BAGHDAD: The US troop surge did what it aimed: Calm Iraq down. But now, an increasing number of US officials are worried that the hard-won drop in violence may be only temporary.
The fear: That Iraq may squander this period of relative calm, failing to reach the difficult political deals the surge was designed to allow — and thus setting the stage for another round of violence some day. The worry is behind US military leaders’ constant warning that Iraq’s current calm may not endure. Defense Secretary Robert Gates was the latest, saying this week that US military commanders do not yet believe “our gains are necessarily enduring.” Their fears are sound.
At least 32 people were killed and 43 were wounded in a car bombing Friday evening in Dujail, a mainly Shiite town 80 km north of Baghdad, Iraqi officials said.
Iraqi leaders face major challenges in the coming months, even as the effectiveness of the surge remains a hot-button topic in the US presidential race. If the Iraqis lack the necessary political skill or desire to compromise, those challenges would lay the ground for a new wave of violence.
Ironically, the Iraqi government’s newfound strength could tempt the Shiite leadership to resist calls for compromise with its rivals.
“We have to admit to shortcomings in the practice of democracy,” Parliament Speaker Mahmoud Al-Mashhadani acknowledged this week. “And we are lacking a spirit of consensus.” Exhibit A: The Iraqi government’s delay in integrating Sunni armed men into the country’s police and armed forces.
US officials insist the Shiite-led government of Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki intends to do so starting next month.
The government’s success in clearing Baghdad and Basra of Shiite militias in spring and summer emboldened the prime minister, who previously had been widely dismissed as weak.
Now he’s pushing back against the Americans in talks on a new security agreement, warning Sunnis against resisting plans to take over their armed volunteers and threatening force against the Kurds.
“What we see is very substantial progress. But that progress has by itself created a climate in which Iraqi leaders and factions feel much more secure about advancing their own cause,” said former Pentagon analyst Anthony Cordesman. Iraqi politicians often see other sectarian and ethnic groups in the country “as rivals” rather than potential partners, Cordesman notes.
That could mean the surge — which so successfully lowered violence — fails at its larger goal of providing some space for political peace to flourish.
