Bring Back The Baathists

It was unwise on the part of the US to have invaded Iraq and overthrown the genuinely secular regime headedby former President Saddam Hussein. The result is there for all to see.

Bloody November, which saw a hundred deaths of coalition troops -- 81 of them Americans -- and of anunestimated, but reportedly large number of innocent Iraqi civilians, who had nothing to do with either Saddamor Al Qaeda or the International Islamic Front (IIF), at the hands of the American troops, is a forewarning ofmore bloody months to come.

Before the US-UK invasion, Iraq had no jihadi terrorists. Some Palestinians belonging to organisations suchas the Abu Nidal Organisation and the members of the anti-Iran Mujahideen-e-Khalq, to whom Saddam had givenshelter, were terrorists, but not of the jihadi kind.

Since the occupation of Iraq, the country is swarming with jihadis -- more indigenous (about 6,000) thanforeign (about 320) -- who have been waging a two-front jihad against the occupation troops -- the jihad ofthe indigenous resistance fighters, who are not terrorists, and that of the foreign mujahideen, who are. TheIraqi resistance fighters have been attacking American troops and their Iraqi collaborators. The foreignmujahideen have been targeting nationals of countries which have been collaborating with the US andinternational organisations. There is so far no evidence of a common mastermind guiding the activities of theindigenous and the external.

The jihad of the indigenous has been targeted and well-planned avoiding innocent Iraqi civilian casualties.They are well-organised and seem to have better intelligence than the American troops. If the US version thatthe Iraqi attack on an American escort party at Samarra on November 30, 2003, was because that party wasescorting a vehicle carrying large quantities of newly-printed currency notes is correct, the fact that theIraqi fighters had advance knowledge of this would show the kind of moles they have in the set-up of theoccupational forces.

The large civilian casualties, as during the fighting at Samarra, have been more due to over-reaction by UStroops than due to any indiscriminate firing by the indigenous jihadis. Such over-reactions, thoughregrettable, are unavoidable when the jihadis operate from the midst of civilian-inhabited areas. Fortunately,the indigenous jihadis have till now refrained from using too many explosive devices, which indiscriminatelykill civilians.

The jihad of the foreign mujahideen has been ruthless with indiscriminate use of explosive devices andsuicide bombers. As many Iraqi civilians have died at the hands of these foreign jihadis as at the hands ofthe American troops.

The IIF, which was formed by Osama bin Laden in 1998 and whose activities are now co-ordinated by theLashkar-e-Toiba (LET) of Pakistan, has advised the pro-bin Laden jihadi terrorist organisations all over theworld to give priority to the despatch of volunteers and funds to confront the Americans in Iraq even at therisk of a slow-down of the jihad being waged by them in their own countries.

There are clear indications of a stepping-up of fund collection, particularly in Pakistan. During therecent observance of Id, not only jihadi terrorist organisations allied to Al Qaeda in the IIF, but also theIslamic fundamentalist parties, which are members of the pro-bin Laden and pro-Taliban coalition called theMuttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), collected funds all over Pakistan ostensibly to support the jihadis in India'sJammu & Kashmir and Iraq and the families of the "martyrs" who sacrificed their lives during thejihad.

The Pakistani authorities did not stop the fund collection, which was made even in Army cantonments. Theresponse was good, but it is difficult to estimate how much was collected, how much of it would go tofinancing the jihad and how much to the personal bank accounts of the religious leaders. Even assuming that asubstantial percentage of the collections would be misappropriated, the balance should still be sufficient tokeep the jihad in Iraq going for months.

The response to the call for foreign volunteers to go to Iraq has not been that encouraging. There has beena reshuffling, with Arab nationals of Chechen origin being shifted from Chechnya and Pakistan to Jordan andSaudi Arabia and some Pakistanis and Arabs, including Yemeni-Balochis, also being similarly shifted. While thejihad-hardened veterans of the jihads of the 1980s and 1990s are willing to go and fight the Americans inIraq, very few post-2001 new recruits are prepared to go to Iraq. They prefer to fight the American troops inAfghanistan by joining the Taliban and Gulbuddin Heckmatyar's Hizb-e-Islami.

As a result, the number of foreign jihadis active against the US troops in Iraq has remained at about 320for some weeks now. Media reports of hundreds of jihadis being recruited in different countries and sent toIraq are not corroborated by ground intelligence.

The US troops continue to be handicapped by the scarcity of precise intelligence about the nature of theenemy, his motivation and capability. As a result, they have been literally hitting out in the dark notknowing whether those targeted by them are friends or foes. This is another reason for the large civiliancasualties.

The Iraqi Governing Council, to which the US proposes to transfer provisional authority by June next, is afarce, with very little visibility and credibility in the country. They are viewed by the Iraqi population asAmerican quislings. One cannot win a war with the help of quislings.

It is in India's interest that the US prevails over the jihadi terrorists and is able to exit Iraq with itshonour and dignity intact. If the US gets beaten and battered in Iraq by these jihadis, it would be even moredifficult to deal with them in the rest of the world than it is today

To be able to do so, the US has no other alternative but to dump these quislings, rehabilitate theintellectuals and the ruling elite of the Baath Party and seek their leadership and co-operation in itsefforts to defeat the jihadi terrorists and re-construct the Iraqi civil society which it has destroyed.

Re-Baathification of Iraq is the only solution to the dilemma confronting the US and other occupyingpowers. There is no other viable option.

This may please be read in continuation of my earlier article of April 21, 2003, AfterSaddam, The Mullahs & Imams

B. Raman is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, and, presently, Director,Institute for Topical Studies, Chennai, and Convenor, Advisory Committee, Observer Research Foundation (ORF),Chennai Chapter