British Withdrawal May bring Militia, Iranian Influence
Najaf Bomb Kills 18
Rick Jervis of USA Today--reporting from Baghdad-- suggests that the British drawdown from Basra could allow greater Iranian and militia influence in the Shiite deep south of Iraq.
LA Times says that the British are drawing down in Iraq because they cannot fight both there and in Afghanistan without overtaxing their army and facing "operational failure."
A Marine was killed by guerrillas in al-Anbar; guerrillas shot down a US helicopter but the crew and passengers were rescued; a car bomb killed 16 and wounded 40 at the Shiite holy city of Najaf. Sunni Arab guerrillas are attempting to provoke Shiite militiamen to come out for revenge, knowing that they would likely then be curbed or shot by the US military.
Reuters reports on other political violence on Wednesday, of which there was a lot. The number of bodies found in the capital appears to have gone back up after a lull.
Guerrillas also struck at a second chlorine truck, causing Baghdad residents to sicken and go to the hospital with problems breathing. The guerrillas are deliberately attempting to use gases of various sorts to spread chaos.
Underestimating Vice President Dick Cheney's influence with Bush would be a big mistake. I don't think Condi Rice is on the same level at all.
The decline and fall of the coalition of the willing in Iraq.
David Ignatius reports on the growing anger toward the US in the Arab world. We are down to a 12 percent favorability rating. Ignatius rightly points to the security threats engendered by Bush's failures in policy and in public diplomacy.
posted by Juan Cole @ 2/22/2007 12:33:00 AM
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4 Comments:
It is interesting that you mention Public Diplomacy efforts... As the opinion polls show, the Bush administration's efforts to spin the Arab and Muslim countries have failed, largely because they can't talk their way past their disastrous actions...
The true impact of these actions largely escapes the American public... After all, most Americans don't get exposed to the stark and bloody images of Bush's war, but Arabic news channels provide abundant coverage of the same... Iraq is still largely a clean and synthetic war for the US public, save for the occasional documentary on HBO or Sundance channel...
Among the American public that still supports the Bush war, there is largely a sense of detached resignation to the 'fact' that wars are always bloody, and freedom ain't free.. All of this, of course, is glib nonsense... The Bush war is failing to achieve its two main objectives - peace and stability with respect to US and Israeli presence in the region, and steady access for American oil companies to Iraq's fields (as opposed to Russia and China's growing presence)...
And as far as Public Diplomacy is concerned, well it can often boil down to a little more than dressed up propaganda training for government officials... Prof. Eytan Gilboa has been on the forefront of the Public Diplomacy movement for Israel, but one look at his writing shows that he comes from a point of view where the Israelis are the bearers of truth, and the Arabs are liars, and the press (mostly European) are fools for listening to the Arabs and ignoring the Israeli official line...
The problem in the ME is NOT that the press is ignoring the Israeli, or for that matter the US, officials... The 'problem' is that a slowly growing number of journalists are going to the street to find the reality of the Middle Easy - and that reality bites, hard...
Does it not seem obvious that Bush, having sacrificed the pursuit of Osama bin Laden to get Iraq, is now sacrificing the occupation (what's left of it) of Iraq to go after Iran?
It seems to me our natural adversaries are not the Shi'ia, but the Sunnis. (As it was after initially 9-11.)
In light of the recent Wapo Walter Reed Army Hospital expose', and the ancillary details of their outpatient support funding director who apparently runs his own rehab operation:
[February 22 2007] Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: Veteran's Benefits And The Muslim Nations - Five Years Into A War And We Still Don't Understand Muslim Culture At All
In Full
In The News:
The Iraqi resistance begins using improvised "Dirty Bombs", tanker trucks filled with chlorine.
3149 Dead Soldiers, and for what? Oil.
Recently, 3 killed in al-Anbar, 1 in Baghdad, and the resistance is starting to use concentrated small arms fire to bring down helicopters. It works, and anyone with a rifle can participate.
Political Rubble: Carson City Nevada Democratic presidential candidate forum... David Geffen, of Geffen Records and long-time Clinton supporter creates a stir by slamming the Clintons and backing Obama, Dennis Kucinich delivers the speech of the evening, claims the mantle of 'No Strings Candidate'. (no funding either, go figure....)
Nancy Pelosi angrily phones the White House about VP Cheney's statement in Korea regarding al-Qaeda winning if John Murtha's miltary appropriation plan is enacted.
Scooter Libby trial wrapping up with defense based on Libby's supposedly poor 'memory capacity'.
Two German clowns have been shot to death during a performance in Colombia (?!?!)
--30--
"Sunni Arab guerrillas are attempting to provoke Shiite militiamen to come out for revenge, knowing that they would likely then be curbed or shot by the US military."
How do you know this? It was not in the article you referenced, and I am certain you cannot read the minds of the terrorists who did this - and claiming it was "Sunnis" without evidence is very misleading.
I have made comments before about how you claim it was "Sunnis" that did this or that - without evidence, and you failed to publish on your comments section.
Let's see if this one shows up there.
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