There's a growing conventional wisdom amongst the wise folks of Washington that by backing the "moderate" SCIRI in the person of Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, Bush's latest I-looked-that-man-in-the-eyes White House guest (SCIRI does have Islamic Revolution in it's name) Moqtada al Sadr can be marginalized. Of course this idea is all based on the notion that a) there is a possible winning strategy for the U.S. in Iraq and b) that the U.S. occupation can help achieve Iraqi goals.

Spencer Akerman explains exactly why this is nonsense:

If the U.S. throws its weight behind Hakim -- which is what we're talking about, really, if we're talking about "more
moderate alternatives" -- Sadr's charisma is way more likely to grow. [my emphasis] Sadr's calling card is his family history; his unyielding anti-occupation stance; and now his willingness to murder Sunnis. All of a sudden his chief rival joins with the occupation and begins purging fellow Shiites.

As Tony Shadid has shown in Night Draws Near, there isn't a
single Shiite political figure that can hope to match Sadr's political charisma. Setting up a pale alternative in Hakim, in all probability, will unite the fracturing Sadr movement and convince the mass of Iraqi Shiites that the U.S.-sponsored political process that so far has worked to the Shiites' benefit holds nothing for them but the choice of collaboration or death. (Furthermore, I don't quite understand what Gerecht's end-state for Sadr is in this scenario, but let's leave that aside for the time being.)

Akerman backs up his assertion with the WaPo quote:

In the sidewalk restaurant where Sadr's poster hangs, its owner, Ali Hussein, points at clusters of young men nearby. They are all Mahdi Army, he said. And so is he.

Hakim, he said, made a fatal mistake by meeting Bush. In today's Iraq, credibility and power are measured by opposition to the United States.

"At this time, whoever has his hands with the Americans or Jews is not an Iraqi," said Hussein, as he chopped up cubes of lamb. "So how could Hakim put his hands with the Americans? There will be tensions because Sayyed Moqtada Sadr is a revolutionary man, like his father. Even if Hakim tries to come back to Sadr, Sadr will never receive his hand."

What the idiot policy wisemen of Washington don't understand is a very very basic underpinning of the entire great Iraqi adventure.


We weren't thought of so well prior to Iraq, and since Bush and for
reason too numerous to elaborate on here, it has gone steadily downhill from there. Because Bush may think he has good intentions doesn't mean Iraqis see him that way. But this is just like a narcissistic-dry-drunk-child-like individual. Bush likely believes that when he leaves the room, everything ceases to exist and if he just covers his eyes he's invisible.

Until U.S. policy recognizes our radioactivity and we do something real to prove we mean the region well, we are impotent to do anything about the problems there. And when impotence meets a critical national interest (keeping the oil flowing), you have a disaster.

Update: This is quite a good point:

Thus far the U.S. has faced a Sunni insurgency (which by most estimates continues to account for 80% of U.S. casualties), and sectarian violence in which Shias and Sunnis are killing each other. Shia militias are violent, destructive and radical, but Shia militias are a very different problem from the Sunni insurgency. Shia militias, unlike t[h]e insurgency, are not targeting American troops. But it looks like the administration is set to change that. Over the past year Washington and its Baghdad embassy have alienated the Shia and undermined the authority of the more moderate Ayatollah Sistani. Anti-Americanism has grown in Shia ranks as they accuse U.S. of favoring Sunnis by focusing on Shia militias rather than Sunni insurgency. By going to war with the increasingly popular Sadr Washington runs the danger of losing the Shia altogether.

As a reminder. Sunni's make up roughly 20% of the population of Iraq while Shiites are roughly 80%. I want to emphasize what is being said here. So far, the Shiite militia's have not been attacking the U.S. If we go after al Sadr with the "Nationalists Peoples New Way Forward", can you imagine what it would look like if the Shiites begin attacking Americans?

I guess there's one good thing in that possiblity. Bush, will again, have proven himself a uniter.