BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Iraq in 2005 faces the likelihood of the most profound shift of political power in its modern history, while struggling with an insurgency that has confounded U.S. strategists and their optimistic forecasts that preceded the war.
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Insurgents, using small arms and mortars, launch an attack on U.S. forces in Fallujah, Iraq, in this Nov. 8, 2004 file photo.
AP / File
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A U.S. Army soldier guards the entrance of Camp Bonzai after a stone-throwing mob attacked U.S. forces near the base, in this March 2, 2004 file photo. Soldiers had been treating Iraqis injured resulting from multiple explosions at the nearby Imam Kadhim Shrine when the mob attacked the troops and chased them back to the base.
AP / File
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A U.S. Army soldier uses a dummy to draw a sniper into view in Najaf, Iraq, in this Aug. 20, 2004 file photo.
AP / File
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The January ballot will be the first since the April 2003 collapse of Saddam Hussein's regime. And the vote in December will complete the steps envisioned by the Bush administration to transform Iraq from one of the Middle East's most ruthless dictatorships into a functioning, albeit flawed, democracy.
That's a tall order for a nation of nearly 26 million people, a volatile Sunni-Shiite divide and large areas that are virtual no-go zones for Westerners, government officials and the country's own security forces.
If the plan works, the United States may be able to see a time when it can bring home substantial numbers of U.S. troops.
Instead, Iraq, already America's bloodiest military operation since the Vietnam war, is awash not only in the wreckage of failed forecasts but also in tons of missing Iraqi weapons and ammunition feared to have fallen into the hands of insurgents.
If elections do take place, they are expected to shift power to the long-suppressed Shiite Muslim community, an estimated 60 percent of the population. That would spell the end of Sunni domination which predates the establishment of the modern Iraqi state after World War I.
Nevertheless, it will take considerable political skill for Iraq's leaders to maneuver through a tectonic power shift without inflaming sectarian and ethnic passions among Kurds, Sunni Arabs, Turkomen, Christians and others who make up this country's mosaic.
The Kurds, estimated between 14 percent and 20 percent of the population and the most pro-American group, are anxious to maintain the self-rule they have enjoyed in the north since 1991.
If they feel threatened, or if the new constitution strips them of that right, the Kurds may push for independence, arguing that Washington owes them that for providing militiamen to fight alongside U.S. troops in the 2003 invasion.
But the dismemberment of Iraq would alarm not only every country in the region but the Europeans and the Americans as well.
The Sunnis are divided between those who have opted to participate in politics, such as Iraq's interim president, Ghazi al-Yawer, and elder statesman Adnan Pachachi, and those who reject anything that smacks of cooperation with an American force they regard as ccupiers.
The challenges facing Iraq will be to draw them into the political process, perhaps through power-sharing formulas or guarantees of Sunni status to lure them away from Islamic extremists.
Meanwhile, steps to prosecute Saddam were slowed after the government fired the director of the war crimes tribunal, Salem Chalabi, and the Iraqi leader isn't expect to stand trial soon. But the interim government announced in mid-December that it expected to issue formal indictments against some of Saddam's top aides early in the new year.
European experts have shied away from helping excavate mass graves and gather other evidence because Iraq has reinstituted the death penalty, which Europe has abolished.
