TSR: "a new military campaign against the infidels in Iraq"


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Length: 4:08


WOLF BLITZER: Meanwhile, there's a new audiotape out believed to be from the new leader of al Qaeda in Iraq. He's warning his group is launching a major military campaign, and he urges other Muslims in Iraq to join in as well. CNN is unable, so far, to independently verify the speaker's identity.

For more, though, on the tape and the allegations by Bob Woodward, we go to the Iraqi capital.

And joining us now from Baghdad, our correspondent Michael Ware.

Michael, there's a suggestion, word beginning to circulate now in this new Bob Woodward book, that, perhaps, in 2007, the insurgency, the sectarian violence, the bloodshed in Iraq, is going to be even worse than it's been in 2006 and 2005.

Looking down the road, based on everything you have been seeing and hearing -- you have been embedded with U.S. troops -- you are speaking to various forces out there -- does it look like the situation next year is going to be worse or better?

MICHAEL WARE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, it's in absolutely no one's interest within the insurgency or the militias which currently hold sway with the governments or among these lethal sectarian death squads to let up.

There's simply no incentive for them to do so. In fact, it is the extremes of both the Sunni and the Shia communities that are not only dominating the insurgency but also increasingly dominating the political agenda, whom are benefiting from all this violence, which there simply are not enough U.S. forces or Iraqi forces, for what they are worth, to contain it. So, there's no reason for this to decrease. In fact, there's every reason to suggest it should increase. And we have every sign that these insurgents and militias have this well within their capabilities -- Wolf.

BLITZER: But what about the suggestion that the Iraqi military, the Iraqi police forces, that they are becoming increasingly more successful, or more -- better prepared, better trained, to deal with this, and as a result the burden on the international forces, especially the U.S. forces, will be reduced?

WARE: Well, I mean that's the crux of the whole plan, isn't it? Train them up, until they can withstand the al Qaeda onslaught, even though we don't have enough troops now to withstand the al Qaeda onslaught, and then leave them to it.

Well, that's paper-thin. That is a deck of cards. And offline, most American commanders will concede the drastic limitations of the Iraqi forces that they work with. And this is not even touching on the fact that key elements, large sections of these Iraqi security forces are in the sway of the Iranian-backed militias, the surrogates, as U.S. military intelligence calls them.

Other large chunks are heavily penetrated by the insurgency. So, really, this is a mirage in so many ways -- Wolf.

BLITZER: We heard a new audiotape from the new al Qaeda leader in Iraq. After Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was killed by U.S. forces, it was going to get better. But now this guy shows up, and making all sorts of threats out there. What's your take on what we heard from Abu Ayyub al-Masri?

WARE: Well, I think this message is a declaration. I mean, this is the first chapter of al-Muhajir's manifesto. He's establishing the new platform for al Qaeda in Iraq.

Zarqawi, and his assassinated religious right-hand man, Abu Anas al-Shami, both carved out a certain path. Well, with Zarqawi's death, the question was, would that path be followed?

But the replacement for Zarqawi being an Egyptian, a veteran of the Afghan al Qaeda camps, and coming from the Egyptian strain of jihad, which is increasingly growing greater influence inside al Qaeda itself, it signaled a return to classic al Qaeda.

And this platform suggests that here he is starting to spell it out. And, most menacingly, he vows that he now unleashes a new military campaign against the infidels in Iraq -- Wolf.

BLITZER: What a story. Michael, thanks very much for joining us.