The militant insurgency that followed the termination of Saddam Husseins regime has now lasted ten months. During this period, claims that the insurgency has been in decline have often been followed by particularly violent and costly attacks; mid-December 2003 and mid-January 2004 offered vivid examples of this cycle of optimism and deflation.
In circumstances where propaganda and reality are so intertwined, and where all contending parties are prone to exaggerate their position, it is not easy to make a reliable assessment of the overall security prospects for coalition forces in Iraq.
Paul Rogerss new book, a collection of his openDemocracy weekly columns, is now available. A war on terror: Afghanistan and after is published by Pluto Press
The first ten months of the war after the war have been characterised by a substantial level of regular, almost routine violence, combined with spectacular attacks of great significance. The pattern of suicide bombings continues, most recently with the attack on a Polish-run base at Hilla, south of Baghdad, on 19 February which killed ten people and injured dozens. The large, symbolic operations have included bombings of the UN headquarters in Baghdad, the Shi'a shrine in Najaf (both in August 2003) and the offices of the two main Kurdish political parties in Irbil in January 2004.
Since April 2003, US forces have developed many methods for countering the insurgency. These have included a range of technical solutions to respond to the frequent use of roadside bombs; the use of highly-protected troops to patrol key areas; the cordoning off of villages and towns; and vigorous search operations that sometimes extend to the use of heavy firepower.
More recently, American troops in particular (among the coalition contingents) have reduced their patrols substantially, withdrawn from many of their former bases in cities such as Baghdad, and protected themselves in heavily-guarded and secure compounds. For example, the number of US bases and camps in Baghdad has been reduced from sixty to twenty-six, and is intended to decrease to eight, with only one inside the city.
Despite these measures, attacks on US forces have persisted, regularly inflicting deaths and many serious injuries. Three soldiers were killed in separate attacks on 17 February, for example, bringing the American forces death toll since the start of the war to 541. There is evidence that the insurgents, as well as the Americans themselves, have adapted to new circumstances, and are proving to be difficult for the US army and Marine Corps to counter. All this casts very serious doubt on any claim that the insurgency is coming under control.
Transfer or makeover?
The problems of military occupation for US forces are severe and (as will be discussed below) in particular respects even increasing. What, then, of the political prospects? The plan to transfer power to a client regime in Baghdad, one assembled primarily by means of controlled caucuses, is proving difficult to implement; this is partly because of Shi'a demands for open, nation-wide elections, and partly the result of a wider Iraqi antagonism to what is seen to be a likely process of selection rather than election.
This is not an easy circumstance for Washington, given the pressing need to demonstrate some kind of administrative handover in Iraq well before the November 2004 presidential election. The US political leadership and the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) in Baghdad will continue in the effort to present a semblance of choice to Iraqis over their countrys future, but a further obstacle in the way is the attitude of many members of the US-appointed Iraqi Interim Governing Council (IGC).
This body had earlier supported the caucus plan, but now elements of it are insisting that they are best suited to run Iraq for at least the next year. One concern from within the IGC focuses on the demand of religious leaders for early elections, something they fear the United Nations may also recommend. Members therefore seek an interim transfer of power to the IGC itself, which would give it considerable influence in the run-up to any elections (see Rajiv Chandrasekaran, Iraqi Panel Pivots on U.S. Plan, Washington Post, 17 February 2004).
Such a process might be helpful to the United States, for whom the IGC members it has appointed might form a useful basis for a client state though it could only be implemented over strong objections, in particular from Shi'a leaders.
The security matrix
But if the obstacles to political progress in Iraq are formidable, in current conditions these may be less significant than the recent emergence of particular security problems. Indeed, these may turn out to be as momentous as the initial development of the insurgency ten months ago and the major attacks since, such as that on the UN headquarters in August 2003.
The core issue is that although the insurgents are continuing their attacks on American (and other) troops, their main strategy has developed in new directions as a direct response to US efforts to transfer some security functions to local forces while maintaining a firm grip on overall control.
Although it has proved difficult for the US armed forces to train and equip an Iraqi army, there have been rapid developments in other aspects of security. In addition to the changes in US deployment patterns, the Coalition Provisional Authority has sought to privatise or at least sub-contract many functions which had previously been undertaken by US troops, often at risk to their own security.
It is, for example, now common practice for supplies to be moved not by the US army but by contractors employing expatriate workers, principally from south Asia. Although such convoys are still subject to attack, killings of non-Americans receive little media coverage and carry no political consequence in the United States.
More generally, there has been a rapid training process for the Iraqi police force, pipeline and border guards and other security personnel; tens of thousands of people are now employed in these forces across the country. The very high level of unemployment has meant that recruitment to these forces was not initially difficult. This recruitment is one factor that has helped to sustain periodic optimism about the USs ability to divest itself of some of its security problems.
In the light of certain insurgent attacks in the past three weeks, and especially two incidents in Fallujah in recent days, a more cautious assessment needs to be made.
A coup in Fallujah
On Thursday 12 February, a convoy carrying the head of US Central Command (Centcom), General John Abizaid, was attacked near Fallujah. Coalition sources conceded the seriousness of such an attack but implied that it was random. If so, it was an extraordinary coincidence, and more likely indicates a high level of intelligence available to insurgents. This was even more apparent in an attack on the police station in Fallujah two days later, one that involved probably the most substantial concentration of insurgent forces in the past ten months.
With careful planning and coordination, about fifty insurgents prepared a sophisticated operation centred on an attack on the police station. A group of forces first encircled and fired on the city hall and the local army barracks, preventing those inside from aiding the police. In a second action, also designed to hinder reinforcements, three main intersections in the city were blocked, so that the insurgents controlled a key part of the city for almost an hour. The main attack on the police station resulted in the deaths of twenty-three police officers, six civilians and four insurgents, and the release of about fifty prisoners (most apparently local criminals rather than political detainees).
In brief, a large insurgent group executed a heavily-armed and carefully coordinated seizure of a major police station in the heart of an Iraqi city, almost a full year after the old regime was terminated. The symbolic significance of such an assault is considerable; as Remy Ourdan (Le Monde, 16 February 2004) remarked: for a trial coup, it was a master coup.
A recently intercepted al-Qaida missive declares the deliberate incitement of a civil war in Iraq as a primary objective for the network. This has been highlighted by American sources, though there is as yet little evidence that paramilitary groups from outside Iraq are having much impact in this direction. Iraqi insurgents themselves are already conducting operations, like the bomb attacks in Irbil, designed to foment a civil war. The extensive participation of militants from abroad in the insurgent campaign may yet come, over a time-span of many months.
The implication of this analysis is threefold. The United States does not have the security situation in Iraq under control; it faces problems in ensuring the creation of a client state; and the full security effects of its presence in Iraq may lie ahead. At any time this situation would be difficult for a US administration. In an election year it may prove formidable.
