Iraq: Going Through Some Needed Changes

[Valin]

Strategy Page:

September 18, 2015:

 

In Iraq the Shia militias, many of them with Iranian advisors, are increasingly being seen as a problem by the new Iraqi government and Iraqis in general. The previous Maliki government had long worked closely with Iran but lost power because Maliki and his allies would not do anything about the corruption that is largely seen as the main reason ISIL made such rapid advances in 2014. Iraqis are discovering, as the anti-corruption efforts now accelerate, that a lot of that corruption, especially in the military, was encouraged, and sometimes paid for, by Iran. This has caused public opinion among the majority Shia Arabs in Iraq to turn against Iran. Another reason for that is the Iran supported (and often armed and paid) Shia militiamen are seen as fanatics and undisciplined who are mainly loyal to Iran. These Shia militiamen are largely motivated by revenge (for years of Islamic terrorist attacks on Shia civilians) and their Iranian advisors encourage that. The Iran backed Shia militias are now seen as a potential threat to the Iraqi government. While the Shia militiamen have less training they are more fanatics and undisciplined. To the Americans the biggest risk is the Shia militiamen terrorizing (kidnapping, murdering, looting and so on) Sunni civilians in areas ISIL (al Qaeda in Iraq and the Levant) is driven out of. The Americans realize that the key to regaining control of Anbar is gaining the support of the Sunnis (who comprise nearly all the Anbar population).

 

Iran is not happy with this new attitude. It got worse recently when Iraq got its first few F-16s into service. While being used mainly for attacking ISIL on the ground, the F-16s can also use air-to-air missiles and the Iraqi pilots can go after Iranian cargo aircraft transiting Iraqi airspace on their way to Syria and force them to land or turn back. Iraq could never do this before and Iran was able to pretty much use Iraqi air space for these flights without any fear of the transports being threatened. Iraq has always tolerated this Iranian use of Iraqi airspace to rapidly supply the Assad government in Syria. Iraq did this despite constant pressure from the United States to block the Assad aid. Now the Iraqis are paying more attention to their American allies than their Iranian neighbors.

 

The Iraqi Army and Shia militias continue advancing slowly against ISIL in central (towards Mosul) and western (Anbar Province) Iraq. The advance is so slow that there are doubts about any progress at all and some accusations that ISIL is actually in more areas now than at the beginning of the year, despite thousands of air strikes. The main problem is the difficulty in obtaining accurate data about what is happening on the ground. As the government gains access and then control of more territory more is revealed about what is going on there. Turns out that in late 2014 the government abandoned a lot more territory than ISIL took control of. This sort of chaos is common in Iraq and the region. A lot of it has to do with the culture of corruption. This highlights another problem. As ISIL has become less of a problem (stalemated or put on the defensive) this year another revolution has appeared. This uprising is about the endemic corruption that has long crippled Iraq (and the region). The popular anger about the corruption has been growing for decades and became a real threat once democracy was introduced in 2004. Now there are regular (usually Friday, the start of the “weekend” in Moslem majority nations) and the government has been forced to act. In addition to firing hundreds of corrupt officials the government has also rushed to be more frank, prompt and honest in reporting the state of the war with ISIL. That means admitting that problems exist. The military leadership is still a mess as is that portion of the military responsible for keeping the fighting troops supplied. The government never liked to admit that the military was corrupt and incompetent, but the Iraqi people can find detailed reports of this on the Internet and in a growing number of Iraqi media outlets. It is no longer forbidden to report the unpleasant truth. It can still be dangerous, especially if you talk about Iran backed Shia militia. The upshot of more information is the confirmation of what American advisors and trainers have been saying for over a decade; it takes time to find and train competent officers. An even more unpopular bit of advice was warnings about the impact of corruption. It is now generally accepted that once the Americans left in 2011 the unsurprisingly corrupt Iraqi politicians began replacing competent officers with more corrupt ones who were believed more concerned with politics than in running an effective army. That was the major reason why ISIL advanced so quickly in mid-2014. Most Iraqis now accept this rather than the usual “it’s all because of a foreign conspiracy” excuse that is so popular throughout the region. All this openness and honesty does not solve the leadership problems in the military and government, but does allow a fix to proceed more quickly. There is still some resistance to replacing incompetent officers, usually from politicians who sponsored those officers. There is still fear of another civil war between Shia political factions and politicians feel safer if they “own” a few senior commanders. That is an ancient tradition in this part of the world and such long-standing practices are not easily changed.

 

Meanwhile ISIL is also having leadership and morale problems. Popular resistance in ISIL occupied areas, especially Mosul and western Iraq, is growing despite ever more arrests and executions......................................(Snip)