The surge in Iraq has been a success by any measure, Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell said during a news conference July 23.

The policy, announced by President Bush in December 2006, pushed additional brigades in to Iraq to provide a security umbrella so the Iraqi military could build and the country’s government could grow.

The surge has allowed Iraq to make improvements from security, political and economic standpoints, Morrell said. The last of the five surge brigade combat teams recently left Iraq.

“By every metric that we measure violence in Iraq, there has been a dramatic improvement from where things were before the surge,” Morrell said. “I’ll just point to one, and that is [that] in July of last year, we had 79 U.S. [servicemembers killed in action] in Iraq. We have four thus far this month.”

The dramatic security gains have provided room for political and economic successes. “You name it, it is happening in Iraq,” Morrell said. “Do you want to talk about political gains? We’ve had basically all the major benchmark legislation passed.”

The Sunni bloc has returned to the government, 10 of 18 Iraqi provinces are under local control, and Najaf International Airport has reopened. “You see a $300 million luxury hotel opening up in the Green Zone [and] $50 million in refurbishment of the airport road,” Morrell said. “There’s economic investment, and there’s political progress. There’s increased security. All those things are undeniable, and they are attributable to the fact that we plussed up forces in there.”

There were, of course, other factors at work in the security improvement, Morrell said, but the surge and the change in U.S. counterinsurgency strategy made all else possible. The “Anbar Awakening” that allied formerly insurgent Sunni Muslims with the coalition and influential Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr’s cease-fire were other factors, he said, but he noted they didn’t happen independently of other events.

“If we think that Sadr acted in a vacuum, I think we’re kidding ourselves,” Morrell said. “There clearly was political and military pressure which caused him to make a decision to have his troops stand down.

“But we benefitted from it, no doubt,” he continued. “There’s no question that the awakening in Anbar, the cease-fire by Sadr, simultaneous to the surge, has helped the overall security situation in Iraq.”

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By Jim Garamone
American Forces Press Service

Hezbollah is the Iranian front group in Lebanon. They’ve moved into Iraq, due to their superior training ans experience against the Israelis and now are trying to create the fiction that they are a home-grown organization. They are part of the Mahdi Army Special Groups and directed by Iran.

Coalition forces captured a suspected propaganda specialist of the Hezbollah Brigades early Monday morning in the New Baghdad district of Baghdad.

Based on intelligence information, Coalition forces targeted the location of a suspected propaganda expert affiliated with the Hezbollah Brigades in Iraq. Information taken from suspected criminals already in custody indicate that the man uploads web sites with imagery and video taken from attacks on Iraqi Security and Coalition forces. Reports indicate this is part of a propaganda effort in order to earn money and support from their Iranian financiers.

Coalition forces entered the targeted individual’s location without incident. Following questioning, the suspect’s wife told forces her husband was the wanted man, after which the man relented and was detained.

Intelligence indicates that Kata’ib Hezbollah or Hezbollah Brigades is an offshoot of Iranian-trained Special Groups.

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Moqtada al-Sadr has called upon his followers to engage in civil resistance. In reality, his Iranian masters have called out their troops in an effort to demonstrate that the Iraqi government cannot secure its own country, that the Coalition – the United States – is merely propping up a puppet government. This is Iraq’s Tet Offensive.

Remember Tet. We wiped out the Viet Cong entirely and set the North Vietnamese back a year or more on their plans for conquest. Yet, due to the mood of the media, we were told that we lost those battles, that the entire war was lost. It may become a similar sentiment for today’s media in the next few weeks.

The situation on the ground is this: Sadr’s people control much of eastern Baghdad and have moved south into the Shia heartland, Kut, Hillah and Basra. These areas are not traditionally a place where he has influence. Other Shia leaders have been influential in the south.

The Mahdi Army is armed with rifles, grenades, rockets and IED’s, much of Iranian origin. The vast majority of Sadr’s followers are cannon fodder, with little or no training. A cadre has received training, in Iran, or in Iraq by Iranians or Iraqis trained in Iran. It is likely that some of them are also deserters from the Iraqi security forces or were kicked out of those forces.

Basra is the flash point. The city was under nominal Iraqi national control. In fact, the city was run by a number of criminal gangs and several militias. Many of those criminal elements were part of or aligned with the Mahdi Army.

Iran would like to control the south. It is oil rich, and Iran is running out of its own supplies. In addition, it would cut an old enemy, Iraq, off from its only link to the sea and sea borne commerce.

North of Basra, in Kut and Hillah, the Mahdi Army is going to have some difficulty. Both the Iraqi Army and the other Shia militias will be opposing them and the fight should be fairly short and sweet. Some of the fighting may not be with the Mahdi Army since this is also the area where a doomsday cult called the Soldiers of Heaven has rebelled twice in the last two years, suffering incredible losses but still being a threat.

In Basra itself, the fighting will be house to house. The Iraqi Army will win, but Basra will be their battle of Fallujah. At this point the British have only provided air support but that may change. Logistics and medical support would be logical additions to the support package. British troops may not be involved in the fighting, though it would not surprise me to see them provide indirect fire from artillery.

Baghdad is another matter. Iraqi troops will be taking the lead here but Americans will be involved in the battles. Our civil affairs units have had six months and more to work their magic and I would suspect that Sadr’s support has wained a bit.

Sadr is not in Iraq. The last information I saw said that he was engaged in religious studies in Iran. Without Sadr on the scene, the willingness of the entire Mahdi Army to fight is certainly in doubt.

Here are the reports from Multi National Force – Iraq:

March 24: 5 IED emplacers killed by an airstrike in Basra

March 25: US soldier killed by hostile fire in Baghdad

March 25: Attacks from Sadr City strike Baghdad

March 25: ISF, Coalition forces reinforce three checkpoints

The press have many more reports, but with little detail as yet. This will be the first piece in a series as I cover the Sadr Revolt so please check back for more information as it becomes available.