It Doesn’t End With Fallouja

A Marine general commented last week after his men ousted nearly all Iraqi guerrillas from Fallouja that the two weeks of fighting had “broken the back of the insurgency.” If only it were that simple.

Marines did a good job of purging enemies from the city, but as the general spoke, flames and smoke rose in other Sunni Triangle cities in the north and west; foreigners and Iraqis were beheaded, shot or killed by suicide bombers; and political parties vowed to boycott national elections that the Bush administration has put forth as a harbinger of democracy in a nation where the concept is a stranger.

More than 50 U.S. soldiers were killed in the Fallouja fight, which began Nov. 8 in one of the cities where Sunni Muslims are the majority, and the U.S. death toll in Iraq has now passed 1,200. An estimated 1,200 insurgents were killed in Fallouja as well.

The difficulties of pacifying Iraq were obvious last week. Insurgents showed the depths to which they’re capable of sinking when evidence surfaced that Margaret Hassan, the kidnapped director of CARE International in Iraq, had been shot to death. And even as Marines tried to kill the last remnants of resistance in Fallouja, guerrillas stormed police stations in the northern city of Mosul, where more than 80% of police responded by abandoning their posts.

The U.S. goal is to get an Iraqi army and police force trained to provide the nation’s security and let American troops come home; that objective remains elusive. Iraqi soldiers following Marines into battle in Fallouja did well, but their numbers are few.

Fallouja was thought to be the headquarters of militant leader Abu Musab Zarqawi; if so, he left before the Marines arrived. Zarqawi’s followers continue to try to terrorize Iraqis into opposing the U.S. occupation by beheading natives and foreigners alike. Zarqawi was born in Jordan, but Marines said most of the fighters in Fallouja appeared to be Iraqi. That could be a hopeful sign that although the Iraq misadventure has inflamed Islamic opinion against Washington, few foreign fighters have wanted or been able to enter the country. But it also may mean Iraqis are sufficiently angered by the invasion to be willing to fight and die in large numbers without outside help.

The brutality of battle was brought home in television footage of a Marine fatally shooting an Iraqi insurgent in a mosque. An inspection after the shooting indicated the insurgent was wounded and unarmed, and U.S. officials said they would investigate the incident. Soldiers faced with the possibility of booby-trapped corpses and suicide bombers trying to kill them are understandably on edge, but even if the shooting is found to be accidental, it will be used as anti-American propaganda, stacked next to the photographs from Abu Ghraib prison.

As the killing has spread, the political battle has suffered setbacks. Dozens of political groups, many with mostly Sunni members, announced plans to boycott January’s elections, in part because of anger over Fallouja. A boycott would undercut the legitimacy of balloting; the interim Iraqi government should try to bring all politicians into the process. If that proves impossible, those elected will have to try to govern in a manner that makes all Iraqis feel they have a stake in the nation, regardless of religious beliefs.