Is the U.S.-allied Sunni tribal alliance against al-Qaeda in Iraq fracturing?
One of the bright spots in Iraq has been the recent tribal shift in Anbar Province against al-Qaeda. Started after al-Qaeda declared an “Islamic State of Iraq” — alternative translations put it as the “Islamic Emirate of the Land of the Two Rivers,” implying that statehood is a religiously illegitimate concept — last fall, over 25 tribes decided that al-Qaeda’s severe vision for Anbar threatened their interests more than the U.S. occupation does. As a result, tribal leaders created the Anbar Salvation Council, a political alliance that worked with the U.S. against al-Qaeda; and ever since, the U.S. military has reported increasing numbers of killed or captured al-Qaeda affiliates. The tribes have also sent their young men to join the Iraqi army and police, but they also retain a military wing that the U.S. has equipped and worked with, leading some analysts — and military officers — to worry about the creation of yet another militia.
Recently, however, strains have been on display in the Anbar Salvation Council. A key figure in its creation, Sheikh Abdul Sattar al-Rishawi, has been alienating some of the other tribes through his enthusiastic cooperation with the U.S. and his heavy-handed graft. al-Rishawi denies any such rift, but the Washington Post reports:
Tribal relations are notoriously fickle and fluid, and recent tensions within the Anbar Salvation Council bear some hallmarks of a power struggle that could signal either its evolution or its collapse.
(Lieutenant Colonel Richard D.) Welch, a U.S. Army Reserve officer in Baghdad who specializes in tribal and religious affairs, said that “you will see, I think, in the next few days a complete severing” of relations between Abu Risha and other members of the council, and the formation of a new group.
(Duliam tribal confederation leader Ali Hatem Ali) Suleiman said 12 Anbar tribal leaders have signed an agreement to form a new coalition that would result in the dissolution of the Anbar Salvation Council and the purging of Abu Risha. “Those people have thrown themselves in the arms of the U.S. forces for their own benefit,” he said.
It’s unclear what would happen if the coalition splits. Suleiman’s quote suggests that, at best, his faction would become fence-sitters in the war between the U.S., al-Qaeda and Sunni insurgent groups. Some of those groups, while having a murky (and in some cases hostile) relationship to the Anbar Salvation Council, have turned against al-Qaeda for largely nationalistic reasons, resisting the Islamic State of Iraq as well as the U.S. presence. One of the biggest, the Islamic Army of Iraq, last week declared a cease-fire with al-Qaeda, suggesting that the order of battle between the U.S., the Sunni Iraqis and al-Qaeda in Iraq is less stable than it appears.
All of these tribal tensions come as the U.S. military command in Iraq tries to export the Anbar tribal model to other Sunni areas. Reports the New York Times:
American officers who have engaged in what they call outreach to the Sunni groups say many of them have had past links to Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia but grew disillusioned with the Islamic militantsâ extremist tactics, particularly suicide bombings that have killed thousands of Iraqi civilians. In exchange for American backing, these officials say, the Sunni groups have agreed to fight Al Qaeda and halt attacks on American units. Commanders who have undertaken these negotiations say that in some cases, Sunni groups have agreed to alert American troops to the location of roadside bombs and other lethal booby traps.
But critics of the strategy, including some American officers, say it could amount to the Americansâ arming both sides in a future civil war. The United States has spent more than $15 billion in building up Iraqâs army and police force, whose manpower of 350,000 is heavily Shiite. With an American troop drawdown increasingly likely in the next year, and little sign of a political accommodation between Shiite and Sunni politicians in Baghdad, the critics say, there is a risk that any weapons given to Sunni groups will eventually be used against Shiites. There is also the possibility the weapons could be used against the Americans themselves.
Naturally, the Shiite-dominated government of Nouri al-Maliki isn’t happy about the U.S. directly arming and supplying Sunni tribal groups. The Times quotes a Maliki aide saying, “We have enough militias in Iraq that we are struggling now to solve the problem. Why are we creating new ones?” That answer is, of course, self-serving: Maliki’s coalition encompasses several Shiite parties that field their own militias for attacks on Sunnis. But as the U.S. tries to pressure Maliki into making sectarian compromises on divisive issues such as Iraq’s oil wealth and de-Baathification, look for the U.S.’s Sunni tribal initiative to become another point of contention.
