I'm not even resting my case because it is already closed, readers:
"Can Iraq hold?"
".... By every measure, their success has been considerable.... But the larger mission of the surge isn't just to quell the violence but to facilitate political accommodation among Iraq's warring forces.... then the inevitable question would be asked: Can the hard-won successes of the surge hold when the US troops leave?
How's that carrot out in front of you nose, 'murkn shit-eater?
Reach it yet?
This is all the surge bought, huh?
A "can we leave yet?"
.... Toward the end of the long meeting, a reporter traveling with the unit asked the local leaders whether the gains on the ground will outlive the surge.
The word came back without hesitation or uncertainty:
"No," said the Shi'ite tribal chief, Sheikh Talib al-Rabei, who serves as chairman of the local 10-member reconciliation committee.
"No," said his Sunni counterpart, Fuad Ali Hussein, a former colonel in the military under Saddam Hussein who is now an imam at a mosque....
"The Iraqi forces are getting better, but it is not as organized as it was. It has a long way to go before we can trust that they will provide security," said Nadim al-Tasi, 46, who was a company commander in the Ba'ath military and now serves on the reconciliation committee....Why did we go there, readers, if a bunch of Saddamists are going to be re-empowered?
Unless:
Occupation Iraq: Israeli-Trained Death Squads
Prop 101: Al-CIA-Duh and the OSI
Prop 101: Al-CIA-Duh's Greatest Hits
Prop 101: The "Terrorism" Business
Prop 102: Iraq and Government Lies
"Al-CIA-Duhs" Catch-and-Release Program
Proactive, Preemptive Operations Group
How much more evidence you need, readers?
Sheikh Talib nodded in agreement.
"Let's be honest. You are the security valve," he said, addressing the Americans through an Iraqi translator whose face is covered with a black ski mask to protect his identity. (Like most translators for the US military, he is seen by many Iraqis as a collaborator; he has been told there is a price of $30,000 on his head.)
"I fear what will happen when that security is gone," the sheikh said....Translation: Iraqis want us to stay!
And CUI BONO, readers?
A fisted glove, a handshake
When Frank and his men arrived in Rashid in February 2007, they immediately took the fight to the enemy, hitting hard against the Mahdi militias on the ascendant Shi'ite side and then pounding Al Qaeda in Iraq insurgent elements that had inserted themselves among the fearful and resentful Sunni side.
They also brokered alliances with former enemies and put onetime resistance fighters on the payrolls of small projects in this community of about 300,000. They've sought out what they call "the reconcilables" - former militia members and resistance fighters on both sides who could be persuaded, or in some cases simply paid, to join the complex mosaic of security forces.
One story they like to tell is of a notorious Mahdi Army militia leader with the nom de guerre of Abu Duma, or "Father of Tears."
.... By September, Abu Duma had begun to cooperate, and the reconciliation group was formed. By November, Frank and his men had facilitated a joint prayer service among Sunnis and Shi'ites at the Al Bakr Mosque in Aamel, a neighborhood in the heart of the Rashid district. By January, a fragile calm was taking hold. Checkpoints were added to further bolster security. A street market long shuttered by the threat of bombings reopened. And by the end of February, nearly 500 families had moved back to their homes.
Frank's unit found a way to instill pride in the pacification: A small company that once minted medals for Hussein's Ba'ath military was hired by the unit to create new medals of honor for citizens helping to make their community better.
It was, said General Petraeus, the intellectual architect of the surge, an inspired touch.
The choreography of reconciliation, he said, can take "a bit of Barnum and Bailey. You know, some plate spinning."
Translation: Bullshit-throwing!!!!
.... Still, the numbers, from a newly declassified report provided to the Globe, are persuasive. Across Baghdad, every category of attack - from improvised explosive devices to snipers and mortar rounds - is down from a high of more than 1,500 in June 2007 to fewer than 500 in February 2008. Civilian deaths, as reported by military and Iraqi officials, have plummeted, from about 3,500 in January 2007 to approximately 700 in February 2008. US military deaths are down from 110 last May to 15 last month. The casualty rate of Iraqi security forces is about triple that of US troops but is on a similarly steep downward trajectory....
You know, I sit here and read all that "success," and I ask myself:
WHAT were the TOTALS BEFORE the U.S. INVADED!!!!
Were 25 PEOPLE A DAY DYING, DOWN FROM over 100??!?
And THAT'S PROGRESS, readers!
How FUCKING BARBARIC!!!!!!
If they are even telling us the truth, which I DOUBT NOW!!!
That there will be force reductions, Crocker said, is certain.
Yup, uh-huh!
How much and how fast and what will follow when US troop strength fades is less clear. "The overall trajectory is established. We're going down. We are reducing forces. But I can't tell you at this point where or how fast we should go beyond July. It is more than geometry, it is calculus. . . . The question is how do we assess what happens when we are gone. That is hard to do."
When the two men return to Washington to offer joint testimony before Congress next month, they will, they said, argue for a period of assessment after forces return to pre-surge levels in July. A pause of some weeks or months is needed, they said, to be sure the progress is "cemented" before further withdrawals proceed....
I'm just shaking my head, readers.
Another telling scene. A Shi'ite family walked through the Karada district in central Baghdad, joining a long line of hundreds of thousands of Shi'ite pilgrims heading south toward Karbala for the annual Ashura, the period of mourning and remembrance of the martyrdom of Imam Hussein, the son of Imam Ali, who is venerated by Shi'ites.
The family, dressed in black, took the juice boxes and small sweet cakes offered to them from tables set up along the pilgrimage route by volunteers, some of whom were Sunni. The food gave them energy for the long journey, by foot and by bus, 30 miles to Karbala.
And I am supposed to buy into all the sectarianism bullshit, right?
I'm fucking TIRED of BEING LIED to by the STINK JEW PRESS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Abd Faraj, 51, a laborer, walking with his wife, Rasmiya, 51, said Shi'ites were not permitted to make this trek on foot under Hussein and they view their participation as a public profession of their faith and their confidence in the new Iraq.
The couple have marched each of the last four years, but this is the first year they have brought their two young children along.
"We feel it is safer now. Things are better," said Faraj, as he led the family at a brisk pace toward Karbala....
So stay, America!!!!
Tolerance fractured
Iraq's present, like its past, is all about the battle for power along the ragged edges of sectarianism - Sunnis, Shi'ites, Kurds, and a small, vanishing community of Christians, all vying for their part of the nation's future.
Under Hussein, sectarian divisions were largely tamped down by the force of the regime - though sometimes they were also inflamed when that suited the regime's purposes. As part of the Sunni minority, Hussein's tenure depended on suppressing, often brutally, the ambitions of Shi'ites and Kurds.
But in Baghdad there was also a tradition of tolerance, of mixed marriages and mixed neighborhoods where Sunnis, Shi'ites, and Kurds lived together....Which the U.S. invasion allegedly destroyed!!!
Of course, if someone invaded and occupied America, I know that the Catholics and the Protestants would start up again, and I'm sure that the blacks and whites would have at it, and there is no doubt that neighbor and in-law would turn on neighbor and in-law, right, America?!
Yeah, we'd all be at each others throats after living together in peace for so long -- with some FALSE-FLAGGING, BLACK-OP HELP I might add!!!!!!!
I am TIRED off the FUCKING ZIONIST LIES, readers!!!!!!!!!!
Garbage was piled and an air of neglect and bitterness was palpable among the Sunni of Fadel. Their mistrust of Americans and Shi'ite political forces such as the supreme council was visible in the cold stares of the men who eyed a Westerner passing through. Behind the Shi'ite ascendancy they see the influence of neighboring Iran and consider America naive about that dangerous regional dynamic.
The Shi'ite political parties in turn blame Sunnis for inviting foreign militants inspired by Al Qaeda and hailing from Syria, Saudi Arabia, and elsewhere in the Arab world to come into Iraq.
And we ALL KNOW WHO "Al-CIA-Duh" is now, right, readers?
So WHO is PITTING IRAQI against IRAQI, readers?
The commander, Qaisi, took a seat in a tea house where old men played dominoes and younger men smoked water pipes that glowed with sweet apple tobacco. He explained that the loyalty of the Awakening, or "resistance fighters," as they prefer to be called, is directly tied to the American military unit in their area....
So WE AIN'T LEAVIN', folks!!!!
Unclear is whether the new alliances are built on much more than the $300 per month the Awakening members receive from US forces for serving as community security guards. Is it a new way of life or just a way to get by until the US troops pull out?
Where's my check, government?
As the meeting ends, the Friday call to prayer begins, a cacophonous mix of prayers from the Sunni and Shi'ite minarets.
Excuse me?
Welcome home
Back on the streets of Rashid, Lieutenant Colonel Frank's convoy left Reconciliation Hall and plunged into the neighborhood. They dismounted and walked the streets house to house, not kicking in doors but knocking on them and checking on families....
Change, huh?
The soldiers waved to checkpoints now manned by the Iraqi Army and more than 1,500 members of the Awakening movement. They patrolled mobile neighborhood health clinics - "quick wins," as Frank calls them, funded by 140 "microgrants" of $5,000 each that Frank has secured from the US command.
Where the fuck is MY CHECK, Dammit?!!
A member of the provincial government wanted to know when money will come to help reopen the neighborhood school.
Yeah, we Americans are wondering the same thing here at home!!!!!!
Frank nodded as he wrote in his notebook. There were numerous questions about electrical service, which is still not functioning for more than a few hours a week in this part of Rashid.
But Iraq is SO MUCH BETTER since BUSH'S INVASION!!!!!!!!!!
And then he happened upon the Tahi family, a Shi'ite clan.
"How's everything going here. You coming back? That's great!" said Frank as he approached the family and asked whether he could enter the courtyard to talk.
Their home had been attacked by Al Qaeda, they said, and one rocket had burst through the wall last summer just above a bed where Mahdi al-Tahi, a 40-year-old civil engineer, was sleeping with his wife. They fled their home that night.
"It is better now, really. Sunni and Shi'a here have lived together for 30 years," said Tahi, as children played and the men worked with trowels repairing a wall in front of their home that had been riddled with machine gun fire.
When asked why the violence erupted if Sunnis and Shi'ites have such a history of tolerance, he said, "Outside forces do this. There is the Al Qaeda from Saudi and from Syria. And there is Iran. We need to have an Iraq free of outside forces," he said.
Which is why I DOUBT the whole SECTARIANISM LIE, folks!!
All BULLSHIT!!!
CUI BONO from keeping Iraq apart?
WHO?
But what about the "outside" force of America, he was asked as the group toured his house and surveyed the damage. Frank was down in the courtyard examining electrical wires that had been severed by bombing. He was out of earshot, but Tahi looked nervously around before answering.
"And, yes, America. Eventually, America should go, too," he said. "Not right now, but in time. We need more time. All Iraqis know that. America wants to leave. And Iraqis want America to leave. And they will, God willing."
Yup, they want us to STAY!!!!!
Quite a contrast from the story the Iraq War Veterans told that the Globe buried in its second section, isn't it, readers?
Yeah, tell me again there is no Zionist bias in AmeriKa's War Daily Shit Sheets! Tell it to me again, maybe I'll believe it -- NOT!!!!!!
Oh, yeah, the surge worked, too!!!
"Police arrested at least 25 members of Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army militia yesterday, a day after two police officers were killed in gun battles in the southern city of Kut, police said.
Police say at least 13 people have been killed in fighting in Kut since Tuesday....
"This operation started in the early morning and so far we have arrested 25 wanted people from the Mahdi Army," said Lieutenant Aziz al-Amara, who commands a rapid reaction unit....
""I'm not able to fight the gunmen with the few troops I have," said Lieutenant Aziz al-Amara, who commands a rapid reaction unit.... "
A mortar attack early yesterday wounded six people, including three members of the same family, Kut police said....
Separately, the US military said eight Iraqi civilians were wounded in a rocket attack on a US facility in Hilla, 60 miles south of Baghdad, late Friday..... Hilla police chief Brigadier General Fadhil al-Sultani said a suspect had been arrested after the attack, which damaged three homes and a school...."
Yeah, Iraq is just splendid since Bush's invasion, yessiree!!!!
