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Threat of Shiite Militias Now Seen As Iraq's Most Critical Challenge
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Rival Shiite militias -- including the Mahdi Army and an armed group tied to the Fadhila political party -- fight openly in Basra's streets, doubling the city's homicide rate in recent months. This week, about 42 people were killed over a four-day period, local officials reported.
Some U.S. officials and military commanders argue that the groups must be confronted. "There's a law on the books that these things are illegal, and it has to be enforced," said the U.S. official who worked on the militia issue.
Col. Jeffrey Snow, commander of the 1st Brigade of the Army's 10th Mountain Division in restive western Baghdad, said he had taken an aggressive stance toward militias, particularly the Mahdi Army, which he blames for a February roadside bomb attack that killed two U.S. soldiers.
"Second to the formation of the government, the key thing here now is dealing with these militias," said Snow, 44, of Nashua, N.H. "My personal opinion is, they form the greatest risk to the development of a professional army and police force."
Snow pointed to a series of heated meetings he has held with Mahdi Army representatives in recent months. "We told them, 'We will not tolerate you bearing arms.' We said, 'You can protect property but cannot leave property carrying a weapon.' And we gave them clear examples of people we detained while implanting bombs who were carrying Mahdi Army badges."
Though the militia question is unlikely to be dealt with until Iraqi leaders finish forming a government, U.S. officials are turning up the pressure but offering few specifics about how the problem should be addressed.
"You can't have in a democracy various groups with arms. You have to have the state with a monopoly on power," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on a recent visit to Baghdad. "We have sent very, very strong messages repeatedly, and not just on this visit, that one of the first things . . . is that there is going to be a reining-in of the militias."
For now, Iraqi leaders are circumspect about what exactly they will do. "The government has a detailed plan on this. I know -- I'm the coordinator," said the national security adviser, Mowaffak al-Rubaie. "But I am sorry, I cannot comment on what it is."
Correspondents John Ward Anderson and Ellen Knickmeyer contributed to this report.
