(Updated: Originally posted December 5, 2006)
Don't watch the false debate machinations, just observe what is going on behind the scenes.
"U.S. Troops in Iraq Shifting to Advisory Roles" byTHOM SHANKER and EDWARD WONG
BAGHDAD, Dec. 2 — The goal is to create platoon-size teams of 20 to 30 advisers for each Iraqi battalion. The larger teams would also have communications specialists capable of such tasks as calling in airstrikes and medical evacuations, Pentagon officials say.
American officers in Iraq say expanding the teams could also allow trainers to work more intimately with Iraqi soldiers, down to the company level. The teams would also be able to watch more closely for sectarian biases and human rights abuses.
Except, of course, the ones we and our agents commit.
Commanders acknowledge that the plan of moving American forces from direct combat roles to training and advising carries risks, especially as the Baghdad security operation already is short by four Iraqi brigades, or approximately 5,000 Iraqi troops.
Asked whether stabilizing Baghdad would require pulling American forces from other contested areas to fill the deficit in forces — in particular whether American troops could be spared from the Sunni base of Anbar Province — the senior officer said only, “We will try and keep our head above water in Anbar.”
As Bill Cosby once said God asked Noah when he became reluctant to build the ark: How long can you tread water?
Of course, Anbar is a "success" now, even though this has been the worst year for American combat deaths!
Meanwhile, wanton destruction pinned on Muslims continues.
Check out this beaut:
"4 Die in Marine Helicopter Accident in Iraq" by KIRK SEMPLE
BAGHDAD, Dec. 4 — Sunni Arab officials said Monday that a bombing of a Sunni Arab mosque in the northern Baghdad neighborhood of Hurriya on Sunday had shattered its blue dome.
The building, the Nidaa Allah Mosque, was empty during the afternoon attack, and the explosion caused no casualties, according to a local cleric, Said Ahmed Mohammad.
The Nidaa Allah Mosque was one of four Sunni mosques in Hurriya that came under attack during a wave of reprisals by Shiite gunmen after a series of car bombings on Nov. 23 killed more than 200 people in Sadr City.
According to Mr. Mohammad, the mosque’s imam and his family abandoned the mosque on Nov. 25 and it had sat empty since then.
In a photograph of the sandstone-colored mosque taken Sunday and distributed by the American military, only a jagged fragment of the dome remained, like a broken eggshell, pocked with holes from automatic gunfire.
NO REASON for the Muslims to do this to each other; in fact, I believe they WOULDN'T!
SORRY!
This smells to me like the continuing desecration of Islam being carried out by the AC in DC, with the only true beneficiary the Zionist state!
CUI BONO?
And yesterday's additions to the grisly toll:
In Falluja, two civilians were killed and two wounded when a gun battle erupted Monday between Sunni insurgents and an American military patrol in the Nazal district of the city, a local police official said.
A bomb exploded Monday in the southern Baghdad neighborhood of Dora, killing a child and wounding two civilians, and at least 52 bodies were found dumped around the capital."
I heard on tv today that a national poll of Iraqis found that 95% -- unanimity, people -- say the society was safer under Saddam Hussein; 50% say US should withdraw ALL troops immediately; of other 50%, half of them say withdrawal should begin immediately!
An uncontrovertible indictment of George W. Bush and his misbegotten war!
And this was before the surge success, readers!
So Iraqis wanted us to withdraw THEN, and ASSHOLE ESCALATED!