Prof Cutler | Musings on the News

Moqtada al-Sadr plays an unusual role on the chess board of US factional politics in Iraq.

As a radical Shiite–one who allegedly favors direct clerical rule and orthodox governance of everyday life–his ascendance is presumably a crisis for Right Arabists in the US foreign policy establishment who fear that the war in Iraq has facilitated the rise of a Shiite crescent in the Middle East.

As a radical Shiite–one who has consistently challenged the “moderate” leadership of Grand Ayatollah Sistani–he becomes a target for Right Zionists. As William Kristol and Rich Lowry suggested in their September 12, 2006 Washington Post Op-Ed, “Reinforce Baghdad,”

[T]he violence perpetrated by the Shiite militias is directly related to politics. It is part of a power play by the likes of Moqtada al-Sadr to marginalize moderate figures such as Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani. Sistani’s recent statement of disgust with Iraqi politics suggests that Sadr’s gambit may be working. Sending more American troops at this juncture would not be a simple-minded and clumsy substitution of military force for political finesse. It would be an attempt to influence Iraq’s political situation in our favor.

It should come as no surprise, then, that foreign policy factional players in the US who disagree about most things in Iraq seem to agree on one thing: everybody loves hates Raymond Sadr.

There are those–including elements of the US military–who fear that a direct assault on Sadr is simply too dangerous, politically and militarily, because everybody (in Sadr City) loves Sadr. But this is simply a tactical issue. Even these folks would like to target Sadr if they thought they could get away with it.

But this map of Sadrist political contours, viewed through the lens of US factionalism, doesn’t tell the whole story.

On the crucial question of regional autonomy/partition–where most Right Zionists support Shiite and Kurdish pressure for the breakup of Iraq and most Right Arabists stand firmly with those who favor the old unity maintained under Sunni Arab rule–Sadr stands with Sunni Arabs against the sectarian breakup of Iraq.

This was made clear, in recent days, as other elements of the Shiite governing coalition pressed for regional autonomy. According to the Washington Post article “Sadr Holds Out Against Plan to Divide Iraq,”

Moqtada al-Sadr, the powerful Shiite Muslim cleric, remains adamantly opposed to a controversial plan to partition Iraq into a federation of three largely independent regions, a top Sadr aide said Monday.

Sadr’s objection to the plan remains steadfast despite a meeting Sunday night in Najaf between Sadr and his intermittent rival Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, the prominent Shiite political party that is leading the push for federalism.

Sadr’s bloc broke with Hakim’s party to support the Sunni boycott on Sunday. That move prompted Hakim to meet later in the day with Sadr and then with Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, although he declined to describe their conversations.

On this question, then, Sadr stands with Sunni political elites and their Right Arabist allies in Washington. And, for what it is worth, Sadr apparently has an ally in George W. Bush on this question.

I argued some time ago that this made Sadr’s position on partition was best explained by pragmatic politics relating to his unique situation as a leader of poor Shiites in Sunni-dominated Central Iraq. And I also argued that on this issue Sadr is a natural ally of Right Arabists.

Insofar as partition is the issue, the real split in Iraq is between Sunni Arabs and Sadrists, on the one hand, and the “mainstream” Shiites and Kurds, on the other.

Nowhere has the evidence of such an alliance been more visible than in recent debates over partition.  A Washington Post article entitled “Federalism Plan Dead, Says Iraqi Speaker” tells the story:

[Parliamentary Speaker] Mahmoud al-Mashhadani said in an interview that legislation to implement a concept known as federalism, which threatened to collapse the country’s fragile multi-sect government, would likely be postponed indefinitely after a meeting of political leaders on Wednesday….

“It is not possible to venture or to start the application of federalism now.”

“Look, Iraqi blood is more important than federalism,” he said.

So, in light of the alliance between Sunni Arab politicians like Mashhadani and Shiites aligned with Sadr, why don’t Right Arabists in the US embrace Sadr?

The answer may be that for Right Arabists opposition to partition–important as it is–is still less important than one other issue: an ongoing, forceful US military presence in Iraq.

The problem with Sadr, for Right Arabists (and, to be sure, Right Zionists) is not that Sadr is too close to Iran (he is arguable less close than the defenders of Shiite autonomy). It is not his vision of everyday life (do Right Arabists even care?).

The problem with Sadr is that he continues to demand US withdrawal from Iraq.

According to a September 13, 2006 Associated Press report (via the Guardian), Sadr made has once again made a push for US withdrawal.

A group of lawmakers tried to take advantage Tuesday of the unpopularity of U.S. troops among many Shiite and Sunni legislators to seek approval of a resolution setting a timetable for the withdrawal of all foreign troops – which the mainstream Shiite-dominated government has so far refused to do.

Sponsored by supporters of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and some Sunni Arabs, the resolution managed to get 104 signatures in the 275-member parliament before was effectively shelved by being sent to a committee for review.

The Associated Press report suggests that the Shiite-dominated government has refused to support a demand for US withdrawal. True enough. But according to some reports, it was Sadr’s erstwhile ally on partition–the Sunni Arab Speaker of the Iraqi parliament, Mahmud Al Mashhadani–that scuttled the resolution.

Wasn’t Sadr’s participation in the government–a government formed under the watchful eyes of US military occupation–a sign that he was moderating his line on US withdrawal?

Sadr looks increasingly “Leninist” in his approach to participation in government. Here is one of his key aides, Mustafa Yaqoubi, in an interview for another Ellen Knickmeyer Washington Post profile by Sudarsan Raqhavan and Ellen Knickmeyer on Sadr entitled, “Sadr, A Question Mark in Black.”

“We have entered a political game,” said Yaqoubi, who wore a black turban signifying his descent from the prophet Muhammad. “We entered this government to use it as a weapon to make pressure on the occupiers.”

Maybe it is too obvious to have to say, but the “problem” with Sadr–apart from any of his complex relations with sectarian factionalism–is that he and his movement appears to be relentlessly opposed to the US occupation as a matter of…dare I say it?…principle.

If so, his nationalist principles–and credentials–are even more intense than those of Sunni Arab policians like Parliamentary speaker Mahmud Al Mashhadani.

The “so-called Iraqi government” must have got wind of blogosphere accusations from folks like Swopa and Michael Schwartz that the various Iraqi ministers, etc. represented nothing so much as an empty shell of a so-called “state.”

In response, the “government” seems to be making a bid for relevance with a new effort to resolve the minor issue of Iraqi oil.  It may be a failed bid, but even as an attempt it seems interesting and a bit surprising.

After all, there are many serious, outstanding, potentially explosive political issues on the horizon in Iraq, but it seemed like most of that contentious stuff was on hold.  Who really wants to make waves when the ship of state is sinking and the whole country is going down the drain?

Answer: the Maliki government.

The Financial Times offers up the basic story and some important analysis:

Iraq’s main political factions have hammered out an agreement on the sharing of oil and gas revenues but other contentious issues need to be resolved before a draft hydrocarbon law is completed, a senior Iraqi official said on Tuesday.

Barham Salih, deputy prime minister in charge of the economy, told reporters in Washington by video link from Baghdad that the revenue sharing dispute had been settled during three days of intense talks at a “retreat” last week.

“That contentious issue is out,” he said. The cabinet hopes to present the draft law to parliament by the end of the year, he added.

Oil and gas revenues would be shared out at the federal level and redistributed to the regions according to population and “needs”, he said. This would still provide an incentive to regional oil companies to maximise output, he added.

Mr Salih, the most senior Kurd in the cabinet, did not elaborate on the negotiating process but the agreement would appear to be a compromise by the Kurdistan regional government.

Under its own regional draft oil law published this month, Kurdistan – which has already started signing contracts with foreign companies – would have received directly the revenues from “future fields”.

Hussain al-Shahristani, the oil minister from the main Shia alliance, has insisted that the federal government control all of Iraq’s resources. The formerly ruling Sunni minority fears the new constitution, which could yet be amended, would hand control of future oil development to the Shia and Kurdish dominated regions.

The key line seems to be this: “the agreement would appear to be a compromise by the Kurdistan regional government.”

We’ll see how this goes down with the Kurds.  Kurdish politicians have been trying to “manage discontent” within their own ranks since the US invasion in 2003.  We’ll see how this compromise affects Salih’s popularity among Kurds.

It would also appear that this dose of tough love was delivered to the Kurds courtesy of oil minister Hussain al-Shahristani who the politician thought to be most closely identified with Grand Ayatollah Sistani.

Shahristani also talks a very good game when it comes to dealing with major international oil companies.  One recent Reuters article described him as “hell-bent on moving swiftly to lure foreign cash to rebuild and power the country’s economy.”

[Still think Right Zionists have been disappointed by Sistani?]

Does the move also represent something of a snub for Abdul Aziz al-Hakim and his Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), also at the hands of Sistani?

In a recent Associated Press interview, Hakim once again reiterated his commitment to regional autonomy for southern Iraqi Shiites:

Al-Hakim also said parliament should forge ahead with the establishment of a federal system in Iraq that would include a southern Shiite province.

“We need to legislate the mechanism and the rules inside in the parliament and that is supposed to take place in the coming few weeks.

Establishing such a Shiite federal region will entail an amendment to the constitution and approval in a referendum.

That province would resemble the northern Kurdish region. Sunni Arabs could wind up squeezed into Baghdad and Iraq’s western provinces. Many Sunnis fear that federalism will lead to the breakup of the country.

True enough, centralized control of oil and gas resources might mollify some Sunnis.  But it also threatens to anger Shiites like Hakim and independence-minded Kurds.

For what it is worth, Sadr will be pleased if parliament ultimately approves a centralizing hydrocarbon law.  As I discussed some time ago, Sadr is adamantly opposed to regional autonomy.  Nevertheless, recent reports suggest that Maliki may use an upcoming “cabinet reshuffle” to distance himself from Sadr.

If there is an Iraqi government, it would seem to be run by Grand Ayatollah Sistani.

The media is full of Moqtada al-Sadr these days. In fact, even Sadr City’s own Keyser Söze–the mythical Abu Dera (or, Abu Dereh, or most recently, Abu Diri)–has made it to the big time.

Ellen Knickmeyer has a big profile of “Abu Diri” in today’s Washington Post entitled “Disavowed by Mahdi Army, Shadowy ‘Butcher’ Still Targets Sadr’s Foes.” And Newsweek asks, “Iraq: Is Moqtada Losing His Grip?” in an article about alleged divisions within Sadr’s ranks. For some background, see my previous posts (especially, here and here).

The Knickmeyer article on Abu Diri is part of a larger series of reports on Sadr and the Mahdi army, including a front-page August 24, 2006 report entitled “‘Shiite Giant’ Extends Its Reach” and front-page August 25, 2006 report entitled “Sadr’s Militia and the Slaughter in the Streets.”

It is interesting to note that even in Knickmeyer’s Abu Diri article, the lead quote goes to a US military official who asserts an ongling link to Sadr, not tension with Sadr.

U.S. military officials, distrustful of Sadr after battling his Mahdi Army in the first two years of the war, believe Abu Diri is linked to the militia.

“He’s the enforcer,” said 1st Lt. Zeroy Lawson, the intelligence officer with a small U.S. Army unit that works in Sadr City and is responsible for helping train the Iraqi army there. “He goes after specific targets” of Sadr and the Mahdi Army.

Lawson called him Sadr City’s agent “for external affairs,” going across Baghdad in pursuit of Sunnis or any others seen as enemies.

The strange thing about some of this high-profile Sadr chatter is that it doesn’t directly emerge out of “news” events. These are more like feature stories.

So, one is tempted to ask: why all the attention to Sadr?

One answer is that there is a battle going on within US policy circles about how to deal with Sadr and/or splits among the Sadrists. Is Sadr still a force for “nationalist, anti-occupation” energy, potentially aligned with Sunni insurgents? Or is Sadr losing control of his base precisely because his nationalist focus looks weak in the climate of sectarian violence? Perhaps his base wants to fight back against and/or avenge anti-Shiite attacks, unwilling to blame such attacks on the “occupier.”

Are Sadrists more dangerous as one wing of a nationalist, anti-occupation insurgency? Or as a violent Shiite sectarian force that fans the flames of civil war?

If there is US factionalism in the response to these questions, I am not yet able to trace the lines of that dispute (e.g., Right Arabists fear him more/less than Right Zionists do as a sectarian Shiite force than as a “nationalist” insurgent?)

The Cry of Anarchy

In a previous post from June 2006, I discussed a big “pronouncement” from Thomas Friedman in the New York Times entitled Insurgency Out, Anarchy In (subscription required). This article seemed to signal a political turning point for US policy toward Iraq.

You see, the insurgency in Iraq is in its “last throes” just like Dick Cheney said. Unfortunately, its being replaced by anarchy in many neighborhoods not democracy

Indeed, there has been a subtle but important change in the violence in Iraq. The main enemy in many places is no longer the Sunni insurgency. It is anarchy.

We are not losing Iraq to the Iraqi Vietcong–traditional nationalists. Iraq has a freely elected nationalist government. No, we are losing in Iraq to sectarian theocrats, Islamo-fascists and local and regional tyrants.

Of course, I thought then and still think now that the whole “last throes” thing is way off the mark. However, I think it is interesting that Friedman adopted the line that the “main enemy” in his view is “no longer the Sunni insurgency.” In other words, even as they fight on, he seems confident that they can be coopted.

Instead, the main enemy now is Sadr, his Mahdi Army, and various splinter groups of “local and regional tyrants.”

The cry of “anarchy” is, often enough, the prelude to a coup. Someone–perhaps an ex-Baathist like Allawi declares a state of emergency to restore order and save the nation with a group of military officers who call themselves a “National Salvation Front” or some such thing.

And there has been chatter about a coup. Count on Robert Dreyfuss (who I have criticized here) to both notice–and celebrate–signs that the US is preparing to support a coup in Iraq.

Those who scoff at the mainstream media will have trouble explaining the page 1 story in the Times today, a blockbuster expose. And, it saves its biggest punch for the end. I wont do that. Here it is:

Some outside experts who have recently visited the White House said Bush administration officials were beginning to plan for the possibility that Iraqs democratically elected government might not survive.Senior administration officials have acknowledged to me that they are considering alternatives other than democracy, said one military affairs expert who received an Iraq briefing at the White House last month and agreed to speak only on condition of anonymity.

Get that? Considering alternatives other than democracy. That can mean a lot of things, and Id like to see some fairly intensive follow-up. Does that mean that the United States is thinking about a coup detat in Iraq? If so, by whom? There has been a lot of chatter in Baghdad over the past several months about a coup, usually said to be plotted by disaffected Sunnis. There has also been talk of a national unity-type government by fiat, sort of a collective coup, but who knows what that might mean. One thing for sure: the title of the piece I wrote for TomPaine.com recently (Maliki: Dead Man Walking) could not be more appropriate. Hes history.

In some respects, the US has been walking away from “democracy”–i.e., rule by a Shiite majority–for some time, under pressure from Right Arabists long opposed to the US tilt away from dependence on minority rule by Sunni authoritarianism. A coup would just be a final step in this direction and one mainly designed to dump Maliki on account of his dependence on Sadr.

There are big questions here.

For example, would Sistani back such a coup (not because he supports a restoration of Sunni authoritarianism, but only insofar as he may see Sadr as his greatest/nearest foe at the moment)?

But I am even more haunted by a more general question: does the Maliki government even matter? Is it necessary to have a coup against an empty shell of a government?

These questions come, most directly, from Swopa at Needlenose:

But can they really be fantasizing about an anti-Shiite coup? Aside from the fact that it would multiply the U.S. occupation’s enemies well past the ability of our military to handle them, what would be the point?

Since nearly all of the relevant power in the country is essentially outside of government control already, or at best only paying lip service to it, staging a coup in Iraq would be like trying to steal a car that’s already been stripped for parts and is sitting on wooden blocks. Or maybe like trying to hijack a flight-simulator game in an arcade.

Funny. But also potentially accurate?

Michael Schwartz has often argued–if I understand his argument correctly–that the US essentially gave up on the idea of empowering an Iraqi state some time ago, probably around the battle over Jaafari that gave us his aide, Maliki. In a recent post at Tomdispatch entitled “7 Facts You Might Not Know about the Iraq War,” Schwartz hammers away at this point in Fact #1:

1. The Iraqi Government Is Little More Than a Group of “Talking Heads”

A minimally viable central government is built on at least three foundations: the coercive capacity to maintain order, an administrative apparatus that can deliver government services and directives to society, and the resources to manage these functions. The Iraqi government has none of these attributes — and no prospect of developing them.

Indeed, this argument goes quite a distance toward explaining what I noted at the time: the formation of the Maliki government avoided the kind of bitter battles that met all prior US efforts to form a government.

Why?

Because nobody cared about the balance of sectarian forces for a government that was not destined to be viable.

I’m not sure I’m entirely convinced by this argument. And I think it is a very different thing to imply that nobody in the region or in Washington now cares whether Iraq tilts toward Iran or toward Saudi Arabia. Or to imply that the US doesn’t care about Iraqi politics.

But I think it is worth pondering. Thoughts?

The US seems to be once again spoiling for a fight in Sadr City. According to a report in the Washington Post (“US-Backed Operation Targets Shiite Slum“), the raid took place in the predawn hours of Monday morning.

US forces led a raid in March 2006, and a set of raids again in early July. I offered an alaysis of the July raids in a previous post.

Swopa has been minding the “Sadr City Volcano” (here and here) waiting for it to blow, especially in light of Sadrist anger over US-backed Israeli attacks on Hezbollah in Lebanon and a new intensification of US forces in Baghdad. The Associated Press reported that “hundreds of thousands” of Shiites marched through Sadr City on Friday (August 4th) chanting “Death to Israel” and “Death to America.”

By some measures, the Monday morning raids might be interpreted as either US “punishment” for Friday’s Sadr City march and/or as the force that finally blew the lid off the Sadrist volcano. The Post article suggests that US and Iraqi forces met considerable resistance:

The Iraqi troops who conducted the raid, along with their U.S. advisers, came under fire at the outset, the statement said, and “the fire lasted for the duration of the operation and continued as they left the neighborhood.”

The raid prompted Prime Minister Maliki to disavow and condemn the action of the US and his own armed forces. According to South Africa’s 24.com:

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said he had not authorised what he called Sunday’s “unjustified” night time assault by Iraqi troops and US advisers on a target in the impoverished east Baghdad suburb of Sadr City…

Speaking on state television, Maliki said such raids “should not happen again in order to protect the reconciliation process.

“I reiterate my rejection to such an operation and it should not be executed without my consent. This particular operation did not have my approval.”

So, is this the beginning of a major eruption?

Maybe, but I wouldn’t count on it. An Associated Press report by Robert H. Reid in the Washington Post (“Firebrand Critic More Cautious“) notes the “failure to launch.”

U.S. and Iraqi forces strike the Baghdad base of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr–but his gunmen hold their fire. U.S. soldiers kill 15 of al-Sadr’s followers, drawing little more than a few perfunctory complaints.

An article in the Boston Globe quotes an anonymous US official in Baghdad:

“It’s true that we are targeting death squads, but we are not going after the Madhi Army in particular,” said a US official based in Baghdad, speaking in a telephone interview on condition of anonymity. “If we were, it would be much more violent here. It would be a very big fight.”

The attempt to distinguish between “death squads” and the “Madhi Army” may sound like a self-serving qualification (like the distinction between terrorists and insurgents, I suppose). But the interesting part of the quote is the frank acknowledgement that any move on the Madhi Army as such would be “a very big fight”–bigger than the current level of resistance to US raids. In other words, the official is downplaying the extent of the current level of resistance.

If so, it may be because there may be more than a merely semantic difference between the “death squads” in question and the Madhi Army. Consider, as I did in my previous post on US raids in Sadr City, that the Sadrist “movement” is split and that Sadr is essentially acquiescing in US attempts to crush a “rogue” Sadrist faction.

Who is Abu Dereh?

Two of the best Iraq news bloggers–Juan Cole at Informed Comment and “Swopa” at Needlenose–have assembled details on the news reports of explicitly sectarian, Shiite-led executions of Sunni Arabs in Baghdad.

Juan Cole offers the following details about the cycle of vengeance:

Shaikh Abd al-Samad al-`Ubaydi, the prayer leader at the Fakhri Shanshal Mosque in the al-Jihad district, accused the Mahdi Army of committing this crime. “Everything is clear, now,” he said. He added, “When I left the mosque after the crime had been committed, I saw ten bodies of ten men, all of them killed with a bullet to the head, and all of them bearing signs of torture.” He said many of the early-morning killings were carried out in front of the Husayniyah of Fatimah al-Zahra, a Shiite mourning center.

The prayer leader at the Fatimah al-Zahra Husayniyah, Shaikh Hamud al-Sudani, for his part told the AFP that the attacks were carried out by relatives of victims killed in the quarter during recent months. He said, “During the past 5 months, Shiites have been the victims of killings in and expulsion from the al-Jihad district.” Guerrillas, presumably Sunni Arabs, had set off a bomb near the Fatimah al-Zahra center on Satuday evening, wounding 4, which Shaikh al-Sudani said was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Reuters also mentions the bombing of the Fatimah al-Zahra center Saturday evening in its summary of the violence.

Most news sources carry reports that Sadr and his camp deny any involvement in the ambush and execution of Sunn Arabs. The Washington Post:

Other officials in Sadr’s organization condemned the killings in al-Jihad and denied that the Mahdi Army was involved.

“We regret the statements made by some Sunni Arabs who said that the Mahdi Army militia had conducted the raid at Jihad and killed the innocent people there,” said Riyadh al-Nouri, a top aide to Sadr and his brother-in-law. “If the Mahdi Army wanted to enter into a fight, Iraq would become a blood bath.”

I find it interesting, however, that Juan Cole’s post includes a citation of an AFP report that has a local Shiite prayer leader–Shaikh Hamud al-Sudani at the Fatimah al-Zahra Husayniyah prayer center–explaining rather than denying Shiite (if not Mahdi Army) involvement in the ambush and executions.

A similar statement–by an unnamed “senior Shiite politician” of unknown political loyalty–appears in the International Herald Tribune coverage:

A senior Shiite politician said the Mahdi Army fighters from eastern Baghdad had moved into Jihad on Sunday but insisted they were only taking on Sunni militants responsible for killing Shiites. “There are many terrorist groups in Jihad who are killing Shiite families so they went to fight them,” he said.

Which Axis: Nationalist or Sectarian?

Although the Saturday night bombing of the Shiite prayer center may have been the final “straw,” it was certainly not the heaviest–not even the heaviest of the past week, which included a car bomb that killed Shiite pilgrims in Kufa.

All of this seems so plainly “sectarian”–a local cycle of vengeance in a mixed Baghdad neighborhood–that one could almost forget that the final “straw” just happened to coincide with US raids on Sadr City.

The Washington Post article, “Scores of Sunnis Killed in Baghdad,” situates the ambush in the context of US policy toward Sadr:

Iraqi officials and residents of the neighborhood identified the gunmen as members of the Mahdi Army, the powerful militia controlled by the radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. In the past three days, Iraqi troops, with the support of U.S.-led forces, have raided the homes of militiamen and detained some of their leaders.

U.S. commanders and diplomats say Sadr and his militia constitute one of the gravest threats to Iraq’s security.

In a previous post, I suggested that these US raids in Sadr city could inaugurate a new round of violence between the US foreces and the Mahdi Army. And, to be sure, the US-Sadr axis of violence–which is a battle over the future of the US occupation– is alive and well.

The Washington Post reports (“Troops Raid Iraqi Mosque with Ties to Shiite Cleric“) that on Saturday, amidst all the “sectarian” strife, US forces moved against a Sadrist mosque:

Following a tip from a local resident, Iraqi security forces cordoned off the Sadrain Mosque in Zafraniya, southeast of Baghdad, at 5:45 p.m., the U.S. military said in a statement. Four hours later, national police searched the mosque, detained 20 people and seized six AK-47s.

Among those detained were mosque guards, two servants and a librarian, said Col. Abdul Razzak Mahmoud of the ministry’s operations room.

The military did not mention any involvement by U.S. troops, but Mahmoud said the raid was conducted by American forces. U.S. troops frequently provide air or ground support for Iraqi military operations.

The reason for the raid remained unclear Saturday evening.

Last week’s US raids in Sadr city seemed likely to be the final “straw” that broke the camel’s back of Sadr’s cooperation with the current US-backed government.

Certainly some US commanders and diplomats seem to have been spoiling for this fight–a direct confrontation between the “national unity government” and Sadr. In this scenario, Sadr would be isolated and targeted by Prime Minister Maliki and the major governing Shiite political parties.

Why, then, have the Sadrist seemingly responded to a new US offensive with an explicitly sectarian act of vengeance?

The sectarian axis of violence–the cycle of Sunni-Shiite retaliation described by Shaikh Hamud al-Sudani at the Fatimah al-Zahra Husayniyah prayer center–seems far more likely to provoke a very different scenario: civil war.

In its article on the US-backed raid on the Shiite mosque in Zafraniya, the Washington Post reports:

Riyadh al-Nouri, Sadr’s brother-in-law and a top official in his organization, criticized U.S. involvement in the recent raids against Sadr.

Nouri said in an interview that the council of top Shiite religious leaders in Iraq could lose patience with attacks against Shiites and call for an uprising.

“It depends on the people. If they are angry, they will fight,” said Nouri. “Until now the Shiite giant has not begun to move.”

What I find most surprising and potentially significant in this quote is that Nouri responds to a US raid in explicitly sectarian–rather than nationalist–terms. A “Shiite” uprising, not a “nationalist” uprising.

In the past, Sadrists responded to US offensives with appeals to Iraqi nationalism, including joint action with Sunni insurgents. Here, Nouri responds to a US raid with an appeal to “the council of top Shiite religious leaders in Iraq” and to “the Shiite giant.”

In other words, if Sadrists once sought an end to political isolation through a nationalist alliance, they seem to think that their present isolation demands a sectarian alliance. The reference to “the council of top Shiite religious leaders” is an appeal to Sistani for help.

Sistani, as Nouri suggests, “has not begun to move” against either Sunni or US provocation.

Nouri is not the only one who has noted that “the Shiite giant has not begun to move.”

Back on November 24, 2004, Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer made a similar observation in his essay, “A Fight For Shiites.”

People keep warning about the danger of civil war. This is absurd. There already is a civil war. It is raging before our eyes. Problem is, only one side is fighting it…

This is the Shiites’ and Kurds’ fight…

Seven months ago I wrote in this space that while our “goal has been to build a united, pluralistic, democratic Iraq in which the factions negotiate their differences the way we do in the West” that “may be, in the short run, a bridge too far. . . . [W]e should lower our ambitions and see Iraqi factionalization as a useful tool.”…

Where are the Shiites?… It is their civil war.

Well, now it may finally be.

According to Reuters, Sadr himself is calling for restraint.

“I urge all government and popular forces to exercise restraint and take responsibility in front of God first and society secondly,” cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, whose supporters are part of the national unity government, said in a statement…

Sadr, whose supporters have waged two rebellions against U.S. forces in Iraq, has made repeated calls for an end to the U.S. occupation. He blamed Sunday’s violence on a “Western plan aimed at sponsoring a civil and sectarian war between brothers”.

The problem, for Sadr, may be that his only chance to avoid political isolation in the face of a US-backed crackdown by Maliki’s “national unity” government may be to unleash the sectarian forces that would bring Sistani and the “Shiite giant” to his side.

Either way, Sadr now risks acquiescing to one or another “Western plan.”

Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki has named–and the Iraqi parliament has already approved–a new Interior minister, Jawad al-Bolani. This was one of the key appointments that has held up the full formation of a new, “permanent” government. Lots at stake here.

So far this morning, most media outlets are reporting his name with little or no additional information. The Washington Post article–“Iraqi Parliament Selects Top Security Ministers“–simply notes,

The new interior minister, Jawad al-Bolani, was nominated by the Iraqi United Alliance, the largest Shiite bloc in the parliament. But unlike his predecessor, Bayan Jabr, he is not connected to Shiite militias. He had been an engineer in the Iraqi air force until 1999. He became involved in politics after the fall of Saddam Hussein’s government and eventually joined Iraq’s interim parliament.

There is a bit more to say than that. Here is some background on Bolani:

On the occasion of Paul Bremer’s extraordinary “re-Baathification” order, The Times of London ran an April 24, 2004 article (i couldn’t find it on-line; link anyone?) by Stephen Farrell under the headline “Baathist officials in from cold as US does U-turn.” The report quotes Jawad al-Bolani, referring to him as a “spokesman for Abdel-Karim al-Mohammedawi, widely known as the ‘Prince of the Marshes'”:

The Americans could face an uprising because all people will reject this. I want to tell the Americans they must remember that who kills the American soldiers now are the Baathists in Fallujah.

So, at least back in April 2004, Bolani was intensely committed to de-Baathification and saw Bremer’s U-turn as a betrayal.

In December 2004, the New York Times ran an article by Robert Worth under the headline “Rift Among Shiite Factions May Hurt Them in Election” (couldn’t find it on-line; link anyone?) about the formation of a new “Shiite Council.” Bolani is named as the chairman of the Shiite Council.

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Dec. 6 — A rift has developed among the major Shiite political groups here, raising the prospect of fierce competition for votes among rival Shiite factions in the coming elections and possibly altering the religious and political alignment of the country’s new national assembly.

The development is a major setback for Iraq’s most powerful religious leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali alSistani, who appointed a committee in October to create a single coalition dominated by Shiite religious parties…
On Monday a coalition of several dozen groups and individuals calling itself the Shiite Council announced plans to break away from the United Iraqi Alliance, the new umbrella group formed under Ayatollah Sistani’s auspices…

Officials with the Shiite Council have questioned the loyalty of some of their rivals, saying the Alliance has favored parties and individuals with foreign connections, including many who lived in Iran and the West until Mr. Hussein was ousted. That accusation is a potent one here and could color the political debate as campaigning begins in the coming weeks.”How can you run with a man who tries to get foreigners to intervene in an Iraqi election?” said Ali Faisal, a spokesman for the Shiite Council, referring to Ibrahim Jafari, a member of the Alliance who has lived in Britain and spent time in Iran more recently…

The United Iraqi Alliance had hoped to unite all the Shiite religious parties under a single banner, with a date palm as its logo. It also drew in Sunni and Kurdish parties and tribal leaders from throughout the country in an effort to create a truly national coalition under Shiite leadership.”These are the major players in Iraq,” said Hussein al-Shahristani, a former nuclear scientist imprisoned by Mr. Hussein and a member of the Alliance’s six-man coordinating committee.

But the committee allocated dominant positions to the Dawa Islamic Party and the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, whose candidates will receive preferred positions in the Alliance’s allocation of assembly seats. That infuriated members of the Shiite Council, who were considering joining the Alliance but felt they were not getting their fair share and rankled at the party’s favoring of candidates with foreign ties…

[Caption…]

Shiite CouncilMade of about 40 smaller political groups. They have criticized the Alliance for its foreign ties and its favoring of expatriate leaders.

Jawad al-Bolani, the chairman of the Shiite Council, is not pictured.

On March 5, 2005, the New York Times ran an article by Edward Wong under the headline, “Two Legislators Withdraw in Impatience From Fragile Shiite Coalition” that shed further light on the relationship between Bolani’s patron–Muhammadawi, Prince of the Marsh Arabs–and Ahmad Chalabi:

Two newly elected politicians announced Friday that they were withdrawing from the fragile political alliance cobbled together by the country’s most powerful Shiite cleric, marking the first notable fracture within the alliance.

One of the departing politicians, Sheik Abdul Karim al-Muhammadawi, said as many as eight others on the Shiite list might withdraw. Mr. Muhammadawi is a close ally of Ahmad Chalabi…

Mr. Muhammadawi, an influential politician from Amara, a southern city near the Shiite marshlands, heads the Hezbollah Party (which has no ties to the party of the same name in Lebanon, listed by the United States as a terrorist organization). The other politician is Ali Hashem Yousha, the head of a little-known party called the National Coalition.

Mr. Muhammadawi said in a telephone interview that the main reason he had lost confidence in the Shiite alliance was that the alliance had failed so far to install a government. ”There hasn’t even been a meeting yet to choose a new president,” he said.

Mr. Muhammadawi’s withdrawal could have a significant ripple effect. Before the elections, he agreed to ally the Hezbollah Party with the Shiite Council, an umbrella political group assembled by Mr. Chalabi that later joined forces with the Sistani group, the United Iraqi Alliance. The Shiite Council has at least a dozen members in the Shiite alliance, and Mr. Muhammadawi could take some of them with him.

Regarding Muhammadawi, his Hezbollah Party, and the politics of Basra (see HERE, HERE, and HERE for background). On August 7, 2005, the Associated Press ran the following report:

Dozens of armed men belonging to two rival Shiite Muslim groups went into the streets late Sunday as tension rose between them following a raid by gunmen on a police station that police said freed four prisoners.The raid on the Saudia police station in central Basra was carried out by members of the Hezbollah group, said police Capt. Mushtaq Kadhim. Hezbollah members fired several shots in the air before fleeing with the four, Kadhim said…

Right after the raid, more than 200 armed members of the Fadhila group as well as police took positions in the streets around some police stations and the governor’s office of the Basra province.

Basra’s provincial governor, Mohammed al-Waili, is a member of Fadhila, a breakaway group of the movement led by radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. About 20 other Fadhila members are on the provincial council.

The two groups had close relations until after the provincial elections in January, when Fadhila defeated Hezbollah, headed by legislator Karim Mahoud al-Mohammedawi.

So, in terms of Basra politics, it looks like Bolani/Mohammedawi were the folks that Waeli’s Fadhila party defeated back in the January 2005 elections. What does the appointment of Bolani as Interior Minister say about the political significance of Maliki’s “state of emergency”?

If the tensions between Mohammedawi’s Hezbollah party and Waeli’s Fadhila party have continued unabated, then it certainly looks like the inclusion of Bolani in the Maliki government implies that Waeli and Fadhila’s political control of Basra are the likely targets of the Basra crackdown.

According to a June 30, 2005 New York Times report by Edward Wong under the headline “Secular Shiites in Iraq Seek Autonomy in Oil-Rich South,” Mohammedawi is also a champion of regional autonomy for Basra.

With the Aug. 15 deadline for writing a new constitution bearing down, a cadre of powerful, mostly secular Shiite politicians is pushing for the creation of an autonomous region in the oil-rich south of Iraq, posing a direct challenge to the nation’s central authority…

Here in Basra, Iraq’s second-largest city, banners have appeared on the streets in recent weeks calling for an autonomous region similar to Iraqi Kurdistan…

Mr. Chalabi and Sheik Abdul Kareem al-Muhammadawi, a prominent member of the National Assembly, are planning to propose a regional vote on the question of southern autonomy in October, at the same time as a national referendum on the constitution, said Ali Faisal al-Lami, an aide to both politicians…

The staunchest Shiite opponents of autonomy are Moktada al-Sadr, the young firebrand cleric who led two uprisings against the Americans, and Ayatollah Muhammad Yacoubi, another activist cleric who was close to Mr. Sadr’s martyred father.

Yacoubi is the leader of the Fadhila party that beat out Muhammadawi’s Hezbollah party in the January 2005 electiosn for control of the Basra Provincial Council.
Update:

Reuters says,

Out of 198 deputies present in the 275-seat legislature, 182 voted for Bolani and 142 backed Jassim.

As I’ve suggested in the past, the best way to get a handle on the political identity of various players is to listen to the accusations of their enemies. The 182 out of 198 vote tally for Bolani looks impressive at first glance, but it will be important to hear what key Sunni-aligned politicians (Dulaimi, Mutlak, Allawi, Pachachi, etc.) have to say about the appointment, especially given the Bolani/Mohammedawi link to Chalabi and de-Baathification.

Tracking Iraqi domestic politics can feel like following a soap opera: if you don’t already know the characters and background, it can be difficult to jump in and make sense of it all, even if you arrive at a crucial, emotionally-charged moment. So it is with recent political developments in the oil-rich southern Iraqi city of Basra. (For a bit of background to the current post, see my previous long post on Basra and a short follow-up post.)

Rarely has the news coverage of Iraqi domestic politics been more frustrating than in the case of Basra oil politics. This is hardly surprising in the case of the mainstream media, but a bit unsettling when the “alternative” press mangles the story in such a way that it leaves the reader more confused than ever.

I have in mind an article published by the Inter Press Service News Agency. I’m a huge fan of IPS writer Jim Lobe and I generally think IPS generates very useful reporting. There is also some excellent and original reporting in a May 26 article by Aaron Glantz and Alaa Hassan entitled “Basra Begins to Fall Apart.” But a few key facts are botched and the context is so vague that the entire report tends to be very misleading.

The British military — whose 8,000 soldiers in Iraq control Basra — were considered by many to be more humane than their American counterparts.

But when thousands of residents took to the streets earlier this month to protest high unemployment and corruption in the governor’s office, the British attacked the demonstrators with helicopters. Fighters responded.

“They shot down a helicopter,” As’aad Kareem, president of the Iraqi oil workers union in Basra told IPS. “It was real resistance. They shot it down because the British were supporting the governor and shooting at the people in the demonstration. And the governor didn’t stop the British from bombing the demonstration, and so that’s his responsibility also“…

Kareem said lack of water and electricity are not the only reasons for the tensions. “The government in Baghdad was giving a lot of support and money to Basra, but the governor (Mohammed al-Waili) was misusing it, and that led to violence and a lot of strikes, including walkouts by the military and police,” he said…

Fadil el-Sharaa, spokesman for Shia cleric Moqtada Sadr, says British forces and the governor (who comes from the Shia group, the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq) want to blame the killings on sectarian conflict.

But that is not the case, he said. “What happened in Basra is that Ayatollah al-Sistani’s representative talked about the corruption created by the governor and his administration, which caused the governor to say that the religious offices were responsible for all the violence in Basra and that we are dividing people against themselves.”

El-Sharaa added: “They should be more responsible in their proclamations.. Now the problem has been solved by the Sadr office. We sent our representative to Basra, and we held a meeting of the two groups and tried to solve the problem peacefully.”

Glantz and Hassan provide the correct name of the Basra Provincial Governor, but every other news source I’ve ever read (see, for example, this May 26 Reuters report) says Waili (more commonly “Waeli” or “Waelli” in the mainstream press) comes from the Fadhila party–NOT Fadhila’s major Basra rival, the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI).The article cites very serious accusations against the governor (Waeli): that unidentified demonstrators were protesting “corruption in the governor’s office”; that the governor “didn’t stop the British from bombing the demostration”; that “the British were supporting the governor”; that the governor was “misusing” money given to Basra and therefore became the target of “strikes” and “walkouts by the military and police.”

In the current climate–when Basra Provincial governor Waeli is being criticized by the British and Iraqi governments–it would be very helpful to know more about the political perspective of the accuser.

Indeed, if there have been demonstrators against corruption in Waeli’s office they might well be people aligned with SCIRI. As the Washington Post reported on June 1, 2006, Fadhila ousted SCIRI in January 2005 local elections for the Basra Provincial Council. SCIRI responded to the defeat with a boycott of the Council. SCIRI and Waeli are locked in battle.

Who, then, is the accuser? “As’aad Kareem, president of the Iraqi oil workers union in Basra.” Anti-war activists who try to follow labor union politics in Iraq (no easy task) might be familiar with Hassan Jumaa Awad al Assadi, President of the General Union of Oil Employees in Basra. Some of his speeches against the US Occupation (and against privatization of the Iraqi oil industry) have been translated by Gilbert Achcar and circulate on the internet. But try doing an internet search on As’aad Kareem. I could find nothing, apart from the reference by Glantz and Hassan in the article under discussion. I’m not suggesting he doesn’t exist or doesn’t matter; I’m simply saying that it might be helpful to have some context, especially given the tenor of his allegations against Governor Waeli.

Is As’aad Kareem a SCIRI-linked labor leader? Or, more likely perhaps, a Sadrist labor leader?

There was a British helicopter shot down in Basra. It was “real resistance.” But who does As’aad Kareem intend to credit with such resistance? Is As’aad Kareem suggesting that SCIRI shot down British helicopter? Highly unlikely.

One May 8, 2006 report from The Guardian suggested a more direct link to Sadr’s Mahdi Army:

As soldiers from the British army’s Quick Reaction Force got to the scene, they were confronted by stones thrown from the crowd. A minority, chanted support for the Mahdi army, the militia of the radical Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, and was armed with assault rifles, rocket-propelled grenades and petrol bombs, British defence sources said…

A commander of the Mahdi Army, Jassan Khalaf, was reported yesterday as saying that his men brought down the helicopter and threatened more attacks.

Has there been tension between Sadrists and Fadhila? Absolutely. Is it possible that Sadrists were demonstrating against Waeli? Yes, it is certainly possible. But this is big and important news and needs to be made clear. If Glantz and Hassan are reporting on serious friction between Sadrists and Fadhila, this is crucial information that may even help explain why the Sadrists have thus far raised no public objections in the media regarding the Iraqi government decision to crack down on unrest in Basra. (In my previous post, I discuss a scenario where Sadr and Maliki are aligned against Fadhila and Governor Waeli.)

Serious tension between Sadrists and Fadhila runs against the grain of an earlier September 2005 September 2005 report of a growing alliance between Fadhila leader Ayatollah Yaqubi and Sadr.

As’aad Kareem suggests that the “British were supporting the governor.” This is also an important claim but it is hard to know how to weigh its accuracy. If the British were–or are–supporting Waeli, this is also big, breaking news. It may be true, but it certainly requires some explanation since Waeli has had a rocky relationship with the British.

The current indications are very mixed about the relationship between Waeli and the British. Aftering severing all ties with the British in January 2006, Waeli apparently tried to patch things up with the British. According to the May 8, 2006 report from The Guardian:

Basra’s governor, Muhammad al-Waeli, agreed yesterday to resume cooperation with the British, which he broke off four months ago, in an effort to defuse tension.

Was that “yesterday” the day before the helicopter was downed? Or was it a response to the attack on the helicopter?

A June 1, 2006 report from The Guardian also sends mixed signals about the state of British relations with Waeli. On the one hand, the article tends to undermine and general claim of an alliance between Waeli and the British:

The British and Iraqi governments have often clashed with the governor of Basra, Muhammad al-Waelli, whom they regard as part of the problem.

Indeed, it would not be surprising if the entire Maliki “state of emergency” in Basra was aimed at ousting Waeli. According to Reuters, the whole Basra crackdown was formally initiated–under pressure from the UK–by Iraqi President Jalal Talabani.

Talabani, a Kurd, issued a statement urging Maliki to despatch senior officials to Basra to calm the situation. He said it should have wide-ranging powers, including being “authorised to dismiss and appoint” officials.

But the June 1, 2006 report from The Guardian also includes quotes from Fadhila officials who do not seem particularly upset by news of the Maliki “state of emergency.” One might expect them to sound either alarmed or upset if it looked like the entire crackdown was aimed at dismissing the Fadhila-linked governor.

Assan Abdul Jabbar, an aide to Mr Waelli, said yesterday: “The focus on Basra by the media and the rulers in Baghdad is not justified and has a political motivation behind it. They want to divert attention from the bad situations in Baghdad and the Sunni triangle.”

Mahdi al Nasi’a, a senior member of the Fadhila party, one of the factions engaged in the power struggle, accused Iraq’s prime minister of exaggerating the problems in Basra. “These efforts will not help the city, but they may indeed open the door to a crisis in security,” he said.

He said Fadhila would work with any recommendations put forward by the government “provided they were legitimate and focused on improving services to ordinary citizens of Basra”.

Apart from the prediction that the crackdown “may… open the door to a crisis in security,” these comments by Mahdi al Nasi’a and Assan Abdul Jabbar hardly amount to a declaration of war (“Fadhila would work with any recommendations…”). Such reporting gives some credence to the idea that Fadhila aspires to good relations with the British.

What if Assan Abdul Jabbar is right and the “state of emergency” is not an attack on Fadhila but a publicity stunt intended to “divert attention from the bad situations in Baghdad and the Sunni triangle”? (In my previous post, I called this the “Maliki Media Magic” scenario.)

Or, what if Sadr has been silent and Fadhila relatively calm because–UK pressure notwithstanding–Maliki really did try to initiate a “peace mission” (what I called the “Solidarity Forever” scenario in my previous post) and Sadr and Waeli are taking a wait-and-see approach?

If the Glantz and Hassan article can be taken to signal tenstion between the Sadrists and Waeli, then perhaps one side is targeted for attack but not the other. Who is more likely aligned a Maliki crackdown? Waeli and Fadhila who left the Maliki coalition in protest after being recently stripped of control of the oil ministry and now threatens to cripple oil exports? Or the Sadrists of Basra who claim credit for shooting down British helicopters?

My hunch is that British and UK forces–along with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani–are gunning for Sadr and Waeli, with our without the enthusiastic support of Maliki who still depends on Sadrists to maintain his government coalition.

The key to the Basra crackdown may turn on Basra Crude–the politics of oil. It is for this reason that it has become urgent to know more about Basra oil workers. Where do oil workers stand on the question of regional autonomy for the oil industry?

Where does Fadhila stand? Where do the Sadrists stand?
Where does “As’aad Kareem, president of the Iraqi oil workers union in Basra” stand? Where does “Hassan Jumaa Awad al Assadi, President of the General Union of Oil Employees in Basra” stand?

Finally, where do Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, and Khalilzad stand?

UPDATE:  from Juan Cole at Informed Comment:
Al-Zaman reports that the Sunni Arabs of Basra are mostly forced to stay at home, going out only when absolutely necessary, for fear of being assassinated or kidnapped. They are virtual prisoners in their homes…
The Arab League is preparing to send a commission to Basra, at the request of the Sunni Arabs. (Arab League member states have as their citizens mostly Sunni Arabs.)

Meanwhile, al-Zaman says, hundreds of British troops have spread through Basra neighborhoods, arresting persons on its list, who belong to the Mahdi Army or Iraqi military intelligence. (The latter in Basra was presumably mostly recruited from the Badr Corps paramilitary of the [hard line Shiite] Supreme Council).

At least one critical question emerges from my long post on Maliki’s Basra lockdown:

Where is Sadr on the Basra lockdown?

1. Sadr/Yaqubi: the alliance between Sadr and Yaqubi (mentioned in my previous post) still holds and both are targets of the Maliki crackdown on Basra.  The Maliki/Sadr alliance has already ended and the consequences will soon emerge: like Yaqubi’s Fadhila party, the Sadrists will withdraw from the government.

2. Sadr/Maliki: Sadr has sold out Yaqubi and given Maliki the green light for a crackdown on Fadhila’s control of the Basra oil infrastructure.  The political isolation of Yaqubi’s Fadhila party is complete and the only resistance to Maliki’s crackdown will come from Fadhila’s rank and file.

3. Maliki Media Magic: there is no Basra lockdown worthy of the name.  It was all a publicity stunt for the benefit of the Sunni insurgency to show that a Shiite government would “get tough” on its own rather than (or prior to) any comparable crackdown in the Sunni-dominated Anbar province.

4. Solidarity Forever: Maliki and the UK will disarm Sadr’s Mahdi Army and SCIRI’s Badr Brigade—and gently remove Fadhila’s rank and file from sensitive positions in the oil industry—but will do so in such an even-handed way that all parties will consent to the initiative.  The UK will establish a monopoly on the use of force.  Basra oil will flow like a mighty river into the waiting hands of International Oil Companies.

The betting window is now open… Place your bets!

The new Maliki government has made headlines for one major action–swooping into Basra with talk of smashing militias and imposing a state of emergency. The decision seems to have been welcomed by–and probably initiated under pressure from–the US and the UK.

The Basra initiative seems likely to be very significant, although it is hard to make sense of the politics at this juncture. But understanding the politics of Basra may prove quite helpful going forward, if only because the nature of the Maliki government otherwise remains so vague–especially in relation to the former Jaafari government, which drew so much criticism from the US. Does Basra signal anything about the contours of the new Iraqi politics?

Perhaps the first thing to note is that the stakes in Basra seem quite high: NYT columnist Thomas Friedman recently went so far as to say that the true obstacle in Iraq has now moved from the Sunni insurgency to Shiite militias in Basra. His article, “Insurgency Out, Anarchy In” is for subscribers only (value added?), but here are some “highlights” of his latest missive…

You see, the insurgency in Iraq is in its ”last throes’‘ — just like Dick Cheney said. Unfortunately, it’s being replaced by anarchy in many neighborhoods — not democracy…

Indeed, there has been a subtle but important change in the violence in Iraq. The main enemy in many places is no longer the Sunni insurgency. It is anarchy. Mini-wars of all against all. As the BBC reported Wednesday from Basra: Prime Minister Nuri Maliki ”has declared a monthlong state of emergency in Basra, which has been plagued by sectarian clashes, anarchy and factional rivalry.” That’s what happens in a security vacuum…

We are not losing Iraq to the Iraqi Vietcong — traditional nationalists. Iraq has a freely elected nationalist government. No, we are losing in Iraq to sectarian theocrats, Islamo-fascists and local and regional tyrants…

We’ll see about the idea that the insurgency is actually in its “last throes.” Suffice it to say I have my doubts that the “Iraqi Vietcong” has been coopted and contained by the “elected nationalist government.” What news prompts this unlikely prediction?

The more serious part of the Friedman piece is his tirade against political realities in Basra, especially since this part likely mirrors Bush administration concerns. The problem is not really “anarchy” (or, better, the distinguishing characteristic of Basra is not anarchy) but the loss of British control over the oil-rich Shiite city. The cry of “anarchy” functions to justify the suspension of local control by a democratically elected Provincial Council under the state of emergency.

The real issue is that the UK began to lose political control of Basra when SCIRI lost control of the Basra Provincial Council to the “Islamic Virtue Party” (Fadhila). The Washington Post quotes Reidar Visser on the roots current situation:

“The conflict with SCIRI in Basra dates back to early 2005, when, after the local elections, Fadhila managed to sideline SCIRI in the local governorate council, by entering into coalition with smaller parties,” Visser wrote in an e-mail. “At first, the tension was mainly fought out within the council. Then SCIRI boycotted the council for a while, and now it seems that the conflict has begun affecting the general security situation in Basra.”

One thing seems clear enough. The UK has not gotten along well with Fadhila, especially Fadhila-backed Governor, Mohammed al-Waeli, along Ayatollah Mohammed al-Yacoubi, the religious figure most closely associated with Fadhila.

According to the Washington Post report, the British hold Waeli and Fadhila responsible for the collapse of the Basra police force and for guerilla attacks on British soldiers.

The governor of Basra province, Mohammed al-Waeli, suspended the police chief, Maj. Gen. Hassan Suwadi and demanded he be fired, saying he was involved in criminal activities. A bomb exploded outside Suwadi’s house in an apparent attempt to kill him. And nine British soldiers have died this month in three incidents, including the downing of a helicopter.

According to the Telegraph Waeli’s clashes with the police go back to the summer of 2005. At that time,

Gen Hassan al-Sade, the chief of police, recently admitted that he had lost control of the majority of his officers because of penetration of the force by members of the militias.

Meanwhile, Ayatollah Mohammed al-Yacoubi, the religious leader of Fadhila, has emerged as a major thorn in the side of US and UK political officials. A September 24, 2005 Telegraph report provides a very useful background for understanding the current impasse:

Basra lurched further towards religious extremism yesterday after the leader of one of the province’s biggest political parties instructed his supporters to reject a draft constitution in a national referendum next month.

The unexpected announcement by Ayatollah Mohammed Yaqubi, head of the Fadhila party, has shocked British diplomats and raised fears that Basra could become the main focus for violence in the Shia-dominated south.

Mr Yaqubi’s declaration came as the most revered Shia figure in Iraq, the Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, signalled that he would endorse the constitution and indicated the possibility of a damaging split among Iraq’s usually cohesive Shia majority.

Mr Yaqubi’s apparent mutiny also risks turning Basra into a radical outpost, western diplomats warned.

“There has always been a small possibility that Basra could become something like the Fallujah of the south,” a western diplomat in Baghdad said…

The new stance by Mr Yaqubi locks the ayatollah into a surprising alliance with his one-time rival, the fiery young cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, whose Mahdi Army militiamen took captive two SAS soldiers earlier this week.

Yaqubi and Sadr were rivals to succeed the latter’s father, the Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Sadiq al-Sadr, one of the country’s most respected clerics until he was assassinated in 1999.

Sadr’s appeal is limited to the slums of Basra but he has a disproportionate influence on the southern capital’s police force, thanks to a heavy degree of infiltration by his Mahdi Army, which twice rose up against US forces last year.

The new alliance will be an unwelcome development and suggests that Basra’s governor, a member of Fadhila who has withdrawn his co-operation from the British, could prove increasingly intransigent in the future.

More recently, the Daily Times (Pakistan) and Reuters reported that Yaqubi called for the US to dump Ambassador Khalilzad for the same reasons that alienate Right Zionists in the US, namely his attempt to appease the Sunni Arab minority:

“The American ambassador and the tyrants of the Arab states are giving political support to those parties who provide political cover for the terrorists.”

This last remark by Yaqubi raises a central question about the most recent Basra blowup: are all factiosn within the US/UK “coalition” equally afraid of Fadhila controlling Basra oil? Does the conflict with Fadhila intersect at all with Right Zionist/Right Arabist factional fights?
At a basic level, the “loss” of Basra matters to all factions because it is home to the oil industry and Iraq’s only outlet to Gulf tankers. In the formation of the Maliki government, Fadhila lost control of the oil ministry to Sistani-aligned Hussein al-Shahristani. Nevertheless, the party still has considerable control over the oil industry in Basra itself. Fadhila formally left the Shiite Alliance when Maliki moved to hand the oil ministry to Shahristani and now threatens to sabotage production at Basra oil facilities (currently the only major source of Iraqi oil exports).

A May 26, 2006 Reuters report provides the basic outline:

Iraq’s new government risks being held to ransom by a dissident Shi’ite faction using its local clout in Basra to hobble vital oil exports, Iraqi officials and senior political sources said on Friday.

They warned that the locally powerful Fadhila party was threatening to have members in the oil industry stage a go-slow to halt exports through the key southern oil port if it did not win the concessions it wanted from Baghdad.

“Fadhila is in control,” a senior Shi’ite political source close to the party said…

“He who owns Basra owns the oil reserves. It is the gateway to the Gulf,” the Shi’ite political source said. “It’s the richest city in the world. It has a strategic position so why would any one give it up?“

However, at a deeper level, the politics of Basra oil seems wrapped up in the larger question of Shiite power (and regional autonomy) in relation to the Sunni Arab minority. Right Arabists defend a centralized state as the basis for rebuilding and retaining Sunni Arab political dominance while Right Zionists defend regional autonomy for Shiites and Kurds.

On the one hand, Sharistani–the new oil minister–has emphasized his desire to centralize control over the oil industry. The May 26 Reuters report suggests,

Shahristani in turn has vowed to centralize control of oil in Baghdad and crack down hard on corruption and oil smuggling, which officials say are endemic in the southern oilfields.

An earlier Reuters report included quoted Sharistani:

“According to the constitution the oil and gas are the property of all Iraqi people, the revenues will be put in the state coffer,” said the Shiite Islamist known for his no-nonsense approach.

“The main concern for regions is to get its share and not to run the oilfields or sign any contracts,” he added.

Such comments can hardly be welcomed by Kurdish or Shiite advocates of regional autonomy–including control over all new oil field development.

Where does Fadhila stand on the issue of Shiite regional autonomy? This is where things get very murky. Some reports suggest that Fadhila itself has campaigned against Shiite demands for regional autonomy. For example, in August 2005 when SCIRI leaders announced their support for Shiite autonomy, the New York Times article suggested:

One of Iraq’s most powerful Shiite politicians on Thursday strongly backed demands for the formation of a semi-independent region in the oil-rich south, adding fresh turmoil to the drafting of a new constitution as the deadline for its completion draws near.

The politician, Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, a religious Shiite with close ties to Iran, told a large gathering in the holy city of Najaf that it was “necessary” for Shiite Arabs to secure broad governing powers for the south, which is dominated by the Shiites and was long oppressed under the rule of Saddam Hussein…

Mr. Hakim’s remarks followed a meeting he had Wednesday in Najaf with Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the most revered Shiite cleric in Iraq. The ayatollah told Shiite politicians last week that he supported the concept of autonomy, though he did not make specific recommendations…

Many of the Shiite politicians who initially backed the idea of southern autonomy are secular. The most powerful supporter has been Ahmad Chalabi, a vice prime minister and a former Pentagon favorite. Mr. Hakim is the first leading religious Shiite figure to lend his backing in such a public way…

But there are also Shiites who vehemently oppose any move toward autonomy. Moktada al-Sadr, the young rebel cleric who led two uprisings against the Americans last year, and Ayatollah Muhammad Yacoubi, another radical cleric with ties to Mr. Sadr, have both denounced the movement, saying it goes against the concept of central Islamic rule.

If Maliki is backed by Sadr and if both Sadr and Yaqubi favor centralization, then where is the fight between these forces and Sharistani?
Perhaps Sharistani’s centralization move is a head fake. He does favor regional autonomy, but only once Basra has been “liberated” from the “anarchy” of Fadhila control. For now, centralized control means taking control away from Yaqubi and his Fadhila party. In the longer-term, it is a good bet that Sharistani will support regional autonomy.

Meanwhile, Yaqubi and Sadr both appear to be Iraqi nationalists who are aligned against the other Shiite parties (esp. SCIRI) who favor regional autonomy. The only way to re-align Yaqubi and Sadr would be to shift the axis of conflict from “central v. regional” to “Shiite v. Sunni.” Of course, that is Zarqawi’s central function, isnt’ it?

At present, however, the Sadr/Yaqubi alliance in Basra is public enemy number. The crime is spoiling the fantasy of an independent Basra. That dream was most clearly sketched in a February 27, 2005 James Glanz article in New York Times entitled “Iraq’s Serene South Asks, Who Needs Baghdad?”

[I]f no inconsiderable number of people here have their way, the provinces of the south, home to rich oil reserves but kept poor by Saddam Hussein, will soon become a separate country, or at least a semi-autonomous region in a loosely federal Iraq. The clear southern preference for profit over politics could make it a place where foreign companies willing to invest hard cash are able to do business.

”Quite a few people prefer to be separated, because they are disappointed,” said Sadek A. Hussein, a Basra native who is a professor in the college of agriculture at the University of Basra, and who speaks with the mildness characteristic of southern Iraq. The trait is refreshing in itself, in a country better known for its firebrands, chatterboxes and just plain loudmouths…

Some members of the local governing council recently went as far as trying to impose a 10 percent tax on oil revenue from the south, but they were stymied by legal barriers.

If southerners cannot put a stop to the great sucking sound to the north, many would like to see an international boundary between them and the capital. ”They see all of the good things going to Baghdad,” said Ramzi, a translator who asked that only his first name be used…

[T]he south of Iraq is just that, the south of Iraq, with no wider ethnic entanglements to worry about, just a close religious affinity with neighboring Iran, which, like southern Iraq, is overwhelmingly Shiite…

And Zuhair Kubba, a board member of the Basra Chamber of Commerce, said that, in contrast to the xenophobia dogging other regions of Iraq, Basra’s history made it likely to welcome foreign investment.

”They have a port, and being a port, they have experience with foreigners,” said Mr. Kubba, a follower of the largely pacifist and apolitical Sheikhi branch of Shiite Islam, whose holiest cleric, Sayyed Ali Al-Mousawi, is based in a Basra mosque.

Some foreign companies, including Kellogg, Brown & Root, the Halliburton subsidiary that is repairing parts of Iraq’s oil industry under American government contracts, are already listening. The company is moving its center of operations from the insurgency-ridden streets of Baghdad to the south, said Ray Villegas, a general manager for the company, and not just to be closer to its field work, which is mainly in the south.

”This is the place you want to be,” Mr. Villegas said. ”It’s much different down here. You have flat open land, so you have a lot of visibility. We don’t have the day-to-day traffic problems that you experience up in Baghdad, so the opportunity is much less for insurgents to act.”

Most of all, he said, ”we’ve found that the Iraqis here are much more willing and accommodating to approach the Americans.”

Quite a fall–from Glanz’s description of the “mildness characteristic” of Basra residents who demonstrate a “clear southern preference for profit over politics“ to Friedman’s more recent discovery of “sectarian theocrats, Islamo-fascists and local and regional tyrants” running Basra.
This is an intra-Shiite battle that pits Sistani, on the one hand, againt Sadr and Yaqubi on the other, with the oil weath of Basra caught in between. This battle will surely the test the Right Zionist hope for a US-Shiite alliance like nothing else.

Did I seem overly negative in my post of the new Iraqi government? If so, I’m not alone. The most recent analysis from the Economist Intelligence Unit (May 22, 2006) is no less pessimistic. Entitled “Iraq Politics: Barely Afloat,” the text reads:

The two most contentious posts in the new Iraqi government are those of interior and defence ministers. By leaving them vacant during his presentation of the cabinet to the National Assembly on May 20th, the prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, managed to secure a large majority of votes in favour of the line-up, which may have been more difficult had he filled them. However, the gap in the government list also cruelly illustrated the shortcomings of Mr Maliki’s administration as it seeks to address the main challenges that he has identified–ensuring security, rooting out corruption and providing decent services to the Iraqi people.

Not to rain on the parade about the “successful” formation of a new Iraqi government, but it was a failure, not a success. Maliki has thus far failed to reach a deal on the key Interior and Defense ministries. He went ahead with the formation of a government that left unresolved the most contentious issue of all: control of the security ministries.

Presumably, the failure to resolve a conflict might have provoked howls of protest and concern from either Shiite parties or Sunni parties. Both might have reason to fear that Maliki was saving “bad news” for another day. It didn’t happen that way. Maliki’s refusal to name security ministers prompted a Sunni walkout, not a Shiite rebellion. If as I suggested in a previous post, we shall know the score by listening to the protests, then Maliki’s incomplete government is most ominous to elements of the Sunni Arab community.

The Washington Post reported details of the parliamentary protest:

While a man read a verse from the Koran, Khalilzad talked to a Sunni leader, then abruptly stood up and left the room. He returned a few minutes later with Adnan al-Dulaimi and Khalaf al-Elayan, two leaders of the main Sunni coalition, who both appeared to be reluctant to attend.

Seconds after the parliament’s speaker, Mahmoud al-Mashhadani, began to speak, another Sunni parliament member stood up and asked for two more days to research the cabinet nominees before a vote on them would take place.

Then Saleh al-Mutlak, head of a Sunni group that is not part of the main coalition, interrupted the session again. He declared that Maliki’s Shiite coalition had offered him ministries in the government but only if he agreed to change his political agenda. Mashhadani tapped loudly on his microphone to try to stop Mutlak’s speech, while grumbling from other parliament members grew louder.

Maliki stood silently at a podium on the stage, waiting to name his cabinet. Once he finally gained the parliament’s attention, he listed the 37 names quickly. After that, Mutlak and his party’s members walked out of the session, along with several members of the main coalition of three Sunni parties, who protested against swearing in an incomplete cabinet.

Mutlak, it may be recalled, was being courted by the US in its effort to find common ground with Sunni Arabs and former Baathists. Recall that in mid-April, Mutlak figured prominently in such efforts. He met with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on her trip to Iraq. The Washington Post report of that time helps put Mutlak’s recent parliamentary walkout in some perspective:

After her dinner in Baghdad, which in addition to Hashimi included Kurdish leaders and Saleh Mutlak, a Sunni politician who has long been accused of ties to Iraqi insurgent groups, Rice noted what she called a “considerable maturing of the Sunni political leadership.” Later, in an interview with CBS News, she called the Sunnis’ entry into politics “one of the most extraordinary developments” of the past year.

Mutlak, Hashimi and others say that after months of raising concerns with U.S. officials in Baghdad, they finally feel that their voices are being heard — and echoed in recent statements by Khalilzad and officials in Washington…

Mutlak said he told Rice at the dinner that the sectarian tension between Iraqi Sunnis and Shiites had arrived with the U.S. invasion force in 2003. “I am not sure she agreed or not,” he said. “But she listened to me. When they came to Iraq, absolutely they were biased to the Shiites. I think they are being more evenhanded than what they were before. They realized they cannot solve the problems in Iraq without us.”

Sunni leaders say the new U.S. stance has opened the way for dialogue between U.S. officials and Sunni-led insurgent groups. Khalilzad, while circumspect about details, has acknowledged such contacts in recent weeks.

Mutlak said Americans have held discussions mostly with smaller insurgent groups linked to better-known armed groups. Among the issues on the table, predicated on insurgents laying down their weapons, he said, are amnesty for some categories of insurgents, incorporating more Sunnis into Iraq’s security forces, economic support for impoverished Sunni regions and a timetable for U.S. troop withdrawals.

“I think if they can reach a good agreement with these groups, they can jump to bigger groups,” he said. “But it is just beginning.”

Has that beginning now come to an end? If the formation of a Maliki government was intended to reflect a new accord between the US and figures like Mutlak, it seems to have failed in that regard. If, however, the formation of the Maliki government–over the objections of Mutlak–signals a retreat from attempts to co-opt the Sunni insurgency and a dramatic tilt toward the Shiite majority, it is hardly a bold step in this direction.

Presumably, Maliki will have to name permanent ministers to head the two security ministers. Either Maliki will select weak technocrats in the hope that they will signfy as little as possible (more waffling and delay) or the final shoe will drop and Khalilzad will no longer be able to corral reluctant Sunni leaders back into the political process.

It is too early to predict the outcome of back room negotiations over the composition of a new Iraqi government. However, there have been scattered reports, most recently by Agence France-Presse, of an agreement to allow the Shiite Alliance to retain control of the Interior Ministry.

If true, this would tend to undermine the idea that US concern over SCIRI Badr Brigade “death squads” at the Interior Ministry was a central factor in Khalilzad’s refusal to back the first Shiite Alliance government proposed by Ibrahim Jaafari. Has Khalilzad simply retreated? Or was the whole idea–that the US feared uncontrolled Shiite “death squads”–something of a stretch from the start.

Perhaps the controversial outgoing Interior Minister, Bayan Jabr Solagh, knows too much about US participation in the formation of the “death squads” to be easily marginalized at this point. Most recently, he has joined the chorus of complaints about death squads, but he doesn’t accept responsibility for the death squads. Instead, he blows the whistle on the US:

Solagh said most of the human rights abuses attributed to the Iraqi police and interior ministry could be laid at the feet of the various security bodies belonging to other ministries. Referring to the country’s interior and defence ministries, Solagh said: “These forces are out of control. In total there are 200 000 not controlled by the MOI and MOD. “No one controls them, not even the prime minister.” Solagh said that, in addition to the 250 000 armed forces and police members, 200 000 others are guarding ministries, pipelines and infrastructure, or working as private security in the country. In the case of the Facility Protection Service (FPS), which guards the various ministries and consists of almost 150 000 men, the equipment is similar to that of the police, he said. Solagh said: “They have the same cars, the same weapons, the same uniforms as the police, just instead of ‘IP’ it is written ‘FPS’.”

The Interior Minister made similar charges in a BBC interview in April 2006.

Interior Minister Bayan Jabr has admitted that death squads and other unauthorized armed groups are carrying out sectarian murders in his country. The minister alleged that non-governmental security agencies like the Facility Protection Service (FPS) – which was set up under the US governorship in order to protect public buildings – were behind many of the killings. Jabr told the BBC that the 150,000-strong FPS was “out of order, not under our control“.

The US seems to have removed its objections to Shiite control of the ministry some time after he linked the US to the death squads. There has been precious little discussion of the Facility Protection Service. Maybe Jabr is blowing smoke. Maybe not.

In any event, the key to the entire “death squads” issue is that the US at one point had a hand in all this.  Prior attempts to sideline Jabr and the Badr Brigade reflect US fears of Shiite death squads much more than concern over Shiite death squads.  It is a political thing, not a humanitarian thing.

Bush takes a lot of heat for sticking to his guns, most recently from Stephen Colbert:

“When the president decides something on Monday, he still believes it on Wednesday — no matter what happened Tuesday.”

Iraq is, presumably, a case in point. It just ain’t so. In truth, the Bush administration has done nothing but flip flop about the political outcome in Iraq. The long wait for a new government in Iraq is a product of US indecisiveness.

Prime Minister-designate Nouri al-Maliki could form a government today if he didn’t face pressure from US Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad. The Sadrist Shiite parliamentary bloc recently rebuked Khalilzad for pressuring Maliki to make too many accomodations on behalf of the Sunni Arab minority. From the New York Times:

As 275-member parliament convened Sunday, Bahaa al-Araji, a lawmaker loyal to the radical anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, denounced what he said was continued U.S. meddling in the selection of ministers for the coveted interior and defense ministry posts… “Within the past two days, the occupation forces have been interfering with certain names and certain posts,” said al-Araji, whose group holds 30 seats in parliament. “There are also blocs participating in the (formation of) the government that have begun demanding more than what they are entitled to electorally…” he said, singling out the Sunni Arab Accordance Front as one example.

Who is stalling? Araji threatened that if the US did not quit stalling the process on behalf of the Sunni Arab forces, the Shiite alliance would “form a government without regard to their demands.” According to the NYT report, Araji “set a deadline of two-days before the 130 alliance deputies act unilaterally.”

Such a government would, no doubt, drive most Sunni politicians into the hands of the insurgency. The fact that such a government has not been announced is hardly a consequence of Shiite ambivalence or hesitation, however. It is a result of US attempts to pressure Iraqi Shiites to reach out to the Sunni Arab minority.

There have been some moments of extraordinary US political decisiveness in Iraq, but they have always been contradicted in short order. In May 2003, early in the occupation, the Coalition Provisional Authority issues orders to de-Baathify the Iraqi state apparatus and to disband the Sunni Arab-dominated Iraqi Army officer corps. Both steps were bold initiatives designed to signal US support for a full-blown political transformation in Iraq. Both steps also generated massive opposition. In Iraq opposition took the form of the Sunni Arab insurgency. In the US it took the form of a revolt by the Arabist Republican foreign policy establishment.

No later than September 2003, however, Bush administration resolve weakened and started to wobble. Eventually, the de-Baathification order was rescinded and the US began to reach out to former regime elements. By June 2004, the Bush administration took another bold step, albeit one completely at odds with its first bold step. In that month, the Coalition Provisional Authority formally handed sovereignty to Iyad Allawi, a former Baathist. It looked like the US had returned to its older policy of favoring “Saddamism without Saddam.”

If Allawi was supposed to function as an unelected authoritarian Iraqi “strongman,” this role was completely undermined by the January 2005 elections, the October 2005 Constitutional Referendum, and the December 2005 elections. Undertaken with the enthusiastic support of Right Zionists (so-called neocons) and the Iraqi Shiite majority–but over the objections of Right Arabists–these elections put full-blown political transformation back on the Iraqi agenda.

The current stalemate is an index of US flip-flopping and mixed signals. On most days, Ambassador Khalilzad devotes himself to appeasing the Sunni Arab minority–most visibly in the March 2006 attempt to form an extra-Constitutional “national security” council. That one looked like a coup in the making.

Even as the “security” situtation continues to deteriorate on all fronts, the US remains fundamentally unwilling to take a stand and stick with a plan on the “political” front. Plan A: support the Shiite majority and get on with counter-insurgency against the Sunni Arab resistance. Plan B: support Allawi as a new Iraqi strongman and get on with the inevitable counter-insurgency against the (future) Shiite resistance. Plan C: declare Kurdistan the 51st state of the US and get on with the inevitable military clashes with Turkey.Right now, the US seems to be carefully weighing its options and pondering alternative plans. How many US troops died today while the Bush administration sat stewing in its own strategic ambivalence and half-hearted flip-flopping?

In an earlier post I identified several issues that might have been behind the Jaafari impasse. Recent news makes me think that one issue in particular–the question of Kirkuk and Kurdistan–may be worth additional attention.  I refer to the Washington Post news report, highlighted by Swopa, of growing tension between the Mahdi Army of Muqtada al-Sadr and the Kurds of Kirkuk. The report featured Kurdish complaints that Sadr was moving elements of his militia to Kirkuk.

Let’s start with some basics. The city of Kirkuk is home to approximately 40% of Iraqi oil reserves. The city sits atop key oil fields that have been central to the geopolitics of the region for decades. Check out, for example, the prominent place given to discussion of Kirkuk in Ludwell Denny’s 1928 book We Fight for Oil (incredibly, the full text of this long-forgotten out-of-print book is actually online! must be something about the title and our times…hmmm).

Iraq’s Kurdish minority considers Kirkuk to be the capital of “Kurdistan“–a would be nation-state betrayed by the West after World War I that includes sizeable populations in Iraq, Iran, Turkey, and Syria. Kurds accuse Saddam Hussein’s Baathist party of displacing many Kirkuk Kurds; of importing Arab Sunnis and poor Shiites from Sadr city to live in Kirkuk; and of redrawing provincial boundaries to separate Kirkuk from the Kurdish provinces. Iraq’s Turkman minority also calls Kirkuk home.

Since the end of the Gulf War in 1991, Kurds have maintained autonomous control of the Kurdish region of Iraq–except for Kirkuk. The US invasion of Iraq in 2003 ignited Kurdish hopes that a new political structure–especially a new Iraqi Constitution–might allow them to achieve three major goals:

1. Resettlement of Kurds to Kirkuk: This is often referred to as the “normalization of Kirkuk.” The aim is to use population resettlement to reclaim property and restore Kurdish dominance and control within Kirkuk. Arabs (Shiite and Sunni)–and the Turkman population– fear being marginalized and displaced as Kurds reclaim property.

2. Annexation of Kirkuk: At present, Kirkuk is not formally part of the autonomous Kurdish region. Kurds hope to annex Kirkuk and make it formally part of the Kurdish region. Resettlement is, in part, a necessary condition for establishing a population able to win annexation of Kirkuk in any future referendum. Any referendum raises enormous questions about eligibility to vote and Kurds can be expected to press for maximum geographic coverage and Kurdish predominance within the electorate.

3. Federal Autonomy for Kurdistan: The “federalism” demand centers on political control of natural resources, i.e., oil. In a Financial Times editorial (originally published August 16, 2005) the Prime Minister of autonomous Kurdistan demanded Kurdish control over all new/undeveloped oil fields in the region, including the unexploited fields of Kirkuk.

The broad coaltion that aligned itself against Jaafari–the Kurds, Iyad Allawi, and SCIRI–have all made their peace with the Kurds. However, Muqtada al-Sadr–the key player that allowed Jaafari to win the Shiite nomination for Prime Minister after the December 2005 elections–has declared Kirkuk to be a red line. In a February 2005 interview with al-Jazeera, cited in the Washington Post, Sadr gave a clue to the root of his particular brand of Iraqi “nationalism”:

“The problem with Kirkuk is the presence of oil in it… It should be in the ownership of all Iraqis. No one has the right to demand Kirkuk.”

Sadr is often depicted as a radical ideologue. On the issue of Kirkuk, however, he may simply be playing the part of a pragmatic politician defending his constituency, the impoverished Shiites who settled in Kirkuk during Saddam’s rule and who fear being displaced by Kurdish resettlement plans, not to mention the impoverished Shiites of central Iraq who remain in Sadr city and who would be left with no oil wealth if federalism prevailed in the Kurdish north and the Shiite south.
The Jaafari Impasse may have been, at least in part, about Kurdish perceptions that Jaafari–and his Daawa party–were willing to jettison Kurdish concerns about Kirkuk in order to build and maintain an alliance with Sadr.

So far, it is difficult to figure out how Kirkuk figures in the settlement of the Jaafari Impasse. It is certainly possible that the Kurds–who started playing hardball with Jaafari over the issue of Kirkuk since the summer of 2005–decided to back down. They may have decided, under pressure from the US, that their best bet was to renew their alliance with the Shiite parties. Did they get anything in return? Unclear. Did Sadr retreat from his red line on Kirkuk? Unclear. If the Kurdish leadership (or more specifically, Talabani) retreated, look for a split in the Kurdish ranks, especially if Barzani tries to make hay out of Talabani’s compromised position.
If, however, Kirkuk figured as part of a compromise agreement and if the compromise was achieved by moving the question forward in time–to the promise of a 2007 referendum on Kirkuk, for example–then this might explain the recent flurry of news about tension between Sadr and the Kurds over settlement and resettlement.
Is everyone trying to stack the deck ahead of an upcoming referendum?

The selection of Jawad al-Maliki as the new Iraqi Prime Minister does little, so far, to clarify the nature of US objections to the prior designation by the Shiite alliance of Jaafari as PM. Reporters and bloggers have generated elaborate profiles of Maliki’s record, but none have discerned any major differences between Jaafari and Maliki. One US diplomat, cited by the New York Times, reports that Maliki is simply more “competent.” Maybe. But the idea that the administration of George W. Bush put it all on the line in defense of “competence” stretches credulity to the breaking point. Swopa cites the LA Times conclusion: Jaafari and Maliki appear to be carbon copies.

If so, it becomes even more difficult to discern who blinked in the impasse over Jaafari. On the one hand, Khalilzad’s attempt to spin the Maliki deal as “a major positive” seems like a weak effort to cover his losses. Khalilzad’s attack on Jaafari seemed, at times, to aim at reshaping the power balance in Iraqi governance, replacing democratic Shiite majority rule with an extra-constitutional government of “national unity.” No sign of that here. Not yet, at least. If he aimed at substance, he missed. Khalilzad blinked. And lived to fight another day.

On the other hand, if the Shia–Sistani, but especially Sadr who stood by Jaafari for months while the US complained–were really looking to defy the US and establish their political independence, why hand the US even a symbolic victory? Why accept a carbon copy when you hold all the winning cards? Why allow Zhalilzad the (false) image of success?

If personnel changes do little to illuminate the central issues at stake in the Jaafari impasse, policy decisions almost certainly will. First up, according to Reuters, the future of Iraqi militias. Maliki seems to favor “integration” of militias within the official security system, the US allegedly wants the militias disbanded. Is this the real crux of the issue? If so, Maliki seems defiant and the US is headed for tough sledding with the new government. But does the US want “all” militias disbanded? The Kurdish Peshmerga? Nah. The US-instigated and trained Shiite “Commando” units at the Interior ministry? Nah. Sadr’s Mahdi army? Maybe, but why? Hasn’t Sadr has been pretty well contained within the political system? And if Khalilzad is interested in reaching across the sectarian divide, is it plausible to think that Sadr’s nationalism is so dangerous? Sadr has worked overtime to try to keep his own rank-and-file base from retaliating against the Sunni minority for anti-Shiite terror attacks.

During the long months of the Jaafari impasse, Iraqi Shiites rightly suspected that Khalilzad’s real goal was to put the Shiite genie back in the bottle and restore Sunni minority rule in Iraq. If Badr brigade control at the Interior Ministry is a symbolic sign of Shiite power, then the militia issue seems significant at that level. But during the last two months, Khalilzad managed to keep SCIRI closely aligned with his agenda. If there is some massive split between SCIRI and its own militia wing, it is fair to say that the details of such a rupture have been largely ignored by media outlets of all stripes.

Suppose, then, that the real index of US efforts to retreat from de-Baathification is the fate of former-Baathist and pro-Baathist figures like Iyad Allawi, Adnan Pachachi, and Salih Mutlak. If so, then the real mystery of the Jaafari impasse is that it featured entirely mixed-up alliances. Allawi, Pachachi and Mutlak stood with their old sectarian enemies: the Kurds and the pro-Iranian Shiite forces of SCIRI. Standing in opposition to this peculiar re-Baathification initiative was the most ant-Iranian Arab nationalist Shiite leader and the only Shiite leader with links to the Sunni-led insurgency, Muqtada al-Sadr. The alleged reason: Sadr is still bitter that Allawi led military campaigns to crush Sadr during Allawi’s time as US-appointed Prime Minister. Maybe. But the world has seen stranger bedfellows.

Perhaps one reason why Khalilzad blinked and let the Jaafari impasse slide was because the battle lines were not useful for a sustained campaign againt Shiite power. Don’t worry, though, he’ll try again. And next time, he might have Sadr on his side. At the height of Shiite objections to Khalilzad’s post-election maneuvering in favor of a national unity government, Juan Cole noted that Sadr offered up a peculiar, but potentially significant formula: “We want the expulsion of the Occupier and not the American ambassador.” Khalilzad, take note.

The decision by Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari to step aside is illuminating for several reasons. Press reports quote Kurdish politician Mahmoud Othman:

Jaafari’s change of heart followed meetings Wednesday in the Shi’ite holy city of Najaf between UN envoy Ashraf Qazi and both anti-American Shi’ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr and Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the nation’s most prestigious Shi’ite cleric. ”There was a signal from Najaf,” Othman said in an interview. ”Qazi’s meetings with [Sistani] and [Sadr] were the chief reason that untied the knot.”

Othman’s claims, if true, are significant for the following reasons:

1. Sistani has advanced the US agenda in Iraq. This can only be seen as consistent with pre-war planning by neo-conservatives who argued for an alliance between the US and Sistani. For an elaboration of this argument, see my article “Beyond Incompetence: Washingon’s War in Iraq.”

2. Sistani will not deal with the US directly, but he is willling to negotiate and compromise through the legitimating mediation of the UN. Hence the role of UN envoy Ashraf Qazi. Sistani used the same technique in February 2004 when he used the mediation efforts of UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi as cover for an agreement that allowed the US to formally transfer Iraqi sovereignty in June 2004 while postponing Iraqi elections until 2005.
3. Sistani seems willing and able to contain Sadr. Sadr provided Jaafari with much of his base within the Shiite Alliance and Jaafari’s retreat is only possible with the consent of Sadr. Until Sistani withdrew his support, Sadr and Jaafari had boldly defied US demands for Jaafari to step aside.

On the other hand, the end of the Jaafari impasse leaves several issues unresolved, especially the original reasons for US objections to Jaafari. It is possible–but unlikely–that the naming of a new Prime Minister will illuminate the key issues at stake for the US throughout the Jaafari impasse.

Why the original impasse? What does the US want in an Iraqi PM?

1. US Occupation/Status of Forces Agreement: According to a December 2005 AP report, Sadr pressed Jaafari to support a “code of honor” that demanded a timetable for the end of the U.S. military presence. If the US believed that Sadr made this a condition for his support for Jaafari and believed that Jaafari would make good on the promise, then this might provide the key to US objections.

Note, however, that the AP report alleges SCIRI also signed the declaration. This makes it difficult to understand why–after the December 2005 election–the US initially backed the SCIRI candidate, Adel Abdul Mahdi, who lost to Jaafari by one vote in Shiite Alliance balloting for the Prime Minister post.

2. Iran: Jaafari’s party is close to Iran.

Fine, but SCIRI is just as close to Iran. The Iran issue is an obstacle for Bush administration Arabists who never wanted elections or an alliance with Sistani. Bush administration Zionists, however, know Sistani is Persian but remain confident he is no friend of the incumbent “revolutionary” regime in Iran. The key point, from this perspective, is that Sistani is more powerful than any of the political parties. So, why fear Jaafari?

3. Appeasing the Sunni Minority: Jaafari was too closely identified with Shiite militias, Shiite death squads in the Iraqi Interior Ministry, and de-Baathification. Hence, the US pressure for a government of “national unity,” rather than Jaafari-led Shiite sectarianism.

First, the Shiite Interior Ministry is controlled by the Badr brigades, a militia linked to SCIRI, not Jaafari’s Dawa party. And it is far from clear that the Interior Ministry has been as independent of the US as has been alleged by the US in recent days. In any event, if SCIRI-backed death squads are the concern, why the US preference for SCIRI’s Adel Abdul Mahdi? Second, Sadr is the Shiite most inclined to build bridges with Sunni nationalists. Wouldn’t a Jaafari-Sadr alliance present the greatest opportunities for reaching out to Sunni parties, including those close to the insurgency?

4. Neo-Liberalism: Adel Abdul Mahdi is a leading Iraqi neo-liberal.

Fair enough. But it was the old, provisional Jaafari government that tried to cut gasoline subsidies only days after the December 2005 election. True, Sadr opposed these austerity measures and might have had more influence in any new Jaafari government.

5. Kurdistan: Jaafari met with the Turkish government–which opposes Kurdish independenc–wihtout first consulting the Iraqi Kurdish leadership. Sadr is also resistant to Kurdish demands for autonomy and control over the oil-rich city of Kirkuk.

Is the US ready to go to war with the Iraqi Shiite majority and Turkey in order to appease the Iraqi Kurds? The question must be rephrased in order to be answered. Are Bush administration Arabists ready to go to war with the Iraqi Shia? Yes. And the formation of a Sunni Arab/Sunni Kurdish bloc in opposition to the Iraqi Shia is the best way for mobilizing such an effort to restore Sunni Arab power in Iraq. Are Bush adminstration Zionists ready to alienate the Iraqi Shia? No. (For an explanation, see my article “Beyond Incompetence: Washingon’s War in Iraq.”)