Iraq “Surge”

The US “surge” into Baghdad and western Iraq is complete, 28,500 additional troops are now in Iraq. An early Pentagon assessment concluded:

Three months into the new U.S. military strategy that has sent tens of thousands of additional troops into Iraq, overall levels of violence in the country have not decreased, as attacks have shifted away from Baghdad and Anbar, where American forces are concentrated, only to rise in most other provinces, according to a Pentagon report released yesterday.
…
Iraq’s government, for its part, has proven “uneven” in delivering on its commitments under the strategy, the report said, stating that public pledges by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki have in many cases produced no concrete results.

Iraqi leaders have made “little progress” on the overarching political goals that the stepped-up security operations are intended to help advance, the report said, calling reconciliation between Shiite, Kurdish and Sunni factions “a serious unfulfilled objective.” Indeed, “some analysts see a growing fragmentation of Iraq,” it said, noting that 36 percent of Iraqis believe “the Iraqi people would be better off if the country were divided into three or more separate countries.”

Unfortunately the Bush administration will not be able to claim the the “surge” is still surging and that the full “surge” is not present. That didn’t stop Press Secretary Tony Snow from using this excuse one last time in yesterdays press conference:

So what the President does is he looks at the 90-10, and you look at it in terms of what’s going on not merely throughout the nation, but keep in mind that the Baghdad security plan understands that the first thing you’ve got to do is secure the capital. There have been some encouraging signs, but, again, we will reiterate, the surge is not complete, forces are just now, this next couple of weeks flowing in so that you’ve have the full complement of forces, and it’s going to be another month or two before they’re completely up and running at full speed.

Next, I’m sure will be the line, they just got there and they are just now getting started. I expect this line to last till September. Hopefully Sept. will bring a marked improvement but I’m not optomistic and don’t believe the case will be made that the strategy is effective enough. Now is not the time for baby steps in Iraq. The time for that was in 2003-04.

Menwhile, 4^th generation warfare guru William Lind lambastes the tactics used in this urban guerrilla war as indicative of the failure of US foreign policy (check out a coming post on the Gaza situation for more claims of US FP failure). Particularity the use of US air power on Iraqi ground targets such as a railroad station. Lind writes:

It turns out the bombed railroad station was no fluke. According to other reports, U.S. aircraft have dropped more than 200 bombs or missiles on Iraqi ground targets this year in support of U.S. ground forces at a rate double that of last year.

Nothing could testify more powerfully to the failure of U.S. efforts on the ground in Iraq than a ramp-up in airstrikes. Calling in air is the last, desperate, and usually futile action of an army that is losing. If anyone still wonders whether the “surge” is working, the increase in air strikes offers a definitive answer: It isn’t.

Worse, the growing number of air strikes shows that, despite what the Marines have accomplished in Anbar province and Gen. David Petraeus’s best efforts, our high command remains as incapable as ever of grasping Fourth Generation war.

To put it bluntly, there is no surer or faster way to lose in 4GW than by calling in airstrikes. It is a disaster on every level. Physically, it inevitably kills far more civilians than enemies, enraging the population against us and driving them into the arms of our opponents. Mentally, it tells the insurgents we are cowards who only dare fight them from 20,000 feet in the air. Morally, it turns us into Goliath, a monster every real man has to fight. So negative are the results of air strikes in this kind of war that there is only one possible good number of them: zero, unless we are employing the “Hama model” of seeking total destruction, which we are not.

Saddam Hussein Executed

Perhaps the biggest story from the past few days was the hanging of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. It took place on Friday and during the Islamic holiday of Eid al-Adha (The Festival of Sacrifice), and therefore is full of symbolism for many Muslims. However, the execution quickly became controversial with respect to the handling of the event. A conclusive video was taken by an Iraqi official and leaked out into the media, the video captured actions that have offended some and made the new Iraqi government look foolish and un-unified. This leaked video incident is now under official Iraqi review by the Interior Ministry (so that will probably be the last we hear of it…)

Iraq’s Shiite-led government said Tuesday that it had ordered an investigation into the abusive behavior at the execution of Saddam Hussein, who was subjected to a battery of taunts by official Shiite witnesses and guards as he awaited his hanging.

Iraq: al-Sistani and al-Sadr are inseparable

Less than a week ago the NY Times reported that some indications were given by a leading Shi’a figure in Iraq (and the greater MENA), Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, that he favored a new governing coalition in Iraq. In particular it hinted at a willingness to sideline radical Cleric Moktada al-Sadr and other extremist factions. This made a hopeful few days for those interested in the stability of Iraq. Unfortunately, the LA Times reveals that this report was “just a rumor.”

One of Iraq’s most influential Shiite clerics rejected a U.S.-backed proposal to isolate Shiite extremists in the national government, saying the country should govern itself with the help of anti-U.S. firebrand Muqtada Sadr, according to politicians who spoke with the cleric Saturday.

Shiite politicians met with Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani in this Shiite holy city, and then said they had thrown their support behind Sadr, who demands a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq rather than the temporary increase under consideration in Washington.

“The Sadr movement is part of Iraqi affairs,” said Haider Abadi, a leader of Shiite Prime Minister Nouri Maliki’s Islamic Dawa Party. “We won’t allow others to interfere to weaken any Iraqi political movement.”

Ali Adeeb, another member of the Dawa Party, said Shiite leaders, including the prime minister, would resist U.S. efforts to sideline Sadr and his Al Mahdi army.

MENA Blog Roundup (12/20/2006)

The bloggers at Foreign Policy’s passport highlight a different take on the recent elections in Iran.

Friday’s elections for Iran’s local councils and Assembly of Experts were widely reported as a “setback” for President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. And they were. But a more appropriate way to view them, says blogger Jonathan Edelstein, is as a crisis averted for Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei.

As Edelstein, a lawyer in New York with a knack for analyzing Middle East politics, explains, Ahmadinejad’s faction was hoping to take control of the Assembly in order to install Ayatollah Mohammed Taghi Mesbah-Yazdi as the new Supreme Leader. With Yazdi in charge, Ahmadinejad would be free from the shackles Khamenei has placed on him in the realm of foreign policy.

The passport also points out this (via Bloomberg)

In the Tehran municipal election the president’s sister, Parvin Ahmadinejad, who is running on a list titled “the Pleasant Scent of Service,” ranks 11th from 15th candidates, state television said. She could fail to win a seat.

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Marc Lynch of Abu Aardvark looks at a new, post Baker-Hamilton study released by the International Crisis Group entitled “After Baker-Hamilton: What to do in Iraq“.

After the disappointing showing of the Iraq Study Group, the ICG makes for bracing reading – and offers a much more serious attempt to find some kind of solution. It eviscerates Washington fantasies in ways far deeper than Baker-Hamilton’s simple admission that things aren’t going well, by going straight to the heart of the political structures which have emerged from the American occupation.

Here’s more on the report.

Top Iraqi Cleric Favors A New Coalition for Iraq

Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani reportedly has approved favors a new coalition that aims at isolating extremists and perhaps most importantly, Moktada al-Sadr. Al-Sistani had been relativly quite as of late and taken second stage to Sadr. However, he is perhaps the most important figure to millions of Iraqi Shi’a; not to mention the larger Shi’a Umma.

Juan Cole sums the coalition and ads his $0.02

The coalition that the Americans hope for would look like this:

Iraqi Accord Front (Sunni Fundamentalist): 44 seats
Kurdistan Alliance and allies: 58 seats
SCIRI [Shiite fundamentalist] and allies: 63 seats
National Iraqi List of Allawi: 25 seats

That would be 190, more than enough to form a government and appoint a prime minister. It would potentially leave the Sadrists (32 seats) and the Da`wa Party of Iyad Allawi in the opposition, along with Salih Mutlak of the secular Sunni National Dialogue Front (11 seats).

The problem is that not all of the Iraqi Accord Front may be willing to join the coalition, and perhaps not all of the National Iraqi list will come in. Moreover, the idea that the Iraqi Islamic Party, the Kurds, and the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq are going to hold together as a united coalition very long strikes me as daft.
This plan of cutting the Sadrists out of parliamentary power and then launching a military attack on their paramilitary, the Mahdi Army, seems to me unlikely actually to reduce Muqtada’s power and influence.

It would also be possible for Muqtada and allies to put together a significant bloc:

Da`wa: 22
Sadrists: 32
Fadila: 15
Salih Mutlak’s list: 11
Mishaan Juburi list: 3
Part of the Iraqi Accord Front?: 10?

Sadr could find enough deputies to block the formation of a new government.

The real problem is that Parliament isn’t very powerful. Although the NYT blames Sadr’s boycott for the failure of parliament to reach a quorum the last couple of times it tried to meet, in fact it is because many of the parliamentarians virtually live abroad (they like London) and just aren’t around in Baghdad to take part in a vote.

The idea of the Bush administration is that you cut Sadr loose in parliament, so that the prime minister doesn’t depend on him, and then you have him call in the Iraqi Army against the Mahdi Army militiamen and defeat them. The Sunnis would thereby be reassured, the thinking goes, that the Sadrist death squads have been dealt with, and the Sunni Arabs would gradually become more willing to rein in their paramilitary. I don’t think it is plausible that the US military can defeat a widespread and entrenched social movement like the Sadrists at this late date, so we are in for a lot of trouble.

I tend to agree. Perhaps ‘too little, too late’ is an appropriate phrase here with emphasis on the too late part. However, a more stable government would have a minor ripple effect in Iraq. At this point in time we should happily accept that.

The Iraqi Insurgency

Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) released a report (.pdf) last week on the current sectarian or civil war occurring in the middle portion of Iraq. The results of his studies paint an expected picture of the state as one that is anything but encouraging. Most coverage of his report was concentrated on his analysis of the insurgency, concluding that “[s]ectarian fighting, led by the growth of some 23 militias around Baghdad, formed the foundation of the civil war.” Baghdad was “…the center of the sectarian conflict, but violence spread to surrounding towns — particularly Baquba, Balad, and Amara — as the civil war threatened to engulf the entire country.” The first paragraph sets the mood of this report

The insurgency in Iraq has become a “war after the war” that threatens to divide the country and create a full-scale civil conflict. It has triggered sectarian and ethnic violence that dominates the struggle to reshape Iraq as a modern state, has emerged as a growing threat to the Gulf region, and has become linked to the broader struggle between Sunni and Shi’ite Islamist extremism, and moderation and reform, throughout the Islamic world. (p. 2)

Some of the emerging trends noted by Cordesman adding to the troubles in Iraq are listed below (p. 2-3)

Sectarian fighting, led by the growth of some 23 militias around Baghdad, formed the foundation of the civil war. Moqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army developed rogue components that acted outside of his command. Sunnis formed loosely organized neighborhood death squads in the urban areas, some with ties to al-Qai’da or ex-Ba’athist groups. Two large scale attacks formed the foundation of reprisal killings in the fall: On 14 November Shi’ite militias were accused of abduction 150 people from the Ministry of Higher Education and on 23 November Sunni militants were accused of killing over 200 in bombings in Sadr City.

Baghdad and other major cities – such as Basra and Baquba – were almost completely divided into sectarian strongholds as both Sunnis and Shi’a fled neighborhoods in which they were a minority. Soft ethnic cleansing forced upwards of 400,000 Iraqis to relocate within Iraq since the February Samarra mosque bombing.

The Sunni Arab insurgency remained focused in the western Anbar Province and benefited from the relocation of US troops to quell sectarian violence in Baghdad.

Attack patterns continued to focus on civilians with the average deaths per day rising to almost 100 in October. According to Iraq Coalition Casualty count, 3,539 Iraqi civilians died in September, 1,315 died in October, and 1,740 died in November. The US also saw an increase in attacks in the capital and IED attacks reached an all time high. 104 US troops died in October, the highest since January 2005. One-third of the deaths were in the capital, but the majority of US troops were killed in Anbar Province. An additional 68 US troops died in November.

The Shi’ite community was internally divided, increasingly along militia-support lines. The Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) was the most powerful political bloc, but al-Sadr’s militia and its rogue components found widespread support from the Shi’ite population. An incident in Amara in October underscored the tensions between SCIRI and al-Sadr.

US military attention focused on curbing the heightened concentration of violence in Baghdad, while violence outside of the capital continued to intensify, particularly in key areas such as Baquba, Basra, Mosul, and Falluja.

Turkey pledged their support for the minority Turkoman population in Iraq and urged Iraq to take action against PKK rebel activity in the Kurdish north. Kurds continued to conflict with Arabs in key cities such as Kirkuk and Mosul.

Regional players, particularly Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iran, and Turkey were increasingly concerned about the spread of civil war across the region.

Politically, Cordesman finds that the reconciliation process is failing, and the fragile government is often in deadlock and on the verge of collapse. The Iraqi government was also unable to quell the violence and create order; even with the aid of the MNF, additional US troops, and the 300,000 US trained Iraqi Security Forces.

Economically, Iraq is — again — deteriorating rapidly. The average Iraqi potentially faced a “severe fuel crisis, joblessness, high inflation rates, and a burgeoning black market” in recent months. Oil production remains low and the average hours of electricity per day in Baghdad was 6.8 hours (see fig below). Additionally, education and healthcare also began to feel the effects of the conflict. An estimated 400,000 people have fled Iraq since the war began.

(h/t the Passport)

[2006-12-20 1:47 PM] UPIs coverage.

Iraqi Unemployment

Perhaps one of the main problems in Iraq today is employment. Poor employment figures are likely to be proportional to high recruitment into the insurgency and militias. One recent assessment put the figure at 50% of Iraq as unemployed.

The Divide in Baghdad as seen by the US Military

Here is the US Military has released a new map of the ethno-sectarian divide in Baghdad

(h/t Times Online (UK))

[2006-12-15 1:14 PM] More here…

The Iraqi Refugee Problems

Juan Cole points out these two troubling points

Jordan and Iraq may sign a protocol on security cooperation.
Something like 15% of Jordan’s population is now made up of expatriate Iraqis, and its own security is wrought up with that of Iraq (which is to say that that little kingdom is in big danger as we speak).

Some say there are as many as a million Iraqis in Syria, or around 5% of the some 19 million population. The UN High Commission on Refugees has run out of money to help them.

More brain drain for Iraq.

MENA Blog Roundup (12/13/2006)

Marc Lynch (aka the aardvark): “I want to throw this out for discussion: in the not so distant future, we may be looking at the return of former Prime Minister Iyad Allawi.”

Why? Lynch notes that Nouri al-Maliki has lost the confidence of the US and holds no parliamentary mandate. Abd al-Aziz Hakim (of SCIRI) is presented as the current replacement for Maliki here in the US but he is also a figure complacent in the current sectarian/civil war driving the Sunni-Shi’a divide. A Sunni sponsored nationalist alliance is in the works that proposes to unite “Salah Mutlaq, a key secular Sunni leader…” and his “Iraqi National Dialogue Front, Muqtadar Sadr’s organization, and the al-Wifaq movement headed by Allawi (who recently returned from London to Amman), in a ‘nationalist’ (wataniya) front.”

Why Allawi? He’s an ex-Baathist secular Shi’a with an existing record. And he’s more palatable to the West (and US) than anyone else mentioned above at this time and he is not an Iranian puppet.

Full disclosure: Commenter’s at Abu Aardvark rejected this idea soundly… Lynch points out Allawi’s work of late with the insurgency, pointing to recent reports:

Brushing aside the results of Iraq’s democratic elections, the insurgents proposed that an emergency government be formed under Allawi’s leadership. Non-sectarian politicians should be appointed to the crucial ministries of defence and the interior, they urged, because they would be responsible for rebuilding a strong national army and security service. Under this proposal, the newly elected Iraqi government would, in effect, have been sidelined.

We’ll have to see, for no one knows. My question is, why would an American voice pull any weight in a sovereign Iraq?

The Religious Layout of the Greater Middle East

Mark I Levenstein writing at Foreign Policy’s internal blog the Passport passes along a few pointers to incoming chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Silvestre Reyes, who like most Americans has no idea about the MENA and it’s religious intricacies. Read the full link here, here are some of the more important details…

Foreign Policy: Options for Iraq

Foreign Policy magazine has put together a compilation of strategies existing for Iraq (as of 11 December 2006). The categories are go big, go long, go Sunni, go Shiite, go home, go regional, and divide Iraq.

(h/t the Passport)