Good Morning, Iraq.

[bmolsson]

Maybe Syrian guy's shoot only are freedom fighters that is trying to remove a totalitarian regime ???

[Proletariat]

http://fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com/...nd-london.html

They would have blown up 30 trains if they had the means. Certainly it was not the milk of human kindness that stayed their hand.

The inevitable question then is 'why could Bin Laden not find the means to attack 30 trains?' The answer it seems to me, must be Afghanistan, Iraq, the Horn of Africa and hundred other places where he is engaged without quarter by US forces.

...the practice of engaging an enemy on one front to weaken him on another has been tested from antiquity and is more natural than the alternative....There are many who accept without question the proposition that the US Armed forces are being 'bled dry' in Iraq; that it has become over extended...Yet the very same persons will vehemently reject the idea that Al Qaeda can also be spread thin...it is as if one set of natural laws operated for the Jihad and another for the blundering Americans. But mental honesty will compel us to accept that this can't be true...that if we thought about it really hard, everyone who lives peacefully in a Western city owes it to the men out on patrol tonight.

But don't listen to Wrechard, he's just a former special operations officer...

[Redleg]

http://fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com/...nd-london.html




But don't listen to Wrechard, he's just a former special operations officer...

Ah but you miss their point Prolerariat his views run counter to thier expectations - and he is an American therefor they will blindly ignore anything he has to say.

[Tribesman]

But don't listen to Wrechard, he's just a former special operations officer...

Then he should know that if the "enemy" concentrates its forces hunting for you , then you bugger off somewhere else where he isn't looking.

Ah but you miss their point Prolerariat his views run counter to thier expectations - and he is an American therefor they will blindly ignore anything he has to say.

What you mean like this bit
...Yet the very same persons will vehemently reject the idea that Al Qaeda can also be spread thin...
But his views don't take into consideration that it only takes 1 terrorist in a city anywhere in the world to blow up a train . So it don't matter how thin you spread them does it .

[Proletariat]

Substantially "out" in time for the 2006 mid-term elections?

The United States and Britain are drawing up plans to withdraw the majority of their troops from Iraq by the middle of next year, according to a secret memo written for British Prime Minister Tony Blair by Defense Secretary John Reid.

The paper, which is marked "Secret -- UK Eyes Only," said "emerging U.S. plans assume that 14 out of 18 provinces could be handed over to Iraqi control by early 2006," allowing a reduction in overall U.S.-led forces in Iraq to 66,000 troops. The troop level is now at about 160,000, including 138,000 American troops, according to a military spokesman in Baghdad.

Reid on Sunday did not dispute the authenticity of the document, but said that no decision on troop levels had been made. In Washington, a Pentagon spokesman said officials there had not seen the document.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...071000725.html

This article seems like both a "best case scenario" and an indication that "standing up" has come to mean solely an ability to fight insurgents, and not a remake of society.

I also see another fight between Rumsfeld and the commanders on the ground, in some ways necessitated by the over-extension of the Clinton-destroyed force numbers.

I also see the mid-terms as importantly driving the result. It is important that people see success at the mid-terms, but a permanent constitution and two successful elections in the fall and winter should be all the success they need. Alas, only a significant troop drawdown would probably work at that point.

I still think it's a woefully bad idea for this information to have been released. But, expecting the Western Press to do anything to further the goals of Bush and Blair is silly. The person who leaked the memo should be tried for treason.

[Proletariat]

Translation of a letter from the head of the Da'awa party that is required reading.

What is significant about this article and the Jaafari visit, is that this man represents the leadership of one of the main stream conservative religious parties in Iraq, the Da’awa party. To pronounce the words of thanks is a formal declaration of alliance and negation of the notion of Occupation and affirmation of the Liberation by one of the recognized leaders of the main current of the Shiaa movement in Iraq. You don’t thank an occupier, but you can thank a liberator. Also the donkeys that he is talking about are not in the extremist enemy camp, but some in the Shiaa camp. The hypocrites are the likes of the followers of Muqtada Al Sadr. The enemy is boiling with spite which explains the murder of one of Sistani's agents and the attack on a house of the Prime Minister today.

Politically, the U.S. has made an important conquest so far: That of the hearts and strategic alliance of both the majority of the Shiaa and certainly the Kurds; that accounts for at least 75% of the Iraqi people. And I am sure a sizable part of the Iraqi Sunnis can be won over eventually. The undercurrent of largely unspoken popular support and gratitude remains despite all the hardships, mistakes and even harshness in the relationship between the troops and the population due to the mistrust created by the terrorists. This is something that no amount of Media bias and enemy propaganda can shake off. This is the decisive factor, and this is what is going to prevail in the end of the day.

http://messopotamian.blogspot.com/20...24233622314946

[Franconicus]

Substantially "out" in time for the 2006 mid-term elections?



http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...071000725.html

This article seems like both a "best case scenario" and an indication that "standing up" has come to mean solely an ability to fight insurgents, and not a remake of society.

I also see another fight between Rumsfeld and the commanders on the ground, in some ways necessitated by the over-extension of the Clinton-destroyed force numbers.

I also see the mid-terms as importantly driving the result. It is important that people see success at the mid-terms, but a permanent constitution and two successful elections in the fall and winter should be all the success they need. Alas, only a significant troop drawdown would probably work at that point.

I still think it's a woefully bad idea for this information to have been released. But, expecting the Western Press to do anything to further the goals of Bush and Blair is silly. The person who leaked the memo should be tried for treason.

This is the best news for long time. HJope they can execute their plan

[Gawain of Orkeny]

Dont say execute