There are two powers in Iraq now, and two resistance groups. The powers are the new assembly, led by Sistani’s crew and the Shiite Islamists, on the one hand, and the American armed forces on the other. The resistance is the "former regime elements" and the Sunni Islamists. Hope for Iraq, if that’s what it can be called, lies in a deal between the U.S. military and the FREs.
Robert Dreyfuss is a freelance writer based in Alexandria, Va., who specializes in politics and national security issues. He is a contributing editor at The Nation, a contributing writer at Mother Jones, a senior correspondent for The American Prospect, and a frequent contributor to Rolling Stone.
Way too late, the United States—through the Central Intelligence Agency—has begun talking to the Iraqi resistance. It’s too early to say if the talks represent a serious effort to end the war. But the new Iraqi government, if it is led by the Shiite bloc, can be counted on to oppose any American effort to bring the resistance into an accord. In that, Iraq’s Shiites will be joined by America’s neoconservatives.
According to Time magazine, at least two meetings have been held in Iraq with leaders of the nationalist opposition to the current regime. Still, the initiative represents the only serious effort by the Bush administration to end the war, since the Jan. 30 elections resulted in a hopelessly imbalanced national assembly.
The meetings have been held between State Department and CIA officers on one side, and people representing the so-called “former regime elements,” or FREs—Pentagon-speak for the Iraqi Baath party and government officials from the Saddam Hussein era—on the other. The contacts were made through Jordanian intelligence and with members of a group in Iraq called the Association of Muslim Scholars, a Sunni organization.
The United States has excluded from the talks anyone connected with the Al Qaeda-linked Abu Musab al-Zarqawi group.
What is important about the CIA dialogue with the resistance is that it represents a frontal challenge to the pro-war U.S. neoconservative axis and their Iraqi allies, especially Ahmed Chalabi and the former Iraqi National Congress (INC). Although Chalabi failed in his bid to become prime minister of Iraq, he seems certain to gain a high post in the new government. Chalabi is bitterly opposed to the U.S. dialogue with the insurgents, and he said that even if the United States were able to reach an agreement with the opposition, Iraq’s new government would not be bound by it. Chalabi is insisting on a complete purge of all Baathists from positions of influence, and the Shiite bloc’s candidate for prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, seems to agree.
Ten days ago, at the Hudson Institute, Entifadh Qanbar of the INC referred to the U.S. dialogue with the resistance, before Time’s report was published. “The Baath is still running terrorism in Iraq, functioning from Jordan and Syria,” said Qanbar. He said that the U.S. embassy in Baghdad has been meeting with “terrorists” associated with the Association of Muslim Scholars, including at least one meeting inside the embassy itself. Reprising the 2003 division between the Pentagon—on the one hand—and the CIA and the State Department on the other, Qanbar said: “These efforts are being done by the CIA and the State Department, not by the Bush administration.” Concerning the Association of Muslim Scholars, Qanbar said: “There is no doubt that this is a terrorist front, and all of its members are former Baathists.” However, sources in the Defense Intelligence Agency said that the Association is a far more complex organization that simply a Baath party front. “That is just bullshit,” said the DIA official.
Inside Iraqi politics, it took several days of back-room jockeying between the two religious parties, Al Dawa and the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, and Chalabi, over who would become prime minister. Jaafari won when Chalabi dropped out, but no word yet on what Chalabi got in return for agreeing not to force the contest to a vote inside the Shiite bloc. With the new assembly made up almost entirely of Shiites and Kurds, it is a two-legged stool that can only fall over. Neither Chalabi nor the religious Shiites have offered a serious olive branch to the Sunnis or the resistance, and they are unlikely to do so.
Now Iyad Allawi, the current prime minister, has joined the mix. Allawi, a CIA man, was involved in secret talks late in 2004 with the resistance leaders in Jordan and Syria, and he might conceivably be a vehicle for bringing the Sunni opposition into a deal. He has also had secret talks with Sunni tribal leaders, many of whom have links to the resistance. But Allawi’s prospects seem slim. There are rumors that the Kurds—or some of them—might support Allawi. But again, it all seems too late.
So there are two powers in Iraq now, and two resistance groups. The powers are the new assembly, led by Sistani’s crew and the Shiite Islamists, on the one hand, and the American armed forces on the other. The resistance is the FREs and the Sunni Islamists. Hope for Iraq, if that’s what it can be called, lies in a deal between the U.S. military and the FREs, with Allawi as the broker and the Kurds as silent partners. More likely, though, the Shiite parties will hold on to power, and Iran will emerge as the big winner.
