PMDs: The other intelligence failure

Much attention was paid last week to the huge intelligence failure of the Bush team in Iraq. Saddam Hussein had no WMD. But there is another...

Much attention was paid last week to the huge intelligence failure of the Bush team in Iraq. Saddam Hussein had no WMD. But there is another, equally egregious intelligence failure when it comes to Iraq, one that is still bedeviling us: It is our complete ignorance about the PMD of Iraq 8212; the people of mass destruction, suicide bombers 8212; and the environment that nurtures them. The intelligence failure was not just about the chemicals Saddam was mixing; it was about the emotions he was brewing in Iraqi society.

There have been some 125 suicide bomb attacks against US forces in Iraq in the last 16 months, carried out most likely by Sunni Muslims. What is even more unnerving is that, unlike the Hamas, who produce videos of themselves, explain their rationale and say goodbye to families, virtually all the bombers in Iraq have blown themselves up without even telling us their names.

To put it bluntly: We are up against an enemy we do not know and cannot see 8212; but who is undermining the whole US mission. In fairness, this sort of network is very hard to crack, especially when it has the support of many Sunnis, but our ignorance about it is part of a broader lack of understanding of changes within Iraqi society.

When I visited Iraq after the war, what struck me most was how utterly broken it was. The 35 years of Saddam8217;s misrule, including a decade of UN sanctions, had decimated Iraq8217;s physical and social infrastructure. The young masked gunmen sawing people8217;s heads off last week came of age in this vacuum, which was filled in by religion 8212; some of it injected by Saddam for his own reasons, and some of it flowing over the borders, mainly from Saudi Arabia, Syria and Iran.

For the past few decades there has been 8216;8216;a surge of Islamic identity, not just in Iraq, but all over the Arab world8217;8217;, said Yitzhak Nakash, a Brandeis University expert on Shiite Islam. 8216;8216;We definitely ignored it. We were in denial.8217;8217; But Saddam recognized its potential, Nakash said. On the Shiite side he allowed Muqtada al-Sadr8217;s father to lead Friday prayers in hopes of soaking up the religious energy among Shiites and directing it away from the regime. When the elder al-Sadr turned it on Saddam instead, Saddam had him killed in 1999. On the Sunni side, Saddam went on a mosque-building spree, to bolster his legitimacy, and tolerated an infusion of Wahhabi Islam from Saudi Arabia to counterbalance the Shiites.

By the time the US invaded Iraq, 8216;8216;Islam was a potent force,8217;8217; Nakash said. 8216;8216;Iraq was no longer a largely secular country, waiting to embrace America.8217;8217; Does this mean all is lost in Iraq? Not necessarily, Nakash argues. It does mean that we have to alter our strategy and narrow our short-term expectations. The Shiites and the Kurds, who are 80 percent of Iraq8217;s population, still want a democratic Iraq. That is a foundation for hope. However, the first manifestation of any democratic Iraq will almost certainly be strongly influenced, if not dominated, by religious figures. We will not go from Saddam to Jefferson without going through Grnd Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani 8212; the ayatollah we can work with. You just hope that the road will be short.

New York Times