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 The prospect of Iranian-backed militias leading efforts to retake
Ramadi underlines Washington’s dwindling options to defeat Islamic
State in Iraq, with Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi’s grip on power
weak, a national army still in its infancy and Tehran increasingly
assertive.
Islamic State's capture of Ramadi, despite months of U.S.-led air
strikes and military advice, marked a fresh low for the shattered
Iraqi army, which beat a chaotic retreat from the city over the
weekend.
Abadi immediately turned to the Shi'ite militia groups, backed by
Iran, which together have become the most powerful military force in
Iraq since the national army first collapsed last June in the face
of sweeping Islamic State gains.
A column of 3,000 Shi'ite militia fighters arrived on Monday at a
military base near Ramadi, the capital of Sunni-majority Anbar
province that has long been a center of opposition to Iraq's
Shi'ite-led government.
One U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, described
Ramadi as "a powder keg" and said any use of militia has "got to be
dealt with very, very delicately."
"There's the potential it can go very, very badly," the official
said, without predicting such an outcome.
 U.S. officials said Washington was deeply divided about the
involvement of Shi'ite militias with links to Iran, a U.S. rival
that has been expanding its influence throughout the Middle East.
After spearheading the recapture of Tikrit, some Shi'ite fighters
last month went on a spree of burning, looting, and violence in the
Sunni Iraqi city, according to local residents.
"There are people in our government who see any involvement of Iran
as anathema. There are others who say the Shi'ite involvement will
promote sectarian violence. There are others who say that's not
true," a second U.S. official said on condition of anonymity.
One U.S. intelligence official said one concern was that Islamic
State could use the involvement of Shi'te militias to itself stir up
sectarian hatred.
RISK OF ALIENATING SUNNIS
But the reality, analysts said, is that Iraq's government does not
appear to have enough Sunni forces at its disposal to make an
assault on Ramadi.
U.S. President Barack Obama reluctantly started bombing Islamic
State targets last year after it seized swathes of Iraq but he has
made clear his desire not to let U.S. troops get sucked back into a
conflict he vowed to end when he first ran for president.
The loss of Ramadi comes a month after Obama gave Abadi a warm
welcome in Washington, backing the Shi'ite politician to bridge
Iraq's sectarian divide and forge a strong national army to take the
fight to Islamic State.
"We never tried to stop it," the second official said of Abadi's
recourse to Shi'ite militias. "You got to fight with the army you
got, and this is the army they got."
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Another official said the United States could support "all elements"
of forces aligned against Islamic State, including the Shi'ite
militias that are nominally under Baghdad government control.
"But, as we have said, there must be clear (Iraqi security force)
command and control, sound planning, and coordination wherever
possible with local leaders," the official added.
To be sure, atrocities by Shi'ite militias could force the United
States to rethink its support.
Republican senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, among the most
outspoken critics of Obama’s foreign policy, called the fall of
Ramadi "a sad reminder of this administration’s indecisive air
campaign” and a broader lack of strategy.
They also expressed concern about Iranian-backed Shi'ite militias
launching an offensive.
"Whatever operational success (Shi'ite) militias may have in Anbar
would be far exceeded by the strategic damage caused by their
violent sectarianism and the fear and suspicion it breeds among
Iraqi Sunnis," they said.
"With neither the United States nor Gulf Arab states willing to
deploy their ground troops and the Iraqi armed forces in disarray,
Iraq has little choice but to turn to the militias," said Bruce
Riedel, a former senior CIA expert on the region who is now at the
Brookings Institution in Washington.
"The flaw in the coalition strategy for the last year is weak ground
forces. Given the constraints on the U.S. and its Arab allies, the
only viable ground force option is Iranian-led Shi'ite Iraqis," he
said.
"Of course this will alienate the Sunnis -- both in Iraq and in
Saudi Arabia -- but Baghdad has no other serious option."
(Additional reporting by Roberta Rampton and Patricia Zengerle;
editing by Stuart Grudgings.; Writing By Arshad Mohammed)
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