President Barack Obama and US military leaders assert that they will withdraw their troops from Iraq at the scheduled date (at the end of 2011). There is no disagreement over this decision, neither within the army nor in the hallways of the White House or in Congress. But if one were to look at the map of fleets deployed in the oceans, and at land bases in the Gulf and in Turkey, one could say, without taking much risk, that such a withdrawal will be a mere redeployment, after the mission has been accomplished. And the mission, by the way, is not to subject Baghdad to direct military occupation, and to bear the burden of this, financially and morally, according to international law, but rather to break up Iraq into reconciled microstates, which move from agreement to clashes when interests call for it. In this sense Washington has achieved what it had charged itself with. The Iraqi people have turned into quarrelling sectarian communities that struggle for power. Their domestic consensus reflects regional and international consensus, and their political frames of reference are not Iraqi, exactly as is the case with Lebanese sectarian communities. And because stability is required after US redeployment, in order to preserve US interests, it was imperative for Washington to support its allies in order to place them in a position of decision-making. It tried to draw the Sunni clans away from Al-Qaeda, and succeeded, but was confronted by Shiite opposition led by Muqtada Al-Sadr. It thus tried to subdue him by force, and Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki waged a military campaign against his movement in Baghdad and in the South. This forced Sadr to retreat, disband the Mahdi Army and withdraw from the military battle to Iran, under the pretext of completing his religious studies, so that he may assume the position of religious authority “by virtue of his scholarship, not of his father and uncle's legacy”. Subduing Al-Qaeda militarily and politically was possible because the movement is foreign to Iraqi society, having ridden the wave of occupation to establish its own “state” and to spread its religious ideas that paint others as infidels. Al-Sadr's movement, on the other hand, is deeply entrenched in Iraqi political life. It arose from the legacy of his father, Mohammad Sadeq Al-Sadr, and his uncle Mohammad Baqir Al-Sadr, who founded the Dawa Party based on the principle of the Velayat-e-Faqih (Guardianship of the Jurist) and on opposition to the Baath regime in the 1970s. Sadr has retreated militarily, but his movement has remained politically active and was able to win more seats in the elections than any other Shiite party, including Maliki's and Hakim's. Sadr's movement has come to represent a problem for the Americans, as they are on the verge of leaving Iraq. Neither defeating it militarily is possible, as it has withdrawn from the battlefield, nor is subduing it politically, as it enjoys broad popularity among Shiites. The solution was for his movement to participate in the government without holding any of the important decision-making positions. Its situation is similar to that of Hezbollah in Lebanon to some extent. Indeed, Hezbollah is on the US Terrorist List, and yet there is no way to keep it away from government, in view of its popularity and of its domestic and regional alliances. In other words, it is an element of stability inasmuch as it is an obstructing element for US plans. It is thus acceptable for it to be in a position of power, until the time comes for relinquishing stability. Bringing order to the Iraqi interior before the withdrawal will not be an easy task, but it is nonetheless possible. This is why Washington is calling for a government “in which all would participate”, as it has declared several times. Moreover, Iran's influence can be contained through sectarian and confessional balances. And as for the great confrontation with Tehran, the fleets and army bases can handle it, and Israel vouches for it. US military withdrawal from Iraq will take place as scheduled, but US political and diplomatic presence remains and is taking root more and more by and through the Iraqis themselves.
