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Wednesday, April 09, 2003
posted by gbarto at 8:22 AM:
U.S. TANKS IN CENTER OF BAGHDAD;IRAQI FINANCE MINISTRY ON FIRE
There's your big headline. As we saw in the French news, some are ready to declare Baghdad - and by extension the Iraqi regime - fallen. It looks like we've some work to do yet, but the quagmire has really petered out.
This means we need to start thinking about what next. There is going to be a lot of chat about the UN. Colin Powell was right to say they'd have a role, making it clear they wouldn't get the role in running the show. But some preemptive moves are in order so that those who would thwart us at the UN and in other international forums will have their work cut out for them.
The Iraqi people have had everything taken from them - right down to their freedom - for the duration of Saddam's regime. What Saddam took has been too long in Iraqi hands for redistribution to potential former claimants. What the regime seized belongs to the Iraqi people.
The Iraqi people must, therefore, be promised now that Iraq's oil revenue is theirs, to be equally distributed among the citizenry. In a few years, mechanisms might be offered to either sell one's interest in the oil revenue or for the government to sell oil fields, but they should be contingent upon approval by the people by, say, a two-third's majority in a referendum, so that the people can decide to what degree they'll risk corruption. The five year wait would be needed because too many Iraqis know too little of property, of individual rights, of the right to vote they want, etc, and must learn about these first.
The purpose of the oil revenue distribution is two-fold. 1) It gives everybody in a thoroughly impoverished society access to some wealth, crucial for forming a capitalistic society - if most people don't own anything, they'll have no interest in protecting ownership rights. 2) It provides a lovely wedge against the Europeans who will want to begin divvying up the oil fields among themselves and using their clout in the UN to make it so. The United States should empower the Iraqi people and take its chances on their whims. Maybe they'll hire us to rebuild, maybe someone else. Maybe they'll sell their oil to us. Maybe to someone else. But I imagine the people who drove their tanks to Baghdad to announce from loudspeakers that the oil money was theirs will be favored over those suing in international court to take it away from them. This is a place where we can for once be crafty and sharp in our diplomacy while the Europeans pay for their cravenness. And all by broader than expected goodwill. We should take the chance.
Update: Is giving the Iraqi people the oil wealth a meme? Barone has talked about it; I first read about it on Instapundit a few days ago (go down about 10 for the link); this morning it was suggested on the NYT op-ed page by the head of the oil trust fund in Alaska.
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