Trouble in Awakening Land Posted by Ilan Goldenberg

Marc Lynch breaks down new signs of the internal rifts within the Awakening movements and the danger that they pose

There are more and more signs of the Awakenings strategy hitting turbulence, if not going off the rails.  The drumbeat of assassinations of Awakenings leaders and attacks on their men continues.  Joseph Galloway reported yesterday of the growing tension over allegations that Shia militias are behind the recent upsurge of attacks.  Patrick Cockburn reported from Falluja that an important local commander warned that if his people aren't integrated into the Iraqi military and police in three months they are prepared to stand down and let al-Qaeda back in.   The Anbar Salvation Council declared that it would not fly the new Iraqi flag, meaning that for a while these local militias would literally be operating under a different flag than the national institutions from which they remain excluded.  Today, al-Hayat reports that 230 Awakenings fighters north of Baghdad quit because they hadn't been paid in two months.   And then, there's been a series of public eruptions between Anbar Salvation Council leaders and between the ASC and the Baghdad-based Awakening militias.

Just another reminder that this situation is extraordinarily volatile and that once these groups don't have a common Al Qaeda in Iraq enemy to deal with, they may very well turn on either the Shi'a or each other.