IRAQ - Basra fight widens rift among Shiite factions

IRAQ - Basra fight widens rift among Shiite factions

NOTE FROM TGR: Should we be looking for an American action against Iran, military or otherwise, claiming that Iran is the cause of the current outbreak of violence in Iraq? The USA would need to argue that Sunni, Shiite, tribal, Kurdish, etc. splits are not the evident cause of what is now happening.



csmonitor.com - The Christian Science Monitor Online

posted March 27, 2008 at 5:04 p.m. EST - http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0328/p25s01-woiq.html

Basra fight widens rift among Shiite factions

In Baghdad Thursday, thousands protested the Iraqi government's battle with the Mahdi Army militia loyal to Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.

By Sam Dagher | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor
and Abdul-Karim al-Samer | Contributor to The Christian Science Monitor



Baghdad and Basra, Iraq



(Photograph)



Mahdi Army fighters loyal to Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr stood in Basra, Iraqi, on Thursday. Fighting raged in the oil-rich city for the third straight day and the militiamen continued to control the streets.
AP



(Photograph)



In Baghdad on Thursday, thousands of Moqtada al-Sadr supporters protested against the Iraqi government crackdown on the Mahdi Army militia. Many carried posters of the Shiite cleric and chanted “No, no to America.”
Ceerwan Aziz/Reuters

Moqtada al-Sadr's powerful Shiite movement upped the ante Thursday in its battle with Iraqi government forces. Militiamen loyal to the young cleric refused to back down in their fight in the southern oil-rich city of Basra and his foot soldiers in Baghdad took to the streets in a show of force, calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

The clock continues to tick away on Mr. Maliki's 72-hour ultimatum for Mr. Sadr's Mahdi Army militia to lay down its weapons in Basra or face all-out assault. At the moment, witnesses in Basra say there appears to be no sign of any letup in fighting between government forces and the Shiite gunmen, who are said to still control 75 percent of the city.

"We have made up our minds and we have waged this war and we will continue till the end. No retreat, no compromise, no accords," said Maliki during a meeting with local tribal leaders in Basra. He remains in the city to oversee the battle there that has killed at least 50 people so far.

The continuation of fighting marks a serious escalation in a long-simmering battle between Iraq's rival Shiite factions that pits Sadr, whose influence extends into key government ministries and spans across Baghdad and nine southern provinces, against factions allied to Maliki's Dawa Party such as the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq and its affiliate the Badr Organization.

The fight in Basra is also having global implications. After news broke that one of Iraq's main oil export pipelines from Basra exploded, cutting at least a third of the exports from the city that provides 80 percent of the government's revenue, oil prices jumped more than $1 a barrel, Reuters reported.

However, according to Jamal Hamed al-Fraih, spokesman for the South Oil Company, it was a pipeline feeding crude oil to one of the main refineries in the province that was struck. Mr. Fraih said that a fire that raged for hours Thursday has come under control but that now the main refinery of Shuaiba has come to a standstill because of a power outage.

"Oil exports are still flowing but they are less than a few days ago," he said adding that oil exports from Basra, Iraq's main outlet, had been averaging 1.5 million barrels a day before the start of fighting.

Fraih also said the company is bracing for the worst. He said all administrative offices, including the headquarters in the city, were closed with extra security forces mobilized to protect them. "Yes there is a great risk that company property maybe attacked or looted."

Elsewhere in Basra, one of Saddam Hussein's former regime palaces – occupied by British forces until September when they pulled out to an airbase on the outskirts of the city – now serves as one of the main bases of Iraqi government forces and was hit with heavy mortar fire.

The US-funded Arab television station Al Hurra reported that a contingent of US Marines was now in Basra's city center and involved mainly in sniper operations. This could not be immediately confirmed with the US military. But several residents reported that they saw snipers posted on roof tops especially in the neighborhood of Tamimyah.

The US military has so far insisted that only US advisers and so-called "transition teams" embedded with Iraqi troops are in Basra. Coalition aircraft are providing air cover and surveillance support.

Al Sharqiya TV, a private Iraqi station often critical of the Iraqi government, showed what it said were exclusive images of masked militiamen – some of them in military fatigues – parading in Humvees they had seized from Iraqi government forces in Basra. The words "Mahdi Army" and "Mahdi's Followers" were spray painted in black on the white-washed vehicles. There was also footage of what looked like the remains of burnt Iraqi Army vehicles. The militiamen chanted and danced, flashing victory signs.

Yahya al-Taiee, a Basra-based lawyer and member of the Sadr movement, said many Iraqi soldiers have surrendered themselves and their vehicles to the Mahdi Army. His claims could not be immediately verified.

"The fight will go on until the end. We will do whatever Sayyed [an honorific] Moqtada orders," Mr. Taiee said, as the sound of explosions echoed in Hay al-Hussein, one of the militia's Basra strongholds.

A rare interview with Sadr is scheduled to be broadcast on Al Jazeera Saturday. He has been out of public view since May of last year.

Basra residents contacted say they fear a prolonged battle. Many have been without water or electricity since Tuesday. In some areas, hospitals and medical care was unavailable. Food was also running out.

"It's all a grab for oil and power. They couldn't care less about what happens to people," grumbled a man interviewed in the Basra neighborhood of Junaina. He gave his name as Abu Hussein.

Violence in Basra has spread to parts of the capital and other towns and cities between Baghdad and the southern oil city. Since Wednesday, at least 60 people have been killed in violence in Hilla, 60 miles south of Baghdad.

The Associated Press cited police officials as saying that 40 gunmen had been killed and 75 others wounded in clashes in Kut, southeast of Baghdad.

In Baghdad itself, fighting involving US and Iraqi forces continued for a second day in Sadr City, the Mahdi Army militia's stronghold, with at least 40 people reported killed. Gunmen kidnapped Tahseen al-Shaikhly, an Iraqi civilian spokesman for Baghdad security operations, after killing three of his bodyguards and torching his house in the neighborhood of Ameen, a Mahdi Army stronghold in southeastern Baghdad.

Salvos of rockets and mortars, mostly originating from Sadr City, also continued to slam into the heavily fortified Green Zone, home to the US Embassy and the Iraqi government.

In the Kadhimiyah district of Baghdad, the location of a revered Shiite shrine, thousands of Sadr supporters marched through the streets as police stood back, apparently concerned about a violent response. Small, angry mobs broke away from the main demonstration and burned photos of Maliki against an image of a US flag.

"After Saddam's infidel regime collapsed ... many parties pretending to have been in the opposition and to [be speaking] in the name of the oppressed climbed to the top on our shoulders. After they have achieved their goals they became mere slaves and puppets in the hands of the occupier," Mazen al-Saadi, one of the turbaned clerics leading the march, told the crowds. "We call for the ouster of Maliki and his government."

"No, no to America," screamed the crowd.









CNN.com






















Analysis: Al-Sadr in trouble, Iraq headed for meltdown

* Story Highlights

* CNN analysts assess what Basra fighting says about Iraq's future

* Michael Ware: Iran fosters clashes among rival Shiite factions

* Michael Holmes: Crisis is opportunity for central government to stand up

* Sheppard: Breakdown could lead to political chaos, loss of gains from surge

(CNN) -- The fighting among Shiite militias and government troops in Basra is a glimpse of Iraq's future, and pivotal cleric Muqtada al-Sadr is in deep trouble, according to two CNN correspondents and a CNN military analyst.

The fiery religious leader has a loyal following in Baghdad's Sadr City neighborhood and other enclaves thanks to generous social programs, but his political movement, his Mehdi Army militia and the cease-fire al-Sadr recently extended are no match for Iranian intrigue, according to CNN's experts.

"Al-Sadr is involved in a very complicated relationship with the Iranians," said CNN Baghdad correspondent Michael Ware. "The Iranians do provide funding and support for his militia, yet at the same time they're trying to rein him in and get him to adopt a certain political agenda, which from time to time he resists."

Ware said Iran wants to use al-Sadr's populist base to advance its agenda in Iraq. "However, they don't want to see him get too big for his boots or to rise to a position where they can no longer have sway over him."

Iran has weakened al-Sadr by encouraging dissension within his Mehdi Army and backing hardliners -- known as the Special Groups -- who break away and keep up the fight against the U.S. occupation, Ware said.

"Iran's very good at putting pressure on you, forcing you to split, and anything that squeezes out the side, Iran picks up and turns into hardline factions," Ware said. "That's exactly what's happened to Muqtada. He's had purge after purge after purge of belligerent commanders, and they've all been swept up by Iran.

"And now the most lethal attacks on U.S. forces, the most coordinated attacks on U.S. forces, the most daring attacks on U.S. forces in the country are committed by Iranian-backed breakaway elements of Muqtada's militia faction." Learn more about the Mehdi Army and other key players in Basra »

The violence in Basra -- which has spread to Shiite areas throughout the country, including Baghdad -- is a kind of fighting Americans are unaccustomed to seeing, said retired Air Force Maj. Gen. Donald Sheppard, CNN's senior military analyst. VideoWatch the violence multiply »

"This is intra-Shia. This is not Sunni vs. Shia, this is not civil war, this is not sectarian violence, it's intra-Shia politics for control of the government," he said.

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki is trying to hold together his political alliance -- an alliance that includes the political wings of the militias he's fighting, Sheppard said.

"If this alliance breaks apart because of the fighting, you've got chaos within the Parliament," Sheppard said. VideoWatch Sheppard assess the military situation »

So far, al-Sadr has resisted the temptation to end the Mehdi Army cease-fire, which, combined with the simultaneous increase in U.S. forces last year, had brought a sharp reduction in violence.

If the truce ends, "the success of the surge is going to be hugely in doubt," said CNN International correspondent Michael Holmes. "I've always said, yes the surge has reduced violence in Baghdad, but you have to put it in context: Why has it reduced the violence, and what else has happened?

"It's a lot like squeezing a balloon, as a general told me: You squeeze it in Baghdad, it pops out elsewhere. Where you've seen a lot of the militiamen go, a lot of the insurgents go, is to the south and mainly to the north, which is why you're seeing a lot of action up in Mosul."

And the Mehdi Army and Badr Brigades -- the principal combatants in the Basra region -- are hardly the only militias at arms in Iraq. Indeed there are dozens, each with its own political, social, religious and military agenda, Ware noted. VideoWatch Ware look ahead to a post-American Iraq »

"What worries me the most is all of the good work that we've done with the surge, spreading higher levels of security throughout Iraq, the people slowly gaining confidence in their own security forces -- that could all break down," Sheppard said.

"It could all break down because of Basra, it could break down because al-Sadr basically ends the truce and fighting starts all over the country in the Shia areas.

"This is very, very serious and it could all go wrong for the United States as we try to extricate ourselves. It could go wrong in many, many ways and cause everything to come apart there."

But Holmes suggested there's a chance al-Maliki and Iraq will survive this crisis.

"This could be a good test of Nuri al-Maliki and the security forces. They're going to have to stand up at some point; maybe this is a time to see how they do."

Ware doubts the security forces can prevent a meltdown.

"This is a window into the future of Iraq after the American withdrawal," Ware said.

"What many people suggest is that we're looking at a situation that will be akin to Lebanon in the 1980s, with vicious, well-armed militia proxy wars where all the factions are supported by one foreign sponsor or another.

"But this will be Lebanon on steroids."









Times Online

From The Times

March 27, 2008
Iraqi militia success means Britain must fight – or admit failure

Richard Beeston, Foreign Editor

The battle for Basra now raging on the streets of Iraq’s second city shows every sign of turning into a nightmare for the dwindling British forces based near by.

For months Britain has been quietly reducing its presence in Iraq with the intention of pulling out altogether. First it withdrew last September from the Basra Palace base in the city centre and moved its forces to the airport. Then it changed its tactical role to “overwatch”, a vague term for supporting the Iraqi security forces nominally in control of the port city.

The intention was to withdraw British forces from frontline duties and concentrate on training Iraqis and offering support when needed. But the problem from the outset has been the failure of the Iraqi army and police to take control of the city, a mission that British troops, with the advantage of modern equipment and training, had failed to do during their four years in southern Iraq. Instead the Shia Muslim militias — the Mahdi Army loyal to Moqtadr al-Sadr, the Badr Brigades of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq and the smaller Fadillah Party — effectively took over the streets.

The three groups were in open contest for control of the city. The battle has little to do with ideology but everything to do with economics. Basra is the hub of Iraq’s valuable oil industry and the militias are making millions by taking their cut of the exports.

The problem now facing the British is how to respond to the fast-changing situation.

Nuri al-Maliki, the Iraqi Prime Minister, who flew to Basra to take personal control, said that his forces would fight “to the end” against the militias. Unfortunately for him, the end may come sooner than he expected. The Iraqi Army contingent of 30,000 troops has failed to dislodge the Mahdi Army, there are widespread reports of defections from the police to the militias and there are clear signs that the operation could backfire badly.

British forces, who can probably cobble together an armoured battle group of a few hundred soldiers, may well be asked to intervene should the Iraqi offensive fail. If that happens, any hope of the withdrawal promised by Gordon Brown last year of another 1,500 British troops this spring will have to be shelved until Basra can be stabilised.

It may even be necessary to reinforce the British contingent with more combat troops, something that the Ministry of Defence can ill afford as it prepares for the fighting season in Afghanistan.

The only other option would be for Britain to admit finally that it has lost the fight in southern Iraq. That would mean an ignominious withdrawal and handing over control of Basra to the Americans, who grudgingly would have to take over responsibility for the south. As American officers and officials have privately made clear, much of today’s problems in Basra can be traced back to Britain’s failure to commit the forces necessary to control Basra and southern Iraq in general.

Whereas President Bush’s “surge” tactic of sending 30,000 reinforcements to central Iraq has succeeded in bringing down the level of violence in Baghdad and Anbar province, the Americans believe that the gradual withdrawal of British troops from the south has had the opposite effect, a point that Mr al-Maliki and his soldiers are discovering to their cost on the streets of Basra today.

Battle lines

March 2003 46,000 troops
Mission Topple Saddam

May 2003 18,000 troops
Mission Secure the peace

May 2004 8,600 troops
Mission Win hearts and minds

January 2007 7,000 troops
Mission Curb violence

September 2007 5,500 troops
Mission Withdraw to Basra airport for “overwatch” role

December 2007 4,500 troops
Mission Support and training for Iraqi troops

Spring 2008 Planned reduction to 2,500 troops

Source: Times archive, agencies





Times Online

From The Times

March 28, 2008
Basra crisis leaves British withdrawal in ruins

James Hider in Baghdad, Michael Evans, Defence Editor and Richard Beeston, Foreign Editor

Britain faced one of its toughest challenges in Basra since the invasion of Iraq five years ago, after an Iraqi military offensive against Shia Muslim militias in the city appeared last night to have backfired, thwarting Government plans to bring 1,600 troops home this spring.

Intense fighting on the ground even raised the possibility that British forces could be asked to reengage on the frontline.

Nuri al-Maliki, the Iraqi Prime Minister, flew down to Saddam Hussain’s former palace in central Basra to take personal control of the offensive, led by 30,000 Iraqi troops backed by para-military police.

But reports from the city suggested that the Iraqi forces had failed to make any significant inroads and a deadline imposed for the militias to disarm was ignored. Instead Iraqi police were defecting to the militia ranks.

Ministry of Defence officials admitted last night that they were no longer thinking about cutting troop numbers to 2,500 from the Spring, as had been outlined by Gordon Brown in a statement to the Commons last October.

“We’re keeping troop numbers under review but we’re no longer talking about reducing to 2,500 at this time,” one official said.

Officials insisted that so far British forces were providing support only in the form of air cover and logistics support but did not rule out sending a small force to help the Iraqis if requested by the authorities in Baghdad.

Mr al-Maliki had hoped to lead his army to victory in Shia militia strongholds in Basra, Iraq’s oil city in the south. Instead, Iraq’s Shia prime minister was left with the prospect of disaster as district after district of his own capital fell to the rival Mahdi Army.

Residents of Basra complained that water and electricity had been turned off in the three main areas besieged by the Iraqi Army. Estimates of the death toll in Basra are as high as 200, with hundreds more wounded.

Under present strategy, the 4,100 British troops still in Iraq are supposed to remain at their base at the airport northwest of Basra and join the Iraqi forces in a security operation only when requested. No such request has been made and a source in Basra said there was not expected to be any call for help during the present operation.

President Bush praised the high-risk strategies. He said: “Prime Minister Maliki’s bold decision to go after the illegal groups in Basra shows his leadership and his commitment to enforce the law in an evenhanded manner.”