Iraq: Al Qaeda Gaining Strength

The Washington Post reported November 22 that al Qaeda in Iraq has regained some of its strength and is now trying to inflict damage to the Iraqi government as U.S. military forces prepared to withdraw from the country.

The Post says, "The group asserted responsibility for four powerful bombings that targeted five government buildings in Baghdad in August and October -- the deadliest attacks directed at the government in more than six years of war. Authorities say al-Qaeda in Iraq intends to carry out additional high-profile attacks in the months ahead and is attempting to regain its foothold in former strongholds just outside the capital.

"The strategy represents a shift in tactics from the group's efforts to kindle the kind of sectarian violence that brought Iraq to the brink of anarchy in 2007. The group suffered major setbacks after the 'surge' in U.S. troops to Iraq that year, but American and Iraqi officials say that al-Qaeda in Iraq has found more recent success by enlisting other groups in an effort aimed at undermining elections scheduled for January and the formation of a new government."

I suspect we'll see some power plays from other groups as well. If competing factions expect U.S. military forces to withdraw, they will inevitably jockey for position in a post-U.S. occupied Iraq. The Maliki government may or may not survive. Radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr and his Mehdi Army will probably make a move at some point, with or without his return from Iran.

Going back to al Qaeda in Iraq, The Post says, "Although the group has lost many top leaders, funding sources and popular support, it stands to gain from a deeply split political establishment, growing Sunni resentment toward the Shiite-led government, disjointed Iraqi security agencies and the diminishing ability of U.S. forces to engage in combat operations in Iraq. 'They're still capable of conducting singular high-profile attacks,' Gen. Ray Odierno, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, said. What was once a foreign-led terrorist organization is now a mostly Iraqi network of small, roving cells that continue to rely on the flow of fighters and weapons smuggled through the Syrian border, albeit at a slower rate, U.S. and Iraqi officials say."

One personal note here: the Syrian border has been a problem since day one of the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. The Assad government has taken minimal steps, and even then only when pressed by the U.S. government, to stop the flow of foreign fighters across its border with Iraq. Of course, Syria denies that there is a problem.

The Post continues, "Al-Qaeda in Iraq came to control large parts of the country between 2005 and 2008. The group is the largest within the Islamic State of Iraq, an umbrella organization that seeks to turn Iraq into an Islamic republic run by Sunnis. The U.S. troop surge in 2007 and the creation of American-funded Sunni paramilitary groups left al-Qaeda in Iraq reeling, as scores of its leaders were killed or detained. But after the provincial election in Iraq this year, al-Qaeda offered an olive branch to other Sunni extremist groups, issuing a message that even went as far as extending 'a hand of forgiveness' to those who worked with the Americans."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/21/AR2009112102009.html