US
Military Escalates Confrontation With Shiite Militia In Iraq
By Peter Symonds
31 August 2006
World
Socialist Web
Two
days of fierce fighting in the Iraqi city of Diwaniyah is one more sign
that the US military is preparing for a bloody showdown with the militia
forces of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. The target of any new offensive
will be not just Sadr’s Mahdi Army, but the Shiite urban poor
who are overwhelmingly hostile to the US occupation and who demonstrated
in their tens of thousands on August 4 against the US-Israeli war on
Lebanon.
The clashes in Diwaniyah,
180 kilometres south of Baghdad, erupted on Sunday after government
troops arrested a member of the Sadrist movement for allegedly planning
a bomb attack. According to the army, 23 soldiers and 30 militiamen,
as well as a number of civilians, died in the fighting. Major General
Othman al-Ghanimi accused the militants of publicly executing a number
of soldiers, a claim that the Sadrists denied.
Nasir al-Saadi, a spokesman
for Sadr’s parliamentary bloc, told the New York Times that the
army had attacked Mahdi-dominated neighbourhoods late on Sunday night,
damaging homes and killing civilians. Iraqi soldiers were backed by
Polish troops and US warplanes, which bombed at least one alleged militia
position. According to the army, the Mahdi fighters were joined by other
militia groups in continuous fighting that lasted into Monday afternoon.
The US-led military command
in Baghdad issued a statement declaring that the Iraqi army and police
had successfully “fended off” an attack by a large number
of “terrorists” in three districts of Diwaniyah. In comments
to Associated Press, however, army captain Fatik Aied said the gun battles
had broken out when Iraqi soldiers launched raids in the city’s
southern suburbs to flush out militants and seize weapons. Asked about
the clashes with Iraqi soldiers, one Mahdi militiaman involved in the
fighting told the New York Times: “We know they are our brothers,
but the Americans are pushing them against us.”
While the US military claimed
a victory in Diwaniyah, the fighting was inconclusive, even after the
army brought in reinforcements, and only ended after a truce was negotiated.
Sadr, who was personally involved in the negotiations with provincial
officials, tried to distance himself from the clashes. Saheb al-Ameri,
a spokesman in Najaf, blamed the fighting on the “personal behaviour”
of some Mahdi Army members. However, the efforts of the Sadrist movement
to downplay the battle in Diwaniyah will not prevent a broader confrontation
with the US military.
A series of articles have
appeared in the US press vilifying Sadr, blaming his Mahdi Army for
the escalating sectarian conflict in Iraq and urging the government
of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to take a tougher stance. In early
August, in the aftermath of the mass protest in Baghdad against war
on Lebanon, outgoing British ambassador William Patey declared in a
leaked memo: “Preventing the Jaish al Mahdi from developing into
a state within a state, as Hezbollah has done in Lebanon, will be a
priority.”
Patey’s remarks echoed
General John Abizaid, US commander in the Middle East, who told National
Public Radio in late July that a confrontation with the Mahdi Army was
inevitable. “If you don’t do this, you will end up with
a situation like you have in Lebanon, where the militia becomes a state
within a state.” In comments to the US Senate Armed Services Committee,
Abizaid declared: “In my opinion, there are groups within the
Mahdi Army that are under the pay of the Iranian government [and] are
terrorist organisations.”
Paradoxically, of all the
Shiite organisations in Iraq, the Sadrists, who espouse Arab and Iraqi
nationalism, are the least likely to rely on Iranian assistance. The
party with the closest links is the Supreme Council for the Islamic
Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), which, with Tehran’s tacit support,
backed the US occupation from the outset and is a linchpin for the Maliki
government.
A Washington Post article
entitled “Sadr’s militia and the slaughter in the streets”
accused the Mahdi Army of the arbitrary murder of Sunnis. US Lieutenant
Colonel Mark Meadows told the newspaper: “I have no doubt... they
hold trial courts and execute people.” He described the Mahdi
Army as “probably the largest, most aggressive militia in the
country... They are a terrorist organisation. They terrorise people.”
In the wake of the Diwaniyah
clashes, Time published an article yesterday entitled “Failing
the test against Iraqi militias”. Pushing for a sustained offensive,
it commented: “For weeks the US and Iraqi militaries have been
striking piecemeal at an enemy they are not even allowed to name: Moqtada
al-Sahr’s Mahdi Army. And after fierce clashes Monday, it appears
that Iraq’s government and military is only willing to go so far
in their efforts to rein in the powerful Shiite militia.”
The US-backed attacks in
Diwaniyah are clearly a dress rehearsal for further attacks on the Sadrist
movement—particularly on the huge slums of Baghdad’s Sadr
City. These Shiite suburbs have virtually been a no-go area since the
Mahdi Army fought pitched battles with US forces in 2004 in the capital
and the southern cities of Najaf and Karbala. During the current US
operations aimed at winning back control of Baghdad, the American military
has so far avoided Sadr City.
Any offensive against the
Mahdi Army will rapidly provoke a crisis in the Maliki government, which
rests on a coalition of Shiite fundamentalist parties. The Sadrist movement
has 30 parliamentarians and five cabinet ministers, including key portfolios
controlling government services. More importantly for Maliki, the support
of the Sadrists has enabled his government to deflect growing anger
among the Shiite poor over its failure to end the US occupation and
improve living standards.
A military assault on Sadrist
strongholds would also rupture the country’s highly factionalised
security forces. Shiite soldiers, many of whom are ex-militiamen, may
simply refuse to fight against the Mahdi Army. The Los Angeles Times
noted on Tuesday that 100 Iraqi soldiers from a battalion of 550 stationed
in the southeastern province of Maysan refused last weekend to deploy
to Baghdad. The refusal of the Shiite troops to move was particularly
embarrassing as the unit and its commander were regarded by the US military
as among the best in the Iraqi army.
Since the 2004 clashes with
the US military, Sadr himself has attempted to maintain an increasingly
difficult balancing act—between his social base among impoverished
Shiites, on the one hand, and support for the US puppet government,
on the other. While he felt compelled to condemn the US-Israeli war
on Lebanon and to warn the US against any attack on Iran, Sadr has tried
to rein in his Mahdi Army and dissociate himself from more radical elements
in the ranks of his movement.
Sadr’s maneouvrings
will not prevent an all-out offensive by the US military. As the US
occupation sinks further into the quagmire, the Bush administration
will be driven to more desperate measures. The denunciations of Sadr’s
“state within a state” reflect the fear that Shiite working
class enclaves such as Sadr City can become the focus for the eruption
of a radical movement directed at the US occupation of Iraq and its
militarist policies throughout the region. The danger for Washington
is all the greater as it escalates its confrontation with Iran.
It is these considerations
that are propelling the US military into reckless and bloody operations
against the Mahdi Army, regardless of the consequences.