Southern Iraq, long touted as a peaceful region that's likely to be among the first areas returned to Iraqi control, is now dominated by Shiite Muslim warlords and militiamen who are laying the groundwork for an Islamic fundamentalist government, say senior British and Iraqi officials in the area.
The militias appear to be supported by Iranian intelligence or military units that are shipping weapons to the militias in Iraq and providing training for them in Iran.
Some British officials believe the Iranians want to hasten the withdrawal of U.S.-backed coalition forces to pave the way for Iran-friendly clerical rule.
Iranian influence is evident throughout the area. In one government office, an aide approached a Knight Ridder reporter and, mistaking him for an Iranian, said, "Don't be afraid to speak Farsi in Basra. We are a branch of Iran."
"We get an idea that (military training) courses are being run" in Iran, said Lt. Col. David Labouchere, who commands British units in the province of Maysan, north of Basra. "People are training on the other side of the border and then coming back."
British military officials suspect that the missile that was used to shoot down a British helicopter over Basra on May 6 came from Iran. Five British soldiers died.
"We had intelligence suggesting five surface-to-air missile systems being brought over from Iran only seven days before it went down," said Maj. Rob Yuill, a British officer based in Basra.
Yuill said that the information suggested that the missiles were destined for the Mahdi Army, the militia loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Bassem al-Samir, a senior official in the Sadr office in Basra, denied that his organization was involved in the helicopter attack.
Another Sadr official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution from other Sadrists, said that while the Mahdi Army wasn't responsible, "the missile was shot by an Iranian-trained group."
American military officials in Baghdad often point to the relatively low number of attacks against British soldiers in southern Iraq as proof that much of the country is stable.
Last month, however, at least 200 people were killed in Basra, almost all of them by militia violence, according to an Iraqi Defense Ministry official there.
A week with British troops in Maysan and Basra provinces and three additional days of reporting in the city of Basra made it clear that Iraqis here are at the mercy of Shiite militia death squads and Iran-friendly clerics who have imposed an ever-stricter code of de facto Islamic law.
The city of Basra has largely come under the control of Shiite clerics, who have banned alcohol sales. A woman without a headscarf is a rare sight. Record shops have been replaced with stores selling Quranic recordings. It's difficult to purchase chess or backgammon sets; the games are frowned upon by hard-line clerics.
Iraq's top Shiites acknowledge that they want to set up a regional government in the south, but they insist that the provinces involved would remain loyal to the central government in Baghdad. But an Iran-friendly Shiite government in the south could have far-reaching effects on Iraq and the Persian Gulf region and on the strategic position of U.S. military forces in the country.
U.S. forces are dependent on a fragile re-supply line that runs from Kuwait north to Baghdad through southern Iraq. A regional government allied with Iran could pose a risk to that supply line.
Such a government also would further agitate Iraq's Sunni and Kurdish minorities, which could fragment the country, a development that Western analysts fear would destabilize the region.
A Shiite regional government might also greatly enhance Iran's regional influence by giving it a strategic Shiite partner with vast amounts of oil in a Middle East dominated by Sunni-run countries. Neighboring Kuwait's population is about one-third Shiite, and Bahrain and Saudi Arabia's oil-rich Eastern Province are majority Shiite.
Already, there are signs that neighboring Sunni countries are pumping resources to small Sunni factions in Basra to combat Iranian influence, said a senior Iraqi Ministry of Defense official in Basra. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because he feared for his life.
"Saudi Arabia is trying to counter the rising power of Iran in Basra by giving money and weapons to fanatical Sunni groups operating there," the official said.
In much the same way that Kurdish leaders and militia units in the north have made control of the oil-rich city of Kirkuk a top priority for their region, Shiites have identified Basra as the economic engine of Iraq's Shiite south. Basra is near Iraq's largest oil fields, with billions of dollars in proven reserves, and is home to the only shipping port in Iraq.
While there are many signs that Iran is backing the Shiite push for control of Basra, it's not clear to what extent the Iranian government is formally involved, said Brig. Gen. James Everard, who commands the British brigade in Basra.
"Do we see weapons technology that has Iranian hallmarks on it? Yes, we do," he said. "Is it freelance work by Iranians or is it official policy? I don't know."
Some British officers also believe that Iran is working through Iraq's Shiite-dominated central government.
Earlier this month, Iraq's Interior Ministry sent a letter ordering Basra's police chief to hire or promote 50 men with direct ties to one of Iraq's largest Shiite militias, the Badr Organization, according to Yuill, who said he'd reviewed the document.
The letter was signed by Bayan Jabr, the then-interior minister, who has deep ties to Badr. The Iranian-backed Badr Organization is the armed wing of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, one of the most powerful Shiite political parties in the country.
Yuill said that Jabr had on several occasions in the past year directed the police chief to stack the ranks of the police with Badr recruits. Jabr was recently named finance minister. A new interior minister has yet to be named.
"My gut feeling is he (Jabr) was trying to improve the Iranian power base, probably with the hope of creating a separate, almost Iranian state in Iraq," Yuill said. "A lot of the people I've talked to in the chain of (Iraqi police) command with militia links are known to have ties to Iranian intelligence."
British officials accuse Iraqi politicians in Basra of using those police as death squads. A British Ministry of Defense political adviser said that the provincial governor uses officers from the police criminal investigations unit as hit men to gun down those who oppose him.
"They're his thugs; they enforce his power," said Al Pennycock, the adviser at the British Army brigade headquarters in Basra. "There are a number of individuals in the police who have been linked to assassinations, to killings, to extortions. It's hard to link it to one overlord, but the governor has very clear links to these elements."
Yuill accused the governor of paying members of the Mahdi Army and Badr, the two major Shiite militias operating here, to carry out killings to support his oil smuggling operations.
The governor declined a Knight Ridder interview request.
British commanders charged with securing far southern Iraq say they hope that the political process will soften the militias. The militias' route could be similar to that of the Irish Republican Army, which many of the British commanders fought against in Northern Ireland.
"At the moment we're just watching the dogfight. The Iraqis are competing for power, and as the local (U.S.-led coalition) commander, I'm very reluctant to interfere," Everard said.
Everard emphasized that his men wouldn't allow bloodshed to engulf the city, but he said that he has little choice but to accept the militias.
"I think there's a perception . . . sometimes that the people of Basra and the militias are separate," Everard said. "Actually, the people of Basra and the militia are the same thing."
Labouchere used similar logic in explaining why he didn't send troops to crack down on militia members in the town of Majar al Kabir, north of Basra, after suspected militiamen from there fired 44 mortar and rocket rounds at his base this month.
"I look at them and say, `Shall I go and clean it up?' And I think I'm just going to piss them off and drive them away from democracy," Labouchere said. "Will I have done good for the people of al Majar? Probably not. I will have just radicalized them."
The fight for control, and the unrest that comes with it, extends well beyond Basra.
In Amarah, a city of 400,000 to the north of Basra, the police are heavily controlled by the Badr Organization, said Maj. Charlie Howard-Higgins, who works with Iraqi security forces in the area.
The Mahdi Army is also a major factor.
The governor of Maysan province is a former Mahdi Army company commander and the provincial council is controlled by politicians loyal to Sadr, said Labouchere, who commands British units in that province.
"If they don't get people to vote the way they want, it's a good possibility you will end up with a bullet in your head or a bomb on a door," Labouchere said. "It's the way things are."
Furat al Shara, the head of the Supreme Council's Basra office, said the way toward peace in southern Iraq is simple: Accept that there will be an Islamist government that will fall short of Iranian theocracy but will be nothing like Western-style democracy.
U.S. and British officials "need to understand that the majority of Iraqi people believe in Islam," al Shara said. "We do not want a secular government."
Al Shara added: "Standing against this current will only cause them problems."
Outside his office, more than a dozen men sat on sofas, with AK-47 rifles piled against the wall next to them.
Two days earlier, a British patrol had driven up to a police station in southern Basra to try to persuade the police there to go on a joint patrol. The police refused.
Standing outside the station, in the heat of the day, Cpl. Patrick Owens shrugged his shoulders.
"It's hard to know who the militia is; it's hard to tell between them and the local police force," Owens said. "The only thing that I've seen get any better here is the weapons they're using against us."
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Comments: 14
The problem is really only a problem because we are trying to fix it. All we really want is to keep their petty litle wars petty and over there. We have no need to 'give them democracy'. They clearly don't want it. We can work as much as we need to with a dictator, do it all the time. Some dictator actually becomes a threat or danger to us then blow him up and go home and see who shows up next. No need to prop one up or help the survivors elect the new one or any of that. We have no right to tell other countries how to run themselves. We do have a right to put a stop to their being a threat to us. We should confine ourselves to that and forget all the do gooder 'bring em democracy' stuff.
Isn't this one of the areas that has been in dispute between Iraq and Iran for several decades? I can remember reading about border clashes.
Once again you have kept us in the loop before the event.
Thank You.
Magi
"We have no need to 'give them democracy'. They clearly don't want it."
Could there possibly be a more concise, illuminating window on the narrowness of the agenda-driven liberal mindset? How shockingly blind! How heartbreakingly sad!
I wonder, Lily, what YOU think Roya Tolouee's response would be to Mr. Merritt's analysis. What might her family's response be? What might be the response of the millions of families who have suffered similarly, who CONTINUE to suffer similarly, today? What might be the response of almost ANY woman in ANY of those horribly repressive countries? "Help me?"
So many liberals continue to delight (and what a disgusting thing it is) in mocking the president by misconstruing an entirely accurate statement. A SINGLE ststement that by no means relfects the broad nature of the ongoing efforts in Iraq. The "mission", at the time that banner was raised, was a military mission to unseat Saddam Hussein and his murderous regime. THAT MISSION was accomplished. We're rife, these days, with arm chair critics are batting 100% - in hindsight - but I heard no single liberal step up - before the war - and say, "you better be ready for..." or "you better do...". Quite the contrary, almost as one, they fought for position at the microphone, on the House/Senate floor, to authorize the president to conduct this war.
Do you REALLY think the answer is to leave? To leave the Iraqi PEOPLE to an ever-stricter code of de facto Islamic law? To the likes of Shiite militia death squads and Iran-friendly clerics? To Muqtada al-Sadr and the Mahdi Army? To the Iranians?
Or do you think maybe - just maybe - we'd better stay the course and FIND a way to help these wretched people: educate them, offer them some kind of real opportunity, help them secure some genuine measure of human rights...? Raise them up from thousands of years of...well, you know...don't you? Of course you do...
One thing about this whole conflict now is that if they want us to get out, it would happen pretty quick if the violence stopped. Hell of a lot of pressure here to do so, and a new President coming up. They could wait, and as the last planeload of troops left Kuwait, they could start all the crap in a much better position. It would be so easy.
Or is it possible they don't play the easiest of cards because there are a great many more Iraqis that might just like a little freedom of speech, and some say in their leadership? That the Insurgency, though successful in blowing people up, is not as universally liked as it would seem to many.
I wonder.......
There were a lot of people who were saying that this would lead to a civil war. That's why they are saying "I told you this would happen" now.
There were plenty of people saying that this would lead to instability in the region. Now that it's happening, do you think that they will listen when those same people say to get out and let this situation work it's self out without our troops being in harms way.
I think that anyone who thinks we should be there as a nation, volunteer to take the place of one of our troops that thinks this is ill fated, and that we shouldn't be there to begin with. Start by offering to take the place of someone who's been stop/lossed or who's been there more than twice. That alone would bring home about 10,000 to 20,000 troops.
I think they'd be surprised at how many troops come home because they've seen enough of Iraq and heard enough of the lame justification for us being there.
Here's another little aspect. Did it ever occur to anyone how absurd it is that the people who don't think working women should have a fair wage, and that abortion should no longer be a choice, but go back to the illegal and dangerous thing it was before Roe v Wade, are all for Iraqi women's rights? And then they say that the incident in Haditha wasn't anything other than the fog of war and we shouldn't be making a big deal of it. How many innocent women and children have been killed there by the soldiers who are supposed to be liberating them and giving them human rights?
We don't want to give the Iraqi people Human Rights. We don't care about Human Rights when it is inconvenient for our economic policy. If we cared about Human Rights, we'd be doing more in Darfur. We'd be allowing women in Africa to get condoms from U.S. government health programs instead of telling them about abstainance. We'd be doing something about the women who are have their genitals mutilated against their will across the African continent, and about situation in Saudi Arabia where people work and live as virtual slaves to oil companies, including women who are slaves in the sex trade.
Besides...being wretched is a matter of perspective, and is more than a little condescending. Most of the people in Iraq live there by accident of birth, but they live lives like any of us. Loving their families, going to mosque (temple or church), and making the best of their circumstances that they can. Some of them believe that their rights as humans are secondary to their duties to their deity.(who, by the way, is the same Judeo-Christian God, by name, that we worship. Yahweh is one language variation, Allah is another, but the deity is the God of Abraham.)
Human rights are not the same to them as they are to us. They believe much deeper in human duties. That some of them have differing views on what's important to be dutiful to God is not unexpected. Look at all the sects of Christianity, Judaism, Paganism and on and on. If they are fighting about it, they can work it out, but we can not make them work it out with force.
Our trying to LIBERATE them is only making situations worse. When we were leaving Iran alone, they were on their way to changing their government to a democracy and were slowly marginalizing the Ayatollahs. Now look at what's going on there. The Ayatollahs are once again firmly in power, and the people are behind them because they don't want the U.S. to nuke their country.
Leading by example is the only way to expand democracy. Imperialistic hubris only makes people mad and want to kick your ass while your back is turned.
Clicking on the link you included http://www.iranfocus.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=7370 guided me to the article written by Tom Lasseter, so I assmed the words -byTom Lasseter- meant he was the author. Are you Tom Lasseter? Did you write the article for Tom Lasseter? Or are you saying you work for the news service prodiver Iran Focus and your -day job- is to pull articles contributed to the site by other writers and post them elsewhere?
"Human rights are not the same to them as they are to us."
* The only intelligent observation you've made here...
"They believe much deeper in human duties. That some of them have differing views on what's important to be dutiful to God is not unexpected."
* Nor are many of those views acceptable to civilized people...
"When we were leaving Iran alone, they were on their way to changing their government to a democracy and were slowly marginalizing the Ayatollahs."
* Which "history of the world" are you reading? Following is an article posted right here on Gather. Read it. You might just learn something.
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Nazanin and Million Others -- Article Published in European version of Kayhan newspaper
June 19, 2006 09:03 AM EDT (Updated: June 20, 2006 09:20 PM EDT)
Nazanin and Million Others
By Dr. Dariush Homayoun
Translated By Lily Mazahery
On January 3, 2006, Nazanin was sentenced to death by a court in Tehran, and if the Iranian supreme court affirms that ruling, Nazanin will be hanged in public. According to Etemad newspaper, the 17 year old Nazanin was spending a day with her 15 year old niece at a park in western Tehran when three men attacked them, forced the two girls to the ground, and attempted to rape them. During the struggle, Nazanin was able to reach a knife that she had been carrying in her purse, which she used to injure her assailant and escape. Unfortunately, she was not able to get very far before the men caught up with her, captured her, and proceeded to sexually assault her. As she fought for her life, Nazanin once again used her knife to fight off her attacker by stabbing him in the chest. Later, the assailant died from the wound that was inflicted in that struggle. Had Nazanin failed to defend herself and her niece during that incident, the two girls would have been charged with adultery (defined in Islamic societies as any form of sexual activity between unmarried individuals), the punishment for wish is 100 lashes in public. In Iran, where 9 year old girls are sentenced to death, and where women are condemned regardless of the circumstances, Nazanin's case was hardly newsworthy.
However, in United States, Ms. Lily Mazahery (LMazahery@Gmail.com) and Kristian Hvesser organized an effort to defend and save Nazanin through a petition that objects to Nazanin's conviction and sentencing, and obtained over 130,000 signatures. In addition, Ms. Mazahery has launched an international campaign to raise the requisite blood money (http://www.cafepress.com/dcist) that needs be offered to the family of the real guilty party in this case (i.e. the man who attacked and sexually assaulted Nazanin), and she is seeking the support of Iranians everywhere.
One must remain hopeful that this effort will save the life of an innocent girl-child in a land of not only injustice, but even worse, a society that is indifferent to the sanctity of human life and human value. Nazanin is one among thousands of victims in similar circumstances. As such, it is vitally important to consider the millions -- the tens of millions -- in Islamic societies and third world countries who face similar atrocities. Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Dutch film-maker and author who has had to maintain a high level of security due to threats against her life for describing the brutality and violence against women in Islamic societies in her film, and whose director, Theo van Gogh was savagely murdered by a Moraccan immigrant whose religious duty mandated such an act, has used the 2004 report of the Center for Democratic Control of Armed Forces in Geneva, as well as a report by the United Nations to provide the following statistics:
Every year, between 113,000,000 to 200,000,000 women and girls disappear worldwide. How?
* Each year, 1.5 to 2 million women are killed based on gender-related beliefs;
* In countries where male children are revered and female children are considered to be God's curse, female fetuses are routinely aborted and baby girls are killed;
* Young girls are dying because their families give food and medicine to the male members of the family before giving them to the girls;
* In countries where women are viewed as mere chattel, their fathers and brothers murder them based on honor killings for bringing shame to the family;
* Young brides are killed because their fathers fail to provide sufficient dowry to the groom's family. Women whose dowries are not considered sufficient by their husband or in-laws are set on fire and burned to death;
* Countless girls are murdered in the sex trafficking business;
* Domestic violence is the main cause of death of women in every country;
* A woman's life is considered so worthless that, each year, more than 600,000 women die during childbirth;
* Every day, approximately 6000 girls are subjected to genital mutilation. Those who do not die during the procedure live the rest of their lives in excruciating pain;
* One out of every 5 women is raped or is sexually assaulted;
These statistics serve to inform those of us who live in Western societies of the atrocities that take place on a daily basis in the other two-thirds of the planet. However, even in the exceptional Western world, being a woman does not automatically translate into unrestrained freedom or safety: domestic violence, sexual trafficking, and rape are among the many problems affecting the lives of Western women. Yet, until Muslim immigrants secure the means to abuse the democratic system, pass Islamic laws and terrorize the non-Muslim populations, Western women have the freedom as well as the ability to both discuss the societal ills that impact them and take actions towards eliminating those ills. The freedom of speech is the most powerful tool for fostering societal reform and change without resorting to violence and force. In contrast to Islamic societies, where Islamic fundamentalism has given rise to even more violence against women, Western nations have enjoyed a decrease in similar types of brutality.
So why is it that our adopted countries in the West are exceptions to the miserable societies that we have left behind, including Iran? One aspect is the prevailing perceptions of women in these societies. In the Greek, Roman, and European civilizations, the concepts of Hejab or polygamy have never existed. Women in those societies were never forced to cover their faces, and even though they might have been treated as second-class citizens, they were still considered to be citizens -- not entities whose worth were half of a man or his farm.
Even the worst acts of excess and wrongdoing committed by the Catholic church could never compare to the clear and unquestionable Islamic doctrine of brutality and abuse. In the Western culture, the phenomenon of "Namoos" has received neither acceptance nor the savage meaning that it has enjoyed in Islamic societies. (Namoos is another word for the unmitigated arrogance of a man who can not tolerate the so-called eyeing of his "property," i.e. that part of the woman that belongs to the male members of her family, such as her father, husband, or brother.) Sicilians, who are not as civilized as their northern counterparts, make up the only other group that is arguably concerned about Namoos. However, this is only because, throughout history, Sicilians have had more contact with Muslim men than the rest of their countrymen.
The most direct path to progress and modernization is changing the perception of women and their roles in society. The impact of understanding the equality between men and women in any society is a decrease in violence and crime. By actively involving women in each and every part of society, we have the ability to establish progressive societies that emphasize the value and contributions of all humans. Where women's voices are the force that govern and shape cultures, infanticide will not be treated as anything less than murder.
Yet it is not only men who need to grant more power to women. Rather, women, themselves, must initiate change; they must refuse to tolerate any form of gender discrimination, and they must combat the brutal crimes that male-dominated cultures impose upon them. The 6000 girls who are subjected to genital mutilation on a daily basis are mutilated by their mothers and other women close to them.
Up until now, Iranian women have put up an excellent show. Yet, the show is woefully inadequate, for the true obstacles of progress are the masses of Iranian women who, through their superstitions, their cultural surrender, and their acceptance of a male-dominated culture prolong the slaughters of the Nazanins of this world.
Dr. Dariush Homayoun was the Minister of Iranian Information under the Shah. Dr. Homayoun is a prominent thinker who has articulated a dispassionate understanding of his country's modern history and has set forth a clear-eyed vision for its democratic future in numerous books, debates, lectures, articles and interviews. Dr. Homayoun is the organizer of the largest political party in exile opposing the clerical dictatorship in Tehran.
Ms. Lily Mazaheryis a Persian-American attorney, and the founder and president of the Washington, D.C. based Legal Rights Institute. Ms. Mazahery is an active advocate of the human rights of women around the world and an outspoken opponent of laws that serve to oppress women in the name of religion. Ms. Mazahery provides expert commentary on Iranian and Islamic laws, as well as human rights violations in Islamic societies. She has testified before the U.S. Congress on the condition of women and children in Iran under the Islamic regime, and has described the atrocities to which women are subjected under the Sharia legal system, such as public hanging, public stoning, and temporary marriages.
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As for "civil war" - there is no civil war. Period. There ARE, however, some in THIS country who wish there were... By the way, WHO WERE some of those "a lot of people" who said this would lead to civil war?
Somalia has just been declared the "official" new haven for fundamentalist Islam (Some folks credit the vaunted Clinton Administration for that...). Many other African countries are teetering on the brink. Much of South Asia is teetering on the brink. Will pacificism, prayer, economic sanctions, turning a blind eye, or United Nations resolutions/posturing make the slightest difference?
If not, who/what will? Should we fight? If so, when and where SHOULD we fight? How long will it be before America, Japan, Europe and every other civilized society around the world are forced to bow to "differing views on what's important to be dutiful to God."
Should we care? Damn right we should...