UIA Divisions Endanger Security in Shrine Cities
Iraqi politicians said on Wednesday that the visit to Iraq of Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice and UK Foreign Minister Jack Straw had proved counter-productive. Positions actually hardened with the visit. Haider al-Abadi said, "All it's doing is hardening the position of people who are supporting Jaafari . . . They shouldn't have come to Baghdad." Someone let Niall Ferguson know that this revival of empire business isn't going very well; the "natives" appear remarkably lacking in deference, and the viceroys remarkably ineffectual.
PM Ibrahim Jaafari has said he will fight to the finish for his position as candidate for prime minister in the next government.
The LA Times thinks that the United Iraqi Alliance, the coalition of religious parties, might split over the issue of who should be prime minister.
al-Zaman/ AFP report that US helicopters brought a Marines unit to Karbala, which went into a home in the Askari quarter and arrested followers of Muqtada al-Sadr. The arrest comes in the context of heightened tensions in the holy cities of Najaf and Karbala because of the competition between the Dawa Party and the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq for the post of prime minister. Apparently security forces guarding the shrines are choosing up sides between Abdul Aziz al-Hakim and Muqtada al-Sadr. Several other clerical lineages have dropped in importance, including al-Khoei, Shirazi and Mudarrisi. The Islamic Action Council of Muhammad Taqi al-Mudarris did not win a single seat in parliament. US troops have gone on alert at reports of heightened tensions in the shrine cities.
After what happened in Samarra and its aftermath, we should all be nervous about tensions in shrine cities.
Al-Zaman says that death squads have shown up in Basra and Diwaniyah for the first time.
The UN is seeking help to stop the ongoing assassinations of Iraqi professors.
Roadside bombs in western Baghdad.
posted by Juan Cole @ 4/06/2006 12:30:00 AM
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11 Comments:
The breakup of sect/ethnic based lists is not only a Good Thing, it is essential for the survival of Iraq.
The ordinary Iraqis see the Turbans in action every day, and they are absolutely sick of them.
These freaks have no future, apart from the Kurds perhaps who should be independent and out of the equation anyway.
In the short term, there are many options. One is a re-run of the election where the voters can punish the Turbans - the lack of 'proper' parties is not a problem, independents are best now.
The other is a 'tribal ceasefire' which is what the US is hoping for. Nobody has explained why that should fix the security, it seems like wishful thinking (Bush&Co are always looking for the next turning point which why they are running in circles!)
The third, which is what is happening now, is perpetual negotiations.
A fourth one, which is difficult to implement, is turning Iraq into a UN-administered entity, with no national sovereignty. This would be the best way to stabilize the country and allow non-militia political groups to come to the fore.
Of course Jaafari was never part of the pro-US bloc in Iraq. He is the person who apologized for the Iran-Iraq war and got a promise, which was later blocked, for Iranian help in training the Iraqi army.
Jaafari's most visible backer is Sadr, who considers the US, UK and Israel the "triad of evil."
Once Bush said Iran is in the axis of evil, Iran stopped making moral appeals to Bush for favors. Why are Rice and Straw making an appeal to Jaafari?
If Condoleeza Rice had wanted to speed up the process of forming a government what she would not have done is gone to Iraq and asked Jaafari to be flexible while telling the Kurds to remain firm.
If Rice had asked the Kurds to be flexible, the Kurds actually would have listened. If that had happened, maybe a government would have formed by now.
I think it is clear that Rice's problem is not that the government is taking too long, but that the wrong candidates are taking positions.
Just one more blow out of many to the US image as democracy promoters in the Middle East. I wonder if there is anyone outside of the United States who still believes in that image.
Professor Cole,
Have you read the "Letter from Iraq: Lessons from Tal Afar" by George Packer in the latest New Yorker? I'd provide a link but it's only in the print edition.
The article seems to imply that the US military is getting out of Iraq pretty much regardless of what the politicians say. If they're not literally leaving the country, they are moving everyone to huge Forward Operating Bases in the middle of nowhere where they are completely insulated from whatever else is happening in the country.
This would explain a lot - for example why the US casualty rate has declined even as the country has gotten more violent.
What is your opinion of this? Have you heard other comments to this effect?
Sincerely,
Jim Stewart
Just out of interest: the time being taken to form a government in Iraq may seem terrible, but it may also be just a product of a proportional-representation, multi-party electoral system.
In 1996, New Zealand, a pretty civilised sort of place, switched from a Westminister-style, "first-past-the-post" system to a semi-proportional arrangement, in the interest of fairer representation.
In this first MMP (Multi Member Proportional) election, it took 6 weeks to form a Government, mainly because the balance of power was held by a third party headed by an egotistical popularist idiot, who got a kick out of prolonged flirting with the two main parties before finally forming a coalition.
Maybe the Iraqi politicians are to some extent just getting a kick out of jerking the Coalition authorities around?
It would only be human nature.
Like the report of Sistani leaving George Bush's envelope on the mantlepiece, unopened.
If the Shiite alliance splits, it seems reasonable to expect more emphasis -- and not less -- will be placed on militias for security.
Civil War Inside DOD?
There seems to be a struggle going on within DOD on reporting the number of wounded, a key indicator of military losses.
Reality-based forces have gotten word out on a week-by-week basis on icasualties.org, showing a break-down by returned-to-duty within a short period or not. This source shows casualties in part of March alone of over 550 wounded.
Faith-based forces hold a somewhat stronger position, controlling two key sectors in icasualties.org, the monthly totals sector, and the year-to-date sector. On both of these fronts, they maintain that a miracle has happened: there have been exactly no wounded whatsoever for over two months, the count having stopped at 311! This is the equivalent of the miracle of Joshua holding up the sun's setting until victory was achieved on the battlefield.
Amb. Khalilzad has been pushing hard for a government of national unity in Washington, hoping to paper over the obvious rift. The SOD insists DOD policy is infallible, there is no contradiction, and no changes are necessary. The WH staff insists the President is unaware of the issue, and the VP asserts that the Lord will sort it out. The CIA refused comment, noting that it is only Iraqi casualties that they don't count, not US ones. MSM newspapers and TV stations were polling their members to see if there were any reporters left on staff that could be asked to go into their communities to see if any wounded were actually returning, and thus get some sort of handle on the situation.
We should all hope for a miracle.
Traitor in Chief?
Various news media are reporting this morning that Scooter Libby has testified he was authorized by Dick Cheney, who in turn was authorized by President Bush to leak classified material to the press to discredit war critics in the news media... This news report from that hippy leftist socialist rag Bloomberg News:
(QUOTE)
President George W. Bush authorized disclosure of classified information on Iraq's weapons program to rebut war critics, a former top administration aide told a grand jury, according to documents filed in federal court.
The documents don't allege the president approved the identification of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame, although they were filed in connection with the investigation into who leaked the operative's name to reporters in 2003. The court filing by special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald also doesn't suggest Bush violated any rule or law governing the handling of classified material.
The document described federal grand jury testimony by I. Lewis Libby, the former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, who was indicted last October of charges of perjury, obstruction of justice and lying to FBI investigators probing the Plame case.
In the filing, Fitzgerald describes Libby's testimony about disclosure to former New York Times reporter Judy Miller of a 2002 National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq's pursuit of nuclear materials.
``Defendant testified that the vice president later advised him that the president had authorized defendant to disclose the relevant portions of the NIE,'' Fitzgerald wrote.
Cheney previously has said he has authority to release classified information, as does the president.
``There's an executive order that specifies who has classification authority, and obviously it focuses first and foremost on the president, but also includes the vice president,'' Cheney said in a Feb. 15 interview on Fox News.
The administration had no immediate comment on the court document, which was filed last night.
(END QUOTE)
Mum's the word, eh? Here's another report on this story, this one from the AP:
(QUOTE)
Vice President Dick Cheney's former top aide told prosecutors President Bush authorized the leak of sensitive intelligence information about Iraq, according to court papers filed by prosecutors in the CIA leak case.
Before his indictment, I. Lewis Libby testified to the grand jury investigating the Valerie Plame leak that Cheney told him to pass on the information and that it was Bush who authorized the leak, the court papers say. According to the documents, the authorization led to the July 8, 2003, conversation between Libby and New York Times reporter Judith Miller.
There was no indication in the filing that either Bush or Cheney authorized Libby to disclose Plame's CIA identity.
(END QUOTE)
Well, let's examine that little bit of twisted logic here - El Presidente Arbusto has always maintained that he knew nothing of the leak of Valerie Plame's identity as an CIA Non-Official Cover (NOC) operative on WMDs... However, if Bush authorized the leak of classified material to discredit his critics, then it is very likely that the declassified material contained discussion of Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson's background, including his spouse's occupation... By authorizing the release of any piece of paper or electronic record that had that information, Bush in effect authorized the release of Valerie Plame's identity.
I know, we can't blame HIM - he doesn't read ANYTHING... Had he been the reading kind, he might have paid attention to the ole "Bin Laden Determined to Strike America" memo he received on August 6, 2001 (BEFORE the 9/11 attacks)... Question now is whether he outed a CIA NOC agent on purpose, or whether his illiteracy caught up with him.
It will be fire workd if Mokhtada finds his way into leadership of good ole Saddam's Army. Peace in Iraq is only possible when one diabolically powerful dictator arises from all that carnage brought about by the incompetence & foolishness.
I think only Mokhtada is such a leader and it is only common sense. The Americans are just if not more diabolical than Mokhtada and they are not that stupid. I think what makes the Americans hesitate is the likelihood that Mokhtada will fall into the influence of Iran, but from my perspective he is too ambitious to cede power to anybody else, no matter that he has openly announced that he will defend the intergrity of Iran. The USA will eventually see this possibility as the real EXIT PLAN.
There is no way that the USA can declare victory and leave. To my mind the freedom fighters will bleed the USA and force them to leave with their tails between their legs; beaten by a ragtag medievel insurgency, and to think that 3 years ago that American braggard Ronny Rumsfeld boasted that the USA can fight 3 battles simultaneously AND WIN !
This character 'spin proof' is being quite ignorant/racist and this latest comment was very offensive. Given that you moderate comments, Dr. Cole, I admire your patience in posting his comments here.
As an Iranian, I'm no fan of Shi'i fundamentalism, but I find it quite hilarious that mr. proof pretends to know anything about Iraqi popular opinion, to the level that he can claim 'they are absolutely sick of them'. It frustrates me to no end that vulgar Americans (an assumption, granted) continually assume that they are somehow more mature than Iraqis/Muslims AS INDIVIDUALS; certainly this is no surprise given the past two centuries of relations between the Middle East and the West, but it is such great folly that one must question how many times they will fall into this mold.
Americans, Brits: understand! Politics is an invention of the Middle East! The pols of that region WROTE THE BOOK long before Machiavelli and they understand their own situations much better than the West ever could. If anyone thinks that the current wrangling in Iraq is a result of the mismanagement of bumbling politicians, get over yourself! Even the most inexperienced of these newly-elected Iraqi pols know exactly what they are doing and they will continue to act as they like regardless of what Condi, Jack, or Uncle Zalmay have to say about it. It is utter fantasy to think otherwise.
"What can we do then?" Shut up, get out of Iraq, and NEVER repeat those mistakes again.
As a sidenote, I'd suggest mr. proof not call the Iraqi people or their elected legislators 'freaks' or 'turbans' lest he further betray his prejudiced and unreasoned view of things he simply does not understand.
Let me get this right: an Iranian accuses the Iraqi SpinProof of not understanding Iraq because the Iraqi is an outsider!
The Iranian further tells the Iraqi: "Shut up, get out of Iraq, and NEVER repeat those mistakes again" Shouldn't that be the other way around?
Just completed Cobra II, the summary at the end is worth everyone's review.
Sadly, Rumsfield is not the only problem. We have a fractured military that is so concerned with it's own future that it cannot stand up to wrongminded political leadership.
One wonders what would happen to us if we faced a first class foe with near technical and military equivalency.
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