Insurgency and Counter-Insurgency in Iraq

by Ahmed S. Hashim

Overview

Years after the U.S. invasion of Iraq, a loosely organized insurgency continues to target American and Coalition soldiers, as well as Iraqi security forces and civilians, with devastating results. In this sobering account of the ongoing violence, Ahmed Hashim, a specialist on Middle Eastern strategic issues and on irregular warfare, reveals the insurgents behind the widespread revolt, their motives, and their tactics. The insurgency, he shows, is not a united movement directed by a leadership with a single ideological vision. Instead, it involves former regime loyalists, Iraqis resentful of foreign occupation, foreign and domestic Islamist extremists, and elements of organized crime. These groups have cooperated with one another in the past and coordinated their attacks; but the alliance between nationalist Iraqi insurgents on the one hand and religious extremists has frayed considerably. The U.S.-led offensive to retake Fallujah in November 2004 and the success of the elections for the Iraqi National Assembly in January 2005 have led more "mainstream" insurgent groups to begin thinking of reinforcing the political arm of their opposition movement and to seek political guarantees for the Sunni Arab community in the new Iraq.

Hashim begins by placing the Iraqi revolt in its historical context. He next profiles the various insurgent groups, detailing their origins, aims, and operational and tactical modi operandi. He concludes with an unusually candid assessment of the successes and failures of the Coalition's counter-insurgency campaign. Looking ahead, Hashim warns that ethnic and sectarian groups may soon be pitted against one another in what will be a fiercely contested fight over who gets what in the new Iraq. Evidence that such a conflict is already developing does not augur well for Iraq's future stability. Both Iraq and the United States must work hard to ensure that slow but steady success over the insurgency is not overshadowed by growing ethno-sectarian animosities as various groups fight one another for the biggest slice of the political and economic pie.

In place of sensational headlines, official triumphalism, and hand-wringing, Insurgency and Counter-Insurgency in Iraq offers a clear-eyed analysis of the increasingly complex violence that threatens the very future of Iraq.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780801444524
Publisher:	Cornell University Press
Publication date:	03/22/2006
Series:	Crises in World Politics
Pages:	512
Product dimensions:	5.00(w) x 7.50(h) x 1.56(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Ahmed S. Hashim is Professor of Strategic Studies at the U.S. Naval War College. His previous books include Iran: Dilemmas of Dual Containment and Iraq: Sanctions and Beyond, both written with Anthony H. Cordesman.

Editorial Reviews

Another embed at Tal Afar was Ahmed S. Hashim, an academic who has taught at the US Navy War College and served three tours advising the US command in Iraq. His analysis of the battle from the front line in Insurgency and Counter-Insurgency in Iraq diverges sharply from the official line given by Time and similar publications, and by the BBC, and illustrates the deadly game of war and truth now being played in Iraq, with the latter usually coming off worse.

Times Literary Supplement - Robert Fox

Ahmed Hashim is well-placed to study the Iraqi insurgents and their opponents. An American of Turkish-Eygptian origin, he is a professor at the Naval War College and was an advisor to the American authorities following Saddam Hussein's fall, both in Baghdad and in hotbeds of violence such as Tel Afar, near the Syrian border. His bleak appraisal may well be the most detailed analysis yet of the insurgency and America's efforts to squash it.

The Economist

"Another embed at Tal Afar was Ahmed S. Hashim, an academic who has taught at the US Navy War College and served three tours advising the US command in Iraq. His analysis of the battle from the front line in Insurgency and Counter-Insurgency in Iraq diverges sharply from the official line given by Time and similar publications, and by the BBC, and illustrates the deadly game of war and truth now being played in Iraq, with the latter usually coming off worse."—Robert Fox, Times Literary Supplement, 16 December 2005

"Ahmed Hashim is well-placed to study the Iraqi insurgents and their opponents. An American of Turkish-Eygptian origin, he is a professor at the Naval War College and was an advisor to the American authorities following Saddam Hussein's fall, both in Baghdad and in hotbeds of violence such as Tel Afar, near the Syrian border. His bleak appraisal may well be the most detailed analysis yet of the insurgency and America's efforts to squash it."—The Economist, 4 February 2006

"Hashim has written a much-needed assessment of the Iraqi insurgency. . . . His interviews and experience there, combined with his use of primary sources, have resulted in a compelling account of the socioeconomic factors that spur the insurgency as well as the problems, both political and strategic, that have fed its growth and hampered U.S. counterinsurgency efforts. Hashim has succeeded in putting together an analysis of the violent situation in Iraq that avoids ideological posturing."—John Russell, Library Journal, June 15, 2006

From the Publisher