[...] interview with Michael Yon, who continues to provide remarkable insight into the Iraq war; this article about the mainstream press’ routinely inaccurate response to the fighting, and this one about [...]

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Actually, this has absolutely nothing to do with the surge. Basra has been the responsibility of British forces pretty much since the beginning of the war, They’ve treated it like a peace-keeping mission rather than a counterinsurgency, and they’ve drawn their troops down to the point that they can only field a few hundred men. The Shiite gangs are basically stepping into a power vacuum.

What the Basra incident shows us is what would happen if the US withdraws its troops prematurely, as the British did. Short version, we’d get something like Mogadishu in Iraq, more or less controlled by the Iranians.

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Ryan,

By insurgents, I’m not sure whom you mean, Shia or Sunni, or both.

There are Shia in Parliament that don’t like the direction Maliki is going, and, of course, there are Sunni’s that don’t like it either.

I’m assuming you mean both. If so, there’s a rub: Sunni’s want a ‘reasonable’ portion of the revenues, while some Shia don’t want to give them to have their requested percentage (in a nutshell).
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Today’s Forbes:

"Heavy fighting has erupted in a bastion of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr’s militia in Basra as military operations against gunmen in the southern oil city entered a third day. Historically, two-thirds of Iraq’s oil output came from southern fields and flowed through Basra. In February, 1.54 mln bpd of oil shipments came from Basra, according to the oil ministry. ‘Thus far, exports from Basra have not been materially affected, but concerns regarding those exports are high and rising,’ said Dennis Gartman, editor of The Gartman Letter — a daily trading note."

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Concern should be high. Sadr doesn’t want to cripple the Iraqi economy, but he’s capable of it. The above pipeline bombing was probably a warning to Maliki to back off.
  

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When the final history is written on Basra, this latest turn of violence will look like just a comma.

Precisely.

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Christine in comment #6:

Since "If it bleeds it leads" controls the press, they have been pretty silent. They have turned a little paper cut into a hemorrage.

Every negative "setback" is always held up as if this is the "turning point" from success, and another benchmark to defeat; and another guarantor that we will ultimately fail.

When the final history is written on Basra, this latest turn of violence will look like just a comma.

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Missy,

Sadr was in a position of strength early on and killing him may have made him a "martyr".  While many in the military think we should have taken him out before he gained his initial power, the post invasion "lawfar" seemed to prevent us from doing so.

Since he could not be taken out before reaching the pinnical of his power, that power had to be removed, block by block, until all that remained was a hollow shell.  It is a deadly game of move-countermove played out often in the region.

First, the chief Shia cleric in Iraq belittled Sadr and marginalized him.  Sadr then tried to integrate himself into Iraqi Parliment.  Once integrated, he tried for a political coup and lost, marginalizing him further.  He tried to regain his following but lost many to both the more aggressive elements and those who were done with fighting ( the "disobedience" he refers to).

Now Sadr’s once so-called unstoppable might is reduced to the pathetic statement you cited above.

In the end, he is a failure at every level and even his Iranian leash holders will probably abbandon him.  Hopefully before fleeing Iraq, the Iranian "elite" forces will either shoot him themselves or give the Iraqis and "tip" to his location.  Both outcomes have precidence and are not all that bad.

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ChrisG,

Most of my fellow posting pals often wondered why he wasn’t taken out in the beginning because of the Iranian connections.  He seemed to be nothing but an opportunistic gang leader that was allowed to cause trouble and cost lives.  Sheesh, I’m talking about him in the past tense already.

This Sadr comment was included in Roggio’s write up, ought to help in that strong/weak horse thing:

"So far I did not succeed either to liberate Iraq or make it an Islamic society — whether because of my own inability or the inability of society, only God knows," Sadr wrote to his followers. "The continued presence of the occupiers, on the one hand, and the disobedience of many on the other, pushed me to isolate myself in protest. I gave society a big proportion of my life. Even my body became weaker, I got more sicknesses."

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That’s really horrible news, Doug. That’ll definately be an event that will effect the economy in Iraq given all of the strains that will restrict trade as a result. The thing is, it raises questions for me.

The insurgents who are launching attacks in Iraq disagree with the direction Iraq is heading in, politically that is. Well, suppose that they were to have their way in the Iraqi government. How would they distribute oil revenues to the country? Would they give more the areas that are controlled by the people who share their sect of Islam or would they divide it fairly and share it with all of Iraq?

For some reason, I think the insurgents would be more likely to do the first one, which is give it to the places that contain more of the people who share their ideologies. Either way, the United States has a moral obligation to stay and make sure such people don’t take control of the government. 

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Missy,

Sadr fled to his Iranian masters last year when I was in Iraq.  The Coalition and the Iraqi People made a big to do about "where in the world is Al Sadr" to the Iraqis who supported Sadr.  He is own actions and words plus the marginalization by Iraqis in general made him appear to be an ineffectual leader at best or a pathetic loser at worse.

Weak leaders and losers fall fast in the warrior cultures of jihadists.  Now Sadr will not die a martyr, but a loser and few will cry at his funeral so long as he died a pathetic loser in Iraqi eyes.

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It’s this kind of stuff that will be the shape of Basra for quite some time now as disparate men use disparate measures:

One of southern Iraq’s two main oil export pipelines has been severely damaged in a bomb attack, officials said today.The bombing of the pipeline, seven miles south of Basra, came as clashes between Iraqi security forces and Shia fighters in the port city entered a third day."This morning, saboteurs blew up the pipeline transporting crude from [the] Zubair 1 [oil plant] by placing bombs beneath it," an oil company official said. "Crude exports will be greatly affected because this is one of two main pipelines transporting crude to the southern terminals. We will lose about a third of crude exported through Basra." The official said it would take three days to repair the damage if security could be provided for workers.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/03/27/iraq/main3971693.shtmlThe Basra ports and pipelines are "guarded" by the Iraqi Army.
  

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