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"Let there arise out of you a band of people inviting to all that is good enjoining what is right and forbidding what is wrong; they are the ones to attain felicity".
(surah Al-Imran,ayat-104)
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BAGHDAD -- Every time he drove, he feared this moment. Now, it was too late.
As Omar Ahmed neared the checkpoint, he recalled, he saw armed men dressed in black ordering passengers out of a minivan and checking their identity cards. Some were told to get back into the van. Others were taken to a Shiite mosque across the street. The gunmen clutched Glock pistols, normally used by the Iraqi police.
Ahmed, 30, was a Sunni Muslim. And he was in Shaab, a volatile, Shiite Muslim-dominated neighborhood. Questions raced through his mind: Was the mosque a base for a Shiite militia? Were the men members of a Shiite death squad?
So Ahmed set in motion a ritual that many Sunnis across a divided Baghdad now practice. He pushed in a cassette tape with Shiite religious songs and turned up the volume. He wrapped a piece of green cloth that he brought from the Imam Ali shrine in Najaf, one of Shiite Islam's holiest sites, around his gearshift.
To the world outside, he was now a Shiite.
In a city riven by religion, violence and politics, fearful Sunnis and Shiites are hiding their identities to survive. Their differences -- some obvious, most subtle -- have become matters of life or death in ways never before seen in modern Iraq.
As he reached the checkpoint, Ahmed recalled, he was petrified. His wife, his mother and two small daughters were with him in their gray Honda. He pulled out his fake identity card, on which his Sunni tribal name, al-Obeidi, was changed to al-Hussein, a Shiite tribe.
"Deep inside, I was frightened," he said.
'What Is Your Sect?'

For centuries, from the Ottoman Empire to the British-installed monarchy to the republic eventually ruled by Saddam Hussein, Sunnis were the elite who got the bulk of government jobs. Shiites, in Hussein's time, were badly persecuted.
Yet in daily life hardly anyone cared about telling Sunnis and Shiites apart. It was considered rude to ask a person's sect, and it is practically impossible to discern from their looks, speech or dress. For generations, the two sects intermarried, making it difficult to differentiate them by surnames. They attended the same schools and lived in mixed neighborhoods.
Now, in the fourth year after a U.S.-led invasion toppled Hussein, a struggle for power is unfolding between Sunnis and Shiites in the political arena and in the streets of Baghdad. Since the bombing of a Shiite mosque in Samarra in February, sectarian strife and lawlessness have escalated.
At checkpoints set up by police or by sectarian militias, Iraqis said in interviews, it is common to hear questions such as "What is your sect?" or "What is your tribal name?" A wrong response could prove deadly.
On July 9, in Baghdad's al-Jihad neighborhood, Shiite militiamen allegedly killed 40 Sunnis after erecting checkpoints and checking identity cards. Three days later, unknown gunmen attacked a bus station in the northeastern town of Muqdadiyah and separated Sunni men from Shiites. They blindfolded and handcuffed the Shiites, then shot them in the head.
"People are basically killed or taken away simply because of their name, their identity or specific affiliations, " said Gianni Magazzeni, head of the U.N. human rights office for Iraq.
In Baghdad, it is difficult to tell a real checkpoint from a fake one. Police uniforms and badges are easily available on the black market. Shiite militiamen have infiltrated the Iraqi security forces, while Sunnis have largely remained outside them. Sunni insurgents have set up checkpoints and targeted Shiites.
A Fake ID and 12 Tips

"It is like Russian roulette," said Omar al-Azzawi, 33, a tall, broad-shouldered Sunni computer technician, who curled his fingers into the shape of a gun and pressed it against his temple. "I like my country, I like my people. But these days things are really different. To be in Iraq is to tempt fate."
Azzawi said Shiite militiamen abducted his aunt at a checkpoint in July in Baghdad's Shula neighborhood. Three days later, police found her body dumped on a street. Since then, Azzawi has taken measures to protect himself.
From his brown wallet, he pulled out a fake press credential from an Arabic-language newspaper. It cost him $35. On the red and white badge, Omar, a common Sunni name, became Amar, a common Shiite name.
Whenever he enters a Shiite neighborhood, Azzawi slips on a large silver ring worn by many Shiites, especially those considered to be descendants of Muhammad. He also carries a torba , a round piece of clay Shiites use to place their foreheads upon when they bow in prayer.
At work, Azzawi said, he often surfs Web sites to learn more about Shiites and their practices. For instance, he's been learning to recite the 12 imams of the Shiites, in perfect succession. He's heard that Shiite militiamen at checkpoints often use this as a test.
"I don't like to learn something that happened more than a thousand years ago," said Azzawi, who wore black jeans, a black shirt and a thin beard. "But I have to."
One Web site, http://www.iraqirab ita.org , offers a 12-point plan for Sunnis to disguise themselves as Shiites. The No. 1 tip: "Get a forged ID card, especially if your name is Omar or Othman."
Other tips include keeping a poster of Imam Hussein, the grandson of Muhammad, and a copy of a Shiite prayer book inside your house; keeping a set of black clothes, like those Shiites wear to commemorate special religious occasions; and learning the dates of the births and deaths of the 12 imams.
Tip No. 8: Learn how to curse Yazid, the Sunni caliph whose army killed Imam Hussein in the 7th century.
And if all else fails, tip No. 11 reads: "It is okay to claim that you were a Sunni but you were later 'enlightened' and became a Shiite." And tip No. 12 reminds Sunnis to practice all 11 tips well -- and to pray in a husseiniya, or Shiite mosque.
Azzawi's cousin keeps a latmiya -- sad Shiite chants about the 12 imams -- in his collection of ring tones in his cellphone. He activates it in majority-Shiite neighborhoods. Other Sunnis have images of Imam Ali or Imam Hussein on their cellphone screens.
Haki Ismael is a Shiite guard at a government ministry. He lives in Amiriyah, a mostly Sunni neighborhood. Every time he left, he said, he used his fake Sunni identity card. But one recent morning, he was kidnapped by members of the Mahdi Army, the Shiite militia aligned with firebrand cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. They thought he was a Sunni, he recalled.
So Ismael spoke with an accent typical of Shiites from the south. The militiamen began to relax. They released him.
Judging by Appearance

Ghassan Khalaf, a Sunni shopkeeper, was saved by his short hair. In June, Shiite policemen stopped his black BMW at a checkpoint in the mostly Shiite neighborhood of Bayaa. They saw the picture of Sadr near the speedometer and Imam Ali on the windshield. But their eyes zeroed in on Khalaf's cousin, Ahmad Jabbir. He had a long, bushy beard and a white tribal head scarf, worn by many religious Sunnis.
The policemen asked him for his ID. He did not have a fake one. Worse, his tribal name was al-Douri, the same as Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, who was a top deputy to Saddam Hussein. The policemen pushed Jabbir into their vehicle and ordered Khalaf to leave.
A few days later, Jabbir's corpse turned up in the morgue, Khalaf said. It had 24 holes from an electric drill; the head and beard were shaved.
Two weeks ago, a Shiite friend visited Khalaf's home, where photos of Sadr and Imam Ali are prominently displayed. Like most neighbors, he thought Khalaf was Shiite. He pulled out his cellphone and asked Khalaf:
"Did you see the last operation the heroes did?"
Then, Khalaf recalled, the friend played a grainy one-minute, 40-second video of armed men in black dragging a corpse by its shirt and dumping it in a sandy lot. "God help us get rid of the Salafis and Wahhabis," Khalaf told him afterward, referring to two Sunni branches.
"They think I am one of them," Khalaf explained later. "If you make a mistake, they'll find out you have some sympathy for Sunnis. They will kill me."
The friend asked Khalaf to pull out his blue cellphone with its latmiya ring tone. Then, he beamed over the video with a Bluetooth device.
"When my friend left, I cried because I remembered my cousin," Khalaf said.
"I thought, 'This is what happened to him.' "
Khalaf kept the video in his cellphone. It had become another piece of his disguise.
A Song and a Blessing

At the checkpoint, one of the armed men in black ordered Ahmed to get out of his Honda. His family sat in silence, veiled in fear. The man looked inside the car and spotted the green cloth and the picture of Imam Ali. A Shiite religious song flowed through the speakers.
"Where are you coming from?" he asked Ahmed.
"From a ziyara ," he replied in a southern Shiite accent, using the word for a visit to a shrine.
"God bless you. Go fast," the armed man replied.
Ahmed stepped back into his Honda and drove away.
"I felt like life came back to me," Ahmed recalled.
© 2006 The Washington Post Company
http://www.washingt onpost.com/ wp-dyn/content/ article/2006/ 09/28/AR20060928 01996_pf. html
 Reply:   US Commander: Insurgency in Ir
Replied by(Noman) Replied on (2/Oct/2006)
The insurgency in Iraq's volatile western Anbar province can be beaten but probably not until after U.S. troops leave the country, the commander of forces in the provincial capital said Frid
The Associated Press
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 2006

WASHINGTON The insurgency in Iraq's volatile western Anbar province can be beaten but probably not until after U.S. troops leave the country, the commander of forces in the provincial capital said Friday.

"An insurgency is a very difficult thing to defeat in a finite period of time. It takes a lot of persistence — perseverance is the actual term that we like to use," Army Col. Sean B. MacFarland, commander of 1st Brigade, 1st Armored Division, said in a video-teleconferenc e with reporters at the Defense Department.

"Who knows how long this is going to actually last?" he added. "But if we get the level of violence down to a point where the Iraqi security forces are more than capable of dealing with it, the insurgency's days will eventually come to an end. And they will come to an end at the hands of the Iraqis, who, by definition, will always be perceived as more legitimate than an external force like our own."

He did not say the insurgency could be defeated only if U.S. forces left, but he indicated that his brigade's mission is to reduce violence until Iraqi security forces can take over — not to outright defeat the insurgency.

MacFarland's brigade is fighting in Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province, where the insurgency has become so entrenched and feared by residents that the city has no Iraqi mayor. Recently, however, the tide has begun to turn against al-Qaida in Iraq, which has become the dominant anti-government force, the colonel said.

"It's a situation that's beginning to spiral in our favor," he said.

MacFarland painted a largely upbeat picture of the battle for Ramadi. He said attacks against U.S. and Iraqi forces have dropped from about 20 per day to about 15 per day, and the attacks have become less effective.

Also, recruiting for the Iraqi security forces has "soared 10-fold," local Sunni tribal leaders have begun cooperating more against the insurgents, and the U.S.-equipped Iraqi police are becoming more effective, he said.

On Monday the Pentagon announced that MacFarland's brigade has been ordered to remain in Anbar for 46 days beyond its previously scheduled departure in mid-January. That means the nearly 4,000 soldiers there will exceed the 12-month tour of duty that the Army has said should be the maximum for all units in Iraq.

MacFarland described his soldiers as disappointed but greeting the news "with a collective shrug."

He would not discuss casualty trends in his brigade, saying that would assist the insurgents by telling them how effective they have been. This month alone, the Pentagon has announced five soldiers from MacFarland's brigade killed in action in Ramadi, of which four were killed by roadside bombs; the other was killed by small arms fire.

http://www.iht. com/bin/print_ ipub.php? file=/articles/ ap/2006/09/ 29/america/ NA_GEN_US_ Iraq.php

 
 Reply:   As Kurd and Arab Clashes Surge
Replied by(Noman) Replied on (2/Oct/2006)
When the Kurdish President, Massoud Barzani, banned the Iraqi flag from being flown on top of public buildings in Kurdistan this month
By Patrick Cockburn in Arbil
Published: 30 September 2006
When the Kurdish President, Massoud Barzani, banned the Iraqi flag from being flown on top of public buildings in Kurdistan this month, the Iraqi Kurds took a further symbolic step towards de facto independence. He justified the ban by saying "so many pogroms and mass-killings were committed in its name".
The Iraqi Kurds are not seeking statehood, calculating that this is not now in their interests, but they want a degree of autonomy that amounts almost to the same thing. "If there is no federal solution there is no hope for this country," Mr Barzani told The Independent in his mountain-top headquarters in Salahudin overlooking the Kurdish capital, Arbil.
Mr Barzani's refusal to allow the Iraqi flag to be hoisted was sharply criticised by politicians in Baghdad. The Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, produced a bizarre endorsement of his national emblem saying: "Not only the Kurds were slaughtered under this flag, but many Iraqis were slain under this flag. Iraq was slain under this flag."
But to many Arab Iraqis the flag means a lot. In Mosul, where Arabs and Kurds are in conflict, the mainly Arab police force went around insisting that shopkeepers and public buildings fly the Iraqi flag. A month later, street-sellers were doing a steady business selling miniature Iraqi flags to drivers.
The Kurdistan over which Mr Barzani rules is the only peaceful part of Iraq and has been so since the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003. Made up of the three Kurdish provinces of Arbil, Dohuk and Sulaimaniyah, the enclave escaped rule from Baghdad in 1991 after the Kurdish uprising and was protected by US over-flights.
Arab Iraqis got used to the idea that this wholly Kurdish enclave known as the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) enjoys semi-independence. But it is the Kurdish determination to allow Kurdish majority areas in the rest of northern Iraq, notably Kirkuk, to join the KRG that is leading to a deepening conflict between Arabs and Kurds on the ground.
Iraq is already the site of two wars, one between the Iraqi Sunni community and the US that started in 2003 and a second sectarian conflict between Sunni and Shia Arabs that began in 2005. Iraq may now be beginning to suffer a third war, between Arabs and Kurds in the northern provinces.
This is because under Article 140 of the Iraqi constitution, agreed last year, the Kurds won the right to return to areas from which they have been driven for more than half a century. A census will then determine who lives where and, finally, a referendum must be held by the end of 2007, under which Kurdish areas can join the KRG.
The plan is having explosive consequences. Kurds claim to make up as much as a third of the 2.7 million population of Mosul province next door. They have an enclave at Khanaqin in Diyala province north-east of Baghdad. In many cases, the Kurdish and Arab populations are intertwined and animosity is increasing.
In Mosul city, some four or five Kurds are killed every day, the deputy governor, Khasro Goran, said. Seventy thousand Kurds have been forced to flee this year, mostly from Mosul city, he added. In Kirkuk, there is a surge in the bombings of Kurdish party headquarters and assassinations of Kurds. In Diyala, Baghdad and across central Iraq, Kurds are taking flight for the safety of the KRG.
Co-operation at ground level between Arab and Kurd is becoming more difficult. In Jalawla, a mixed town in Diyala province, Arab and Kurdish members of the local police fought a gun-battle last weekend. This was because an Arab police major had replaced a Kurdish one and the new police chief wanted to replace Kurdish rank-and-file with Arabs.
In theory, the Kurds and Arabs of northern Iraq will determine their future at the ballot-box. But the government in Baghdad is weak and it is difficult to see it organising both a census and a referendum it does not want. Mr Barzani is studiously polite about the Baghdad government, but he is clearly dubious about its authority. No doubt he is right in saying a new Iraq will be federal, but it may be the federalism decided by the gun rather than by the ballot-box.
When the Kurdish President, Massoud Barzani, banned the Iraqi flag from being flown on top of public buildings in Kurdistan this month, the Iraqi Kurds took a further symbolic step towards de facto independence. He justified the ban by saying "so many pogroms and mass-killings were committed in its name".
The Iraqi Kurds are not seeking statehood, calculating that this is not now in their interests, but they want a degree of autonomy that amounts almost to the same thing. "If there is no federal solution there is no hope for this country," Mr Barzani told The Independent in his mountain-top headquarters in Salahudin overlooking the Kurdish capital, Arbil.
Mr Barzani's refusal to allow the Iraqi flag to be hoisted was sharply criticised by politicians in Baghdad. The Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, produced a bizarre endorsement of his national emblem saying: "Not only the Kurds were slaughtered under this flag, but many Iraqis were slain under this flag. Iraq was slain under this flag."
But to many Arab Iraqis the flag means a lot. In Mosul, where Arabs and Kurds are in conflict, the mainly Arab police force went around insisting that shopkeepers and public buildings fly the Iraqi flag. A month later, street-sellers were doing a steady business selling miniature Iraqi flags to drivers.
The Kurdistan over which Mr Barzani rules is the only peaceful part of Iraq and has been so since the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003. Made up of the three Kurdish provinces of Arbil, Dohuk and Sulaimaniyah, the enclave escaped rule from Baghdad in 1991 after the Kurdish uprising and was protected by US over-flights.
Arab Iraqis got used to the idea that this wholly Kurdish enclave known as the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) enjoys semi-independence. But it is the Kurdish determination to allow Kurdish majority areas in the rest of northern Iraq, notably Kirkuk, to join the KRG that is leading to a deepening conflict between Arabs and Kurds on the ground.
Iraq is already the site of two wars, one between the Iraqi Sunni community and the US that started in 2003 and a second sectarian conflict between Sunni and Shia Arabs that began in 2005. Iraq may now be beginning to suffer a third war, between Arabs and Kurds in the northern provinces.
This is because under Article 140 of the Iraqi constitution, agreed last year, the Kurds won the right to return to areas from which they have been driven for more than half a century. A census will then determine who lives where and, finally, a referendum must be held by the end of 2007, under which Kurdish areas can join the KRG.
The plan is having explosive consequences. Kurds claim to make up as much as a third of the 2.7 million population of Mosul province next door. They have an enclave at Khanaqin in Diyala province north-east of Baghdad. In many cases, the Kurdish and Arab populations are intertwined and animosity is increasing.
In Mosul city, some four or five Kurds are killed every day, the deputy governor, Khasro Goran, said. Seventy thousand Kurds have been forced to flee this year, mostly from Mosul city, he added. In Kirkuk, there is a surge in the bombings of Kurdish party headquarters and assassinations of Kurds. In Diyala, Baghdad and across central Iraq, Kurds are taking flight for the safety of the KRG.
Co-operation at ground level between Arab and Kurd is becoming more difficult. In Jalawla, a mixed town in Diyala province, Arab and Kurdish members of the local police fought a gun-battle last weekend. This was because an Arab police major had replaced a Kurdish one and the new police chief wanted to replace Kurdish rank-and-file with Arabs.
In theory, the Kurds and Arabs of northern Iraq will determine their future at the ballot-box. But the government in Baghdad is weak and it is difficult to see it organising both a census and a referendum it does not want. Mr Barzani is studiously polite about the Baghdad government, but he is clearly dubious about its authority. No doubt he is right in saying a new Iraq will be federal, but it may be the federalism decided by the gun rather than by the ballot-box.

http://news. independent. co.uk/world/ middle_east/ article1772326. ece

 
 Reply:   U.S. general warns that Iraq i
Replied by(Ghost) Replied on (29/Sep/2006)
A top-ranked U.S. military officer in Iraq said Wednesday that the United States thought that the government of Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki was running out of time to prevent Iraq from di
By Nancy A. Youssef
McClatchy Newspapers


BAGHDAD, Iraq - A top-ranked U.S. military officer in Iraq said Wednesday that the United States thought that the government of Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki was running out of time to prevent Iraq from dissolving into outright civil war.
"We have to fix this militia issue. We can't have armed militias competing with Iraq's security forces. But I have to trust the prime minister to decide when it is that we do that," said Lt. Gen. Peter Chiarelli, the second-highest- ranking American military official in Baghdad.
Chiarelli's comments to a gathering of reporters were a part of a growing chorus of concerns from U.S. political and military leaders about the Iraqi government's ability and willingness to tackle corruption and militia-run death squads. They suggest that top American leaders are growing frustrated with the pace of reforms and may even be starting to argue for eventual U.S. withdrawal.
Throughout the month, senior military officials - almost always speaking anonymously because of the sensitivity of the subject - have expressed frustration with the government, saying corruption and rogue militias backed by rebel Shiite Muslim cleric Muqtada al Sadr are rampant. They've complained of ministers using their offices to fill the coffers of their political parties and of government workers using their jobs to attack rival sects. They said the Iraqi government turned a blind eye, embracing a sectarian winner-take- all approach to governance.
American and some Iraqi leaders quietly complain that Maliki isn't willing to make difficult decisions because he's politically beholden to the followers of Sadr, who backed his premiership. He often has blocked U.S. military officials from entering Shiite militia areas such as the Baghdad slum of Sadr City to make arrests.
"There's a political piece to this to see if they deal with these guys," a senior military official said earlier this month, speaking on condition of anonymity. "There is corruption and problems in some of these ministries, but it's got to be dealt with and it ought to be dealt with by the prime minister and the folks that are inside this government. I think the time is short for them to deal with that over time, because this can't go on like that."
Maj. Gen. William Caldwell, a top American military spokesman, said Wednesday that murders and executions were now the top reasons for civilian deaths in Baghdad. He said it was widely believed that Shiite militias and Sunni Muslim insurgency groups were doing the killing.
"When we say murders and executions, we're assuming murders and executions are in fact sectarian violence that is occurring within the city," Caldwell said.
In a WorldPublicOpinion. org poll conducted Sept. 1-4 by the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland, 77 percent of Iraqi respondents, including 100 percent of Sunnis polled, said they'd prefer a strong government that would get rid of militias.
The minority Sunnis, whom U.S. officials want to remain in the political process, threatened last week to leave the government if Maliki doesn't address the problem of the militias.
Hassan Sineid, a Shiite assemblyman and fellow member of Maliki's Dawa Party, said security forces had performed badly, and he called for the defense and interior ministers to resign. He said the prime minister soon would present a resolution before parliament calling for the disbanding of militias.
Recently, Maliki publicly denounced an attack in Sadr City that killed 34 people last week. It was one of the few occasions he's condemned violence in Iraq at a time when an average of 100 people are killed in the country each day.
American officials continue to support Maliki because he's the country's elected leader.
In other developments, the U.S. military said eight people, including four women, were killed early Wednesday in a raid in Baqouba that targeted a terrorist with ties to the group al Qaida in Iraq. Three other people, including two whom the military said were tied to terrorist activity, were wounded.
During the raid, gunfire came from the building that soldiers were targeting and from throughout the neighborhood. The military called in an air attack.
Weapons and a global positioning system were found in the targeted building. American military spokesman Lt. Col. Barry Johnson said the deaths of the women came after those in the building were warned repeatedly to stop firing.

McClatchy special correspondent Zaineb Obeid and Mark Brunswick of the Minneapolis Star Tribune contributed to this report from Baghdad.
http://www.thestate .com/mld/ mercurynews/ news/special_ packages/ iraq/15623156. htm

 
 Reply:   US: Iraq Govt Impeding Efforts
Replied by(Ghost) Replied on (29/Sep/2006)
Senior U.S. military officials have stepped up complaints that Iraq's Shiite-led government is thwarting efforts to go after Shiite death squads blamed in the execution-style killings of Sun
By Solomon Moore

Times Staff Writer
September 28, 2006

BAGHDAD — Senior U.S. military officials have stepped up complaints that Iraq's Shiite-led government is thwarting efforts to go after Shiite death squads blamed in the execution-style killings of Sunni Arabs in neighborhoods across this capital.

Although deadly Sunni Arab rebel attacks remain frequent in Baghdad, U.S. officials, including Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, say death squads affiliated with Shiite militias have become the main factors ratcheting up the capital's death toll from sectarian killings.

Civilian deaths in Baghdad during July and August totaled more than 5,100, according to United Nations figures, and most were caused by the sectarian strife.

However, the 8,000 U.S. troops sent to Baghdad in recent weeks to restore order have been largely prevented from confronting those militias, many of which have ties to Iraqi government officials.

The statements by ranking U.S. authorities complaining about the situation highlight rising American dissatisfaction with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki and an increasing willingness to exert pressure on the fledging Iraqi government.

The U.S. forces would like to stage heightened military operations in Baghdad neighborhoods such as Sadr City, a stronghold for anti-U.S. Shiite Muslim cleric Muqtada Sadr's Al Mahdi militia.

"We have to fix this militia issue," Army Lt. Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli, commander of day-to-day operations in Iraq, said Wednesday.

"We can't have armed militias competing with Iraq's security forces. But I have to trust the prime minister to decide when it is that we do that."

U.S. officials are anxious for Iraqis to take a stronger role in their country's security because of mounting pressure to withdraw American troops as soon as possible. Rising public discontent in the United States with the war, tired troops on their third and fourth rotations in the Middle East and huge expenditures by American taxpayers are all driving U.S. officials to press the government of Maliki, a Shiite, to quickly take more responsibility.

A map provided by the U.S. military on Wednesday identified nine neighborhoods that have been targeted in a Baghdad security plan, a major effort aimed at ridding the capital of Sunni Arab insurgents and Shiite militias.

However, all but two of these neighborhoods are predominantly Sunni.

Publicly, U.S. military leaders say they are simply conducting operations in areas where they are tracking the most killings, but privately they acknowledge that the Iraqi government has been reluctant to go after Shiite militias.

Tensions increased between the U.S. military and the Iraqi government after the Iraqi army's recent failure to deploy 4,000 troops to Baghdad.

Iraqi officials have attempted to send soldiers from the south to Diyala province to stabilize sectarian strife in the provincial capital, Baqubah, 35 miles north of the capital.

But a U.S. military official with knowledge of combat operations in Iraq said, "We told them that they can't send anybody to Diyala until they give us the troops we need for Baghdad."

The military official, who requested anonymity because of restrictions about speaking to news media about combat operations, also complained that Maliki's government had scrapped a plan to move U.S. and Iraqi troops into Sadr City before the start of the current holy month of Ramadan, a sign of how sectarian political considerations were hampering attempts to quell violence in Baghdad.

U.S. Army Maj. Gen. James Thurman, commander of military forces in the capital, said last week that "one of the sources of death groups are militias."

"I consider that issue a problem that the [Iraqi] government must deal with immediately. "

Iraqi government spokesman Ali Dabbagh said Maliki well understood the dangers posed by Shiite militias, but he said that political realities in Iraq could present the prime minister with even greater peril.

"This might create a negative reaction, and it may affect the political situation as well as the security situation in Baghdad," he said, defending Maliki's refusal to allow the U.S. military to raid Sadr City this month.

Dabbagh also said it was unfair to treat the Shiite militias the same as the Sunni Arab insurgents, because, he said, the paramilitaries were reacting to first blows by the rebels.

"Extremists and Saddamist parties are making bombs and killing Iraqis," Dabbagh said. "We do agree that there are revenge killings taking place, but not in the way of the Saddamists — this is just a reaction. We have to deal with the main causes: There are suicide bombers and car bombs attacking the Iraqis every day."

The American frustration in Baghdad is part of a growing chorus in recent weeks from officials both in Iraq and Washington expressing disappointment that Maliki has not taken a stronger stand against the militias, some of whose members serve in Iraq's army and police forces.

The dissatisfaction comes as scores of corpses — many mutilated by power drills, knives and multiple gunshots — continue to arrive at Baghdad's morgues, victims of death squads that officials fear are affiliated with politically backed militias.

The Sadr movement has control of some of Iraq's most powerful ministries, including Health, Transportation and Agriculture. The Badr Organization, a militia affiliated with the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq — a leading Shiite political party — and followers of Sadr have a strong influence at the Interior Ministry, which supervises the nation's police forces. Many ministries have their own security forces, which have been implicated in killings.

U.S. officials said they worried that a hands-off stance toward the militias could alienate those Sunni Arabs who have entered Iraqi civil society, including the army. They say they are concerned that Maliki's unity government could fray and that disaffected Sunni Arabs could drift into militancy.

U.S. military leaders described various obstacles facing them as they attempt to quell sectarian violence in Baghdad, including "no-touch lists" that prohibit them from arresting politicians and other high-status individuals, and off-limits areas in Baghdad that the U.S. military may not enter without permission from the Iraqi government.

U.S. military officials said they were also constrained by their desire to see the Iraqi government prove its ability to rule fairly, without regard to narrow sectarian interests and without significant U.S. interference, by resolving the sectarian conflict.

"There's a political piece to this to see if they deal with these guys," said another high-ranking U.S. military official in Baghdad, who also requested anonymity in order to maintain relationships with the Iraqi government.

"I won't deny the fact that there is corruption and problems in some of the ministries, but it's got to be dealt with, and it ought to be dealt with by the prime minister and the folks inside his government."

Instead, Maliki's government has often appeared to respond with ambivalence and occasional hostility to efforts to crack down on Shiite gunmen.

In August, U.S. forces raided Sadr City and battled with suspected militia members in one of the first thrusts of the Baghdad offensive. The prime minister responded by rebuking the American government for conducting the Sadr City incursion without permission from his administration.

Maliki's government also criticized two raids last week that captured suspected Al Mahdi militia leaders in the southern holy city of Najaf and in Baghdad.

In Washington, members of the Iraq Study Group — a high-profile, administration- backed panel examining U.S. policy in Iraq — recently held a news conference to say that they believed Maliki had just three months to act against the militias and restore stability.

But some observers say that Americans may have unrealistic expectations for an embryonic government so riven with sectarian and partisan fissures. Even if the Iraqi government had the will to act, it might not be able to control the militias, which U.S. and Iraqi officials contend have splintered into more radicalized and deadly elements.

"For example, Muqtada Sadr was ordered to control the militias, but even he can't control them," said Suha Azzawi, a Sunni Arab politician.

*
solomon.moore@ latimes.com
Staff writers Julian E. Barnes and Peter Spiegel in Washington contributed to this report.
Copyright 2006 Los Angeles Times http://fairuse. 100webcustomers. com/fairenough/ latimes444. html
 
 Reply:   Iraq at the Gates of Hellscri
Replied by(Ghost) Replied on (29/Sep/2006)
Victory in Iraq will be difficult and it will require more sacrifice. The fighting there can be as fierce as it was at Omaha Beach or Guadalcanal. And victory is as important as it was in th


Recently,
in one of many speeches melding
his Global War on Terror and his
war in Iraq, George W. Bush



said,
"Victory in Iraq will be
difficult and it will require
more sacrifice. The fighting
there can be as fierce as it was
at Omaha Beach or Guadalcanal.
And victory is as important as
it was in those earlier battles.
Victory in Iraq will result in a
democracy that is a friend of
America and an ally in the war
on terror. Victory in Iraq will
be a crushing defeat for our
enemies, who have staked so much
on the battle there. Victory in
Iraq will honor the sacrifice of
the brave Americans who have
given their lives. And victory
in Iraq would be a powerful
triumph in the ideological
struggle of the 21st century."


Over three years
after the 2003 invasion, it's
not unreasonable to speak of
George Bush's Iraq. The
president himself likes to refer
to that country as the "central
front [or theater] in our fight
against terrorism" and a
National Intelligence Estimate
(NIE), part of which was
recently leaked to the press and
part then


released
by the president, confirms that
Iraq is now indeed just that – a
literal motor for the creation
of terrorism. As the document
puts it, "The Iraq conflict has
become the 'cause célèbre' for
jihadists, breeding a deep
resentment of U.S. involvement
in the Muslim world, and
cultivating supporters for the
global jihadist movement." A
study by a British Ministry of
Defense


think tank
seconds this point, describing
Iraq as "a recruiting sergeant
for extremists across the Muslim
world."


So what exactly
does "victory" in George Bush's
Iraq look like 1,288 days after
the invasion of that country
began with a "shock-and-awe"
attack on downtown Baghdad? A
surprising amount of information
related to this has appeared in
the press in recent weeks, but
in purely scattershot form.
Here, it's all brought together
in 21 questions (and answers)
that add up to a grim but
realistic snapshot of Bush's
Iraq. The attempt to reclaim the
capital, dipped in a sea of
blood in recent months – or the
"battle of Baghdad," as the
administration likes to term it
– is now the center of
administration military strategy
and operations. So let's start
with this question:


How many
freelance militias are there in
Baghdad?


The answer is
"23" according to a "senior
[U.S.] military official" in
Baghdad – so write


Richard A. Oppel Jr. and Hosham
Hussein
in the New York Times;
but, according to National
Public Radio, the answer is "at
least 23." Antonio Castaneda of
the


Associated Press
says that there are 23 "known"
militias. However you figure it,
that's a staggering number of
militias, mainly Shi'ite but
some Sunni, for one large city.


How many
civilians are dying in the Iraqi
capital, due to those militias,
numerous (often
government-linked death squads),
the Sunni insurgency, and
al-Qaeda-in- Mesopotamia- style
terrorism?




Five thousand one-hundred and
six people
in July and August, according to
a recently released United
Nations report. The previous,
still staggering but
significantly lower figure of
3,391 offered for those months
relied on body counts only from
the city morgue. The UN report
also includes deaths at the
city's overtaxed hospitals. With
the Bush administration bringing
thousands of extra U.S. and
Iraqi soldiers into the capital
in August, death tolls went down
somewhat for a few weeks, but
began rising again towards
month's end. August figures on
civilian wounded – 4,309 – rose
14 percent over July's figures
and, by late September, suicide
bombings were


at their highest level
since the invasion.


How many
Iraqis are being tortured in
Baghdad at present?


Precise


numbers
are obviously in short supply on
this one, but large numbers of
bodies are found in and around
the capital every single day, a
result of the roiling civil war
already underway there. These
bodies, as Oppel of the Times
describes them, commonly display
a variety of signs of torture
including: "gouged-out eyeballs
… wounds … in the head and
genitals, broken bones of legs
and hands, electric and
cigarette burns … acid-induced
injuries and burns caused by
chemical substances, missing
skin … missing teeth and wounds
caused by power drills or
nails." The UN's chief
anti-torture expert,


Manfred Nowak,
believes that torture in Iraq is
now not only "totally out of
hand," but "worse" than under
Saddam Hussein.


How many Iraqi
civilians are being killed
countrywide?


The


UN report
offers figures on this: 1,493
dead, over and above the dead of
Baghdad. However, these figures
are surely undercounts. Oppel
points out, for instance, that
officials in al-Anbar Province,
the heartland of the Sunni
insurgency "and one of the
deadliest regions in Iraq,
reported no deaths in July."
Meanwhile, in Diyala Province,
northeast of Baghdad, deaths not
only seem to be on the rise, but
higher than previously
estimated. The intrepid


British journalist Patrick
Cockburn
recently visited the province.
It's not a place, he comments
parenthetically, "to make a
mistake in map reading." (Enter
the wrong area or neighborhood
and you're dead.) Diyala, he
reports, is now largely under
the control of Sunni insurgents
who are "close to establishing a
'Taliban republic' in the
region." On casualties, he
writes: "Going by the accounts
of police and government
officials in the province, the
death toll outside Baghdad may
be far higher than previously
reported." The head of Diyala's
Provincial Council (who has so
far escaped two assassination
attempts) told Cockburn that he
believed "on average, 100 people
are being killed in Diyala every
week." ("Many of those who die
disappear forever, thrown into
the Diyala River or buried in
date palm groves and fruit
orchards.") Even at the death
counts in the UN report, we're
talking about close to 40,000
Iraqi deaths a year. We have no
way of knowing how much higher
the real figure is.


How many
American and Iraqi troops and
police are now trying to regain
control of the capital and
suppress the raging violence
there?


Fifteen thousand
U.S. troops, 9,000 Iraqi army
soldiers, 12,000 Iraqi national
police, and 22,000 local police,



according to the commander
of U.S. forces in Baghdad, Maj.
Gen. James Thurman – and yet the
mayhem in that city has barely
been checked at all.


How many Iraqi
soldiers are missing from the
American campaign in Baghdad?


Six Iraqi
battalions or 3,000 troops,
again


according to Thurman,
who requested them from the
Iraqi government. These turn out
to be Shi'ite troops from other
provinces who have refused
orders to be transferred from
their home areas to Baghdad. In
the capital itself, American
troops are reported to be deeply
dissatisfied with their Iraqi
allies. ("Some U.S. soldiers say
the Iraqis serving alongside
them are among the worst they've
ever seen – seeming more loyal
to militias than the
government." )


How many Sunni
Arabs support the insurgency?


Seventy-five
percent of them,


according to a Pentagon survey.
In 2003, when the Pentagon first
began surveying Iraqi public
opinion, 14 percent of Sunnis
supported the insurgency (then
just beginning) against American
occupation.


How many
Iraqis want the United States to
withdraw its forces from their
country?


Except in the
Kurdish areas of northern Iraq,
strong majorities of Iraqis
across the country, Shi'ite and
Sunni, want an immediate U.S.
withdrawal,


according to a U.S. State
Department survey
"based on 1,870 face-to-face
interviews conducted from late
June to early July." In Baghdad,
nearly 75 percent of residents
polled claimed that they would
"feel safer" after a U.S.
withdrawal, and 65 percent
favored an immediate withdrawal
of U.S. and other foreign
forces. A recent Program on
International Policy Attitudes
or PIPA poll found 71 percent of
all Iraqis favor the withdrawal
of all foreign troops on a
year's timetable. (Polling for
Americans is a dangerous
business in Iraq. As one
anonymous pollster put it to



the Washington Post,
"If someone out there believes
the client is the U.S.
government, the persons doing
the polling could get killed.")


How many
Iraqis think the Bush
administration will withdraw at
some point?


According to the
PIPA poll, 77 percent of Iraqis
are convinced that the United
States is intent on keeping



permanent bases
in their country. As if
confirming such fears, this week
Jalal Talabani, the Kurdish
president of the U.S.-backed
Iraqi government ensconced in
the capital's well-fortified
Green Zone,


called for Iraqis
to keep two such permanent
bases, possibly in the Kurdish
areas of the country. He was
roundly


criticized
by other politicians for this.


How many
terrorists are being killed in
Iraq (and elsewhere) in the
president's Global War on
Terror?


Less than are
being generated by the war in
Iraq, according to the just
leaked National Intelligence
Estimate. As


Karen DeYoung of the
Washington Post
has written: "The war in Iraq
has become a primary recruitment
vehicle for violent Islamic
extremists, motivating a new
generation of potential
terrorists around the world
whose numbers may be increasing
faster than the United States
and its allies can reduce the
threat, U.S. intelligence
analysts have concluded." It's
worth remembering, as retired
Lt. Gen. William Odom, former
director of the National
Security Agency, told a group of
House Democrats this week, that



al-Qaeda recruiting efforts
actually declined in 2002, only
spiking after the invasion of
Iraq. Carl Conetta of the
Project for Defense Alternatives



sums the situation up
this way: "The rate of terrorism
fatalities for the 59-month
period following 11
September 2001 is 250 percent
that of the 44.5 month period
preceding and including the 9/11
attacks."


How many
Islamic extremist Web sites have
sprung up on the Internet to aid
such acts of terror?


Five thousand,
according to the same NIE.


How many
Iraqis are estimated to have
fled their homes this year, due
to the low-level civil war and
the ethnic cleansing of
neighborhoods?


Three hundred
thousand, according to
journalist Patrick Cockburn.


How much of
Bush's Iraq can now be covered
by Western journalists?


Approximately 2
percent,


according to New York Times
journalist
Dexter Filkins, now back from
Baghdad on a Nieman Fellowship
at Harvard University.


Filkins
claims that "98 percent of Iraq,
and even most of Baghdad, has
now become 'off-limits' for
Western journalists. " There
are, he says, many situations in
Iraq "even too dangerous for
Iraqi reporters to report on."
(Such journalists, working for
Western news outlets, "live in
constant fear of their
association with the newspaper
being exposed, which could cost
them their lives. 'Most of the
Iraqis who work for us don't
even tell their families that
they work for us,' said
Filkins.")


How many
journalists and "media support
workers" have died in Iraq this
year?




Twenty journalists
and


six media support
workers.


The first
to die in 2006 was Mahmoud
Za'al, a 35-year-old
correspondent for Baghdad TV,
covering an assault by Sunni
insurgents on two U.S.-held
buildings in Ramadi, capital of
al-Anbar province on Jan. 25. He
was reportedly first wounded in
both legs and then, according to
eyewitnesses, killed in a U.S.
air strike. (The U.S. denied
launching an air strike in
Ramadi that day.) The most
recent death was Ahmed Riyadh
al-Karbouli, also of Baghdad TV,
also in Ramadi, who was
assassinated by insurgents on
Sept. 18.


The latest death
of a "media support worker"
occurred on Aug. 27: "A guard
employed by the state-run daily
newspaper al-Sabah was
killed when an explosive-packed
car detonated in the building's
garage." In all 80, journalists
and 28 media support workers
have died since the invasion of
2003. Compare these figures to
journalistic deaths in other
American wars: World War II
(68), Korea (17), Vietnam (71).


How many U.S.
troops are in Iraq today?


Approximately



147,000,
according to Gen. John Abizaid,
head of U.S. Central Command,
significantly more than were
in-country just after Baghdad
was taken in April 2003 when the
occupation began. Abizaid does
not expect these figures to fall
before "next spring" (which is
the equivalent of "forever" in
Bush administration parlance).
He does not rule out sending in
even more troops. "If it's
necessary to do that because the
military situation on the ground
requires that, we'll do it."
Finding those troops is another
matter entirely.


How is the
Pentagon keeping troop strength
up in Iraq?


Four thousand
troops from the 1st Brigade of
the 1st Armored Division,
operating near Ramadi and
nearing the end of their
year-long tours of duty, have
just been informed that they
will be held in Iraq at least
six more weeks. This is not an
isolated incident,


according to Robert Burns
of the Associated Press. Units
are also being sent to Iraq
ahead of schedule. Army policy
has been to give soldiers two
years at home between combat
tours. This year alone, the time
between tours has shrunk from 18
to 14 months. "In the case of
the 3rd Infantry," writes Burns,
"it appears at least one brigade
will get only about 12 months
because it is heading for Iraq
to replace the extended brigade
of the 1st Armored." And this
may increasingly prove the norm.



According to senior Rand
Corporation analyst
Lynn Davis, main author of
"Stretched Thin," a report on
Army deployments, "soldiers in
today's armored, mechanized, and
Stryker brigades, which are most
in demand, can expect to be away
from home for 'a little over 45
percent of their career.'"


The Army has also
maintained its strength in
through a heavy reliance on the
Army Reserves and the National
Guard as well as on involuntary
deployments of the Individual
Ready Reserve. Thom Shanker and
Michael R. Gordon of


the New York Times
recently reported that the
Pentagon was once again
considering activating
substantial numbers of Reserves
and the National Guard for duty
in Iraq. This, despite, as
reporter


Jim Lobe
has written, "previous Bush
administration pledges to limit
overseas deployments for the
Guard." (Such an unpopular
decision will surely not be
announced before the midterm
elections.)


As of now, write
Shanker and Gordon, "so many
[U.S. troops] are deployed or
only recently returned from
combat duty that only two or
three combat brigades – perhaps
7,000 to 10,000 troops – are
fully ready to respond in case
of unexpected crises, according
to a senior Army general."


How many
active duty Army troops have
been deployed in Iraq?


Approximately
400,000 troops out of an
active-duty force of 504,000
have already served one tour of
duty in Iraq, according to



Peter Spiegel of the Los
Angeles Times.
More than one-third of them have
already been deployed twice.


How is Iraq
affecting the Army's equipment?


By the spring of
2005, the Army had already
"rotated 40 percent of its
equipment through Iraq and
Afghanistan. " Marine Corps
mid-2005 estimates were that 40
percent of its ground equipment
and 20 percent of its air assets
were being used to support
current operations," according
to analyst Carl Conetta


in "Fighting on Borrowed Time."
In the harsh climate of Iraq,
the wear and tear on equipment
has been enormous. Conetta
estimates that whenever the Iraq
and Afghan wars end, the postwar
repair bill for Army and Marine
equipment will be in the range
of $25-40 billion.


How many extra
dollars does a desperately
overstretched Army claim to need
in the coming Defense budget,
mainly because of wear and tear
in Iraq?


Twenty-five
billion above budget limits set
by Secretary of Defense Donald
Rumsfeld this year; over $40
billion above last year's
budget. The amount the Army
claims it now needs simply to
tread water represents a 41
percent increase over its
current share of the Pentagon
budget. As a "protest," Army
Chief of Staff Gen. Peter
Schoomaker chose not even to
submit a required budget to
Rumsfeld in August. The general,
according to


the LA Times' Spiegel,
"has told congressional
appropriators that he will need
$17.1 billion next year for
repairs, nearly double this
year's appropriation – and more
than quadruple the cost two
years ago." This is vivid
evidence of the literal
wear-and-tear the ongoing war
(and civil war) in Iraq is
causing.


How is Iraqi




reconstruction
going?


Over three years
after the invasion, the


national electricity grid
can only deliver electricity to
the capital, on average, one out
of every four hours (and that's
evidently on a good day). At the
beginning of September, Iraq's
oil minister spoke hopefully of
raising the country's oil output
to

3
million barrels
a day by year's end. That
optimistic goal would just bring
oil production back to where it
was more or less at the moment
the Bush administration,
planning to pay for the
occupation of Iraq with that
country's


"sea"
of oil, invaded. According to a
Pentagon study, "Measuring
security and stability in Iraq,"
released in August, inflation in
that country now stands at 52.5
percent. (Damien Cave of


the New York Times
suggests that it's closer to 70
percent, with fuel and
electricity up 270 percent from
the previous year); the same
Pentagon study estimates that
"about 25.9 percent of Iraqi
children examined were stunted
in their physical growth" due to
chronic malnutrition which is



on the rise
across Iraq.


How many
speeches has George W. Bush made
in the last month extolling his
War on Terror and its Iraqi
"central front"?


Six so far, not
including press conferences,
comments made while greeting
foreign leaders, and the like:
to the


American Legion National
Convention
on Aug. 31, in a


radio address
to the American people on Sept.
2, in a


speech
on his Global War on Terror to
the Military Officers
Association on Sept. 5, in a



speech
on "progress" in the Global War
on Terror before the Georgia
Public Policy Foundation on
Sept. 7, in a


TV address
to the nation memorializing
Sept. 11, and in a


speech
to the UN on Sept. 19.





This week, the
count of American war dead in Iraq passed 2,700. The Iraqi dead are literally uncountable. Iraq is the tragedy of our times, an event that has brought out, and will continue to bring out, the worst in us all. It is carnage incarnate. Every time the president mentions "victory" these days, the word "loss" should come to our minds. A few more victories like this one and the world will be an unimaginable place. Back in 2004, the head of the Arab League, Amr Moussa, warned, "The gates of hell are open in Iraq." Then it was just an image. Remarkably enough, it has taken barely two more years for us to arrive at those gates on which, it is said, is inscribed the phrase, "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here."

 
 Reply:   Killings by Shiite Militias De
Replied by(Ghost) Replied on (29/Sep/2006)
Iraq's two most deadly Shiite Muslim militias have killed thousands of Sunni Arabs since February, with the more experienced Badr Brigade often working in tandem with Al Mahdi army
BAGHDAD — Iraq's two most deadly Shiite Muslim militias have killed thousands of Sunni Arabs since February, with the more experienced Badr Brigade often working in tandem with Al Mahdi army, collecting intelligence on targets and forming hit lists that Al Mahdi militia members carry out, a senior U.S. military official said Wednesday.

In some cases, death squads have been accompanied by a "clerical figure to basically run" an Islamic court to provide "the blessing for the conduct of the execution," the official said.

The disclosures came during a U.S. intelligence briefing that included details about Shiite militia death squad operations and links to Iranian finance and weapons networks.

The military official said there were corrupt Iraqi security officers who allowed Shiite militia members to kill Sunni Arabs in Baghdad neighborhoods that had been secured by joint U.S.-Iraqi military sweeps aimed at quelling sectarian violence.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity, but was one of a series of high-ranking American officials who gave detailed briefings to reporters this week, at a time when the U.S. military is struggling to restore order to Baghdad and to press the Iraqi government to move decisively against Shiite militias.

The Badr Brigade, the military wing of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq — a member of the leading Shiite political bloc with 30 seats in parliament — was responsible for most of the Shiite death squad killings last year, the official said.

That changed in February, when Sunni Arab insurgents bombed the Shiite shrine of the Golden Mosque in Samarra, and Al Mahdi army, a militia loyal to radical anti-Western Shiite cleric Muqtada Sadr, moved to the front of a rising sectarian bloodbath.

Sadr's political organization also holds 30 parliamentary seats and controls several government ministries.

The hallmarks of the Shiite death squads have been mass killings in which the victims are found with their "hands bound, shot in the back or head," and their bodies showing signs of torture, the U.S. official said.

Mosques and safehouses in Sadr City, a huge poor Shiite neighborhood that is the Al Mahdi stronghold in Baghdad, have been the base for many death squad operations, the official said.

The official also said that Iraq's Interior Ministry, known to be heavily infiltrated by both Shiite militias, was complicit in many of the killings.

Militia members have used Iraqi security forces' uniforms and vehicles during assassinations and checkpoint sweeps.

"Those would get up to 60 individuals detained in a sweep," the official said. "OK, and again, often they would release those who were Shiite. We'd see that over the course of, say, that afternoon. And then there'd be individuals ransomed, and then there would perhaps be a mass killing in Sadr City and burial."

American military officials have arrested at least 30 death squad members, the official said, all of them associated with extreme Al Mahdi militia elements.

Death squad cells within the Badr Brigade still carry out killings, the official said, but the number of slayings by Al Mahdi extremist cells has far outstripped them.

Al Mahdi militia's growth has hindered Sadr's ability to control the paramilitary force, the official said, citing instances when the cleric's commands to fighters to stand down were ignored by militia commanders.

The official said U.S. investigators in Iraq have evidence that militiamen have acquired shoulder-fired rockets capable of shooting down aircraft, as well as Iranian-made explosives capable of puncturing armor plating.

Iran has "enhanced violence" in some militia-dominated Iraqi cities with its flow of weapons, the official said, but he downplayed the Shiite-controlled country's long-term influence in Iraq, saying that Iraq's historic independent streak would eventually outweigh its affinities for its neighbor.

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