Prospects for Mideast cooperation on Iraq

Saudi Arabia, a Sunni kingdom anxious at the prospect of Iraq's majority Shiites taking control from longtime Sunni rulers, stands accused of allowing Sunni radicals to infiltrate across a porous border to help resist both the US and Shiite advances.

"Traditionally the Saudis need a release valve to take the pressure of the radical Islamists off of their internal affairs, and recently Iraq has served as that release," says Matthew Levitt, a former Mideast counterterrorism expert for the FBI now at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. "We need the Saudis to do more about controlling their border," he adds, "just as we need the Syrians to do more about turning over funding that is passing through there."

Mr. Jabar, the Iraqi, agrees, noting that a Saudi intelligence official recently told him that the Saudis view the promotion of Wahhabism in Iraq - the form of the Sunni practice that is Saudi Arabia's state religion - as the only way to head off a complete Shiite takeover. "I told them my view that this is the shortest way to disaster," Jabar says, "but the flow of money and influence continues."

Still, Saudi Arabia has begun moving seriously against extremist interests, such as Al Qaeda at home, and has stressed its antiterror cooperation with the US. That leads some, like Mr. Baram, to conclude that cooperation on Iraq can be won. Iran, Iraq's Shiite Muslim neighbor to the east, is more complicated. The US showed early signs of warming to cooperation with Iran after its influence with Iraqi Shiites became clear, but those feelers appear to have been pulled back since Iran's influence with Iraq's more radical Shiites has become apparent.

Baram says the US must remember that Iraq's eastern neighbor is really two Irans - the radical Islamic one and the more moderate, pro-democracy Iran - and that both are interested in Iraq's future, while not necessarily in the same outcome.

Others note that Iran was particularly helpful in postwar Afghanistan and should not be dismissed as a force for stability in Iraq. James Dobbins, who represented the Bush administration in Afghanistan, believes Iran could promote the pro-stability, antiterrorist stance he says it took there.

The kind of regional conference UN envoy Brahimi is promoting - like the one for Afghanistan where Mr. Dobbins witnessed a cooperative Iran - could also help in Iraq's case, experts say, although they insist it is not a new idea. CSIS's Aliriza notes that Turkey has been quietly gathering regional foreign ministers for periodic discussions on Iraq for almost a year.

But most experts agree that a regional conference would not be successful if it were seen as a tool for implementing the American project in the Middle East.

"The Brahimi idea is the type of thing you do whether it's going to work or not, because states can do together what they can't do alone," says Mr. Levitt. "But it certainly won't work if it is seen as giving legitimacy to what the US is doing." Pointing to the Iraqi prisoner scandal that has sunk America's reputation below already historic lows, Levitt adds, "The timing is very bad in that sense."

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