Meet our new Sunni Warlord allies in Iraq...

[DeadCanDance]

Paying sunni warlords and former insurgents to be our new "allies" in Iraq.

I remember how well that worked out, when we paid afghan warlords to fight for us against the taliban. They took our money, took our weapons, and did a half-assed job in fighting and capturing the taliban. Sometimes, helping us to a certain extent. Sometimes, just letting taliban fighters get way (Hello? Tora Bora?). i.e., Basically, pursuing their own interests, and taking our money and weapons when it suits their interests.

Meet Abu Abed: the US's new ally against al-Qaida

With summary beatings and imprisonments, he has the methods of a mafia don. But he and others like him are crucial to American strategy

Ghaith Abdul-Ahad in Baghdad
Saturday November 10, 2007

On a recent Friday morning in west Baghdad, 20 of Hajji Abu Abed's men were shifting their feet nervously in the dusty yard outside his house as they waited for their leader to emerge.

The men, young and well armed with Kalashnikovs, pistols and hand grenades, were wearing the favoured dress for militiamen in Iraq these days: green camouflage commando uniforms decorated with bits of US army kit - a pouch on one man, webbing on another, a cap here, sunglasses there, a few flak jackets between them. Some bore the insignia of Iraqi army officers....snip

Abu Abed, a member of the insurgent Islamic Army, has recently become the commander of the US-sponsored "Ameriya Knights". He is one of the new breed of Sunni warlords who are being paid by the US to fight al-Qaida in Iraq. The Americans call their new allies Concerned Citizens.

It is a strategy that has worked well for the Americans, on paper at least. This week, the US military claimed it had forced the extremist group al-Qaida in Mesopotamia out of Baghdad altogether, and cut the number of murders in the city by 80%. Major General Joseph Fil, commander of US forces in Baghdad, said: "The Iraqi people have decided that they've had it up to here with violence."

Critics of the plan say they are simply creating powerful new strongmen who run their own prisons and armies, and who eventually will turn on each other.

A senior Sunni sheikh, whose tribe is joining the new alliance with the Americans against al-Qaida, told me in Beirut that it was a simple equation for him. "It's just a way to get arms, and to be a legalised security force to be able to stand against Shia militias and to prevent the Iraqi army and police from entering their areas," he said.

"The Americans lost hope with an Iraqi government that is both sectarian and dominated by militias, so they are paying for locals to fight al-Qaida. It will create a series of warlords.


The Americans pay him $400 (£200) a month for each fighter he provides, he said, and he had 600 registered. His men are awed by his courage, his piety and his neurotic rages.

Like many other insurgent groups, the Islamic Army had an uneasy alliance with al-Qaida. On one hand they needed financial support; on the other, al-Qaida became a burden, bringing upon the Sunnis the wrath of Shia militias and death squads who started an organised campaign of sectarian cleansing against the Sunnis in retaliation against al-Qaida's mass killing of Shia.

"We lost our area," Abu Abed said. "It became a battle zone between al-Qaeda and the Shia militias."

So when a prominent Iraqi Sunni politician who had lived in the US returned to Iraq last year and started direct talks between the Islamic Army commanders from his tribe and the Americans, Abu Abed was prepared to listen. "A year ago we reached the decision that we needed to fight al-Qaida," he said. "I knew I couldn't fight them face to face - they had more men and weapons. So I started gathering intelligence on their commanders. I knew them all very well."

The turning point came last year, when al-Qaida declared the establishment of the Islamic State of Iraq and attempted to impose itself on other insurgent groups. In one instance in west Baghdad, they demanded 25% of all the loot from other insurgent groups' operations. The Islamic Army refused to pay and direct confrontations ensued.

"The bodies piled up in the streets," Abu Abed said. "Most of the people had to leave the area and flee."

The Hajji and his men used the same techniques they mastered as insurgents against their former allies. Sitting on a big sofa in his office, he recounted the events. "When we decided to attack we started with assassinations. We killed six [al-Qaida] commanders in the first week of fighting," he said. "We would drive in unmarked cars, shoot a commander dead and then flee. At first, no one knew who was killing them."

Soon an open war started. Of the hundreds who pledged to fight al-Qaida, only 13 actually stuck with Abu Abed. These days, almost all his followers claim to have been one of the 13. "When the Americans intervened, we went out with them on missions, leading them to the Qaida fighters," he said.

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2208821,00.html