Actions and Consequences

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and his fellow Shiite government authorities just couldn't wait for the United States and its military to decamp from Iraq. Yes, yes, thank you very much, we're just fine now, on our own, we'll be more than capable of looking after things. Mind, the U.S. offered to retain a presence in Iraq, particularly in Baghdad where it had invested so much in its giant and hugely expensive mission. Washington was more than prepared to post members of its military on an ongoing basis, to help Mr. al-Maliki look after things.

Thanks, but no thanks. The sticking point was granting immunity from possible prosecution under Iraqi law for any Americans remaining behind, apart from the diplomats who do have guaranteed immunity under the Vienna Convention. Iraq's government wasn't buying it. And as soon as the U.S. departed, the Iraqi Shia Prime Minister declared his country's Sunni vice-president a terrorist. Tariq al-Hashemi fled those charges, but was sentenced to death by a Baghdad court that found him guilty of murder.

This hasn't endeared the now-Shi'ite-led government of Iraq to its minority Sunni and its Kurd population. When the U.S. engineered a new government for the country, guiding it into a version of Arab-style democracy with equal representation for the three main groups, Sunni, Shia and Kurd, as an antidote to Saddam Hussein's Sunni Baath  regime's brutal oppression of the Shia majority and the country's Kurds, it was meant to pacify ancient sectarian and tribal antipathies.

With the departure of their mentor, the Iraqi government swept the equality slate clean to opt for their version of the Hussein-Baathist regime. The difference being that Iraq is now happy with its Shia neighbour, Iran, enjoying very smooth relations for they do have much in common politically and religiously. This is also a reflection of what happened when Iraq convinced the U.S. that its military was more than prepared to defend the country and the Americans could stand down.

In so doing, the Awakening Councils of the Sunni tribal areas that had been so repelled by the brutality of the al-Qaeda terrorists that had streamed into war-torn Iraq in 2005, committing atrocities against Shia and Sunni alike, that they formed themselves into battalions prepared to fight back. They made common cause with the U.S. military, which paid their salaries, trained and armed them. When they were handed over to the government military to integrate when U.S. troops stood down, they had their doubts.

And those doubts, despite American assurances to the contrary, were met in full measure. Viewed with suspicion and disdain by the ruling majority Shia who also comprised the military membership, their weapons were confiscated and they were never welcomed as equals, valued for their battle prowess, by the regime. And with the claims of terrorism levelled against the Sunni Vice-President followed by the resignation in protest of other Sunni government leaders, the Sunnis had good reason to believe they were being given short shrift in power-sharing.

Power is now in the hands of the majority Shia, a turn-about from the Hussein-regime years, and the Sunni feel hard done by and resentful. In the same token, al-Qaeda in Iraq has over the years become more deadly, mounting their precision suicide bombings and killing an average of a thousand Iraqi civilians, mostly Shia, a month, latterly. In desperation, the Shia military have appealed to the Sunni Awakening Councils to resume their former collaboration to battle the forces of al-Qaeda.

Photo by: Cliff Owen

Vice President Joseph R. Biden welcomes Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to the Naval Observatory. (Associated Press)

And now, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has travelled, cap in hand, to Washington, to appeal for aid in beating back the blood insurgency which he claims has resulted from the conflict and chaos occurring in neighbouring Syria, another Shia-led regime whose minority status hasn't stopped it from oppressing the country's majority Sunnis.