Baquba Can't be Held by Iraq Troops: Bednarak
This AP story made me angry. I admire a straight shooter, so I am glad that Brig. Gen. Mick Bednarak admitted to AP that the Iraqi Army is not up to actually holding the neighborhoods in Baquba that US troops recently cleared, in hard fighting, of Salafi Jihadi guerrillas.
So Baquba is a city of like 300,000 northeast of Baghdad, in Diyala Province. Diyala has a 60% Sunni majority, and it had a lot of Baath military bases in the old days. It is now ruled by the (Shiite) Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, which benefits from the province's proximity to Iran. The previous Iraqi military commander had to be fired because he was helping, behind the scenes, Shiite militias.
So the Sunni Arabs in Baquba are done out. They have a Shiite government in their province that they don't want, and they have a Shiite/Kurdish government in Baghdad that sends Shiite troops of the Iraqi Army against them. The Sunni Arab neighborhoods of Baquba have thrown up local militias, and they have made alliances with Baathi and Salafi Jihadi cells.
The US military spent last week trying to 'clear' these Sunni Arab neighborhoods of 'al-Qaeda.' But I doubt they have Bin Laden's telephone number. They are just local guys or foreign volunteers who don't like seeing Sunni Arabs subjected to Shiite ayatollahs and secessionist Kurds.
As US troops fought on Sunday, they discovered that the guerrilla leaders had set mines and then made themselves scarce.
So after 6 days of hard fighting, in which US troops were killed and wounded, what do we have?
A sullen, defiant Sunni Arab urban population.
A guerrilla leadership that slipped away.
An Iraqi army unable actually to hold the 'cleared' neighborhoods, which are likely to throw up more guerrilla leaders and campaigns.
A continued dominance of Sunni Arabs in Diyala by a Shiite government completely unacceptable to them.
A US commitment to upholding the Shiite ("Iraqi") government.
So I am angry because this looks to me like we sent our guys to fight and die for a piece of political quicksand in which the entire endeavor is likely to sink.
It is not right.
Labels: Iraq
posted by Juan Cole @ 6/25/2007 04:15:00 AM
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16 Comments:
So where does this leave the "clear, hold, build" strategy that the surge supposedly made possible?
Extremely well put, Prof. Cole.
I admire your work on Iraq.
TOM BURKE, Milwaukee.
I think the problem lies with the inability of the political leadership here in the US to effectively seek out and establish an understanding with the various Iraqi groups, Shiite, Kurdish and Sunni, and then work toward a comprehensive and coordinated plan for Iraq.
What we have seen is a fits and starts approach, whether it is the arming of Sunnis to fight Al Qaeda, or building up an Iraqi police and military force that is full of Shia militiamen, and then turning around and attacking Shiite militia leaders.
It seems as if the teams negotiating with the Sunnis have no idea of what the teams negotiating with the Kurds or the Shiite groups are doing.
And the loosely defined 'insurgents', who are routinely conflated with 'Al Qaeda' for the sake of American audiences, seem to have no problems keeping a few steps ahead of the US military and the Iraqi security forces as they sweep from one province to another.
- Abhinav Aima
Lately, we have begun to notice that, more and more, the US military and the mainstream media are characterizing all Iraqi guerrillas as "al Qaeda." What's interesting about this is that it doesn't make much difference to the outcome on the ground if the guerrillas are al Qaeda, Salafi Jihadists or Baathists. We will kill them or they will kill us, and we will prevail or they will prevail, whoever they are. The difference, I suspect, is that there is no limit to the determination of the American people to fight al Qaeda, while our commitment to fighting Salafi Jihadists, Baathists and other guerrillas amid the deadly confusion of an Iraqi civil war is certainly limited.
For all his carefully crafted reputation as a brillant counter-insurgency strategist and tactician or better, because of it, I have insisted from the very first announcement of Petraeus's appointment that Bush chose this dangerous man, not as a signal of any new or enlightened approach but because he gives good PR.
The latest offensive justifies my concerns. As Josh Marshall and Glenn Greenwald have documented,
there's been a surfeit of "Al Quaeda" references in press coming out of "the Central Front". Seems the only people we're fighting are Al Qaeda armed by Iran. Friday we were "kicking AlQaeda butt" (actual quote from an embedded reporter via IraqSlogger!) from Baquba to Beruit; Saturday, they'd given us the slip. Sunday US forces couldn't get into the city because of minefields and anyway we're told the Iraqis can't hold the town!
Breakout the hip boots. We've got over two months to go before this all culminates in a 9/11 offensive of flag waving at the "Islamofascists"
Your post rightly touches on something that the media often misunderstands.
Coalition casualties are not a measure of success or failure. They are a cost -- the most important cost -- we pay for the Iraq War.
I hope that whatever we gain is worth what we're paying. Unfortunately it looks like we getting nothing, at best.
If not for propagandists like Faux "News" and the hard-core Shrubbots, most Americans would have realized this long ago and demanded change. It is an outrage, and now even Republican Congressfolk are starting to get it.
The 5th Iraqi Army Division that controls Diyala is the worst of the original 10 Iraqi Army Divisions (IADs).
Major General Shakir Hulail Hussein, the commander of the 5th Iraqi Army Division, was relieved of his command (he was widely accused by sunni arabs of being a front for JAM) and replaced by Staff Brigadier General Abdul-Hussein al-Timimi.
Gen al-Timimi's subordinates still don't know how the new CO (commanding officer) likes to run things. As a result they are reluctant to show initiative.
I think that the Iraqis and we need to give Gen al-Timimi a chance to turn 5th IAD around. I would note that 5th IAD has a lot of Sunni Arab officers and soldiers in its ranks (although they represent less than the 48% of Sunni Arabs in Diyala province). With good leadership, improvement can be quick.
The IP (Iraqi Police) in Diyala are worse than the IA (Iraqi Army). It will take time to fix them.
It is thought that most Al-Qaeda/Takfiri/Jihadi terrorist attacks in Iraq were coming from Diyala province. The current operation had to be done to secure the rest of Iraq.
One short term affect of Operation Arrow-Head will be lower ordinary crime rates and violent deaths in the province. This should jump start government services and the private sector. Whether this can be sustained over time depends on the Provincial government, Provincial and local IP, and Gen al-Timimi.
If they can hold the fort in Diyala for the next 9 months or so, the GoI should be able to send one additional high quality IA brigade to the province. (By 2.28.08, all of Iraq except Baghdad and Diyala will be "PIC").
Assuming that Congress allows large number of US combat troops to stay in Iraq (say 14 of the current 20 combat brigades in country), come next spring a lot of US brigades will be available for "3D" (civil affairs, governance, economic development) operations in Diyala. [They won't be needed elsewhere, excluding Baghdad. A US military presence should also accelerate improvements in the Diyala IP and 5th IAD.]
Iraqis have no alternative but to try to stabilize Diyala province. It is at the fault line of different communities and tensions that could spark a broader civil war in Iraq, or a regional war that drags in many countries.
Does anyone here have any insight into when new provincial elections will be held in Diyala? (Provincial and local elections will be held across all of Iraq on 01.09.)
The biggest fears sunni arabs in Diyala have are Jaish-e-Mohammed, Badr and Iran. JAM and Badr are seen by many as Iranian quislings. They blame Iran for the sectarian murders and head drillers that are attacking them. Many of them even believe that Iran is backing Al-Qaeda attacks against them (Muqtada himself makes that accusation). Will the GoI be able to reassure Diyala Sunni Arabs that it can and will protect them from Shia extremists? Will PM Maliki be willing to defy his allies to do it?
First of all, the Anbar tribal heads are not remotely pro-US, and the US is fully aware of that. It is just a marriage of convenience.
As for Baquba, the "clear" bit is easy if you have armor and air power, and they don't. The "hold" bit is as you describe and the US knows that from bitter experience, but it is different this time.
The Anbar success has been like an earhquake in Iraq. Few months aga, the Americans described Anbar as a lost cause, then the tribes fixed it with their own light weapons and zero support from Baghdad. This is now the template, and is already being activated in some areas in outer Baghdad itself.
The Shi'a-Kurdish coalition went hopping mad first, but the US generals told them to keep out of it. Maliki just did a 180 degrees saying that HIS plan in Anbar has worked, and his earlier statement, which actually included a threat to attack the tribes, were mis-understood. He also said that HIS security plan is coming to fruition now so he can turn his attention to other matters!
I am looking forward to your opinion of the following WSJ news item.
Iraq's cabinet approved U.S.-backed oil legislation and Parliament is expected to start discussing it next week.
Prof. Cole:
Thank you so much for being one of the few voices committed to discussing the reality of Iraq.
Thanks professor-this post gets to the heart of the danger of US policy in Iraq.
Truly they are plowing the sea--they push the insurgents out of one area only to have them come back in again behind them.
Well, they did kill 50-100 insurgents but I suppose the entire operation was a complete failure because they didn't acheive any long term sectarian reconciliation. What a waste.
do you want Iraqi Oil in your bigass suv / bubba truck or not ?
if the usa has to kill every single Iraqi fighting its occupation and Oil stealing, dems are the breaks.
very truly yours,
richard b. cheney
We have watched with interest over the last couple of years as the mainstream media - with some noble and notable exceptions - have blindly repeated the administration/military definitions of who they are fighting in Iraq.
We are among the few who have actually done any primary source reporting on this issue. In ten months of speaking with people who are involved in the violence against coalition forces and their Iraqi allies we learned that they are overwhelmingly Iraqi and are motivated by either a secular or religiously based nationalism.
The resulting film - "Meeting Resistance" - lays out clearly the foundations and development of the very complex situation we see in Iraq today and provides a basis from which to ask the questions necessary to the Iraq debate.
For more information and to see clips from the film, visit www.meetingresistance.com
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