Report: Some AQI rank and file turning on leadership?
posted at 1:25 pm on July 23, 2007 by Allahpundit
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Well, who knows. It’s not unheard of for hardcore jihadists to have a change of heart after witnessing acts of extreme brutality. Hassan Butt claims to have had his moment on the road to Damascus after the London bombings and Ed Husain walked away after his cohorts allegedly murdered a Nigerian Christian. The revelation about Omar al-Baghdadi being an AQ smokescreen may have flipped some of them too. “These guys are not immune to nationalist tendencies,” a U.S. intel analyst told Newsweek in connection with its Zawahiri story; some Iraqi Salafists might not have taken kindly to the news that they’re actually working for Saudis and Egyptians.
Or maybe this is just U.S. propaganda manufactured to cause paranoia in enemy ranks. All theories are welcome.
Fed up with being part of a group that cuts off a person’s face with piano wire to teach others a lesson, dozens of low-level members of al-Qaeda in Iraq are daring to become informants for the US military in a hostile Baghdad neighbourhood…
“They are turning. We are talking to people who we believe have worked for al-Qaeda in Iraq and want to reconcile and have peace,” said Colonel Ricky Gibbs, commander of the 4th Brigade, 1st Infantry Division, which oversees the area…
It is impossible to corroborate the claims, but [Lieutenant James Danly] said that scores of junior al-Qaeda in Iraq members there had become informants since May, including one low-level cell leader who gave vital information after his arrest.
“He gave us dates, places and names and who did what,” Lieutenant Danly said. When asked why he was being so forthcoming, the man said: “Because I am sick of it and I hate them, and I am done.”
Doura is one neighborhood in Baghdad. North of the city, AQI is reportedly staging parades in local villages. The military is trying to cut that off at the root by brokering a truce between Sunni and Shiite tribesmen in the area to purge the local Salafists. That sort of thing’s worked well so far in Anbar where everyone’s Sunni. Let’s see how it works in Diyala.
Finally, take a moment to read this piece at Strategy Page about Al Qaeda’s “downward spiral” since 9/11. Money quote: “[A]l Qaeda is largely an idea, and a lot of web pages, rather that any kind of organization. It doesn’t work very well, except for politicians and media looking for a hook to help them get something else done.” That seems overstated, especially given the emphasis on training foreign-born lieutenants in the Pakistani camps and then sending them home to recruit and train others, but SP would know better than I would.
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I think things are becomming clear to the Iraqi nationalists that the US is planning to leave Iraq at some point and Al Qaeda is not.
BohicaTwentyTwo on July 23, 2007 at 1:56 PM
BohicaTwentyTwo on July 23, 2007 at 1:56 PM
Yep and that thought isnt filling them with a great deal of confidence.
doriangrey on July 23, 2007 at 1:58 PM
Hmm… enemy is loosing their will to fight. Finding they are fighting the wrong fight against the wrong enemy.
Ya know what this means? It means we’re winning.
Lawrence on July 23, 2007 at 2:09 PM
Will Harry and Nancy spin this like a top or continue to ignore good news from Iraq?
Regardless, the stories of Iraq’s turn-around cannot be suppressed forever.
Swinehound on July 23, 2007 at 2:35 PM
Swinehound on July 23, 2007 at 2:35 PM
They’ll do their best to ignore it and only try to diminish it if confronted.
doriangrey on July 23, 2007 at 2:38 PM
Makes sense. Apparently, to know al-Quaeda for any length of time is to loathe them, even if you are a disgruntled Baathist insurgent. I’ve got to believe that after the last four years the former Saddam apparatchiks have no desire to see the realization of AQI’s ascetic, 7th century lifestyle come to fruition, and if they can get any assurance that the Shia won’t exterminate them once the U.S. leaves, they’d be willing to some sort of compromise that hangs AQI out to dry.
Dudley Smith on July 23, 2007 at 3:11 PM
I suspect their desire to get a copy of the new Harry Potter book has outstripped their desire to cut off their best friend’s head to prove their allegiance to the murder machine that is AQI.
This is good news either way….
Biffstir on July 23, 2007 at 3:40 PM
Uh Oh, we’re winning. Better pull out of Iraq fast before the American people find out. We don’t want to lost the Presidency again!
Unsincerely as always,
Dingy Harry & the Dems
Ordinary1 on July 23, 2007 at 3:40 PM
No amount of disunity in the Islamic world should give us hope that we avoid a war with the muslims. I know we would like to think we can avoid a war, just as our forefathers in 1940 thought they could avoid war. But we simply can’t. Our enemies are too fanatically bent on world domination.
thuja on July 23, 2007 at 8:53 PM
I’m leaning toward basic self interest. Unless you’re all geeked up for virgins, there’s no upside to the al-Qaeda program. Once upon a time, it was easy to see the US as crusading infidel occupiers. 4 years later and a lot of empirical evidence to the contrary, not so much. And the same period of time has given a good look at what AQ has to offer your local community, which is brutality and oppression.
It was only a matter of time before the locals turned away from those who bring nothing but pain and death toward those who bring relief and hope for a better future.
God help us if we abandon them to these animals.
Pablo on July 23, 2007 at 9:46 PM
This would be awesome of course, if it’s true. Why would any Dim leadership pay attention to this though. It’s good news. So in their game of political posturing it can’t be true. Too little, too late they’d say.
PowWow on July 23, 2007 at 11:56 PM
Islamic animals.
pat on July 24, 2007 at 12:30 AM