Yes, and isn’t that turning out to be fun. Technically, though, you have a point—once a government or occupying power has effectively admitted defeat and allowed guerillas to take over large swathes of the country (which was happening as early as 2003), the term “insurgent” no longer applies. Imagining these groups are different in some absolute sense from the Mahdi Army, OTOH, is simply wrong AFAICT; what is supposed to be the difference between their militia rule in Sadr city and militia rule in the north or the south?

The peshmerga are the government in Northern Iraq, for all intents and purposes. And something similar is true for much of the South for SCIRI and the Badr brigade.

The Mahdi Army is something different.

Grouping them all together under the heading of “insurgent” is not helpful, and is actually incorrect, since the peshmerga aren’t insurgents against anyone – if anything, much of what they do is counter-insurgency as practiced by governments all over the world.

You cannot, however, be an armed group that usurps functions of governance and legislation normally supposed to be exercised by a central government (or an occupying power) without being an insurgent.

soru

The debate over the American debacle in Iraq sounds more and more like the Fram oil filter ads from the 1970’s. In those spots, a hard-nosed mechanic tells consumers, “you can pay me now or pay me later.” The inevitable result of the current political dialogue over Iraq will be the “Fram choice” for Americans: the United States can lose now or lose later.

On the right, President Bush and his fellow travelers refuse to accept accountability for selling a war that a majority of Americans view as a mistake. The administration and its amen corner refuse to deviate from a failed strategy that has produced a security nightmare and economic devastation, while maintaining the fictional linkage between 9/11 and Iraq.

Many on the left, swept up in the emotion of Cindy Sheehan’s crusade, are calling for an immediate withdrawl from Iraq that could produce the next Somalia or worse, the next Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, confusion reigns on Capitol Hill. Republican Senator John McCain and Democratic Senator Joe Biden, seeing the rising chaos and porous Iraqi borders, have called for sending more troops. A House group led by Republican Walter “Freedom Fries” Jones (R-NC) is proposing a joint resolution calling for a presidential commitment this year to bringing the troops home starting October 1, 2006. And Senator Russell Feingold (D-WI) has called for withdrawing all U.S. troops by the end of 2006.

The key question for the United States is no longer Cindy Sheehan’s “why did my son die for?” but “what is to be done now?” With rising U.S. casualties, an emboldened insurgency, American credibility in tatters and no end in sight, any plan forward must define what, at this late date, can be said to constitute “success” in Iraq and whether or not success so defined is still be possible. If not, and if American defeat is inevitable, we should cut our losses begin to withdraw now…

For more, see:

“What Is to Be Done: A 10-Point Plan for Iraq.”

These are hardened and armed street thugs who kill, extort, torture and rob (and, let’s face it, probably rape as well). In the absence of an effective and non-corrupt police force (and there is no effective and non-corrupt police force in the whole of Iraq, and nor is there any real likelihood of any such force emerging anytime soon), a large minority of Iraq will soon be under the control of these militias. In five or so years time, it may well be the majority.

However, if you think these people are about as threatening as the women’s institute why don’t you fly to Iraq and explain that to them? I’m sure if you explain in pidgin English, with much hand waving, that you are of the ‘decent left’ who has always had the interests of the Iraqi people at heart, this will stop them killing you/raping you/flaying you alive.

No, no, no, i’m not joking. I’ll even chip in for your plane fare. Send us a postcard.

Why not broaden the definition further, to include say, anti-globalisation protestors in Scotland, the women’s institute of New Jersey, the Falung Gong, and all people with a name beginning with ‘K’?

Is is that you have, somewhat ahead of conventional wisdom, given up on the actual insurgency, the one physically fighting against the elected government of Iraq, but still want to defend a position that it’s ‘victory’ was ‘inevitable’?

soru

We should have a contest to see which platoon can pack their gear fastest and a race to see to see which military unit can cross the border soonest.

Iraq was a failure when we got there and it will be a failure when (and if) we leave.

‘Sunday August 21, 2005 11:46 AM.

The Army is planning for the possibility of keeping the current number of soldiers in Iraq – well over 100,000 – for four more years, the Army’s top general said Saturday.

In an Associated Press interview, Gen. Peter Schoomaker said the Army is prepared for the “worst case’’ in terms of the required level of troops in Iraq. He said the number could be adjusted lower if called for by slowing the force rotation or by shortening tours for soldiers.’

‘Although Western readers often associate the guerrilla movements with the Sunni Arab areas, in fact guerrillas operate everywhere in Iraq . It is just that some favor the new status quo and wish to burrow into it, while others reject it. Anthony Shadid and Steven Fainaru report on the way in which militias and militia-infiltrated police forces have established hegemony in cities such as Basra and Mosul. The existence of party-based paramilitaries alongside the police, described here, is similar to the situation in Iran after the Khomeini revolution. Revolutionary Guards and basij volunteers operated parallel to formal government bodies such as the police and army. The Kurdish and Shiite militias have such power because of a vacuum. There are only a few hundred US troops in the Kurdish north, apparently. And only 8,500 British troops are responsible for much of the Shiite south’.

Now, when the like of ‘Harry’s Place’ attack the ‘insurgents’ what they mean is the ‘classic’ ‘terrorists’, who carry out ‘classic’ terrorist actions like car bombs, drive by shootings etc.

But if one broadens this definition (as, I would argue, we should) to unlicensed and illegal armed groups (i.e. paramilitaries, in the strictest use of that sense) then there are MANY more groups than just the ‘classic’ al-qaeda, Sunni ‘insurgents’.

Here’s the link to the Washington Post article.

‘Shiite and Kurdish militias, often operating as part of Iraqi government security forces, have carried out a wave of abductions, assassinations and other acts of intimidation, consolidating their control over territory across northern and southern Iraq and deepening the country’s divide along ethnic and sectarian lines, according to political leaders, families of the victims, human rights activists and Iraqi officials…While Iraqi representatives wrangle over the drafting of a constitution in Baghdad, forces represented by the militias and the Shiite and Kurdish parties that control them are creating their own institutions of authority, unaccountable to elected governments, the activists and officials said. In Basra in the south, dominated by the Shiites, and Mosul in the north, ruled by the Kurds, as well as cities and villages around them, many residents say they are powerless before the growing sway of the militias, which instill a climate of fear that many see as redolent of the era of former president Saddam Hussein.’

Those who argue that the insurgents will ‘never win’ ignore the fact that in large chunks of Iraq they already have. The idea that the Sunni insurgents (who, to repeat, is who we all think of when we think of the insurgents) ‘can’t win’ (i.e. can’t seize control of Iraq) ignores the fact that they don’t have to and perhaps don’t want to . All they have to do is seize power in Sunni areas, in the same way Kurdish paramilitaries and Shia paramilitaries have seized control in their areas.

The comparisons here are of course with Northern Ireland, where large sections of the Province were, whilst nominally under UK control in actuality under IRA control and were ‘no go’ territory for the British Army and the police.

The problem with this comparision is that in Iraq the situation is a thousand times worse. Iraq may be heading back to a situation redolent of Afghanistan BEFORE the Taliban, in which there was, nominally, a central government (perhaps even ‘democracy’) but in fact real power rested with dozens of local ‘warlords’, who had absolute power in their own little fiefdoms. (Actually this isn’t a million miles away from Afghanistan now, now I come to think of it).

But this is very far from the argument you’ve been making here: that the insurgency consists of Sunnis whose goal is to dominate the Shia.

Sufis Under Attack as Sunni Rifts Widen

“Sheik Ali al-Faiz, a senior official at this Sufi shrine, or takia, rattled off a list of recent assaults – the leader of a takia in the insurgent stronghold of Ramadi was abducted and killed this month; a bomb exploded in a takia in Kirkuk earlier this year; gunmen beat Sufi worshipers at a mosque in Ramadi in January; a bomb exploded in the kitchen of a takia in Ramadi last September and a bomb in April 2004 destroyed an entire takia in the same city.

The early attacks were frightening, but until this spring there had been few Sufi deaths. Then, on June 2, a suicide bomber rammed a minivan packed with explosives into a takia outside the town of Balad, 40 miles north of Baghdad, killing at least 8 people and wounding 12.”

And this is just the Sufis, it is even worse for the Shia.

Sectarian violence is a real issue in Iraq. Whitewashing it is not the right response.

Back in October 2002 or so, when Shrub was arguing that Iraq was a “gathering threat”, I wondered, “gathering threat to what or whom?”. The Al-Saddaam and Al-Hussein mililes hacked together from old SCUD’s had a range of 600 miles. Well, that’s no threat to Washington, 6000 miles away. But it’s a pretty serious threat to Israel, to whom Saddam was quite hostile and belligerent. And so we see whose interests we are “protecting” there.

Likewise with the decision to leave. AIPAC would never, ever, let the USA just withdraw from Iraq. NFW. Likewise Shrub’s “hand-holding” buddies in Saudi—they don’t want to see a chaotic Iraq either.

In fact, I’ll bet this deteriorates to the point where a whole bunch of them will wish that the write-in ballots for “Saddam” in the blue-thumb election hadn’t been disqualified.

Thanks for going on to provide such a concise illustration of that malady, Soru.