Whatever you might think about Sunday’s election process in Iraq, it is definitely now a fait accompli. There was a lot of worry that it would have to be postponed, but the insurgents were unable to cause quite enough chaos to prevent it from being held as scheduled.
So what next? According to the official timetable, the new Parliament will (in addition to forming a government) draft a new constitution, which will be submitted to a referendum in July; and, if it’s ratified, new elections will be held in December. No timetable has been set for withdrawal of Coalition troops from Iraq, but there’s no doubt that the preceding will be preconditions for it.
So:
What will the new Parliament look like, once the votes are tallied?
Will it have a perceived mandate to govern, despite the boycott of the vote by many groups?
Will the insurgency start to die down? Will the new status quo be more acceptable?
Will the new constitution be ratified? (It won’t be if the referendum fails in any three provinces – a provision included to give the Kurds an effective veto.)
Will the December elections come off as scheduled?
Assuming all that is done, when will the Coalition troops leave?
Best guess: 70% Shiite, 24% Kurdish, 6% Sunni. Unless someone steps in and decides to artificially bump up Sunni representation due to their unerrepresentation in voting.
Perceived by whom? By the U.S.? Sure. By the Shiites? You bet. By the Sunnis? No way. By the rest of the world? Pretty much irrelevant.
No way. The vote changed nothing about the factors underlying the insurgency.
Dunno. Have to wait and see what they come up with.
Ditto.
Sure, some of the “Coalition” troops will be coming home. Poland, for instance. Don’t expect the U.S. to be going home anytime soon, however. I’d guess our troop levels will still be well over 100,000 by the end of the year, and probably closer to the pre-election 125,000.
I also think that there may be a battle within the Shiite faction as well. Now this is what I understand simply from various new reports, but it seems there are Shiites who wish to be far more secular in government and then there are those who don’t. I know Alawi is saying all the right things about inclusiveness, but only time will tell if it can even be achieved within the majority faction.
Would anyone be surprised to see Iraq broken up into smaller countries?
Not sure of the exact percentages, but the majority will be Shi’ite, with Sunni and Kurdish represenation being lower. The Shi’ite faction most likely to win has already made some noises about giving additional representation to the Sunni if they want it…to try and bring them into the fold more tightly.
Yes, I think it will be perceived by the Iraqi people as a mandate to govern. The fact that some people decided to voluntarily disenfranchise themselves won’t make a difference as to the perception that this Iraq government and those to follow is derived from the majority of the Iraqi people.
To follow up on MG’s points: In the US? It will mostly break down along partisan lines I think. Those who are politically tied to Iraq will see it as a mandate, those opposed will see it as no big deal or will harp on the fact that the Sunni’s chose not to vote and so the new government isn’t represenatational. The only people who really count are the Iraqi’s anyway.
The world? No idea…to big. It will probably be seen as a good first step mostly, though again it will break down along political partisanship as far as what it really means.
In the short term I doubt there will be much change. In the medium and long terms though I think you will see the insurgency start to die down…and eventually die or at least fade to the background. I think its a matter of confidence for the majority of the Iraqi’s who, IMHO, have been sitting on the fence waiting and watching to see what will happen. My hope and my belief is that this election will cause many to get off the fence. And of course, the Iraqi military will become stronger as time and training go on…which will eventually begin to make its presence felt more by the insurgents even if I’m wrong about it dieing on its own, or from lack of support by the majority of Iraqi’s. Time will tell I suppose.
Of course it will be…eventually. It may have to go through a lot of changes and some serious horse trading, but eventually they’ll have a constitution. Its pretty much inevitable IMO.
I don’t see why not. After all, if these did, why wouldn’t the ones in December? In theory at least the Iraqi’s should be even better able to defend themselves by December than they are now…and the US/UK will almost certainly still be there as well.
Gods know. Coalition troops? Perhaps sometime in 2006 some of the nations will start seriously pulling out. The US? Anywhere from a few years to several decades depending on how things go. I can envision troops in Iraq when I’m old and grey…just like troops still in Germany and South Korea today, even though I wasn’t born when both of those conflicts concluded.