Anti-U.S. Cleric Muqtada al-Sadr Retakes Stage Amid Iraq Turmoil
But analysts say that his recent calls for brigades to form and protect holy shrines from attacks by Sunni militants – which culminated in the weekend’s show of force – betray a canny commandant and risk returning Iraq to some of its darkest days.
“The forces that he puts on the streets are some of the worst sectarian killers in Iraq”
The endless lines of men with fists
raised in the air and armed with machine guns and rocket launchers
rallied in Iraq’s streets to send a warning of military might to the Sunni extremist fighters tearing through their country.
But the thousands of Shiite fighters
– some sporting suicide vests and calling themselves the “Peace
Brigades” – also sent another signal: feared firebrand cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army are back.
While Sadr
was once the poster boy for violent resistance to the U.S.-led
invasion, he has in recent years positioned himself as a political
kingmaker in post-withdrawal Iraq and even publicly discouraged
sectarian strife.
But analysts say that his recent calls for brigades to form and protect holy shrines from attacks by Sunni militants – which culminated in the weekend’s show of force – betray a canny commandant and risk returning Iraq to some of its darkest days.
“The forces that he puts on the streets are some of the worst sectarian killers in Iraq”
“It means two things – that Iraqi
security forces are incapable of providing security in Baghdad and the
chance of the re-emergence of sectarian slaughter – with death squads
roaming Baghdad and other areas around the capital – increases
dramatically,” said Bill Roggio, editor of The Long War Journal.
Roggio – like many – question Sadr’s attempts to play a moderate card.
“He speaks a good game but watch
what Sadr does, not what he says. That’s been the real problem with him
all along,” he added. “He may speak a good game, but the forces that he puts on the streets are some of the worst sectarian killers in Iraq.”
Sadr formed the Mahdi Army in 2003
after the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime. The Shiite militia gained
broader notoriety when it waged fierce battles in Najaf against U.S.
forces a year later. It is blamed for the mass killings of Sunni
civilians in sectarian violence in Iraq that peaked in 2006 and 2007 and
for cleansing Sunnis from Baghdad neighborhoods.
The Pentagon once said the Mahdi Army had “replaced al Qaeda in Iraq as the most dangerous accelerant of potentially self-sustaining sectarian violence.”
When Sadr
ordered a ceasefire in 2007, the move was accompanied by questions over
whether he sought to wait out U.S. forces or to make a political play.
Sadr helped usher Iraq’s Shiite
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to power in 2006 and ultimately again in
2010 – but since then has become one of the premier’s most vocal
critics, describing him as a dictator.
In February, Sadr
said he was withdrawing from all politics and unaffiliated with any
faction. His explanation: a necessary decision to protect the family
name.
The puzzling move – accompanied by
fierce criticism of Maliki’s government – prompted rampant speculation
that the cleric was repositioning himself – or reinventing his brigade –
rather than retiring.
Few “really bought it” when Sadr
said in Feburary he was stepping away from politics, according to
independent Iraq analyst Stephen Wicken,
“He’s much more canny than that,”
Wicken said. “He plays this reluctant hero card: that he doesn’t want to
be dragged into politics and public life but then has to by force of
his belief or weight of his family’s legacy.”
Those guesses appeared to play out when Sadr
recently called for brigades to form and protect Shiite shrines from
the lightning advance and offensive by Sunni extremist fighters from the
Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS).
The heavily armed fighters who
answered his call marched through Iraq’s cities over the weekend under
the name “Saraya Al Salaam” – or Peace Brigades – but to analysts and
Iraq watchers, they are the officially inactive Mahdi Army – rebranded.
Sadr’s
ability to call out massive numbers of supporters at a moment’s notice
has been one of the cleric’s “hallmarks” over the years,
according to Wicken. In this case, calling up fighters in the name of
protecting Shiite interests could present a dig at Maliki, whose forces
have been unable to stave of the ISIS advance. “This is an opportunity
for Sadr,” Wicken said.
“If the state needs to rely on thugs like Sadr and others to secure areas that are being threatened by ISIS … then it is really in trouble”
While Sadr’s
ultimate ambition might be to achieve the spiritual authority of his
forebears – both his father and father-in-law were Grand Ayatollahs –
“he doesn’t actually have the personality” or gravitas to become a
religious authority, according to Wicken.
Sadr’s timing
is everything, according to analysts, who point to the cleric’s
tendency to step away from day-to-day politics and return when
opportunity is ripe to reclaim the mantle of Shiite defender.
“He’s not a serious cleric, he’s
not a religious authority. The only power and legitimacy that he
actually has comes primarily from his family’s name and legacy and also
from his willingness to take really populist platforms and, when
necessary, call out his forces to kill people,” Wicken said
Sadr’s real credentials stem from his role in founding and commanding the Mahdi Army. While he has lost some ground to splinter groups in the past few years, “he still has that resonance,” Wicken said. While Sadr is not a “gifted orator, his words carry weight,” according to Wicken.
Putting fighters on the streets would signal to Sadr’s Shiite rivals that “he’s still relevant,” according to Hayder al-Khoei, an Iraq analyst for London-based think tank Chatham House.
“He’s played his hand now,” al-Khoei said. “He’s back and he’s back for good.”
Rebranding the militia as the Peace Brigades reflects a broader attempt to put distance between atrocities commited by Sadr’s fighters against Sunnis in 2006 and 2007.
“They’re trying to shed that black
history that they have,” al-Khoei added. “Lots of Sunni Iraqis remember
the role they played.”
The mobilization of Sadr’s militia adds to the polarization and portrayal of Iraq’s current crisis as a Shiite-Sunni conflict, analysts say.
Still, the cleric’s battle-hardened
and ideologically driven fighters could be an asset to Iraq’s security
forces if they are deployed for operations.
“They can add experience in the counterinsurgency campaign – experience that the Iraqi army is desperate for,” al-Khoei said.
While “Sadr has always been more
than willing to use force to get what he wants in Iraq,” Roggio said the
cleric’s recent re-entry also underscores a deeper point.
“Its further evidence of the deterioration of the state,” Roggio said. “If the state needs to rely on thugs like Sadr
and others to secure areas that are being threatened by ISIS and regain
control of areas outside of Baghdad, then it is really in trouble. Once
the sectarian groups like the Mahdi Army reach
the streets, it just greatly increases the chances of the sectarian
killing that brought Iraq to the brink of full-scale civil war.”
No comments:
Post a Comment