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It seems that the US administration has heaved a sigh of relief after Iraq completed last Saturday a referendum on a draft constitution, which US President George W. Bush said was "a very positive day for the Iraqi people and as for world peace."
A large turnout in the vote and the calm relative to the January election of a interim government indicated the Sunnis of Iraq participated in greater numbers in this election than last time. "That's a good news," Bush told reporters at the White House on Sunday.
Ever since the downfall of Saddam Hussein and his regime in May 2003, the making of a new constitution in Iraq has been a key process for the Bush administration which has spared no effort to promote democracy in the war-torn Arab country.
"We believe, and the Iraqis believe, the best way forward is through the democratic process. al-Qaeda wants to use their violent ways to stop the march of democracy because democracy is the exact opposite of what they believe is right," Bush said.
Bush is reasonably to advocate and stress the spread of democracy in Iraq. However, to the majority of Iraqis, the most pressing matter of the moment is to have a sense of security and stability rather than the so-called "democracy" which is a destination far away after all.
The United States has currently deployed some 150,000 troops in Iraq in hope to curb increasing insurgency in the country. But things are not as good as the people expected. For now, nearly 2000 US soldiers have been killed since the US-led war in Iraq more than two years ago. And the death toll is still increasing.
Strong US military force has not stopped the situation in Iraq going from bad to worse. Will the democratic vote change the situation effectively? Analysts are skeptical.
"No one really won in this constitution. It left almost everything vague. Everyone played to a tie but we don't know how the ties are going to be resolved," said Jon Alterman, director of the Middle East Program for the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a Washington think-tank.
Both the White House and the US State Department hailed that the level of violence in Iraq was considerably less than the last election, quoting Iraq's electoral commission as saying that there were 35 attacks on polling stations and election staff on referendum day, compared with 91 such incidents during the Jan. 30 election in Iraq.
However, Anthony Cordesman, another Middle East expert and security analyst of the CSIS disagreed with the lopsided evidence. Noting there were no indications Iraq's insurgency was abating, Cordesman said that in the weeks before the poll, attacks totaled about 570 a week compared with 470 a week from February to August. The previous peak was 540 a week from June to November, 2004, he said, citing statistics released by the Bush administration during their October 2005 report to Congress.
Judging the current situation, Cordesman believed that the realization of the planned mid-December elections and the installation of a new government afterwards remain in uncertainty.
Under Iraq's interim constitution approved in March 2004, Iraqis will choose, following approval of the draft constitution, a new parliament in national elections to be held by December 15. The parliament will then select a new government, which must take office by December 31. The new administration will be the first permanent, fully constitutional government in Iraq since the collapse of Saddam Hussein's rule in 2003.
But in case the draft charter is defeated in the just-ended referendum, things will start all over again when a new parliament will draft another constitution within a year and present it to voters in a second referendum.
It was expected that the acceptance of the new constitution by the majority of Iraqis will be a major step in the attempt to establish a democratic government that could lead to the pullout of US troops. But a signal given by the Bush administration shows that US military withdrawal from Iraq is not closely linked to the referendum.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice warned on Sunday that violence will continue in Iraq, even if the new constitution is adopted. Reviewing the stand that the White House has been holding, it might not be difficult to imagine that what will happen to US troops deployed in Iraq over the coming months.
Bush has said time and again that the United States will not shrink from the task of establishing a peaceful self-government in Iraq that will be an ally against terrorism.
"America will not run, and we will not forget our responsibilities," Bush said right on the day of Iraq's constitutional referendum. "We have stood by the Iraqi people through two elections, and we will stand by them until they have established a free nation that can govern itself, sustain itself, and defend itself."
(Xinhua News Agency October 19, 2005)
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