Signs of Division in Iraq Insurgency

In an amazing breakthrough, the Associated Press is reporting of sharp divisions and breakdowns among those who are fighting against a forward-moving Iraq.

There are growing signs of hostility between secular Iraqi insurgents and Muslim extremists — some of them foreigners — fighting under the banner of al-Qaida.

The factions have exchanged threats and are increasingly divided over the strategy of violence, much of it targeting civilians, that aims undermine the fragile new government.

The increased tension, critically, arises as the mainstream component of the Sunni Arab-led insurgency — which remains active, deadly and vibrant nearly two years since it began — has opened a campaign designed to reap political gain out of its violent roots.

Post-election realities appear to have forced the tactical change as majority Shiites and Kurds consolidate power and the population grows increasingly angry over the largely Sunni-driven insurgency that is killing vast numbers of ordinary people and the country’s fledgling army and police force.

Well, the AP can’t give up the ghost just yet. I want to point out that I question the following choices of phrasing: “Muslim extremists — some of them foreigners”, “fragile new government”, and “killing vast numbers.” All three of the emphasized words imply an unidentified scale or opinionated wording that could have been either substantiated or phrased in a more neutral manner.

“You see a withering of the insurgents that had a short-term agenda, like preventing the January election. But the insurgency is not unraveling yet,” said Peter Khalil, former director
of national security policy for the now-defunct U.S.-led occupation authority in Iraq.

Now let me selectively quote and add my own punctuation: “You see a withering of the insurgents … but the insurgency is not unraveling … yet.”

The divide among militants, however, is becoming more noticeable.

In Ramadi, the capital of Anbar Province and a stronghold of the insurgency, homegrown Iraqi fighters have begun recently to air their differences in menacing fliers plastered on walls and distributed in mosques — making threats and denouncing the tactics of the extremists, according to witnesses who have seen the fliers.

Some of the fliers threaten reprisals against the militants or threaten to inform police of their identity and whereabouts. The extremists have not publicly responded, but residents say the fighters have kept a low profile since the appearance of the fliers in the Euphrates-side city and that some of them may have moved to the outskirts to avoid clashes.

Implicit in my bolded portion is an open admission of the growing authority of the Iraqi police forces.

Ramadi’s insurgents argue that al-Qaida fighters are giving the resistance a bad name and demand they stop targeting civilians and kidnappings. Al-Qaida militants counter that Iraqis who join the army and police are “apostates” — Muslims who renounce their faith — and deserve to be killed.

“They have tarnished our image and used the jihad to make personal gains,” said Ahmed Hussein, a 30-year-old mosque imam from Ramadi, speaking of al-Qaida fighters. “They have no legitimacy,” said Hussein, who claims insurgency links but says he’s not a fighter himself.

Not that your image was all that great outside the Arab world anyway, Ahmed. Too long have y’all silently, seemingly condoned kidnappings, beheadings and butchery for your cause.

In Baghdad’s mainly Sunni Azamiyah district, another insurgency hotbed, residents have repeatedly brought down from walls and street light poles the black banners of al-Qaida in Iraq.

Repeatedly, but never reported until now.

Iraq’s newly elected president, Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani, urged insurgents to sit down and talk with the new government, but he’s made it clear his offer is exclusively available to homegrown Iraqi insurgents and not to extremists or foreign fighters.

“We must find political and peaceful solutions with those duped Iraqis who have been involved in terrorism and pardon them, and invite them to join the democratic process,” Talabani said Thursday as he was sworn in at parliament. “But we must firmly counter and isolate the criminal terrorism that’s imported from abroad and is allied with criminal Baathists.”

Even the AP is now admitting a wedge exists among the opposition. This is an excellent way for the Iraqi government to slam a mallet against that wedge.

Ideological or tactical shifts within the insurgency are difficult to gauge because of the secrecy surrounding it and the different, sometime conflicting, agendas of its disparate groups — with the majority of homegrown insurgents hardcore members of Saddam’s Baath party, former members of his army and security forces as well as religious nationalists.

Associated Press reporters in the insurgency strongholds of Ramadi, Baqouba and Samarra say there have been fewer attacks in those towns in recent weeks. They also report rising hostility toward militants associated with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian al-Qaida leader in Iraq.

U.S. defense officials say nationwide attacks were down to 40-45 a day in recent weeks, lower than the pre-election daily average of 50-60.

The change was apparent after the Jan. 30 elections, with the number of U.S. soldiers killed dropping from 58 in February to 33 in March — the lowest monthly death toll since 20 American soldiers were killed in February 2004, according to an Associated Press count.

Meanwhile, there are unconfirmed news reports in Arab media that factions of the insurgency may be indirectly negotiating with authorities to lay down their arms in return for amnesty, jobs and reconstruction money. The Iraqi government has not commented.

I’ve blogged before about the declining casualties and the admission among the Sunnis of their strategic blunder to generally avoid the elections. It’s nice to see the AP slowly catching up to the obvious.

It’s also good to see our Iraqi opponents, smelling blood in the water, beginning to turn on the foreign radicals and Saddamists holdouts.

Okay, maybe they aren’t smelling blood in the water. Maybe they are finally seeing the writing on the wall.