An inevitable effect of the Hurricane Katrina disaster in New Orleans and along the Gulf coast has been to push the issue of Iraq off the establishment media in the United States and much of western Europe. Yet the events are connected in at least two ways: the deployment of around a third of Louisianas national guard to Iraq when they are needed so badly in their home state, and the contrast between the US military's rapid deployment capabilities when fighting distant wars and the failure of federal politicians to invest these resources for social and civic needs in the homeland.
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While post-disaster management dominates the news and op-ed pages and the TV networks, the anti-war campaign led by bereaved mother Cindy Sheehan and fellow anti-war activists outside President Bush's summer retreat in Crawford, Texas, continues to reverberate. Its spreading momentum may just signal the start of a major movement in the United States against the war. The likelihood of this, however, will depend largely on what happens in Iraq, and recent events here and in the region may really be significant.
An insurgency in spate
The Iraqi insurgency continues, headlines or no. United States forces are attempting to alter the balance of advantage: by transferring authority to Iraqi security units in some of the less troubled parts of the country, and by conducting vigorous raids backed by heavy firepower against urban areas in the insurgencys heartlands.
Their efforts continue to exert a high cost in military casualties. A relative decline in US casualty rates in the early summer has now been decisively reversed: eighty-five US troops were killed in August (the highest figure for eight months, and one of the worst monthly totals since the start of the war), and 496 soldiers were injured, nearly a third of them seriously.
There are also numerous attacks on Iraqi security forces. In Basra on 7 September, a car-bomb targeting a restaurant frequented by Iraqi personnel killed sixteen people and injured scores more. It followed another attack in the city earlier in the week that killed four US security guards.
The continuing problems of reconstruction add to popular anger and help cultivate a climate of unrest. An important background indicator is that electricity and water supplies are in even shorter supply than in the previous two post-Saddam summers (see Dan Murphy, "Iraqis Thirst for Water and Power", Christian Science Monitor, 11 August 2005).
Although nearly $20 billion has been committed to major power and water projects, up to a quarter of Iraqs budget has to be spent on security, and even when projects are completed, they are readily targeted by insurgents.
An August incident in Samawa, south of Baghdad, is indicative of the tensions. A protest against unemployment and lack of electricity and water turned into a full-scale riot; 1,000 people demonstrated outside the governor's office, burning a police van and retreating only when police opened fire, killing one of the protesters.
Tall Afar, Iraq
Beyond individual incidents like Samawa and Basra, the most difficult problem facing US forces in Iraq at present is the near-total control by insurgents of many towns and cities to the north and west of Baghdad, especially those towards the Syrian border. The US response has been to mount major operations against selected towns, some of them approaching the scale of the assault on Fallujah in November 2004.
On 2 September, for example, more than 5,000 US and Iraqi troops staged an assault on Tall Afar, sixty kilometres from the Syrian border. A range of fighting vehicles, supported by M1-A1 Abrams tanks and helicopter gunships, pounded the city; large numbers of insurgents were reported killed as the combined forces sought to take control of the city.
Tall Afar was a repeat on a larger scale of an assault on the same city in September 2004. It was followed by a withdrawal of US forces, not least because of lack of personnel, but the Iraqi forces replacing them could not prevent the insurgents seizing control once more.
This time, the US military has resorted even to destroying bridges over the Euphrates in an effort to contain the movement of insurgents. Such actions inevitably damage the local economy and greatly affect the surrounding population; in strategic terms, they indicate near-desperation, and a situation that is closer to full-scale war than to containable insurgency.
Even as the Tall Afar assault was continuing, the insurgents in another parallel with the Fallujah operation responded elsewhere. Militia loyal to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi occupied the border town of Qaim on 3 September, publicly executing nine alleged collaborators in public executions even as US marines are stationed nearby (see Ellen Knickmeyer and Jonathan Finer, Insurgents Assert Control Over Town Near Syrian Border, Washington Post, 6 September 2005)
An even more remarkable show of strength was a daylight assault on the interior ministry in central Baghdad on 5 September by a unit of insurgents who arrived in separate vehicles, blasted their way in and killed two police officers in a fifteen-minute raid. US helicopter gunships and armoured vehicles responded rapidly, but the insurgents disappeared.
Aqaba, Jordan
If Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's group is indeed responsible for the surge in insurgent activity in places like Qaim and Tall Afar, this may reflect a closer connection with the diffuse al-Qaida network. The video released to al-Jazeera portraying Mohammed Sidique Khan (leader of the 7 July London bombing team) and Ayman al-Zawahiri (Osama bin Ladens deputy and al-Qaidas chief ideologist) may be designed to give a particular impression of its current capacities. But a recent military operation may give a more practical illustration of its "reach".
In the early hours of 19 August, three Katyusha artillery rockets were fired at two large US navy ships anchored in the harbour at Aqaba, Jordan: the USS Ashland, a 15,000-ton warship, and the USS Kearsarge, a 40,000-ton amphibious warfare ship (twice the size of the largest ship in Britains navy).
The rockets missed their target: one landed near the Israeli town of Eilat, the other hit a warehouse in Aqaba used by US forces, killing a Jordanian guard. Jordanian security officials later found a launcher in a hilltop warehouse overlooking the port that had been rented a few days earlier; four more rockets had not been fired.
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The fact that the attack took place is more significant than its failed outcome. Jordan, one of the United Statess closest regional allies, places a high premium on security against paramilitary groups. Yet the militants responsible were able to deploy a cluster of Katyusha rockets crude, unguided 127-mm missiles with a range of up to 27 kilometres close to the heavily-protected temporary berth of US warships that had recently completed exercises with the Jordanian navy.
Since the USS Cole was attacked in Aden harbour on 12 October 2000, killing 17 sailors and wounding 39, the US navy has developed strong security measures based on threat assessments at any ports it uses in the region. The Aqaba attack went ahead despite such procedures in place; the US warships put to sea very soon afterwards.
When anti-US groups can operate in Jordan with a degree of impunity, it is clear that the threat to US activities in the region is not confined to Iraq. It may even mean that al-Qaida and its affiliate groups are once more interested in extending their operations.
