Mahdi Army militia members have stopped wearing their black uniforms, hidden their weapons and abandoned their checkpoints in an apparent effort to lower their profile in Baghdad in advance of the arrival of U.S. reinforcements. "We have explicit directions to keep a low profile . . . not to confront, not to be dragged into a fight and to calm things down," said one official who received the orders from the anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. The official asked not to be named because he was not authorized to reveal the militia's plans. Militia members say al-Sadr ordered them to stand down shortly after President George Bush's announcement that the U.S. would send 17,500 more American troops to Baghdad to work alongside the Iraqi security forces.
The decision by al-Sadr to lower his force's profile in Baghdad will likely cut violence in the city and allow American forces to show quick results from their beefed up presence. But it is also unlikely in the long term to change the balance of power here. Mahdi Army militiamen say that while they remain undercover now, they are simply waiting for the security plan to end. "If the Mahdi Army is attacked, they will defend themselves," said Sheikh Abdul Razzaq al-Nidawi, a senior al-Sadr official in Najaf. "American troops are the enemy troops . . . if the Americans want armed resistance, we are ready, but we will work hard not to get involved in an armed opposition and we will work hard to endure the pressure even if we make sacrifices to keep our people and country safe."
Mahdi Army sources said that their heavy weaponry had been moved from Sadr City or hidden since the announcement. Across the capital residents described a changed Mahdi Army - in Sadr City, a Shiite slum of more than 2 million people, in Talbiyah on the outskirts of Sadr City, and in Hurriyah, a formerly Sunni Muslim neighborhood in the north of the capital that in recent weeks has been taken over by the Mahdi Army. Checkpoints in those locations were gone. Instead, young men in jeans and buttoned shirts directed traffic, helped the Iraqi army and wandered the streets nonchalantly.
ID checks for Sunni names like Omar have been replaced by a sort of Shiite code. "Mawlak?" a Mahdi Army member will inquire. "My master?"
A Shiite will answer, "Mawlak al Hussein" - "My master is Hussein," referring to a revered Shiite saint. They check for the Shiite accent common in the south versus the Baghdadi accent of the Sunnis.
But Shiite residents said the weapons were nearby. "We expect the American troops or even some Iraqi troops to besiege Sadr City," said Raed Mohammed, a 37-year-old taxi driver.
Some Sunnis worry that the new Baghdad security plan will clear the way for the Mahdi Army to finally cleanse Sunnis from Baghdad. In announcing the plan, President Bush said that U.S. forces would concentrate on defeating al-Qaida and the insurgency. But Sunnis note that in most Sunni neighborhoods, local men unaffiliated with the insurgency also carry weapons to protect their families from militias and the Iraqi security forces, who they distrust and believe are heavily infiltrated by the Mahdi Army.
On Saturday, many Iraqis stockpiled canned foods, water and kerosene in preparation for violence. Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite whose political backers include al-Sadr, has told legislators and advisors that security forces under the new plan will first go after the Sunni insurgency, which is responsible for most of the capital's car and roadside bombs that target Shiites and U.S. forces. After that, he's said he'll move to quell militias, including the Mahdi Army, who are suspected in the killings of dozens of Sunnis.
American officers here say they have no plans to go after militia groups as long as the militias do not attack. "We're not necessarily going after the militias if the militias don't come after us," said Army Lt. Col. Scott Bleichwehl, a military spokesman for the Multi-National Division-Baghdad. "Our mission is not to take down the militias, that's a function of the government."