A terrible thought on the violence in Baghdad...

[kentuck]

As we know, the Shias are reportedly dragging people out of buses and cars and shooting them in the head on the spot. They are now going into homes looking for anyone with a Sunni name. But as we know, the Shias are now in charge of the "government".

There were times during the Vietnam War when our troops would use "terror" to try and control a certain village or part of the population. It happened. My thought is that maybe it is happening again. The US military, along with the new Shiite government may have decided to put the fear into the Sunni citizenry, so they would stop the violence by the Sunni "insurgents"?

This latest round of violence may be part of the "new" American strategy? Just saying...



see this link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/09/AR2006070900139_pf.html

[Kagemusha]

1. They don't need to be encouraged by the US

It's taking all the string pulling available to stop them from doing far worse through discouragement by the Ayatollahs.

[kentuck]

4. But it doesn't seem to be random...it seems to be organized..

all dressed in black, like the VC, with the sole purpose of striking fear into a certain group of people. The only thing limited in war is your imagination.

[Kagemusha]

7. The organizations are called militias, FYI.

And they're who I'm referring to.

[kentuck]

8. Yes, but I'm talking about the possibility that this is organized terror..

by the US military, in concert with the new Shiite government. Maybe a few Vietnam vets can explain how some of this stuff happened in Nam. We have done it before.

[The Magistrate]

10. It Is Organized, Sir

Apparently by Mr. al'Sadr's militia, and in response to a recent attack against a Shia mosque.

There is probably a degree of "assistance" from elements of the puppet government we have installed, as there are powerful persons within that who are affiliated with Mr. al'Sadr, and certainly policemen who are members of his militia.

This is nowhere near U.S. direction, however: it is not wise to over-rate the capacity of the U.S. to control events in Iraq on any level. There are certain over-laps of interest between Iraqi factions and the U.S. occupation force, but even in such cases Iraqis act on their own, and for their own purposes, which in all cases are in the long run quite incompatible with either the desires of the U.S., or its interests.

[kentuck]

13. Does this mean al Sadr is the new Zarqawi?

And is the person to blame for all the violence? But he's a Shia? And he must be somewhat appreciated by the US and the new government for his violent acts against the Sunnis, Saddam's people. Whose interests are served here? War is so confusing...

[The Magistrate]

17. Unlike The Late Zarqawi, Sir

Mr. al'Sadr is a widely popular figure with a great footing among the mass of Shia believers, most particularly the young and less well off elements of that sect in Iraq. He is a genmuine and powerful force in Iraqi politics and society. He is certainly hostile to the U.S., both in general and in terms of the occupation of Iraq, and has openly opposed it with his armed followers in the past, even though he is also a force within the puppet government through his followers and allies in office.

If you keep your eye on the facts that Iraq is already in the opening stages of civil war, that the Shia have largely captured the government with intention of using its agencies as a tool in this civil war against the Sunni, and that the highest leadership of the Shia, the Ayatollah al'Sistani, regards the U.S. as his tool for carrying on the open conflict with the armed Sunni elements, matters become much less obscure.

[Tesha]

9. The part our high poobas never understood is the "self organizing" stuff

> ...it seems to be organized all dressed in black,
> like the VC, with the sole purpose of striking
> fear into a certain group of people.

The part our high poobas never really understood is that
a lot of this stuff can be "self organizing" once the basic
operating principles are understood.

Just for example, that's really the beauty of Al Qaida;
it's more like a franchise brand name than a gang of
masterminds magically controlling shadowy operatives
all around the globe.

OBL and his friends created the brand, they laid out some
basic operating principles, and they now issue the occasional
encouraging message from franchise headquearters. All the rest
can be taken care of by the individual franchisees and it will
look just the same as if central headquarters were actually
commanding things. Each franchisee comes up with schemes that
will work in their area, recruits the workers to carry out
the schemes, and succeeds or fails (apparently mostly
depending on whether or not they figure out who the FBI
guy is).

And if they succeed, the franchisee gets to put up the cool
little sign under the great big AQ logo:

Al Qaida: Over 6,000,000,000 customers terrorized.

The same things is probably true here. Take one religious
faction (which is already well-branded across more than a
millenium), add some basic enabling technology (for the
construction of IEDs), cook up a few websites to disseminate
the information, and *BOOM*, you're off to the race riots!

Tesha

[kentuck]

11. But the violence, mostly, is against the Sunnis...

which are not part of this new government, for the most part. But they are the ones allied with al Qaeda, supposedly, and they are the ones that need to be brought under control if there is going to be any stability for this new government. Just saying...

[The Magistrate]

14. But The Condition, Sir

Is already one of civil war between these two broad secular factions. Their hostility is long loved and deeply engrained, constituting one of the principal facts of the polity. In Sunni areas, there is exactly this sort of activity aimed at Shia, just as in Kurdish areas, such activity is directed at Arabs in general.

The hope, and it is a forlorn one, of the U.S. is to have Sunnis co-operating with the puppet government of Iraq along with Shias. Random killing of Sunnis, partricularly in circumstances that lead readily to suspicion of some involvement by Shia agency within the government, is hardly a productive path to this goal.

[kentuck]

15. That is true Magistrate, but...

maybe one side is taking the offensive, in an attempt to shut down the insurrection against the government once and for all? Once the Sunnis are dealing with enough fear and terrorism of their own, perhaps they will not have time for more car bombs, etc? Just saying, as in the movie Apocalypse Now, once they got rid of a few people, enemy activity dropped off dramatically...

[The Magistrate]

18. Movies Are Poor References, Sir

Reality does not come with a script, and nothing ever works so tidily in real life as it does in fiction, particularly where mass violence and political movements are concerned.

Random violence such as the recent episode in Baghdad usually leaves quite untouched organized armed factions operating clandestinely, and tends to increase their recruitment, as people enraged by the loss of loved ones seek vengeance, and persons struck to fear by such actions decide fighting back represents their best chance of survival. Indeed, the only sensible long term strategem these events might embody, from the Shia point of view, is an attempt to radicalize the Sunni and increase the violence they are willing to resort to, in the calculation that, Shia greatly outnumbering Sunni, and God being famously on the side of the biggest batallion, the crisis produced is certain to end in a Shia victory. But there is probably not even this degree of calculation in the action: this is most likely a combinmation of revenge and neighborhood "purification", to expand the area wholly controlled by Shia within the capital city.

[Tesha]

16. I used as Al Qaida by way of example.

I didn't make it clear in my post; I was using Al Qaida
by way of example but the principle is the same for any
number of organizations: They don't need any central
"command and control", they just need a motivating goal,
a logo, and some basic opertaing principles. Then random
people in the population will pick up the thought and
execute on it.

I'll go back and fix my post now ;-).

Tesha

[The Magistrate]

12. Indeed, Ma'am

Probably the best recent historical illustration of the method is the activity of the Anarchist movement during the latter nineteenth and early twentieth century, and the doctrine of "propaganda of the deed" this employed. The parallels are striking.

[Libby2]

2. Nothing would surprise me.

[Dhalgren]

3. Well, if that is true, then it is just as misguided an operation as the

whole damned affair is. Iraqi culture is one of vendetta and the blood-feud. This won't "put the fear" into the Sunnis, it will harden their determination to fight to the end...

[kentuck]

5. Oh, to know the truth...

It may not be as off-target as we might think?

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

6. "Things are going very, very, well in Iraq" General Peter Patch

Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff