With Saddam behind bars America's troubles continue, writes Salah Hemeid A series of suicide bombings and other attacks in Karbala on Saturday killed 19 people, including seven coalition soldiers, and wounded more than 170 others. The blitz of four suicide car bombs, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars were clearly aimed at undermining US resolve two weeks after Saddam Hussein's capture. Targeting troops in the Shi'ite Muslim holy city also sent a clear message from the insurgents, whose operations have been previously confined mostly to Sunni areas, that they could expand their arena of operations. A day later roadside bombs in and near Baghdad killed two American soldiers and two Iraqi children. On Monday, following a day of fighting in Mosul, American soldiers killed three suspected members of the Islamic radical group Ansar Al-Islam. The following day a roadside bomb exploded in downtown Baghdad while American soldiers were patrolling the area, killing an Iraqi passer-by and wounding another. Last Thursday several shells exploded inside the American compound on the west bank of the Tigris in Baghdad. Meanwhile, explosions and gunfire echoed throughout parts of the Iraqi capital in the early evening as American soldiers continued to try to rout out guerrillas. At dawn insurgents fired a barrage of rockets at the American headquarters and at hotels popular with Western contractors and journalists. Three of the more than half-dozen rockets seemed to be aimed at the German, Turkish and Iranian embassies, though none caused much damage. As attacks mount US commanders insist their troops are succeeding in the hunt for leaders of the insurgency. They claim to have unravelled networks that funnelled money, weapons and instructions to gunmen and bomb makers. After months of intelligence gathering that began with the arrests of an outer circle of bodyguards close to Saddam the US military claims only a handful of rebel leaders remain at large. The political situation, meanwhile, continues to develop as Iraqi and US officials brace themselves as 30 June deadline for the transfer of power approaches. Leaders of Sunni groups across the country have agreed to form a council to represent them during the transition from American rule. Many Sunnis believe they do not have a strong enough voice on the 25-seat Iraqi Interim Governing Council. The capture of Saddam left many of Iraq's minority Sunnis wondering how they would fare in the new power structure. Their sense of vulnerability increased as American administrators focussed on forging close political ties with Iraq's Shi'ites and Kurds. Feeling increasingly disenfranchised under the occupation, a revival in Sunni expectations and demands could greatly complicate the transfer of power for the Americans. Shi'ite groups, meanwhile, have been demanding political rights commensurate with their numbers. The majority of Iraq's population of 25 million is Shi'ite. Kurds have been pressing for a federal system that will give them greater autonomy in their northern enclave and in areas they claim were Arabised by Saddam's regime, including the oil-rich Kirkuk province. The White House, increasingly focussed on US presidential elections, feverishly attempts to assess the impact of Iraq on Bush's reelection chances. The Washington Post reported on Sunday that the Bush administration is backing away from its more ambitious plans to transform Iraq's economy, political system and security forces in response to the escalation of attacks on US troops which in turn prompted the decision to end the civil occupation by the summer of 2004. The newspaper also said plans to privatise state-owned businesses -- a key part of a larger Bush administration goal to replace the socialist economy of Saddam with a free-market system -- have been dropped over the past months. So, too, has a demand that Iraqis write a constitution before a transfer of sovereignty. With the administration's plans tempered by time and threat, the chief US administrator of Iraq, Paul Bremer, is now focussed on forging compromises with Iraqi leaders and combating the insurgency in order to meet the deadline for the transfer of sovereignty to a provisional government. The US is also backtracking over the disarmament of militias backed by political groups. The occupation authority initially sought to disband the Kurdish peshmerga militias by moving members into the new army and police force. US officials no longer press the issue with Kurdish leaders. Similarly, plans that a constitution be in place before the occupation ended have been shelved. While US officials acknowledge this increases the risk of the drafting process being dominated by extremists, such considerations have been outweighed by the desire to end the civil occupation by next summer. The presence of US troops in Iraq, however, will go on longer, military officials said. So what is left of the neo- conservative strategists designs to fashion Iraq into a secular, pluralistic, market-driven nation? By handing over sovereignty first the administration has ceded veto power over the final constitution and is forcing Iraqis to confront a raft of contentious issues, ranging from Kurdish demands for autonomy to Shi'ite demands for Islamic law, without the benefit of a referee. Winning the peace looks as difficult as ever.
