- Iraqis also know that 14 US military bases are already
under construction, enough to accommodate the (for the moment) 110,000
American soldiers who will stay in Iraq until at least 2007. No sovereign
Iraqi government has approved the construction of these bases. Kimmitt
- the No 2 Pentagon man in Iraq, and the one who launched total war on
Fallujah - said the bases are "a blueprint for how we could operate
in the Middle East". A ring of US military bases throughout what the
Pentagon calls the Greater Middle East is a key element of the neo-conservative-driven
strategy to control world energy resources as the way to control the destiny
of America's economic rivals - the European Union and Northeast Asia.
-
-
- One Year On: From Liberation To Jihad
-
- By Pepe Escobar
-
- "So this is the Bush administration-sponsored "free
Iraq" people identify not only in the Sunni triangle but in the Shi'ite
south: an occupying power maybe not formally occupying the country any
more, but installed in 14 military bases and able to exercise full control
on security, the economy and the whole infrastructure. In plain English:
a US colony. This is the reason the mob in Fallujah rejoiced in the burning
of those American bodies. This is the reason Sunnis and Shi'ites have for
now united in anger. And this is the reason the "liberation"
has finally turned into a jihad."
-
- On April 9, 2002, Saddam Hussein's statue in Firdaus
Square in Baghdad was still enveloped, like a Christo installation, waiting
to be unveiled in an official ceremony. On April 9, 2003, the statue was
toppled by the US Army, and later replaced by a faceless figure symbolizing
"liberation". On April 9, 2004, the faceless statue is plastered
with photographs of "outlaw" Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.
-
- One year after the "fall" of Baghdad, the old
colonial maxim "divide and rule" does not apply anymore. For
the occupiers, this is the ultimate nightmare: Sunni and Shi'ite, united
(almost) as one. From Kirkuk in the north to Karbala in the south, from
Fallujah to Nasiriyah, from Ramadi to Baghdad, Iraq is in turmoil - and
this is not the work of "Saddam Fedayeen", "remnants of
the Ba'ath Party" or "foreign terrorists". This is the beginning
of the end: the serious possibility that the Shi'ites - 60 percent or so
of the invaded and "liberated" Iraqi population - will be tempted
actively to lead the multifaceted Iraqi resistance.
-
- It's ironic that it took one year after its supposed
US-sponsored liberation for the resistance to qualify Fallujah as liberated
- before the city of almost 500,000 came under siege by the marines this
past Monday. There's no food or water coming in. By blocking the highway
connecting Baghdad, Amman and Damascus, the Americans have strangulated
practically all trade between Iraq and its neighbors Jordan and Syria.
The city is totally sealed off from the rest of the world. AlJazeera has
the only media crew in town. Reporter Ahmad Mansur says: "Everybody
walking in the streets is now becoming an [American] target." Mosques
are broadcasting calls to jihad.
-
- An Apache helicopter fired three missiles into a compound
housing the Abdul Aziz al-Samarrai mosque in Fallujah during afternoon
prayers. The mosque itself was not hit - but dozens of people were. Homes
are being turned into makeshift hospitals. Whatever the spin from the Pentagon,
this is the word of mouth in the Iraqi street, soon to spread like wildfire
all over the Muslim world: the Americans now are bombing mosques. Fallujah
is the new Gaza. Fallujah residents are to be subjected to ferocious Israeli-style
search-and-destroy raids for the men with rocket-propelled grenades who
first attacked the four American mercenaries from Blackwater Security Consulting,
whose corpses were later mutilated and hanged by an angry mob. Iraqis in
the Sunni triangle believe that the Americans received their "rules
of engagement" from Ariel Sharon's army in Israel.
-
-
- Meanwhile, in the Shi'ite belt, the holy city of Kufa,
the power base of the clerical al-Sadr family, in whose mosque "outlaw"
Muqtada al-Sadr took refuge, became the first Iraqi city to spin completely
out of US control. Asia Times Online has confirmed that Muqtada is now
in the holy city of Najaf, in his office in an alley near the Imam Ali
shrine, protected by hundreds of armed members of his Mahdi Army. The Iraqi
police have totally vanished. The Spanish garrison outside of town describes
the situation as "high tension". The Mahdi Army now in effect
controls the shrine, as well as central Najaf. A constant stream of Muqtada's
followers comes from Baghdad. In his most recent statement, he says: "I'm
prepared to have my own blood shed for what is holy to me," and calls
on Sunnis and Shi'ites alike to fight the Americans.
-
- Proconsul L Paul Bremer's Coalition Provisional Authority
(CPA) has already amplified Muqtada's cult-hero status, and may soon create
a martyr by having a warrant for his arrest issued. Muqtada's black-clad
Mahdi Army may have only several thousand members, but he commands support
of at least 30 percent of an estimated 15 million Iraqi Shi'ites: some
serious Arab analysts even talk of 50 percent. And just as his father,
Grand Ayatollah Mohammed al-Sadr, became a martyr to Saddam in 1999, Muqtada
well appreciates the benefits of becoming a martyr to the US occupation.
-
- Cross-confessional intifada For all purposes, an intifada
is now going on. Local sources tell Asia Times Online there are pro-Muqtada
posters all over Anbar - the richest, predominantly Sunni, Iraqi province.
Ramadi - where marines have been under fierce attack - is in Anbar. Only
a war of national liberation is the motive capable of explaining these
posters. The concept - penned by the Pentagon - of a Shi'ite Mahdi Army
fighting the marines in Sunni Anbar is positively ludicrous. This regional
resistance is conducted by former officers of the Iraqi army, as tribal
sheikhs in the Sunni triangle told this correspondent last year.
-
- Sunnis and Shi'ites are united in Baghdad, under the
same nationalist impulse. Sheikh Raed al-Kazami, Muqtada's man in the Shi'ite-majority
Kazimiya neighborhood, is not very far from the truth when he says: "All
of Iraq is behind Muqtada al-Sadr; we are but one body, one people."
On the other side of the Tigris, Sunni-majority Adhamiya is now aligned
with Kazimiya, as well as Fallujah, Ramadi and even Mosul, against the
"American invaders". The popular justification is always the
same: this is now a jihad, regardless of whether one is Sunni or Shi'ite.
People will fight in their neighborhoods, even if they don't join the Mahdi
Army.
-
- Asia Times Online has learned that in an unprecedented
move, 150 powerful Sunni tribal leaders and emissaries personally delivered
a support message to Muqtada's key aides in the 2-million-plus slum of
Sadr City, the former Saddam City: "We are all behind Muqtada al-Sadr,
we are by his side because he awakened the Iraqi people to liberate the
country from the infidel invaders." The message also said: "We
are but one Muslim nation - no one can separate us, be it in Iraq or Palestine."
-
- Washington was busy predicting a civil war among Sunnis,
Shi'ites and Kurds. The White House, the Pentagon and the CPA even had
the perfectly manufactured culprit: Jordanian Mussab al-Zarqawi, the new
Osama bin Laden. What they bought themselves instead is the ultimate occupier
nightmare: Sunni and Shi'ite united. Muqtada may be a cross between two-thirds
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini of Iran and one-third Che Guevara (without
the romantic charisma). But he finds enormous echo in Iraq when he compares
Bremer to Saddam (in Sadr City, US-trained Iraqi soldiers first fired on
peaceful demonstrators, followed by the US Army with tanks, Apaches and
jets firing at random on homes, shops and even ambulances; according to
local hospitals, dozens of civilians were killed and many more were injured).
Muqtada also finds enormous echo in the Arab world when he aligns himself
with Hamas - predominantly Sunni - and Hezbollah - predominantly Shi'ite.
-
- US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld swears Washington
has nothing to do with the arrest warrant against Muqtada: this is "Iraqi
justice" in action. Wrong. The Iraqi Jurists Association published
a statement on Wednesday saying that the arrest warrant is "illegal
and based on a lie ... The arrest warrant is illegal and incorrect, as
the occupation forces issued it in disregard for sovereignty of Iraq's
justice system." The Iraqi minister of justice, Abdel-Rahim Al-Shibly,
also says he had not been aware of the arrest warrant.
-
- The Bremer-Muqtada-Sistani triangle The CPA will never
persuade Iraqis - Sunni or Shi'ite - that the violent repression against
Muqtada and the Mahdi Army is capable of safeguarding the "handover
of sovereignty" on June 30. Apart from Humvees, tanks and Apaches,
Bremer sent the new Iraqi army - using ski masks, so they would not be
recognized later by the neighbors - to fire on the urban poor of Sadr City,
the same Saddam City "liberated" by the marines a year ago. After
this performance, the CPA's credibility, already low, is now less than
zero: the average Iraqi portrays it as a dictatorship exactly like Saddam's
- intolerant of a critical press and fully repressing peaceful protests.
-
- Former counter-terrorism expert Bremer may have been
foolish to use such tactics. Or he may have been very clever - employing
a typical Sharon move: a provocation leading to anger and protests, which
cries for a crackdown to restore "order". He may have wanted
to trigger a move to cripple the growing influence of the army of Sadrists.
Muqtada and his followers would have every chance of getting a great number
of seats if elections for a Iraqi parliament are really held next January.
-
- Muqtada is indeed a radical upstart compared with the
religious Shi'ite first among equals, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. But
Sistani prefers to carefully mold the United Nations to his wishes, rather
than confronting the CPA - which he loathes in silence and seclusion. But
as many Shi'ite religious leaders have told this correspondent, Sistani
just has to say the word (or issue a fatwa). If he says the word, the occupation
is finished.
-
- One thing is absolutely certain: there is no possible
US military solution to smash the resistance. Harith al-Dari, secretary
general of the Iraqi Islamic Scholars Association - one of the country's
highest religious authorities - goes straight to the point: "They
insist on enforcing a military solution as if they are facing an enemy
in a battleground, not isolated civilians."
-
- If Bremer behaved like a fool, he only has one card left
to play. He badly needs Sistani's help to reign in Muqtada. But Sistani
does not even admit receiving a deferential visit from Bremer in person.
Supposing this would happen, there would be a heavy political price to
pay: plenty of US concessions and a total review of the US-imposed Iraqi
constitution. For the moment, Sistani has voiced "solidarity"
with Muqtada, and is still preaching "negotiations", while Dawa
- the oldest Shi'ite political party - has distanced itself from the Muqtada
uprising.
-
- Hell and Blackwater The four Americans killed in Fallujah
were not simply "civilians". Three were Navy Seals (sea, air,
land special forces) and one was Delta Force, working on contract for the
Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and employees of Blackwater Security
Consulting - one among dozens of so-called "private" companies
performing shady operations in Iraq and other parts of the world Washington
prefers be attributed to "civilians": a US$100-billion-a-year
market. There may be as many as 10,000 "civilian" security contractors
in Iraq at the moment. Blackwater is a paramilitary operation: it trains
soldiers in counter-terrorism and urban combat, and profits from rent-a-soldier
schemes (using former Green Berets, Army Rangers and Navy Seals). Blackwater's
corporate leaders are proud to manage the largest and most professional
private army in the world, with around 400 armed commandos in Iraq alone.
Some of them compose the Praetorian Guard of Bremer himself.
-
- Additionally, there may be up to 3,000 CIA agents in
Iraq at the moment. As far as the Iraqi resistance is concerned, "security"
contractors, Seals, Delta Force or CIA are not civilians but legitimate
military-related targets.
-
- Anybody who has traveled in the Sunni triangle knows
how the US occupation is universally loathed. Fallujah residents told this
correspondent last year that the Americans themselves triggered the birth
of the resistance only two weeks after the fall of Baghdad, when their
troops entrenched in a Fallujah school opened indiscriminate fire against
an angry crowd, killing at least 17 people, including women and children.
-
- The Pentagon and the White House could not possibly admit
there's a war of national resistance going on - but that's what it is:
the spirit of the resistance is a mix of Iraqi nationalism and Arab pride,
and has absolutely nothing to do with Saddam. Even before the crackdown
on Fallujah and against Muqtada's followers, different groups had united
under an official denomination: the Patriotic Front for the Liberation
of Iraq.
-
- The US response in Fallujah - "deliberate, precise
and overwhelming", according to General Mark Kimmitt - won't deter
the resistance. In Fallujah, they call themselves the Resistance Brigades
of Fallujah, and have even issued a communique taking credit for the killing
of the American contractors. The Brigades include the Brigades of the Martyr
Ahmad Yasin, the Brigades of Ali ibn Abi Talib the Lion of God and Conqueror,
and the Brigades of the 1920 Revolution.
-
- 'Free Iraq' Bremer has declared war on local populations:
this is an enormous mistake. The Bush administration's "war on terror"
has led to thousands more civilian victims in Afghanistan and Iraq than
in the United States on September 11, 2001. This is never debated in the
US mainstream media - where as a rule an American life is deemed to be
superior to any other. On every front, the "war on terror" is
not leading to an end of terrorism, but to a never-ending war.
-
- The administration of President George W Bush is busy
selling the concept of a June 30 handover of "sovereignty" to
an Iraqi administration. Even before the current Operation Bloodshed, Iraqis
- avid consumers of political intrigue - knew full well what's behind it.
They know the CPA has confirmed that after June 30, the $18.4 billion of
reconstruction funds will be administered by the US Embassy in Iraq - the
largest in the world, capable of housing 3,000 people. These funds - supposed
to last for five years - will be spent on Iraq's crucial infrastructure:
oil, water, electricity, communications, police and the judiciary. What
Bremer's CPA is in fact saying is that any Iraqi government simply won't
be able to decide how the country will be rebuilt.
-
- Iraqis also know that 14 US military bases are already
under construction, enough to accommodate the (for the moment) 110,000
American soldiers who will stay in Iraq until at least 2007. No sovereign
Iraqi government has approved the construction of these bases. Kimmitt
- the No 2 Pentagon man in Iraq, and the one who launched total war on
Fallujah - said the bases are "a blueprint for how we could operate
in the Middle East". A ring of US military bases throughout what the
Pentagon calls the Greater Middle East is a key element of the neo-conservative-driven
strategy to control world energy resources as the way to control the destiny
of America's economic rivals - the European Union and Northeast Asia.
-
- Iraqis also know about another Bremer executive order
- according to which even with an interim Iraqi government the Iraqi army
will be controlled by top US commander Lieutenant-General Ricardo Sanchez.
And they know they will also have to live with an Iraqi version of Condoleezza
Rice - a Bremer-appointed national security adviser with a five-year mandate.
-
- Muqtada may be an Islamic fundamentalist. But his intifada
is popular because the base consists of legions of Iraq's urban poor and
unemployed - roughly 70 percent of the total working-age population. And
the motive is plain and simple: this is part of a national resistance against
a colonial enterprise. No institution created by the US invasion - especially
the CPA - has any political legitimacy, any moral legitimacy, or any kind
of popular support. Juan Cole, professor of history at the University of
Michigan and one of the leading American experts on Iraq, is adamant: "The
United States has managed to create a failed state, similar to Somalia
and Haiti, in Iraq."
-
- So this is the Bush administration-sponsored "free
Iraq" people identify not only in the Sunni triangle but in the Shi'ite
south: an occupying power maybe not formally occupying the country any
more, but installed in 14 military bases and able to exercise full control
on security, the economy and the whole infrastructure. In plain English:
a US colony. This is the reason the mob in Fallujah rejoiced in the burning
of those American bodies. This is the reason Sunnis and Shi'ites have for
now united in anger. And this is the reason the "liberation"
has finally turned into a jihad.
-
- http://www.atimes.com
-
- http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2004/05/288657.shtml
|
