U.S. Strategy on Sunnis Questioned

[Uboat509]

While I do not disagree with your point about the IP and the IA, this is a circular argument. Because of the loyalty issue we are creating counter forces to the others and you bet your bottom dollar that is weakening any pretense of a government built on democratic lines. Since building such a government was among the litany of reasons for this effort, proceeding down this tribal path merely demonstrates the futility of the democracy effort in the first place.

Not neccessarily. There is a middle ground. The IA and the IPs generally focus on the big cities and towns. There is an awful lot of ground that doesn't fall under that definition in Iraq. That is where I would think athat the neighborhood watches come in. It's not perfect but it is a start. In any case, if you want to truly build a democratic society in a Iraq you will have to start by co-opting the tribes, and then build from there. If you try to build it without them then you threaten the power of the Sheiks and they will shut you down.

Yes Saddam bought off the tribes. His tribe the Tikritis enjoyeed pride of tribal place. He also ruled with a degree of cruelty needed to keep the tribes in line as well as the larger issues of sectarian and ethnic divisions. We will not do that and that always was the number one tool for persuasion in Saddam's tool box.

That is kind of my point. Even with all his cruelty, Saddam still had to deal with the tribes. Since we do not have the option of brutality then we absolutely have to deal with the tribes.


SFC W

[Tom Odom]

Originally posted by Uboat509:Not neccessarily. There is a middle ground. The IA and the IPs generally focus on the big cities and towns. There is an awful lot of ground that doesn't fall under that definition in Iraq. That is where I would think athat the neighborhood watches come in. It's not perfect but it is a start. In any case, if you want to truly build a democratic society in a Iraq you will have to start by co-opting the tribes, and then build from there. If you try to build it without them then you threaten the power of the Sheiks and they will shut you down.

Again, I do not disagree with your points on the tribes. But I am extending to the larger political strategy and the huge gap between what is a security and reality driven measure to work with and acrively arm the tribes and the political strategy that is nominally trying to keep Iraq together. The reality has intruded in the military realm but fallen behind in the political. We are pursuing countervailing courses.

Meanwhile none of what you and I have exchanged so far even touches on US political reality. We do not have the 2 generations Ken White talked about. We have 1-2 years maybe at any sizable tropp commitment.

Since we do not have the option of brutality then we absolutely have to deal with the tribes.

Exactly. That is the reality. When do we alter the end state of our political strategy to recognize an extremely federal Iraq or a true division? That is the geo-political reality that is not reflected in the current state of affairs. So when you talk about people who look at things as they should be versus how they actually are, that symptom is very much in play when we ignore this disconnect.

Best

Tom

[Merv Benson]

I think we are riding the crest of a general uprising among the tribes against al Qaeda and its allies. This post describes a recent action in Iraq:

Fed up with violent and indiscriminate terror tactics, a group of more than 80 residents of the Adhamiyah district, on the east side of the Iraqi capital, banded together Sunday to oust suspected terrorists from a local mosque.

The uprising led to a string of events over the next 12 hours that ultimately resulted in the arrest of 44 suspected terrorists and the capture of three weapons caches.

The initial takeover of the Abu Hanifa Mosque occurred at about 2 p.m., apparently triggered by news that terrorists had murdered two relatives of a prominent local sheik. As the news spread, angry residents joined the sheik to storm the mosque, long believed to be a sanctuary for terrorists operating in the area, and ousted the suspected terrorists inside from the building.

It was after the uprising that the Iraqi Army and the US came in to take tips from the angry residents that led to finding even more weapons caches. I think it can be argued that what we are doing with the tribes is an attempt to manage and channel this anger against our common enemy. This grass roots action is not just limited to Sunni tribes. Several Shia tribes have already done the same thing. While the US military is adapting to this new grass roots reality, it appears the Iraqi government and many in our congress are being left behind by events.