Iraq: It's "Their" Country Now

We have argued since 2007 that the politics of Iraq were well beyond its US occupiers. The myth of the "surge" might obscure that reality, but it could not displace it. Gareth Porter, who has always been one journalist who could see beyond the US military, offers another compelling case for the ascendancy of the manoeuvres between Iraqi parties. Doing so, he also shatters the far-from-constructive storyline that Iran was responsible for American troubles in Iraq.

The article was originally posted by Inter Press Service:

Shi’a Unity Deal Explodes U.S. Proxy War Myth

The agreement announced Monday between Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and a Shi’a resistance group called the "League of the Righteous" (Asa'ib al-Haq) formally ended the group’s armed
opposition to the regime in return for the release of its leader and eight other Shi’a detainees. This deals a final blow to the U.S. military’s narrative of an Iranian "proxy war" in Iraq.

The U.S. command in Iraq has long argued that Iran was using "special groups" of Shi’a insurgents who had broken away from cleric Moqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army to destabilise the U.S.-supported Iraqi regime --- but pro- Iranian groups were weakened by U.S. military pressures throughout 2007 and defeated by the al-Maliki regime in 2008.

The history of the new agreement confirms what was evident from existing evidence: the "League of the Righteous" was actually the underground wing of the Mahdi Army all along, and the Sadrist insurgents were secretly working closely with the al-Maliki regime against the Americans and the British --- even as it was at war with armed elements within the regime.

The contradictory nature of the relationship between al-Maliki and the Sadrists reflects the tensions between pro-Sadrist elements within the regime --- including al-Maliki’s Da’wa Party --- and the anti-Sadrist elements led by the Supreme Council of Islamic Revolution in Iraq.

The relationship between al-Maliki and the U.S. was also marked by contradictions. Even through he was ostensibly cooperating with the U.S. against the Sadrists in 2007 and 2008, the al-Maliki regime was also cooperating secretly with the Sadrist forces against the Americans. And al-Maliki --- with the encouragement of Iran --- was working on a strategy for achieving the complete withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq through diplomatic means, which he did not reveal to the Americans until summer 2008.

Meanwhile, the Iranian Qods Force commander was playing the role of mediator between al-Maliki and the Sadrists, encouraging the latter to reach ceasefires with the government on the promise that he would get American troops out of the country.

Representatives of the "League" have said their reconciliation with al-Maliki is based on a common aim of expelling the U.S. military influence from Iraq.

One of the insurgent group’s representatives, Abdul Hadi al-Daraji explained the reconciliation with the government this week by observing that the government "is working to regain Iraqi sovereignty, and that is what the resistance was aimed towards".

But al-Maliki made it clear that the group had not renounced violence against the American troops. "We are only fighting the United States," he told the New York Times.

Underlining the lack of distinction between the "League" and the Sadristmovement, both of the main negotiators for the Shi’a insurgents on the agreement are among Moqtada al-Sadr’s most loyal lieutenants.

Salam al-Maliki was the head of the bloc of Sadrist members of parliament in 2006. Abdul Hadi al-Daraji was a senior aide to Sadr when he was arrested in Baghdad in Jan. 2007 by Iraqi Special Forces working closely with U.S. forces. Sadr complained to al-Maliki about the arrest, however, and al-Maliki adviser Sadiq al-Rikabi pledged that al-Daraji would be released.

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