If
Iraq wasn't on the brink of civil war before last
month's bombing of the previously gold-domed
Askariya Mosque in Samarra, which is sacred to
Shi'ite Muslims, it certainly is now. The attack
turned what was a low-intensity sectarian conflict
hot, with media reports saying that Baghdad's
central morgue alone recorded 1,300 Iraqis dead in
four days of reprisal killings after the attack.
That increased violence between Arab
Sunnis and Shi'ites has persisted, and fears are
growing that civil war could draw Iraq's
neighbors further into the
conflict, or even spark a wider war. That fear was
recently expressed by US Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay
Khalilzad, who warned that if US troops pulled
out, a regional conflict could result. Religious
extremists could triumph, he said, and use Iraq as
a base for expansion, while Persian Gulf oil
supplies could be disrupted.
Khalilzad is
hardly a disinterested party, so his motives bear
scrutiny. But his belated observation that the
United States had opened a Pandora's box in Iraq
echoed the concerns of those who wanted the
Ba'athist lid kept on to begin with.
With
the lid nearly off, the incipient civil war is
capsizing the failing Iraq project, complicating
the formation of a government, turning the armed
forces into just another militia, and transforming
Iraq into a bigger, meaner version of the Lebanon
of 1975-90.
War by proxy, or regional
war? As it was in Lebanon, the civil
conflict in Iraq is rooted in the genuine
historical grievances of the country's basic
communities. And as Lebanon did, Iraq is fast
becoming a battleground for the competing
interests of surrounding states. Yet because Iraq
sits at the nexus of the world's largest petroleum
reserves, far more more is at stake.
Experts believe that increased
intervention by Iraq's neighbors is now
inevitable.
"I think it's definite that
they will become involved in the same way that
they were in Lebanon, by proxy," said Dr Rosemary
Hollis, the director of research at London's Royal
Institute of International Affairs (RIIA). "They
will support the factions that they feel the most
affinity to, in part because those factions will
need help and will come looking for it, but in
part because they won't want their opponents to
win."
Iraq's neighbors, particularly Iran,
are already deeply enmeshed in the Iraqi
maelstrom. And as the chaos mounts, they may be
tempted to assert forcefully their economic
interests and their stake in what political system
eventually rises above the killing fields. Added
to this are growing fears of the Sunni-Shi'ite
divide igniting sectarian fires across the region,
with either calls from the majority-Sunni states
to protect the Iraqi Sunni minority, or sectarian
tension in the Gulf states, many of which have
large Shi'ite minorities (and a majority in
Bahrain).
As a proxy war evolves, direct
interventions are unlikely, according to Dr Bahgat
Korany, the head of Middle East Studies at the
American University of Cairo (AUC). "If the
Americans don't want that, it will not happen," he
said. "I can't imagine that troops from other
countries will cross borders when you have
150,000-160,000 American troops there."
There have been consistent attempts by the
US to secure Arab troops to aid the occupation,
however, an outcome that could have myriad
unforeseen consequences once those troops
disembark. Informed sources said US Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice, on her recent visit to
Cairo, made a strong pitch to persuade Egypt to
send troops.
Ripples of chaos The predominant fear now in the region is the
dismemberment of Iraq.
"If the whole state
system unravels, if Iraq unravels and everybody
has to choose inside Iraq - and there's no
nationalist side - then everybody's state is in
jeopardy," said Hollis. The neighbors are
therefore caught between asserting influence to
create a favorable political order and pushing so
hard they force it apart. A Sunni-Shi'ite war
could make this balancing act unsustainable.
A recent report by the International
Crisis Group (ICG) captured this dilemma: "Should
neighboring states conclude either that Shi'ite
influence has become a strategic threat or that
Iraq's breakup is inevitable, they are likely to
take steps that will accelerate the country's
disintegration ... a development in which,
ironically, they have no interest."
The
greatest danger of copycat sectarian warfare is in
the Persian Gulf region, though there is as yet no
sign of it. Shi'ite empowerment appears to be
emboldening Shi'ite minorities, but not inspiring
militancy. Korany of AUC cautions that the dynamic
in these countries is different from that in Iraq.
"Minorities expressing their grievances doesn't
mean that you're going into a civil war," he said.
But Hollis of RIIA warned that instability
in Iraq could alter the existing balance in such
countries as Saudi Arabia.
"The Shi'ites
of the eastern province of Saudi Arabia are much
better off loyal to the crown at this stage," she
said. "But they are using this rise of Shi'ite
power in Iraq as a bargaining tool to get a bit
more recognition for their rights as Saudi
citizens. In the future, if the al-Saud seem to be
losing their grip, then maybe they would make a
new calculation."
Shi'ite Iran, with its
ties to the former Shi'ite Iraqi exiles who now
rule Iraq, has considerable influence in that
country, perhaps greater than the United States.
Various agencies of the Iranian regime have
maintained leverage with Iraq's multitude of
feuding Shi'ite power brokers, whose rise to power
has given Iran currency even as it profits by
raging against the occupation that delivered them.
The full extent of Iranian military involvement in
Iraq is not clear, though. While support for the
Shi'ite militias is probable, some analysts say
Iran is supporting Sunni militants at the same
time.
Hollis said that many in the Iranian
regime preferred stability in Iraq, but not all.
"There's been a certain amount of hedging of bets,
keeping in with as many factions as possible."
But while moderate conservatives want
stability, Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad
may be more of a gambler. "I think the president,
as a populist and a bit of a believer in his own
ideology, may see larger work to be done in a sort
of regional, Shi'ite Muslim anti-Western sense,"
Hollis said.
The administration of US
President George W Bush recently warned Iran
against direct interference in Iraq and accused it
of sending in the Revolutionary Guards. But for
all the tough talk, the looming civil war and the
reality of Iranian influence appear to have led to
last Friday's announcement by the US that it would
hold talks with Iran on Iraq. If those talks go
ahead, Iraqi Prime Minister-designate Ibrahim
al-Jaafari's fate will certainly be on the agenda.
Tehran is backing Jaafari, with Washington hoping
to install Abdul Aziz al-Hakim of the Supreme
Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq. This
ongoing political war has the potential to add
internecine Shi'ite warfare to Iraq's lethal brew.
While Iran now operates behind the scenes,
there are scenarios for direct Iranian
intervention. One flash point is the nuclear
issue. The ICG report concluded, "Should the
nuclear question come to a head and force
international intervention of some kind (including
sanctions), the regime may want to fight the US
where it is most vulnerable, namely in Iraq."
Korany of AUC said also that "if the
sacred holy places of Shi'ism are violated", as in
Samarra, "the Iranians could be so provoked and
the government under so much pressure" that
Iranian troops could conceivably cross the border.
Sunni fears, secular woes Iraq's other neighbors have an obvious
economic stake in Iraq - Turkey, Jordan and Syria
benefited from Iraqi oil concessions before Saddam
Hussein's fall, and stability in Iraq would open
markets that civil war is foreclosing. But the
more pressing preoccupations of Iraq's secular,
Sunni-majority neighbors are political and
ideological. Not only is the rise in Iranian
Shi'ite Islamist influence causing sleepless
nights, but so is the empowerment of Sunni
Islamist militants who have western Iraq as their
playground.
Islamist parties are now
scoring victories at the ballot box across the
Arab world, with their kindred spirits in Iraq
proving the enduring power of military jihad. The
combination is focusing secular minds as never
before.
Turkey is particularly worried
about Iran's central role in Iraq. As Ayhan Simsek
has written in The New Anatolian, Turkey would
like to keep Iraq intact, partly so that it can
serve as a buffer to its regional rival, Iran. Key
to this are fears of Iranian influence and
Islamism spreading to strongly secular Turkey.
Jaafari's recent visit to Ankara, of which
he neglected to inform Kurdish Iraqi President
Jalal Talabani in advance, has also reignited
tension with Iraq's Kurds. Ankara fears their
empowerment will embolden its own Kurdish
minority, and Iraqi Kurds fear that Ankara is now
sidestepping them to keep a check on their
ambitions.
Talabani has vocally opposed
Jaafari's candidacy, with reports suggesting the
Kurds are displeased that Jaafari is forestalling
a resolution of their bid to control the oil-rich
city of Kirkuk. There are also reports in the
Turkish press that while in Ankara Jaafari offered
to have Turkish troops replace US troops in
northern Iraq.
If Iraq dissolves into
civil war, Korany said, Turkey could feel obliged
to secure its interests in northern Iraq. "I can
imagine that the Turks, who are not happy at all
about the autonomy of the Kurds in Iraq, will try
to reimpose a sort of control of the situation,"
he said, "so that there wouldn't be a contagion
through the Kurdish population in Turkey."
Just as Turkey fears the extension of
Iran's reach, Jordan is worried about the rise of
Sunni extremists. Those claiming to fight under
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's banner now have a base from
which to try to bring down the pro-Western,
secular Hashemites. And some Jordanians, said
Hollis, "foresee that in the breakup of Iraq,
Zarqawi is more likely to see his battlefront as
western Iraq and Jordan, and are [speculating]
that Jordanian troops will end up being deployed
to western Iraq in order to head this off".
Such adventurism would, of course, require
US acquiescence, and unnerve Iran and Syria. Of
all Iraq's neighbors, Syria has perhaps the most
ambiguous relationship to Iraq's widening vortex.
What role Syria has played in allowing fighters to
cross into Iraq is an enduring mystery of the war.
What is clear is that the phenomenon is a
doubled-edged sword for Damascus.
On the
one hand disorder in Iraq undoubtedly distracts
the United States from its confrontation with the
regime of President Bashar Assad. On the other
hand, militant Islamist fighters may well be
crossing back into Syria, complicating the secular
Ba'athist regime's long struggle with the Syrian
Muslim Brotherhood.
The sharp dangers of
the phenomenon of blowback from Iraq's new jihadis
was demonstrated recently in the Saudi context,
with the failed attack on Abqaiq, the world's
largest oil-processing facility, on February 24.
While a Saudi al-Qaeda-linked group claimed the
attack, the first directly targeting the Saudi oil
industry, there has been speculation that it was
inspired by attacks on Iraq's oil infrastructure.
The House of Saud is facing its own
mini-insurgency and is perhaps the regime with the
most to lose as Iraqi jihad is exported.
America's Iraq conundrum The
Sunni-Shi'ite war in Iraq is a potential
catastrophe for US interests in the region. Not
only are allies of the United States being
threatened and its military being placed under
further duress, the symbolic setback civil war
presents is profound. Korany of AUC said the US is
now facing "complete failure of the objective of
establishing a new Iraq, which would have been a
showcase, a model of democracy for the region".
"If the Americans leave now," he said,
"with the chaos behind them, it is bound to affect
American influence - particularly its advice on
democracy in the region."
With the war
more unpopular than ever in the US, the Bush
administration is now befuddled by an
election-year conundrum. On March 13, President
Bush came as close as he has yet to setting a
timetable for withdrawal when he vowed Iraqi
troops would control most of the country by the
end of the year. But by the administration's own
logic, withdrawal would bring Khalilzad's warning
to fruition.
As a result, the US
administration may well have to choose between, on
the one hand, holding together a country at war
with itself and, on the other, surrendering it and
ushering in a regional war.
Ashraf
Fahim is a freelance writer on Middle Eastern
affairs based in New York and London. His writing
can be found at www.storminateacup.org.uk.
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