Informed Comment

Bush Will Speed Turn-over of Security Responsibilities
Maliki Skipped Weds. Banquet, Snubs Bush over Memo

Bush will speed the transfer of security responsibilities to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, it was announced at their summit in Amman. Al-Maliki has been pressing Washington for some time to give him the authority to order much bigger battle units into action without securing permission first from the US military. The PM has been frustrated that he isn’t allowed to set security policy but then is blamed for not achieving security. He also assured Bush that he can handle the Sadr Movement and the Mahdi Army militia. The Sadrists in parliament suspended their membership in protest against al-Maliki’s meeting with Bush. In an ordinary parliamntary system, al-Maliki would be considered a minority PM and might well lose a vote of no confidence. But Iraq actually seems to be run as an oligarchy, and too many of the major politicians now live in London to permit ordinary politics to play out.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki actually blew off US President George W. Bush and Jordanian King Abdullah II on Wednesday, declining to show up at a scheduled formal banquet! Talks between him and Bush have been postponed until today.

Bush talked to Abdullah II on a bilateral basis on Wednesday, and will meet one on one with Maliki today.

The no-show was presumably Maliki’s protest against the highly critical memo of US National Security Council adviser Stephen Hadley about Maliki, leaked to the New York Times and published on Wednesday. Maliki needn’t have bothered. Informed experts find the memo mediocre at best and wholly impractical at worst. I have to say I was shocked at Hadley’s lack of understanding of the parliamentary system in which Maliki works, such that his government could easily fall.

Some have also speculated that Maliki minded discussing bilateral US-Iraqi affairs with King Abdullah II of Jordan in the room, and was annoyed at the Jordanian monarch’s attempt to insert the Israeli-Palestinian issue into the talks.

Maliki may also have intended to show he was his own man, in the face of heavy criticism from the Sadr Movement members of parliament and of his own cabinet. Some 32 members of parliament loyal to Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr suspended their membership in the legislature at 6 pm on Wednesday, and the 5 Sadrist cabinet members also resigned contingently.

Al-Zaman reports in Arabic that Shiite cleric and leader of the largest bloc in parliament, Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, also met Wednesday with King Abdullah II. But after the meeting, al-Hakim, head of the Shiite Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, was quoted as having said that if Iraq went to all-out sectarian civil war, the Sunni Arabs would be the losers. This belligerant threat provoked consternation among observers, presumably because it had been hoped that al-Hakim’s meeting with a neighboring Sunni monarch was aimed at improving relations with Sunni Arabs.

Al-Zaman also notes that Iyad Allawi has flown to Amman [from London, where he now mostly resides along with many other Iraqi politicians]. The head of the Iraqi National List and formerly an appointed prime minister, a Shiite with a Baathist past, Allawi has been marginalized in Iraqi politics but still has patrons in Washington.

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Health Ministry Attacked
Khamenei Calls for US Withdrawal

Iraq’s Shiite-run Health Ministry was attacked again Weds. morning, presumably by Sunni Arab guerrillas.

Thomas Ricks and Robin Wright at WaPo examine the increasing tendency of the American political class to blame the Iraqis for the political turmoil there.

I see. The US invaded their country, abolished their army, gutted their civil service, occupied their cities, and now it is the Iraqis’ fault.

Iran’s Supreme Jurisprudent Ali Khamenei said in talks with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani that the US must withdraw from Iraq for there to be peace.

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King Abdullah II: It’s Palestine, Stupid
US Troops may Leave al-Anbar

A surprise for Americans: The most urgent and destabilizing crisis in the Middle East is not Iraq. It is, according to King Abdullah II of Jordan (who will meet Bush today), the Israel-Palestine conflict, which is a major engine driving the radicalization of Muslims in the Middle East and in Europe. It seldom makes the front page any more, but the Israelis are keeping the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank in Bantustan penitentiaries and bombing the ones in Gaza relentlessly, often killing signficant numbers of innocent civilians. Richard Perle, Douglas Feith, Paul Wolfowitz, Michael Rubin, David Wurmser and other Likudniks who had managed to get influential perches in the US government once argued that the road to peace in Jerusalem lay through Baghdad. It never did, and they were wrong about that the way they were wrong about everything else.

In fact, September 11 was significantly about the Israeli occupation of Jerusalem, and as long as the Israelis continue their actual creeping colonialization of Palestinian land while they pretend to engage in a (non-existent) “peace process,” radicalism in the region will only grow. Polls taken in the last few years have shown that 64 percent of Egyptians expressed satisfaction with the Mubarak government, but only 2 percent had a favorable view of US foreign policy (i.e. knee-jerk pro-Likud policy) in the Middle East. That is, the argument that authoritarian government breeds radicalism is either untrue or only partial. It is the daily perception of a great historical wrong done to a Middle Eastern people, the Palestinians, that radicalizes people in the region (and not just Muslims).

Back to Iraq. The US military is considering withdrawing from Anbar province! I think this is all that they can do. As I said Monday, there is not a military mission that can obviously be achieved by keeping our troops there any longer. The argument could be made that the attempt to subdue al-Anbar province has been a major radicalizing factor for not only the province itself but for Sunni Arab Iraq in general. The destruction of Fallujah, which is nevertheless still not secure, was a negative turning point in the guerrilla war. The Iraqi troops of the Nuri al-Maliki government will have to keep order or learn to compromise with al-Anbar, one or the other.
Money quote:

‘ “If we are not going to do a better job doing what we are doing out [in al-Anbar], what’s the point of having them out there?” said a senior military official. ‘

UN Secretary General Kofi Annan is offering to host a United Nations-sponsored conference of Iraqi parties and their neighbors. The idea is modeled on the relatively successful 2001 Bonn conference on Afghanistan. This is the most help the UN has offered in a long time. It is a long shot, but the offer should certainly be accepted.

Sunni Arab guerrillas killed three Fort Hood soldiers.

Two contract service providers to the US military, one a driver and the other a security man, were killed by guerrillas in Iraq.

US troops took fire from guerrillas in Ramadi, then attacked their safe house, which appears to have actually been a family domicile. They may have winged a guerrilla, but they mainly killed 5 girls and women and an unidentified man. It is said that this sort of firefight happens almost daily in Ramadi. I guess we only get a report on casualties where an attempt is being made to head off a public relations disaster.

Police found 50 torture victims of the Iraqi civil war in Baghdad and Baquba.

Reuters reports other civil war violence on Tuesday, including a mortar attack on the Sunni Arab district of Baghdad, Ghazaliyah that wounded two dozen persons.

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Hizb and Mahdi: Do they or Don’t they?

The NYT was told by somebody in Washington that Hizbullah has trained between 1,000 and 2,000 Mahdi Army militiamen. I don’t know if I believe it, and I am not sure it is significant if true. There are thousands of Mahdi Army militiamen, and some have much more direct war experience, fighting the Marines in 2004, than does Hizbullah. Their popularity has anyway more to do with their charitable work, as WaPo pointed out Monday, than with their military prowess, such as it is.

The logistics are suspicious here. To get from southern Iraq to Lebanon you have to go through Iraqi Sunni Arab territory, which would get most Shiites killed. And, why take the militiamen for training all the way to Lebanon when Iran is right next door and easy to get to via Kermanshah or Basra?

Nor can the effect of the training be seen on the ground. Hizbullah’s signature tactic is setting shaped charges, which is rare for the Mahdi Army but is often engaged in by the Sunni Arab guerrillas, who are not to say the least being helped by Iran or Hizbullah. And, it is being alleged that Mahdi Army is being trained to kidnap and torture. That needs training?

There is a real possibility that this report is disinformation “leaked” by the Cheney/Wurmser axis in order to forestall a move to negotiation with Iran and Syria over Iraq, which the Baker-Hamilton Commission will likely recommend.

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Will Bush Rehabilitate the Baathists?

Al-Zaman [in Arabic] is under the impression that Bush’s talks with al-Maliki in Amman will aim in part at politically rehabilitating members of the Baath Party. The “Debaathification Commission” of Ahmad Chalabi (who anyway lives in London) will be abolished, it says. Discussions will be held with the neo-Baathist leadership (grouped politically as the al-`Awdah or Return Party) of the armed resistance. The resistance cells will be offered amnesty if they come in from the cold. Their enemies, the Mahdi Army and the Badr Corps, among the Shiites will be dissolved. And Sheikh Harith al-Dhari, in Amman, will be deployed to make these contacts and concessions, along with reaching out presumably to the Salafi Sunni revivalists, as well.

I am paraphasing the article even though I don’t think it sounds plausible. Al-Dhari, a wanted man, is calling on the Arab League to turn against the al-Maliki government. Though Jordanian King Abdullah II is said by al-Hayat to be conducting a furious round of meetings with expatriate Iraqis in Jordan, including al-Dhari, in preparation for Bush’s summit on Wednesday. [Link below in Arabic].

And Nuri al-Maliki, head of the al-Da`wa al-Islamiyah Party (Islamic Call [Shiite]) will make all those concessions to the Baathists over his own dead body. (Remember he is already being stoned when he goes to Sadr City; what do you think the Shiite masses will do to him if he kisses and makes up with the remnants of the Baath officer corps?)

On the other hand, I have long argued that the neo-Baathist and Baathist-cum-Salafi guerrilla movements are the central political actors in Sunni Iraq, and something like the process described by al-Zaman will have sooner or later to be attempted.

This political negotiation with the Sunni Arab guerrillas would be one point of involving Syria, since elements of the Syrian Baath might still have credibility with the `Awdah Party, which is reportedly strong along the Syrian border.

Likewise, President Jalal Talabani’s discussions in Tehran may be aimed at convincing them to help convince the Shiite militias to lay down their arms. Since the major Shiite militia is the Sadr Movement’s Mahdi Army, though, and since a lot of Sadrists don’t like or trust Iran, I’m not sure that is going to work. And, Time magazine is reporting that VP Richard Bruce Cheney and NSC adviser Stephen Hadley oppose greater Iranian involvement, according to al-Hayat (I’m traveling and don’t have time to look up the English.)

This process sounds so muddled because Washington is flailing around without the slightest idea of what could be done, practically speaking, in Iraq, according to Time: “Several officials who are in touch with commission members said that with violence appearing to spiral out of control in Iraq, the group has been flummoxed about finding a solution. “There’s complete bewilderment as to what to do,” one official said. “They’re very frustrated. They can’t come up with anything. For the last couple months, they’ve been thrashing around, calling people, trying to find ideas.”

The real reason for the muddle is, as I said yesterday, that the Bush administration has not defined a realistic and achievable set of military goals in Iraq. Its original political goal of establishing a unified Iraq with a pro-US government that would let oil contracts on a favorable basis for Houston, would ally with Israel, and would form a springboard for further US pressure on Iran and Syria, is completely unrealistic. Cheney’s inability to let go of those objectives is the biggest problem we have in Iraq. Move on.

More from Reuters on Monday’s death toll in Iraq (excerpts):

‘ FALLUJA – A U.S. F16 warplane crashed northwest of Baghdad with one pilot on board, the U.S. military said. A spokeswoman said she had no information on the fate of the pilot or the cause of the crash. Residents said they saw the pilot eject but that he was killed, and television footage filmed by a local journalist appeared to show the pilot dead near the crash site. . .

BAGHDAD – Baghdad police retrieved 39 bodies in the 24 hours to Monday evening, most apparently victims of death squads and kidnap gangs, an Interior Ministry source said . . .

BAGHDAD – An Interior Ministry source said five people were killed and at least eight wounded during a U.S. raid in Husainiya, a mainly Shi’ite area on the northern outskirts of Baghdad. . .

BAGHDAD – Three mortar rounds landed on a residential district, killing three people and wounding 15 in Baghdad’s southeastern Diyala Bridge area, an Interior Ministry source said.

TAL AFAR – Clashes erupted between gunmen and police during the night, killing three policemen and one gunman in Tal Afar, about 420 km (260 miles) north of Baghdad, police said. . .

‘

For the implications of the crash and some challenging comments on the situation in Iraq, see EBW’s posting at Wampum.

Then there is this item: “BASRA – France’s Defence Ministry said a French intelligence officer was killed by a local militia during an inspection at a checkpoint in Basra on Nov. 21.” What is that all about?

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad pledged Monday to help with Iraq’s security problems:

‘”The Iranian nation and government will definitely stand beside their brother, Iraq, and any help the government and nation of Iran can give to strengthen security in Iraq will be given . . . We have no limitation for cooperation in any field . . . ‘

On the other hand, ISNA reports that his cooperation is premised on a US withdrawal:

‘ “You said you wanted to bring forth freedom but from the moment you got to Iraq, over 150 thousand people were killed and you are stuck in a quagmire where can never get out of it by any means. Iran is ready to help and save you on the condition that you resume behaving in a just manner and avoid bullying and invading. Return to your own country and stop the occupying, because in the persistence of such methods lies nothing but loss and misery for you,” declared Ahmadinejad.

“Today the nations of the world have become awake and there is no point in isolating and deterring countries from their path of progress. Such attempts no longer have a way in the world. Come and be friends of the nations. You came here under the pretext of confronting Saddam and weapons of mass destruction, but in truth you had come here to take over the oil of the region,” he concluded. ‘

I suspect that the hardliners in Iran are signalling that the price of their help in dissolving the Shiite militias will be a US pledge to withdraw militarily from Iraq. That would in my view be a pretty good bargain assuming the Iranians could deliver. Personally, I doubt that they could. Washington’s tendency to code the Iraqi Shiites as cat’s paws of the Iranians does injustice to the strong strain of Iraqi Arab nationalism in its Shiism.

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