:05:14. > :05:24.Garner helped these Kurdish leaders win autonomy from Saddam after the
:05:24. > :05:52.
:05:52. > :05:56.or whatever, the freedom and so forth. There were thousands of
:05:56. > :06:06.people on the streets. The children were all dressed up in dresses.
:06:06. > :06:11.
:06:11. > :06:14.There were flowers being thrown. Everywhere we loblegd, people were
:06:14. > :06:18.cheering and -- looked, people were cheering and there were signs
:06:18. > :06:21.welcoming me back. It makes you feel good.
:06:21. > :06:24.Kurdistan after 12 years of self rule under western protection showed
:06:24. > :06:27.what might be possible in the rest what might be possible in the rest
:06:27. > :06:31.what might be possible in the rest what might be possible in the rest
:06:31. > :06:41.of Iraq. With Saddam gone, the Kurdish leaders wanted to secure
:06:41. > :06:45.
:06:45. > :06:55.their position. They arranged a lake side lunch for Garner. We were
:06:55. > :06:55.
:06:55. > :06:59.wondering what was the Iraq policy and how they would rule Iraq.
:06:59. > :07:09.said, " Look, I can't let you go to Baghdad and form a Government. I'm
:07:09. > :07:14.
:07:14. > :07:18.the guy that is supposed to form the about you guys taking a over the
:07:18. > :07:21.Government, it is about you know, coming to Baghdad and engaging in
:07:21. > :07:27.discussions, it is about recognising there are other leaders here that we
:07:27. > :07:32.have got to bring into this. The Kurds agreed to meet the
:07:32. > :07:38.ex-Highland opposition leaders in Baghdad. Garner was in a rush to get
:07:38. > :07:43.them there. He was shaken by what he had seen in the capital. Jay took me
:07:43. > :07:49.aside and said, " I am worried. This is not what we expected." We really
:07:49. > :07:54.got to get this thing, moving, I said. There are too many vacuums and
:07:54. > :07:59.I can't fill all the vacuums. I don't have enough people.
:07:59. > :08:07.His words were, " This is slipping away from us." Garner had been
:08:07. > :08:11.concerned about Baghdad's essential services. I went to the hospital and
:08:11. > :08:21.I spent a couple of hours there. I talked to the doctors. They didn't
:08:21. > :08:24.have anything. They didn't have any electricity or anything. I went to
:08:24. > :08:28.the sewage facility and there was nobody there. I thought we have got
:08:28. > :08:32.to get this thing working and if we don't, we're going to have an
:08:32. > :08:38.epidemic. The Iraqi State collapsed and the
:08:38. > :08:42.Americans failed to stop the looters overwhelming Baghdad.
:08:42. > :08:46.We don't have the capacity to take everybody in, especially right now,
:08:46. > :08:52.so we are trying to give them the advantage, if they make a mistake,
:08:52. > :08:57.they correct it. They see what they did wrong and we let them go.
:08:57. > :09:07.To protect their local services, some clerics set-up Islamic
:09:07. > :09:27.
:09:27. > :09:37.Kurdistan, the Kurds and the exiled opposition leaders gathered in
:09:37. > :09:42.
:09:42. > :09:48.Baghdad. Adnan Pacahachi had been Foreign
:09:48. > :09:55.Minister before Saddam took power. was happy to be back, but I was
:09:55. > :09:59.appalled by the destruction that the city of my birth was reduced to.
:09:59. > :10:08.He had worked closely with the Americans in the run-up to the war.
:10:08. > :10:13.He had been airlifted airlifted into Iraq with his own private army.
:10:13. > :10:23.We lobbied with the US Government to put together a military force. We
:10:23. > :10:24.
:10:24. > :10:32.worked to protect whatever we could from what was left in Baghdad.
:10:32. > :10:42.Mowaffak Rubaie was an Islamist. My house was confiscated by Saddam
:10:42. > :11:06.
:11:06. > :11:16.US ambassador, ZalMay Kahlilzad also arrived in Baghdad. Went up some
:11:16. > :11:22.number of floors and there was an oval shaped table that I vividly
:11:22. > :11:25.recall and there was lots of happy, but at the same time tense faces
:11:25. > :11:29.because they didn't know what their role was going to be.
:11:29. > :11:35.I said we, the Iraqi opposition, jointly with the people inside the
:11:35. > :11:41.country, we should form an interim Government and it is a huge mis
:11:41. > :11:46.mistake leaving the country in a vacuum.
:11:46. > :11:49.He sat across the table and looked at me and said, " Your idea for a
:11:49. > :11:55.provisional Government is compelling. Everyone has come to
:11:55. > :11:59.accept it." We want you Iraqis to dporm an interle rim Government as
:11:59. > :12:07.quickly as possible. We had no interest in governing Iraq.
:12:07. > :12:16.This Government will rule Iraq until the election is held in Baghdad. We
:12:16. > :12:20.all welcomed this. We discussed the transitional
:12:20. > :12:26.Government. We agreed this Government, this authority, ought to
:12:26. > :12:30.be from within a -- ought to be formed within a month.
:12:30. > :12:39.The ambassador and General Garner believed America was well on its way
:12:39. > :12:44.to accomplishing a mission. So apparently, did President Bush.
:12:44. > :12:50.Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the Battle of Iraq and the
:12:50. > :12:52.United States and our allies have prevailed.
:12:52. > :12:59.APPLAUSE But in fact, the President was
:12:59. > :13:04.already nervous that he did not have the right team in place in Baghdad.
:13:04. > :13:10.General Garner thought he would have three months to complete his task.
:13:10. > :13:15.He was wrong. There is nobody clearly in charge and there is a
:13:15. > :13:25.real question of law and order and it causes the President to think, "
:13:25. > :13:30.We need to accelerate the transition from Garner to Gerry Bremer.
:13:30. > :13:35.president had chosen Gerry Bremer to take over. He was close adviser to
:13:35. > :13:42.three secretaries of state. He had a clear grasp of Washington's
:13:42. > :13:45.priorities. The phone rang and I picked up the phone and it was Gerry
:13:45. > :13:50.Bremer calling me from DC. I thought he had done a terrific job
:13:50. > :13:59.under very difficult circumstances. I was very sensitive to trying not
:13:59. > :14:04.to make the transition difficult for him. He said, " You know the optics
:14:04. > :14:10.aren't good." I said, " I'm not sure I know what you are talking about."
:14:10. > :14:15.He said the press isn't good. I said, " I don't control the press."
:14:15. > :14:20.He said, " But you need to give that a lot of thought." A few days before
:14:20. > :14:27.Bremer set out for Baghdad, the President invited him to lunch.
:14:27. > :14:31.doesn't usually do lunch alone with people. I said to the President, "My
:14:31. > :14:35.experience is in business and you have to have one guy in charge."
:14:35. > :14:41.President says to Gerry, "You have got to get over there. You have got
:14:41. > :14:46.to establish your authority. And you have got to bring some law and order
:14:46. > :14:50.to that place." He is an athlete. I am an athlete, but we do different
:14:50. > :14:54.sports and I said to him. "This is going to be more like a marathon
:14:54. > :14:59.than a sprint. It is going to take time. Fixing a country is not
:14:59. > :15:04.something you do overnight." This challenge to the policy of a
:15:04. > :15:11.quick handover to Iraqis was then debated by the National Security
:15:11. > :15:21.Council. The discussion was around the question of how quickly we were
:15:21. > :15:21.
:15:21. > :15:24.going to get an interim Government in place. as often in the Bush
:15:24. > :15:30.cabinet, the Secretary of State and the vice president clash.
:15:30. > :15:33.Colin Powell, like Bremer, wanted a slower approach. Dick Cheney pushed
:15:33. > :15:37.the speed. I thought the idea of a provisional government was a good
:15:37. > :15:41.one and one of the prime objectives would be to establish a
:15:41. > :15:44.democratically elected government as soon as possible. We had the
:15:44. > :15:48.concerns, because who are you going to turn it over to and how will they
:15:48. > :15:54.protect the people and have security? Are you going to succumb
:15:54. > :16:02.to the United States Army to some Iraq fellow you brought in from
:16:02. > :16:06.London? Bush lent towards Bremer and Powell. It wasn't so much that there
:16:06. > :16:10.was a conscious decision made, but if you didn't do anything, then
:16:10. > :16:16.those arguing for not setting up a provisional government won, they
:16:16. > :16:19.would prevail. The president said to Bremer, you should feel comfortable
:16:19. > :16:25.changing direction. When you get there and see the situation, you may
:16:25. > :16:31.have to call audible is, an American football term for one quarterback
:16:31. > :16:36.changes play at the last minute. With those words, the President gave
:16:36. > :16:45.Bremner the authority he needed to drop the plan for a quick handover.
:16:45. > :16:52.We are in the process of discussing an appropriate transition to an
:16:52. > :16:56.Iraqi government, at a timeline that still has to be determined. A month
:16:57. > :17:04.after the fall of Baghdad, Bremer set up his headquarters in Saddam 's
:17:04. > :17:11.old Republican Palace. He called a meeting with the group exiled
:17:11. > :17:16.leaders. All of these people who had been fighting Saddam for many years,
:17:16. > :17:23.the Kurdish leaders, the Shia leaders, and some Sunni leaders,
:17:23. > :17:26.this Bremer, nobody had heard of, he shows up. I can understand that a
:17:26. > :17:30.number of these people had been given the impression that they were
:17:30. > :17:34.about to become the Government. I knew my job was to give them a cold
:17:34. > :17:41.shower. I had to say, openquote It is not going to be that way close
:17:41. > :17:50.quote. And then I said, you do not represent Iraq, there is not a woman
:17:50. > :18:00.among you. There is no Christian here. This group does not represent
:18:00. > :18:06.
:18:06. > :18:11.interior government. I said, Mr Ambassador, what are your
:18:12. > :18:18.responsibilities and authorities? was to exercise all legislative and
:18:18. > :18:25.judicial authority in Iraq. I said, then you are the Viceroy. And he was
:18:25. > :18:27.really, really upset. These leaders were having a difficult time
:18:27. > :18:34.understanding what international law made clear, which is that we were
:18:34. > :18:41.the governors of Iraq. He said, I will listen to views, but they are
:18:41. > :18:48.all advisory. When I left there, I spoke for myself. I said this is a
:18:48. > :18:54.real occupation. Bremer was taking charge of a nation of some 25
:18:54. > :19:04.million people. One of his first decisions would antagonise some of
:19:04. > :19:17.
:19:17. > :19:20.of $20 to state employees. The equivalent of six months salary. But
:19:20. > :19:30.no payments were made to the soldiers and officers of Iraq 's
:19:30. > :19:49.
:19:49. > :19:53.approved this document. It said it would be dangerous to immediately
:19:53. > :19:59.demobilised 250-300,000 armed men and put them on the streets. So the
:19:59. > :20:01.Iraqi army was to be employed as a national reconstruction force. The
:20:02. > :20:06.Americans had promised the Iraqi soldiers that if they lay down their
:20:06. > :20:15.arms during the fighting, they would be looked after. Many went home.
:20:15. > :20:16.They now faced ruin. Some officers from Saddam 's General staff
:20:16. > :20:26.secretly contacted an American colonel at the coalition
:20:26. > :20:36.headquarters. They were all in civilian clothes, they knew if they
:20:36. > :20:46.
:20:46. > :20:56.put on a uniform they would be in They said, we have not been paid in
:20:56. > :21:09.
:21:09. > :21:16.many months, what do we have to do ranks, what units they worked with.
:21:16. > :21:20.And as the counts came forward, we eventually were pushing 100,000.
:21:20. > :21:29.Colonel Hughes told his bosses that these soldiers were ready to work
:21:29. > :21:34.for the coalition. They just needed pain. --pain. He spoke to Walt
:21:34. > :21:38.Slocombe, in charge of Iraq 's Defence Ministry. He managed to
:21:38. > :21:43.annoy a somewhat by saying we should make good on the pavement that
:21:43. > :21:51.Saddam had not paid since February. My joke is, what is the Arabic for
:21:51. > :21:56.chutzpah? He decided he was not ready to make the commitment to pay
:21:56. > :22:05.the $20 already back wages. He thought it was not in America 's
:22:05. > :22:08.interests to recall Iraq 's army or ministry of defence. I told them,
:22:08. > :22:15.getting rid of Saddam 's army, particularly getting rid of the
:22:15. > :22:18.formal institutions, was a part of a general policy of making clear that
:22:18. > :22:25.the old Saddam system was being dismantled and would not be allowed
:22:25. > :22:31.to come back as such. Walt Slocombe said the prewar plan has gone, we
:22:31. > :22:36.have do basically start from scratch, we have to build an army.
:22:36. > :22:40.Starting the army from scratch meant reversing a presidential decision.
:22:40. > :22:46.Bremer had to tell the National Security Council. Jerry Bremer was
:22:46. > :22:50.brought into the meeting by videoconference. He said to the
:22:50. > :22:53.president that he was about to sign an order which was going to disband
:22:53. > :22:58.the regular Iraqi armed forces. There was a moment of shocked
:22:58. > :23:02.silence around the table. This was, of course, completely contrary to
:23:02. > :23:08.the view is that we had been operating under. The problem was the
:23:08. > :23:14.role of the army as Saddam 's primary instrument of repression.
:23:14. > :23:22.The political gesture of recalling the army itself would have been a
:23:22. > :23:25.disaster, and my view was that I wanted to hold Iraq together.
:23:25. > :23:28.president paused for what was probably the longest ten seconds of
:23:28. > :23:38.my life and said, well, Jerry, you are the guy on the ground, you do
:23:38. > :23:39.
:23:39. > :23:42.what is right. The old army was a part of the old
:23:42. > :23:47.regime. The old military needed to be formally disbanded, so that it
:23:47. > :23:53.could be replaced by new military organisations Armed Forces suited to
:23:53. > :24:03.a democratic nation. I was standing there, just
:24:03. > :24:06.
:24:06. > :24:11.dumbstruck, thinking, " how could he have done this? Closed. I was using
:24:11. > :24:14.stronger language in my mind. You don't take men who know how to use
:24:14. > :24:18.weapons and nowhere munitions stored all over Iraq and say, you guys are
:24:18. > :24:23.no longer relevant. In the week before the order to dissolve the
:24:23. > :24:33.army, no coalition forces were killed by hostile action. The week
:24:33. > :24:39.
:24:39. > :24:44.worse with each successive week. The first week, there were small
:24:44. > :24:48.demonstrations after Friday prayers. They grew the next week. The third
:24:48. > :24:58.or fourth week, I literally had to stand on a wall with a megaphone in
:24:58. > :25:05.
:25:05. > :25:09.Mosul and faced 10,000 or so former for the ceremony in which General
:25:09. > :25:14.Sanchez was promoted to three stars and took command of the military
:25:14. > :25:19.headquarters overseeing the effort in Iraq. At the reception
:25:19. > :25:26.afterwards, Petraeus, who I knew, came up to me. I was quite blunt
:25:26. > :25:30.with him. I said to him, Walt, your policy is
:25:30. > :25:35.killing our soldiers. That got his attention. He said this is a serious
:25:35. > :25:39.problem, it is putting my people in danger. There has to be measures to
:25:39. > :25:41.make sure the soldiers are given stipends. But they can have
:25:41. > :25:46.provisions to feed their families and there will be some respect for
:25:46. > :25:56.them. And I said, I will take that very seriously, I will do what I
:25:56. > :25:56.
:25:56. > :31:29.Apology for the loss of subtitles for 333 seconds
:31:29. > :31:32.Four days later, Baghdad saw the coalition. He was not interested in
:31:32. > :31:42.that discussion he wanted to discuss the way in which the Iraqi
:31:42. > :31:58.
:31:58. > :32:02.understand that the constitution will have to be written by Iraqis,
:32:02. > :32:12.and at that point, Ayatollah Sistani interrupted him and said, not only
:32:12. > :32:29.
:32:29. > :32:34.the need to ensure what the new Constitution of Iraq is, one that is
:32:34. > :32:38.elaborated and improved by elected representatives of the Iraqi people.
:32:38. > :32:45.Sistani issued a fatwa, insisting that elected Iraqis must write the
:32:45. > :32:55.constitution. That way, he would secure the interests of the Shia
:32:55. > :32:56.
:32:56. > :32:59.majority permanently. The fatwa was issued from outside the Ayatollah 's
:32:59. > :33:06.has and was shared by hundreds of mosques around the country. Bremer
:33:06. > :33:12.gathered his team. We realised this was a very important fatwa, but we
:33:12. > :33:15.didn't appreciate that it would be a showstopper. There was a sense that,
:33:15. > :33:24.maybe this can be worked around, maybe it can be mass arched. Sergio
:33:24. > :33:28.de Mello went to see Bremer. I said to Sergio, look, we can't
:33:28. > :33:32.hold elections now, there has been no sensors for 40 years, there are
:33:32. > :33:36.no electricals, no party political laws, no constituent boundaries.
:33:36. > :33:40.When you went down the list, there was nothing in place from which to
:33:40. > :33:48.have elections. So we had to find some way to select a group of Iraq
:33:48. > :33:53.is to write a constitution. --Iraqis. Bremer appointed an
:33:53. > :34:01.advisory group, the governing Council. In their first meeting, he
:34:01. > :34:07.set them an impossible challenge. They would select a group of Iraqis
:34:07. > :34:17.to figure out how to get a constitution in place, but also
:34:17. > :34:34.
:34:34. > :34:38.in a position where you had to disobey a fatwa. I suggested to them
:34:39. > :34:43.that they set themselves a deadline for August 30th, giving themselves
:34:43. > :34:52.six weeks to figure out how to do this. The one man able to mediate
:34:52. > :35:00.between the macro --people-macro and the American delegates was Sergio de
:35:00. > :35:03.Mello. -- between the Shia and the American delegates. They were very
:35:03. > :35:13.interested, because they knew we were an independent, trustworthy
:35:13. > :35:28.
:35:28. > :35:36.were experts on how we could integrate the former Iraqi members
:35:36. > :35:41.of the Army back into civilian life. I drove out of the UN, drove down
:35:41. > :35:47.the road and my car lurched forward. I pulled over and I got out of the
:35:47. > :35:49.I pulled over and I got out of the I pulled over and I got out of the
:35:49. > :35:56.I pulled over and I got out of the car and I looked back at the UN.
:35:56. > :36:00.That was really the first of these big attacks. So it took a little bit
:36:00. > :36:10.big attacks. So it took a little bit of time to sink in. A suicide bomber
:36:10. > :36:22.
:36:22. > :36:32.had destroyed the UN building in Baghdad killing 21 include including
:36:32. > :36:36.
:36:36. > :36:43.Sergio de Mello. The UN mission left Iraq. Al-Qaeda would later claim
:36:43. > :36:48.responsibility for the bomb bombing. The rebuilding of Iraq by the Iraqi
:36:48. > :36:53.people is going to go on. It is not going to be stopped by this act or
:36:53. > :36:59.any such acts. But without the UN, Bremer was
:36:59. > :37:07.stuck. He had been in Iraq for over three months and was no closer to
:37:07. > :37:11.handing over to Iraqis. On the morning of 8th September 2003,
:37:11. > :37:17.Washington's policy makers got a shock. They opened their newspapers
:37:17. > :37:21.to find an article by Bremer setting out his plans. He said that
:37:21. > :37:30.beforehanding over, he would need to get a constitution written, hold a
:37:30. > :37:34.referendum, and an election. It was all going to take a long time.
:37:34. > :37:39.to the Pentagon. One of the first things that day was the daily
:37:39. > :37:43.meeting with the secretary. So Secretary Rumsfeld got up and he had
:37:43. > :37:47.this article from the Washington Post in his hand and he was not
:37:47. > :37:50.happy. He went around the table and said, " Did anybody here see this,
:37:50. > :37:55.know that it was going to be published?
:37:56. > :38:01." This is a major blueprint for the future of Iraq that has been
:38:02. > :38:04.announced by Gerry Bremer without consultation, not only with the
:38:04. > :38:08.principals, but without consultation of the president of the United
:38:08. > :38:12.States. If the Iraqis disagree, we are stuck
:38:12. > :38:16.in our position for a long time and that's not acceptable. I just
:38:16. > :38:23.remember it was a stunner and the prospect of having this continue for
:38:23. > :38:27.another two years, which was what was implied in that, I thought
:38:27. > :38:32.potentially a fatal mistake. Bremer's bosses ordered him to find
:38:32. > :38:42.a way to hand over sovereignty as soon as possible. He saw no option,
:38:42. > :38:52.but to give in to Sistani. He promised elections. It was a promise
:38:52. > :39:17.
:39:17. > :39:22.A few days days later, Bremer visited the Iraqi Symphony
:39:22. > :39:27.Orchestra. A brief pleasure on a difficult day. That night, he would
:39:27. > :39:33.have to break his promise to the Shia. .
:39:33. > :39:39.Bremer had been told he must end the occupation by 30th June 2004. That
:39:39. > :39:43.didn't leave enough time to organise elections. I would always prefer
:39:43. > :39:48.elections, but if we can't pull it off then what happens? We slide past
:39:48. > :39:53.the June 30th date. We start to get into the American political season,
:39:53. > :39:57.it was an election year. Who knows what falls off that edge of the
:39:58. > :40:02.cliff. Bremer's alternative to elections was locally appointed
:40:02. > :40:08.councils. They would select the Government. In America, this system
:40:08. > :40:13.is called a caucus. Bremer tried to sell the caucus plan to the
:40:13. > :40:19.governing council. I said, " Look, I lived in the United States and I
:40:19. > :40:24.followed their political system for many years and I still don't
:40:24. > :40:34.understand the caucus system. It is so complicated and I think it would
:40:34. > :40:50.
:40:50. > :40:55.I spent a lot of time with these people. Now, he left the meeting and
:40:55. > :40:58.walked outside in the middle of the meeting and I followed him out and I
:40:58. > :41:07.explained what the stakes were and this was the moment where all of
:41:07. > :41:13.this could come together. I remember very, very clearly him
:41:13. > :41:18.looking at me and with a face that I now realise was, you know, this face
:41:18. > :41:23.saying, " It is not going to change." Saying, " We are not going
:41:23. > :41:27.to be able to go forward with this plan." Bremer's failure alienated
:41:27. > :41:34.millions on the streets. It would bring a new threat to America's
:41:34. > :41:42.entire project. In the holy cities of Najaf and Karbala in the Shia
:41:42. > :41:47.south and in the slums of Baghdad, Muqtada al-Sadr was the rising star.
:41:47. > :41:52.Al-Sadr came from a revered Shia family. He offered an alternative to
:41:52. > :42:02.the stalled politics particulars in Baghdad. His message was simple -
:42:02. > :42:37.
:42:37. > :42:43.Muqtada's Shia army grew. But what happened in the Sunni city of
:42:43. > :42:47.Fallujah raised Iraqi resistance to an uncontainable level. In March
:42:47. > :42:57.2004, four American contractors were murdered and their bodies
:42:57. > :42:57.
:42:57. > :43:02.murdered and their bodies murdered and their bodies
:43:03. > :43:08.desecrated. The US Marines hit back. For ten days, the images of dead
:43:08. > :43:11.For ten days, the images of dead For ten days, the images of dead
:43:11. > :43:17.civilians in Fallujah led the news. The governing council is in
:43:17. > :43:22.imploding. Several members told me they are going to resign. The
:43:22. > :43:26.President has a very difficult decision to make which is if we
:43:26. > :43:32.continue this operation much longer, it is likely that his entire
:43:33. > :43:35.political goal of passing sovereignty to a creditable Iraqi
:43:35. > :43:42.Government on 30th June will be in jeopardy.
:43:42. > :43:49.The Americans stopped the assault without taking a Fallujah. Three
:43:49. > :43:59.weeks later, these photos leaked. American soldiers abusing Iraqis in
:43:59. > :44:34.
:44:34. > :44:44.Abu Ghraib Prison. The insurgency forces in Iraq now faced insurgency
:44:44. > :44:46.
:44:46. > :44:51.on a massive scale. The Sunni Brigades, add sadder's -- sadder's
:44:51. > :44:58.brigade officers and Al-Qaeda. Bremer was still under orders to
:44:58. > :45:01.hand over to Iraqis by the end of June. Two months awayle. Even
:45:01. > :45:11.caucuses would take too long. He would have to appoint the
:45:11. > :45:17.
:45:17. > :45:20.Government. I thought the best man to be secretary of defence was -- he
:45:20. > :45:25.had the right background for a tough job.
:45:25. > :45:29.During his exile in London, he had worked with western intelligence. He
:45:29. > :45:38.survived an attempted axe murder thought to have been ordered by
:45:38. > :45:43.Saddam Hussein. Bremer came to see me and said, we
:45:43. > :45:47.want you to be the Minister of defence. I said, I don't know who is
:45:47. > :45:50.the Prime Minister, what kind of government? He said, I want to be
:45:50. > :45:55.sure that the defence minister has the following authorities...
:45:55. > :45:59.Basically, the authorities he headlined with authorities of the
:45:59. > :46:06.Prime Minister. The Americans got what they wanted, a Western
:46:06. > :46:16.friendly, nonsectarian Prime Minister. Ayad Allawi.
:46:16. > :46:23.
:46:23. > :46:29.The exit strategy that the coalition I could see a lot of frustration and
:46:29. > :46:34.I asked him, what was up, Mr Prime Minister? I said, imagine you are
:46:34. > :46:39.running a country that has nothing. No army, no police, no money,
:46:39. > :46:44.nothing at all. A month later, this feeble new state faced its first
:46:44. > :46:52.test. Grand Ayatollah Sistani left Iraq for medical treatment in
:46:52. > :47:02.London. In Najaf, Muqtada al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army took over the
:47:02. > :47:11.
:47:11. > :47:15.city and its holy shrines. Iraq's summoned the coalition commander.
:47:15. > :47:19.said, Prime Minister, this is a difficult situation but I believe
:47:19. > :47:25.that Saddam may have given this new government an opportunity to
:47:25. > :47:28.demonstrate that it can protect the Iraqi people. I said that the
:47:28. > :47:38.Government should be in control and American forces should not be
:47:38. > :47:50.
:47:50. > :48:00.engaged at all in this fight, But the US Marines provided the real
:48:00. > :48:24.
:48:24. > :48:34.THE ANCIENT CRYPTS AND PASSAGEWAYS ally, Shia and Sunni leaders put
:48:34. > :48:34.
:48:34. > :54:01.Apology for the loss of subtitles for 333 seconds
:54:01. > :54:07.aside their differences to fight the said, what is this? What are you
:54:07. > :54:14.doing? You cannot have the Government seen as weak in this way.
:54:14. > :54:18.Mr Prime Minister, I have the signature of Muqtada al-Sadr in
:54:18. > :54:25.black and white in my hand. It is only me to sign it, I have not
:54:25. > :54:32.signed it yet. I said you have to stop this immediately and come back.
:54:32. > :54:42.When he came back, I told him to go and find himself and Ambassador
:54:42. > :55:14.
:55:14. > :55:24.place. Allawi's government Snow the Mahdi Army retreated to the
:55:24. > :55:40.
:55:40. > :55:44.a final assault, grand Ayatollah Sistani returned to Iraq. He crossed
:55:44. > :55:48.into Basra and announced that the Shia hierarchy would settle the
:55:48. > :55:58.crisis themselves, but first, he needed the Government to guarantee
:55:58. > :56:14.
:56:14. > :56:19.ministers to talk to Sistani. When he got there, he was presented with
:56:19. > :56:29.an ultimatum. The government was told off for 24 hours, so Sistani
:56:29. > :56:29.
:56:29. > :56:39.could talk Muqtada into the shrine. I tried many, many times to reach
:56:39. > :56:39.
:56:39. > :56:44.Doctor riot, but the telephone lines was not working. --Dr Ayad. Then I
:56:44. > :56:50.fed myself in a position where I must say yes or no. If I say no,
:56:50. > :56:58.then I will destroy this initiative, Ayatollah Sistani. And I found that
:56:58. > :57:05.we had to agree on the recourse of the Ayatollah. Allawi and the
:57:05. > :57:09.Americans were still considering storming the mosque. We had paid
:57:09. > :57:15.significant blood and treasure here and we wanted to finish the
:57:15. > :57:19.operation to restore Iraqi control to Najaf. There was pressure, but we
:57:19. > :57:24.cannot allow American forces to go into the shrine. It is very
:57:24. > :57:29.difficult, very sensitive. The minister finally got a phone line
:57:29. > :57:37.through to Baghdad. They said they are agreeable, they
:57:37. > :57:43.want to call exactly what they have been advocating. To get away from
:57:43. > :57:49.the shrine and to leave it. And we were told that Ayatollah Sistani
:57:49. > :57:52.would leave and by three, there would be a cease-fire and the battle
:57:53. > :57:56.would be over. And I looked at the Prime Minister and said, we can
:57:56. > :58:06.accommodate that but we need to keep fighting until three o'clock. And
:58:06. > :58:15.
:58:15. > :58:25.along with thousands of his supporters, returned to Najaf, while
:58:25. > :58:32.
:58:32. > :58:37.Ali shrine, and filed out, providing cover for Muqtada's fighters.
:58:37. > :58:45.Muqtada's Mahdi Army have suffered horrendous losses. But his
:58:45. > :58:52.popularity grew. And he announced he was forming a political movement.
:58:52. > :58:58.Iraq finally have elections five months later. A Shia Islamist