[CPProt.net] An insider's account of the evacuation of Babylon

Fri May 6 17:35:00 CEST 2005

An insider’s account of the evacuation of Babylon 
In his first interview since returning to Europe, Dr René Teijgeler, former
senior advisor to the Iraqi Ministry of Culture, speaks about his
experiences in Baghdad

By Gary Schwartz  

UTRECHT. René Teijgeler (54), a Dutch conservator specialising in the
preservation and management of non-Western artefacts and documents, served
as senior advisor of the United States Embassy to the Iraqi Ministry of
Culture from July 2004 to March 2005.

With the withdrawal from Iraq of the Dutch on 10 March, Teijgeler left Iraq.
His tasks have now been taken over by Robert Kerr, cultural affairs officer
of the US embassy.

Dr Teijgeler spoke to The Art Newspaper about his experiences in Iraq—his
first interview since returning to Europe.

GS: What is your training and background?

I studied sociology, anthropology, bookbinding and conservation. Since 1996
I have run a bureau called Paper in Development, for the preservation and
management mainly of collections of non-Western artefacts and documents. I
have worked extensively in libraries, archives and museums in developing
countries. 

GS: How did you get to be Senior Advisor to the Iraq Ministry of Culture?

At a Blue Shield symposium in spring 2003 I heard a presentation on the
cultural affairs unit of CIMIC [CIMIC stands for Civil Military
Co-operation, a NATO programme for sending militarised civilian experts into
the field to perform tasks for which the military is unequipped. The
Netherlands, Poland, Germany, the Czech Republic, Denmark and Norway form
CIMIC Group North, the Dutch contingent includes a unit of militarised
cultural heritage experts]. I offered my services and was taken on. I was
given four weeks of basic training, waited a while, had another two weeks of
instruction about the mission and was shipped out to Baghdad by the Dutch
army as a major in the reserves. Two weeks after I arrived my predecessor
[Zainab Bahrani] left and I was promoted in quick stages to Senior Advisor.

GS: What facilities were you offered?

I was attached to the US embassy, in the Republican Palace in Baghdad. There
were 1,600 people working there, who all had to be put up inside the Green
Zone. The Palace was surrounded by an improvised trailer park, where the
sewage tanks were always running over. At first I was able to spend free
time in the cafés outside the perimeter, but after they were hit by a bomb
attack, we all had to stay inside the palace grounds. My trailer was a
10-minute walk from my office. Most of the Senior Advisors had extra staff,
but all I had was a translator. The most important instrument at my disposal
was the high status of the position of Senior Advisor. In military terms,
this was equivalent to the rank of a general; it gave me access to people in
command.

GS: How did the function of Senior Advisor originate and what did it entail?

The Americans offer an advisor to each of the ministries of the Iraqi
government. It is up to the minister whether or not to accept the offer. The
first advisors for the Ministry of Culture were the Italian diplomats Pietro
Cordone followed by Mario Bondioli Osio. They were succeeded by John Malcolm
Russell and Zainab Bahrani. The quick succession of advisors was confusing
for the Iraqis. When I assumed office, I was the fourth cultural advisor
within a period of four months. 

GS: Why is it that your predecessors received lots of publicity and you did
not?

I chose to avoid the press and the media. I did this mostly for my personal
safety but also because keeping a low profile made it easier for me to
negotiate.

GS: How did you establish your priorities?

They defined themselves. In the first place, I had to win the confidence of
the Minister of Culture, which took a while. On the ground there were two
major challenges, safeguarding the National Library and protecting Babylon.
The National Museum could pretty much take care of itself. The National
Library and Archive had been gutted by fire and 70% of the collections were
lost. But 42,000 documents, including rich archives from the Ottoman era,
had survived in the basement of the Ministry of the Interior, where they
were damaged by water. I got a $100,000 grant from the US army for freezer
trucks to stabilise them. A team of three Iraqi restorers are going to take
a course in paper conservation at the Library of Congress and come back to
restore the archive. 

Before I arrived an Italian NGO had set up an electronic cataloguing
project. We worked very well together until the two staff members, the two
Simonas, were kidnapped in October 2004. Soon after I went to Europe with
the director of the library for three weeks to raise money. Basic repairs
got under way at the beginning of 2005, but there is still not enough money
for proper reconstruction. 

I gave high priority to training and improving management. To take full
advantage of the training opportunities that were offered to us, I
introduced the rule that everyone who went abroad had to speak English. In
December 2004 more than 10 restorers-in-training went to the Czech Republic
for a two-month course on conservation. I could have established
high-profile, expensive, prestige programmes, but instead I chose to invest
in human capital. 

The Ministry of Culture sent 100 of its people to the American University of
Beirut last month, for a month-long course in management and team building.
In the near future we hope to send as many as 500 others.

GS: What was the problem at Babylon?

Babylon is one of the most important archaeological sites in the Middle
East. While heavy combat was still going on, the US Marines set up a base to
protect it. Then, in September 2003 the Multinational Division South Central
(MND-CS), under Polish command, established its regional base there. What
happened next is incomprehensible. Halliburton-KBR, the main US Army
contractor for non-military activities, got permission—from whom, no one is
saying—to set up a regional logistic centre in Babylon. They levelled large
tracts with earth-moving equipment to create flat storage areas for heavy
items like trailers, containers and chemical toilets. When the dust cleared,
there were 2,500 troops stationed at Babylon. The Polish militarised
archaeologists managed to prevent some destruction, but a lot of damage was
done.

GS: How did you get Camp Babylon evacuated?

I worked out a plan from which everyone would benefit. The Iraqis were going
to get the site back under their control; they received $200,000 and lots of
equipment; 350 jobs were created for paid guards, who received uniforms,
arms and other equipment. 

The benefit for the Americans was considerable. It might not seem that way,
but they worry a lot about international law. Even though the US is not a
signatory to The Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Heritage in
the Event of Armed Conflict, the Army claims to behave in the spirit of the
convention. Halliburton-KBR was easy to please. They made money out of
demolishing the old camp and building the new one. The move cost about $300
million.

The Poles were another story. In the beginning they were dead set against
the move. It took a direct command from Warsaw to get them to clear out.

Even with basic agreement between all parties, things were not happening
quickly enough. I encouraged the Minister of Culture to write a letter to
the then US ambassador to Iraq, John Negroponte, requesting a speedier
evacuation. With the help of General Charles Davidson, head of Civil
Military Affairs, who was genuinely concerned about Iraqi culture and
history, I reached George Casey, US Commanding General of the Multi-National
Force in Iraq. General Davidson and I drafted a response to the Minister of
Culture assuring him that all coalition troops would be out of Babylon by
January 2005. Once the Americans gave their word, they followed through.

The logistical problems were vast. 882 trucks rode on and off day and night
for months, moving everything to Diwanya, about 100 kilometres away. To
dissolve oil spills, we brought in oil-eating bacteria. Everyone involved
had to be made aware of the danger of causing new damage. It happened.
Babylon is now empty and under Iraqi control. Conferring about the
evacuation on site one day, I found myself staring at the huge concrete
security blocks that the coalition forces put at the end of the famous
Paradise Road. The heavy trucks that put them there destroyed many of the
2,500 year-old baked tiles paving the road. I asked the Iraqis how they were
going to remove these eyesores; they did not know. Taking advantage of the
moment, I got the Poles to lift the blocks out with Chinook helicopters.

GS: A year ago you were a self-employed consultant on conservation; for
seven months in the interim you were the cultural proconsul of Iraq; and now
you’re a private citizen again. How does that feel?

Weird. All development work is addictive, but Iraq was something else. On
the one hand I felt like a potentate, with powers that I never had before.
And on the other hand... My colleague Jim Mollen, Senior Advisor to the
Ministry of Education, with whom I shared an office in Baghdad, was killed
last November four days before he was going to go home. The day she was
kidnapped, I was scheduled to meet with Simona Torretta. A convoy to
al-Hatra that I almost joined was attacked by terrorists.

I left with the feeling that I had done good work. Before the American
invasion of Najaf, I impressed on the Deputy Chief of Mission, James
Jeffrey, that the Mosque of Imam Ali there is very holy to the Shi’ites. I
arranged for an archaeologist to be attached to the Project Contract Office,
so all building plans could be monitored. I assisted Iraq in re-enlisting
the major international cultural organisations. 

The US has asked me to return to Baghdad in September as a civilian advisor
to set up and support national programmes for archives and libraries. 

The contribution of Dutch militarised cultural specialists in Iraq, mainly
in Uruq, has attracted attention. I hope the Dutch decision makers will
realise that they have a major lead in the field of military-cultural
expertise compared to most other countries. Unfortunately so far nothing new
has materialised, but we hope our government will pick up on these
opportunities. The Ethnographic Museum in Kabul, for which our help has been
requested, would be an excellent project.

With my experience in this line of work and with my new military contacts, I
am planning to found an NGO for cultural development work in countries in
conflict, filling the gap between military presence and the arrival of
civilian specialists. I am working on this with the CIMIC officer who
recruited me, Joris Kila.

GS: You were known to oppose the war in Iraq. Did your conscience bother you
working for the Americans in Iraq?

I was not in favour of the American invasion of Iraq. But when I got there,
I decided that recriminations would do no one any good. I accepted reality
as I encountered it and set out to effect whatever improvements I could. To
get anything done in a war zone you have to cooperate with the military,
whether you like it or not. Once you accept that fact of life many things
become possible. Without the coalition forces I could have done nothing for
Iraq’s cultural heritage. Moreover, I soon realised that whatever damage the
coalition troops have done, the effects of Saddam’s rule were far worse. 

The Americans did not invent war, and it is not going to disappear from the
planet any time soon. With this awareness, I avoided the question of blame
altogether and concentrated on what to do next. This was also the spirit in
which I dealt with the Iraqis and the Poles, who were not talking to each
other when I arrived. I agreed with them in advance that we were not going
to assign blame, only to seek common solutions to common problems. It worked
for me, and I made it work for them.

With thanks to Joris Kila.