The News From Basra
November 23rd, 2007 by JEB KOOGLER
Since the British started to withdraw troops from Iraq’s southern city of Basra at the end of the summer, observers have been watching carefully. Because Basra is seen as an important indicator of what would happen in the event of a broader troop withdrawal, both sides of the “should we stay or should we go” debate have been looking for evidence to bolster their case. It’s no surprise, then, that it’s so hard to get any idea of what’s actually going on.
On the one hand, you’ve got reports that suggests that violence is down and that the city is stabilizing without foreign forces. According to one widely-cited report, violence has dropped by 90% since the British forces left. Brandon Friedman, over at Daily Kos, wrote about this development, noting that it suggests that there’s “no reason to believe that Iraq’s only means of national survival is to depend on a 160,000-person fighting force of Americans.” (Assuming that this report is valid, and that things are actually improving in Basra, I’m not sure that Friedman’s right to assume that a national withdrawal will lead to a similar cutback in violence. Basra is much more homogeneous than much of the rest of the country and has significantly smaller numbers of Sunnis, al-Qaeda members, and foreign fighters.)
Meanwhile, on the other hand, you’ve got this Washington Post article which says that Shiite militias are literally butchering each other in the streets. With the drawback of British forces, Badr and Mahdi militiamen have been jockeying for who will control the city. Via Juan Cole, we learn that the Shia-on-Shia violence continues to this day, with assassinations and killings occurring on a routine basis. The AP is reporting that, in the past few weeks, the Mahdi army has come out on top in Basra and that they’ve forced the local police chief to flee.
What’s to be made of these contradictory narratives?
The only thing that’s clear is that the reality in Basra is a lot more nuanced than it is being portrayed to be by many partisan observers. Unfortunately, both sides of the withdrawal debate are trying to distort what is going on in Basra to use as evidence for their case. Friedman’s post at Daily Kos, with all due respect to him, distorted the reality far too much in order to present the argument for a national withdrawal. Conservatives, on the other side of the debate, have irresponsibly generalized about Basra’s Shia-on-Shia fighting as evidence that withdrawing troops on a larger scale would be an obvious disaster. Few commentators (save Juan Cole) have been willing to give us a more balanced portrayal of the situation on the ground.
My own reading of the situation is that, while there may be some positive signs, it’s probably a mistake to tout Basra as some kind of success. The reports that I’ve read about events in Basra have been overwhelmingly negative. According to one recent al-Jazeera article, people are leaving in droves to escape the fighting. The police force is now heavily infiltrated by militiamen and Shia groups are still battling it out in the streets.
All that is not to say that there isn’t a very strong case to be made for withdrawal; but it is important that we don’t sugarcoat how smoothly it might go.
This entry was posted on Friday, November 23rd, 2007 at 10:48 am and is filed under Iraq. Both comments and pings are currently closed.
November 23rd, 2007 at 11:25 am
Jeb:
Good piece, and you are correct that simplistic portrayals don’t cut it.
One very important factor is that the British Army has ceded Basra city to the militias and conditions should be viewed through that prism. When they are, “success” and “failure” become a whole lot less relative.
November 23rd, 2007 at 11:44 am
The overall question that should be asked is whether or not there are enough citizens of Iraq who are interested in being citizens of Iraq instead of being interested in being Shias, Sunnis and Kurds to produce a stable, relatively peaceful nation. I don’t think anyone knows but I’m certainly not optimistic.
November 23rd, 2007 at 12:26 pm
In a somewhat related topic, there’s more good news coming from the Kurdish area. While browsing at McClatchy, no letup from previous owners, I found this interesting story.
Iraqi Kurdistan schools will teach religions other than Islam
Sure beats the BS story about the southern Iraqis/Mek petition.
Back to Basra, “IntheRedzone” by Steven Vincent is a good starting point at a nuanced look at Basra. And the IRONY of his murder by Shia militia says it all. The militia angle went unreported in the US, didn’t fit the AQ narrative.
November 23rd, 2007 at 12:34 pm
The fact that it’s Shia-on-Shia violence, hgihlights what so much of it is about throughout Iraq: it’s a power struggle amondg all the different factions, tribes and religious groups. Personally, I suspect, it;s there, under the surface, even in areas that have been pacified.
On top of that,come the Iranian and Syrian influence, the influx of insurgents from Saudi Arabia and the still presesnt Al Qaeda, all of it covered by a web of corruption at all levels.
What underlies the stay/go arguments hasn’t moved much off first base if you consider Iraq as a whole. It’s a different story in different regions in nn ever changing kaleidoscope. There is no teason to think that will change any time soon, IMO.
For the American public, then, it becomes a question of how long and to what extent the US could/ chould play the role of referee/.police.
It’s amazing and deeply regrettable, that no politician and no candidate lays out the picture in these realistic terms. It’s all showman talk and bravado.
Biden is the exception, but his plan for separation does not go over well with the Iraqis. They seem to be one of two types: either they are clinging to the idea of turning beack the clock and rresurrecting integrated neighborhoods or thery are involved in the power struggle.
I’m doubtful that statements by senators like Levin, recommending the ouster of al Malik or other drastic internal change are helpfuli The last thing the Iraqis want to hear is the US talking like an imperial power, willing to rearrange the Iraqi chess board at will. No matter how badly thigns are going, any people would feel insulted by being ignored as the big boys play in their country.
That is what the US doesn’t seem to get.
In a narrow way, Basra is the canary in the mine, though.
November 23rd, 2007 at 12:49 pm
[…] House The News From Basra » This Summary is from an article posted at The Moderate Voice » Domestic and international news […]
November 23rd, 2007 at 1:15 pm
Seen by whom? Iraq is way too complex to extrapolate what happens in Basra to the rest of the country, just as the success in Anbar, Diyala and elsewhere cannot be carbon-copy replicated everywhere. What the British have done is Basra is very similar to what the US did in Anbar in 2005-2006, for example, under Casey’s “disengagement” plan. That, obviously, didn’t work out so well.
So you’re right on the money with this post.
November 23rd, 2007 at 1:32 pm
The British military style is also completely different. Their use of bases and engagement is different…
November 23rd, 2007 at 3:08 pm
I admit that I found Friedman’s blog entry overly triumphalist regarding the post-withdrawal peace. The problem in Iraq is that the various sects, tribes and factions feel each other out regularly and pounce when they sense an advantage. Nothing of late - including the Awakening Councils - has reversed that trend. Only a political agreement at the central government level will put an end to this warlord state of affairs. Localized ground-up reconciliation plans will never pan out nationwide on their own; there are too many forces with a vested interest in sabotaging somebody else’s gains. The Lebanese Civil War between 1975 and 1990 had multiple “cease fires” and reconciliation summits, but they never amounted to anything permanently until the Taif Accords in 1989.
November 23rd, 2007 at 11:16 pm
Without sweating nuances of the Basra situation, or anywhere else in Iraq, what does it tell you when, at this late date the picture of what’s going on is so murky and hard to make sense of?
That is a question that should be asked of our president and vice president their every working day. It’s a question that should haunt their nights.
Because, their running out the clock to avoid presiding over something less than a victory is costing people their lives.
Remember, I said should.
November 24th, 2007 at 6:21 am
Nice post - you nicely demonstrate that compelling narratives are generally not internally contradictory, but data is. If you look at just two indicators, the number of deaths, and the cumulative number of displaced refugees, you can have contradictory data that makes it hard to write a news story for someone with a five second attention span.
Also good catch on the fallacy of composition - i.e. that either Basra (or Anbar) are necessarily proxies for the rest of Iraq.
November 24th, 2007 at 9:12 pm
Thanks for all the interesting comments, folks.