WEBCASTS: ISW WEBCAST WITH COL FLYNN AND MAJ BROOKE
ISW Webcast Transcript
COL CHARLES FLYNN and MAJ MATTHEW BROOKE, 1BCT/82nd Airborne Division
Interview Conducted By
DR. KIM KAGAN, Institute for the Study of War
COL FLYNN: Thanks for having us.
DR. KAGAN: I am eager to talk with you about your experiences during the surge and the experiences of your brigade, and I would really love if you would begin by explaining what your missing was at the beginning of the surge and what kind of forces you had available.
COL FLYNN: Okay. Well, as I mentioned earlier, you know, as the brigade was getting ready to deploy to Iraq, we initially were being directed that we were going to be up in MND‑North, but as the surge hit, the first battalion of mine deployed with 2nd Brigade which was then a DRB in the 82nd, leaving the brigade with minus an infantry battalion.
DR. KAGAN: DRB stands for?
COL FLYNN: The Division Ready Brigade. Right. Sorry.
DR. KAGAN: Thanks.
COL FLYNN: And so as the forces or as, you know, the brigade continued is modular transformation ‑‑ mind you, we had just come back from Afghanistan ‑‑ we then were given an idea that we would end up being the Sec.4 brigade at the tail end of the surge because we were going to deploy in June anyways, so ‑‑ but we were minus a brigade.
So, anyways, we ended up deploying in June as the SEC‑4 brigade, and really at the same period of time as the surge forces went out, though not formally designated as one of the five surge brigades, we really did come in at the same time, and we replaced a National Guard brigade, the 34th Brigade out of the Minnesota National Guard.
And our mission initially upon arrival in Iraq was to be the Security Forces Brigade, which effectively secured all the logistics convoys going from Southern Iraq all the way up into Northern Iraq, and then we had another battalion task force out west which basically did the convoy security between al‑Asad and the Jordanian border and back.
So that was our initial mission going over there. We replaced a 5,500‑man brigade with a 2,500‑man BCT. We did pick up some enablers, and we did pick up a battalion from 2nd Brigade 3rd ID, which was the ‑‑ really the fifth of the five Designated Surge Brigades, and so when I arrived over there, I had a nine‑battalion brigade task force. We were spread out in every MND AO, and we moved effectively on all the MSRs and ASRs, securing all the conveys that were delivering all the commodities and supplies to keep the tempo and the pace of operations sustained in Iraq.
DR. KAGAN: Where were you headquartered?
COL FLYNN: The headquarters was in COB Adder, a Tallil airfield in the south, just west of the City of Nasiriyah.
DR. KAGAN: What is actually involved in securing a convoy, and why would we need a BCT, a Brigade Combat Team, to do that ‑‑
COL FLYNN: Yeah.
DR. KAGAN: ‑‑ during the surge operations?
COL FLYNN: Well, I think that, you know, those materials and commodities that were being delivered, particularly at the height of the surge, ammunition, fuel, water, food, parts, just all of the materials to sustain the tempo that General Petraeus and at the time General Odierno wanted the ‑‑ you know, the brigades in Iraq to maintain, and then, you know, of course, his, you know, direction to get into COBs and JSSs only extended the lines of communication and the supply lines because now we had to deliver to the hubs, but then they had to move all those things out to these various locations to keep the force supplied and outfitted and kitted.
And of course, you know, at the time that we're coming, it's the summer. Violence is very high because now we had five more brigades in Iraq. So things were breaking. So, you know, that's the importance of really being able to move those things and move them when we needed to move them without being interrupted or interdicted by the enemy.
DR. KAGAN: Were there enemy groups trying to interrupt and interdict those supply convoys?
COL FLYNN: Oh, yes.
DR. KAGAN: Who? Who were they?
COL FLYNN: Yeah. I think, you know, in the beginning, it was ‑‑ it was pretty evident to us that ‑‑ that, you know, special groups, JAM at the time ‑‑ we really didn't know exactly what we were confronted with, but you know, the EFPs that were an absolute killer were happening along MSR Tampa, really from where ‑‑ south of us, actually between where we were in Nasiriyah and Basra and then up towards ‑‑ closer towards Diwaniyah, Diwaniyah into Hillah, and then, of course, as we transited in through Baghdad and northern Baghdad, as we were going up to Balad, the threat out west was ‑‑ was greatly reduced at the time. There was really very little going on.
But you know, the movement from north to south and south to north on MSR Tampa and the various other ASRs that you have to skirt through was difficult and really had to do with the JAM elements that were out there conducting this.
MAJ BROOKE: I was reflecting back when we first initially had to do IPB that was about two‑hours long when we briefed it, because we had to brief on every element that was ‑‑ enemy element that was within Iraq, and so to answer your question on who might be attacking those, in the south, what we would call pretty much from Kuwait up to COB Adder, you would actually have folks that would want to try to get the supplies. That would be the folks, the tribal, the Marsh folks, would actually try to interdict the movement, so that we would have to leave a vehicle, and then they would pilfer from that to be able to re‑sell.
But then that's also where once you past COB Adder, you started to see around COB adder and then north up to CSC Scania and into Baghdad ‑‑ you started to see the EFP threat because that was the Shi'a ‑‑
COL FLYNN: Right.
MAJ BROOKE: ‑‑ folks that was in that area, but as soon as you got past al‑Hillah, then you had to work with al‑Qaeda on one side of the road and Shi'a on the other side of the road that are also battling.
And al‑Qaeda typically from our perspective would take target of opportunity, not necessarily wanting to get the goods or anything, but because we were moving on the routes, they would actually try to, you know, either put something along the road or try to interdict us as we go, just to cause us some friction, and that is the same going around in through Baghdad as well. You are on the roads. You are out there. That is where the enemy can go.
And one of the things that Colonel Flynn will hit on is that relationship building was a key thing across the board, more importantly with coalition partners, our own U.S., to know, "Hey, 182 is rolling through your battle space. We might need a little help here because, you know, your back is to the road looking west. Your back is to the road looking east, and we are going right up in between you." So that was very important, and that was the sharing piece to identify what specific groups were there, who was targeting us at the time, and then be able to share with the battle space owners of those areas and say, "Hey, this is what we're seeing. Can you get us a little artillery here, maybe a little coverage from Eye in the Sky, et cetera, to be able to help us out?"
COL FLYNN: Right.
MAJ BROOKE: So it was very complex coming in. It got a little more simple, even though it is still complex, later on because as we expanded out from the 500 meters from the road and really focused on our operation environment that we could ‑‑ or the brigade commander could directly affect and influence in the south there.
DR. KAGAN: What do you mean by that? What caused you essentially to spread from the road? What were you trying to accomplish in creating a wider security zone than simply to transit out?
COL FLYNN: Right. Well, you know, vice just protecting the physical movement of the vehicles, I guess from my perspective, it was ‑‑ initially, I think we started by saying we needed, you know, to be able to secure a thousand meters off the sides of the road because we were really just trying to prevent complex attacks from occurring, not just an IED, but an IED followed by mortars, followed by small arms fire, followed by an assault force, because there were those events that did go on, and I was ‑‑ this wasn't long after the kids from the 10th Mountain were grabbed as hostages.
I was afraid, you know, we had six vehicles out there. They are escorting 40 trucks, and you know, having eight convoys back to back to back throughout. I was concerned that one of the elements would be isolated, and I'm just talking about a single vehicle, and then now we've got a hostage situation in the middle of the night when one of these complex attacks happens along Tampa.
So we immediately started ‑‑ really I guess because of the nature of who we are and what we do, we just framed it as a movement to contact every night and day. So it was okay, we're going to protect the vehicles going up the road, but then we are going to get off a thousand meters and be able to engage or deny, disrupt and/or defeat any forces that were going to be trying to hinder our movement, and by doing that, it forced us to ‑‑ you know, we extended our patrolling off of Tampa. We put our cops out along Tampa.
When we first got there, we had five. We shrunk down to three because we found them to be in better positions, and when out there, it was really a combined arms fight that had human collection teams, and they had ‑‑ you know, they were doing CMO operations. They were engaged in the travel sheets. They were talking with the police.
The Iraqi Highway Police at the time when we arrived was ‑‑ was really nonexistent. I mean they were almost the ‑‑ you know, they were the cops that showed up at the police station and said, "Hey, you go to the highway today," you know, because they were left out there effectively alone and with no vehicles, no uniforms, barely any ammunition.
Well, we really started talking to those guys and getting them to ‑‑ well, I guess collectively, we were saying, "Hey, look, these guys need some help, and if you can help them, Iraqi Police, then they can help you. They can help commerce move from point to point. They can help the population just feel better about getting on Tampa and driving between Basra and Baghdad and doing it in, you know, three hours vice having to take six hours to go up the bumpy roads on the side and going through every town.
So, you know, it was not just what we needed to do to move our supplies and protect our forces. It was also, you know, on concert with the Iraqi Police and Highway Police in this particular case to open up those roads, so that the population can move on it as well, and that's ‑‑
I think that, coupled with our ‑‑ you know, the relationships that we have with each of the BCTs as we moved around through Iraq were critical to the success of this. I mean I think the coordination of intelligence sharing, the coordination of using attack aviation, using artillery, using mortars, knowing where their friendly forces were that may have been in an OP or checkpoint or laying in an ambush, and being able to talk to those forces as we were moving up through all these various brigade areas.
You have got division boundaries, brigade boundaries, battalion boundaries. So our guys in each of these convoys were talking to them, and they would do things that would disrupt the enemy and basically pull that threat off of the main roads where we were moving all these convoys.
DR. KAGAN: Could you give me an example of something that happened in a brigade?
COL FLYNN: Yeah. Before each one of these convoys would take off, the convoy commander would basically get a briefing on where they thought the ‑‑ we called them "elevated threat zones" at the time. EFPs or complex attacks would go on.
Some of those would be outside of our area, which I contend to be south, but as it got up closer to Baghdad ‑‑ for example, at the time, it was 425 I think was just south of Baghdad. It was pretty early on. We coordinated for them to fire illum rounds over Tampa as the convoy was coming up.
In one instance, there were illum rounds fired. The convoy stopped really at the time to do a little bit of arrest halt, but when the illum rounds were fired, there was some attack aviation that was sent in after they picked up a hot spot. The convoy had to get moving again. They picked up and started moving. They were engaged, and the convoy then stopped, reengaged the enemy, but then called in the attack aviation that was actually working for 425 at the time, but because of the coordination that was done, now we had attack aviation over the top of this enemy cell that was out putting in an IED, EFP around the complex of attack, and they were killed. And there was a number of events that occurred like that.
And I think that by doing that and bringing in really a combined‑arms fight on those elements along the MSR, that began to take away their initiative because now they were being ‑‑ now they were being disrupted, destroyed, and defeated by direct fire, by indirect fire, by attack aviation, and we had a better idea of where they were going to do these ambushes on us because we were doing a really good job of collecting intelligence about their patterns that they have as well because they do ‑‑ they did have patterns as well, so ‑‑
DR. KAGAN: When you were engaging a long MSR Tampa, you mentioned that you were engaging tribal sheiks. Why, and for what purpose?
COL FLYNN: Yeah. Well, in the provinces that we were operating in, you really had these different groups that were connected to the city capitals, like Diwaniyah, Samara or Samawah, Nasiriyah, and in these three provinces, the tribal sheiks, I think were an important part to having access to what do the people really need in these provinces.
It was a rural area. There wasn't a lot of money that was being pumped into some of the needs of the people, bridges, electricity, jobs, and so early on, I think we engaged them in order to help with employment and with trying to find out from them what they felt the problem was in their areas.
Matt, if you want to ‑‑
MAJ BROOKE: Well, it is really interesting because you have to think about the tribal folks are the ones that have always maintained their presence there.
A lot of the people that we worked with, the governors and the leaders of the provinces, actually lived in Iran, you know, Governor Ogeli for 21 years. So these are the folks that had to put up with dictatorship for so many years and been beaten down, and they have never been really invited to the table since we have come in that we had saw in the south.
Our predecessors did work with them a little bit on small projects, but it would be one tribal sheik on one little water project versus bringing them in, as Colonel Flynn said, and having their voice be heard, so that when the provincial council meets, they can actually listen to the people to say this is what we need to have done, whether it be as simple as a fertilization product, a date plant, whatever it may be, but they actually get a voice in it.
And that was very important because as we will see later, as our tour went on, there was actually formation of three tribal battalions to assist the Iraqi Security Forces, and that was some of the issues that we will talk about once we get to the January time frame, but they were very important because they actually provided a layer of security not only for their tribe, but also for the social population that they were around because they are not all living out as Bedouins. Some are in the cities as well, so they can help protect themselves.
But it's interesting because this whole thread that we will talk about today, you have to uncover a lot of things, and what I mean by that is it's almost layers, and the way you do that is you have to be present. We will tal about this as far as, you know, timelines and all that, that other people decide way above us, but it is very important to have those layers uncovered to know where you need to go and have specific gates that have to be passed through.
My example I wanted to give earlier when we were talking about the enemy was it is like taking the LAPD and dropping them in New York with no databases, no background, and say go. That is what we are still facing because we ‑‑ it is an economy of force mission was the south. We needed to move stuff through there, but you know, the Iraqis got it. We are going to let them do it, but the embers were always there, and they were always festering. We will say that a little bit later as well, but who was stoking those fires just to the east, as we will talk about those guys east of Iraq.
So it is very important to know that because until we started to pull back the layers by getting with the tribal guys, getting with the IHPs, getting with the IPs, and know who is good, better, ugly in them because you are going to have that, that is going on, and getting down on the ground to understand why, you know, besides the fact, "I am unemployed. I am going to meet at the bus stop. Somebody is going to come by and give me $50 to put this on the side of the road. I don't know why, but I am going to do it because I want to feed my family," to get in that decision‑making process.
So that is why it is very important, you know. The expand from the road really was to expand our tentacles in to get a better understanding of our operational environment. Then that way, he, Colonel Flynn, then could put focus and direction in our overall plan and strategy to be able to help, you know, them move forward for that piece.
DR. KAGAN: Which tribes in particular were tribes that you identified as those unique to work with in the early stages, in the pre‑January stages, and how did you identify those?
MAJ BROOKE: I will be generic in answering this first. All those that know and wanted to gives names of. In other words, the ones that were coming forward all the time, we pacified them to continue talking, but we went after the ones that no one had even brought up. If you would say the name, you got me cold on. I am giving you one of those names, but it would be a name that no one would talk about in the circles of when you are talking about the tribes because it doesn't have 20,000 members in it.
So, really, later on as well ‑‑ I will stop saying later on, we'll get to it, but really even in Amara is we treated all 24 of the tribal sheiks that came in equally.
COL FLYNN: Yeah.
MAJ BROOKE: That was very important to do that because, you know, it's little kids. If this guy gets it, then this guy wants to have it. So you have to be kind of patient with that, but ‑‑
COL FLYNN: I think the Combat Outpost, you know, between Scania and the three that we had effectively down to Nasiriyah, their engagement at really the lowest level to help bring ‑‑ you know, to help them have a voice in the needs, and we really kind of weaved that I think between the tribal sheiks back to the PRT leaders because one of the unique things that we had was we had three provincial reconstruction teams right at Nasiriyah with us. And Muthanna and Dhi Qar and Maysan were right there. So we were able to leverage, you know, some of the cross‑talk between what the PRT leader was getting, what a rep maybe from USAID was getting, to what our guys at the Combat Outposts were getting and bring all of that back and then say, "Okay. Well, you know, really this area needs a little more of this."
Jobs. I mean I remember one meeting we went to in Muthanna. We come in with these big ideas. We wanted to build a powerplant.
MAJ BROOKE: Powerplant.
[Laughter.]
COL FLYNN: You know, do this and do that, and the only thing they wanted, they wanted a bridge to get across this river, so that the kids could go to school ‑‑
MAJ BROOKE: Kids could go to school.
COL FLYNN: ‑‑ on the other side of the bridge, and they had been trying to build this footbridge for, you know, whatever, five, six years, and they kept saying no one is doing anything about it, and so ‑‑ but you know, it took this, going from our grand ideas to just a simple footbridge.
And now what we did was we connected tribes. We connected families. We connected the community, and you know, all of a sudden, you get a lot of goodwill out of something like that because that bridge went up in ‑‑
MAJ BROOKE: No time at all.
COL FLYNN: ‑‑ I don't know ‑‑ about three ‑‑ about three months, it was done.
MAJ BROOKE: Yep.
COL FLYNN: And now we had people going to markets. They could move their small carts and donkeys and even their small, little, you know, Hilux trucks that go. I mean it was a simple fix, but it made great strides.
One other thing I'll say about the tribes in the south particularly, as you know, we were co‑located with a Romanian battalion, the Australian battalion. We were really operating in the U.K.'s battle space down there. I mean Muthanna and Dhi Qar and Maysan province was part of the MND‑Southeast.
The Australians and the Romanians had good insights on the tribal sheiks, you know. They had been down there continually for three, four years. They would hand off the names of the tribal sheiks and those tribes that had been, I guess, engaged.
I think what Matt touched on before was an important point. We began to touch other tribes that had not been addressed by the Australians and the Romanians and the Brits. So now we were expanding that outreach, if you will, to tribes that had been marginalized or really not had ‑‑ paid no attention to.
And I think in doing that, it gave them a voice that they previously did not have, and so by empowering them a little bit and making them part of the community, if you will, now we really had U.S. forces touching into these tribes, Australian forces touching into them, Romanian forces, and I think that helped those tribal sheiks have a voice, you know, that previously was not being heard.
And again, I think the power of the location that we had, where we were co‑located with three PRTs, the Gulf Region South Corps of Engineers, of course, the 1st and 82nd, the Australians, the Romanians, Special Forces, was really a pretty powerful joint and coalition partnership of capabilities that could then really expand the influence of what we needed to do.
I used to use that a lot with all of the leaders that were working there because I really do think it was ‑ you know, General Petraeus came down early on and said, "Well you got to be larger than you are," and ‑‑ because we were really, you know, a brigade minus, but we had all these forces all over Iraq. But I think he knew sort of instinctively that, you know, we did need to be larger than we were in the south in order to find out more about what was going on, and that is exactly what we ‑‑ really what we did.
I mean that comment he made to me, it really resonated with me because it was like, well, we extend over four provinces. We are into the fifth province up in Babil, and there is no other U.S. brigade down here. I am not working for Division Headquarters. I really do have to be larger than I am, and I am not going to get a lot of resources to help me do it. So I have got to leverage everything I have at COB Adder to do that, and all of those elements that I spoke of before allowed us to have that reach.
DR. KAGAN: So, as you expanded into this large area, did you start to get a sense that it was a problem that there were not other U.S. forces in the area? Were there a number of enemy groups functioning in the area that really needed to be addressed that were not being addressed?
MAJ BROOKE: Well, I think as we expanded, it was, as I mentioned, the layers. It was interesting because as you get a better situational feel, you almost have to take it as an example of being on the street ‑‑ is the individuals that are on the street are going to know the current talk‑about, if you will.
So, in regards to friendly, they are going to say, "Man, I have been seeing those 82nd Airborne guys everywhere," even though we may have been only a couple places, but that is how it gets passed.
But it's the same thing can be held true. They are going to know the neighbor or the folks that are hanging out in the house that are doing bad things. So, in lieu of the fact that there is U.S., a lot of the comments we have would be like "I've never seen a coalition forces soldier in my village before until you came," "I had never seen a U.S. person in here until you guys had come as well," because you got to remember, you know, the Sec.4 mission up until that point was COB Adder‑specific and run, run up and down the roads, and we left it to our coalition partners, and that's a lot of space. As they became smaller, they being our coalition partners became smaller, they had inability to cover that vast amount of around.
And what we would tend to do is we would try to get outside, if you will, the suburban areas, vice the center of the city, because one of the things that we will discuss is Provincial Iraqi Control, and PIC is very important because they will say, "Oh, you are in PIC environment. You couldn't do much." No, not true.
You can still do everything you need to do, but you are working with that government.
COL FLYNN: Right.
MAJ BROOKE: You are letting them know. It would be like if I want to do ‑‑ going back to my LA and New York cop vignette is if I was just going to have them come in and assist me, you are going to let the governor know. You know, you are not going to swing by and just kind of go in it. Well, if you do, you get in trouble, but you are going to let them know that, and that is the same thing that Colonel Flynn would do, but that helped cross‑talk not only one way to say, hey, we are not only going to do this engagement, but you know, we're going to go and probably take a look at this guy and probably remove him. What if you guys ‑‑ you guys ‑‑ no what if you do, not if ‑‑ you will. You guys take the lead, which they would, and then we will support you in what we call a scalable support package to support them to go in that area, and that is really that relationship and that partnership building that was so critical.
And then all of a sudden ‑‑ we were talking about this today ‑‑ they would always touch you, but that is important because now they are going to touch you and they are going to share with you, and they are going to tell you the good things they are working on and then the struggles they are having to move forward.
COL FLYNN: I don't want to underestimate the ability for us to do that, though. We allow ‑‑ we gave ourselves time and space by taking the MSR Tampa corridor back.
In other words, when we didn't have to be in a fight every night, like we were when we first got there, because it literally was every night, five or six, you know, attacks each night, when we didn't have to do that anymore ‑‑ of course, we were ready for it, but when we were able to expand out and expand our influence by using the Combat Outpost and by leveraging the PRTs, by synchronizing and coordinating with the Army Corps of Engineers projects that they were working, by collaborating the intelligence between the Australians, the Romanians, the U.S. Special Forces, by doing all of that, it really allowed us to uncover some things that really had not been previously addressed.
To your point about having other U.S. forces down there, I didn't really see that as a problem. I mean I honestly ‑‑ you know, though not on a formal organization chart, because the Australian battalion was really working for the British brigade down in Basra, but quite frankly, it was hard for them to work for the British brigade in Basra because the British brigade in Basra was pretty busy with just Basra.
So, you know, I just kind of ‑‑ I sort of used that location and said, hey, you know, to both the Australian battalion commanders that were there and the Romanian battalion commanders that were there, "Use me as your brigade commander. I can give you resources, and you can give us resources," and by sharing that information, I think that we really kind of helped one another out.
So I didn't think there was ‑‑ I never felt like we needed more U.S. forces down there. I just felt like what we had, we needed to spread out and do more, and by doing more, I think, you know, it addressed some things that previously had not been really addressed.
DR. KAGAN: So what happened in January?
COL FLYNN: Do you want to start and then I'll come in?
MAJ BROOKE: Sure. Well, it is important to note, to build up to January, that the Australians, that was their battle space, you know, An Nasiriyah, the surrounding area, Suq Ash Shuyukh, et cetera. It is important to know that, but we would assist in the intelligence piece or other assets that we could coordinate for.
As Colonel Flynn mentioned, you know, as we came with EFPs being very important, but then also complex attacks, and we really had not seen them at a certain level.
Important to thread into this to get to January is what those stoker of the embers was doing at this present time was they were ‑‑ the Iranians were actually assisting the Shi'a insurgency inside of Iraq around our area, meaning they would have a specialized mortar expert. They would have guys that could do rockets, guys that could do EFP stuff. So they were really like next to them as we moved through the late summer, early fall. Okay.
There was a couple key assassinations that occurred in August. The governor of Qadisiyyah, which is above us, and then Muthanna as well were assassinated, which had key linkage to Iran as well.
That is very important because from that time forward, August was the same month that Muqtada al‑Sadr put his edict out to basically stand down what we call "JAM," okay, because later on the special group piece comes into play, but ‑‑ so, as this is moving forward, what we are seeing is a pulling of folks to the east, to the other country in Iran there, to go over there and receive training, and this was shared with us by the ISF as well that were tracking on some of these key entities from their population centers that were going over to receive what I would call like, you know, ILE for a major, the higher level where you are going to help plan, coordinate, orchestrate, not necessarily execute.
So those common street thugs that we have been giving a little bit of that up from the past on were actually now growing in fame, if you will. They were the ones being recruited over to help do this.
So, in January time frame, speaking of which, I want to also bring in the tribal battalions because this is very important to this incident that took place on 18 January 2007 ‑‑ 2008.
COL FLYNN: '8, yeah.
MAJ BROOKE: Sorry. A year behind.
Is Abu Bakar was actually a critical node leader inside of An Nasiriyah for the police force. He was like the SWAT commander, if you will, for easy terms, and he was working with the governor. He was, but he was ‑‑ he was laying down the law, and he was being fair and impartial, honestly, you know, because we talk about sectarian violence, et cetera, but he would go after those.
I mean it was 98‑percent Shi'a. so it is not really a lot of Sunnis there. There is not too many there.
But what occurred was the ‑‑ the scary part, what occurred was the planning and the coordination and the movement of weapons and systems that were used on that day because what they did was they attacked the An Nasiriyah tribal battalion headquarters because they knew exactly what impact what would give.
The impact or the reaction would be Abu Bakar and several others would rush to assist them because that is part of the Dubar [ph] tribe. That is the big tribe that he was associated with or that he is a member of.
Upon arriving, it was an L‑shaped ambush that actually decapitated literally four or five critical ISF leaders, and it is important to note that because as we saw an ebb and flow of the insurgency in the south, when they couldn't be successful against coalition forces, they would turn more towards Shi'a and Shi'a violence, and also they would look more towards assassinations, whether it would be the August piece we talked about or whether it would be these critical cases.
Removing a man like Abu Bakar, you know, we were worried because we actually did some red‑teaming and said, "Hey, you need to put on a Kevlar," or you know, an ACH. You need to put on body armor, and that just wasn't his nature.
So, when he got up in the coupla [ph], they take over the gun, that's, you know, when the snipers hit him, but we did see from that, though ‑‑ and really, as we tell this story, it is very important because the timeline is extremely important because the ISF maturity that continued to go on through this time, this is really we are hitting another culminating point in January because they rebound from it.
They lose four of their top five guys, but then they come back. They end up getting a new police chief later on, but there was not ‑‑ there were a couple of flare‑ups in February‑March, and they were able to handle those by working with the governor, working with the IA, which was really a new level that had been ingested into there because there had only been a brigade there, and they moved the Basa‑rine [ph] 10th up to An Nasiriyah. So that hadn't been seen.
But that ‑‑ altogether, that partnership really, but that was the incident that happened in January, and it had big repercussions because the fall‑out was in February, an attack on Suq Ash Shuyukh on the OMS office that actually completely obliterated it to the ground, that was Abu Bakar's brother.
DR. KAGAN: who attacked the office?
COL FLYNN: That was ‑‑ well, basically, I wouldn't say attack. They went to arrest the insurgents, to include the head OMS leader that was there, to arrest them for, you know, basically the attacks that happened in January, and what we said was a lot of these guys were what we'd say ‑‑ you know, Tom Clancy hit me in the knee ‑‑ but a sleeper cell, and not so much that they are crazy and all that, but they would just go about their normal business, but when called upon, each of them had a special capability that they could bring together, and this lashes out to the coordination of meetings that were occurring to the east. So, when they did that, they could come back, and then they could give specific guidance of how they were going to set up the attack, where you were going to situation yourself, how we are going to do the mortars and the rockets to the tribal battalion, and then how we are going to ambush those key ISF officials as they are rolling through there.
COL FLYNN: You know, there was another attack in January almost simultaneously in this attack in Nasiriyah in Basra. At the time, you're kind of in the middle of it, but there was definitely a connection to it, and so that, you know, gave us some insights on that connection between the special groups and criminals that were operating in the Maysan, Amara, Basra, Basra and Nasiriyah‑Dhi Qar area and the routes that were leading into Iraq out of Iran.
MAJ BROOKE: Yeah.
COL FLYNN: So, to touch on a point that Matt was talking about earlier, leading up to this, these attacks that occurred in January, you know, there was ‑‑ the attacks started going down for a wide range of reasons I talked to before, one, because, you know, the surge forces were out and getting after it. We were able to defeat them at least in our area to take the MSRs and ASRs back from them. We were interdicting their AA&E flow and finding cache. So they had less ammunition, if you will, to go conduct some of these attacks.
And I think that when we saw that shift away from moving arms and ammunition and equipment and do more of an investment and train the trainer and bring these people back into these areas, that may have previously just been a mid‑level kind of criminal, you know, tribally based smuggling network, now all of a sudden he was getting money and training to go conduct attacks against coalition forces or Iraqi forces.
You know, between the months of January and March when everything unfolded down in Basra, that was really a key, key point down there because it really gave us some insights as to what the connections were between Amara and Basra and Nasiriyah and Baghdad and Diwaniyah and Hillah.
MAJ BROOKE: Right. And it was really that pressure that had never been seen because Sadr City, oh, by the way, was going on.
COL FLYNN: Right.
MAJ BROOKE: And so you had all these pressure points being placed down where we had always saw individual cells, if you will, but now with that pressure, you started seeing cells that never talked to each other start to talk to each other and do coordination for movement sometimes to go opposite ways, to get supplies, AA&E ‑‑
COL FLYNN: Yep.
MAJ BROOKE: ‑‑ and then also coordination with some of the HVIs, and really it would be remiss to say some of the critical nodes also, besides the huge changes, were the HVI pieces, you know, with the SWAT teams all the way from Southern Baville [ph] down to Nasiriyah.
The ODA teams were marvelous in those areas, and then our troopers as well, to really go through the whole targeting cycle and deem a target as an HVI, to get the evidence, to get a warrant through the Iraqi courts, which that is probably a bigger thing that people gloss over a lot of times because, you know, to get into their decision cycle is why is, you know, Bad Guy Brooke, why is he bad, and a lot of times, we'd see a warrant that just said "terrorism," and we'd say can you define us a little more. "Well, yes, he had these ammunitions. We feel he was responsible for this attack."
But that was very critical because you got to remember ‑‑ and you know this, but a lot of people forget that, you know, 2003 really is the beginning stage, and we're talking about politically, socially, economically a population that has been held down for so long, specifically the Shi'a, to be able to ‑‑ i's like ‑‑ like we were talking the other day, it's like giving your car to your 10‑year‑old, you know. They're ‑‑ I mean ‑‑ and it's not to be mean against the Shi'a. They've very good people, but the analogy has to be taken in that context because they are just not quite ready to drive.
So ‑‑ but how long do you stay in that driver or that passenger side, you know, that ‑‑ heaven forbid, I never want to be a student teacher for driving, driver's ed, but that's what we do because overwatch is really being in that driver ‑‑ that passenger side, to let them be able to drive on their own, and it's difficult because it's going to affect us because if they go off the road, you're going to crash as well, but how much do you want to grab the steering wheel, how much do you want to use the brake that's on your side, you know, the right side of the car, and that's ‑‑ that's really the balancing act that Colonel Flynn had to work through to be able to know how much is enough, how much is to hold back, and ‑‑
But we did know from the get‑go that holding back completely does not work. You know, we talk a lot about when we share with our paratroopers internally, both the other brigades is you have to be next to them. If you are not in that passenger‑side car, you are not going to know what is going on. You are not going to know they got the phone call or they are using their text e‑mail and they are not keeping their eyes on the road. You are not going to know those pieces because you are not next to them, and that teenager, just like that strong Iraqi, is not going to share with you unless you are near them as well.
So that is really a critical point as ‑‑ pardon the pun ‑‑ as we drive forward, but that really has to be looked at because politically they start ‑‑ they got a judicial system that works now in the south. We witnessed it firsthand.
Now, is it swayed one way or the other? I mean look at New York in the 1900's. I mean come on. It's going to be swayed a little bit, but at least it's there and stabilized, and that's a piece we're going to hit on as well, like what is needed in the future. It is those subject‑matter experts that are kind of outside the Army's realm to work, you know, how do you manage a budget for your provincial council, how do you make sure that, you know, the lights stay on, that you can run a government functioning, that you are spending the money for the tribes, for all the people, that you are getting education that is at least provided or it's there for everybody that's out there. So it's quite ‑‑
DR. KAGAN: Let me backtrack ‑‑
[Laughter.]
COL FLYNN: Yeah.
DR. KAGAN: ‑‑ and ask you. You talked about the connections that you're first able to see in January between enemy groups and criminal elements and, indeed, Iranian‑trained funded groups ‑‑
MAJ BROOKE: Uh‑huh.
DR. KAGAN: ‑‑ among the southern provinces and into Baghdad. What do you mean by connections?
COL FLYNN: I will touch on this.
Well, there is ‑‑ there is definitely a connection between the City of Amara, Basra, and Sadr City, and I think that Amara, because of its location, just inside of Iraq from Iran, and the lack ‑‑ well, there was no coalition presence there when we arrived. In fact, there was no ‑‑ there were no U.K. forces up there. The PRT hadn't even visited into the province in well over ‑‑ well, almost two years.
So, you know, obviously with transnational sanctuary, you've got them right there in Amara, and Amara is connected to Basra. It's connected to Sadr City in that, effectively, those ‑‑ Sadr City and Hyaniyah [ph] in Basra were built from the tribes that came out of Amara, and so, you know, there's tribal connections. There is ‑‑ there is family connections, and the routes that lead to those locations, they were able to move EFPs and move components, move money, and move people to those locations to conduct attacks against coalition and Iraqi forces. So ‑‑
DR. KAGAN: So is Amara a staging base for both Basra and Sadr City?
COL FLYNN: Yes, no question.
DR. KAGAN: And by staging base, you mean that it was a sanctuary for enemy leadership or a safe haven or a place to put weapons? What purpose did it serve for the special groups and for [inaudible]?
MAJ BROOKE: Well, we witnessed firsthand. It was always a way point, a passthrough, but just as much as it would flow into Basra, it would flow into Maysan as well and unimpeded because no one is going to bother it.
And the piece that Colonel Flynn ‑‑ Colonel Flynn hit on is very important because Saddam built these ‑‑ and I'll call them "camps" ‑‑ to help blue collar workers to build stuff, whether it is to build a dam, to build a powerplant, whatever it is, but that is why these cities were so important, and they had the tribal links together, and they have been transversing back and forth to see them. And they were really like the poor side of town in each, Sadr City, Amara, and also in Basra.
So, even when talking with the ISF, they don't interdict a lot of AA&E when we had spoken with them because, you know, whether it is somebody that is getting paid off to let it go through or not, but the important piece is on ‑‑ yes, Maysan being used as a sanctuary, it could store a lot of stuff, as we witnessed firsthand. Of all the things, "things" being very vague, all the rockets, mortars, EFPs, small arms weapons, C4, all that stuff that we uncovered in really the first 12 days of going into just Amara and then expanding out into Maysan, that really the Iraqi Army and the National Police, along with our guys in the Marines that were part of a MIT, the National Police uncovered, and uncovered I will say by folks telling them where it was located.
The safe haven, that is an interesting one. I would surmise that most of our HVIs would use that to transition back over to Iran.
I would surmise also when the pressure was placed, Sadr City, also Diwaniyah with Operation Lion Pounce in the fall, over into the winter, and then in Basra, that they would traverse in those areas where they would, you know, not be bothered, if you will, and they had sanctuary, and that was, you know, Governor Maliki, not the other Maliki, but from Amara, and they weren't that bad off, but the brigade that was there ‑‑ the two brigades that are there ‑‑ or actually, the one brigade is a part of the 10th, which was right outside our door.
DR. KAGAN: Yeah.
COL FLYNN: Yeah.
MAJ BROOKE: General Habib and crew.
And they were working, you know, working to get better, replacing folks that weren't so tied in heavy, but that is a tie that has been there for, you know, a lot of years, thousands of years of, hey, you know, we're connected this way, let this pass through, and we ‑‑ I also believe ‑‑ my personal opinion is ‑‑ confirmed by the ISF guys, but it is interchangeable, whether it is drugs or whether it is weapons, would move with these individuals, moving, you know, from Iran into Iraq and then the drugs then would push the, you know ‑‑
COL FLYNN: The Iraqis were coming to us, and I mean they were telling us that Amara is a problem. They knew it was a problem too.
You know, how deep they wanted to get into it varied on in terms of who you talked to, but, you know, I know we will talk about this at some point, but really, the watershed event of Prime Minister Maliki making his stand in Basra and, you know, the coalition doing what we were able to do to really take the city back, that had an effect in April and May and June leading up to ‑‑
MAJ BROOKE: Sadr City.
COL FLYNN: ‑‑ when we did go into Amara because now they had lost their sort of ‑‑ their influence and power in Basra because we saw HVIs then leave Basra and either return to wherever they came from or they migrated up to Amara because now ‑‑ now Amara still had no force presence in it. So they were just, you know, where you ‑‑ it's like a spring. You push down hard in Basra, they are going to pop up somewhere else, and they ended up popping up in Amara.
So, you know, that afforded us the ability to, okay, now that we have Basra under control, the Iraqi Army has, you know, regained its credibility, its forces back out in the streets. It is doing what needs to be done, and then we see all of this presence of these people that we had been looking for. In Amara, it became pretty evident, the time that something had to be done.
And I think going back to the comment I made about the Iraqis, when that happened as well, they gained confidence as a result of doing what they did in Basra. So now they were sort of, okay, "We want to go to Amara too, and we know we need to do this. So let's plan. Let's coordinate. Let's try to synchronize what we are going to do."
And you know, I think that there was a lot of good that came out of that as a result of those events really that unfolded.
MAJ BROOKE: And we used to refer to is as the "Whisper Campaign" because, you know, the losses taken by the insurgents in Sadr City and Basra had a great, a huge effect on what was going to transcribe or the outcome of what would happen tomorrow because, as you know, the first 12, 13 days when we went into Amara, zero incidents, you know. Random gunfire here or there, but truly amazing because we had never seen that sense of control over any group because that is where you get into JAM or special groups.
There is always going to be a cowboy out there that wants to go and, you know, put something on the side of the road or go try to interdict somebody, but nothing happened, which is very odd.
And they have had a couple, a couple incidents since our departure, but nothing that we thought we would see. We thought we would see similar to Sadr City and Basra as far as the fight would go, but once again, that was Iraqi led. It was supported by a scalable support package by the coalition forces, and really a theme that could be taken away is ‑‑ and it is no BS ‑‑ the security provide by the Iraqis improved so much on our timetable as we were there, huge leaps and bounds, but they are always going to lack a few items that we have that they don't have yet.
But they won't lack the courage, the determination, and the wherewithal to, you know, really a nationalistic flavor to move their country forward.
A lot of folks that Colonel Flynn and I and the folks in the 182 spoke with is they did not like the negative influence that Iran would pose. Did they like the produce and some of that stuff? Certainly, because that is your basic necessity that you need.
COL FLYNN: I think the haste with which Basra occurred, I mean they took some losses down there, and I think that the next big operation that we did after that was Amara, and Sadr City, of course, was going on effectively at the same time for, you know, a more prolonged period of time, but I think they, you know ‑‑ if we can credit them also with being a learning organization, you know, they learned, "Hey, we don't want to do that again. We don't want to hastily have to move forces into something that is that challenging because we are going to take some losses," and I think that by those experiences and then partnering with us to go to Amara, they felt like, "Well, if we plan it properly, we coordinate it properly, then our chances of going into Amara and, you know, not having this huge battle where we are going to take some more losses will be to our advantage," and that is exactly what unfolded.
I was really happy, and quite frankly, I was surprised. They did a lot of great shaping operations up there ‑‑
MAJ BROOKE: Right.
COL FLYNN: ‑‑ with their own IO ‑‑
MAJ BROOKE: That is the Whisper Campaign.
COL FLYNN: ‑‑ and their own public affairs. They have their own, you know, civil, military, humanitarian assistance deliveries going on. It was really something. You know, it was really ‑‑ it was a great thing to see, as I mentioned to you when you came up there on your visit, so ‑‑ but again, I think they learned that as a result of their previous experiences in Basra and Sadr City and hopefully will continue to do so.
MAJ BROOKE: I can remember sitting at the table, actually snapping a couple pictures just to get a couple of the crew, but to take a look at having the DEJIS [ph], the INIS, having the Army commander and having the police all in a room and actually war‑gaming like we would do as just an Army unit, war‑gaming and actually planning to do the coordination of what would transpire and juxtaposing a little bit, but at the end of the day, that was the orders that were given by the INIS commander, you know, to say, hey, this is what we're going to do.
What I always like to say ius, you know, the story unfolds, taking the SITEMP [ph] out of the proverbial Iraqi closet and sharing that with their partners because it's hard to share, you know. They do have a sense of insecurity when it comes to some of their brothers, you know. They love them, yes, but they don't know all the time who to trust, and I think in that room there, that day, those key leaders in there were trustable individuals that were moving the Iraq country forward and doing the planning.
And they were aware of the fact that things that they did would have impact. So, in other words, we just can't blow up the whole block, you know, and just leave it, and they were really focused on the ‑‑ because they were asking us for a little bit of assistance, but on providing those packages to water and the food stuff on the tails of an operation, so that they would show, hey, we're not here just to destroy your homes and take your husbands away, but we want to be able to provide you something, you know, to assist you a little better as well.
DR. KAGAN: So what was the plan that they developed for entering [inaudible]?
COL FLYNN: Well, you know, they had the ‑‑ the IGFC, you know, headquarters, really the direction came down to the 1st Iraqi Army Division to be the lead headquarters for the operation.
Of course, Maysan Province was a province of 10th Iraqi Army Division, which is the division that we were primarily working with.
Of course, there was a little bit of synergy that was gained here with the coalition as well because the 1st Brigade of the 1st Iraqi Army Division also was the brigade that we worked with in Basra. So 1st Brigade had, you know, partner MIT teams with battalions and brigades in Basra, and of course, 1st IA or 1st brigade ‑‑ 1st IA's Maine MIT was in Basra with us.
And because they were in Basra and they were there for a couple of months with elements of 1st Brigade, we really almost ‑‑ you know, after sort of things settled down in Basra, we really started planning and coordinating and synchronizing the operations that the Iraqis wanted to conduct into Amara.
Later, the Iraqis ‑‑ the IGFC designated a national police brigade, was also going to be part of the operation, and they were going to come down from ‑‑ from the north.
So, really, through the 1st Iraqi Army Division commander and the 10th Iraqi Army Division commander ‑‑
DR. KAGAN: Names?
COL FLYNN: Well, we have General Habib from the 10th Iraqi Army, and the 1st Iraqi Army Division commander was General ‑‑ I'm trying to remember.
MAJ BROOKE: I see him in the front too. It's bad.
COL FLYNN: Oh, I can see his face right now.
MAJ BROOKE: He'd kick us in the knee.
[Laughter.]
COL FLYNN: It will come to me in a minute.
MAJ BROOKE: Roger.
COL FLYNN: Nonetheless, those two headquarters shared their plans, and we had a couple of war games with them. Of course, we were talking with his MIT team and in late May, early June. There was a discussion over the timing of it, and so in late June, we ended up moving up into Amara, and there was forces that came out of Basra.
A National Police Brigade came down from the north through Al‑Kut, and 10th Iraqi Army Division and the bulk of our forces came up through Nasiriyah and across ASR Worthington into Amara, and we used multiple ways to get there, air, rotary wing air, fixed‑wing air, ground.
And really, you know, the Iraqi Army, I credit their coordination on this and the execution part because they were deliberate in how they did it. They shared information as best they could.
We have all these, you know, formal and high‑tech means of sharing information. They just pick up a cell phone and say go do this, and that is how they coordinate their operations, but it worked fine, and you know, they have ‑‑ you know, we were fortunate in that I had a good personal relationship with General Habib.
Of course, as mentioned to your earlier, General Saad, who was then ‑‑ he was the former 40th Brigade, 10th Iraqi Army Division commander, and had been designated the Maysan provincial chief of police.
So my, you know, year‑long, you know, relationship with General Saad was very helpful because now he was the ‑‑ he was the chief of the police in the Maysan province, and I think that our biggest concern was not the Army because the brigade that was in Maysan province based in Amara was part of the 10th IA. It was how was the police going to respond to t he movement of all these forces, Iraqi forces and coalition forces into Maysan.
DR. KAGAN: So, presumably, the police had been commanded by another individual just prior to the operations.
COL FLYNN: Yeah.
MAJ BROOKE: Roger.
DR. KAGAN: Who was he?
COL FLYNN: And he was removed.
MAJ BROOKE: We never even got to see him.
COL FLYNN: Yeah. He was removed prior to us coming there, you know, for corruption and for allegations that he wasn't supporting the governor.
MAJ BROOKE: I can see his face.
COL FLYNN: And then allowing JAM special groups to sort of ‑‑
MAJ BROOKE: Well, he was actually supporting Governor Maliki.
COL FLYNN: Yeah.
MAJ BROOKE: But they left him in place, which that is interesting as well.
DR. KAGAN: What party is he from?
MAJ BROOKE: Well, I believe he's Dawah [ph], but he is ‑‑ he is intertwined a little bit with Prime Minister Maliki somehow, some way. I mean I shouldn't say somehow. It is a very important ‑‑ I won't step in the political arena, but if you got to see in the end of June, the press conference that Prime Minister Maliki gave, it was awesome in the regards that he was reaching out to the tribes, had a good discussion of what they were going to do in Maysan, but when he finished, the key part of all that was he went and sat next to Governor Maliki and put his arm around him.
Now, who knows what he whispered? Maybe he said if you have anything happen, you know, you're done, or maybe he said hey, you know, hang in there. Who knows? But seeing that on TV was very important because you have to look at it this way. There's a lot of things that were developing.
As we rolled ‑‑ actually, the first couple of times we reconned into Amara, we were amazed at the sheer things that were going on, and going on, you know, new roads being built, new buildings being built, sewerage pipes being laid and stuff, because remember the PRT had not been up in there. So that was all organic to Governor Maliki, good, bad, or ugly, but that would go back to him to say he is moving forward on these projects, getting jobs to people, et cetera.
So we wrestled with that a lot because it wasn't really our decision what they were going to do with him. They did house arrest for several days. They kind of left him alone, but really our only opinion that we provided was leave him there and make him responsible, since he was there when things weren't that good. They were trying to get better, but still leave him here, and let the voters when the elections come about, let them decide then, because he is probably better to keep under your thumb than he is to let go and run back to Iran or wherever you go, but keep him there until elections.
And we're curious on the elections too because that's going to be ‑‑ that's really a decisive moment as well. I haven't really been following what had happened yet, but they're supposed to be occurring pretty soon. But that will be very important because, as I said, you know, a lot of people will talk about it in a coffee shop, you know, well, it's democracy, we're shoving it on them and everything. Well, like I said, it started in 2003. I mean they have not known how to hold onto what they have now and then build from it. I mean they are learning this as they go, but that is going to be a very crucial step.
We are not playing a role in that at all. That is all the Iraqis. That is all Iraqi led as far as the election stuff, which it should be, because we shouldn't be ‑‑ I mean maybe if something happened, but they are making sure the polling sites are secure. They are making sure that the ballots aren't stacked. They are making sure people take their thumbprints, you know, to make sure how people register in their voting, but I think that's a good thing because, once again, now they are getting to the 13, 14. They are getting the learner's permit, you know, and that's a big piece to move down the road for them. It will be a huge success.
COL FLYNN: If I can just go back to Amara for a minute and pick an aspect of this. I think nit is important really in all the provinces that we operated in and as more provinces go pick balancing how much assistance you give them to allowing them to become self‑reliant and even the perception to the population that they can rely on their elected government officials [inaudible].
And I think in Maysan and Amara, there was a balancing of that because it was a picked province. Yes, there hadn't been any coalition forces there. Yes, we knew there was a problem in Amara, and of course, the EFPs that were sitting there and the rockets that were sitting there, they were killing U.S. and Iraqi soldiers.
I think everybody knew that something needed to be done about it, and I just think that by Prime Minister Maliki taking the steps he took in Amara or ‑‑ correction ‑‑ in Basra and then the same steps effectively they took in the Maysan province with Governor Maliki were important. That was an important way for him to expand his ‑‑ I shouldn't say expand his power, but to showcase his power to subordinate provincial governors, that look, if you are not operating within the parameters of good governance, then I am going to address that issue as the prime minister.
And I think doing that in Basra and Amara was important. It was important for the Iraqi Security Forces to have that. It was important for the Shi'a population of many of his own party to see that. I thin it was important for the Sunni population to see that because now it was, you know, a Shi'a prime minister taking actions against his own population, and I think that that really was an important sort of milestone in his tenure so far today.
I mean obviously, it had an effect of itself, no question about it, and we were also able to pull a lot of ordinance out of there which, you know, saves an enormous amount of lives.
DR. KAGAN: As we look at this situation, it seems to me that you have learned a lot about what the Shi'a insurgency, so to speak, was about [inaudible], what its purposes were, how it was organized, and I would very much appreciate it if you could let us know what it consisted of.
COL FLYNN: Well, while it may seem like it is all sort of one population down there, Shi'a, there's ‑‑ it is ‑‑ it is very complex, and there's no question that the Iranian influence in the south was trying to expand its influence.
Of course, you have the national resources in the south with the southern oil fields and the port in Basra, and you do have commonality in that they are Shi'a.
And I know that, you know, people speak of the Arab‑Persian divide, but honestly, I think that's a little less than it was probably three or four decades ago. To a degree, it's still there, but I think it's more important that Iraqis think that they are Iraqis first and nationalistic further grows.
I do think that that insurgency consisted of the movement of weapons and finance and leaders back and forth across the border, doing training, as we spoke of earlier, sharing information, and then going to, you know, places like Baghdad and Basra to, you know, sort of gain their ‑‑ or expand their power base and their network in those two urban areas.
Of course, I have often said that Basra is really the strategic prize because of its location and because of its importance to the economic growth and, therefore, the social and government growth of Iraq, and I think that the portions of the special groups that were breaking away, if you will, and really not following the edicts at least that were publicly announced by Muqtada al‑Sadr were an easy organization for Qud Force operatives and surrogates and Lebanese Hezbollah to velcro into and then use those as a proxy force in the south to do their dirty work.
DR. KAGAN: And what did they want to achieve?
COL FLYNN: Well, I think ultimately, it is probably to gain some political clout inside Iraq, and I think if they could keep a weak central government and embarrass the U.S. forces that were there through either, you know, killing, hostages, or just having us not be successful, I mean ultimately I think that would have been ‑‑ those two objectives and gaining and wielding more power and influence in Basra, those three things probably would have been at least their ‑‑ I would say probably their short to mid‑term objectives while we were still there.
I think that if I could look back on that right now, given ‑‑ I think the central government, though, is no longer weak. I thin it is gaining in strength. They have lost their grip on the City of Basra, which is a good thing for us.
The last part is what will the outcome of the elections be, and that will be ‑‑ that is kind of the unknown right now, how much influence can they gain by the upcoming elections.
I don't want to overstate the fact as well that, you know, Iraq and Iran are tied in the south with economics. I mean, you know, a lot of produce comes in from Iran to help the population in the south, particularly fruits and vegetables, you know, things that people need to sustain themselves.
At the same time, you know, there is going to have to be a relationship that develops, and we are going to just have to continue to keep an eye on it between Iraq and Iran because they are going to need one another. They are going to need to have that balance on the border, so it is not confrontational, but affords both countries to prosper a little bit.
I think that over time that it can get that way. It is just going to need a little bit of time to help that mature and balance really.
MAJ BROOKE: We always like to say multi‑phase, multi‑problem, but really what that means is a piece that can't be excluded is Islamic revolution, you know, and that kind of gets whitewashed because we ‑‑ in our country, people look at religion a little differently, but I would tell you from the perspective of Iraq and its influence is if it ‑‑ along with a weakened central government, but also weakened ISF, because they don't need to have big growling dogs on their border because that's the last thing they would want to have to happen.
But I think you have to look at it almost in a part ‑‑ and I will give you a really bad analogy, but almost Miami 1980 with all the drugs that came through, and the analogy is that you had people that would move those drugs, that had no doing in the sale of them, the distribution and all. All they were, were a proxy that moved.
Really, if you look at the Shi'a criminal element, that is one of those folks, tied most likely into a tribe, but is used to moving stuff form Point A to B and doesn't really care what it is at the end of the day because he is not the one that is actually going to deliver it and then make it explode, if you will, but that could be drugs. That could be EFPs, you name it, but he is just a mule, if you will, for a better term, to move from Point A to B. So that is your criminal.
Along with the criminal, you had the same street thug kind of mindness that we have in our States as well. I own these 38th and 39th areas down in Basra. They're mine. I am the kingpin. So, therefore, I am a JAM company commander. Well, who dubbed him that? Probably either the ISF or us or somebody else because they don't go, "Hey, I am JAM company commander." No, I have my block area that I am in charge. So you have that going on as well, and that's just basic fighting that I am in charge of my little piece of the ground.
But then you move to the next level, and that's ‑‑ that's where it got kind of ‑‑ it became a little more complicated because Jaish al‑Mahdi, as we know it, JAM, those that were adhering to Muqtada al‑Sadr, what he was saying, we kept in that box.
And then special groups, we took out of the box and said these are the ones that aren't adhering. This was like the August‑September time frame, and so the special groups, those are the ones that actually got the specialized training, that had a little more care, a little more nurturing, but a lot of times, even within the special groups, when they would actually execute an order, they didn't know where it came from.
It is sort of like the mafia concept. You know, you're not going to know that Tony Soprano gave you the order to put the hit out. In this case, you are not going to know that Iran or IRGC, Qud's Force or the Iranian Republican Guard Corps or Qud's Force actually put that out because when it comes down the pike, it is like if Colonel Flynn gives me an order, I am going to tell my troops, "This is the order we have," not, "Hey, Colonel Flynn told me." No, this is how it works. So that also gets lost in what we call the "special group people" because ‑‑
But a vignette to that is with the pressure pieces and with the layers as we go back in our conversation that we started to uncover, really with all these things happening simultaneously over time, it allowed us to see a network of networks of the insurgency that took us from the criminal element all the way to the top HVIs, interconnected, which we were not able to see it.
And we have been talking about this for the last couple days, but it is very interesting because ‑‑ we use the word "complex," but it is very complex, but it is almost like it was a puzzle, and every piece that we did along the way was done through really deep planning and coordinating and synchronization from the brigade's perspective of how can we do more. You know, first, how can we do more with less? You know get more people out there, but how can we do the next step? And it's not that we had all the right answers, but that guide path that Colonel Flynn provided through the staff to get his direction and guidance really allowed us to get each one of those ‑‑ I'm so into analogies for [inaudible], but all those little puzzle pieces to put it together, to actually see a picture of the south that we had never seen before.
And I really have to go back, and I know it's a bad word, but really the status quo because it was like, you know, economy force, we are going leave that alone, but we had to not only tell the ISF and the provincial leaders, but also our leadership as well, and they listened.
And we said, "There is systemic problems down here that we need to wrestle with," getting back to how does Iran want to influence. Maybe it is more non‑kinetic now. Maybe it is more in the political arena or the central services arena where they peel back more from the kinetic attacks.
And you also have to look at it as because of that, the Iraqis almost put a status quo on the south as well. They didn't have MITs with their armies. You know, the Brits started to have some, et cetera, but they didn't have the focus as Baghdad and al‑Qaeda fight had, and really that was ‑‑ our drum beat from the beginning was because we were able to ‑‑ you asked the question of how we get off the road. Because we were able to quell those attacks, get out to the population, a lot of it more operationally and strategic to look at the picture what was going on ‑‑ and because Colonel Flynn alluded to this. A BCT covering five provinces? That is ‑‑ wow, that's ‑‑ I think you said yesterday, 300 by 200, just a rough shot, kilometers.
That is a lot of land mass, where a normal brigade is focused on ‑‑
COL FLYNN: I think, you know, to your question about the insurgents in the south, I mean probably the difference in where we were and what we were doing and, you know, again, the capabilities there or the Tallil airfield, we really did have to take a regional look at what was going on in the south.
I mean if you are in al‑Rashid or Endora [ph], you know, you kind of ‑‑ you're kind of looking at that area that you're at. Mind you, it's different terrain, different ‑‑ different conditions, but because we, you know ‑‑ all of these areas influenced what we were doing, and because we were co‑located with organizations that covered the same provinces and because I did strike up a good relationship with the U.K. Headquarters in Basra, I really had to because the Australians were co‑located with me, the Romanians were co‑located with me. We were operating in their battle space for large parts of the southern portion.
We really had to bring all this stuff together because we really had to work with one another to uncover really the question you were asking, which was what was going on in the south, what was its insurgency, and what was ‑‑ or what was part of the insurgency and how was it ‑‑ you know, how was it connected, and I think by us doing that, we started to see some of those connections with a lot more clarity.
And I think that the Iraqi security forces, at least the leadership, they knew of it, and they just needed our help in addressing it. Obviously, some were more adamant about getting after it quicker, and others were a little more slow, but I think ‑‑ you know, again, I can go back to that watershed event in Basra. That kind of changed everything.
DR. KAGAN: So, obviously, we are waiting for the political dynamics to play out with the provincial elections that we hope will take place by the end of 2008. In the meantime, we know that many of the enemy from al‑Amara fled after your operations back to Iran.
COL FLYNN: Uh‑huh.
DR. KAGAN: So is Iran and are the special groups still a threat to the outcome, the political outcome in the south?
COL FLYNN: Well, I think ‑‑ I think that they are ‑‑ are they a threat to the political outcome? That would be ‑‑ I think that ‑‑ again, as I said earlier, a weakened central government, embarrass the U.S. forces, and then expand power and influence. How do they expand the power and influence? They do that in a multi‑pronged [inaudible], you know, social, economic, political.
These elections coming up, I certainly feel that they are going to try to influence those elections. How they do that, I don't know.
I mean are they going to try to do it by, you know, an uptick in assassinations against the political leaders to spread intimidating and fear? That may be one approach. They certainly have tried that before. They may try it again.
Could they try to wreck the elections somehow to undermine its legitimacy? That is possible.
I don't know what approach they will take, but I do feel that they will try to influence those elections somehow from the political outcome.
I think that with the HVIs fleeing, you know, the same thing happened in Basra, and they started to leak back in a little bit, but you know, they have been marginalized, and I don't know if they can come back and get to the same level that they were before, and that the elements that are their key leaders may have to regroup a little more and think about exactly what are our objectives now, if we can't weaken the central government, if we can't embarrass the U.S. forces from ‑‑ or the coalition forces from leaving Iraq, then what do we need to do, and to your question, it probably is some kind of an influence on the political elections, but I just don't know how they are going to do that.
And I think that at some point, the HVIs may come back in. I think the question is are they going to go back to their former position or are they going to take another role and attempt to try to become part of the political apparatus, and so ‑‑ because they could come back and not be a special groups leader anymore and attack. They could just come back and, you know, merge themselves back into the political or even the religious organizations, the tribal organizations, and then take their role that way.
MAJ BROOKE: I am smiling because one of the dangers is, you know, HVI kinetic. Okay. That's what we're looking at, but you got to remember there's surrogate offices all through Iraq, with Iranian presence, and I would argue that there are HVIs that we don't know about that directly influence every day, both the policies, the procedures, everything that is going on within the Iraqi confines, specifically in the south, because another deep down discussion that needs to occur is does Iran want a nationalist south where all the provinces are together.
I would argue no because if you keep Maysan and Basra separate with the natural gas, with the oil, with the copper, the other items that are there, it gives them more influence to intimidate those provinces to be able to pull off ‑‑ not to pick on Iran totally, but you know, it gives them a little more influence because the stronger that Iraq central government goes back to how they are going to eventually do that, that ‑‑ the hydrocarbon law and the stuff that is coming up they are going to pass is very important because if you are not one of those provinces that are stuck together when they find the new oil, well, you don't get the money stuff, and I know it comes back to money and all that stuff, but that's ‑‑
And I would tell you that there are already enemies within Iraq that we don't put on a card or that we don't put on an HVI list that, you know, have been there for years and that are working within that, and I would tell you not all of them went back to Iran. There's a couple other countries that they might ‑‑
[Laughter.]
COL FLYNN: There's a caution about them coming back.
I also believe that, you know, this is something that the Iraqi government is going to have to address. I mean, you know ‑‑
MAJ BROOKE: And they know them.
COL FLYNN: They know them, as well as we know them. In fact, they probably know them better, and so this is ‑‑ you know, if they come back and they, you know, create internal strife, then, you know, they are going to have to address that, and some of those individuals have committed crimes and contributed to killing American soldiers and Iraqi civilians and soldiers. So there is a degree of collective accountability that has to go on here, and I think it has to happen, you know, with the political leaders and the security force, whether Army and police, and they are going to have to hold these people accountable for their actions, their previous actions at this point. They are not doing them now, but ‑‑
And you know, I was encouraged at the end there. The police chief in the Dhi Qar province, the one that was there did not have a very good relationship with the governor. In fact, they were really deeply fractured, and they replaced him, and the new police chief that came in [inaudible] General Samad [ph] was ‑‑ came from Baghdad, and the governor initially didn't want him there, but you know, the guy was impartial. I mean he was doing his job. He was doing it as an Iraqi first, and it was really an encouraging sign to have him come down there and do that because ‑‑ and he started to pull in the ‑‑ you know, the special tactics unit from the police, working with the Army, and he was working with the governor, although the governor initially didn't want him, but just to see that, you know ‑‑ you know, okay, they have got differences, but they are trying to pull themselves together and work together. To see a couple of leaders actually do that was really pretty ‑‑ it was encouraging.
And I have not previously seen that, at least in that particular provinces. Other provinces were doing it. Muthanna was doing a great job, but in Dhi Qar to see that, that was really good, particularly toward the end because it hadn't been happening before.
MAJ BROOKE: And you have to think about it. These are courageous human beings. I mean we put George Washington on a pedestal, you know, some of our forefathers that fought really an insurgency back then ‑‑ sorry, U.K. But I mean it's the same concept, and these guys have a target on their whole ‑‑ their back, their head, everywhere, and they are still moving forward to do this.
I always say it's a lot like Elliot Ness because during prohibition, everybody wanted to take that guy out because they all wanted to get their drink, but in this case, guys like General Othman, who we didn't talk much about, up at 8th Iraqi Army, he has been around for a long time. That guy is a hero, you know.
General Saad, you know, he's a hero. General Samad. Those guys that are living basically fearless every day because their life could be taken away at any time, you know, go back to Abu Bakar and the January piece. I mean true heroes. To be able to sit with them and discuss ‑‑ and granted, to us it's like 82nd Airborne. We have no fear either, but you know, to sit in the same room and be able to have that, it's a very proud moment to be part of that and to see that growth. So that's my kind of bite on the courageousness of those individuals and the time we did, very short time.
I mean it seems long for families. I know my wife would hit me, but 14 months seems long. But really 14 months is just a drop in the bucket because you got to remember, you know ‑‑ bring up eating soup with a knife ‑‑ you know, counter‑insurgency wasn't one for at least 12 years. It takes a lot of time, and the folks that don't want to see it work, they have time on their side, and they will wait it out, and they will wait to see who changes out. Hey, well, we're going to lose another battalion, another brigade, and that is going to be very important in the future because it is how do you still maintain that right‑seat driver mode, but not lose visibility of what is going on, so that they can take their country back at the end of the day and run forward.
DR. KAGAN: Well, I thank the two of you and indeed the 1st Brigade of the 82nd for all the courage that you have shown in your service to America, and I am really pleased to have had both of you here today to talk with us and the Institute for the Study of War.
‑ ‑ ‑
ISW President Kim Kagan talks with Colonel Charles A. Flynn and Major Matthew W. Brooke of the 1BCT, 82nd Airborne about their recent experiences in Iraq. Colonel Flynn and his brigade, which returned from Iraq in August, were stationed at Tallil Air Base, roughly 15 miles southwest of Nasiriyah. They were initially responsible for theater security operations in southern, central and western Iraq securing the ground lines of communications (an essential component for the safe passage of supply convoys coming from Kuwait along Main Supply Route Tampa). These lines of communications had been contested by Special Groups, Coalition Forces, and Iraqi Security Forces. Special Groups sought to hinder Coalition and Iraqi movement by planting EFPs and IEDs; while U.S. convoys sought to secure the towns and highways from these extremist groups.
During the interview, Colonel Flynn and Major Brooke present their assessment of the southern provinces - the security that they and their Iraqi partners achieved, as well as the long-term political, economic, religious, and military challenges that remain.
Webcast Segments:
Delicious
Digg
StumbleUpon
Reddit
Technorati