George W. Bush møter problemer hvor han enn snur seg i Irak: Fra toppen, fra militsene og fra grasrota. Amerikanerne kan kanskje rydde opp, men hvem skal overta? Blir USA barnevakt after all?

Bush er ikke så isolert og alene som NRK og norsk presse fremstiller det. De overforenkler og tror til slutt på sine egne fremstillinger. Flere militære støttet f.eks. «surge», mest på mellomnivå, de som har kommandoen på bakken.

Men problemene er formidable:

Times laget en liste over tilfeller hvor Nuri al-Maliki tydelig viste at han og regjeringen ikke spiller på lag med USA.

# Al-Maliki pressed ahead with Saddam Hussein’s execution over the new year despite US requests to slow down the process until legal questions had been answered.

# In November, al-Maliki ordered US forces to lift roadblocks they had put in place to try to track down a missing US soldier.

# On October 24, when Zalmay Khalilzad, the US Ambassador, and General George Casey, the coalition commander, announced (with Bush’s backing) a new «timetable» for quelling the violence, al-Maliki denied that he had signed up to any such plan, a public rebuff to the US. Iraq was sovereign, he said, and no one was going to dictate timetables (nor does Bush’s plan this week venture to put dates on its targets for the Iraqi Government).

# On October 25, US and Iraqi forces raided Sadr City, the stronghold of the militia led by the radical Shia Hojatoleslam Moqtada al-Sadr, whom the US blames for persecuting Sunnis and destabilising Iraq. Al-Maliki disavowed the operation, saying he had not been consulted and insisting «that it will not be repeated».

# When US forces embedded with Iraqi forces have urged them to crack down on the Shia militias and to prevent the slaughter of Sunnis, al-Maliki has overruled them.

# During Israel’s attack on Lebanon in the summer, al-Maliki condemned the Israeli action and arranged a high-profile meeting in Tehran with Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, the Iranian President, who has called for Israel to be wiped off the map.

These are not the actions of a man who shares the US goal of creating a multi-ethnic Iraq, in which Sunnis are represented and their rights protected.

Gnisningene blir neppe mindre. C. Rice avslørte igår at ordren om å riste opp de iranske nettverkene i Irak kommer fra høyeste hold. Det har vært to episoder nå hvor amerikanerne har arrestert iranere, først utsendinger i Bagdad, og så det som ble kalt et konsulat i Mosul. I begge tilfeller reagerte Maliki-regjeringen med stor irritasjon.

A recent series of American raids against Iranians in Iraq was authorized under an order that President Bush decided to issue several months ago to undertake a broad military offensive against Iranian operatives in the country, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Friday.

«There has been a decision to go after these networks,» Ms. Rice said in an interview with The New York Times in her office on Friday afternoon, before leaving on a trip to the Middle East.

Mahdi-militsen er nå blitt så sterk at en militær konfrontasjon synes over evne. Maliki vil aldri gå med på det. Militsen vokste seg sterk fordi den beskyttet og hevnet shiaene. Den har derfor betydelig folkelig støtte.

In the giant Shia slum of Sadr City, the Baghdad stronghold of the radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, his al-Mahdi Army is ordering every man aged 15-45 to register for combat. One al-Mahdi fighter told The Times’s Iraqi staff that they had been put under orders not to seek confrontation. «We expect this new American plan to try to take on our leadership, not to go after every fighter, weapon and vehicle. We will keep our leadership in safe areas.»

Mobben overtar

På bakken overtar Mahdi-militsen og mobben. Britene pleide å gjøre et nummer av at de brukte myke luer og ikke hjelmer. De ville vise befolkningen tillit. Nå går de i fullt kamputstyr og skyr irakisk politi som de mistenker for å stå i ledtog med opprørere som vil ha dem ut, og i Basra er det ikke sunnier, men shiaer.

Historien om hvordan britene forlot sin base Abu Najii i Maysan-provinsen sier mye. Britene ble beskutt inne på basen. At de skulle evakuere var hemmelig, men det tok bare noen timer så var basen oversvømmet av irakere som plyndret og ødela materiell for 500.000 dollar.

I den nærliggende byen Amarah har noe lignende skjedd.

The largely notional – if not fictional – power of the Baghdad central government simply vanished while the forces of hardline cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, which already controls the local government, stepped forward to proclaim its triumph and guide the victory celebrations in the nearby provincial capital, Amarah. «This is the first city that has kicked out the occupier!» blared Sadr-supplied loudspeakers to streets filled with revelers, as the Washington Post noted in a solid – but deeply buried – story on the retreat.

Den bitterheten som gjennomsyrer Chris Floyds skildring, er nok beskrivende for hva mange idag føler:

A British Harbinger of American Defeat

Bildet av Bush er intenst, nakent og viser en mann som lar seg bevege. Det er neppe bare sentimentalitet. Tårene trillet da Bush deltok i en seremoni for Jason Denham, som ofret sitt liv da en granat falt ned i deres panservogn. De fire kameratene ble reddet.