39
Insurgent groups recognized the detrimental impact the U.S.
strategy of
engagement with militias was having on their objectives, and attempted to disrupt the
relationship established between the Anbar Awakening and the U.S. military. They
failed utterly. On September 13, 2007, Sheik Sittar was killed by al Qaeda affiliates in a
roadside bomb attack just ten days after President George W. Bush met with him in a
“surprise visit to Anbar to extol the Sunni cooperation that has made the province once
Iraq’s most dangerous, relatively safe.”
112
Fortunately for the U.S. military and the
Anbar
Awakening, Sheik Ahmed Abu Risha, Sittar’s brother, stepped in to fulfill his
brother’s role. Sheik Risha reaffirmed the strength of the alliance with the U.S. in the
strongest terms: “[T]he martyrdom of Sittar will not affect this council because every
member of this council has the same beliefs and the same motivations and this sad
incident will not stop them from moving forward.”
113
The results of COL MacFarland’s strategy of engagement with militias were
staggering. In September 2006, twenty-five of thirty-one tribes located in Anbar
province had joined the Anbar Awakening.
114
By October 2007,
violent deaths in the
Anbar province were down by 82 percent.
115
Additionally attacks against the U.S.
military in August 2007 were just over 200 compared to October 2006 when they peaked
at 1,400 a month. Colonel Martin Stanton, Chief of Reconciliation and Engagement for
Multinational Corps, Iraq, reports that four months after COL MacFarland began his
engagement with the Anbar Awakening, the “10
th
Mountain Division’s 2
nd
Brigade saw
its casualty rate plunge from 12 deaths a month to just one.”
116
The engagement strategy
also contributed to improved success with finding and clearing weapon caches. In
112
Alissa Rubin, “Sunni Sheik Who Backed U.S. in Iraq is Killed,” NY Times,
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/14/world/middleeast/14iraq.html (accessed September 14, 2007).
113
Rubin.
114
Paul Von Zielbauer, Khalid Al-Ansary and Ali Adeeb, “Iraqi Tribes
to Join Forces to Fight
Insurgents,” New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/17/world/middleeast/17cnd-
iraq.html?pagewanted=print (accessed December 12, 2007).
115
Aseel Kami, “Violence in Iraq Drops Sharply: Ministry,” Reuters,
http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSCOL24813120071022?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews
&rpc=22&sp=true (accessed November 12, 2007).
116
David Mays, “Concerned Iraqi Citizen Movement Saves American Lives,” American Forces Press
Services, http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=48030 (accessed November 2, 2007).
40
Multinational Division North, 40 of 72 weapons caches were cleared by locally formed
militia groups consisting of Concerned Local Citizens.
117
Overall, a total of 2,111 caches
were found in just eight months of 2007 versus 1,222 in all of 2006.
118
The Anbar model of engagement has been gradually accepted in other Sunni
dominated areas of Iraq.
In the rural town of Qarghulia, located in east Baghdad, local
militias comprised of Sunnis and Shias now occupy 42 of 49 Coalition-approved traffic
points. Prior to their employment, the area was patrolled by the national police, which
are “mistrusted by the populace.” Captain Troy Thomas, the
commander responsible for
this engagement, insists: “I couldn’t do it without them,” acknowledging that providing
security is beyond the capabilities of his forces, and also that the militias “perform with a
sensitivity that no U.S. soldier could match.” He also suggests that they serve U.S.
interests better that U.S. forces could: they are from the area and thus “they know who
should be there and who shouldn’t.”
119
Approximately 39,000 militia members of the
70,000 countrywide are paid between $100 and $125 dollars a month. Although, this is
approximately “half the starting
wage for a government worker, [it constitutes] real cash
for a young man” who was formerly unemployed and at greater risk to insurgent
influence.
120
This new strategy has also had a residual effect on the unification of Sunni
and Shia Sheiks against insurgents like al Qaeda. On November 8, 2007, U.S. military
commanders were notified about a meeting involving over thirty Sunni and Shia tribes,
which publicly declared their unification to fight against al-Qaeda and “work toward a
lasting peace for their region.”
121
117
“Concerned Local Citizens Find and Remove IEDs, Mortars (Adwaniya),”
Multi-National Force
Iraq, http://www.mnf-iraq.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=15198&Itemid=21
(accessed December 15, 2007).
118
Petraeus,
Report to Congress on the Situation in Iraq
, 1-13.
119
Doug Smith and Saif Rasheed, “Sects Unite to Battle Al Qaeda in Iraq,”
Los Angeles Times
, sec.
World News, November 19, 2007, 2007, http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-
concerned19nov19,0,973036.story?coll=la-home-center (accessed November 19, 2007).
120
Smith and Rasheed.
121
Jason Waggoner, “Sunni, Shia Sheiks Present United Front Against Al-Qaeda,” Multi-National
Force-Iraq, http://www.mnf-iraq.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=15170&Itemid=1
(accessed November 10, 2007).
41
The success of this particular engagement strategy has not been without its
military skeptics. Many senior military officers felt the risks of arming groups that
formerly fought against U.S.
troops outweighed the benefits, and refused to reward any
Sunni groups “who have been responsible, even tangentially, for any of the more than
29,000 American casualties in the war.” Major General Rick Lynch, commander of the
Third Infantry Division who is responsible for the major land mass south of Baghdad said
that “no U.S. support would be given to any Sunni
group that has attacked
Americans.”
122
Other officers have questioned the change in motives of many tribal
sheiks. Colonel Martin Stanton, Chief of Multinational Corps Reconciliation Unit
initially asked if “this is just another way that someone can position himself to siphon his
share in the community and be the godfather?”
123
Yet, he soon realized that the will of
people to stop the violence was greater than personal gain.
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