So What Happens Now?

[rayboyusmc]

I would hope that we anticipated this and do what we can to be prepared if Al Sadr decides he needs to be in the press again.

The six-month ceasefire that Moqtada al-Sadr called in August 2007 is set to expire at the end of February. Observers believe the freeze in operations of his Mahdi Army is a major reason for the recent security successes in Iraq; and most expected it to be extended. But recently the Sadr camp has said that it might end the ceasefire. On January 18, a spokesman for Sadr in the religious capital of Najaf issued a statement warning that "the rationale for the decision to extend the freeze of the Mahdi Army is beginning to wear thin." Is the U.S. alarmed? It is not - and that is alarming.

Though American officials recognize the importance of Sadr's inactivity, they are now saying that the cleric's political influence in Iraq has diminished. On Thursday, the senior diplomat overseeing U.S. policy in Iraq, David Satterfield, told a room of foreign policy experts at the Middle East Institute that the 34-year-old cleric was a "deeply troubled young man" who is spending most of his time in Iran watching events in Iraq move "beyond his ability to influence." Those are strong words about the surviving scion of a revered religious family who has proven time and again to be a thorn in the side of U.S. efforts in Iraq.

There are so many internal variables in Iraq that we just don't control.

You would have thought they learned something from MacNamara's admission of his screw-up.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20080212/wl_time/underestimatingalsadragain

 

[DeadCanDance]

My guess is that Al Sadr will extend the ceasefire. He's playing Bush like a fiddle, why give up now? Bush has the american army, for the most part killing and hunting down Al Sadr's enemies: sunni insurgents and sunni fundamentalists. That give Al Sadr's Mehdi army and his fundamentalist shia movement more time and opportunity to consolidate power in southern iraq. In short, Bush has created the conditions for a fundamentalist hezbollah-style shia movement to flourish in southern iraq.