Iraqi Tribes in Al-Anbar Province Assisting Against Insurgents

Looks like the broadcast media has been ignoring even the not so little changes in the Iraqi theater. The LATimes provides this one.

As tribal leaders from Iraq's troubled Al Anbar province met last week with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki, pledging their support to clean out Al Qaeda insurgents, it soon became clear that they were as good as their word.

That day, at a mosque in the town of Ramadi, armed tribesmen seized four men - two Iraqis and two non-Iraqi Arabs - whom the tribesmen believed to be Al Qaeda fighters. The men pleaded for their lives, "for the sake of Islam, and for the sake of the prophet," according to a man who witnessed the incident during group prayers.

Their bodies were found a few hours later in a dumpster.

Abdul Jabber Hakkam, spokesman for a coalition of 11 tribes that have pledged to fight insurgents in Al Anbar, said that despite what apparently happened in Ramadi, the tribes' plan was not to dispatch suspects on the spot. Instead, he hopes his fighters will arrest suspects and take them to court or shun them until they leave.

"People have done this with their own personal weapons," he said. "Now each house that hosts a terrorist, they will force all the residents of the house outside, so they're on the streets," he said. When that is done, he predicted, the insurgents will "have no one to keep them, and they will withdraw."

With any luck these tribal groups will form militias that are controlled by the government. If the Iraqi government can get them established in a controlled manner and keep oversight, then they'll have an excellent tool in the counterinsurgency.

U.S. officials say the decision of some tribal leaders to begin going after insurgents reflects growing public anger over attacks that have killed or injured more than 8,000 Iraqis, according to local government figures. They also say there has been growing alarm on the part of some tribal leaders over insurgents' demands for adherence to strict Islamic law. U.S. military leaders say that alarm has inspired a sense of partnership that didn't exist earlier.

"It's only frankly been the last six months that they've recognized two things: One, they can't do it themselves, and two - they had much more in common with the coalition than they do with Iran," said a senior U.S. military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

But he said it was not clear whether the tribes would be able to mount an effective operation against the leading insurgent groups.

"The difference between targeted killings and a deliberate campaign that is successful in removing folks from the area, I have not seen," he said.

This sounds more pessimistic than it needs to be. In fact, if the coalition forces and the Iraqi government move aggressively to provide these tribes with training and embedded military advisors or Iraqi police oversight, they could easily become effective. The tribal leaders could also be lead to understand that the government wants them to succeed and that could be quite empowering in the province where there has been large amounts of insurgent activity.

If you heard Pelosi's rant yesterday on cleaning up the GOP 'swamp' and fixing Iraq, you'll realize that she and her ilk still don't have a clue. She actually called for a full 'redeployment' by the end of the year. How she can say that this isn't cut-and-run is beyond me. It also is quite evident that she has absolutely no concept of where things are going in Iraq and that it will take time. Anyone who has taken even the most pedestrian of examination of past insurgencies will understand that they don't clear up quickly. Though you can lose to an insurgency instantly by withdrawal.

The Bush Administration hasn't been the smoothest running of the peace in Iraq, but at least it has moved in the right direction. Don't like the present "stay-the-course" line, then provide some real answer. Cut-and-run isn't a viable solution and will ensure that the end result in Iraq is a further destabilize middle-east and a large country in it's center that can't stop the terrorists that will use it for their own ends.