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