Clashes in Iraq’s No. 2 City May Trigger Violence Elsewhere

The escalating unrest in southern Iraq, particularly new clashes this week between rival Shiite factions in the key southern port city of Basra, threaten to spark wider confrontations that could set back security progress in Baghdad.

Hundreds of Iraqis demonstrated to protest the cycle of murders and killing recently taking place in Basra.

Basra now is the front line of a major sectarian conflict between Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, with his powerful Mahdi Army militia, and the largest Shiite party, the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, led by Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, with its militia wing, the Badr Brigade. Other smaller Shiite factions, like the Islamic Virtue Party, or Fadhila, are also in the mix.

Iraqi soldiers and police on Wednesday battled Mahdi fighters for control of key neighborhoods in Basra, Iraq's second-largest city, 340 miles southeast of Baghdad, the Associated Press reported. The fighting erupted a day after Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki flew there and announced the security crackdown against the militias.

There are indications that the United States is, to some extent, choosing sides in the inter-Shiite power struggle. When Vice President Dick Cheney made a visit to Baghdad earlier this month, his one foray outside the heavily fortified Green Zone was to visit Hakim's office in Baghdad. Hakim also traveled to the White House and met with President Bush in December 2006.

The Mahdi Army, meanwhile, has been largely observing a cease-fire since August, which has been a major contributor to the decline in American deaths in the country. That cease-fire was extended in February for six months, to the relief of American commanders in Baghdad.

But there are signs that the truce is unraveling. Sadr threatened a countrywide "civil revolt" on Monday and his followers shut down several neighborhoods in western Baghdad, warning residents to stay away from stores and checkpoints, according to news reports. The Sadrists' demands include a freeze on coalition and Iraqi forces targeting their members and a release of detainees. The Green Zone, meanwhile, has received a steady barrage of rocket and mortar fire—a common response from Sadrists after a high-ranking member of the militia is detained.

Sadr's supporters accuse their Shiite rivals—the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council and Maliki's Islamic Dawa party—of using the Iraqi Army and police to increase their factions' power in southern Iraq.

With U.S. forces mounting a major operation in Mosul, in the north, a British newspaper reported this weekend that American commanders may ask the British to mount a "surge" to stabilize Basra. The oilfields surrounding Basra contain some 80 percent of the country's oil wealth and the city is the country's second most populous.

British troops remained at their base at the airport outside Basra and were not involved in the ground fighting Tuesday, according to the British Ministry of Defense. But three British jets provided aerial surveillance for the Iraqi forces, according to a military spokesman in Basra.

Security in Basra was officially handed over to Iraqi forces in December. Since then, there have been numerous reports of criminal gangs and militias killing dozens of women, academics, and scientists.

The 4,000-strong contingent of British troops that remains in the country is stationed at an airport complex dubbed Camp Blackadder, located outside the city. The base is the frequent target of shelling from mortars and rockets—sometimes up to 30 rockets per day. More than 1,000 mortar rounds landed on the base complex during the summer.

"[The security situation] is not nearly as benign as often depicted at home or even in Baghdad," wrote one American stationed with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Basra in January.

The corps still oversees millions of dollars in U.S.-financed reconstruction projects around the city, including several courthouses, a witness-protection facility, a children's hospital, and road, water, and sewage projects. Yet the American military presence is so small that the corps relies largely on Iraqi Army convoys for security to conduct site visits and oversee the projects.

Late last month, Lt. Col. Kenneth McDonald, the Basra area deputy commander for the corps, was riding in a convoy when his vehicle was hit by an explosively formed penetrator, an advanced IED. McDonald was evacuated to a military hospital in Germany and the corps suspended site visits inside Basra city. Earlier that month, a journalist and an Iraqi interpreter working for CBS News were kidnapped outside the Basra hotel. The Iraqi was freed, but there has been no public word about the journalist.

And just days after McDonald was injured, Col. Qassim Obeid, a commander of the Iraqi provincial police, was killed when gunmen ambushed his convoy and shot him and three of his bodyguards to death on Basra's main street. Around 5,000 Iraqis took to the streets in early March to protest the deteriorating security there.

U.S. News Associate Editor Alex Kingsbury recently returned from a monthlong reporting assignment in Iraq.