“If it’s alcohol or some other drug—”
“Please. If it were that, the Mahdis would just have set fire to the truck. Who knows, maybe that’s what they had in mind. But the shipment is an antique, something whose value would be obvious even to ignorant Shia bandits. So they took it.”
“And you want me to get it back?”
“I could do it myself,” Saddam said, “but you know I hate to disturb the peace. And if I send my men into Sadr City . . .”
“Right.” Blood in the streets. More importantly from Saddam’s perspective, there was a good chance his men would never be heard from again. “What is it you expect me to do, send in the real army?”
“The method I leave to your discretion. But if the president’s servant can’t get my property back, who can?”
Mustafa frowned. “I can’t promise anything now.”
“Of course not,” Saddam said. “You go check back with the president—about the IRS thing too, don’t forget—only don’t take too long. If the Mahdis decide to destroy my property, or sell it to someone else . . .”
As they returned to Saddam’s office, there was an urgent knock on the outer door. “Come,” Saddam said, and Abid Hamid Mahmud—the ace of diamonds—entered looking flustered. “What is it, Abid?”
“I’m sorry to disturb you, Saddam, but there’s trouble at the main gate. A crazy woman. She says she’s Anmar al Maysani’s daughter, and says if we don’t let her in, she’ll have the estate reduced to rubble.”
Saddam Hussein looked at Mustafa.
“A friend of yours, perhaps?” he said.
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Mahdi Army
This article is about the contemporary, Baghdad-based Mahdi Army. For other Armies of the Mahdi throughout history, please see the
disambiguation page
.
The Mahdi Army of Iraq is a Shia community relief organization whose stated mission is to provide security, charity, and other services to poor neighborhoods that have traditionally been ignored or underserved by government agencies. Based in Baghdad’s Sadr City district, the Army has established chapters in other parts of Baghdad and in other Iraqi cities such as Najaf and Kufah.
The Army’s founder and leader is Muqtada al Sadr.
ORGANIZATION HISTORY
In 1959 the Baghdad city council, faced with a huge influx of poor Shia workers from southern Iraq, voted to build a public housing project called Revolution City in northeast Baghdad. Much of the money allocated to the project ended up in the pockets of corrupt city and union officials. The new housing was shoddily constructed, and Revolution City quickly gained a reputation as a slum.
This was hardly the last insult the neighborhood would suffer. In the decades that followed, Revolution City’s residents complained of being shortchanged on all manner of public services, from health-care access to street repair. Law enforcement was a particular sore spot—within the RC district, the Baghdad police often acted more like an armed gang, shaking down legitimate businesses while allowing criminals to run free. For their own protection, citizens formed militias, often organized around local mosques; while these militias did provide a semblance of order, they also fought one another for control, or were broken up by police when they became too powerful.
The cycle of corruption and anarchy continued until the late 1990s, when the election of Baghdad’s first Shia mayor, Anmar al Maysani, brought a brief period of hope for change. Unfortunately, Al Maysani’s sweeping reform program did not fare well against the reality of Baghdad politics. Crime remained a serious problem, and matters reached a crisis point after the RC district’s most prominent resident, the Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Sadiq al Sadr, was murdered. When police announced they had no suspects in the case, Revolution City—now renamed Sadr City—exploded in protest. At a rally attended by an estimated 50,000 men, the Grand Ayatollah’s son, Muqtada, called for the formation of a new super-militia to fulfill the promise of peace and justice the occupants of city hall had failed to deliver on . . .
CONTROVERSY AND CONFLICT
Although the Mahdi Army’s vigilantism is excused by some as a necessary evil, it has also come in for a lot of criticism. In addition to its well-publicized attacks on muggers, burglars, drug dealers, prostitutes, blasphemers, and homosexuals, the Army is accused of targeting innocent Sunnis who wander onto the Army’s “turf.”
The Mahdi Army has also clashed repeatedly with the Baghdad police force. The police have often come off the worse in these encounters, with the result that patrolmen are now said to be reluctant to enter Sadr City and other Mahdi Army strongholds without large amounts of backup. Al Sadr’s spokesman insists that such animosity is not the Army’s fault: “We don’t hate all cops, just the bad ones. Unfortunately, finding a good cop in Baghdad is rather like finding a righteous man in Sodom.”
The Mahdi Army is also believed to be involved in a recent rash of assaults on members of the Baath Labor Union. Although Baath has long been implicated in the corruption afflicting Sadr City, there is speculation that the real motive for the attacks is a personal vendetta against Baath Union President Saddam Hussein, who some suspect of having ordered the murder of Muqtada al Sadr’s father. Whatever the truth, Baathists and their allies give Sadr City an even wider berth than the police do . . .
Mustafa called his cousin Iyad.
Iyad was the son of Fayyad, the uncle who treated God like one of his creditors. Partly in reaction to his father’s impiety, Iyad had been intensely religious as a young man, even studying for a time to become a Shia cleric. Ultimately more like his dad than he liked to admit, he’d dropped out of seminary without completing a degree and gone to work driving a cab. He stayed on good terms with his old classmates, though, and when the Mahdi Army took over Sadr City, Iyad became one of a select group of Baghdad cabbies allowed to operate in the district. A few Army big shots kept him on speed dial, and once or twice—so he claimed—he’d even given the Ayatollah’s son a ride.
Iyad did other jobs for the Mahdis as well. A few years back he’d been arrested for vandalizing a betting parlor that had opened shop too close to Sadr City. Mustafa had intervened with the police on that occasion and was able to get Iyad released with no charge and no penalty other than the beating he’d already received.
So Iyad owed him, and Iyad was family, but even so Mustafa knew better than to tell him what he wanted over the phone. Instead he had Iyad come by the apartment while Abu Mustafa was out and explained the favor in person, trying to make it sound like it was no big deal.
Iyad wasn’t buying it. “You want me to help you rip off the Mahdis for Saddam?” He cocked his head to stare at the stitches on Mustafa’s neck. “I heard you’d been injured, cousin, but I didn’t know there was brain damage.”
“I’m not looking to rip anyone off,” Mustafa said patiently. “I want to strike a bargain with the Mahdis.”
“For something Saddam wants. You think you can bribe them into overlooking their blood feud?”
Mustafa did think that, actually, but saw no point in saying so. “I’ll be bargaining on behalf of Homeland Security. The Mahdis’ vendetta against Saddam doesn’t come into it.”
“The Mahdis may not agree,” Iyad said. He frowned. “I’m not even sure I do. What about your own oath to put that monster in prison? And now you’re working as his errand boy?”