Monthly Analysis: June 2007

By: Ryan Mauro

TDCAnalyst@aol.com

Politics and Iraq

The troop surge is barely under way, yet Senator Lugar seems to want to ditch the strategy before its full implementation.  Politically, it’s quite understandable, as casualties will likely rise and heavy combat will persist for some time.  However, the new strategy, implemented since January, has produced some results, even though all the required manpower didn’t arrive until June, and the simultaneous offensives planned haven’t yet been launched.  That is proof that any success from the surge is due to the strategy, not solely from increased manpower.  Despite the fact that the situation on the ground is beginning to change, U.S. political expediency is likely to abandon Iraq’s struggling democracy.  Already, there are leaks occurring that indicate the Bush Administration plans to draw down forces in the spring or, perhaps even sooner.

Politically, this may be the game plan: The Administration will point to positive reports from General Petraeus, perhaps even going so far as to state that all of the objectives which required U.S. troops to be in the lead have been met, and it is time to switch to a secondary role, accompanied by a drawdown in U.S. forces.  The remaining forces will stay on to deter Iran and Syria, and to provide logistical, intelligence and air support. These remaining forces will also serve as a rapid reaction force.

The Democrats will respond by claiming that the change in role is because the Administration is, at last, recognizing that their strategy was flawed, and the Democrats were right from the beginning in opposing the surge.  The Administration, on the other hand, will argue that the change in role is due to the implementation of Petraeus’ new strategy, which enabled the Iraqis to take the lead, and the U.S. to begin phasing out.

Although that debate may dog the political discourse, in the end it would reduce Iraq as an issue for the 2008 elections, and maybe, just maybe, the surge will have improved the situation enough for the Iraqis to successfully take command. If, in their reduced presence, U.S. casualties continue at high levels, then the debate will become whether ALL U.S. forces should be removed, further cuts should be made, or if the current force is adequate.

The key tipping point in this debate will be troop casualty levels because, while the American people tolerate long-term deployments of our soldiers, they don’t tolerate troop casualties in an overseas land, especially when they don’t see much benefit from their sacrifice.

No matter what happens, it seems extremely unlikely the prevailing U.S. political temper will allow for the surge to be implemented on the scale (in terms of strength and time) it is intended.  The situation might have been different had the surge had been implemented in the fall of 2003 or, even as late as 2005.  We can only hope now that the gains made by the surge, before the U.S. withdraws, will be sufficient to enable Iraq to persist on its own.

JFK Plot

In early June, the big news was the thwarted terrorist plot at JFK Airport.  This sophisticated plot was blamed either on homegrown terrorists, not directly connected to al-Qaeda, or to al-Qaeda, depending on to whom you talk.  While al-Qaeda must be targeted, the U.S. must be careful not to put so much focus on them that state sponsors of terrorism are provided with deniability should they use a proxy to attack US interests. 

The JFK plot is a good example of this.  Only Steve Schwartz at The New York Post, the Northeast Intelligence Network (HomelandSecurityUS.com), and Michael Ledeen reviewed potential links to Iran.

            Two of the suspects involved, Abdul Kadir and Kareem Ibrahim, are Shiites, which separates them from the usual Sunni suspects rounded up in the West.  Kadir was arrested as he got on a plane to go to Venezuela (which is an ally of Iran) and then to a conference in Iran. Karrem Ibrahim is a Shiite cleric educated in Iran, who later became a socialist politician in Guyana.

            New evidence of an Iranian role in the plot came to light in July when a judge from Trinidad said that tape recordings showed the terrorists sought funding from people in Iran and Britain. On one tape, Ibrahim refers to a “brother” who was sent to Iran to discuss expanding “the revolutionary movement.”[i]

For more information, see the Northeast Intelligence Network investigation here: http://homelandsecurityus.com/JFK061407

Middle East

The most hotly debated issues in Iraq right now are (1) oil, and (2) the use of tribal alliances (along with ex-insurgents like the 1920s Brigades).  Tribal alliances have now formed in Anbar, Baghdad, Diyala, Nineveh, and Salah ad Din.  The debate is whether the US is trading near-term decreases in violence, for long-term stability, by supporting a governing structure that may undermine the power of the central government.

However, Saddam did the same thing, and also courted the tribes.  It’s a formula for stability that has many problems, but is very risky to abandon.  As Iraq modernizes and democratizes, the tribal influence will slowly decrease.  It will take time for this to occur, and the U.S.’s marginalization of this critical element in Iraq would only lead to additional U.S. and Iraqi casualties.

Another significant event: Recently, over 130 religious leaders and scholars from different sects took part in the conference that condemned al-Qaeda, claiming the insurgency in Iraq is twisting the tenets of Islam.  In Iraq, there exists a wide array of moderate religious leaders who haven’t been organized.  Opinion on US intervention may be mixed, but that is a minor issue as these clerics stand up to attempt to win the intellectual and spiritual war inside Islam.

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The U.S. military seems to have renewed the campaign to substantiate Iran’s role in the Iraqi insurgency.  In June and early July, major revelations were released.  Iran is being directly blamed for the sophisticated attack in Karbala that killed five American soldiers on January 20.  It has also been reported that satellite surveillance has located a mock-up of the site which was attacked inside Iran.[ii]

The U.S. military also revealed the specific case of a member of Lebanese Hezbollah, Ali Mussa Dakdouk, who was captured in Basra, in March.  Dardouk was sent by Iran, and he confirmed that Iran was behind the assault.  Coalition forces also seized a 22 page document indicating that Iran provided intelligence to the attackers for the assault.

The U.S. military has officially stated that the Revolutionary Guards’ Qods Force is building an Iraqi version of Hezbollah.  Iran uses Hezbollah to train and organize insurgents, and senior Iranian leaders are involved in the effort.  Senior Hezbollah agents have been deployed in Iraq since at least 2004.

The U.S. military claims that Qods spends at least $3 million per month on the insurgency, and that groups of 40-60 Iraqis, sent to three training camps outside Tehran, are used to prepare bombings and kidnappings.  Iran is also taking advantage of more radical elements of the Mehdi Army that have split from Moqtada al-Sadr.  The U.S. military claims that 18 high-level Iranian operatives backing “special groups” have been arrested and three have been killed. [iii]

            240mm rockets from Iran, with a range of up to 30 miles, giving the insurgents the longest-range weapon they have to date, have been seized from radical Shiites in Basra and Baghdad in recent weeks.  Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this is that the weapons bear the markings of the Revolutionary Guards, and a date of 2007, and are identical to those supplied to Hezbollah.  Apparently, Iran is unconcerned about hiding the fact that they are assisting radical Shiite elements in Iraq.[iv]  To them, the death of U.S. soldiers is merely one component of “negotiating” with the West.

WorldThreats.com and GlobalPolitician.com writer Nick Guariglia reminded me of another piece of evidence about Iran’s cooperation with Ba’athist insurgents, perhaps even with Saddam’s blessing, before his fall.  Although we’ve previously discussed this, it is worth mentioning again.

The leader of the Mohammed’s Army insurgent group in Iraq, Moayad Ahmed Yasseen, was captured in Fallujah in 2004.  He was a former colonel in the Iraqi army.  He testified that two other Iraqi military officers went to Iran between April and May of 2004, and met Iranian intelligence officials and Ayatollah Khamenei.  They received money, weapons and even car bombs.

Yasseen reported that Saddam personally him that, once Iraq was invaded, he should cross into Syria and meet with a Syrian intelligence officer to receive funding and arms.  This is proof that the insurgency, to some degree, was planned before the war began, with cooperation from Syria.  It would be interesting to pick Yasseen’s brain to see if Iran was talking to Saddam’s regime in this regard.

The excellent website, MEMRI.org, has translated a May 4th report from Al-Arabiya (published on MEMRI June 6) regarding Nasser al-Bahri, a former bodyguard to Osama bin Laden, who was captured in 2001.  According to the report, al-Bahri stated that al-Qaeda was “coordinating” with Iran, as they had a common enemy.

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The Syrian opposition has been reporting that Fatah al-Islam is being sponsored by the Syrian government.  New information emerged that supplements the evidence we last reported in these analyses.  An Arab newspaper has published the testimony of a captured Fatah al-Islam terrorist named Muhammad Suleiman Mara’i.  Mara’i claims that he was recruited by his brother, also a member of Fatah, and that his brother worked with Assef Shawkat, the head of Syrian military intelligence.

According to the report, Mara’i also states that his brother served as a liaison between the two parties, that Shawkat helped his brother insert al-Qaeda explosives expert Abu Muhammad al-Iraqi into northern Lebanon and, that al-Iraqi gathered intelligence on possible terrorist targets like hotels and embassies, and is now hiding in Syria.[v]

The event that may affect the Middle East the most in the future this month occurred in Europe.  As Kenneth Timmerman reported, a wide range of Iranian opposition figures are assembling to attempt to form a united front against the current regime in Iran.  The primary challenge in uniting the opposition hasn’t been a lack of popular support or capability, it’s been the scarcity of any unity of focus.

It may be considered a somewhat positive development that members of the opposition, from different ethnic backgrounds, and many different political ideologies, are now at least talking about how to move past their differences, so they can at least attempt to assemble a united front.  A united front is, of course, critical in order to topple the mullahs, and also to form a new Iranian government.  The groups are forming “Solidarity Iran,” named after those who toppled the Communists in Poland.  This is the great hope of the Middle East, and hopefully Washington will learn that before it is too late.

Asia

New evidence is coming to light that Iran is assisting terrorist elements in Afghanistan, including Taliban remnants.  British forces intercepted at least two arms shipments of mortars, RPGs, C4 explosives, and small arms, headed to Helmud Province. These weapons are identical to those being furnished to insurgents in Iraq.[vi]

For the first time, a credible major newspaper is claiming that China is involved in the Iraqi insurgency.  Bill Gertz of The Washington Times has reported that China is supplying large amounts of small arms to the insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan (specifically the Taliban) through Iran.  China is reportedly not responding to U.S. inquiries about this.

Some of the weapons are being shipped directly from Chinese factories and include sniper rifles, ammunition, RPGs, and equipment for roadside bombs.  These weapons are not from Saddam’s arsenal since he did not possess such armaments.  The report also noted that Taliban forces have been using Chinese HN-5 anti-aircraft missiles.[vii]

Given this recent information, and what is already known regarding the stated intentions of the two ideologically similar regimes, one can easily envision a much larger conspiracy is currently in the offing.  Although the topic is debatable, some have accused Russia and China of utilizing rogue states as proxies for their global totalitarian ambitions.

It has been reported that the arms flow to insurgents from Syria leads directly back to Russia.  If the arms pipeline in Iran leads back to China, then those who see the struggle between the West and the rogue states, as part of a significantly larger end game on the part of Russia, and/or, China, are correct.

The key question then becomes whether Russia and China are coordinating their efforts, just as their rogue proxies, Syria and Iran, are coordinating their activities.  If they are, then the global situation is beginning to look decidedly more dangerous, and one must consider whether a grand anti-U.S. bloc isn’t being created.