Thursday November 30, 9:20 PM
ANALYSIS: Plans for Iraqi Forces Vague
President Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki both told an anxious world Thursday that they want to speed the handover of security responsibility to Iraqi forces as a way to calm the country. But neither gave a clue as to how they might accomplish that difficult task.
The problem is that more guns, military training or even more U.S. troops are unlikely to result in a strong, capable Iraqi force without Baghdad solving the underlying problem _ sectarian militias infiltrating Iraq's government and police and engaging in reprisal killings that are tearing the country apart.
Even in his private talks with Bush, al-Maliki was noncommittal when probed on his plans to deal with the Mahdi Army militia blamed for much of the sectarian violence, according to a top al-Maliki aide at the meeting.
The Iraqi prime minister said only that it would not be a "big problem" to handle the group, the aide said, speaking on condition of anonymity because the meeting was private.
Yet so far, despite continued vague promises, al-Maliki has done very little to curb such militias. That has become a key frustration of the Bush administration, according to an internal memo by a top Bush aide.
In that memo obtained by The New York Times, National Security Adviser Stephen J. Hadley said it was unclear if al-Maliki was simply refusing to take steps to slow the militias' power and drum them out of Iraq's security forces _ or if he lacked the power to do so.
It's unclear if Bush got more satisfaction on that troubling question.
Publicly, the president said only that he was "reassured by (al-Maliki's) commitment to a ... a society in which people are held into account who break the law _ whether these people will be criminals al-Qaida, militia, (or) whoever."
The Iraqi prime minister said publicly only that the al-Sadr political wing and its Mahdi militia are "just one component" of his ruling coalition.
All that leaves unclear if al-Maliki will take new, bold steps at a time when Shiite-dominated death squads and their Sunni enemies engage each day in brutal bloodletting.
Bush did pledge that U.S. forces will stay in Iraq as long as needed. He gave strong words of support for the Iraqi leader, showing no sign of tension over al-Maliki's abrupt decision to skip an earlier meeting with Bush and Jordan's king.
Yet that Wednesday night snub also strongly hints at future trouble.
The Bush administration has hoped to calm Iraq in part by getting Sunni insurgent sympathizers into talks with al-Maliki's Shiite-led government. It has pushed Sunni allies like Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia to take the lead.
But al-Maliki's refusal to talk to Bush in front of Jordan's king showed a startling level of distrust toward at least one of his Sunni neighbors _ distrust that can only hamper the U.S. effort.
It may signal even worse _ the possible start of a region-wide Sunni-Shiite split, spilling over from Iraq, that America may be powerless to control.
Few things would be more harmful to Iraq than if Mideast countries began "taking sides" in its internal fight, sharpening the Shiite-Sunni split and the march toward all-out civil war.
No effort to avoid a full-blown civil war in Iraq can ever succeed without "a lasting political compromise between its key (Shiite and Sunni) factions," one expert, Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said recently.
The meeting between Bush and al-Maliki showed little progress toward that, and perhaps even some signs that things could get worse.
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Sally Buzbee is the AP's Chief of Middle East News.