Fighting Terrorism in Iraq Part Two: The Insurgency

In March of 2003, the Coalition ground forces began the epic blitzkrieg battle to Baghdad that would last only six weeks. It was an unprecedented invasion in terms of speed. Several units, including the First Marine Division, broke their previous records for the most distance covered in the least days. Bombs craters riddled Baghdad's streets and buildings. Saddam's regime quickly crumbled before the Coalition. By April 2003, President Bush stood atop the USS Abraham Lincoln and declared that major combat operations were over.

It was the scene America was looking for. A cheering crowd of servicemembers in front ot a "Mission Accomplished" sign. This was not the case though. Without the government to keep control, Iraq decended into anarchy. Looting became a common scene in Baghdad, and the Coalition forces who were there to fight the Saddam loyalists, weren't there to police the city. Eventually, this is exactly what they had to do all over Iraq. The situation transformed from "Mission Accomplished" to became mission peding.

After a while, it became obvious that the Coalition would be occupying Iraq for a long time. Insurgents soon began attacking the foriegn troops that they now wanted out of their country. In Robin Moore's book, Hunting Down Saddam, he followed around groups of cotractors and soldiers in Iraq as the war began to heat up again. One of the contractors broke down the four groups of insurgents that they had to fight: former Saddam Loyalists after money, Shi'ite Muslims that were being recruited and funded by Iran, Palastinians who wanted to bring attention to their cause, and perhaps worst of all, terrorists. Al-Qaeda thought it opportune that the Coalition invaded Iraq. Civillians or servicemembers, it didn't matter to them. Americans are Americans, and crossing a few borders to kill us in Iraq is way easier than attacking our own soil. In the words of former Iraeli commando Aaron Cohen, "There are more than enough Americans to shoot in Iraq".

So our worst fears were realized ironically because of our actions. From the beginning of the insurgency to today, al-Qaeda has been coordinating attacks in Iraq. They were invited by the Sunni Muslims who had been disenfranchized by the new Iraqi government and the Coalition. The Sunnis felt they had made a good descision when they saw al-Qaeda's leader in Iraq help command insurgents in the biggest battle of the war. Abu Musab al-Zarqawi led the Sunnis in the Battle of Falluja, that would innevitably lead to the deaths of 151 Americans and the wounding of over 1,000 more. The Sunnis later realized that they had made a deal with the devil when al-Zarqawi, decided that a civil war in Iraq would be the worst possible event for the Coalition. This is when al-Qaeda began to attack Iraqi civilians along with Coalition troops. To this very day, they bomb mosques and other public buildings in the country with hopes that the different ethnic groups in Iraq accuse each other for the attacks and go to war with each other.

By 2007, Iraq had come extremely close to that civil war. Most of the secarianism was centered around Baghdad, where there were and are several factions that surround the capital. The year 2007 was also the blodiest for the coalition as almost 1,000 died in that year alone. It seems al-Zarqawi was right. The more the Iraqis killed each other the worst the situation got. Of coure Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's deeds didn't go unrewarded. The Coalition eventaully dropped a couple of 500-pound bombs on his safehouse, killing him, one of his wives, one of his children, and four others.


Critics of the Global War on Terror (GWOT) often complain that the Coalition's military actions have only increased terrorism worldwide. Lokking at Iraq, I must agree with them. Of course, at the same time, supporters of the GWOT often clain that fighting terrorists in the Middle East is keeping them from attcking us here. This is also partially true, because as previously mentioned, no logical terrorist is going all the way to the United States to kill Americans when there are some in their backyard. Unfortunately, not all terrorists. On Chrismas Day, 2009, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, a radicalized youth from Nigeria tried to blow up Northwest Airlines Flight 253 which was loaded with 290 passengers. This attempt failed, but according to many Counter-Terrorist experts including Carl Stiner and Aaron Cohen, this is not the last attempt. It takes time to plan these attacks, but with hatred motivating them, another attack by terrorists is inevitable. The wars in Iraq and Afghnistan will do nothing to stop that.