ROBERT SIEGEL, host:
From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Robert Siegel.
MELISSA BLOCK, host:
And I'm Melissa Block.
From U.S. intelligence agencies today, a new assessment of the situation in Iraq - and it's a mixed picture. The National Intelligence Estimate says that while sectarian violence remains high, Iraq's overall security could, quote, "continue to improve modestly." But on the political front, the news is worse. It judges Iraq's government will become more precarious in the coming months.
With us now to sort through the estimate is NPR's Mary Louise Kelly. And Mary Louise, let's start with the security situation. U.S. intelligence agencies say they're seeing some signs of improvement. What signs?
MARY LOUISE KELLY: They're seeing what, as they phrase it, measurable but uneven improvements. And what they're tracking is they say that the escalation in the rate of violence that we had been seeing has been checked for now. They note that the overall attack levels across Iraq have fallen during seven of the nine last weeks, so that's good. The caveat is that overall violence remains very high, that when you're starting at the level Iraq was starting at, that even if you're seeing a slight reduction, it's still an unacceptably high level of violence. They note that al-Qaida is still capable of high-profile attacks.
Overall, though, the headline is that over the next six to nine months, they say that barring other changes, if everything else remains as is, security will continue to improve modestly - their words.
BLOCK: And I gather that one of the bright spots that this NIE points to is something we've been hearing a lot about lately - Sunni tribal leaders turning against al-Qaida.
KELLY: Right. This is a development we started hearing about in Anbar province, where you had Sunni tribal leaders, in an encouraging development, joining with U.S. forces to fight al-Qaida. The encouraging further news is that that development appears to be spreading.
We see some related developments in western Baghdad, in Diyalah, and U.S. intelligence analysts were citing that today. They were saying this could possibly, at some point, blossom into a hopeful model. That if you have a bottom-up reconciliation, as they call it, among local leaders, that could be a catalyst for national reconciliation. But again, that's still very much in the hopeful stage, not the reality stage. And they also were cautioning there could be downsides to this. You don't know how this will play out in the future. You don't know how reliable a partner, these Sunni tribal leaders, may prove for the U.S. in the future. And they say that just because they are fighting al-Qaida does not mean that they are supportive of the central government in Baghdad. So a lot of unknowns there still.
BLOCK: Okay, and now the political picture. We mentioned that the report says that Iraq's government will likely become more precarious in the coming months. What leads them to that conclusion?
KELLY: It's a number of factors. Sectarian divisions, as we know, remain strong, perhaps stronger than ever. And the estimate go through and point out divisions among Shia factions. They judge that those will probably increase. They say that Sunnis remain politically fragmented, that Kurds remain reluctant to compromise. So you have clearly some problems there. And they judge that overall the political process is stalled, that Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is not able to govern effectively.
Now, they did not get into - intelligence analysts were briefing on this today; were asked the question that's dominating Washington at the moment: Should Maliki stay or should he go? And they don't want to weigh in on that. They say that's best left to the policymakers. But it's telling, in this estimate, the most supportive thing you can find in here is the judgment that it would be disruptive, that Sunni - that Shia leaders judge it could potentially paralyze the Iraqi government if they have to take the time to search for a replacement. So the message seems to be Maliki may not governing effectively, but it's not clear that anyone could, given the current circumstances.
BLOCK: Does the intelligence estimates say anything about the role that Iran is playing in Iraq?
KELLY: Briefly, it says that in the last six months since the last intelligence estimate on Iraq that Iran has stepped up its support for Shia militants in Iraq. It mentions the dramatic rise in EFP attacks. In particular, these are these explosively formed penetrators that are - armor piercing bombs. And it says, broadly speaking, Iran and other neighbors of Iraq - Syria, for example -are calculating that the U.S. is moving towards some sort of troop drawdown, and that they are moving strategically within the country to increase their influence in Iraq in anticipation of some sort of U.S. withdrawal.
BLOCK: One other positive development in this assessment - it says that al-Qaida in Iraq's capabilities have been reduced. What's the proof of that?
KELLY: What they're saying is that this is a result of some that Sunni tribal action we talked about, a result of some past - some successful U.S. military operations. The basic evidence that they point to is that they perceive al-Qaida's freedom of movement is more limited, that al-Qaida-linked terrorists are not able to go where they want to go when they want to go in the way that they once were. They argued that popular support among Iraqis for al-Qaida is declining, and that al-Qaida's leaders in Iraq keep getting taken out, keep getting captured or killed. They keep replacing them but that still there's an organization taking ahead and that its capabilities are reduced.
BLOCK: Mary Louise, we all know there've been problems with National Intelligence Estimates before. We remember the one from 2002 that said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.
KELLY: Sure.
BLOCK: What are the sources that intelligence officials use to come up with this and how confident are they that they got it right this time?
KELLY: It's a range. They say that there was significant input from clandestine sources, so that may be U.S. spies operating on the ground. In Iraq, that may be signal intelligence, communications intercepts, and of course, they're reading the newspapers and listening to what NPR reports, the same as all the rest of us are. So they're looking at open-source information as well.
BLOCK: Mary Louise, thanks very much.
KELLY: You're welcome.
BLOCK: That's NPR's Mary Louise Kelly. And you can find a link to the declassified version of the new Iraq NIE on our Web site, npr.org.
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