Junior Coalition Partners Seek Pay-Back

If a recent anonymous email to one of Canberra's most prominent anti-war politicians is right, John Howard, the Australian prime minister, was readying troops to fight in Iraq as long ago as last July.

The military contribution publicly proffered by Mr Howard to George Bush many months later provoked fierce criticism, large protests and much dire punditry about his career being on the line.

But by the time Saddam Hussein's statue was being decapitated by cheering crowds in Baghdad, Mr Howard was able to quietly savour the moment of victory, and the political benefits it will bring Australia.

Australia, along with Poland, were the only two countries to commit "boots on the ground" to fight with US and British forces, and both are betting on a payoff. The contribution of the two countries has already been pointedly noted by Washington, with Vice-President Dick Cheney mentioning them honourably in his speech after Baghdad's fall.

Poland, like Australia, made it clear it would support the US war even before the United Nations Security Council's failure to back a new resolution supporting the use of force.

Poland sent about 200 troops to the Gulf, including its secretive special-forces commando Grom, whose duties reportedly included searching ships and assisting in the capture of the Iraqi port city of Umm Qasr.

Australia's contribution was larger - a 2,000-strong contingent including Special Air Services (SAS) soldiers, fighter jets and mine sweepers.

The F-18 fighters were involved in bombing raids, the first for 50 years for Australian jets, while the SAS used their skills in long-range desert patrols to search for missile launch sites in western Iraq.

Australia's has a century-long tradition of enthusiastically committing troops to distant conflicts involving western powers, but Mr Howard is keen to minimise any role as an occupier.

Australia's perennially fragile relations with its near neighbour, Indonesia, the world's largest Muslim nation, have been frayed by its commitment to the war in Iraq. Mr Howard now prefers to bring the troops home and play down any potential commercial benefits from the rebuilding of Iraq.

While Australia and Poland stressed they backed the US for geopolitical and moral reasons, both also have an eye any short-term political dividend for domestic consumption.

Australia recently opened talks with the US on a bilateral free trade pact, something officials privately assert was kickstarted by Canberra's steadfast backing for Washington's war on terror.

Australia also has an eye post-war on protecting its long-term wheat trade with Iraq, putting one of its own officials in charge of agriculture in the US-led transition administration.

With the fall of Baghdad, Warsaw is angling too for a share of the spoils, especially a portion of the multibillion postwar reconstruction business.

Poland had, since 1991, represented Washington in Baghdad via a US interests section in its embassy in the Iraqi capital.

Poland's good relations with Washington - a corner stone of its post-1989 foreign policy, supported by both leftwing and rightwing governments - has irritated some of its partners in the European Union, which it will join on May 1, 2004.

Warsaw has sought to project evenhandedness in its relations with the US and the EU, but French President Jacques Chirac lashed out at Poland and other Eastern European EU candidates in March, accusing them of "childish behavior" and warning their pro-US stance could harm their chances of accession.

Warsaw and Washington have been informally discussing the possibility of Polish companies' participation in postwar reconstruction since at least February, when leftwing Prime Minister Leszek Miller paid an official visit to the US.

Poland's economics ministry and National Economic Chamber are now fielding applications from companies and organisations that want to take a part in postwar Iraqi reconstruction; the economy ministry says it hopes to have a final list of interested firms ready this week.

Polish infrastructure companies were active in Iraq during the communist period, and are now hoping to pick up work subcontracting for far-bigger US groups.

Poland is also hoping to recoup some $700m in unpaid debts it says Iraq owes it.

Poland sent Ryszard Krystosik, who headed the US interests section in its Baghdad embassy until 2001, as its representative to last week's confer ence in Nasiriya, the first international gathering to discuss reconstruction in Iraq.

Perhaps mindful of appearing to seek only commercial benefits, the Polish foreign ministry emphasised the country's credentials in re-engineering formerly autocratic states: Warsaw, it said, will "make a substantial contribution from our experience in building the institutions of civil society".