New Poll of Iraqis

An interesting new poll of Iraqis gives some interesting results:

The results of the poll reflect a great degree of dissatisfaction with the US "surge", with a vast majority of respondents considering the move to have made the situation in the country worse rather than better.

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The latest poll data reflects a slight increase in the number of respondents who consider al-Qaeda and foreign jihadis responsible for fomenting violence.

There was a significant reduction from February to August 2007 in the numbers who believe that the US and coalition forces are mainly to blame.

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The autumn 2007 poll reflects growing disillusionment with the occupying forces' presence in Iraq. There is a growing consensus among respondents that coalition troops should leave the country immediately.

Some 47% of respondents now back an immediate withdrawal, compared with 35% in February.

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One of starkest statistics from the poll is the overwhelming support for attacks on coalition forces among Iraq's minority Sunni population; 93% of those surveyed said they considered it acceptable. By the same majority - 93% - respondents reject violence against Iraqi forces.

The polls aren't as clear-cut as they might seem at first glance. For example, in the second graph, many fewer respondents thought in Aug. '07 that the U.S. government is responsible for the violence in Iraq than thought the same in Feb. '07. The shift is actually pretty striking. So, if the people think that violence has gone up, but fewer people think that the U.S. is to blame for it... it's a bit of a mixed message. Similarly, the number of those who think that al-Qaeda/foreign jihadis are responsible for the uptick in violence has increased from Feb. to Aug., as has the number of those who blame their own government. The number of those who blame "sectarian disputes" has also sharply decreased, which is a good sign for those still hoping for some sort of sectarian reconciliation.

Perhaps most tellingly, 47% of Iraqis support immediate withdrawal of U.S. forces... but 53% don't, preferring the U.S. to stay "until security is restored" or some variant of the same. Those in favor of immediate withdrawal have increased their numbers since Feb., but they are still the minority. this is a key point.

Strikingly, 93% of Iraqis think that attacks against Iraqi troops are not justified, while 57% think that attacks against U.S. troops are justified (although those numbers are heavily skewed by Sunnis). Only 18% of Sunnis think attacks against Iraqi troops are justified, despite the fact that these troops are majorly comprised of Shiites. Other questions yield similarly mixed results.

The upshot: Sunnis say they want a strong unified state (but have largely boycotted the central gov't, indicating that they want some other type of strong unified state than is currently in place), Shia split their support between a strongly unified state or a confederal system, while the Kurds want their independence. This is the primary crux of the political problem... reconciling those three views. But, as we can tell, partition isn't going to fix it, since the Sunnis would be inclined to continue violence until reunification occurred. Similarly, the Kurds seem unlikely to cede regional autonomy under any system. These views have nothing to do with President Bush or the invasion; they are influenced by history and culture and the current security dilemmas and credible commitment problems.

Perhaps the strongest thing to take away from this poll is that Iraqis don't really like being dominated by foreigners, be they jihadists or Americans. This signifies that there is still a strong sense of national unity, even though it clearly manifests itself in different ways. Still, that's really positive; perhaps it can be built on. We've seen snippets of this at other times, like when the Iraqi soccer team won the Asian Cup. The outward displays of nationalism was impossible to miss.

Still, and as always in Iraq, the truth of the situation is much more nuanced than a quick glance would indicate. But there appears to still be some hope buried in these poll numbers.