INSURGANT GROUPS

The Iraqi insurgency is composed of at least a dozen major organizations and perhaps as many as 40 distinct groups. These groups are subdivided into countless smaller cells.

main groupings are:

• Ba'athists, the supporters of Saddam Hussein's former regime including army or intelligence officers, whose ideology is a variant of Pan-Arabism.
• Nationalists, Iraqis who believe in a strong version of Iraqi self-determination. These policies may not necessarily espouse a Pan-Arab ideology, but rather advocate the country's territorial integrity including Kuwait and Khusestan. Historical figures of this movement include the pre-Ba'athist leader of Iraq Abd al-Karim Qasim and his government.
• Iraqi Salafis Islamists, the indigenous armed followers of the Salafi movement, as well as any remnants of the Kurdish Ansar al-Islam: individuals with a Salafi-only policy opposed to non-Salafis though not aligned to one specific ethnic group. Though opposed to the US-led invasion, these groups are not wholly sympathetic towards the former Ba'ath Party as its members included non-Salafis. It is important to remember that the terms Salafi and Wahabi are often used synomously and indeed they are both typically from foreign nations (usually Saudi Arabia).
• Shi'a militias, including the southern, Iran-linked Badr Organization, the Mahdi Army, and the central-Iraq followers of Muqtada al-Sadr. These groups have Shia religious theories and as such, neither advocate the dominance of a single ethnic group, nor the traditional ideologies behind the Iraqi state (eg. these particular Shi'ites do not support the capture of Khustestan or other border areas with Iran, but rather promote warm relations with Iran's Shi'ite government).
• Foreign Islamist volunteers, including those often linked to al Qaeda and largely driven by the Salafi/Wahhabi doctrine (the two preceding categories are often lumped as "Jihadists");
• At least one socialist revolutionaries (such as the Iraqi Armed Revolutionary Resistance).
• Non-violent resistance groups and political parties (not part of the armed insurgency).