(Yesterday, Wathiq Kuzzai, displaced child.)
Today marks five years of war in Iraq. Here’s a look at what went wrong.
Four years ago I was in Baghdad. The city was in anarchy but of the free-market variety. Violence was sporadic. Hope still a viable concept. February 2004 was the most peaceful month of the last five years. But the rule of L Paul “Jerry” Bremer III and his Coalition Provisional Authority crashed so quickly—CPA Iraq may end up holding the land speed record for national collapse.
March 2004: foreigners could still walk the streets without fear of kidnapping. After dark there were dinner parties, Chinese karaoke, wood oven pizzerias, discos even. Yes, there were bombings and a small Sunni insurgency. Overall, however, the Iraqis my pal Jeff and I met (and we were on the streets as much as any foreigners in Baghdad) still radiated optimism for the future.
But as March moved forward, historical fissures combined with terrible CPA policies (disbanding the Army, ignoring the rise of Moqtada Al Sadr’s Mahdi Milita) in destroying any hope for a democratic Iraq. It happened so fast. March kicked off with a twin bombing in Karbala that killed 180. March 16th saw the first night attack in central Baghdad—a 1000 pd bomb at a hotel in cosmopolitan and foreigner heavy Karrada. A few days later, the CPA raided Moqtada Sadr’s office after he suggested opening a Hezzbollah branch in Sadr City. Many says the order came from DC via Ariel Sharon in Israel, a “No Hezz in Iraq” type of thing.
So, in the last week of March, Sadr’s followers—the Mahdi Militia—took to Baghdad’s streets. On the same day that 10,000 Shiites protested at the gates of the Green Zone, four Blackwater mercenaries were ambushed in Fallujah, dragged from their SUV Somalia style. That night I was in the Republican Palace, a gaudy neo-Islamic uber-bunker—the former seat of Saddam’s Baath Part, then the CPA’s HQ, and now the US Embassy. I could hear the Sadr’s followers chanting as I watched the Blackwater guys’ charred, broken corpses dangle from a green bridge on TV. A high-level diplomat (FS-1) was among those in the room, a large command center looking office ominoisly dubbed “Baghdad Central.”
“Civil war is closer than ever,” the conversation went. “These Shiites could take this place in a few hours. We couldn’t stop 10,000 men. It would be choppers on the roof,” ala Saigon. Considering three weeks earlier I’d sat in that very room for a meeting on “civil society taking root in Iraq,” a civil war’s sudden arrival was the shock of my young life.
(Blackwater hangs in Fallujah)
If March 2004 was the month the pot started bubbling, April 4th—Black Sunday as it was later known—was the day Iraq boiled over. Suddenly Iraq was engulfed in a two-front nation-wide uprising. To the west, the Sunnis in Fallujah, a city of 300,000, were fighting 10,000 US troops, who invaded to avenge the Blackwater slaughter. In Baghdad’s Sadr City slum and across Iraq’s Shia south, Sadr’s Mahdi Militia revolted against the occupation. What seemed impossible a few weeks earlier—all-out war—exploded in two weeks time!
I still haven’t grasped the utter speed with which Iraq turned to hell. I never will.
(Augist 2004: Mahdi Militia fighter in Battle of Najaf vs US forces, 1000 killed)
Through the summer of 2004, Sadr continued his antics and the Sunnis expanded their war on the US. But the CPA controlled information with Nazi efficiency and Iraq’s decline never properly entered the US Presidential debate. Right after Bush won his second term, 10,000 US troop leveled Fallujah. In response, 2005 saw the Sunnis pick up the pace and hone their tactics. Meanwhile, the US increased sorties in the air war against the Mahdi and Sunni insurgency. Every day bombs crushed a house or two in Fallujah or Sadr City, urban areas so densely populated collateral damage is imminent.
(Fallujah fall 2004, 1000 killed)
Shiites came to power in the fall of 2005, when national elections saw 75% voter turnout. Still, many Sunnis boycotted or were afraid to vote, so they were underrepresented in the new government.
By February 2006 the Sunnis’ primary target was Shiite power. And their primary tactic was terrorizing the civilian population. But the Sunnis overplayed their hand. On Feb 20th, they attacked the Al-Askari shrine in Samarra, a 1000-year-old mosque central to Shia identity. That was a Friday. By Monday Shiite militias had killed over a 1000 Sunni, according to the Washington Post.
Just like that—snap—Iraq was a full blown civil war. Iran increased support for the Shiite militias. And Saudi funds continued flowing to the Sunni. Both sides stole oil profits to fund their wars.
(Samarra shrine bombed, Feb 2006, 1000 killed in aftermath)
Tit for tat sectarian violence cleansed mixed neighborhoods, partitioning Baghdad north-south down the Tigris: the Sunnis got the south-east and Shiites the west and northeast. The US was undermanned to defend Iraq; the 2 million refugees and 2 million internally displaced, nearly a quarter of the population, make Iraq the largest war on earth.
The US was now obviously losing the war. In the 2006 mid-term election, Iraq’s demise cost the GOP Congress. The next month, December, saw the release of Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group Report. Bulleted out were recommendations: engage the neighbors, remove troops, push for reconciliation. Buried deep in the report was a concept conceived by a Democrat, former Defense Secretary William Perry, to provide a short term troop “surge” to establish security. Of all the ideas in the ISG report, Bush chose this one. Much of America and the world were flabbergasted. More troops, I remember thinking, that’s what you come up with asshole?
But I was wrong. Adding 30,000 combat troops to the equation worked. Security—the most important step towards Iraqi stability—dramatically improved. And from the summer until the beginning of 2008 Iraq calmed down to levels not seen since 2005. Most importantly, the Sunni got sick of the Shia hate they’d unleashed, and chose to ally with the Americans. Now 80,000 US-backed Sunni Awakening Council members patrol Iraq, albeit outside the writ of the central government. At the same time, Moqtada al Sadr’s Mahdi Militia has been under a cease fire.
Yet, as the ISG Report stated, there is no “magic bullet” for Iraq. What the Surge has opened is a window, a tenuous peace with a chance to move forward. But that window is now closing. Violence was up 33% in February. March is off to a bloody start. Attacks on US troops are stuck at 2005 levels. Not the bliss of early 2004, but better than the bloodbath of 2006-7. The Iraqi political front is deadlocked. And neither US political party is offering realistic plans for Iraq. McCain wants endless war. By calling for immediate withdrawal, Hillary and Obama ignore the Iraqi people, who, according to the New York Times’ chief Baghdad hand John Burns, have “an overwhelming desire to see American troops remain long enough to restore stability.”
As for Iraq’s future, only one thing is certain: the Iraq war and America’s involvement in it remain far from over. As for Iraq’s place in history, only one thing is certain: hundreds of thousands have died in a preemptive war launched on shoddy intelligence.
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March 19th, 2008 at 11:58 am
nice reporting, Ray, this is the kind of journalism we need, thanks.