thedrifter
12-13-05, 01:27 PM
Posted on Tue, Dec. 13, 2005
Insurgents seek dialogue with U.S., role in new Iraq
BY LIZ SLY
Chicago Tribune
BAGHDAD, Iraq - As Iraq moves toward crucial legislative elections Thursday, homegrown Iraqi insurgent groups are reaching out to the United States in the hope of launching a dialogue that would draw them into the political process and end their 2 1/2-year rebellion, according to U.S. officials and Iraqis close to the insurgency.
Spurred by fears of the growing influence of Iran and encouraged by signals from Washington that the United States will start drawing down troops next year, insurgents who see themselves as fighting for an Iraqi nationalist cause are looking for ways to distance themselves from the religious radicals and the hard-core Baathists who have dominated the insurgency in the public eye, with a view to establishing a foothold in Iraq's political landscape, the Iraqis say.
At the same time, U.S. officials also have indicated that they are willing to open a dialogue with people representing insurgent groups, as long as they have not been directly involved in violence.
"We're not going to talk to people with blood on their hands," said Gen. George Casey, the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, in a recent interview. "We talk to others who talk to them."
A number of exploratory meetings have taken place between U.S. officials and people who claim to represent insurgent interests, Iraqis and Americans say, though there have been few tangible results. "They haven't got very far," said Casey. "There's too much mistrust."
But the signals from both sides point to a building momentum toward negotiations that could help ease the violence as U.S. forces prepare to start reducing troops next year.
Insurgents also have been reaching out to the Iraqi government. Since President Jalal Talabani told the National Reconciliation Conference in Cairo late last month that he was prepared to "listen" to "any armed group" that wanted to talk, his office has been contacted by a number of people who claim to be leaders of the insurgency offering to negotiate, his officials say.
Dividing the insurgency is central to America's exit strategy for Iraq. In his recent speeches outlining his strategy for winning the war, President Bush has drawn a distinction between what he calls the "terrorists" led by Jordanian-born militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and the "Saddamists" on the one hand, and what he termed the Sunni "rejectionists" on the other. The "rejectionists," he said, could be persuaded to abandon armed struggle in favor of the political process.
Insurgent groups who identify themselves as fighting for a nationalist Iraqi cause are keen to draw a similar distinction, said Talal Gaaod, an Iraqi businessman and tribal leader based in Jordan who is in the forefront of one effort to unite insurgent groups against the al-Zarqawi loyalists.
"There is a difference between terrorists and the national Iraqi resistance," he said. "Zarqawi's group does nothing but suicide attacks and killing Iraqis. That's not resistance."
Thursday's election will provide a test of the divide. U.S. and Iraqi officials are hoping that Sunnis who boycotted last January's election will turn out to vote in large numbers, including Sunnis who support the Iraqi insurgency, in defiance of a statement issued Monday by al-Qaida in Iraq declaring that it is forbidden under Islamic law to participate in the "crusader project."
Many obstacles remain to be overcome before any meaningful dialogue can take place, however. Establishing the credentials of people who claim to represent the insurgency is one problem confronting the U.S. military, officials say, and U.S. officials also refuse to discuss the identities of those they are talking to.
Another stumbling block is the refusal of the American military to give guarantees that they won't arrest or detain insurgent leaders who step forward to speak for the insurgency, say Iraqis involved in the effort to reach out to the Americans.
That makes it impossible for genuine leaders who can speak directly for the insurgency to emerge, said Talaat al-Wazzan, an Iraqi politician who is working to establish an umbrella organization that would speak on behalf of the insurgency in a three-way dialogue with the U.S. military and the Iraqi government.
"We need to find a political face, but it's difficult," said al-Wazzan, who has proposed a three-step plan for diminishing the violence that would begin with a "goodwill" cease-fire on both sides.
"Our mission is to have dialogue with the patriotic resistance," he said. "I'm talking about the Iraqis who are defending their country and resisting the occupiers. Those who came from abroad, the foreign fighters, we consider them terrorists."
With Iraqis due to vote in fresh elections on Thursday and with insurgent violence intensifying ahead of the poll, further progress will likely have to wait for the formation of the next government.
The outreach nonetheless marks a watershed in the evolution of an insurgency that was launched as an ad hoc assembly of disbanded soldiers, disgruntled Sunnis, diehard Baathists and al-Qaida-influenced jihadists united by their opposition to the American occupation.
Now, 2 1/2 years after the invasion, Iraqi nationalist elements of the insurgency are realizing that simply ejecting American forces will not be enough to secure their interests in a new Iraq that is evolving into a nation with a very different identity to the one they had been fighting to bring back.
Shiites belonging to political parties outlawed under the old regime are now running the country, controlling the police force and taking over jobs in the ministries. There's a good chance that this week's election will return another Shiite-dominated government, thereby cementing the ascendancy of the once-downtrodden Shiite majority, at the expense, many Sunnis fear, of the Sunni minority that historically ruled Iraq.
Iraqi insurgents are realizing that they will have to craft a political agenda and find leaders to articulate it if they are to guarantee the interests of disgruntled Sunnis, said Gaaod, who believes the insurgency needs to create a political wing that could serve as the mouthpiece for its interests in the way that the Sinn Fein political organization served as the front for the Irish Republican Army in the negotiations that ended the IRA's war against Britain.
Concerns are also growing among Sunni insurgent groups about the soaring influence in Iraq of Shiite Iran, Iraq's traditional enemy, which enjoys close ties with the Shiite parties now running Iraq.
According to a former Iraqi corps commander who says he has influence over the insurgency, at one meeting of insurgent groups last summer, several Iraqi insurgent leaders suggested that "Iran is a bigger enemy of Iraq than America," and proposed that the insurgency refocus its priorities toward battling Iran.
"But they were overruled by Zarqawi," said the commander, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "The Iraqis, the national resistance, now have no say."
Al-Zarqawi's influence has steadily been diminished in recent months, by a combination of repeated U.S. military offensives against his strongholds in the western province of Anbar and by the beginnings of a rift between the homegrown Iraqi insurgency and the al-Qaida foreign fighters, along with Iraqis who support them. Gun battles have become commonplace in Anbar's provincial capital, Ramadi, between local Iraqi insurgents and those affiliated with al-Qaida, U.S. military officials say.
But the al-Qaida movement remains an influential component of the insurgency, providing the muscle and the money behind the most spectacular and damaging attacks.
Uniting the disparate, fractured cells that constitute the Iraqi nationalist insurgency also won't be easy. Well-established groups such as the Islamic Army, the Army of the Mujahadeen and the 20th Revolution Brigades, which routinely claim responsibility for attacks in which Americans are killed, have established leaders and structures. Countless smaller groups of uncertain allegiance also exist, and bringing them all into line could prove impossible.
But the Iraqi insurgency is now better organized and more cohesive than it was in the earliest days, when al-Qaida and the remnants of the former Baath Party provided the only formal structure and financing, said al-Wazzan, who cautioned that the insurgency's willingness to talk should not be interpreted as a sign of weakness.
"On the contrary, we are stronger now, and it is the occupiers who want us to join the political process," he said. "Now the Americans are in a very embarrassing situation, and they are suffering losses every day. We all realize America needs dialogue now and they are willing to have dialogue."
Ellie
Insurgents seek dialogue with U.S., role in new Iraq
BY LIZ SLY
Chicago Tribune
BAGHDAD, Iraq - As Iraq moves toward crucial legislative elections Thursday, homegrown Iraqi insurgent groups are reaching out to the United States in the hope of launching a dialogue that would draw them into the political process and end their 2 1/2-year rebellion, according to U.S. officials and Iraqis close to the insurgency.
Spurred by fears of the growing influence of Iran and encouraged by signals from Washington that the United States will start drawing down troops next year, insurgents who see themselves as fighting for an Iraqi nationalist cause are looking for ways to distance themselves from the religious radicals and the hard-core Baathists who have dominated the insurgency in the public eye, with a view to establishing a foothold in Iraq's political landscape, the Iraqis say.
At the same time, U.S. officials also have indicated that they are willing to open a dialogue with people representing insurgent groups, as long as they have not been directly involved in violence.
"We're not going to talk to people with blood on their hands," said Gen. George Casey, the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, in a recent interview. "We talk to others who talk to them."
A number of exploratory meetings have taken place between U.S. officials and people who claim to represent insurgent interests, Iraqis and Americans say, though there have been few tangible results. "They haven't got very far," said Casey. "There's too much mistrust."
But the signals from both sides point to a building momentum toward negotiations that could help ease the violence as U.S. forces prepare to start reducing troops next year.
Insurgents also have been reaching out to the Iraqi government. Since President Jalal Talabani told the National Reconciliation Conference in Cairo late last month that he was prepared to "listen" to "any armed group" that wanted to talk, his office has been contacted by a number of people who claim to be leaders of the insurgency offering to negotiate, his officials say.
Dividing the insurgency is central to America's exit strategy for Iraq. In his recent speeches outlining his strategy for winning the war, President Bush has drawn a distinction between what he calls the "terrorists" led by Jordanian-born militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and the "Saddamists" on the one hand, and what he termed the Sunni "rejectionists" on the other. The "rejectionists," he said, could be persuaded to abandon armed struggle in favor of the political process.
Insurgent groups who identify themselves as fighting for a nationalist Iraqi cause are keen to draw a similar distinction, said Talal Gaaod, an Iraqi businessman and tribal leader based in Jordan who is in the forefront of one effort to unite insurgent groups against the al-Zarqawi loyalists.
"There is a difference between terrorists and the national Iraqi resistance," he said. "Zarqawi's group does nothing but suicide attacks and killing Iraqis. That's not resistance."
Thursday's election will provide a test of the divide. U.S. and Iraqi officials are hoping that Sunnis who boycotted last January's election will turn out to vote in large numbers, including Sunnis who support the Iraqi insurgency, in defiance of a statement issued Monday by al-Qaida in Iraq declaring that it is forbidden under Islamic law to participate in the "crusader project."
Many obstacles remain to be overcome before any meaningful dialogue can take place, however. Establishing the credentials of people who claim to represent the insurgency is one problem confronting the U.S. military, officials say, and U.S. officials also refuse to discuss the identities of those they are talking to.
Another stumbling block is the refusal of the American military to give guarantees that they won't arrest or detain insurgent leaders who step forward to speak for the insurgency, say Iraqis involved in the effort to reach out to the Americans.
That makes it impossible for genuine leaders who can speak directly for the insurgency to emerge, said Talaat al-Wazzan, an Iraqi politician who is working to establish an umbrella organization that would speak on behalf of the insurgency in a three-way dialogue with the U.S. military and the Iraqi government.
"We need to find a political face, but it's difficult," said al-Wazzan, who has proposed a three-step plan for diminishing the violence that would begin with a "goodwill" cease-fire on both sides.
"Our mission is to have dialogue with the patriotic resistance," he said. "I'm talking about the Iraqis who are defending their country and resisting the occupiers. Those who came from abroad, the foreign fighters, we consider them terrorists."
With Iraqis due to vote in fresh elections on Thursday and with insurgent violence intensifying ahead of the poll, further progress will likely have to wait for the formation of the next government.
The outreach nonetheless marks a watershed in the evolution of an insurgency that was launched as an ad hoc assembly of disbanded soldiers, disgruntled Sunnis, diehard Baathists and al-Qaida-influenced jihadists united by their opposition to the American occupation.
Now, 2 1/2 years after the invasion, Iraqi nationalist elements of the insurgency are realizing that simply ejecting American forces will not be enough to secure their interests in a new Iraq that is evolving into a nation with a very different identity to the one they had been fighting to bring back.
Shiites belonging to political parties outlawed under the old regime are now running the country, controlling the police force and taking over jobs in the ministries. There's a good chance that this week's election will return another Shiite-dominated government, thereby cementing the ascendancy of the once-downtrodden Shiite majority, at the expense, many Sunnis fear, of the Sunni minority that historically ruled Iraq.
Iraqi insurgents are realizing that they will have to craft a political agenda and find leaders to articulate it if they are to guarantee the interests of disgruntled Sunnis, said Gaaod, who believes the insurgency needs to create a political wing that could serve as the mouthpiece for its interests in the way that the Sinn Fein political organization served as the front for the Irish Republican Army in the negotiations that ended the IRA's war against Britain.
Concerns are also growing among Sunni insurgent groups about the soaring influence in Iraq of Shiite Iran, Iraq's traditional enemy, which enjoys close ties with the Shiite parties now running Iraq.
According to a former Iraqi corps commander who says he has influence over the insurgency, at one meeting of insurgent groups last summer, several Iraqi insurgent leaders suggested that "Iran is a bigger enemy of Iraq than America," and proposed that the insurgency refocus its priorities toward battling Iran.
"But they were overruled by Zarqawi," said the commander, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "The Iraqis, the national resistance, now have no say."
Al-Zarqawi's influence has steadily been diminished in recent months, by a combination of repeated U.S. military offensives against his strongholds in the western province of Anbar and by the beginnings of a rift between the homegrown Iraqi insurgency and the al-Qaida foreign fighters, along with Iraqis who support them. Gun battles have become commonplace in Anbar's provincial capital, Ramadi, between local Iraqi insurgents and those affiliated with al-Qaida, U.S. military officials say.
But the al-Qaida movement remains an influential component of the insurgency, providing the muscle and the money behind the most spectacular and damaging attacks.
Uniting the disparate, fractured cells that constitute the Iraqi nationalist insurgency also won't be easy. Well-established groups such as the Islamic Army, the Army of the Mujahadeen and the 20th Revolution Brigades, which routinely claim responsibility for attacks in which Americans are killed, have established leaders and structures. Countless smaller groups of uncertain allegiance also exist, and bringing them all into line could prove impossible.
But the Iraqi insurgency is now better organized and more cohesive than it was in the earliest days, when al-Qaida and the remnants of the former Baath Party provided the only formal structure and financing, said al-Wazzan, who cautioned that the insurgency's willingness to talk should not be interpreted as a sign of weakness.
"On the contrary, we are stronger now, and it is the occupiers who want us to join the political process," he said. "Now the Americans are in a very embarrassing situation, and they are suffering losses every day. We all realize America needs dialogue now and they are willing to have dialogue."
Ellie