Al Qaeda in Iraq: Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

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Introduction Antiwar Response Get Out: When? Logistics Post-U.S. Scenarios Civil War Refugee Crisis Permanent Presence? Al Qaeda Moral Obligation Charts and Maps Lexicon of Iraq War Lingo Interviews TOOLS E-mail article Print article BACKTALK E-mail the editor

The Outlook

The one important caveat is that AQI's ability to gain control of territory or achieve even a mini-state in Iraq will be limited by the nihilistic tendencies of its recruits. The barbaric violence, radicalism, and extreme puritanism of AQI's recruits have turned off many Iraqi Sunnis, especially because Sunnis themselves have often been the victims of Al Qaeda violence. Al Qaeda's prospects in Iraq depend greatly on the degree to which Sunni Iraqis view it as a protector or an oppressor.

Nowhere has AQI's tendency to intimidate the local population to secure obedience been more evident than in Anbar province, the Sunni-dominated region to the west of Baghdad whose population centers of Ramadi, Fallujah, and Haditha are gateways to the western deserts. Last November, a U.S. Marine Intelligence Report "The State of the Insurgency in Anbar," authored by Colonel Peter Devlin and obtained by the Washington Post, found that Al Qaeda in Iraq had become "the dominant organization of influence" in the province, more powerful than the Iraqi government and U.S. troops "in its ability to control the day-to-day life of the average Sunni." It was, he wrote, "an integral part of the social fabric of western Iraq," so deeply entrenched that there was no longer the option of defeating it with a "decapitating strike to cripple the organization."

As a counterweight, Devlin proposed creating a local paramilitary force to protect Sunnis from Al Qaeda and strengthening the local Iraqi police force. And in the months that followed, the U.S. military did just that, persuading or paying the region's tribes to join in the battle against Al Qaeda in Iraq. After a major November 2006 offensive by U.S. and Iraqi troops that degraded Al Qaeda capabilities in the region, two dozen Anbar tribes working under the auspices of the Anbar Salvation Front and convinced that the tide was turning against Al Qaeda, began to fight the terrorist organization, receiving weapons and ammunition from the U.S. Army.

Anbar does seem to be a genuine success story, but it should be noted that the breakthrough there was set in motion before the start of the U.S. surge. A promised $300 million in U.S. aid for the region, which will likely be funneled through tribal sheikhs in large part, helped win loyalties; this spring the sheikhs instructed their followers, many of whom were former insurgents, to join the local police forces, swelling their number from a paltry 3,500 in October 2006 to over 20,000 by June. That month General David Petraeus told CNN, "What's taken place in Anbar is almost breathtaking. In the last several months, tribes that turned a blind eye to what Al Qaeda was doing in that province are now opposing Al Qaeda very vigorously. And the level of violence in Anbar has plummeted." According to the U.S. military, monthly attack levels in Anbar declined from some 1,350 in October 2006 to slightly over 200 in August this year.

In Anbar and elsewhere, Al Qaeda's hardline attitudes married to seemingly unlimited violence are also increasingly turning other Sunni militant groups against it. In April the Islamic Army of Iraq, for instance, issued an online communiqué condemning the actions of AQI. It is worth quoting in some detail:

These people became insolent against us and wrongly and hostilely killed some mujahideen brothers from this group—over thirty to date. Not satisfied with this, they declared hostility on the other jihad groups, and this hostility turned into confrontations with some groups, such as the 1920 Revolution Brigades…Indeed, Sunnis in general have become a legitimate target for them, especially the wealthy…Anyone who criticizes them or goes against them and demonstrates their error in such actions they try to kill…[We make an] appeal to Sheikh Osama Bin Laden, may God Almighty preserve him…Let him vindicate his religion and honor and take legal and organizational responsibility for the Al Qaeda organization. Let him investigate and ascertain the facts.

Al Qaeda's imperious attitude toward other Sunni Iraqis was reflected by leaflets it left in villages near Mosul in northern Iraq in April: "May the world know that we, sons of the Islamic State of Iraq, impose and lift blockades on any region we wish and at any time we wish." In May the Sunni militants of the Islamic Army in Iraq, the Mujahideen Army, and elements of Ansar al-Sunnah formed the Jihad and Reform Front to counter AQI. These insurgent groups have begun fighting against Al Qaeda in several areas of Iraq. In June AQI released a communiqué accusing other insurgent groups of targeting and killing its members, while the Sunni Baghdad districts of Amiriyah and Doura witnessed fierce fighting between insurgent groups and Al Qaeda over the summer.

For the 1920 Revolution Brigades, a major Sunni nationalist insurgent group, the killing of its leader Harith Dhahir Khamis al-Dari by Al Qaeda in March after he refused to pledge allegiance to the fictional Al Qaeda leader Baghdadi was too much to stomach. A commander of the 1920 Brigades, Abu Hudhayfah, told the Arabic daily Al Hayat that Al Qaeda's actions had "left resistance groups with two options: either to fight Al Qaeda and negotiate with the Americans, or fight the Americans and join the Islamic State of Iraq, which divides Iraq. Both options are bitter." Significantly, the death of the 1920 Revolutions Brigade leader contributed to his uncle, Harith al-Dari—arguably the most important Sunni cleric in Iraq and the head of the powerful Association of Muslim Scholars—announcing in May that Al Qaeda had "gone too far" and its behavior was "unacceptable."

Tensions between Al Qaeda in Iraq and other insurgent groups have been rising for some time. Al Qaeda's use of threats and violence to intimidate Sunnis from voting in the Iraqi elections of December 15, 2005, vexed other insurgent groups. Unlike Al Qaeda, the Islamic Army of Iraq, the largest Sunni insurgent group, is not ideologically opposed to democratic elections. After the elections, Zarqawi fiercely criticized the Sunni Islamic Party of Iraq, a Muslim Brotherhood-founded party, for forming a coalition government with Shiite parties and threatened Sunnis who did not back Al Qaeda's line.

These sorts of threats predictably caused a backlash against Al Qaeda; to try to repair some of the damage, Zarqawi announced the formation of the Mujahideen Shura Council in January 2006, a federation of several Sunni militant groups including AQI that was headed by the fictional Baghdadi. The grouping was, of course, a sham, and did little to mend relations between Al Qaeda and other Sunni insurgents. On June 8, 2006, the U.S. military received intelligence from local Sunnis in Baquba that Zarqawi was present there and launched an air strike that killed him.

His successor Masri again sought to restore unity in the Sunni insurgency by coming up with yet another name for his group: The Islamic State of Iraq. Masri attempted to woo other insurgent groups to unite with the new grouping through flattering rhetoric such as, "O heroes of Ansar al Sunnah Army, O the lions of the Islamic Army, O our sons in the Mujahideen Army…our yearning for you has increased and we are longing for your amity." But the sort of unity that Masri was proposing was signing allegiance to his fake emir Baghdadi, and this only further aggravated other Sunni insurgents. Jihad al-Ansari, an insurgent leader, sent an open letter to Baghdadi on February 2007, complaining that "this step of yours has caused innumerable negative results…many of your organization members desiring to confirm your authority to all Muslims in Iraq, have presumed to attack one and all and have continued to incite against anyone who abstains from swearing allegiance to you." Furthermore, AQI depicted itself as the vanguard for a prototype Sunni breakaway state containing several provinces surrounding Baghdad, a concept that was, according to a U.S. counterterrorism official, anathema to Sunni insurgent groups motivated by Iraqi nationalism.

Algeria in the early 1990s may offer some indication of Al Qaeda's future trajectory in Iraq. While a range of Islamists initially fought a united insurgency against the Algerian military that in 1992 cancelled an Islamist election victory, the radical GIA soon broke away from the more moderate FIS and indulged in more and more indiscriminate killing of anyone who disagreed with its increasingly hardcore "takfiri" ideology, helping to precipitate a civil war that left more than 100,000 dead. The result was that by 1997 the Islamist insurgency was so fractured internally and so unpopular with Algerians that it imploded. The vanishing of radical Islamists as an effective force in Algeria was accelerated by the closing of its key mouthpiece, the London-published journal Al Ansar, whose editors were unable to keep tabs with the internecine rivalries on the ground any longer.

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Introduction
Antiwar Response
Get Out: When?
Logistics
Post-U.S. Scenarios

Civil War
Refugee Crisis
Permanent Presence?
Al Qaeda

Moral Obligation
Charts and Maps
Lexicon of Iraq War Lingo
Interviews

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