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The set-up in Iraq renders its civilians particularly
vulnerable in war
 

MANY aspects of the war hanging over Iraq are
unpredictable but one is not: the unusual
vulnerability of the civilian population. There are
two reasons for this. First, about 60% of the
population, or 16m people, are 100% dependent on the
central government for their basic needs; they survive
only because the government provides them with a food
ration each month. Second, after two wars, decades of
misgovernment and 12 years of exacting sanctions,
there is no fat to rely on.

In last year's Afghan war, as in the 1991 Gulf war,
more people died from the indirect results of the
conflict than from the fighting itself. And Iraqis now
are far less able to get by. In 1991, most of them
were in work, enjoyed fair health and had material
assets; now, more than 50% are thought to be
unemployed and most people have sold just about
everything they once had (visitors gauge this from the
markets, where the goods for sale are increasingly
dilapidated). Though conditions have improved since
the oil-for-food programme was set up in 1996, the
report of an International Study Team*, academics and
doctors with mainly Canadian backing, that visited
Iraq at the end of last month found how vulnerable
Iraqis still are. Most face grinding poverty, and
children, in particular, are terrified at the prospect
of war.

Estimates by Unicef, the UN's childrens' agency, show
close to a quarter of children under five suffering
from malnutrition, some of it acute. A leaked report
reveals that the UN is working on the calculation
that, in war, some 5.4m Iraqis will need emergency
help from outside, with small children needing it
most. The World Health Organisation's contingency
plans allow for the emergency treatment of 100,000
people injured by bombing, and for another 400,000 who
may need medical aid if they cannot get food or clean
water or shelter. The problems, already vast, would
swell exponentially if the fighting is prolonged and
people flee the cities. 

Food is the prime concern. The Iraqi rationing system
works very efficiently (its database also allows the
regime to keep tabs on everybody). In the northern
Kurdish enclave, the food - flour, pulses, cooking
oil, milk powder, all of it imported - is distributed
by the World Food Programme (WFP). In the rest of the
country, it is distributed monthly by local merchants.

Since August, the government has been providing an
extra month of rations in advance to allow
stockpiling. But supplies are running out, and people
have not even been getting their full ration.
Moreover, there is much anecdotal evidence,
particularly in poor areas, of people selling their
extra rations for medicine and other basics. The
collapse of central government could bring
distribution to a stop. So could bombing, if it
disrupts transport: for instance, Iraq is trisected by
two rivers that flow north-south, so blown-up bridges
would halt all east-west traffic. 

Another danger: if power stations are blown up, it
could mean the collapse of water and wastewater
systems, which, in turn, would have profound
consequences for public health. Iraq's water and
sewerage have never fully recovered from the crippling
of the electricity system in 1991, plus neglect and
the difficulty in getting spare parts and chlorine.
Some of the water-treatment plants, and the big
hospitals, have standby generators, but only 10% of
the sewage-pumping stations have them. In any event,
says Oxfam, a British charity, most of the generators
do not work. Even as things are, the power system is
crumbling, with only 60% of the country's needs being
met. Further destruction could be calamitous.

Both the UN and non-governmental organisations (NGOs)
have started to face up to the crisis, but have
difficulty planning for an emergency that has not yet
happened and which nearly all hope can be averted.
Co-ordination has to be low-key. The WFP, already
overwhelmed by the famines in Africa, is
pre-positioning food stocks in the region which it
calculates would feed 900,000 people for three months
(as with all UN agencies, its expatriate staff would
be pulled out of Iraq once war started). Appeals for
money also have to be low-key. So far, the WFP has had
"informal" pledges for only $7m. 

Eclipsing this sort of money are America's
multi-billion-dollar schemes for reconstructing a
post-Saddam Iraq. Working with a civilian UN
administrator, America plans to flood the country with
food and medicine and to rebuild the infrastructure it
may be about to destroy - much of it painstakingly
rebuilt after the bombing in 1991. The NGOs, which
have been gathering in Jordan as the expected gateway
for aid, were this week given a pep talk by senior
American officers. They were told that an American
Humanitarian Operations Centre may be established in
Jordan or Kuwait, and that "safe havens" would be
established for NGOs in Iraq. 

The agencies were uncertain, calculating the problems
of operating under America's military umbrella. Aid
and tanks are uneasy partners, and they wonder whether
they would be allowed to operate outside the safe
havens, In the end, if America occupies Iraq, the
agencies will have no choice, and the dollars will be
welcomed. The Americans claim that they are planning
intensively for the short term as well. They had
better be right. 


 
"Our Common Responsibility: The Impact of a New War on
Iraqi Children". International Study Team, January
30th 2003. (For the electronic version, see www.warchild.ca).

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