History provides a clue
Reader comment on item: Let Iraqis run Iraq

Submitted by Phil Bramley (Australia), Oct 29, 2003 at 18:26

Dr Pipes suggests that the coalition forces assume a much smaller profile by taking them off the streets and re-locating them to desert bases.

Letting Iraqis take charge of government functions, underpinned by coalition military muscle removed from population centres, has a historical precedent

When the first Arab (Umayaad) conquerors came storming out of the desert to wrest control of Byzantine Palestine from Constantinople their armies were confined to military cantonments away from the major centres of population. The functions of government were run by local people, who remained in place after the military conquest , and through this a more ordered change was brought about.

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