In Anbar province, stronghold of al Qaida in Iraq, USA Today reports
The U.S. military is reporting a dramatic and unexpected increase in the number of police recruits in Anbar province, the center of Sunni insurgent activity in Iraq.
In the past two weeks, more than 1,000 applicants have sought police jobs in Ramadi, the provincial capital. Eight hundred signed up last month in Ramadi, said Army Maj. Thomas Shoffner, operations officer for the 1st Brigade, 1st Armored Division.
Those figures compare with only "a few dozen" recruits in September, the U.S. military said.
In announcing his new Iraq strategy last week, President Bush said previous efforts to establish security in the country failed partly because there weren't enough Iraqi and American security forces.
U.S. commanders attribute the sudden increase in police applicants to the support of local tribal leaders and a deepening rift between Sunni tribesmen and extremist groups such as al-Qaeda in Iraq.
"They've seen enough of the murder and intimidation," Maj. Gen. Richard Zilmer, commander of U.S. forces in Anbar, said of tribes in the Ramadi area.
Meanwhile, in Baghdad, al Sadr's "political" party has decided to rejoin the government even without their demand that the US leave Iraq remains unmet
Radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's parliamentary bloc, meanwhile, ended its nearly two-month political boycott after reaching a compromise over its demands for a timetable for Iraqi forces to take over security and the withdrawal of U.S. forces.
"We announce our return to parliament, we will attend today's session, and the ministers will resume their work to serve the people," Bahaa al-Araji, one of 30 lawmakers loyal to al-Sadr, said during a news conference attended by Sunni parliament speaker Mahmoud al-Mashhadani. Al-Sadr also has six loyalist ministers in the 38-member Cabinet.
The decision appeared to be a way for both sides to save face while allowing al-Sadr's bloc, whose support is crucial to Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, to regain legislative influence ahead of a planned U.S.-Iraqi security crackdown in Baghdad.
It's becomming clear that the US and Iraq is serious about disarming the militias. The hope that by helping elect Democrats, the US would stand down is fading. And supply lines from Iran are drying up. All of this, and the first units of the "surge" have only just arrived.
