Sic Semper Tyrannis 2008

Iran's complex game in Iraq.

Bringing the militias to heel is no easy task, considering that it's not clear that the supposed leaders can even control their own fighters. On Wednesday a spokesman announced that Sadr was freezing his militia for six months to bring rogue elements under control. It's difficult to imagine that Sadr would willingly neutralize the militia that aided his rise to prominence in 2004 and has been an important asset in his difficult and often violent relationship with the government and other Shi'ite factions. More likely he is responding to the bad publicity resulting from the scuttling of the commemoration in Karbala. He responded in similar fashion to this year's U.S. troop surge, pledging his full cooperation. As Americans in Shi'ite areas of Iraq can attest, the gap between Sadr's rhetoric and the actions of his militia is often vast.

Sadr's cagey response to the violence underscores that the armed groups battling in Karbala and other Shi'ite areas aren't simply external forces the government must bring under control - they are, in essence, the government. SIIC and the Sadrists dominate Maliki's increasingly tenuous parliamentary majority. And, while the militias had more than enough fighters on hand in Karbala to spark serious violence, the central government had to bring in reinforcements from outside the area to reassert control.

Meanwhile, the continuing American and British policy is to draw down, not increase, their military presence in southern Iraq. The British are in the midst of pulling out of the port city of Basra. The long-standing American policy has been to defer to Shi'ite religious sensibilities and keep as low a profile as possible in holy cities like Karbala and Najaf.

In what one senior American military official called a "schizophrenic" policy, Iran offers support both to the Mahdi Army and to SIIC, even as they fight each other. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad added insult to injury this week by observing that the Americans were leaving a power vacuum in Iraq that Iran and other nations would be glad to fill. The Iranian strategy of playing both sides may not be tenable in the long-term, but for now it gives Iran influence in southern Iraq that must be the envy of both the Americans and Iraqi politicians in Baghdad. "  Time

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"A schizophrenic policy?"  What a joke!  The Iranians must find us really laughable.

They are playing all these groups against each other in order to have the deciding influence with all of them.  Surely that is not hard to understand.

At the same time they are providing a certain amount of aid to the Sunni based groups just to have a "say" in the game there as well.

Compared to these people, we are children.  pl

http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20070831/wl_time/iraqmilitiasfightingforsupremacy

Who is Moqtada al-Sadr?

We ought not to let the comic opera aspects of Moqtada al-Sadr's theatricality deceive us into thinking he is not important in Iraq. 

I have listened to much learned  discussion of his immaturity, the "cloud" over his father's credentials, the splintered nature of his movement and forces.  All true.  He does often seem to be channeling" the Mad Mullah stereotype that so thickly populated old movies like "Drums," one of my favorites.

In spite of all that I think he is probably the man of the future in Shia Iraq.  The coming departure of the British from the south of Iraq will signal the onset of all out struggle; political, paramilitary, and financial for ultimate authority in the Shia run parts of the country.

Shiism is a social construct (and faith) of the disinherited and hungry.  He stands for the Shia poor and their ultimate dreams.  The secular world thinks the idea of the return of the Mahdi/Occulted Imam is absurd, that this supposed belief must be a fraud on some level.  The poor men who carry guns for Moqtada do not think it is a fraud.  they believe that the Mahdi will return soon to restore justice to the earth and that Jesus will come with him.

Moqtada has had a difficult time disciplining his growing "forces."  This was inevitable in a grass roots movement made up of human material focused on salvation and looking to him for leadership rather than command.

Whether or not  one thinks that he was somehow responsible for the recent tragedy at Karbala, it is now clear that he is going to take the opportunity provided by that event to reform his movement and to seek command of those who say they follow him.  We will see if he can do that.

Sadr, IMO, is not really focused on the coalition or the American forces.  He is waiting for them to leave.  When that happens he will seek to become the power behind the prime minister.  pl

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/world/iraq/bal-te.iraq30aug30,0,6258228.story

"Considering a War With Iran" SOAS

One of our readers asked me to look at this paper.  Having done so my opinion is that the authors  need to develop a healthy sense of skepticism when confronted with bureaucratic statements of intent with regard to desired capability.

The premise of the paper is that the US possesses the ability to attack 10,000 Iranian targets from a great distance on a nearly simultaneous basis.  The authors believe this because the US Strategic Command (old SAC) has as its goal to achieve such a capability and a clutch of think tanks are holding meetings about it.

Just after the first Gulf War a senior civilian colleague approached me to express outrage that the "smart" weapons in use had Pk (probability of kill) rates lower in fact than those promised by the manufacturers.  She was surprised when I told her that highly complex equipment (gadgets) never performed as advertised and that they usually broke down just when needed. 

The point is that these two academic authors actually believe the "air power" baloney.  They think that a renewed attempt to apply the principle of "shock and awe" will result in complete devastation of Iran, Iranian inability to respond and a very short war.

Douhet, Trenchard and Mitchell would be pleased with their gullibility.

In fact such a strike would be merely the opening battle in yet another long war fought against a major piece of the Islamic World.

The current IO campaign against Iran makes it seem more and more plausible that such an onslaught will be attempted.  pl

http://www.rawstory.com/images/other/IranStudy082807a.pdf

Basra - Last Hurrah for the Special Relationship?

"The British army is not on the"verge of collapse" - see pw. above.  The British army, like the American army at present, is incredibly stretched and subject to stress - falling recruitment levels, long tours of duty, wear and tear on equipment, high levels of mental stress among troops.  But on the verge of collapse?  The French army in 1917 on the Western Front mutinied; the Italian army retreate from Caporetto was a chaotic debacle; the Iraqi army in the first gulf war fell apart  at the first hint of allied assault.  Those are what you would call collapses. There will be no such collapse - not mutiny nor blind panic stricken chaotic retreat - that will afflict the British or American armies.

pw imagines the politician who associates himself with withdrawal from Iraq will win the election.  Not true.  Iraq and Afghanistan are unpopular wars/occupations here but are not by any stretch of the imagination deeply significant factors in elections.  Iraq rarely makes the headlines and usually is on somewhere like page six, bottom paragraph of the newspapers, or item four in the TV news broadcasts.  The next election will be won or lost on the performance of the economy, and a judgement of the Government's general level of competence.  Only one political leader has openly and unequivocably called for an end to the occupation - Menzies Cambell, leader of the Liberal Democratic party.  This will in the next election, as it always does, get 20 to 25% of the votes and 10% of the seats in the Commons.  The old Liberal party (now theLiberal Democrats) last governed Britain in the period during and immediately after the Great War of 1914 -1918.  Campbell has not a snowball in hell's chance of becoming the next PM.  Cameron, leader of the Conservative party, will remain uncommitted on the issue of whether or not to withdraw British troops; Browne, our "socialist" PM will continue to promise to stand "shoulder to shoulder" with the Americans while he quietly desrts them and oversees the slow withdrawal from Basra."  Mike G

The British Withdrawal from Basra

"The US soldiers are expected to move south early next year, when Downing Street hopes to begin a scale down that will lead to a complete departure. Iraqi sources last night confirmed earlier reports that Britain would pull its remaining 500 troops out of Basra Palace - the last remaining garrison in the city itself - in a matter of days, paving the way for a full scale withdrawal in the coming months.

But the British officer also added: "It's clear from talking to the Americans that they are going to have to fill the gap we will leave.

The feeling is that the moment the vacuum opens there the Iranian Revolutionary Guard will be in like a shot. The Americans are talking about sending a brigade, but it's still fluid."

The likely US presence in the south is smaller than the 5,500 strong British force currently deployed, but US brigades come with far more air power than their counterparts."  The Independent

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I have a lot of respect for British troops, but there is no doubt that the vacuum created in southern Iraq by their government's decision to withdraw them will have to be filled by US troops.  This is yet another burden for a force that is already too small.

I have written often of the danger posed by the exposed US supply line in the same area.  That supply line will have to be protected.  In the same way, the city of Basra can not be completely surrendered to ISCI, the Sadrists and/or their Iranian friends.

pl

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/08/26/nbrown226.xml

"Iraq Tribal Study - Al Anbar Governorate"

"Today, the support of Sunni tribal leaders against al-Qaeda in Iraq is hailed as one of the few successes from the U.S. troop increase this year.

The Iraq Tribal Study provided a handbook on how to gain that support by covering the basics. One section, titled "How to Work With Tribesmen," explains that "RESPECT ( Ihtiram in Arabic) is the key," and also warns: "Do not assume that they want to be like you."

The study summed up how the Sunni tribes viewed the conditions that Washington established in Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussen. "Throughout the modern history of Iraq, the Sunni tribes have occupied a privileged position in Iraq society and enjoyed wealth, autonomy and political clout," the report said. "To lose those advantages in a system of proportional representation that empowered the Shia, or in a truncated Iraq with a Kurdish autonomous province, would bring shame to a long and prosperous Sunni history."

It also cautioned that the main themes of the U.S. message in Iraq -- "freedom and democracy" -- do not resonate well with the population "because freedom is associated with chaos in Iraq." In addition, the Sunnis "are deathly afraid of being ruled by a Shia government, which they believe will be little more than a puppet of the Shia religious extremists in Iran.""  Pincus

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This book was written for the Defense Department by a group of colleagues of whom I was happy to be a member.  It was completed in June, 2006.

Although unclassified the book has not been released to the public and for that reason I can not provide it to you.  pl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/26/AR2007082601143.html

John Warner - I hope he runs again..

Senator Warner was on MTP today.  Senator Warner knows that the present US force levels in Iraq are not sustainable.  He knows that the force must be heavily reduced next year.  There are a number of reasons for this but the bottom line is that the numbers just are not there.  The sizing of the ground forces that was done after the end of the Cold War, was not based on the idea of an interventionist foreign policy.  The Bush Administration did not react to 9/11 by starting an increase in the size of those forces.  As a result the forces are TOO SMALL to sustain continued rotations at the "surge" level.  The numbers MUST come down.  In the message that he has delivered to the White House, Warner is trying to get the president's attention, to warn him that time is running out in the real world, as opposed to the world of the sycophants who surround Bush.

MG Lynch, presently in Iraq, somewhere in what he calls his "battle space," has presumed to instruct members of the US Congress with regard to foreign policy.  "Civics" is a little taught curriculum item in the high schools these days.  When I was a boy, it was core curriculum everywhere.  I learned in high school that US military officers are the servants of the civilian government.  I guess Lynch never learned that.  The decision to go to war, the decision to remain at war, the decision to end wars, these are all foreign policy decisions.  They are not the province of uniformed leaders.  Lynch is way off the reservation in what he has been saying about Clinton, Warner and Levin.  Now we have "legionary" commanders dictating from the Rhine what policy should be?

The Congress has no say in such things except for funding?  The US Congress intervened mightily in the conduct of the Civil War through the "Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War."  Then there was the raging controversy that went on in the Congress during the Philippine Insurrection and over the Platt Amendment...  Shall I continue?

Lynch said that the insurgents will re-occupy the ground that he and his men have gained if our troops are withdrawn.  Well, fellah, unless one subscribes to the idea that the US intends to remain in Iraq permanently, (I do not.) then Iraqis of one stripe or another will have to take charge of your "battle space."  When do you intend to hand it over to them?

The Iraqi Government?  There is no Iraqi Government.  pl

http://www.knx1070.com/pages/856595.php?contentType=4&contentId=838843

http://www.civilwarhome.com/committee.htm

See Barabara Tuchman's "The Proud Tower" for a discussion of the Phillipine controversy.

Anbar and Diyala - Bad news for AQinM

"Alleged al-Qaida fighters attacked a Sunni village east of Baqouba on Thursday and killed a village leader who had led the community in an uprising against the terrorist organization, witness and police said.

At the same time Timim, a nearby Shiite village, came under attack, again by alleged al-Qaida fighters. A total of 15 people, including seven women, were killed and 22 wounded in the two assaults, said Baqouba police Brig. Ali Dlaiyan.

Ten attackers were killed as villagers fought back, he said. A joint U.S.-Iraqi force had blocked the region.

The attack began at 6:30 a.m. by about 25 gunmen on the Ibrahim al-Yahya village when the fighters exploded a bomb at the house of Sheik Younis al-Shimari, destroying his home and killing him and one member of his family. Ten people were wounded, including four other members of the family and passers-by. Some of the wounded were hit by gunfire.

"They were shouting Allah Akbar and Curse be upon the Renegades," said Umm Ahmed, who was among the three women wounded in the attack. She refused to give her full name fearing retribution. "This attack will cause the uprising against them to spread to other villages.""  IHT

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Not a bad day's work for the villagers.  If AQinM feels constrained to attack Sunni villages to try to discipline them and regain control, then they are in a sorry state.  If villagers are willing to defend themselves against AQinM, then a kind of turning point has been reached.  If the technique of accepting the "rally" of previous hostiles has been successfully exported from tribal territory in Anbar, then something serious is happening.  The US military has "broken the code" on this.  It took a long time, but, better late than...

Those who believe that war must follow the dictates of policy however foolish are upset about this development.  They argue that there is a government in Baghdad.  It was elected under a constitution that most admired.  They reason that the present government must have all power in the state and must dictate the terms of power and wealth sharing.

It does not seem to matter for people who reason that way that the government in Baghdad is unrepresentative of the Sunni Arabs and unwilling to share power or wealth with them.  It does not seem to matter that an armed citizenry is the best guarantee of government moderation.  Federalist #46 argues differently, but no matter.

There is a major disagreement building up between the civilians and the newly pragmatic military.  This should be interesting.  pl

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/08/23/africa/ME-GEN-Iraq.php

Nuri al-Maliki, Time's up?

"US President George W Bush has withheld support for embattled Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, saying Iraqi voters could decide to replace him.

"There's a certain level of frustration with the leadership in general," Mr Bush said today, after two senior US senators suggested Iraq's parliament remove Mr Maliki's government if it fails to make progress on national reconciliation.

While Mr Bush acknowledges the Baghdad government is failing to live up to expectations, he plans to issue a stark warning in a speech tomorrow that an early US withdrawal from Iraq could have traumatic consequences similar to the Vietnam War's bloody aftermath. The Australian

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"In Cambodia, the Khmer Rouge began a murderous rule in which hundreds of thousands of Cambodians died by starvation, torture, or execution. In Vietnam, former American allies, government workers, intellectuals, and businessmen were sent off to prison camps, where tens of thousands perished. "  The Australian

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I thought we had learned not to push our "friends" this way.  Ngo Dinh Diem's placid face and white suits should haunt us.  We connived at his removal and no subsequent government achieved real legitimacy in the eyes of the Vietnamese (or us).

What the clever people in this administration seem to "miss" is that there is no one in Iraq who will do any better at stabilizing the country than Maliki.

We re-made the government on the basis of individual rights and interests but the Iraqis don't function that way.  They think of themselves as members of groups, just like the bonzes who burned themselves on the streets of Saigon so long ago.

Maliki knows that his real job is to ensure that the Shia Arabs will be the "overdogs."  In his mind he is the defender of Shia rights in Iraq.  Someone else would merely be the defender of some other group.  There are a few, like Allawi, who think of themselves PRIMARILY as Iraqi, but we saw how well he did at election time.  What a disappointment that must have been.

We keep "screwing up" in places like Vietnam and Iraq because we (as a people) do not accept the relevance of history and cultural difference.  We insists on believing  people are all pretty much the same and that they will behave as we think we would behave.  Nonsense.  We and another set of peoples have paid the price for that cultural blindness once again.

"Swapping" Maliki for someone else would be pointless.  The groups will not share power and wealth amicably.  In their minds that is simply arming and equipping one's enemies.

We are doing the right thing now in Anbar and Diyala.  In those places we are balancing real forces not constitutional fantasies.  Let us get on with that process and start working toward real accommodation with the neighboring states.  pl

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22288051-15084,00.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ngo_Dinh_Diem

Oh, by the way.  US forces had been completely out of VN for two years when the NVA attacked in violation of the cease-fire and over-ran the country.  pl

A recall of Tenet's medal would be a good idea.

" "The agency and its officers did not discharge their responsibilities in a satisfactory manner," the CIA Inspector General found.

"They did not always work effectively and cooperatively," the report stated."  Shrader

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And that's the truth.  The CIA like the DIA failed miserably to penetrate the apparatus of the takfiri jihadi networks.  Such penetrations would have enabled the US to anticipate coming jihadi actions.

Once again it will be said that penetrating these groups is "too hard to do."  Rubbish.  I know better.

Why were these groups not penetrated?

Timidity.  Fear of Risks,  Bureaucratic inertia.  Poor leadership at the top in all the significant organizations.

Has anything changed?  I doubt it.  If it had, bin Laden would be dead by now.  pl

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070821/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/cia_sept11

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