Posted on: Wednesday, June 30, 2004

EDITORIAL
Iraq: What, exactly, was handed over?

The Iraqi and American authorities who advanced the handover of Iraqi sovereignty by a couple of days were smart and entirely correct to do so.

That was not, however, because the new Iraqi government found itself prepared to handle its new responsibilities ahead of schedule, as President Bush suggested, but in order to avoid the extreme violence that Iraq's insurgents probably had planned for the occasion.

Clearly what the Bush administration originally had in mind for this occasion, and now has had to abandon, was the sort of pomp and circumstance observed in the 1997 Hong Kong handover from Britain to China.

Putting the best face on a pale imitation of triumph, Washington suggests the handover means the American occupation of Iraq is ended. And, they add, the Europeans at last have signed on for the rebuilding of Iraq, with NATO agreeing in principle if not in practice to provide training for Iraqi security recruits.

Slate, the online magazine, titled the furtively conducted exercise "slight of handover," suggesting the amount of sovereignty being transferred to Iraq might be minimal. The correct expression, however, is "sleight of hand," in which the word "sleight" insists there's deception afoot.

In a similarly misleading statement, two days after the handover ceremony, the administration said "legal custody" of Saddam Hussein would be transferred to the new government. That's a distinction without a difference, of course, since the toppled dictator will remain physically locked up, indefinitely, in an undisclosed U.S.-run jail.

It remains to be seen, of course, whether the new government will have any ability to override dictates from the new American embassy. Wisdom dictates that the generals deliberately allow this government to win a few early disputes.

That's because, even if the handover is almost purely symbolic, the symbolism implying real sovereignty and independence is absolutely critical if Iraq is to move in the direction of a peaceful, pluralistic society.