Patrick Cockburn: The New War in Iraq
We are asking the bravest reportorial hand on the ground in Iraq, Patrick Cockburn of The Independent from London, to make a coherent picture of the news of the war — starting with the flight of under-equipped and under-committed Iraqi Army units from their assigned war on Muqtada Al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army… and, among other things, the assassination of Muqtada’s brother-in-law in Najaf and, of course, General David Petraeus’s plea in Congress for an extension of the American “surge.” Cockburn’s strongest theme is that the Bush team in Baghdad is in fact fomenting a civil war within the Shia majority — a war that the government troops don’t want to fight and cannot possibly win against Muqtada Al-Sadr’s militias in Baghdad and elsewhere.
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Patrick Cockburn
Patrick Cockburn:The US forces in Iraq are beginning a new war against a new enemy in Iraq. For five years after the fall of Saddam Hussein, the US was confronting (fighting) the Sunni Arab community — about 20 percent of Iraqis, or 5 to 6 million people. Now in the last few months it’s confronting a large part of the Shia community — those that are loyal to Muqtada Al-Sadr, his Sadrist movement and the Mahdi Army, which really represent the Shia poor. But, you know, one Iraqi official who’s not sympathetic to Muqtada was saying to me the other day that the Shia are a majority of Iraqis and Muqtada’s followers are a majority of the Shia. So this is probably 30 to 40 percent of the whole population. This is a massive new confrontation that the US is undertaking in Iraq.
CL: And why is the US undertaking it?
Patrick Cockburn: I think it’s a misjudgment. It think that rather as in 2003 they thought it would be easy to confront the Sunni — I remember going to endless press conferences in Baghdad where we used to have Jerry Bremer, the US viceroy, and various American generals all saying we were fighting the remnant of the old regime of Saddam Hussein. It was obviously untrue but they may well have believed it. This time around there seems to be the idea that if we eliminate Muqtada things will come right. But this won’t happen, because Muqtada’s supporters are too well integrated into Iraqi society. There are too many of them. They’re too committed. They’re not going to give up. This isn’t just a political party. It’s a religious movement.
Patrick Cockburn, Author of Muqtada
(Scribners, 2008), in conversation with Open Source, April 2008
Patrick Cockburn: The most convincing evidence that the surge isn’t working, in terms of restoring security to Baghdad and central Iraq, is that we have 3.2-million Iraqi refugees — that’s about one in nine Iraqis — who’ve fled to Jordan or Syria or within Iraq. Living in appalling conditions, money running out, poor health. I’ve been to refugee camps where there’s no fresh water, where cholera is beginning. And they don’t go home! These are the best judges of what the real security situation is in Iraq — not Senator McCain, not me. But these people who if they felt they could go back to their homes in some security, if they and their children could be safe, they’d do it tomorrow. But they’re not because they know it’s not true; they know it’s as dangerous as it ever was. And that’s really what everybody should remember when they’re asked: how is the surge doing, or for an optimistic moment they think things are getting better in Iraq.
Patrick Cockburn, Iraq correspondent of the London Independent, in conversation with Open Source, April 2008
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April 19th, 2008 at 4:25 am
Fine, timely show. Why not a follow-up with PC’s brother Alexander, who has a new book out:
http://www.amazon.com/Death-Liberal-America-Alexander-Cockburn/dp/1844671305/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1208593446&sr=1-2
April 25th, 2008 at 6:33 am
I remain a faithful listener and commenter here with good reason. Thank you for this. First this confirms in my my that we should leave Iraq come what may. Second, though it’s true that we are no longer paying attention fully ( maybe we get the gist of it and can’t do anything but wait and place our votes in the coming election), just scratch the surface and this war is still a major issue because it is about who we are.
Coincidentally, a companion piece to this interview, which I recommend if you have not listened is Bill Moyers’ amazing one with Leila Fadel of McClatchy. Moyers gives us the opportunity on his web site to watch or listen:
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/04182008/watch.html
Long live people who do good work….. Thank you Chris.
April 25th, 2008 at 6:35 am
Correction ( and it would not hurt to say it again) :
First this confirms in my mind that we should leave Iraq, come what may.
May 18th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
SADR’S GAZA
We now know what Israeli turn-over of Gaza and
American democratization of Baghdad mean: pour
concrete on them all and when it dries shoot from the
air whatever still moves.
Gareth Porter– my personal nemesis supporting Hanoi
back in the Vietnam War days– has proven to be one of
the most astute analysts of the Iraq situation in Wash
DC (perhaps I should reconsider Vietnam too). In a
recent analysis he reads Maliki’s attack on Basra as a
last minute attempt to preempt an American assault on
the city, pre-planned since last June as part of the
surge. Porter is spot-on, as oil companies execs will
testify.
To ease the high cost of gasoline suffered by
Americans before he leave office Bush wants to at
least secure the Basra fields, where 80% of Iraq’s
known oil reserves are located, and the port of exit,
Basra City. He believes that cheap oil will make the
Iraq War worth it to Americans and all his
incompetence and indecisiveness would be forgiven. It
should be remembered that the first priority of the
Iraq invasion of 2003 was not to allow Saddam to, in
defeat, set fire to the oil wells as he had done in
Kuwait. So, while in 2003 every building and person in
Baghdad was pillaged, plundered and molested by roving
gangs, American soldiers stood by watching– a crime
by international law, for safety and order are the
responsibility of the occupying power– the oil fields
were safe and sound.
With oil now at twice the price back when Bush sought
to make Iraq America’s own oil gusher, Bush would like
to leave office with “mission [partially]
accomplished” at least: Basra safe for imperial
plunder by Western oil companies so that Iraq’s oil
can drown OPEC’s quotas.
PM Maliki is still resisting the oil privatization
law– allowing Western investment in and domination of
the oil fields– that the US tried to shove down his
throat. Maliki knows well that if the US seizes Basra,
who masters the fields becomes moot. To date, with the
British having abandoned the imperial program early,
the oil has been flowing through the hands of
everything from religious militias to criminal gangs
on to the global black market. For five years now, so
fearful of the explosive insecurity, American oil
giants have shied away from commitment to seizing
Iraq’s oil. In that sense, one can say that the
insurgency has– so far– been successful.
But suddenly, after Hunt made a totally illegal deal
with the Kurds, bypassing the Iraqi government, for
the smaller fields in the North of Iraq, Maliki,
having denounced and rejected the deal, noted that
American oil companies were lining up to sign on for
the Basra fields in the South. So, to head off Bush’s
plans for Basra oil, Maliki moved to seize Basra first
and forced the US to provide logistic and air support
by placing before Petraeus a fait accompli. To deny
support would violate Iraq’s sovereignty and Malki
could demand that the US leave immediately. Already he
faced down the US last year claiming that if the US
stops supporting him he can find other friends
elsewhere. First the British complied and then
Petraeus had no choice.
But there is a further absurdity in all this. PM
Maiki– who came to power thanks to Sadr’s political
support– has now focused his forces on Sadr’s Mahdi
Militia, insisting that they disarm and disband and
that Sadr himself abandon all political aspirations.
To mount his offensive, Maliki aligned with Hakim’s
Iran run and created Badr forces for the Basra
offensive. The Iran created ISCI that Hakim heads
wants to make a separate autonomous federal unit of
Iraq’s nine Southern provinces, where 80% of the
proven oil reserves lie. So, using the Iran-proxy for
troops, the Brits and US for air support and
logistics, Maliki hoped to destroy the Shi’ite Sadr
Tendency Movement before the US does.
Unlike Hakim, Sadr is an Iraqi nationalist who does
not allow the similar Shia confessional bond with Iran
to eclipse the fact that Iraqis are Arabs, not
Persians. He sought a Shia-Sunni Iraqi alliance to
expel the US with ceremonial thank yous for removing
Saddam and bands playing all the way to the door: it’s
time to go home, Yankee!
Maliki is also an Iraqi nationalist who does not want
Iranian domination. But he realizes that, just as Bush
is on his way out of the White House, the US is on its
way out of Iraq. He must, therefore, come up with a
counter-force to the Sunni neighboring states that
have been feeding the insurgency all along (Saudis
provided suicide volunteers and technology while
Kuwait provided the money and Gulf states serve as
bankers with transferred Saddam’s billions for the
insurgency). Maliki’s solution was a temporary
alliance with ISCI (whose Badr forces were killing
Iraqis for Iran during the 1980s Iran-Iraq War). By
working with this creature of Tehran– whom Bush
Administration schemers saw as the best ally in order
to stop Iranian involvement in the war– Maliki felt
confident that Iran would support his regime while he
brings the Sunnis in line after the Americans leave.
Prior to the invasion, Hakim was in on all the CIA
guided and funded exiles’ councils in London of the
Iraqi National Council, led by Ahmed Chalabi, another
proven Iranian spy. Back then it didn’t matter because
Bush was planning a one-two regime change two-step:
Iraq–>Iran. But with no regime change possible in
Iran to date, Bush had to grumble and watch helpless
while all Shia factions maneuvered for Iranian
backing.
All this is clever by half. As Americans, given our
original oily motives, let us ask ourselves what does
it cost in blood, time and money to kill one insurgent
and how many must we kill in order to secure the oil
fields for ourselves?
Making the multiplication, the price seems almost as
great as the technological revolution that would make
the US independent of Mideast oil. Yet, we rather copy
the storm trooper tactics which the Israelis in turn
copied from the English, Germans, Soviets and South
Africans in order to suppress any objection to our
imperial designs on Iraqi oil; we are thus losing
irreplaceable *VOLUNTEER* soldiers (none of the neocon
chicken-hawks are stepping up to replace them!) and
creating orphans and widows just because we can’t
admit that we were defeated by our own military’s
criminal incompetence. How much top-down
low-brain-powered arrogance will it take before
America realizes that it has been morally, globally
and economically exsanguinated?
The Arab survivors of our war crimes, as the Israelis
learned the hard way, will for generation afterward
never forget and never forgive. In that sense (and
also given that we invited use of airliners as suicide
guided missiles by leaving ALL pilot’s cabin doors
wide open) we are at fault for 9/11 by providing
generations of victims of our violent oil grabs reason
to hate us and want to kill us as they kill themselves
in revenge for generations to come. On might say that
Reverend Wright– who served his country as a Marine,
unlike Bill Clinton who evaded the Draft and
demonstrated against America in Moscow Square– might
have a point: avarice and hubris make us our own worst
enemy.
Daniel E. Teodoru
May 18th, 2008 at 4:18 pm
ANOTHER BANNANAREPUBLIC????
It seems frightening that we are wasting billions of
dollars and thousands of lives– Iraqi and American–
pretending that we are fighting the Mahdi Army or
alQaeda when in fact we are using soldiers to fight
criminal gangs turning on each other, not militias.
These forces disrupt the very Iraq we occupy and fail
to protect while causing a lot of “collateral damage.”
Worse still, we are failing to develop an Iraqi police
force adequate to bring law and order in a nation that
had it until we weakened it since 1991 and destroyed
totally in 2003, promoting US then Iraqi gangster
economics by failing to promote law and order. Our
army does the only thing it knows how to do: make
soldiers. By promoting an army that is 50% greater
than Saddam’s army at his strongest point, the US is
using the Iraqi Army against Iraqis. So what Crocker
and Petraeus didn’t tell us is that we are, in effect,
creating another banana republic where the military
fights the people.
Daniel E. Teodoru