Couching It Diplomatically

(Call It Friday's Red Dot Special....)

Given her unsurpassed political instincts and deft negotiating skills, Condi descended on Baghdad last week aiming to break the stalemate over who would next lead Iraq.

With British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw in tow, Rice (and U.S. Ambassador/Enforcer Khalilzad) held two important meetings.  In one, they met with outgoing Iraqi president Jalal Talbani.  In the other, they sat down with current, incoming and possibly outgoing Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari.  (Jaafari, backed by Muktada al-Sadr, has been giving Washington fits for refusing to stand down.)

Now, I'm not going to reveal which of these photos is from which meeting**.  I'm not even recommending you read yesterday's associated NYT story --"Iraqi Says Visit by Two Diplomats Backfired."  What I will do, however, is make a pitch for the significance of physical arrangement and body language in what would otherwise be considered typical run-of-the-mill newswire fodder.

(**And no guessing by body type.)

(image 1: AP Photo/Pool.  April 2, 2006.  Baghdad, Iraq.  Via YahooNews.  image 2: AP Photo/ Ali Haider, Pool.  April 2, 2006.  Baghdad, Iraq.  Via YahooNews.)

Comments

[Tim]

It's got to be al-Jaafari on top his whole body is turned away from the Coalition contingent as they all sit quietly and look the other way. While Mr. Talabani (I presume) engages with the group, his feet face them as does the rest of his body. He's giving some gesture, Condi kind of looks like she's smiling. Mr. Straw's legs aren't crossed in the second picture. They all seem much more relaxed and a lot less confrontational.

But the thing that struck me most about both photos was the furniture. I guess they just moved their offices right into Saddam's palaces.

[ummabdulla]

Great job, Michael...

I agree with Tim. (This isn't a trick question, is it? Maybe it's too obvious and we have it backwards?) In the top photo, there's no interaction between the three on the sofa and the man in the chair (presumably al-Jaafari). Each of them on the sofa is closed; legs and hands drawn in (except Khalilzad's legs). I wonder who they're looking at, though. Is there someone over on the left (out of the picture) who's talking?

In any case, I'm not surprised that this meeting doesn't look more friendly. They're there to deliver the message that while they're all for democracy in principle, they don't like it when the results aren't what they want. So they're pressuring Al-Jaafari tio give up the post to which he was elected. And the Shias have lost all confidence in Khalilzad.

Apparently Bush sent a message to Sistani, and he's refused to even have it translated. I noticed Condi and Jack Straw groveling while they were in Baghdad, never missing a chance to say how wonderful Sistani was...

In the second picture, they're all engaged. Condi is off the sofa and on a chair close to the President (I think); she's turned in towards him and her foot's pointing towards him. Now here's someone they can feel comfortable with. In their shallow poiont of view, the Kurds are "good".

The Kurds have played the public relations game well, and the impression is that they're modern, liberal, democratic. I notice that when I read of "honor killings" in Turkey, they're usually in the Kurdish areas, but that's not mentioned; they're referred to as being in Turkey. If there's anything of a more postive bent, news reports will call the areas Kurdish. Just recently, there was about a week of violent Kurdish protests in Turkey, leaving at least 16 people dead, but that didn't seem to get much news coverage elsewhere because it was for the Kurdish cause; if it were "Islamists", it certainly would have made headlines.

That furniture is pretty typical. If you watch Arab state TV channels, the first few minutes usually show the leader meeting foreign visitors in rooms that look something like this.

[PTate in MN]

I won't repeat the observations of ummabdulla and Tim, with which I agree.

I find interesting that Jack Staw has the same body posture in both shots, hands folded, legs extended. I infer that the Americans are more enthusiastic about the second figure than the British. The Brits are neutral. They've come along for the ride, to provide international cover to the American meddling.

I wonder whether Rice would be invisible in the first picture if she were a white woman--her body has imploded against that pale sofa. In the second picture, her posture is seductive, the toes pointing, stretched out towards the second figure, who gestures back. I read the hands of the second figure as pleading, explaining. It is no wonder the Americans like him: He defers to to them.

The non-verbals of the unknown President in the top picture are fantastic. The guy is powerful, in control, he's not budging. It's like he took tips from the "GWB look-presidential" playbook.

Like Tim and ummabdulla, I'm inferring from the non-verbals that favored Kurd, Talbani, is #2 and out of favor, al-Jaafari, is #1. If it is the other way round, Whoa!

[ummabdulla]

Maybe Jack Straw's feeling a twinge of jealousy in that second picture; after all, he and Condi have looked like they were going steady for a while now. ;)

She even slept on the floor so he could have her bed on the flight to Baghdad; I guess there was no empty seat on her 757.

[Darwin]

It's really bizarre. In conventional diplomacy, countries are considered equal to one another, notwithstanding the obvious differences in power and status.

So heads of states are equal to one another, Diplomatic chiefs are equal to one another, and lower than heads of states.

Hence the first picture is an appropriate setup for the meeting with either Jaafari or Talabani, since Condi and Jack are both two notches below head of state (Talabani) and one notch below head of government (Jaafari).

The first picture is an audience, the second a friendly equal-to-equal meeting. The first picture is completely appropriate as Jaafari/Talabani are the hosts, and protocol sets them a step above Condi/Jack. In the first picture, you already see who is top dog on the visitor side, as Condi is closer to the host. Protocol says Jack is a step above Khalilzaid, and so Jack gets to be one step closer.

Did Condi and Jack toss for this? Whoever gets the bed on the plane gets to be one step closer on the picture? Just kidding.

In the second picture, the top dog (Condi) gets to sit with El Presidente, while her retainers, including Mr. Straw get to look on. Sitting together with the host is a courtesy, and shows the extra strong working relationships between the coalition and El Presidente. A message for the world that was needed amidst all the other signs of discord coming from Iraq. A message to the Iraqi political class that says we’ll continue to support you guys. A message to the Sunnis that says we got some Kurds in our back pocket. A slap to the UK, that Iraq knows who butters their bread (setting up three chairs) would not have been that much of a hardship.

[momly]

The energy in the bodies is different. In the top photo, everyone looks passive, inert, blase, bored, not connected. There is no investment in the situation.

The bottom photo has more energy. Condi is much more engaged, and the anonymous suit next to her is definitely engaged. The two on the love seat are more engaged than in the previous picture but haven't reached the level of commitment that Rice has.

The room looks cold and sort of sterile. It looks sort of like a very well appointed waiting room in a doctor's office. The light seems bluish and harsh and the furniture, while opulent, does not invite one to sit for long and have a nice chat, as my mother-in-law used to say. There is nothing inviting, welcoming, open, or hospitable in either picture except for Rice's intention to be present with the person at whom she is looking. She is generating the heat in the bottom picture but it is the sort of heat that is concentrated and intense. Kinda like an acetylene torch.

Well, she would need to be sitting forward a bit more toward the other person for that last observation to be true, but I assume that the intensified heat of attention by BushCo. was not effective.

[mugatea]

"Condi descended"

She is soooo condescending I assume your word choice was intentional. Either way, funny.

Before reading the copy, I reacted to the body types and thought Ariel Sharon (2nd photo) had recovered.

[Asta]

You'd think Jaafari had leprosy or something. I'm voting that's him in the top picture.

Lotta LOUD body language in these photos. If you're ever asked to play poker with these guys, take them up on it.

[readytoblowagasket]

Meanwhile, as these dignitaries fuck around with their seating arrangements, the less dignified keep dying.

Here's a nifty CNN chart tracking U.S./coalition casualties, where you can look up who died by name or date, and then read details of where and how they died.
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2003/iraq/forces/casualties/2006.04.html

Here are some less nifty but possibly more informative chartings of deaths in Iraq.
http://icasualties.org/oif/
http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/
http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

According to these charts, it doesn't matter who sits where.

[Cactus]

For some reason the furniture seems to be the major player in these photos. Was it all bought at the 'Queen Anne's Gold Gilt Shoppe'? The people seem like little stuffed pillows tossed into the fray.

As to the pillows, er, people, al-Jaafari is in the top photo with the relaxed pose, arms draped over the chair, hands open. His stance says I'm HERE, I'm COMFORTABLE, and I'M NOT LEAVING. At his feet is the 'dressed' coffee-table, with a low cozy arrangement of pink flowers and a gilt-edged tissue box. All within easy reach. The other pillows need to be puffed up a bit, they look rather deflated, flat. Each has a little bolster pillow precisely separating them from each other. Then there's that gold chair in the corner, it's too obvious, a separation of one person from the group. The little pillow-people on the sofa all have their hands folded in front of them lest something untoward seeps out of them, something undiplomatic, something which must be hidden. They are all looking, uncomfortably, out of frame and away from the object of their discomfort.

In the bottom photo, all the available seats are taken up, no furniture barriers. Talibani is explaining something to them, possibly how to rid themselves of that pesky PM. Rice and Talibani are sitting in identical (equal?) chairs. Straw and Khalizad are sitting on the sidelines, eager to jump into the cozy little duo. The coffee-table is now bare of anything personal and pushed away from Talibani ('I don't need no stinkin' tissue.)

Now that I've read Darwin's comments, I wonder if seeing the room as furniture placements is really the basics of diplomacy. Arrange the furniture and they will come. How close are the chairs, really? And a TOTH to RTBAG for his observation; they are all merely pillows strewn among the furniture and completely incapable of stopping the carnage.

[Cactus]

Afterthought: In the second photo, the door with the white pillow of flowers in front of it, now serves as a barrier between Condi/Talibani and Straw/Khalizad.

[martin]

Ah. Mr.Gasket. I have to draw distinction with your comments. It matters EXACTLY where you sit on this type of seating plan arrangement. It has cost American tax payers twenty-three billion dollars to foot the bill for this guilded photo opportunity. That much is fairly close to audit: the rest? Who knows.
It has also cost 2,300 of your employed citizens overseas. Scandalous, scandalous figures three years to the date.
The other (shrouded) figures that you quote, I am told that I have (know) no way of knowing.
Gild? The embossed seating arrangement for a generation of Palastinian kids

[ummabdulla]

"Each has a little bolster pillow precisely separating them from each other."

They might be there to provide a separation for practicing Muslims, so that an unrelated man and woman wouldn't end up sitting right next to each other. Al-Jaafari would probably care about that, as would at least some of his guests.

[Megan]

Someone brought long-stemmed roses to the lovefest in the second picture. The first meeting only rated pink gerber daisies with an odd stem of orchids sticking out.

[jt from BC]

RTBAG, I see the Grand Ayatollah Sistani sitting in the empty chair in pic # 1.
Your links are interesting but what I want answered is why the same methodology accepted by Blair & Powell in Bosnia, Congo and Rwanada were discarded when it came to the Lancet Study & 100,000 Iraqi Deaths ? Might they be diagnosed as having The Selective Memory Syndrome and if such a dis-ease doesnt exist it better be in the next DSM V, scarry its not coming out until 2010 can we wait?

"Mr. Roberts has studied mortality caused by war since 1992, having done surveys in locations including Bosnia, Congo, and Rwanda. His three surveys in Congo for the International Rescue Committee, a nongovernmental humanitarian organization, in which he used methods akin to those of his Iraq study, received a great deal of attention. “Tony Blair and Colin Powell have quoted those results time and time again without any question as to the precision or validity,” he says".
http://vitw.org/archives/817#more-817

Of those persons pictured Rice and Straw definitely qualify for a seat at The International Court, to face charges of war crimes.

[Mad_nVT]

Great photo commentary.

I agree with jtfromBC-- The International Court should be a constant theme in talking about US and British leadership. Even when they sit on gilded furniture. Or especially when they sit on gilded furniture.

Wanted: For Crimes Against Humanity

War Crimes deserve punishment.

[cj]

In the second photo, Rice is sitting in her own chair as opposed to sharing one with her fellow cohorts. Could the second arrangement be more than just a courtesy? (This would work very well in a campaign ad) Also, second photo is definitely more engaged. Still the box of tissues on the table in the first is a nice effect........ I'd say second photo was Talibani--he's just happy to finally be able to wash his hands of the whole mess and get out of town.

cj

[Kitt]

That's Jack - from Jack-In-The-Box.