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Iran's Limited Ability to Stabilize Iraq

[Washington Institute for Near East Policy] Patrick Clawson - The Baker-Hamilton commission will presumably recommend reaching out to Iran to seek its involvement in stabilizing Iraq. U.S. officials say Iran has had a major and direct role in Iraq's security problems. According to U.S. intelligence, Iran has provided explosives and trigger devices for roadside bombs and training for several thousand fighters inside Iran. To date, however, these efforts seem to have given Iraqi fighters the means to better carry out what they intended to do anyway. Those Iraqis who accept Iranian support may not be as willing to accept Iranian orders that involve changing their course of action. It is by no means clear that Iran has the ability to dissuade the fighting groups it supports from continuing their violent attacks. Rather, the violence in Iraq seems to be increasingly led by local leaders who do not respond well to outside orders. When the radical Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr ordered some commanders in the Mahdi Army to stop their random killing of Sunnis, they ignored him. As New York Times reporter Sabrina Tavernise wrote, "As many as a third of [al-Sadr's] militiamen have grown frustrated with the constraints of compromise and have broken off." If al-Sadr cannot control the Mahdi Army, it is unrealistic to think that Iran can order around fighters with whom it has often had a difficult relationship. Iran's role in Iraq is asymmetrical: it can cause trouble, but it cannot bring peace. Iran can do more to destabilize Iraq than to stabilize it. In sum, Iran has shown little interest in talks with the U.S. on Iraq, and, in any case, could do little to advance stability in Iraq. Counting on Iran to help improve security in Iraq is an exercise in extremely optimistic thinking. The writer is deputy director for research at the Washington Institute.
2006-12-06 01:00:00
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