letters from mosul

February 18, 2006

I arrived in Mosul two weeks ago, and so, as a seasoned veteran, I can share my insights with you.

This is a land with history and memory, the ancient city of Nimrud, the shrine of Jonah, even the name of the province itself – the biblical Nineveh – reminds us that people have lived here continuously for many thousands of years.  It may have been forested then; now, it’s a barren land, where sheep graze and a meager barley crop emerges from the mud, and sculpted hills bear the crosshatches of goat trails over centuries.  The city of Mosul, perhaps the second largest in Iraq (no one is quite sure) has nearly two million inhabitants, most of them Sunni Arabs, but with many Kurds, and a rich assortment of Turkmen, and various Christian groups such as Chaldeans and Assyrians.  Both the city and the province, the locals say, represent the richness of Iraq.

Recent history has not been kind to Mosul. The dictatorship of Saddam Hussein was tough here, as throughout the country. The infrastructure of the country decayed.  For example, not only do insurgents attack the pipelines from nearby oilfields, but the pipelines themselves rupture on their own because they’re old and decrepit. Housing stock is rickety, drainage, sewers, electrical systems, all are run down. The first American troops to enter Mosul in 2003 went on a binge of construction, not all of it well thought out. For example, one hears of wells dug but no one trained to operate and maintain the pumps. Of schools built but no teachers trained. In other words, much was spent, but not enough sustained. 

Then came the attacks on Mosul of late 2004, in which insurgents who had been driven from locations to the south, in the al-Anbar and Salah-a-din provinces, overwhelmed the Mosul police and tried to take over the town as they had done earlier in such places as Fallujah.  Thanks to the heroism of the Iraqi governor, his deputy, and the chief of the provincial council, the local authorities stood firm against the insurgents; combined American and Iraqi army units reclaimed the streets.  Insurgent attacks are down by more than half since that time, but projects were destroyed and the citizens of the city are still not secure.  There are daily roadside bombs and attacks, mainly by insurgents targeting the Mosul citizenry.

The governor of the province tells me his story.  His brother, the previous governor, was assassinated.  He himself lost a son, a cousin, and two nephews to the insurgents.  They burned his house; he lives in the Provincial Office.  He has no car; it was bombed.   He has sent his family to another city for their protection.  A Sunni Arab, he works with the Kurd political coalition that governs the province.  He’s committed to bringing the various peoples of Ninewa together, to implement projects that benefit all Iraqis in his province, not just any particular faith or ethnicity or tribe.  He’s not shy about giving advice to Americans, and telling them what he thinks they’ve done wrong since 2003.  But neither is he ungrateful for the sacrifice that the United States has made to bring democracy and the hope of peace and prosperity to Iraq.  Like all Iraqis I’ve met, he’s generous and straightforward.  What he needs, and he is the first to admit it, is assistance with governance in the province so that the process by which Ninewa is reconstructed is transparent, fair, and effective – and run by Iraqis.

That, then, is the challenge here in Mosul.  The insurgents are at bay, and the Iraqi police and army strengthen daily.  But the American presence is still necessary to keep the peace.  Unemployment is much too high, over 50 percent.  Basic services need to be revived.  It must be Iraqis, with American help, who bring those basic services (such as clean water and reliable electricity) to the citizens of Mosul, and in the process, create jobs.  We do what we can to empower the governor and other elected officials, and to help them sustain their efforts to return grace and elegance to Mosul.

Later I’ll write about the U.S. soldiers and civilians who tackle these tasks.  For now, though, I think of a big glass of Velkopopovicky Kozel as I sip my non-alcoholic beer (no drinking for the troops at the front!) and of my loved ones and friends back in Prague.