Cabinet ministers loyal to the radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr resigned on Monday to protest the prime minister's refusal to set a timetable for an American withdrawal, raising the prospect that the Mahdi Army militia could return to the streets of Baghdad. ...
The departure of the six ministers, while unlikely to topple Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government, deals a significant blow to the U.S.-backed leader, who relied on support from the Sadrists to gain office.
Why is this a significant blow? Maliki is going after the militias and their Iranian masters, including reports that Maliki was going to fire those Sadrist ministers soon. To me, this sounds like Sadr is trying to make lemonade from lemons. If they are going out the door anyway, why not pretend it is a blow to Maliki rather than a blow against Sadr by Maliki?
Maliki has offered no favors to the mullahs. He visited half a dozen capitals in the early stages of his premiership - but pointedly avoided Tehran. He also turned down Tehran's offer of hosting a regional conference on Iraq, preferring to hold the exercise in Baghdad and then, later this year, in Cairo.
Maliki has also given the green light to a crackdown on Shiite militias and death squads, serving notice that the war of the sectarians must end. Within the next few weeks, he is expected to further anger Tehran by dropping from his Cabinet all five Sadrist ministers, who are beholden to the Iranian regime.
Tehran indicated its displeasure by activating its networks in Iraq to organize last week's demonstrations in Najaf.
I noted I wasn't impressed at the size of the recent Sadr protest, and earlier wrote that Sadr might be down to the hard core of Iranian-paid fanatics (if not actual Iranians).
Sadr may yet prove to be a major thorn in our side, but thus far he hasn't seemed like he wants to go for the third and final round in the US-Sadr standoff. Mostly because it would likely be a Sadr-US/Iraq fight.
UPDATE: Secretary Gates thinks this could turn out well:
"I think the impact ... that these resignations have will depend, in some measure on who is selected to replace these ministers and their capabilities, and whether those vacancies are used in a way that can perhaps further advance the reconciliation process," said Gates. "There is the opportunity to turn what might seem like a negative potentially into a positive development."
I still think the power is shifting within Iraq away from the Iranian puppets, and the Sadr boys walked out to avoid the humiliation of being kicked out.
There may yet be an uprising of Sadr gunmen but don't assume this is a Shia revolt. Iran is still intent on winning and a fake popular uprising to impact our domestic front seems like a logical move to me.
