The NY Times is reporting that Sadr Suspends His Militia’s Military Operations. This change of heart is probably not due to a feeling that we all just need to get along:

The surprise declaration was widely taken as a tacit acknowledgment of the damage done to his movement’s reputation by two days of Shiite-on-Shiite in-fighting, which killed 52 people, wounded 279 and forced thousands of pilgrims to flee birthday celebrations for the Mahdi, one of Shiite Islam’s most revered medieval saints.

Mr. Sadr’s aides declared an unequivocal end to all militia operations. Ahmed al-Shaibani, the chief of Mr. Sadr’s media office in Najaf, confirmed that this “includes suspending the taking up of arms against occupiers,” a reference to American-led coalition troops.

Is this merely a retreat? As in “let’s fall back and gather ourselves for the next attack” retreat?

Elrod at The Moderate Voice thinks its an internal issue:

This is not the first time Sadr has found himself trying to control a militia fragmenting into dozens of uncontrollable factions. Past efforts to reign in rogue elements have failed, as the logic of the streets encourages ad hoc militia activity and not centralized military action. My guess is that this latest effort to gain control over the militia – by declaring cessation of all military activities – is an effort to identify who really is a rogue element and then try to purge them.

And there’s some support for that from the Times story:

Mr. Sadr’s officials claimed that the freeze was intended to isolate and eliminate “rogue” elements of the Mahdi Army that no longer responded to Mr. Sadr’s orders.

American and British commanders have frequently made accusations in recent months that some Mahdi Army fighters have slipped out of Mr. Sadr’s control, operating as criminal gangs or receiving financing and training from Iran to carry out attacks on American and Iraqi security forces. One possible impact of the freeze would be to enlist the help of American forces to weed out rogue elements for Mr. Sadr’s group. In effect, Mr. Sadr was saying, anyone who attacks Americans is by definition violating the freeze and laying himself open to retaliatory attacks.

Could be. That presumes that Mr. Sadr isn’t intent on killing Americans in the first place. He’s not what I would call a good friend. The USS Neverdock blog is also skeptical, noting the BBC’s rotating headline that seems to say they aren’t sure what the news means.

Contributing factors could be that he’s getting his check cashed by American troops on a regular basis, and he’s getting defections by followers who want to let the 72 virgins get a bit older before they go to see them (“That’s OK, Rahmad, you take them. I only need two or three, so I’ll see you there in 40 years.”)

Of the possible reasons for Al Sadr’s actions, I think the stronger inducement to slink away is that you are getting killed, and losing. (Its only in America that political leaders want to slink away when you’re winning.)

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