The Shiite Humpty-Dumpty

By Cernig

My colleague Eric Martin and I have had an ongoing discussion about when Grand Ayatollah Sistani's ability to keep the various Shiite factions together in some kind of political coalition would finally break down.

It appears that moment has come - following on the recent removal of their ministers from Maliki's cabinet, the Sadr bloc has just announced that they are removing their members of parliament from the pro-government coalition too.

The move leaves Maliki's coalition in a precarious position with around half the seats in the 275-seat parliament, although it could survive with the support of a handful of independent lawmakers.

"The political committee has declared the withdrawal of the Sadr bloc from the (Shi'ite) alliance because there was no visible indication that the demands of Sadr's bloc were being met," the movement said in a statement released at a news conference in the holy Shi'ite city of Najaf.

The choice of Sistani's hometown for the announcement is probably significant. I believe that an attempt at securing a vote of no confidence against Maliki in the Iraqi parliament cannot now be far away. What happens then?

There have been signs that Maliki would attempt to ignore such a vote if he lost it, which would require the U.S. to decide whether it would support Maliki or parliament. Either way, half of the Shiite majority will be pissed. However, if Maliki loses and does steps down, the U.S. is very likely to be faced by an Iraqi government which is very much more nationalist in leaning and which might refuse to extend the UN mandate for the coalition's occupation which is due for renewal in December. Finally, if Maliki wins a vote of no confidence, a continued US presence is assured but it is highly unlikely that deep divisions in Iraqi politics will deliver anything like progress towards benchmarks or any other kind of political reconcilliation. There are no "good" scenarios.

What's Mookie Up To?

By Cernig

Iraqi Shiite nationalist and firebrand Muqtada al-Sadr has ordered a ceasefire on the part of his Mahdi Army militia. Does this mean Mookie is a spent force? No, not really.

Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr has ordered a six-month suspension of activities by his Mahdi Army militia in order to reorganize the force, and it will no longer attack U.S. and coalition troops, aides said Wednesday.

The aide, Sheik Hazim al-Araji, said on Iraqi state television that the goal was to "rehabilitate" the organization, which has reportedly broken into factions, some of which the U.S. maintains are trained and supplied by Iran.

"We declare the freezing of the Mahdi Army without exception in order to rehabilitate it in a way that will safeguard its ideological image within a maximum period of six months starting from the day this statement is issued," al-Araji said, reading from a statement by al-Sadr.

In Najaf, al-Sadr's spokesman said the order also means the Mahdi Army will no longer launch attacks against U.S. and other coalition forces.

"It also includes suspending the taking up of arms against occupiers as well as others," Ahmed al-Shaibani told reporters.

Asked if Mahdi militiamen would defend themselves against provocations, he replied: "We will deal with it when it happens."

Surge supporters are obviously going to see this as an opportunity to proclaim success, as Captain Ed does today.

Having the Mahdis sidelined will mean less violence in Baghdad, where the militias had ruled the streets until the Americans decided to conduct their aggressive strategy starting in February. It may also mean a capitualtion in the south, where the Mahdis had battled against the Badr Brigade for control after the British pullout.
...A six-month vacation from Sadr will be exactly what the Iraqi government needs to keep the momentum towards reform. Sadr would have been a major stumbling block to the new agreements announced on Sunday, but his political position has eroded badly since the start of the surge. His flight to Iran undermined his credibility, and Maliki's survival without Sadr's ministers called Sadr's bluff.

So far, the signs look good for stability and progress in Iraq. If the situation continues to improve, the six month break will likely turn into a permanent end to the Mahdis and their influence on Iraq.

Ed also suggests that the final catalyst for this ceasefire might be the violence in Karbala over the last few days, where Mahdi militiamen clashed with Badr Brigade (SCIRI) militia acting as security at shrines there. If he's right, then many will see the hand of Grand Ayatollah Sistani behind today's announcement, desperately trying to preserve some form of Shiite unity in the face of spreading factional fighting.

Others wonder whether Sadr can carry through on his promise. After all, local ceasefires previously announced by the Sadrists have proven more a matter of words than actions as extreme Mahdi elements essentially ignored their commanders. Elrod at TMV writes:

My guess is that this latest effort to gain control over the militia - by declaring cessation of all military activities - is an effort to identify who really is a rogue element and then try to purge them. Those continuing to attack the Badr Corps, the Iraqi Army (which is often just Badr Corps militiamen in Iraqi uniform) or US troops will be revealed as rogue elements. It’s a test of discipline, then: who’s still with Sadr and who’s just using the Mahdi brand to carry out their own agenda.

The larger story, of course, is one of deep intra-Shi’ite rivalry that threatens to (and already has in some places) completely destroy Southern Iraq. There are real ideological differences between SIIC and Sadr: the SIIC is more loyal to Iran than Sadr’s militia (though Sadr has received some help from Iran as well in recent years), SIIC is more supportive of the US (in spite of its Iranian heritage and support), Sadr’s forces are more fanatic in their religious orientation, Sadr’s supporters are generally poorer than those of SIIC, Sadr’s base is East Baghdad while SIIC’s center is around Najaf. The struggle between these Shi’ite forces has already engulfed Basra and threatens to destroy the ruling Shi’ite majority in Parliament. If Sadr cannot reign his militia in, he will likely find himself faced with an even more militant rival. The question, though, is whether or not it is too late for Sadr to try to take control of the Mahdi Army. Only time will tell.

I think Ed's being far too optimistic about the positive effect this move will have on iraqi political reconcilliation, and Elrod definitely has a point but it's one that may not matter.

Here's what I think is happening here -

Sadr has figured out that, as everyone keeps saying, violence isn't the path to power in Iraq. As long as he and his Sadrists are still involved in violence against Iraqi and US forces, he's hampered in exactly how far he can push his political star. Yet he doesn't actually have to exert perfect control over his militia - just be in a plausible position to declare any attacks the work of renegades, call them a minority, and promise (frequently) to reign them in or destroy them. Hell, it works for the Iraqi government when they talk about the Badr Brigade thugs in uniform at the Interior Ministry and in the Iraqi Army.

Next, the US military has handed Sadr a "get out of jail free" card in the form of their co-operation with insurgent groups like the 1920 Revolution Brigade, who are now working the system to enable their own little protection-racket fiefdoms instead of bucking it. What's good enough for Sunnis is good enough for Sadrists, we will hear.

All of this will let Sadr consolidate his own state-within-a-state relatively unhampered, while also allowing him greater credibility and greater political power on the national stage, where he's been doing some (possibly two-faced) outreach to Sunni nationalists and secularists as well as positioning himself for the next stage of an eventual bid for the Grand Ayatollah's position. (On that note, the Sadr aide who announced this ceasefire is the prominent imam of the Kufa mosque who has street-cred as someone detained by the US for months then released without charge.)

It doesn't mean he's going to rejoin Maliki's "coalition of the seperatists", far from it. But it will give him more political clout to oppose Maliki while not seriously impacting his ability to exert a monopoly on force in his own demesne. My only real surprise is that he didn't think of it sooner.

Southern Security and JAM-SIIC infighting

Building on Cernig's recent post concerning the security situation in Southern Iraq which has been alternately held up as a counterinsurgeny model and failure of will by the neo-con pony seeking hawks, a new little tidbit indicates increased fighting and offensive action by the Sadrist JAM against their rivals, SIIC.

From Military.com is this report:

A roadside bomb killed the governor of the southern Muthanna province on Monday, police said, the second assassination of a top provincial official in just over a week.....

On Aug. 11, the governor and police chief of another southern province, Qadasiyah, also were killed in a roadside bombing attack.

Both governors were members of the influential Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, a group led by Shiite politician Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim whose loyalists have been fighting the Mahdi Army militia for control of the oil-rich south.

Muthanna was the first province that was transferred to Iraqi control last year.

Yep, really secure; I again want to suggest my plan for marginalizing the Sadrists from their base of support:

Have the US fully embrace him, provide billions in unaccountable dollars, and publicly distribute numerous photographs of top US officials shaking hands and cutting ribbons on freshly painted schools with top Sadrist Movement officials.

This strategy has done wonders in delegitamitizing Allawi, Jaafari, and Maliki, so it should work with Sadr...

Surging For Sadr

By Cernig

Q: So hows that Surge of Saint Pet's going then?

A: Great if you happen to be the Mahdi Army of Muqtada al-Sadr.

The Hurriyah neighborhood of northwest Baghdad, gripped by a spasm of deadly ethnic violence a year ago, has grown markedly calmer over the past eight months. It is now the kind of area that both U.S. and Iraqi officials point to when they cite progress at stabilizing Baghdad.

But only Shiites are welcome — or safe — in Hurriyah these days. And neither Iraq's government nor U.S. or Iraqi security forces are truly in control.

Instead, the Mahdi Army militia runs this area as it does others across Baghdad — manning checkpoints, collecting rental fees for apartments, licensing bus drivers, mediating family fights and even handing out gas for cooking.

..."They control people's lives," said one resident of Hurriyah, a Shiite government employee who would give his name only as Abu Mahdi, 36, because he feared Mahdi militia reprisals. Scornfully calling them uneducated, bullying teenagers, he said: "They are worse than the Baathists" — the party that held total authority under the rule of Saddam Hussein.

Others are more supportive of the militia.

"Our area is safe because of the presence of the Mahdi Army," said Abu Hussein, a 50-year-old taxi driver, who also refused to give his full name. "Most people feel that way. Very few are anti-Mahdi Army."

Yet even Abu Hussein can find the militia oppressive. The rent payments they collect from fellow Shiites displaced from other parts of the city, who now live in apartments in Hurriyah that once belonged to Sunnis, are little more than protection money, he complained.

Now, this comes as no great surprise to those of us who said the Surge was always a plan to look for a political pony in Iraq. Many predicted the military surge would simply create space for more sectarian partitioning and the consolidation of militia's local power. We've seen those fears proven now in Anbar and Baghdad, in the North and the South. But maybe the cheerleading Right would like to explain how this is "success"?

Changing Baghdad's Maps

A couple of days ago, I restated my belief that Moqutada Sadr or one of his high level allies or followers will be in the cat bird's seat to control the skeleton of government for all of Iraq and actually be able to exercise effective and reaching governance for east central and southern Iraq. Dave of the Glittering Eye disagrees with my assessment as he believes the Sadrist movement is too thuggish and politically unsophisticated. I disagree as the Sadrist movement is doing a very good job of creating positive facts on the ground in Baghdad that makes them the logical successor groups.

IraqSlogger has a disturbing but very useful map of the spread of bodies found and what neighborhoods are controlled by what sect in Baghdad as of July 17, 2007.



The bodies are being found in Sunni Arab areas, and those Sunni Arab areas are much smaller and more fragmented compared to looking at similiar maps from six, twelve and eighteen months ago.

This data point also forces me to re-evaluate what I think will happen if/when US forces pull out. I had previously thought that Baghdad's Sunni Arab population would be able to hold the west bank of the Tigris. Now I am moving into line that Baghdad will become a Shi'ite dominated city through a combination of Sunni Arab out migration and Shi'ite Arab in-migration due to reciprocal ethnic cleansing.

Iraq Parliament Wants Timetable For Withdrawal

By Cernig

Bush may want a South Korean style of permanent presence in Iraq, but the Iraqi parliament doesn't and is building a wave of resolutions designed to force Maliki into either ending the UN mandate or be decisively shown up as a Bush administration puppet.

The parliament today passed a binding resolution that will guarantee lawmakers an opportunity to block the extension of the U.N. mandate under which coalition troops now remain in Iraq when it comes up for renewal in December. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, whose cabinet is dominated by Iraqi separatists, may veto the measure.

The law requires the parliament's approval of any future extensions of the mandate, which have previously been made by Iraq's prime minister. It is an enormous development; lawmakers reached in Baghdad today said that they do in fact plan on blocking the extension of the coalition's mandate when it comes up for renewal six months from now.

Reached today by phone in Baghdad, Nassar al Rubaie, the head of Al-Sadr bloc in Iraq's Council of Representatives, said, "This new binding resolution will prevent the government from renewing the U.N. mandate without the parliament's permission. They'll need to come back to us by the end of the year, and we will definitely refuse to extend the U.N. mandate without conditions." Rubaie added: "There will be no such a thing as a blank check for renewing the U.N. mandate anymore, any renewal will be attached to a timetable for a complete withdrawal."

Without the cover of the U.N. mandate, the continued presence of coalition troops in Iraq would become, in law as in fact, an armed occupation, at which point it would no longer be politically tenable to support it.

Now at this point there are some (I think) obvious things that need saying. First is that, barring further defections, the nationalists in parliament have enough oomph to pass this measure, but not enough at present to block a Maliki veto. Maliki would definitely veto - and he's already shown willing to go behind parliament's backs the last time he wanted the UN mandate extended and they wanted to add conditions for withdrawal, which infuriated many.

The second is that every time Maliki does an end-run around parliament and the wishes of some 80% of Iraqis, defections get more likely. Maybe not this time, but next time for sure in my opinion, he's going to run up against a veto-proof majority and the measure will pass. At that point, Bush will have a choice - accede to the will of the Iraqi people (as he has previously said he would and even many conservatives believe he should) by ordering a withdrawal or keep pushing for a permanent presence by extending the concept of executive power over the other branches of government he's touted for himself all along to the Iraqi prime minister and president. That would neatly redefine "if the Iraqis ask us to leave" down to the only Iraqis who wont ask. Two guesses which one I think he will go for, and the first doesn't count.

At that point, armed resistance to what would then be an illegal occupation would, literally, explode. (Although Bush could also try to bully the UNSC into going along with the gag - which would have a slim chance of working at best.) Either the South Korean experience would turn out to be more like 50 years of Vietnam, or the whole thing would go Vietnam-shaped in very short order, with Maliki and his cronies clinging to the skids of the last 'copters from the roofs of the Green Zone. Either way, not good.

So, to my mind, either Bush and Maliki can bow to the inevitable or they can dig their heels in and watch as the Iraqi quagmire is set aflame in very short order.

All of this, I admit, depends on the nationalist pressure on Maliki increasing rather than staying static - something I recognize some bloggers I greatly respect as commentators like Eric Martin and Swopa are sceptical about. In that respect, Kevin Drum yesterday pointed to an article by Robert Dreyfuss at American Prospect.

Earlier this year, Fadhila — a Sadrist movement strong in Basra and Iraq's south — pulled out of Maliki's ruling United Iraqi Alliance. Since then, both Fadhila and Sadr's own party have been discussing a new political alignment with the Sunnis called a "National Salvation Front."....Among Sadr's potential allies are Mutlaq's bloc, the larger Iraqi Accord Front (which includes Sunni religious parties, such as the Iraqi Islamic Party), and Allawi's secular Iraqi National List. Allawi, a secular Shia, has been actively seeking a leadership role in a coalition to replace Maliki, too.

....In the end, if and when the United States reconciles itself to a withdrawal from Iraq, the path to stability will be found in a nationalist government constituting most or all of the emerging "national salvation" coalition. It's possible that the team of so-called realists now in control of U.S. foreign policy can come to that understanding on their own. Or perhaps they'll need to be pushed, and hard, by the Democrats in Congress and on the '08 presidential campaign trail.

But with each passing day, as sectarian violence grows, it will be more and more difficult to make that happen. Americans need to begin understanding that the end of the Maliki government and the start of a U.S. withdrawal are one and the same thing.

As Kevin kindly notes, this is something I've been saying for a while now - and something it seems he now agrees with too - but he also correctly notes that the Maliki government has entrenched itself pretty well and won't fade quietly away in the face of nationalist pressure.

Eric presents the contrary argument well in comments to Kevin's post:

I don't see it. I can't imagine the point at which Sistani says:

"Sure Mookie, go ahead and bust up the UIA in order to ally with Allawi and the Sunnis. Good idea. Can't imagine how that could possibly back-fire. Not like there's any history of Sunnis carrying out coups from the inside or anything. Come to think of it, how did the Baath Party come to power in the first place...."

Likewise, it's highly unlikely Mookie moves on something this large without Sistani's blessing. That's a hell of a person to cross when you're trying to sell yourself as a Shiite cleric.

Not to mention the fact that Sadr himself must be a little wary of these new BFFs he'd be teaming up with. Does he really trust Allawi and some ex-Baathist Sunni groups? Who would have his back?

The only way he makes this break is if Dawa and SIIC get overly greedy and try to push him out of the money and power altogether.

More likely, Sadr is keeping his options open in order to compel good behavior on the part of Dawa and SIIC. Let them know that he can break out if they squeeze him too hard. He's done that before.

And Swopa calls any notion of a nationalist cross-sectarian colaition a "silly fantasy" and adds that Sadr "is all about his "Sunni brothers" when it comes to PR gestures, but his henchmen are still methodically cleansing Sunnis from Baghdad neighborhoods. His only interest in these flirtations is increasing his leverage within the Shiite political alliance."

The trouble with Eric's objection is that Sistani is just one cleric, one man, albeit currently the most important of Iraq's religious leaders. Sadr is a cleric too and undoubtedly has ambition. Reaching for a position of being political and religious leader isn't beyond him. Today's parliamentary resolution proves that Sadr is perfectly willing to bust up the Shiite ruling coalition in pursuit of power. Swopa's objection - that Sadr is only playing power games and will turn on the Sunnis again later if he consolidates power- is only relevant after the fact, if in fact it is true at all. There have been reports of Sadr's Mahdi Army fracturing somewhat, with hardline Sunni-haters deserting due to Sadr's policy of rapproachment, which would suggest strongly that it isn't. Personalities count in Iraqi politics as in all politics - but it would be dangerous to assume in analyzing Iraqi happenings that cults of personality are so strong as to be the only deciding factor of loyalties and policies.

Sadr Reappears

By Cernig

Moqtada al-Sadr has reappeared in Iraq, to give a fiery nationalist speech to followers. The NY Times says his reappearance has come after "his position has been significantly eroded because of a strong push by American forces against the Mahdi Army," although such a contention is highly disputable. There have been few real crimps on the Mahdi Army of late that weren't voluntary and most of Sadr's problems seem to be self-inflicted, relating as they do to hardline breakaway elements who disagree with his course of reaching out to Sunni nationalists.

(The NY Times, like most other media outlets, also uncritically accepts the U.S. military's claim that Sadr has been in Iran this last few months, even though his aides say that isn't true and there's not a shred of evidence other than "because we say so" to support it.)

Having said that, Sadr suffered a major setback today as one of his senior milita leaders was killed by British troops in Basra. The British are claiming the operation had the backing of the Maliki government - something that may well blow up in Maliki's face soon if various readings of political currents turn out correct.

Juan Cole, for instance, cites one Arabic-language report:

the head of the Council for the Salvation of al-Anbar, Hamid al-Hayyis said that a delegation from the Council met with the leadership of the Sadr Movement. They then ment with two cabinet members, the minister of state for national security affairs and the minister for national dialogue affairs. The Council delivered to the government a letter asking that it hasten national reconciliation and stop making sectarian speeches. Al-Hayyis said that this was the first major meeting of the two principal sects in Iraq, where national essentials were agreed upon and shedding Iraqi blood was prohibited.

While KUNA reports on Sadr's speech itself.

Moqtada al-Sadr on Friday said he was against clashing with the legitimate forces of law and order because this served the interests of foreign occupation forces.

The young cleric, who called for the withdrawal of multinational forces (MNF) appeared for Friday prayers at a local mosque three months after he had reportedly fled to Iran when the US-backed Baghdad security plan was launched. "You should beware that those who are behind your clashes with the forces of law and order are the occupation forces, who are looking for an excuse for staying in Iraq.. So do not give them that excuse," he said in a Friday sermon addressed to his followers, who gathered in the mosque for the traditional Friday prayers.

He stressed that "any fighting between the Mehdi army (loyal to him) and the forces of law and order, is forbidden and banned," he said.

He called on members of the Mehdi army to use "peaceful means in the face of any provocation from the weak-hearted." He urged the government not to renew the mandate of the MNF "not even for an extra day, because we want them to withdraw." He called on the authorities to restore basic services, prevent members of the dismantled Baath Party from returning to positions of power and called for repairing religious shrines, that were recently damaged by bomb attacks.

The only real stumbling block is De-Baathification. If Sadr can cleave a line carefully which can restore the staus of Sunni teachers and such while still preventing more prominent Party members from returning to actual "positions of power" then he will be in a very strong political position indeed. With Sunni backing and a rule of non-violence against Iraqis, he can forge a political coalition to unseat Maliki's government in a velvet revolution - and if Maliki is green-lighting attacks on Sadrist loyalists then that will count severely against him in such a circumstance.

Sadr Looks For Common Ground

By Cernig

According to the Washington Post today, the Sadrist movement in Iraq has "embarked on one of its most dramatic tactical shifts since the beginning of the war." It says that Moqtada al-Sadr has ordered a shift away from targeting Sunnis, with the aim of forging a cross-sectarian coalition of nationalists.

The 33-year-old populist is reaching out to a broad array of Sunni leaders, from politicians to insurgents, and purging extremist members of his Mahdi Army militia who target Sunnis. Sadr's political followers are distancing themselves from the fragile Shiite-led government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, which is widely criticized as corrupt, inefficient and biased in favor of Iraq's majority Shiites. And moderates are taking up key roles in Sadr's movement, professing to be less anti-American and more nationalist as they seek to improve Sadr's image and position him in the middle of Iraq's ideological spectrum.

"We want to aim the guns against the occupation and al-Qaeda, not between Iraqis," Ahmed Shaibani, 37, a cleric who leads Sadr's newly formed reconciliation committee, said as he sat inside Sadr's heavily guarded compound here.

"Our retreating from the government is one way to show we are trying to work for the welfare of Iraq and not only for the welfare of Shiites," said Salah al-Obaidi, a senior aide to Sadr. He said the time was "not mature yet" to form a bloc that could challenge Maliki, who came to power largely because of Sadr's support.

Which shouldn't come as any surprise to Newshoggers regulars. We've been saying this was in the wind for some time now.
It's significant that the two Sadr aides interviewed for the WaPo piece were Shaibani and al-Obaidi. Both had been held by U.S. forces and have been recently release - Obaidi five months ago and Shaibani as recently as mid-March when he had a high-profile meeting with prime minister Maliki. Both were released because coalition leaders judged that they "could play a potentially important role in helping to moderate extremism and foster reconciliation in Iraq."

Sadr senses an opportunity in recent moves by Sunni insurgent groups to break away from militants influenced by al-Qaeda, and in the threats by the largest Sunni political bloc to leave the government, which opens the possibility for a new cross-sectarian political alliance, his aides said.

If the sectarian war can be stopped, if the Mahdi Army and Sunni insurgent groups can join hands and break al-Qaeda in Iraq, there will be less reason for U.S. forces to stay, said Shaibani, wearing a black dishdasha, a traditional loose-fitting tunic, and clutching a Nokia cellphone during an interview in late April. "The American argument is we can't have a timetable because of al-Qaeda," he said. "So we're going to weaken al-Qaeda for you."

Sadr's political followers have had informal talks with Sunni politicians and insurgent groups in the past month. "We think there is some possibility to have a closer relationship," said Hussein al-Falluji, a legislator in the Iraqi Accordance Front, the largest Sunni political bloc.

Abu Aja Naemi, a commander in the 1920 Revolution Brigades, said Sadr's representatives have had informal discussions with his group.

The Sadrists, like most Sunnis, are against the idea of creating autonomous regions. They share concerns over the fate of the contested oil-rich city of Kirkuk, division of oil revenue and the need for Iraq's constitution to be amended.

It's still early days, but this is a trend worth keeping an eye on. It's probably what is behind the recent Iraqi parliament move to vote for the end of the occupation, for instance, which would suggest very strongly that the measure would pass as it would have both the Sunni and Sadrist blocs votes from word one. Still, it isn't good news for the Bush administration, who have always intended "victory" to include Iraq being a client state of the U.S., as the forming coalition will be both hostile to the occupation and have broad-based support for violence should the coalition refuse to leave.

Likewise, in the short term a fair number of Sadr's Mahdi militiamen are going to be refuseniks over any kind of Sunni truce and so splinter off into new small armed factions. That will complicate the "surge" picture and lead to more sectarian violence as the Bush administration looks to reduce such violence before a looming September "deadline" which many in Congress are looking towards.

Warlords Of Basra

By Cernig

"If the Prophet Muhammad would come to Basra today he would be killed because he doesn't have a militia. There is no state of law, the only law is the militia law."

Those are the words of one university law professor in Basra, where The Guardian reports competing militia factions have sewn up the city amongst themselves in a pretense at almost-calm. Another Basran, a former politician, told the Guradian's reporters that:

When these religious parties say Basra is calm, that's because they control the city, and they are looting it," he said. "It's calm not because it's under the control of the police, but because all the militias have interests and they want to maintain the status quo. The moment their interests are under threat the whole city can burn."

Like many I spoke to, he said the appearance of a functioning state was largely an illusion: "The security forces are made of militiamen. In any confrontation between political parties, the police force will splinter according to party line and fight each other."

The Guardian also interviewed one of the thuggish militia commanders, who was in the process of telling one Sunni to fork over about $500,000 or be killed for the actions of his brother 15 years ago and was preoccupied by his feud with the Fadhila militia that has controlled the governorship and the oil terminals for most of the past two years.

Sayed Youssif and a group of other militias all with strong ties to Iran were trying to displace Fadhila. "I have told all city council members: you have to make a choice, you either vote against the governor or you will die," he told one of his aides. The next day, two bombs exploded outside the homes of city councillors from the Fadhila party.

With a a senior Iraqi general in the interior ministry.

Most of the police force is divided between Fadhila which controls the TSU [the tactical support unit, its best-trained unit] and Moqtada which controls the regular police," the general said.

"Fadhila also control the oil terminals, so they control the oil protection force and part of the navy. Moqtada controls the ports and customs, so they control the customs, police and its intelligence. Commandos are under the control of Badr Brigade."

The relationship between militias and the security units they had infiltrated was fluid and difficult to pin down, he said. "Even the police officer who is not part of a militia will join a militia to protect himself, and once he is affiliated with a militia then as a commander you can't change him ... because then you are confronting a political party," he added.

More than 60% of his own officers, and "almost all" policemen, were militiamen. "We need a major surgical operation, to clean the city," he said.

and a senior Iraqi intelligence officer who says the militias could take over Basra from the British and the Iraqi central government in 30 minutes if they chose to.

As a young man with a pistol tucked into the back of his trousers brought us cans of Fanta, Samer described the economic forces behind the growth of the militias. "The militias and the tribes are cartels, they control the main ports the main oil terminal, and they have their own ports and everyone smuggles oil. When the balance of power is disrupted, they clash in the streets," he said.

Moreover, the paper gets to the heart of the Iranian influence in Basra - an insiduous takeover that has as much to do with individual factions making money as any grand strategy.

Abu Mujtaba described the level of cooperation between Iran and his units. His account echoed what several militia men in other parts of Iraq have told me.

Sitting in his house in one of Basra's poorest neighbourhoods, he told me: "We need weapons and Iran is our only outlet. If the Saudis would give us weapons we would stop bringing weapons from Iran."

He went on: "They [the Iranians] don't give us weapons, they sell us weapons: an Iranian bomb costs us $100, nothing comes for free. We know Iran is not interested in the good of Iraq, and we know they are here to fight the Americans and the British on our land, but we need them and they are using us."

Despite this scepticism about Tehran's motives, he said some Mahdi army units were now effectively under Iranian control. "Some of the units are following different commanders, and Iran managed to infiltrate [them], and these units work directly for Iran."

...His assessment was shared by both the general and the intelligence official. "Iran has not only infiltrated the government and security forces through the militias and parties they nurtured in Iran, they managed to infiltrate Moqtada's lot, by providing them with weapons," the general told me. "And some disgruntled and militias were over taken by Iran and provided with money and weapons."

...But, like many he was philosophical about Iranian interference. "Unlike the US and the UK, Iran invested better. They knew where to pump their money, into militias and political parties. If a war happens they can take over Basra without even sending their soldiers. They are fighting a war of attrition with the US and UK, bleeding them slowly. We arrest Iranian spies and intelligence networks but they are not spying on the Kalashnikovs of the Iraqi army - they are here to gather intelligence on the coalition forces."

But others cite evidence of Iranian influence being used to pursue less strategic aims. A businessman in Basra, who regularly imports soft drinks from Iran, told me he once had a dispute with his suppler in Iran over price. When he refused to pay, gunmen from a pro-Iranian militia stormed his shop and kidnapped him. He was only released after paying all of what he owed to the Iranian dealer.

Which is worrying enough in itself.

I've always thought that there was a large amount of weapons smuggling from iran and that iranian influence in Iraq was widespread - but that it never quite reached the levels of deliberate and inimical intent from on high propounded by the Bush administration in their search for someone else to blame (especially where EFPs were concerned). This accords well that - it's a lawless land and everyone is taking advantage of it. As the guy says, if they could get weapons from the Saudis they would.

There's a lot more and all well worth a read. After reading it, it hit me that this is Basra, supposedly nothing like as thorny a problem as Baghdad or Anbar or Diyala. The surge doesn't have a hope of success.

Update Juan Cole is even more sceptical than I am about a massively organized Iranian conspiracy.

I don't think the Fadhila Party, or most of the Sadrists, or most of the tribal militias, much care for Iran. A lot of Basrawis don't have good memories of the Iran-Iraq War. Some more extreme Sadrists even burned the Iranian consulate at Basra. The most important ally of Iran is the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, to which he devotes little space.

U.S. Allows Mahdi Army Security Role

By Cernig

The US Army is allowing the Mahdi Army, led by Moqutada al-Sadr, a discreet security role in protecting a key Shiite shrine, according to the AP (via the DC Examiner).

The mosque of Imam Kadhim, the most revered Shiite shrine in Baghdad, is a tempting target for Sunni insurgents. To protect it, Iraqi and U.S. troops rely on the Mahdi Army, the same Shiite militia that Washington considers a threat to Iraq's stability.

That cuts to the heart of a dilemma for the U.S. military three months into the campaign to pacify Baghdad: whether to risk fierce battles by confronting Shiite militiamen blamed for massacring Sunnis or to deal with "moderates" in the Mahdi Army - which the U.S. believes receives weapons and training from Iran.

...The Americans believe that tolerating a discreet role for the Mahdi Army, which U.S. officers refer to by its Arabic acronym JAM, is better than either picking a fight with the militia or taking the blame if Sunni extremists manage a repeat of the February 2006 bombing of another Shiite shrine in Samarra.

That attack, which the U.S. blames on al-Qaida, unleashed a wave of sectarian bloodletting and reprisal attacks on mosques, plunging the country into civil conflict.

Without the militia, U.S. and Iraqi officers acknowledge that the 2,000 Iraqi security forces and 500 American soldiers based in the area would be hard-pressed to protect the neighborhood's 120,000 residents and the shrine, which houses the tombs of two 8th century Shiite imams.

U.S. commanders have chosen to use the Mahdi security network already in place rather than divert resources from other parts of the city where security is worse.

"There are a lot of people affiliated with JAM, and if we made them all enemies, we'd be in trouble," said Lt. Col. Steve Miska, 39, of Greenport, N.Y., who commands U.S. troops in northwest Baghdad.

"So we try to sort out who's extremist JAM and can't be reasoned with because of their ideology, and who we can live with as long as they're not killing U.S. and Iraqi soldiers or civilians."

...Those measures involve inundating the streets around the shrine - a tightly woven web of mostly pedestrian thoroughfares - with mostly young men in their teens and early 20s who dress in civilian clothes and loiter on street corners.

Armed with cell phones, they become the eyes and ears of the Mahdi Army.

The militia "dresses as civilians and they blend in," said Nabil Ali, 23, a Shiite who fled another Baghdad neighborhood after receiving a death threat from Sunni insurgents - a bullet in an envelope. "It's a better way to protect the mosque."

This all makes sense to me, especially the bit from Lt. Col Mishka about trying to seperate the extremists in Jam from others who could provide a useful role. However, it also illustrates why Petreaus' surge is undermanned and unworkable.

But remember this story next time you hear rhetoric about the evil of al-Sadr, the threat posed by his militia or indeed any talk of an ironclad determination to dismantle all militias. Remember that such linear narratives are aimed at those who like their world view to be powerpoint style and un-nuanced. You know - Republicans.

Painted Into A Corner Of Their Own Making

Congratulations to the US military - they've finally found a way to reconcile radical Sunnis and Shiites.

Via the UK's ITV News:

Thousands of Shia Baghdad residents have taken to the streets in protest against the US construction of a wall in the Iraqi capital.

The protests were called by radical Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr who condemned the the wall calling it a sign of the "evil will" of American "occupiers".

The US military announced last week it was building a three-mile long 12-foot high concrete wall in a Sunni stronghold that has been targeted by Shia militiamen.

Shia cleric Hadi al-Kaabi said: "We are Iraqis, Muslims, Sunnis and Shia and there is no difference between us, brothers in this country.

"We don't want those who want to separate us and we don't want walls in this country, and we don't want to be like Palestine and Israel".

Many Sunnis contested the US plans and have also held protests against the wall.

The remarks were the first response on the wall from Muqtada al-Sadr since the US military announced the planned construction last week.

The "Baghdad Wall" is rapidly becoming an unforseen catalyst for events in Iraqi politics - events that were already in motion but which this issue has accelerated.

For some time now, there's been a nationalist undercurrent in Iraq politics involving figures such as Sadr and the Sunni leader al-Mutlaq. Sadr has used Iran for support but isn't nearly as beholden to them as the current CSIRI-based government is - recall that Iranian diplomats arrested by the US for aiding attacks on US forces had appointemnts with the current President, Prime Minister and National Security Advisor. Now, as I wrote yesterday, I feel the circumstances favor Sadr breaking away from his Iranian ties to return to what has always been his first cause, iraqi nationalism. It may well be that we will see a non-sectarian anti-occupation coalition arise in the next few weeks and make a bid for power.

That would change many things - not least the opinions and actions of regional leaders. They've been keen to manipulate the US into staying in Iraq just a little longer, in order to stave off what at present seems inevitable - a three-fold whammy of a pro-Iranian regime in Iraq, Kurdish partition and spillover from both of those leading to serious unrest in neighbouring states. A nationalist coalition in power would enable neighbouring nation's leaders to relax and allow their populace to rule their policy - and the populace uniformly wants an American withdrawal, seeing too many echoes of Israel's policy in Palestine and Lebanon for comfort.

It has been noted today, by no less than the American Conservative magazine, that the single-issue hawks of the Right cannot admit to themselves the mess their single-minded zeal has made of the conservative domestic agenda at home in the US. Likewise, they cannot admit the mess they have made in Iraq, always asking for just another Friedman, another surge, a little more time.

But unless such a solution is forthcoming, then no-one except the faithful hawks actually believes anymore that a continued US occupation of Iraq will actually help matters. All it does is postpone the inevitable, as the ill-feeling and sectarian feuds build up an ever larger head of steam. The longer the US allows itself to be involved in "staying the course" the worse the eventual explosion will be.

Unfortunately, the Bush administration has painted itself into a rhetorical corner where the one thing they most need - a lull in the fighting enough to provide an excuse for an exit - is politically unacceptable if it is provided by such as Sadr and Sunni nationalists who have provided much of the impetus behind the resistance to the occupation.

British Casualties in April

Earlier this month, I wrote that something strange may be going on in the British area of operation due to the increased number of combat related fatalities. If we excluded one outlier, when an RAF Hercules was shot down with ten combat fatalities in January, 2005, the worst month for British combat deaths were several months with six fatalities. April 2007 was one of those months. The maximum number of fatal incidents has been three fatal combat incidents.

The Ministry of Defense has just announced two more combat deaths from a single IED blast in Maysan Province. With April only 60% complete, this month already has the second most combat deaths, and the most combat death incidents. Maysan is north of Basra, and it is an area that Sadrist guerrillas have successfully forced the British out of the capital city of Amarrah last summer, and the remaining British forces in the province are light cavalry units trying to patrol the Iraq-Iran border. These units have seen minimal arms smuggling activity in the past nine months.

John Robb at Global Guerrillas is passing along an interesting breakdown of the various Sadrist factions and splinter groups written by Babak Rahimi:

• Mahdistic (Najaf and Basra). Target: the increasingly irrelevant Shiite establishment in Najaf and the Iraqi government.
• Sectarian militias (primarily in Sadr City) Target: Sunni groups and the US military.
• Regional militias. Specifically, the remnants of Sadr's militia and the Fadhila party (an off-shoot of Sadrist movement) in a contest for control of Basra and the Southern oil company.

The regional militias are splintering and looking out for their own self-interest while also jostling with each other for power. The British are just another, very heavily armed, militia in this power struggle. And they are trying to sit on the smuggling routes, and other sources of revenue, so they are targets for some of the militias.

Surging Delegitimization

The Baghdad Security Plan has only produced a surge in de-legitimization of the national government and its ability to carry out its positive promises of action. At my old blog, I noted that the Jaish al Mahdi was lying low in Baghdad and I speculated on a reasons why it may have been doing so:

There is a possibility that the JAM and Sadr are lying low for two reasons.... a deeper political objective of demonstrating that the only reliable protector of Shi'ites in Baghdad is the JAM as the central government troops and the US Army can not protect the Shi'ite dominated neighborhoods. [emphasis added today by me]

John Robb at Global Guerrillas has a chilling post that validates my interpretation of the delegitimizating effects of the security plan:

Down with Maliki! Where is the security plan? We are not protected by this plan. [italics in original]
Shouts from an angry Shiite mob as they threw stones at the US and Iraqi troops that arrived at the scene of one of the 5 car-bombings that killed 160 people in Baghdad on 18 April 2007

Chaos and destruction are much easier acts and states of being to commit and exist in than order and construction. The insurgencies in Iraq have made the word of the Iraqi government and the US increasingly incredible over the past four years, and this loss of credibility is destroying any fragment of an iota of a chance of improvement in either the general condition of Iraq under the governance of a US backed regime or at least a quasi-functional non-genocidal counterinsurgency program designed to support the US backed regime.

Will Sunni Groups Join The Sadrists?

By Cernig

Two days ago, when news that the Sadr bloc was withdrawing itself from the ruling coalition in Iraq broke, I harked back to a post last December by Iraqi blogger Raed In The Middle. That post quoted Sunni politician Saleh Al-Mutlaq, the head of the national dialogue front, who told a newspaper that a national salvation front was biding its time until the right moment to challenge the Maliki government for power. The front, he said, would include "the national dialogue front, the national Iraqi list led by Allawi, the reconciliation and liberation front led by Meshaan Aljuburi, and the Sadr movement." It would also draw support from Baathists, pan-arabists, the old Army leadership and seven important clerics. I suggested that Sadr's move may well be the first move by that front.

Today, Al-Mutlaq was interviewed by Reuters:

Insurgent groups in Iraq should unite, agree a programme and be ready to reap the political rewards for inflicting heavy losses on U.S. troops, an Iraqi Sunni politician said on Tuesday.

Saleh al-Mutlaq, whose National Dialogue group is a leading Sunni party represented in parliament, said the groups should be ready to fill the "the void" with a blueprint for a "liberated Iraq" if the U.S. plan to stem violence in Iraq fails and troops abruptly leave the country.

"It's now the right time for the national resistance groups to unite its negotiating stance towards the occupation forces and to draft a political programme for the future," Mutlaq said.

"The political programme will fill the vacuum in the event of an abrupt U.S. withdrawal from Iraq," said Mutlaq, who denies ties with insurgents but says he shares their goal of "liberating Iraq from foreign occupation."

..."This will prevent infighting that would risk the gains of the nationalist resistance whose sacrifices defeated America's project in Iraq and the Middle East," he said.

...The prominent Sunni politician said Washington should engage in serious discussions with mainstream insurgent groups if it really sought a stable post-war order.

"It's now opportune for the United States to start quickly to negotiate with these insurgent groups," Mutlaq added, referring to a U.S. backed political process that many Sunnis say marginalised them by giving Shi'ite parties excessive power.

"The political process will not succeed as long as there are arms carried by the resistance," he said.

Now doesn't that sound very like what was being talked about in December? If so, then we should soon see an alliance, maybe not even a formally announced one, between these Sunni groups and Sadr's bloc. As my blog-partner Fester pointed out, they will hold most of the important cards.

The Sadrists and a decent chunk of the Sunni-Arab community that is represented in the government, which is a fairly significant qualification, are vehemently anti-US. Non-represented militias, and insurgent groups are even more vehemently anti-US and these are the groups that are in line with Iraqi public opinion within the contested zones, and they have credible loyal military options. As US forces withdraw, these are the groups that have the capability to cause mass disorder for the Iraqi government OR a reasonable measure of civic peace. They will get what they want, and that means the United States needs to realize that we will continue to not get what what we want...When the United States leaves, the leaving will be near complete.

These groups aren't going to go away no matter how well the "surge" succeeds or fails and will still have the same wish at the end of it - an end to the occupation, if not by peaceful means then by force. If the US co-operates, then there's a chance to make the transition a peaceful one. If not, well there just won't be an end to the violence no matter how many surges the US throws at the problem. They are an immovable object and, after four years of failed Bush administration non-strategy, they know the US is not an irresistable force.

Sadr Makes His Long-Planned Move

By Cernig

Various news agencies are reporting that the Sadrist block, comprising six government ministers and around a quarter of all Iraqi MP's, will pull out of ruling coalition tomorrow. Reuters probably has one of the best reports on the matter.

The political movement of fiery Iraqi Shi'ite cleric and militia leader Moqtada al-Sadr said on Sunday it would withdraw from the government on Monday to press its demand for a timetable for a U.S. troop withdrawal.

Officials from the movement, which holds six ministries and a quarter of the parliamentary seats in Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's Shi'ite Alliance, said the formal announcement would be made on Monday at a news conference.

....The move is unlikely to bring down the government, but it could create tensions in Maliki's fractious Shi'ite-led government of national unity at a time when it is trying to heal sectarian divisions that threaten to tip Iraq into civil war.

"We are going to declare our withdrawal from government because the prime minister does not want to make a timetable for the withdrawal of foreign forces from Iraq," said one official in Sadr's movement who declined to be identified.

There was no immediate comment from the government.

Maliki says he sees no need to set a timetable. He said last week his government was working to build up Iraq's security forces as quickly as possible so U.S.-led forces could leave.

Two other Sadr officials confirmed the intention to pull out of the government but stressed the movement would continue to give "cautious" backing to a U.S.-Iraqi security crackdown in the capital. The Sadrists will remain in parliament.

According to a Sadr spokesman, this is so that Maliki has the best chance to rule...

"We don't believe in partisan quotas. Under the direct orders of Moqtada al-Sadr we have decided we are going to leave the government in order to give the prime minister the best possible options so that he can run his government," Muteyri said.

Yeah, riiiiight.

But let's be clear about one thing, before the idiots start claiming it as a victory of some kind - this is not about the surge.

By remaining in parliament, the Sadrists have avoided a constitutional crisis - one they could so easily have created if that were their wish - whereby the parliament could almost never have reached a quorum. Instead, they have created a power vacuum and set themselves up as a new de facto opposition around which other groups opposed to the occupation can coalesce. This, in fact, has been their plan for some time. The Sadrists have been one of the guiding light behind a nascent anti-occupation "national salvation front" which would cut across sectarian divisions and which has, since December of last year, been awaiting the right time to make its move. Back in December, Iraqi blogger Raed wrote that:

Mr. Saleh Al-Mutlaq, the head of the national dialogue front, told “Al-arab Al-Yaum” that the national salvation front that will be announced soon will include the national dialogue front, the national Iraqi list led by allawi, the reconciliation and liberation front led by meshaan aljuburi, and the Sadr movement.

Mr. Almutlaq added that the new front will include a number of groups that are not participating in the current Iraqi government including Baathists, pan-arabists, the Founding Conference that includes 46 political movements, the old Iraqi army leadership, and tribal leaders from the middle and south of Iraq. In addition, the front will include representatives from Turcoman, Yazidi, and Kurdish patriotic leaders who are against the occupation and for Iraq’s unity, and other Christian movements that believe in Iraq’s unity.

Mr. Al-Mutlaq added that the national salvation government will be supported by 7 religious leaders who hold the Ayatollah title, including Al-Baghdadi, Al-Yaqoubi, Al-Muayad, Al-Maleki, Al-Sarkhi, and Al-Khalisi.
The Iraqi Muslim Scholars association will have representatives in the front as well, according to mr. almutlaq.

Concerning the goals on the new front, Mr. Al-mutlaq said that the front will work to set a timetable (or time limit) for the U.S. presence in Iraq, which is an important condition that will convince the Iraqi resistance to stop fighting and start participating in the Iraqi government.

Mr. Al-Mutlaq said that the NSF will take over the current Iraqi government either by pulling out from the current parliament and creating a new government, or through holding an international conference that may be based on points 30, 31 and 32 of the UN Security Council resolution No. 1546 that calls for a conference every three months that includes the Iraqi government, the multi-national forces, and the UN secretary general to discuss the developments in Iraq.

Finally, and concerning the time that the national salvation front will be announced, Mr. Al-Mutlaq said that the front is coordinating with other regional powers to reach the right timing for this announcement to achieve the front’s goals and minimize any sacrifices.

That time seems to have arrived.

(You can view the various political coalitions here, and ponder for youself how the Sadrist move will alter the balance of political power in Iraq.)

Sadr's Pronouncement in Najaf

The Associated Press and Chicago Tribune is reporting that Moqutada Sadr has issued a statement to his followers that encourages active combat operations against the foreign military forces in Iraq.

""You, the Iraqi army and police forces, don't walk alongside the occupiers, because they are your archenemy," the statement said. Its authenticity could not be verified......"God has ordered you to be patient in front of your enemy, and unify your efforts against them — not against the sons of Iraq,"

This statement could be an innocuous statement reflecting the widespread sentiment among both the Sunni Arab and the Shi'ite Arab populations that attacks against US and UK forces are acceptable. In this case the JAM [formerly known as the Mahdi Army] will continue to do what they have been doing --- lying low, conducting minor harassment operations against US forces, and preserving their strength for a full scale civil war.

There is a lower probability event that this is an action initiation statement. If we remember late March and early April of 2004 when the first Sadrist revolt took place, Sadr was being boxed in. The CPA was attempting to serve its murder warrant, and his movement's mass communication system was under serious attack. Yesterday, Cernig noted that the Sadrists are having internal discipline and cohesion problems and that elements are under attack by US forces.

If some of the hardest of the hard-line JAM forces take this as an action step without significant support from the other Sadrists followers, a three-for one deal could be achieved. Sadr gets rid of a troublesome faction and recentralizes control of his militias, his nationalistic credibility is reinforced, and the hanging sword of Damocles is again brandished against the US supply lines between Kuwait and Baghdad. Thees supply lines are two highways and a couple of secondary roads that can be cut with motivated light infantry supported by engineers who know how to drop bridges. If they are cut, the US Army grinds to a halt. During the April 2004 revolt, the US Army was within 48 hours of running out of supplies for Baghdad, so this threat is real.

I think that this scenario is a fairly low probability scenario at this time, and the most likely intent of Sadr's statement is to reflect current reality and public opinions, but this is something to keep an eye on.

What's going on in Basra?

Over the past week, there have been three fatal attacks and six British combat deaths in the Basra region. This may be unusual.

Using Icasaulties.org as my data source, I pulled all British fatalities from May 1, 2003 to yesterday afternoon, sorted them out by combat/non-combat cause and counted the number of fatal combat encounters. During this entire period, the most fatal attacks in at single month were three fatality causing attacks. This maximum has occurred numerous times. The British have suffered 81 combat deaths. The most common number of fatal attacks per month was zero. The mean was 1.68 fatal attacks per month with a standard deviation of 2.39, so six fatalities in a single month is on the high end of typical variation. If we remove a single outlier, when an RAF Hercules transport was shot down in January 2005 with ten people aboard, six combat deaths in a month is a statistically unusual event.

Even without manipulating the data at all, and making this very simple assumption that a combat death is completely indepedent of any other combat death, the unusual thing is not the six British combat deaths in the month of April 2007, but the fact that we are not even a week into the month and we are already at the edge of typical experience.

So what could be causing this? There are a couple of different and potentially parrallel explanations. The most benign is that the British military is experiencing a run of bad luck. Previous attacks that only wounded soldiers killed soldiers etc. Another is that new technologies are allowing attacks to have a higher expected lethality. We are seeing some reports that the IED that was used to kill four British soldiers this week was a EFP. This report states that the British military and Iraqi police have not seen this type of IED in that region until very recently. A third explanation is that the factional fighitng in Baghdad is spilling over and causing some factions to start taking more shots at the British because the British are seen as aiding a factional opponent.

Right now I do not have enough information to really say anything definative. All I know is that something potentially interesting and different may be occurring in Basra and we should be keeping an eye on that city.