Iraq: The Fire Spreads

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 The escalation of violence in Iraq in early April one year after the fall of the Saddam regime marked a turning-point in the Iraq crisis, with serious implications for the security situation, the countryfs political future and the involvement of the international community.

  The new level of insecurity has forced the Americans to re-think the nature of the enemies they face and the level of forces needed to confront them. Repeated descriptions of the insurgents as gthugs and terroristsh by both President Bush and Defence Secretary Rumsfeld are politically counter-productive. Such rhetoric may have a domestic logic for an American president seeking re-election, but in the Iraqi context it serves only to alienate those Iraqis who regard themselves as nationalists opposed to the foreign occupation of their country and who (like several members of the US-appointed Iraqi Governing Council) consider that the Americans have used excessive force in their crackdown on the Sunni town of Fallujah.

  However, this crude characterisation of the insurgents need not be taken as the considered judgement of US officials on the ground. The decision-makers in Baghdad seem to be aware of two inescapable realities that a number of insurgencies are under way simultaneously with differing aims and differing dynamics, and that there is now a danger that these revolts will gather a collective momentum and attract growing support.

  Four main sources of violence are discernible:

• Indigenous Sunnis in the gSunni Triangleh (the area north and west of Baghdad) who include former Saddam loyalists but also nationalists and Islamists fighting essentially on behalf of a minority community which feels it is losing out in the new post-Saddam order.
• Foreign Islamists who have entered Iraq in order to wage a gjihadh against the Americans and their allies. It seems likely different groups are active, but some appear to be organised by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian of Palestinian origin suspected of having links to Al-Qaida.
• Shifite militants including (but no longer confined to) supporters of the radical young cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Only a few months ago, Al-Sadr represented a minority faction within the Iraqi Shia. But his support has grown as a result of the events of the last few weeks and he has acquired a much higher national profile as a result of his open defiance of the Americans.
• Finally, there are criminal elements who resort to violence in the course of smuggling, extortion and other activities.

  These are not entirely separate categories; there is some degree of overlap between them.

  Given the escalation of both Sunni and Shifite violence, the Americans have had no choice but to halt the scaling-down of their military presence in Iraq, leave open the option of sending extra US troops and re-think their over-hasty plans for the gIraqi-isationh of the security forces.

The 30 June deadline

 They have also, crucially, been forced to rely more heavily on the United Nations, and its special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, in helping bring about the transition to an interim Iraqi government by the end of June. The political future of Iraq remains fraught with uncertainty. Time is short before the scheduled handover of power, and there is as yet no consensus on who will govern the country after 30 June.

  Nevertheless it is likely that President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair mean what they say when they insist there will be no postponement. They feel their credibility is at stake with the Iraqis, the international community and their own domestic constituencies.

Key aspects of the transitional period will be:

• The degree to which Mr Brahimi can work successfully not only with the Americans, the British and the Iraqi Governing Council, but also with important Iraqi personalities such as the leading Shifite cleric, Ayatollah Sistani.
• The question of whether the Iraqi Governing Council will go quietly. Mr Brahimi insists the Council must dissolve itself by 30 June. There are, however, signs that he and a prominent Council member, Ahmed Chalabi (considered the Pentagonfs favourite in Iraq), dislike and distrust one another.
• The degree to which the handover of power is largely symbolic. In both military and financial terms, America will remain the dominant power in Iraq. But in order to be credible, a new Iraqi government will want to show it is no mere puppet.

  Finally, the recent violence and kidnappings have shaken the resolve of countries involved in the stabilisation and reconstruction of Iraq. The withdrawal of Russian civilian personnel, and even more dramatically the announcement that Spanish troops will be pulled out, sent a negative signal as far as Washington is concerned. Mr Bush, Mr Blair and their most senior officials repeatedly pledge that their gresolve h in Iraq is unshakeable. But resolve alone will not be enough to bring the Iraq affair to a successful conclusion.