What do the Sunni insurgents think?

Are the Sunni insurgents who turned on Al Qaeda in Iraq willing to cooperate with a Shi’ite-run majority government? Are they beginning a long, locally-driven process of reconciliation with the Shi’ite population? Or are they merely waiting to finish off Al Qaeda before they use their new weapons against the Shi’ite-led government – and the US again? Or, worse, are they making truces with Al Qaeda under the understanding that AQI leave certain tribal areas alone?

Probably the most important evidence of any success in the surge so far is the willingness of Sunnis in Anbar to turn on Al Qaeda, and the US to support these new anti-AQI Sunnis. Though this “Anbar Awakening” pre-dated the surge by several months, General Petraeus undoubtedly helped sustain this transformation with military and financial support. Alas, attacks against US troops are way down in Anbar, and Petraeus has begun to export this strategy to Sunni neighborhoods of Baghdad and Sunni towns in Diyala.

But all along, even Petraeus has cast doubt on the ultimate allegiances of these new “allies” in Iraq. It’s been taken for granted that whatever the long-term motivations of the Sunnis, it’s better to use them to stamp out AQI than to fret over future problems. But what if the Sunnis are playing Petraeus and the US for fools, and are merely buying weaponry, time and money for the real fight – to take over the Iraqi government and re-install a Saddam-type Sunni autocrat.

We may have a clue as to those motivations if an interview given by the London Times to a leader in the Islamic Army of Iraq is any indication. It’s worth noting that the Islamic Army of Iraq (IAI) is not, per the name, an Islamist group. Rather, it’s a collection of ex-Ba’athists that has spearheaded the insurgency from the very beginning, and is perhaps the strongest of all Sunni insurgent groups to have turned against AQI.

Ibrahim al-Shammari, the representative of IAI, makes a few noteworthy comments regarding larger strategy. First, the IAI will only agree to full-on talks of permanent alliance if the US agrees that the “Islamic Resistance” is the legitimate voice of the Iraqi people, and the US agrees to a timetable of withdrawal. Second, IAI has signed a ceasefire with AQI, with each allowing the other to avoid their respective spheres of influence. If true, this would spell disaster and utter reversal for the anti-AQI element of the surge. Third, IAI views the Maliki government as doomed and grants it no legitimacy whatsoever. IAI views the Shi’ites as nothing more than puppets of Iran. Fourth, IAI is increasingly angry at the way that proponents of the surge have exploited the anti-AQI for their own purposes and is considering re-igniting a policy of militancy and kidnapping in order to disabuse the Bush Administration of any notion that the Sunni insurgents are genuine allies of the US. As the Times puts it:

But the Islamic Army resents the way the Americans have tried to turn the infighting in Anbar to their advantage. “We’ve had big problems with Al-Qaeda ever since they began targeting and killing our men,” he said. “Eventually we had to fight back, but we found American troops were exploiting the situation by spreading rumours that exacerbated the conflict.”

The Islamic Army has also noted President George Bush’s comments about the success of the surge. “Bush foolishly announced to the world that all the Sunnis in Iraq were fighting Al-Qaeda so he could claim to have achieved a great victory,” Shammari said. “It’s nonsense.”

So what to make of this? Is Shammari telling the truth about Sunni motivations? If so, what are the implications?

Abu Aardvack – aka Marc Lynch – notes that the insurgents are trying to assemble a unified political position this September. Just as the various Mahdi militiamen have pushed Sadr’s formidable army in dozens of directions, so the divergent Sunni insurgency must address the real possibility of a post-Maliki government with a unified political front. Perhaps Shammari’s interview with a major Western newspaper was designed to clarify the Sunni position so the US wouldn’t exploit the anti-AQI strategy by remaining in Iraq longer. Surely that’s how the Bush Administration is planning to use the anti-AQI gains, so if Shammari has any political savvy he’d know that he has to either agree to a longer US presence (now “welcomed” by anti-AQI Sunnis) or he must make it absolutely clear that recent alliances with the US against AQI were purely tactical and short-lived. Like Sadr, Maliki, Petraeus and Bush, Shammari is seeking some clarity on the various politico-military fronts in Iraq. His interview, at the very least, suggests we take a skeptical look at all the happy talk floating around this coming September. The Sunni insurgents have proven for four years how powerfully destructive they are; we’d be well-advised to consider their long-term goals when assessing our own.