MILNET Brief: January 7 NIE-Prospects For Iraq's Stability...

MILNET Brief
National Intelligence Estimate

Prospects for Iraq's Stability: A Challenging Road Ahead
National Intelligence Council, January 2007

" Iraqi Society's growing polarization, the persistent weakness of the security forces and the state in general, and all side's ready recourse to violence are collectively driving an increase in communal and insurgent violence and political extremism. Unless efforts to reverse these conditions show measurable progress during the term of this Estimate, the coming 12 to 18 months, we assess the overall situation will continue to deteriorate at rates comparable to the latter part of 2006."

- NIE, January 2007, National Intelligence Council

This briefing renders the PDF document released by the U.S. Intelligence Community into an HTML readable and searchable document, as well as links to the original source document and provides a MILNET mirror copy of that source document. This effort was performed due to the extreme importance (in the judgment of MILNET's chief editor) to the issue of violence in the Middle East, and of course to the outcome of the effort to build a democracy in Iraq.

In our opinion, this is the first academically and professionally acceptable assessment of the situation in Iraq, providing a non-partisan (as opposed to bi-partisan), non political look at the security environment in Iraq. The NIE also takes great pains to present options and possible negative outcomes if certain political and/or outside influences create events that will impact the fragile security in Iraq.

Unlike the ISG report which was wholly inadequate due to political double-speak and sensitivities to both major political parties in the U.S., this NIE is brutal in its assessment and lays out actual steps to be taken, as well as, for the first time, takes aim at the actual religious/sectarian notions of Shia-on-Shia, Sunni vs. Shia, and Kurds vs. both violence that is taking place and correctly calls out the impact of Al-Qaeda in Iraq's efforts to contribute to the chaos.

The differences between this NIE and the ISG are breathtaking. However, this is not hard to understand. The Iraq Study Group was made up of mostly politicians -- whose outlook on the world is biased by their nature -- whereas this report is produced by the leaders of the 16 agencies in the U.S. Intelligence Community. And while one expects that the NIE was prepared in response to a Congressional request, it was clearly a culmination of efforts much previous to the period post-Congressional elections, and probably was the culmination and compilation of several NIE or lesser interim reports that had already been in place for sometime.

The Document

We have NOT rendered the introductory paragraphs that explain who the National Intelligence Council is, the background on NIE's in general, nor the terminology used sections of the original report. We invite you to read the PDF file to read these sections at your leisure...they make fascinating reading for those unfamiliar with the NIE process and adds understanding to much of the "Intelligence Speak" that goes on in making estimates on intelligence matters.

Our HTML rendering begins with the meat of the document, beginning with "Key Judgments" the first topic specific data to appear in the NIE and which begins as the first words on page 6 of the document. We should note that it is our experience and those intelligence sources for MILNET, that the first six pages are not usually briefed at the national leadership level, and may have been added for the benefit of new Congressional members as well as the U.S. public.

Page 6

Key Judgments:

Iraqi Society's growing polarization, the persistent weakness of the security forces and the state in general, and all side's ready recourse to violence are collectively driving an increase in communal and insurgent violence and political extremism. Unless efforts to reverse these conditions show measurable progress during the term of this Estimate, the coming 12 to 18 months, we assess the overall situation will continue to deteriorate at rates comparable to the latter part of 2006.

If strengthened Iraqi Security Forces (ISF), more loyal to the government and supported by Coalition forces, are able to reduce levels of violence and establish more effective security for Iraq's population, Iraqi leaders could have an opportunity to begin the process of political compromise necessary for longer term stability, political process and economic recovery

Nevertheless, even if violence is diminished, given the current winner-take-all attitude and sectarian animosities infecting the political scene, Iraqi leaders will be hard pressed to achieve sustained political reconciliation in the time frame of this Estimate

The challenges confronting Iraqis are daunting, and multiple factors are driving current trajectory of the country's securing political evolution.

Decades of subordination to Sunni political, social, and economic domination have made the Shia deeply insecure about their hold on power. This insecurity leads the Shia to mistrust US efforts to reconcile Iraqi sects and reinforces their unwillingness to engage with the Sunnis on a variety of issues, including adjusting the structure of Iraq's federal system, reining in Shia militias, and easing de-Baathification.
Many Sunni Arabs remain unwilling to accept their minority status, believe the central government is illegitimate and incompetent, and are convinced that Shia dominance will increase Iranian influence over Iraq, in ways that eroded the Arab character and increase Sunni repression.
The absence of unifying leaders among the Arab Sunni or Shia with the capacity to speak for or exert control over their confessional groups limits prospects of reconciliation. The Kurds remain willing to participate in Iraqi state building but reluctant to surrender any of the gains in autonomy they have achieved.
The Kurds are moving systematically to increase their control of Kirkuk to guarantee annexation of all or most of the city and province into the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) after the constitutionally mandated referendum set to occur no later than 31 December 2007. Arab groups in Kirkuk continue to resist violently what they see as Kurdish encroachment.

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Despite real improvements, the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) -- particularly the Iraqi police -- will be hard pressed in the next 12-18 months to execute significantly increased security responsibilities, and particularly to operate independently against Shia militias with success. Sectarian divisions erode the dependability of many units, many are hampered by personnel and equipment shortfalls, and a number of units have refused to serve outside of the areas where they were recruited.
Extremists--most notably the Sunni Jihadist group al-Qa'ida in Iraq (AQI) and Shia oppositionist Jays al-Mahdi (JAM)--continue to act as very effective accelerators for what has become a self-sustaining inter-sectarian struggle between Shia and Sunnis.
Significant population displacement, both within Iraq and the movement of Iraqis into neighboring countries, indicates the hardening of ethno-sectarian divisions, diminishes Iraq's professional and entrepreneurial classes, and strains the capacities of the countries to which they have relocated. The UN estimates over a million Iraqis are now in Syria and Jordan.

The Intelligence Community judges that the term "civil war" does not adequately capture the complexity of the conflicts in Iraq, which includes extensive Shia-on-Shia violence, an al-Qa'ida and Sunni insurgent attacks on Coalition forces, and widespread criminally motivated violence. Nonetheless the term "civil war" accurately describes the key elements of Iraqi conflict, including the hardening of ethno-sectarian identities, a sea change in the character of the violence, ethno-sectarian mobilization, and population displacements.

Coalition capabilities, including force levels, resources, and operations remain an essential stabilizing element in Iraq. If Coalition forces were withdrawn rapidly during the term of this Estimate, we judge that this almost certainly would lead to an increase in the scale and scope of sectarian conflict in Iraq, intensify Sunni resistance to the Iraqi Government, and have adverse consequences for national reconciliation.

If such a rapid withdrawal were to take place, we judge that the ISF would be unlikely to survive as a non-sectarian national institution; neighboring countries--invited by Iraqi factions or inilaterally--might intervene openly in the conflict; massive civilian casualties and forced population displacement would be probable;AQI would attempt to use parts of the country--particularly al-Anbar province--to plan increased attacks in and outside of Iraq; and spiraling violence and political disarray in Iraq, along with Kurdish moves to control Kirkuk and strengthen autonomy, could prompt Turkey to launch a military incursion.

A number of identifiable developments could help to reverse the negative trend driving Iraq's current trajectory. They include:

Broader Sunni acceptance of the current political structure and federalism to begin to reduce one of the major sources of Iraq's instability.

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Significant concessions by Shia and Kurds to create space for Sunni acceptance of federalism.
A bottom-up approach --- deputizing, resourcing, and working more directly with neighborhood watch groups and establishing grievance committees -- to help mend frayed relationships between tribal and religious groups, which have been mobilized into communal warfare over the past three years.

A key enabler for all of these steps would be stronger Iraqi leadership, which could enhance the positive impacts of all the above developments.

Iraq's neighbors influence, and are influenced by, events within Iraq, but involvement of these outside actors is not likely to be a major driver of violence or the prospects for stability because of the self-sustaining character of Iraq's internal sectarian dynamics. Nonetheless, Iranian support for select groups of Iraqi Shia militants clearly intensifies the conflicts in Iraq. Syria continues to provide safehaven for expatriate Iraqi Bathists and to take less than adequate measures to stop the flow of foreign jihadists into Iraq.

For key Sunni regimes, intense communal warfare, Shia gains in Iraq, and Iran's assertive role have heightened fears of regional instability and unrest and contributed to a growing polarization between Iran and Syria on the one hand and other Middle East governments on the other. But traditional regional rivalries, deepening ethnic and sectarian violence in Iraq over the past year, persistent anti-Americanism in the region, anti-Shia prejudice among Arab states, and fears of being perceived by the publics as abandoning their Sunni co-religionists in Iraq have constrained Arab states' willingness to engage politically and economically with the Shia-dominated government in Baghdad and led them to consider unilateral support to Sunni groups.
Turkey does not want Iraq to disintegrate and is determined to eliminate the safehaven in northern Iraq of the Kurdistan People's Congress (KGK, formerly PKK) -- a Turkish Kurdish terrorist group.

A number of identifiable internal security and political triggering events, including sustained mass sectarian killings, assassinations of major religious and political leaders, and a complete Sunni defection from the government have the potential to convulse severely Iraq's security environment. Should these events take place, they could spark an abrupt increase in communal and insurgent violence and shift Iraq's trajectory from gradual decline to rapid deterioration with grave humanitarian, political, and security consequences. Three prospective security paths might then emerge:

Chaos leading to Partition. With a rapid deterioration in the capacity of Iraq's central government to function, security services and other aspects of sovereignty would collapse. Resulting widespread fighting could produce de facto partition,

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dividing Iraq into three mutually antagonistic parts. Collapse of this magnitude would generate fierce violence for at least several years, ranging well beyond the time frame of this Estimate, before settling into a partially stable end-state.
Emergence of a Shia Strongman. Instead of a disintegrating central government producing partition, a security implosion could lead Iraq's potentially most powerful group, the Shia, to assert its latent strength.
Anarchic Fragmentation of Power. The emergence of a checkered pattern of local control would present the greatest potential for instability, mixing extreme ethnic-sectarian violence with debilitating intra-group clashes.

Note: Bold and Italic fonts were used to render the document as nearly identical to that of the original. Similarly, the use of page numbers were used to identify the page breaks to aid those who wish to move to the original document to validate or check the rendering for accuracy.

Sources:

Prospects for Iraq's Stability: A Challenging Road Ahead, National Intelligence Council, 01/2007 (Fox News) (MILNET Mirror) PDF, 235KB
President Bush's Broadcast Speech Transcript, 1/10/2007