Word: samarra
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...says it won't tolerate insurgent control over wide swaths of territory. A strategy aimed at denying the rebels safe haven in towns and cities under their control and installing competent local administrations is under way in Shi'ite areas south of Baghdad. The northern Sunni stronghold of Samarra is being targeted in a similar push, with U.S. troops ousting fighters and returning a civil administration. But in nogo zones like Fallujah, enlisting the help of rebels willing to part ways with al-Zarqawi may be the only way the U.S. can avoid bloody battles down the road...
...there in August for a second, inconclusive battle and then, in September, found itself once again bombing Fallujah in preparation for another frontal assault. The Sadrists have also created flashpoints in Basra, Nasiriya, Karbala, Samawa, Kut and elsewhere throughout the Shiite south, while the Sunni insurgents have added Ramadi, Samarra, Baquba and others to the list of no-go areas for U.S. troops. And both Sunnis and Shiites continue to wreak havoc on the streets of Baghdad on a daily basis...
...officials now concede that the insurgency is far larger than they first imagined, and it is growing both in numbers of fighters and also in the range and boldness of their attacks. And they acknowledge that whole towns in Sunni heartland, such as Fallujah, Samarra, Ramadi and Baqubah have been turned by insurgents into no-go areas for coalition forces. One measure of the depth of the security crisis in Iraq is the Bush administration's plan to spend money earmarked for reconstruction instead on urgent security priorities...
...Sadr's ability to survive such face-offs may have wider reverberations. Two months after sovereignty was handed over to Iraqis, large swaths of the country are controlled by a flourishing assortment of insurgents. U.S. forces have abdicated power in Fallujah, been chased out of Ramadi and Samarra, and are scrambling to keep hold of Baqubah, Tikrit and Mosul. Even in Baghdad, gunmen have turned areas of the capital into deadly no-go zones. While U.S. and Iraqi officials insist they have the firepower to contain the violence, the agonizing search for a way out in Najaf was the latest...
...exactly well-loved within its native population or its clerical establishment - the result might be a long-term insurgency throughout the Shiite south and in the capital. Given the fact that Sunni insurgents are currently in effective control of Fallujah and are challenging for control of Ramadi, Samarra and even, somewhat audaciously, Mosul, a Shiite guerrilla campaign would severely stretch Coalition and Iraqi forces. And forcing the Allawi government to rely so heavily and directly on U.S. military power, as it has done at Najaf, undercuts its own prospects of achieving legitimacy among Iraqis as a genuinely independent government...