Iraq 2003-05, or how I learned to stop worrying and enjoy repression

This much is obvious, isn’t it? In 2003, what faced the Blair government in Iraq was a binary choice between two lemons. To invade or walk away: two poor options. It’s hardly surprising they chose badly. But what has happened since the invasion proves something wholly unintentional, and maybe unexpected: political repression works.

That’s right, we now know that illiberal government does make us safer. There had been precisely no suicide bombings in Iraq under authoritarian government prior to 2003. In fact, the only time Iraq had been targeted by civilian suicide bombers was in Lebanon in the 1980s. Since 2003, more Iraqis have been killed by suicide bombers than all other nationalities combined. Slaughter on the scale of London’s 7th July is happening every day.

So, what’s changed? This: Authoritarian government has crumbled. Torture as an instrument of state control is relatively absent. Secret police activity is negligible in comparison to the Saddam era. But for these to be the key changes, all this needs to be true, too:

1. The tension necessary for a murderous Islamist insurgency was there before we invaded. It wasn’t all imported after 2003.

2. Mass suicide bombings wouldn’t have happened anyway. That is, the absence of dictatorship is a causal factor, not just correlated.

3. Agents of the state can be trusted to torture repress the right people, at least most of the time.

4. There is a describable relationship between repression and terrorism, not just two states of nature, safe totalitarianism and violent democracyish. (That democracies have been the targets of almost all suicide terrorism lends this credibility.)

All that is surely possible, even probable. So, sacrificing a bit of liberty for safety and security might be an unpleasant equation, but it isn’t a foolish one. Libertarian counter-arguments are easily swatted: we have no absolute claim to rights that adversely affect others. Liberty causes terrorism, so absolute liberty isn’t a claimable right. Blair, Clarke and Blair, I. have it spot on.

Or do they?

8 comments
  1. Chris said:

    Liberty causes terrorism

    More that the absence of Liberty prevents terrorism. Not the same thing.

  2. Absence of liberty hasn’t stopped the Chechens much, nor did Nazi occupation prevent the French Resistance causing a fair few problems…

    Quite why they can’t just throw their hands up and admit that terrorism’s going to happen anyway, no matter what anyone does, I have no idea.

    Oh, wait. Mass panic. Forgot about that one…

  3. Terrorism is not the only form of homicide, nor even the most important one.

    On average, a person living in a democratic society[1] is less likely to be killed than a person living in an undemocratic one. And on the whole, the countries with the best records on human rights tend to have lower-than-average rates of homicide.

    But humans don’t just die by being killed, they die from other causes too. To truely evaluate how safe people are from dying we must factor in death from all causes, and consider life expectancies. According to Nationmaster the 10 countries with the longest life expectancy (counting only countries with a population of >1 million), are: Japan, Singapore, Australia, Switzerland, Sweden, Hong Kong, Canada, Italy, France, Spain.

    Of these 10, only Singapore and HK aren’t democracies. All are a good deal less repressive than Baathist Iraq was.

    What does this prove? That mild repression (HK or Singapore style) is no less safe than democracy. I expect both Blairs would like to see a Sinaporean or HK level of repression in Britain, i.e. the sort of place where you are safe provided you don’t criticise government policy or look like a Brazilian electrician.

  4. Andrew said:

    Oh, wait. Mass panic. Forgot about that one.

    Has anyone genuinely looked into this with serious research? Sounds like the sort of thing that sociology departments should be locking people in boxes with fake aliens to find out about. I just find it hard to believe that people wouldn’t be broadly stoical about it.

    Of course, it might be political suicide to suggest that a problem is beyond you to solve, as Chatshow Charlie steps up and claims a unique insight into the mind and motivations of the terrorists and storms to an unexpected general election victory, but that’s another thing altogether.

  5. Phil’s said something interesting, but I doubt it’s right. (I’ll admit that I don’t want “mild repression (HK or Singapore style) is no less safe than democracy” to be right.) So let’s consider other factors. Both Singapore and Hong Kong are pretty much entirely urban and industrialised. IIRC, urban and industrial areas in most countries have long life expectancies than rural areas, despite greater homicide rates. Also: diet. I’m stabbing in the dark a bit, but I think the comparison isn’t as robust as it first seems.

    So Jardyce’s point is roughly: Saddam was a bastard, but the reason that he became — and remained for so long — ruler of Iraq was that a repressive bastard was actually the best option (from several very bad ones) for the country. I suspect there’s quite a lot in that. But I don’t agree with it. “That democracies have been the targets of almost all suicide terrorism lends this credibility” must be a reference to Israel, which is a democracy. But the suicide bombings are about the Occupied Territories, and Israel’s internal politics seem unlikely to affect the motives of suicide bombers. Hamas and similar organisations behave like the weaker side in border disputes/ethnic conflict everywhere, if you ask me. (OK, the suicide angle is novel.) And, as the bombers are committed to dying, the threat of torture or execution strikes me as a poor deterrent. Real repressive countries (North Korea, Syria, China, for example) can’t be relied on (because they don’t have a free press) to give accurate statistics for, er, terrorist activity. So, no, I don’t buy that Israel suffers suicide bombings because it is a democracy, while Syria doesn’t because it isn’t. I believe that repression makes things worse. (You could ask why, since Saudi Arabia is one of the most repressive regimes on earth, Saudi terrorists exclusively strike other countries. And the answer is, I don’t know.)

  6. Jarndyce said:

    “That democracies have been the targets of almost all suicide terrorism lends this credibility” must be a reference to Israel, which is a democracy

    Not at all. Indonesia, India, Sri Lanka, UK, USA, Turkey, Russia, Iraq since “liberation”, Afghanistan ditto. Then the intended targets of those suicide bombings not actually in democracies: Casablanca (Spanish/Israelis), Tunisia (German tourists), Egypt (Western tourists), Yemen (USS Cole), East Africa (US embassies). And so on.

    So, if liberal democracy isn’t a necessary prerequisite, here’s a question: why in “secular Arab” despotisms that are hated by radical Islamists just as much as they hate “Western blah decadent democracy blah” haven’t there been significant numbers of suicide attacks? For me: because terrorists can move around freely in a democratic environment, but not in a repressive one. And because they need a free media for the real purposes of their attacks to be realised. Let’s face it, they’re not going to be able to kill us all off on ratios of 4:52. They need broadcast media doing their work for them – frightening people, clearing the way for authoritarian little shits like Blair, Clarke and Blair.

    [Health warning: the original post wasn’t my considered opinion, just the unpleasant conclusion of a chain of logical thought.]

  7. Jarndyce, I think we’re on the same side but come on! Look I agree with lots of what you say — I like “authoritarian little shits” for instance. I had forgotten that the USA was a target of Islamist suicide attacks. (“Islamist” though I dislike the word, is a necessary adjective because “suicide” includes WWII Kamikazes.) I’m being pedantic I know, but I doubt the qualifications of Afghanistan or Turkey or Russia meet “democracy” as I know the term. (All seem repressive and/or racist to me.) The other countries fit my border/ethnic disputes model.

    HOWEVER, your model, much as it displeases me, still fits my exception of Saudi Arabia. I think you’re wrong because, now I think about it, my fundamental model of “human nature” if you will presupposes a “will to power” therefore there is always an underground waiting for overthrow the current bastards. There is rather too much evidence against this thesis. The happy reigns of Hitler and Stalin and Blair are for instances. Still. I live (“get by” may be a better phrase) in a sort of Dionysian reverie of lions rousing from sleep, and yawning to each other, “Chains, what chains?”

  8. Jarndyce said:

    I doubt the qualifications of Afghanistan or Turkey or Russia meet “democracy”

    Fair enough, Dave. But they’re certainly a stage or two on from…

    Tonight’s headlines: this year’s quota for the wheat harvest has been met in record time.

    …or even, weekend entertainment consisting of readings from the book of Turkmenbashi.

    And I guess your model still has a whole bunch of border/ethnic disputes to account for that don’t end up in suicide terrorism, even though the power asymmetries involved would suggest that as a logical alternative. Aceh, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and so on.

    I don’t know that my answer’s right, btw. But I am convinced that a relationship of some sort between democracy and suicide bombing exists at this point in time – and therefore, unfortunately, one too between repression and personal safety. For me the solution is one suggested in the thread above: leaders just to come out and be honest. “Hey, in any decent sort of democracy, people are going to get killed. End of story.”