When American forces entered Baghdad at the end of the three-week war in April 2003, the outlook for United States policy in the Gulf region looked bright. The Saddam Hussein regime had apparently dissolved into nothing; Iran would be isolated, Syria neutralised, the Palestinians required to negotiate and Israels security assured; the US militarys influence in Central Asia and the Gulf itself would now be boosted by a long-term presence in Iraq, including the development of several permanent bases.
At the same time, most US strategists expected in April that the Iraqi ground war lite would lead rapidly to the withdrawal of the great majority of combat forces from Iraq within months. Indeed, it was believed that the American force levels would be reduced to around 70,000 by September, a large proportion of these being logistics and construction specialists rather than frontline troops.
The reality has been appallingly different. 130,000 US troops are tied down in the country, necessitating the call-up of further reservists. A bitter guerrilla war is underway that is now involving up to twenty attacks each day on American patrols a number that has escalated in the last two months.
In the key of optimism
In the light of these confounded expectations, what do military planners in Washington now hope to achieve? Is there an exit strategy for Iraq and what are its implications? Some sober and remarkably revealing indications are becoming available (see, for example, Thomas E. Ricks Reduction in US Troops Eyed for 04, Washington Post, 19 October 2003).
For the moment, a large proportion of the troops currently in Iraq are likely to return to the US over the coming two or three months; they will be replaced by an equivalent number drawn from regular army and reserve units. The overall 130,000 figure may remain constant for at least the next six months, but there will be a parallel emphasis on the training of Iraqi police and security forces to take over many security functions regarded as relatively low-risk.
By mid-2004, military planners anticipate that US forces in Iraq will be under 100,000 and that this number will decrease to 50,000 by the mid-2005. As part of this cumulative withdrawal, occupying forces will be effectively removed from cities like Basra and Mosul, as well as from some of the more secure parts of Baghdad .
A highly significant feature of this plan is that it would permit the indefinite stationing of large-scale numbers of troops in Iraq without straining the US armed forces in their many other involvements across Europe, the Middle East, Central Asia and Korea/Japan. One Washington think-tank, the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, estimates that six brigades of troops (numbering about 30,000) could be sustained in Iraq. Along with military police, intelligence and civil affairs specialists and others, this would constitute a presence of over 40,000.
This plan carries two immediate implications. The first is that, despite the substantial troop reductions involved, it confirms earlier indications that the United States is in Iraq for the long term as an occupying power as well as a military presence. According to the new head of the armys 3rd Corps, Lieutenant-General Thomas F. Metz, troops will be in the country for at least the next three years. It is especially notable that the troop levels envisaged are far larger than those required to service the four permanent bases the US is now building in Iraq.
If the latter were primarily for the US air force, about 3-4,000 service personnel would be needed possibly far fewer if one or two of the bases were only for reserve or stand-by purposes. But the US authorities now seem to be considering the addition of a long-term army presence numbering tens of thousands of troops.
The second implication of current planning is that given the endemic security problems in Iraq its implementation is almost entirely dependent on the use of peacekeeping troops from other countries, coupled with the rapid development of Iraqi security forces. There is no guarantee that either will happen, or that current levels of guerrilla action will be contained and countered.
On peacekeeping, the weak UN Security Council compromise seems unlikely to encourage other countries to make significant commitments. The Turkish offer has been roundly rebuffed by the US-appointed Iraqi political leadership and is now deeply problematic; the Germans are heavily engaged in Afghanistan; the French, though desirous of influence in the Middle East, are unlikely to offer anything more than a symbolic military commitment in Iraq.
On Iraqi security forces, the US occupying authorities have already created a force of about 20,000 Iraqi guards to protect numerous key sites such as pipelines and power transmission systems. A new Iraqi army is intended to have 40,000 troops by the end of next year; a civil defence militia, planned eventually to grow from its current 6,000 to 25,000, is being created to work alongside the US military. In addition, a reconstituted Iraqi police force numbering 80,000 is being developed over the next two years .
Through a glass, darkly
On paper, this entire scenario seems both rational and feasible. But how does it relate to what is actually happening in Iraq, both now and in the longer term? Some military analysts in the United States and elsewhere regard these latest plans as best case (making the most favourable assumptions possible) and thus unlikely in practice to prove capable of being implemented. In this bleaker view, two other possible scenarios are in view.
The first sees a continuation of the current level of conflict and the unreliability of US-controlled Iraqi security forces resulting in the US being obliged to maintain forces near existing levels for a much longer period. The second (and worst case) sees sustained guerrilla activity, an increase in Shia resistance, and the effective entry into Iraq of al-Qaida and associated militant groups requiring US reinforcements from an overstretched army.
At present, it is beginning to look as though the worst case is indeed the most likely to be realised. Since the bombing of the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad on 19 August, most UN activity in Iraq has been reduced. Non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have withdrawn and civilian coalition personnel are operating under conditions of exceptionally high security, making regular contact with ordinary Iraqis deeply problematic. Yet attacks on coalition administrative and residential centres persist, including a bomb attempt against the heavily-guarded Baghdad Hotel and the killing of a Spanish intelligence officer.
The Shia on the edge
Such incidents reveal a deeper political turbulence. The disturbances in the Shia community of Baghdads Sadr City district are indications of Shia discontent, as is the later violence in the southern city of Karbala. Until recently, most attacks on US troops were said to be coming from remnants of the Saddam Hussein regime, but coalition sources now acknowledge that Shia militia are involved in the upsurge in attacks in the past month including the killing of five US soldiers in attacks in Baghdad and Karbala .
These militia owe allegiance to two radical clerics, Mahmoud al-Hassani and Moqtada al-Sadr. The latter, younger and more charismatic, is the more powerful. Neither represents majority Shia opinion across Iraq, but each is growing in influence. One factor here is that the development of private militias is often accompanied by the provision of welfare services among some of the poorest Shia communities in Baghdad and parts of southern Iraq.
There have been indications that coalition authorities are considering arresting Moqtada al-Sadr for his alleged involvement in the April murder of the moderate Shia cleric, Abdel Majid al-Khoei in the holy city of Najaf, shortly after the latters return from exile. Such an action would carry the danger for the coalition of inciting even greater militancy from al-Sadrs supporters. The social and economic context Shia communities in many parts of Iraq are experiencing more than 60% unemployment, amidst resentment towards the American occupying forces for the failures of post-war reconstruction adds to the delicacy of the coalitions relationship with Shia leaders.
Counter-terrorism: the fly-paper theory in trouble
The current problems for the Americans extend to three further areas: the increasing sophistication of guerrilla attacks on their forces, the extension of those attacks to northern Iraq, and the strong likelihood of an increased al-Qaida involvement.
First, it is worth recalling the belief that the killing of Saddam Husseins two sons in Mosul in July would be decisive in demoralising the resistance. Instead, the resistance has intensified, with greater levels of organisation and pre-planning. Attacks on US convoys frequently involve a combination of roadside bombs to halt a convoy combined with the use of rocket-propelled grenade and light weapons for subsequent ambush. Escape routes are pre-planned; by the time US reinforcements are available, the guerrilla forces have retreated so that subsequent US counter-action can then involve civilian casualties, further heightening tensions.
Second, there has been a sudden increase in attacks in northern Iraq, especially in the previously quiet city of Kirkuk (see Karl Vick, Violence in Iraq Spreads to North, Washington Post, October 2003). Local sources indicate that an opposition group which recently moved to Kirkuk has activated previously dormant local forces, resulting in attacks that killed a US soldier and two Iraqi police officers.
A coherent political strategy seems to be behind this move. Since the end of the large-scale war in April, there has been extensive reconstruction in Kirkuk involving airport and hotel projects, and even a convention centre to attract new business interests. US troops became accustomed to a low level of violence and a reasonably friendly relationship with most local people. The result of recent attacks has been an immediate loss of business confidence and pressure on American troops to adopt tactics and levels of security more typical of Baghdad.
These two developments, in addition to the problems with the Shia, tend to suggest that the worst case scenario is more likely to develop than a hoped-for increase in stability leading to cuts in US forces. The third area of difficulty for the Americans referred to above can only reinforce this prognosis: the activity of al-Qaida and its associates within Iraq.
In July, President George W. Bush strongly emphasised and even welcomed with gung-ho phrases like bring em on the fact that the US presence in Iraq would act as a real attraction to Islamic militants. The prospect of Iraq becoming the new focus for the war on terror enabling US forces to concentrate on destroying elements of al-Qaida and their associates was described as the fly-paper theory of counter-terrorism; Iraq being the fly-paper, the US forces the insecticide and Islamic militants the flies.
It is a crude if curiously attractive theory but it may be faulty in one crucial aspect. What is now happening in Iraq even before any sustained al-Qaida activity develops there suggests that it is the Americans who are becoming the flies.
