll?  Yes, he was.  Although a long time client of the Russians, during the Iran-Iraq war the U.S. shifted toward him.  He was a murderous thug, but since we had lost our murderous thug, the Shah of Iran, we needed some we could count on.  All the other players in the region are minor league.  Does anyone really think the Saudis can be much help?

Unlike the Shah, we didn’t install Saddam.  He did this on his own.  This guy knew power.  When it comes to thuggery, he was impressive.  Just read Republic of Fear. The entire area is run by a collection ruthless killers, but among them Saddam stood out as exceptional.  Does our government know quality, or what?

Knowing all this makes it interesting to wonder just why Saddam ended up at the end of his enemies’ rope.  It is about playing ball.

It is no secret Iraq’s only asset is oil.  Iraq is a virtually landlocked country.  It position is important, but not critical.  It is just the oil.  It is the oil game that did in Saddam.

Invading Kuwait threatened the oil supply.  The supply would never have been totally cutoff, but the price would have been affected, badly for buyers.  The western nations, i.e., the U.S. and its military allies, would have been harmed by Iraq’s actions.  Potentially more so if Iraq had conquered Saudi Arabia.  The western nations could not tolerate this.  It is better to have many suppliers competing with each other than to have a single oil czar setting the price.

Something had to be done.  The U.S. had a defense treaty with Kuwait.  Saddam was told otherwise by the U.S. ambassador when she was asked by the Thug himself.  So the legal framework was there, but how to get the consent of Congress and the American people?

The then U.S. president when on a sales campaign.  He bloviated on about this and that, about threats to the world’s oil supply, about Saddam being a new Hitler.  (Hitler was also our thug of the time, but was replace by Stalin, a much better thug.  Does the our government know quality, or what?)  None of the cant got any traction until the use of the N word.

No, not that one.  The other one.  The one that is really dangerous; the one that has killed thousands and is still killing.  Nuclear weapons, we were told, are being produced in Iraq.  These weapons are a threat to those we love (i.e., to those who are on our payroll), and this just cannot be.  Images of mushroom clouds in Manhattan were invoked.  Israel was mentioned, and the Israeli lobby went to work on Congress.  The deal was in the bag.

No mention was made of whether or not Iraq had an actual working bomb.  Nor was any mention made of how would Iraq deliver a bomb, if they had one, to our land.  Iraq had no long range air force or missiles.  I guess they could have just driven it by truck, or sent it FedEx.

Israel had already struck at Saddam’s nuclear program by bombing the reactor the French were building in Iraq.  (For an inside account of the work of Israel’s intelligence arm, the Mossad, read By Way of Deception.)  Saddam was not deterred, set back perhaps, but not deterred.

Why would he be deterred?  Why should he not pursue nuclear weapons?  Lots of countries have them.  We are not about to give up ours.  This was never mentioned in the propaganda leading up to the counter invasion of Kuwait.  Besides, the U.N. said it was okay to kick Iraq’s army out of Kuwait but not for Iraq to have nuclear weapons. You know what the U.N. is.  So tell me.

The American people were scared (and lied) into agreeing with the U.S.’s involvement.  The Congress was won over by the Israeli lobby.  The U.N. made three in favor.  Any opposing votes?  Good, it is unanimous.  To war we go.

The war was impressive.  How often do you get to see a fourth rate military take on a first rate military and get clobbered?  At least the Iraqi’s were smart enough to surrender.

Kuwait was made safe for democracy, even though it was and still is a monarchy with little freedom.  Most Kuwaitis prefer to live outside of the country were there is the good life.  Saudi Arabia was saved for totalitarianism.  But Iraq’s oil did not flow.

Saddam was still in power, and he was not about to give up.  What was a little military defeat?  He still had the bulk of the military and all the secret police.  He was not going hungary.  That was the duty of the people.  The sanctions imposed by the victors ensured that would happen.

Saddam still had not learned not to mess with the West’s oil.  Just because it was under the ground in Iraq did not mean that it belonged to Iraq.  The West wanted it, and the West was going to get it.  Saddam forgot that when you are on our payroll you better obey.  We pay for quality, and we expect to get quality.  Just ask what’s his name from Panama.

Saddam had to go.  Bill wasn’t up to the task, so the job was given to a Yale man.  Not just any Yale man, but a Yale man who is the son of a Yale man who was the son of a Yale man who financed Hitler.  (Does our government know quality, or what?)  By one of those meaningless, crazy coincidences, all these Yale men were members of the Skull and Bones fraternity.  Blood is thicker than mud.

A new sales job was needed.  There was no defense treaty.  Lying ambassadors were not required.  But how to convince the Congress and the people?  The nuclear issue had not really been resolved.  This time it was repacked as a broader “weapons of mass destruction” concern.  Still, so what?  We have plenty of weapons of mass destruction.  We used lots of them in firebombing Tokyo.  They worked well, and they still do.  This nugget of information was not forwarded to the common folks.  No need to needlessly worry folks.  The fact that Saddam’s army could not do much beyond Iraq’s borders was also concealed.

Into war we went.  Confident we would find the ever abundant WMD’s.  We found sand and people happy to get rid of the Thug, but there were no WMD’s.  We looked everywhere.  There was egg.  It was all over our faces.  Not to worry.  The government’s top spy was rewarded with a presidental medal and given a nice retirement.

Once you jump into the lava pool you must swim or drown.  We tried to swim.  The little matter of this 1000 year grudge between the Shiites and the Sunni factions of Islam surfaced.  It seems that there is a lot of hate here.  This is a feud that is usually settled by violence.  There is nothing we are going to do to stop this.  We can only control this by being there to present another target.  If we play this right, these two groups might just stop shooting at each other long enough to start shooting at us.  At least this is how it seems to be working.

It is tempting to say that you know how the story ended: Saddam was hanged by those who should have joined him and all lived happily ever after.  The end.  p.s., The oil is flowing!

No.  The misery is only beginning.  The oil is not flowing and probably won’t for some time. The place has degenerated in to chaos and civil war.  The Iranians will make much of this to their advantage.  Their guy is not on the payroll.  He has got to go, but right now we are a little busy killing folks in neighboring countries.  He will have to wait his turn.

But don’t lose hope about Iraq. It is just a matter of time; sooner or later some one will take control and rule the country the way Saddam did.  Then all we have to do is put him on our payroll.