ERBIL, Iraq — Meeting with the American ambassador some years ago in Baghdad, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki detailed what he believed was the latest threat of a coup orchestrated by former officers of Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party.
“Don’t waste your time on this coup by the Baathists,” the ambassador, Zalmay Khalilzad, chided him, dismissing his conspiracy theories as fantasy.
Now, though, with Iraq facing its gravest crisis in years, as Sunni insurgents have swept through northern and central Iraq, Mr. Maliki’s claims about Baathist plots have been at least partly vindicated. While fighters for the extremist Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, once an offshoot of Al Qaeda, have taken on the most prominent role in the new insurgency, they have done so in alliance with a deeply rooted network of former loyalists to Saddam Hussein.
The involvement of the Baathists helps explain why just a few thousand Islamic State in Iraq and Syria fighters, many of them fresh off the battlefields of Syria, have been able to capture so much territory so quickly. It sheds light on the complexity of the forces aligned against Baghdad in the conflict — not just the foreign-influenced group known as ISIS, but many homegrown groups, too. And with the Baathists’ deep social and cultural ties to many areas now under insurgent control, it stands as a warning of how hard it might be for the government to regain territory and restore order.
Many of the former regime loyalists, including intelligence officers and Republican Guard soldiers — commonly referred to as the “deep state” in the Arab world — belong to a group called the Men of the Army of the Naqshbandia Order, often referred to as J.R.T.N., the initials of its Arabic name. The group announced its establishment in 2007, not long after the execution of Mr. Hussein, and its putative leader, Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, was one of Mr. Hussein’s most trusted deputies and the highest-ranking figure of the old regime who avoided capture by the Americans.
Referring to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria’s fighters, Michael Knights, an analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who has researched the Naqshbandia group, said, “They couldn’t have seized a fraction of what they did without coordinated alliances with other Sunni groups.”
In some areas under militant control, including areas around Mosul, Kirkuk and Tikrit, he said, “there are definitely pockets where the Naqshbandias are wearing the pants.”
Mr. Douri, the king of clubs in decks of cards given to American forces in 2003 to identify the most-wanted regime leaders, is a mysterious figure, so furtive he was even declared dead in 2005. It is believed that he is still alive today — he would be in his early 70s — although even that is uncertain. After the American invasion he was said to have fled to Syria, where he reportedly worked with Syrian intelligence to restore the Baath Party within Iraq and led an insurgency from there that mainly targeted American interests.
“He’s a great totem of the old regime,” Mr. Knights said. “You need that kind of individual to keep the flame going.”
The role the Baathists are playing in the current uprising justifies not only Mr. Maliki’s suspicions, but also the longstanding concerns of American intelligence officers. As American forces were winding down operations in Iraq, they frequently predicted that the Baathists were well positioned to exploit Sunni grievances and mount a violent challenge to the government.
Analysts say the former regime figures, whose group combines strands of Islamic thought with notions of Arab nationalism typical of Baath ideology, are bedfellows with the Islamist extremists in one respect: Both sides are determined to restore Sunni rule to Iraq and rid the country of what they see as the pernicious influence of Iran, which like Iraq has a Shiite majority. Like the extremists, the former regime figures have won sympathy from ordinary Sunnis who are alienated by Mr. Maliki’s sectarian policies.
Graphic: In Iraq Crisis, a Tangle of Alliances and Enmities
“Our problem is with Maliki, and we will take him down and anyone that stands next to him,” said Abu Abid al-Rahman, a Naqshbandia leader in northern Iraq, in an interview.
He added: “We want to control the land all the way to Baghdad to take down Maliki’s government and to end the Iranian influence in Iraq. What is happening in Iraq today is a result of Maliki’s sectarian policy in Iraq.”
Rekan al-Kurwi, a tribal leader in Diyala Province, where both groups have been operating, said: “ISIS are extremists and strangers. The Naqshbandias are not strangers. We know most of them. In some areas that ISIS has taken they are killing our people, they are imposing their Islamic laws on us. We do not want that, and the Naqshbandias are not doing this. They have a good strategy in cooperating with the people.”
Last year, Iraq experienced a mini-version of the Sunni uprising it faces today. In that case, the Naqshbandias seemed to be in the lead, directing groups of fighters who briefly seized some territories after Iraqi security forces opened fire on a Sunni protest camp in Hawija, a village near Kirkuk that is a Naqshbandia stronghold, killing dozens.
In many ways that fight, after the Hawija raid, presaged what is happening now. It galvanized Sunni opposition to the government, which is being exploited by the alliance between the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria group and the Baathists, who are positioning themselves as secular guardians of Sunni Arab nationalism.
While they may be allies today in the interest of fighting a common enemy — the Shiite-dominated government of Mr. Maliki — the two sides are unlikely to coexist if they should attain power in some areas. The Baathists, being more secular and more nationalist, have no interest in living under the harsh Islamic law that ISIS has already started to put in place in Mosul.
“We are fighting now with ISIS, but we are protecting Iraq from their religious ideas,” said Abu Tulayha al-Obaidi, a Naqshbandia fighter in northern Iraq, who said the group gets most of its weapons from smugglers coming from Syria, Turkey and Iraq’s Kurdish region in the north. “We will not kill innocent people, or soldiers who put down their weapons. We are like the new brain of ISIS.”
Already, there have been reports that the two sides have skirmished inside Mosul, but the Naqshbandias denied that. Mr. Knights said: “For the moment they need each other. But they are going to fight each other eventually.”
bernard ross Said:
That’s true of everybody. Since America installed Maliki knowing full well where his Shia loyalties lay, what exactly are American Interests? I would have thought that both Bush and Obama would have taken a % of the Iraqi oil in payment for American costs??/
Then using the American puppet gotten extensive oil leases for American companies. Most were given to China and none to American companies, since America Left Iraq. Then America never really left Iraq as some 10,000 so called contractors or mercenaries were left in Iraq under “Blackwater” Where they are or stand today ????
@ honeybee:
My reply is in moderation 🙁
honeybee Said:
I read it but the system was operative with every president since Johnson.
My response:
http://leninandsharia.com/joel-gilbert.html
The Pro-Soviet Agent of Influence Who Gave Barack Obama His First Job in Politics By Trevor Loudon
White Reds Exploiting Blacks:
The Weather Underground, Barack Obama, and the Fundamental
Transformation of the United States: Remarks to America’s Survival, Inc. July 19, 2012,conference By Larry Grathwohl
yamit82 Said:
I beleive that the Israel Kurd relations go back decades. The “boycotted” Kurd tanker that ultimately went to Israel demonstrates how sanctions and boycotts can be busted. It also demonstrates that not having relations with Israel can be detrimental in the legal commercial world.
yamit82 Said:
I take such pronouncements with a grain of salt. The admin is bound by the legal retraint of having created and recognized the existing humpty dumpty. the US opposes Maliki gov and is interested in her own interests. The US says lots of things but often acts to the contrary.
yamit82 Said:
No one can “bank” on anyone. the future is just potentialities to be speculated. However, the present 50 year deal is a fact, followed by the taking of kirkuk, which clearly bypassed the central Iraqui gov. So far the iran deal hasn’t happened but wont mean much if it does.
The KDP beats out the PUK who is for fighting ISIS to curry favor with Iraq. The trend is for a kurdistan supported by turkey and oil relations. Logic dictates that this trend is supported by the US under the table until the final fragmentation of Iraq. the US has to legally follow certain policies with the Iraq gov. the US called for Maliki to step down.
yamit82 Said:
Yes, I go with Amando logic long comment wrt Kurd internal squabbles being overated.
honeybee Said:
@ yamit82:
WELL !!!!!!!!!!!! NO RESPONES !!!!!!! BOY
@ yamit82:
Israel to Get First Batch of Oil from Disputed Kurdish Pipeline
Delivery signals growing trade between Israel, Kurdistan; comes despite US opposition to Kurdish oil exports.
The United States opposes the KRG’s oil pipeline, but Israeli officials told Reuters Jerusalem is keen to build relations with the Kurds, both in order to counter the growing influence of Iran and to generally broaden its options for energy supplies.
Turkey has bought stakes in Exxon’s six Kurdistan oil contracts, reinforcing incentives to continue pipeline exports…Two powerful, conflicting U.S. policies toward Iraq’s oil disputes: one belongs to the U.S. govt, the other to Exxon!!!
MNR announces KRG’s second sale of crude oil
@ bernard ross:
Can Iraqi Kurds bank on Turkey?
Read all comments to above article for more insight and or confusion????
@ bernard ross:
Not so fast!!!
Kurdish parties divided on fighting ISIS
KRG to sign agreement with Iran on Kurdish oil export
BasNews, Erbil
An oil deal similar to the one between the Kurdistan Region and Turkey is expected to be signed between Iran and Kurdistan.
BasNews has been informed that the Kurdish agreement with Tehran is in its final stage. Kurdish MP Sherko Jawdat revealed that they have advised the government not to sign the agreement until they have given details of the accord to Kurdistan Parliament.
Jawdat told BasNews that during last week’s meeting Kurdish MPs and Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani spoke of Kurdish oil and gas export via Iran and that the agreement was close to being finalized.
The Kurdistan Region has so far exported oil through Turkey however the identity of the buyers has not been revealed with a number of reports claiming oil has not been sold due to pressure from Iraq and the US.
yamit82 Said:
These are Obama’s mentors: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloward%E2%80%93Piven_strategy along with Alinsky. Must I teach you every thing.
@ bernard ross:
There was a time when Marxists killed our president. Today, they have elected one.
@ bernard ross:
Communists and Muslims: The Hidden Hand of the KGB
Frank Gaffney has put it, Sharia is “Communism with a God.” This seemingly paradoxical problem is real and has been exported by the Soviet Union as part of the communist world revolution.
The core question we are raising in this report: are the Islamists in many cases communists with Islamic masks?
ISIS appears concerned with its image???
@ yamit82:
I posted this before on wrong page
To Understand the Crisis in Iraq, Follow the Pipelines
Iraq Pipelines
ME Oil and Gas Pipelines
note active and inactive, I thing the one through golan is from saudi through Jordan as is inactive. I note a proposed from north central Iraq through Jordan and a large field on iraq jordan border(i think)
yamit82 Said:
anything overt from the arabs through Israel likely wont happen until arab israel “relations” are overt. I posted oil pipelines map recently for Iraq of 2 pipelines going north: one through kirkuk to mosul and one through what is currently ISIS territory to syria. The kurds have rerouted the one through Kirkuk through Kurdistan to turkey the day after the 50 year Turkey Kurd deal and ISIS presumably controls the other.
what is the story on the one through the syrian golan to sidon today, who controls that?
Oil pipelines Map
Israel has some advantages over most end users. It isn’t afraid of OPEC or Big Oil Companies and we have 2 refineries and pipelines to : The Trans-Israel pipeline also known as the Tipline or the Eilat-Ashkelon Pipeline was built in 1968 to transport crude oil from Iran to Europe. The Iranians stopped the use of the pipeline after Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was overthrown as a result of the Iranian Islamic Revolution of 1979. The 254 km, 42″ pipeline’s capacity from a special pier in Ashkelon to Eilat’s port on the Red Sea is 400,000 barrels (64,000 m3) per day, and 1.2 million barrels per day (190,000 m3/d) in the opposite direction. The pipeline is owned and operated by the Eilat Ashkelon Pipeline Company (EAPC) which also operates several other oil pipelines in Israel.
In 2003, Israel and Russia made an agreement to supply Asian markets with Russian oil delivered by tankers from Novorossiysk to Ashkelon and then reloaded onto tankers in Eilat for shipment to Asia. In other words, the oil would flow in the direction opposite to the one intended when the pipeline was originally constructed. This route from Europe to Asia is shorter than the traditional one around Africa, and cheaper than the one via the Suez Canal.
Article from 2003
U.S. checking possibility of pumping oil from northern Iraq to Haifa, via Jordan
The Trans-Arabian Pipeline (Tapline), was an oil pipeline from Qaisumah in Saudi Arabia to Sidon in Lebanon. In its heyday, it was an important factor in the global trade of petroleum—helping with the economic development of Lebanon—as well as American and Middle Eastern political relations. Construction of the Trans-Arabian Pipeline began in 1947 and was mainly managed by the American company Bechtel. Originally the Tapline was intended to terminate in Haifa which was then in the British Mandate of Palestine, but due to the establishment of the state of Israel, an alternative route through Syria (Golan Heights) and Lebanon was selected with an export terminal in Sidon. The Syrian government initially opposed the plan, but ratified Tapline construction in 1949 following the U.S.-backed military coup overthrowing democratic rule there. Oil transport through the pipeline started in 1950.
Kurds support dividing Iraq into three regions….
http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/security/2014/06/iraq-crisis-isis-kurds-support-division-three-regions.html?utm_source=Al-Monitor+Newsletter+%5BEnglish%5D&utm_campaign=198893c9ee-June_19_2014&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_28264b27a0-198893c9ee-100371289
Iraqi Turkmen take up arms in Kirkuk….
A sense of abandonment has prevailed in the ITC after Turkey, opting for strategic ties with the KRG, advised the Turkmens to “act in unison with the Kurds.”
Read more: http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2014/06/tastekin-iraqi-turkmen-isis-kirkuk-mosul-arms-itf.html?utm_source=Al-Monitor+Newsletter+%5BEnglish%5D&utm_campaign=198893c9ee-June_19_2014&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_28264b27a0-198893c9ee-100371289#ixzz357cdrADK