TIME: The Enemy With Many
Faces
Monday, September 27, 2004
By MICHAEL WARE / BAGHDAD
The grenade was visible when the insurgent stepped in
front of our car. His sinewy arm was cocked, ready to
throw. Fifteen more men poured out from the corner of
a nearby tenement, swirling about the car like angry
floodwaters. They brandished grenades and AK-47s,
pistol grips nudging out from under the folds of
their shirts. Spotting me in the backseat, they went
into a frenzy, yanking on the handles of the doors,
thumping the window with the grenades. Across Iraq,
the insurgents have gone on a kidnapping spree,
seizing Italian aid workers, French journalists and
American construction workers. As they ordered us out
of the car, I wondered whether we were about to
become their latest catch.
An Iraqi resistance fighter traveling as an escort
was quickly out of the car, speaking to the group in
a somber, authoritative tone, insisting they let us
go. A furious curbside debate flared. My escort
continued to plead, dropping the names of high-level
insurgent leaders. After what seemed like an
eternity, the insurgents relented. They pushed me
back into our Mazda sedan and ordered us to leave. We
were lucky. The fighters included Iraqis, Syrians and
Jordanians. They were members of Attawhid wal Jihad
(Unity and Holy War), a militant group loyal to Abu
Mousab al-Zarqawi, the most wanted terrorist in Iraq.
The group's black flags flutter from the palm trees
and buildings along the Baghdad boulevard where we
were stopped, an area known as Haifa Street. It's a
no-go zone for U.S. forces.
The fact that insurgents tied to al-Zarqawi are
patrolling one of Baghdad's major
thoroughfares--within mortar range of the U.S.
embassy--is an indication of just how much of the
country is beyond the control of U.S. forces and the
new Iraqi government. It also reflects the extent to
which jihadis linked to al-Zarqawi, 37, the Jordanian
believed to be al-Qaeda's chief operative in Iraq,
have become the driving forces behind the insurgency
and are expanding its zone of influence. Though the
U.S. has long believed that al-Zarqawi's group is
using Fallujah as a base to stage operations, the
militants appear to have also consolidated their grip
on parts of the capital. Last week al-Zarqawi's
forces launched one of their deadliest offensives
yet, setting off at least a dozen car bombs in
attacks across the country. On Tuesday, Sept. 14,
alone, the insurgents killed at least 59 Iraqis,
including 47 in a car bombing outside a Baghdad
police station packed with men waiting to apply for
jobs. Twenty U.S. troops died in seven days of
fighting, bringing the total for September so far to
54. With militants roaming unmolested in parts of
Baghdad, no one is safe. One week after gunmen
abducted two Italian women from their home, a group
of insurgents raided a house in an affluent Baghdad
area and seized two Americans and a British engineer
without firing a shot.
The violent reality of life in Iraq stands in
contrast to the Bush Administration's sunny
assessments of the country's progress toward
democracy. A growing chorus of lawmakers, soldiers
and U.S. military and intelligence officials warn
that the U.S. faces a potential disaster in Iraq.
Critics of the Administration pounced on reports
saying a National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq,
which the CIA gave to the White House in July, lays
out a distressing view of Iraq's future. According to
a U.S. official familiar with the estimate, it
envisions three possible scenarios for how events
might unfold over the next 18 months. The official
says the estimate foresees, "at best, a situation
that would be, in terms of security, tenuous and, at
worst, a trend line that could point in the direction
of a civil war."
Officials from the U.S. military and the interim
Iraqi government are playing down the significance of
the intelligence estimate. "It says what we've been
saying for months," a Pentagon civilian says.
"There's a 1-in-3 chance of civil war." Officials
insist that a sufficient portion of Iraq will be
pacified in order to hold elections as scheduled in
January 2005. But the insurgents have shown an
impressive ability to regenerate. Jeffrey White, a
former senior analyst with the Defense Intelligence
Agency, says there could be "as many as 100,000
insurgents," including those who provide food,
clothing and shelter. "This is not a small number of
people," White says. And they're proving hard to
kill. On Friday, Iraqi troops backed by Americans
swept onto Haifa Street. Al-Zarqawi's militants
responded with two car bombs. Heavy fighting could be
heard for four hours. Speaking by phone during the
battle, an insurgent relayed to TIME a message from
al-Zarqawi's foot soldiers: "We have already slipped
away. The others have gone to their homes. No one
will find them. We are safe." Indeed, once the Iraqi
troops pulled back from the area, the insurgents
reappeared.
The U.S. still characterizes the insurgency as a
loosely organized network that includes former
members of the Baath ruling party, homegrown jihadis
and foreign terrorists. But interviews with
insurgents and materials obtained by TIME suggest
that the most active and violent elements of the
insurgency now come under the sway of al-Zarqawi and
his allies. A series of audiocassettes obtained by
TIME provides rare insight into their mind-set. In
hours of sermons and "seminars," as they are called,
leaders of Attawhid wal Jihad exhort their rank and
file to slaughter Iraqis cooperating with the U.S.
and the interim government. On one tape, a man named
Sheik Abu Anas al-Shami, one of al-Zarqawi's key
commanders and a member of the organization's
religious committee, preaches that any nation built
on secular principles is "in the light of Islamic law
a tyrannical infidel and blasphemous state." Anyone
associated with it, he continues--especially soldiers
and police, whether or not they are good Muslims--may
be murdered, as "they do not represent themselves;
they are means in the hands of the tyrants." Even
Muslims "who pray" may be slaughtered to punish the
Iraqi government or U.S. forces. "If the infidels
have good people among them, and our fighting against
them necessitates annihilating these good people, we
are permitted to kill them because we are ordered [by
God] to do so," he says.
A second tape (both are undated) obtained by TIME
purportedly records the voice of al-Zarqawi
describing U.S. forces as "oppressors" and "doglike
aliens" and criticizing the Western media for
denigrating the will and character of Muslims. But
the target of al-Zarqawi's harshest criticism is an
erstwhile ally: Harith al-Dhari, an Iraqi Sunni
Muslim leader and chairman of the powerful
Association of Muslim Scholars. U.S. intelligence
suspects al-Dhari of helping fund and organize
elements of the insurgency. But al-Dhari has
criticized al-Zarqawi's practice of decapitating
hostages. On the tape, al-Zarqawi calls al-Dhari a
coward "who accepted humiliation" and accuses him of
"extending [his] hands to the enemy."
Sources inside the insurgency say al-Zarqawi's
willingness to sanction terrorist attacks against all
civilians has created splits among the various rebel
groups. Nationalist guerrillas, who make up the vast
majority of fighters but object to killing innocent
Iraqis, say the armed insurgency is being taken over
by the well-funded and motivated international
jihadis answering al-Qaeda's call for a holy war. As
a result, nationalist insurgent groups are attempting
to create their own leadership and forge ties with
moderate Islamists based in Fallujah. Their goal is
to create a political party that can contest and win
elections, held after U.S. withdrawal, in areas like
Fallujah. "Thinking has started to move toward asking
what happens after the Americans leave," says a
nationalist commander who asked to be identified as
Abu Khalil. "So far we have only shown that we know
how to act militarily, but the military wing cannot
lead the country into the future."
Meetings aimed at establishing a political face for
the insurgency have been under way for months. An
earlier conference collapsed beneath the weight of
the conflicting interests of the various groups. But
Abu Khalil says his group is trying to spark a debate
among the insurgents on what kind of country they
want to create. Whereas the jihadis are aiming to
establish a Taliban-style Islamic state in Iraq, the
nationalists say they are willing to participate in a
democratic Iraq, though one that is independent of
foreign influence. The push for political legitimacy
flows from their success at fending off U.S. forces.
"Things have moved so fast, the events are ahead of
our thinking," says Abu Khalil. "A year ago, the
Americans' departure was a dream, but now it's
realizable. We control entire cities, and we're
looking to expand."
For now that prospect remains unpalatable to U.S.
commanders. The U.S. says it won't tolerate insurgent
control over wide swaths of territory. A strategy
aimed at denying the rebels safe haven in towns and
cities under their control and installing competent
local administrations is under way in Shi'ite areas
south of Baghdad. The northern Sunni stronghold of
Samarra is being targeted in a similar push, with
U.S. troops ousting fighters and returning a civil
administration. But in nogo zones like Fallujah,
enlisting the help of rebels willing to part ways
with al-Zarqawi may be the only way the U.S. can
avoid bloody battles down the road. It's hardly the
arrangement Washington had in mind. But if the U.S.
hopes to avert disaster in Iraq, it's going to need
all the friends it can get.
--With
reporting by Timothy J. Burger and Mark
Thompson/Washington