Rejects Not Rebels

A counterinsurgency is inherently socio-political in nature, and its resolution requires socio-political solutions. But there's something important to bear in mind when we consider AQI's involvement in the Iraqi insurgency, which is that AQI is not part of the insurgency - not a valid one, anyway.

AQI, while some news outlets make the claim that they are regaining their footing, is not actually a valid socio-political group in Iraq. 90% of suicide bombers are recruited and imported from foreign countries. AQI does not have the support of the public at large or even a section of the public large enough to make their political and social position tenable. They are also regarded as the enemy by such true insurgent groups like Ansar al-Sunnah and Jaish al-Mahdi. Moreover, their socio-political aims are preposterous and nearly everyone involved knows it.

AQI, then, is not part of the insurgency; they're merely part of the criminal element. A particularly nasty strain of criminal to be sure (a terrorist strain), but that's really all they are. Terrorists and insurgents are - importantly at this point in the prosecution of the war in Iraq - not the same thing. I realize that I've said otherwise before, but the situation has changed drastically in the last year and it's now important to draw the distinction as important elements of what I once referred to as "terrorists" have mutated into something else. To clarify the point further, there is this article about Al-Sadr and JAM at the Asia Times:

"As a political and military force, Iraq's Shi'ite Sadrist movement has undergone a number of radical transformations since 2003, when its leader Muqtada al-Sadr surprisingly emerged as a leading political figure. Muqtada's recent decision to continue with his seminary studies and graduate as an ayatollah at the conservative seminary school of Najaf underpins a major change in the movement's structure that could have serious repercussions for the future of Iraq."

The article, by Dr. Babak Rahimi, is undoubtedly the most useful thing I've read regarding the Sadrist movement in several months and perhaps ever; it's worth your time to read the whole thing.

An insurgency adapts to the environment around it and is willing to adopt different methods to achieve their social and political ends, and they usually do it with some degree of public support that is not by any means negligible. Al-Sadr and JAM are the perfect example of this, while AQI has only ever had the same handful of methods they use everywhere, and operate through public fear, not support. This tactic is just as extremely limited in winning an insurgency as an American conventional military strategy would be against an insurgency; it is heavy on firepower, and light on politics, and the social aspect barely exists as far as the strategy is concerned.

None of this is intended to suggest for even a second that AQI isn't a threat to US interests and the future of Iraq; they demonstrably are, but they cannot win the war. They don't actually stand a chance of coming to power in Iraq provided the ISF becomes capable of effective internal security. The fact that AQI and various Iraqi insurgent groups happen to be pushing the ball in the same direction with violent activity is little more than a coincidence, probably not a conspiracy. Every element of the Iraqi insurgency must know by now that should they actually come to power, AQI will immediately become their policing problem as opposed to a problem for the ISF and the current IG. Which is why the Sadrists, notably, have adopted an anti-AQI stance; they know they'll have to have it anyway if they win.

And, Unlike AQI, should prosecution of the counterinsurgency by the US and the Iraqi government fail, the Sadrists may actually have a serious shot at a win - but not until after a very nasty and likely protracted civil war with multiple parties in the military arena. They won't be able to do it without those prior failures, however, which makes the US effort that much more important now, because that's the real counterinsurgency.

Stripping Al-Sadr and JAM and other groups like them of social and political relevance is the single most important goal in this war, and that is done by providing whatever it is that they provide to their constituents more effectively than they can. AQI is dangerous to be sure, but the approach toward them is the same as it is towards all irreconcilables: kill them, detain them, or push them out. AQI is the easy part, relatively speaking. And that's because they're not insurgents, they're terrorists.