Report finds U.S. Iraq strategy is flawed

By Alister Bull

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Violence and infighting among Shi'ites in Basra are a warning that a last ditch U.S. plan to improve security in Iraq is badly flawed, a think-tank said in a report.

"The answer to Iraq's horrific violence cannot be an illusory military surge that aims to bolster the existing political structure and treats the dominant political parties as partners," said the Brussels-based International Crisis Group.

The report, issued late on Monday, said that Operation Sinbad, in which British forces tried to tackle armed militias and support Iraqi security forces in the southern oil-rich city of Basra, offered important lessons to learn from.

The current U.S. strategy in Baghdad -- a four-month-old offensive aimed at ridding neighbourhoods of gunmen, deploying soldiers to hold the areas and then reviving economic activity -- appears similar to the British plan launched last September.

Sinbad initially helped calm Basra, Iraq's second largest city and its economic hub, but violence has since mounted and British forces have come under increasing attack there.

Britain recently reduced its troops to around 5,500 soldiers from about 7,000. The forces are also withdrawing to a single base outside the city at Basra airport.

Armed militias in Basra have meanwhile joined local security forces, but remain loyal to the Shi'ite political factions that dominate southern Iraq, the report said.

It said part of the Basra police was under the sway of the Mehdi Army of fiery cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, while the intelligence service was influenced by the Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council, previously the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), and the Oil Protection Force was controlled by Fadhila.