http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/06/12/mar...ppy/index.html

Puppy-throwing Marine is removed from Corps

* Story Highlights
* Hawaii-based Lance Cpl. David Motari is being "processed for separation"
* Motari was seen on video tossing a puppy off a cliff while on patrol in Iraq
* Second Marine, who filmed the incident, was also disciplined

From Mike Mount
CNN Pentagon Producer

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A U.S. Marine videotaped throwing a puppy over a cliff while on patrol in Iraq has been kicked out of the Corps, and a second Marine involved has been disciplined, according to a statement released by the Marines.

YouTube.com removed the video for violating the Web site's terms of use.

Lance Cpl. David Motari, based in Hawaii with the 1st Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment, is being "processed for separation" and received non-judicial punishment, officials said in the statement Wednesday night. The Marine Corps would not specify what that punishment was because of privacy regulations.

The statement said Motari received the punishment for his role in the "episode which generated international attention."

The incident appeared on the Internet web site YouTube in March, sparking outrage from animal rights groups around the world.

In the video, Motari is seen throwing the dog off a cliff as it yelps.

A second Marine, San Diego-based Sgt. Crismarvin Banez Encarnacion, received non-judicial punishment as well.

Janice Hagar, a spokeswoman for the Marines in San Diego, said Encarnacion shot the video.

Marine officials at the Pentagon would not disclose the severity of the disciplinary action against Encarnacion, also because of privacy regulations.

CNN did not receive a response from the Marine Corps in San Diego to questions about the case.

The statement said the Marines conducted an investigation as soon as the YouTube video came to the attention of commanders.

"The actions seen in the Internet video are contrary to the high standards we expect of every Marine and will not be tolerated," according to the statement.

On the video, Motari smiles as he is holding the puppy and then hurls the dog over a cliff. An unknown person operating the video cameras is heard laughing and another voice saying "that's mean, Motari."

In a statement, the Humane Society of the United States applauded the actions.

"The bad actors in this case have been dealt with by the Marine Corps, which rightly recognizes that harming animals is unacceptable conduct," said Dale Bartlett, the group's deputy manager for animal cruelty issues. "Now, the Department of Defense and the Congress must step up protection from cruelty for all animals under the law governing military conduct."

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/14/wo...hp&oref=slogin

Iraq Says Talks on Pact With U.S. at Impasse

By ALISSA J. RUBIN
Published: June 14, 2008

BAGHDAD — Iraq’s negotiations with the United States on a security agreement governing America’s long-term involvement in the country are at an impasse because America’s demands infringe upon Iraq’s sovereignty, the country’s prime minister said Friday.

The comments were the first by the prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, in which he explicitly detailed the main points of contention between the United States and the Iraqi government on the security agreement, which would authorize American forces and operations in Iraq after a United Nations mandate expires at the end of the year.

In a meeting with newspaper editors in Jordan, Mr. Maliki said the current draft of the agreement was unacceptable. “The American version of the agreement infringes hugely on the sovereignty of Iraq and this is something that we cannot ever accept,” he said.

Many of Mr. Maliki’s concerns have been voiced publicly over the last several weeks by prominent Shiite politicians in Iraq, some of them from his own Dawa Party. But this is the first time that the prime minister has raised the same points and described the major differences between the two nations.

Mr. Maliki said there were four areas in which proposed versions of the agreement failed to give sufficient deference to Iraqi sovereignty.

“Iraq rejects Washington’s insistence on granting their forces immunity from Iraqi laws and courts,” he said. “We reject Washington’s demand to have a free hand in undertaking military operations without cooperation with the Iraqi government.”

He added: “We cannot give permission to the American forces independent right to arrest Iraqis or execute operations against terrorism. We cannot allow them to use the Iraqi skies and waters at all times.”

The question of immunity for American contractors accused of killing a number of Iraqi civilians unprovoked is a particularly sensitive point with Iraqis who want to be able to bring the wrongdoers to trial in Iraqi courts.

Mr. Maliki had a somewhat firmer tone on Friday than similar comments made on Thursday after he met with King Abdullah in Jordan.

Then, Mr. Maliki emphasized that the talks with the United States negotiators were continuing and that there were many possible ways to proceed.

“There is no agreement yet; there are many drafts, many thoughts,” he said in comments to the press that were broadcast on Radio Sawa, an Iraqi network. “But we have different visions.”.

Although he made clear at the time that there were deep disagreements between the United States and Iraq, he also said the talks were far from over.

“The important thing is that the conversation between us and the United States is still going on but there are many disagreements and different visions between us but we continue in our discussions,” he said on Thursday.

He added that the agreement was “not close” to being signed.

Earlier this week, President Bush expressed confidence that his administration would reach a new agreement with Iraq. The negotiations face opposition in Congress and, increasingly, in Iraq.

Within Iraq, different Iraqi political factions hold varying views — Sunnis and Kurds, for instance are more open to an agreement, while some of the Shiite factions, which are closer to Iran, are more critical of it. But they all emphasize the importance of Iraq’s sovereignty rights. Iran’s supreme leader has warned Mr. Maliki not to ratify an agreement.

Just split the damn country up!

If Obama comes out in support of doing that, he wins in November.

I never post dissenting opinions from mine :

http://www.economist.com/opinion/dis...ry_ID=11535688

Iraq
Iraq starts to fix itself

Jun 12th 2008
From The Economist print edition
Its people are still suffering monstrously, but Iraq is doing far better than it was only a few months ago

AFTER all the blood and blunders, people are right to be sceptical when good news is announced from Iraq. Yet it is now plain that over the past several months, while Americans have been distracted by their presidential primaries, many things in Iraq have at long last started to go right.

This improvement goes beyond the fall in killing that followed General David Petraeus's “surge”. Iraq's government has gained in stature and confidence. Thanks to soaring oil prices it is flush with money. It is standing up to Iraq's assorted militias and asserting its independence from both America and Iran. The overlapping wars—Sunni against American, Sunni against Shia and Shia against Shia—that harrowed Iraq after the invasion of 2003 have abated. The country no longer looks in imminent danger of flying apart or falling into everlasting anarchy. In September 2007 this newspaper supported the surge not because we had faith in Iraq but only in the desperate hope that the surge might stop what was already a bloodbath from becoming even worse (see article). The situation now is different: Iraq is still a mess, but something approaching a normal future for its people is beginning to look achievable.
The guns begin to fall silent

As General Petraeus himself admits, and our briefing this week argues, the change is fragile, and reversible (see article). But it is real. Only a few months ago, Iraq was in the grip not only of a fierce anti-American insurgency but also of a dense tangle of sectarian wars, which America seemed powerless to stop. Those who thought it was just making matters worse by staying on could point to the bloody facts on the ground as evidence. But now it is time to look again. Each of those overlapping conflicts has lately begun to peter out.

A few Sunnis, motivated by Islam or simple resentment of foreign military occupation, continue to attack American forces. But many Sunni tribes, repelled by the atrocities committed by their former and often foreign allies in al-Qaeda, have joined the so-called Sunni awakening, the Sahwa, and crossed over to America's side. At the same time, Sunnis and Shias have stopped killing each other in the vast numbers that followed the blowing up of a Shia shrine in early 2006. General Petraeus's surge is only one reason for this. Another reason, less flattering to the Americans, is that after last year's frenzied ethnic cleansing fewer neighbourhoods are still mixed. But it is also the case that a lot of Iraqis, having waded briefly into the horror of indiscriminate sectarian slaughter, have for the present made a conscious decision to step back.

The conflict between Shias and Shias has died down too. In the past few weeks Iraq's prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki, has belied a reputation for weakness by sending the army to take control of the port city of Basra and the Baghdad slum known as Sadr City, both strongholds until then of the powerful militia run by Muqtada al-Sadr, a vehemently anti-American Shia cleric. The fact that Mr Sadr considered it wise not to resist suggests not only that the army is now strong enough to out-face private militias but also that the state has acquired far greater political legitimacy, in Shia minds at least.

Needless to say, these conflicts could resume. The Sunnis fighting on America's side today could direct their fire back towards the Americans and Shias tomorrow if not enough room is made for them in the new, Shia-dominated order. On the Shia side, it is not clear whether Mr Sadr has given up violence for good. And his is not the only political movement to have a private army. Sunnis, Shias and Kurds alike still see their respective militias as a hedge against an uncertain future.

To that extent, Iraq is still far from normality. But if the calm survives, politics will at least have a chance. Mr Maliki's next job is therefore to go ahead with the provincial elections due before the end of the year. A good showing by the Sunnis, too few of whom voted in 2005, could bring them back into the political mainstream, enabling them to wield serious power in their own provinces at least. The elections can also provide a useful alternative path to power for the Sadrists, if they really have given up violence and decide to take part.

George Bush meanwhile has a further part to play, which consists mainly of not doing things that might tempt him. He should not, for example, attack Iran. One of the impressive things about Iraq's present government is its refusal to take sides between America and its next-door neighbour. It needs good relations with both if it is to prosper. Mr Bush has also to find a way to leave to his successor the business of negotiating a new agreement on the status of American forces in Iraq. This may become a toxic issue in Iraq's elections as the existing UN mandate expires. Mr Maliki is said to want a guarantee that America will defend its borders. His opponents accuse America of seeking permanent bases in Iraq, turning it into a vassal. It would be wrong for a lame duck in Washington to tie the hands of the next administration on such matters.
It's really not about that any more

In highlighting the improved conditions in Iraq we do not mean to justify The Economist's support of the invasion of 2003 (see article). Too many lives have been shattered for that. History will still record that the invasion and occupation have been a debacle. Iraqis even now live under daily threat of violent death: hundreds are killed each month. They remain woefully short of the necessities of life, such as jobs, clean water and electricity. Iraq's government is gaining confidence faster than competence. It is still fractious, and in many places corrupt.

Nor does it follow that a turn for the better necessarily validates John McCain's insistence on America staying indefinitely. A safer Iraq might make Barack Obama's plan to pull out most American troops within 16 months more feasible, though at the moment a precipitate withdrawal looks foolish. But to guard the fragile improvements, the key for America must be flexibility. Both candidates have to keep their options open. If America's next president gets Iraq wrong because he has boxed himself in during the campaign, all the recent gains may be squandered and Iraq will slide swiftly back into misery and despair. That would be to fail twice over.

http://www.salon.com/opinion/kamiya/...aq_withdrawal/

Leave the Muslim world alone

Bush's moralistic Middle East crusade has backfired, creating more enemies than it destroys. It's time for a tactical retreat.

By Gary Kamiya

July 17, 2007 | It is long past time for America to grasp that Bush's decision to pound the Muslim world into submission -- not just in Iraq, but in Lebanon and in Palestine -- is not the solution, it is the problem. We have turned an entire region, and the adherents of one of the three largest religions in the world, against America and everything that it represents, including democracy. As if in a nightmare, our actions have multiplied the demons of apocalyptic religious terrorism they were intended to destroy.

By green-lighting Israel's war against Lebanon and trying to suffocate Hamas, Bush has succeeded in deepening Muslim hatred of the U.S., without achieving any results on the ground. By invading and occupying a country in the heart of the Arab/Muslim world, the U.S. gave Osama bin Laden and his fellow jihadists a greater gift than they could ever have dreamed of. Invading Iraq to defeat jihadist terrorism was like pouring a can of gasoline on a fire. Now that the fire is raging out of control, continuing to fight it is simply pouring more gasoline on it.

Jihadists need their American boogeyman as much as Bush needs his Islamist boogeyman. By fighting them in the wrong way and on the wrong terrain, we have inadvertently allowed them to claim the heroic mantle of nationalism and anti-Americanism. When the U.S. occupiers leave, Osama bin Laden and his ilk will groan in despair.

At this point, the smartest thing we could do would be to leave the jihadists alone and let their neighbors deal with them. Better still, send them birthday cards.

According to military sources cited by the New York Times, every month 60 to 80 foreign fighters enter Iraq to fight for al-Qaida in Mesopotamia. These men, who represent a fraction of the insurgents in Iraq, are the ultimate bad guys, the true believers who would gladly blow up anything American if they could. Yet even these ardent jihadis are not, contrary to neocon claims, an eternal fact of life in the "pathological" Arab world. They are drawn by the presence of U.S. occupiers on Arab soil. Remove the occupiers and their numbers will drop. If Iraq breaks apart after the U.S. departs and descends into a hell of sectarian violence, the brutal logic of numbers will prevail. The jihadists are all Sunnis, and Iraq is going to be a Shiite-dominated country. The Shiites can deal with al-Qaida in Mesopotamia far more efficiently than we can.

A good general recognizes when the conditions are not favorable for a battle -- and this is one war that we simply can't win. But in the long run, a U.S. defeat in the Middle East will be a victory.

For Bush and the neocons, such an acknowledgment of obvious reality is tantamount to treason. Their mantra is "we must take the fight to the jihadists over there so we don't have to fight them over here." In a July 12 press conference in which he discussed interim Iraq benchmarks, Bush repeated this theme: "As president, my most solemn responsibility is to keep the American people safe. So on my orders, good men and women are now fighting the terrorists on the front lines in Iraq."

Yet it is precisely because we are fighting Arabs and Muslims "over there" that the American people are less safe. That is a conclusion reached not by leftist appeasers but by Bush's own intelligence agencies. Almost six years into his war on terror, al-Qaida is as strong now as it was just before the 9/11 attacks, according to a U.S. intelligence threat assessment.

This finding should come as no surprise. It echoes what American intelligence has been saying for the last year. The last National Intelligence Estimate, which came out in 2006, concluded that the Iraq war had greatly strengthened jihadists around the world. The latest NIE, of which the "threat assessment" forms a part, is not out yet, but it will no doubt reach the same conclusion.

After 9/11, it was understandable that Americans wanted to lash out at the enemy that had wounded us so grievously. But foreign policy should not be driven by raw emotion. The painful truth is that using American troops, or Israeli proxies, to fight Muslim radicalism is a self-defeating proposition. In effect, Bush challenged the entire Arab-Muslim world to fight a guerrilla war against us. As any student of military history knows, this was a really bad idea. If you have a choice, you don't want to fight a guerrilla war on the enemy's turf, and you definitely don't want to fight a guerrilla war against people who are willing to kill themselves.

To borrow a concept from the realist school of great-power politics, the Muslim world is outside of our sphere of influence, at least military influence. We are simply too despised there, our goals too dubious, our allies too problematic and our methods too destructive. It is not possible to surgically separate the jihadists, who are our real enemy, from the nationalists and anti-Americans, who make up the bulk of the region's population. Most Arabs and Muslims despise the jihadists. But by attacking the Muslim world, we have turned them into anti-American heroes.

What holds true for jihadists is doubly true for complex militant organizations like Hezbollah and Hamas. Most of the world's Muslims see these groups, which Bush and his neocon brain trust lumps in with al-Qaida, as legitimate national liberation or resistance movements, and are enraged that the U.S. has tried to starve or bomb them into submission. American support for Israel's war on Lebanon last summer greatly weakened our already abysmal standing in the region, and strengthened al-Qaida and its ilk.

By conflating jihadists with militant, religiously oriented national liberation movements like Hamas, Bush has not only undercut the support we might otherwise have received from Arab populations for police operations against genuine jihadists, he has helped to create toxic new forms of anti-Western extremism. Indeed, the most damaging result of Bush's crudely undifferentiated "war on terror" may be that he has succeeded in creating the dangerous, mixed-up jihadist-nationalist boogeyman that he set out to destroy. If al-Qaida-like groups manage to get a foothold in Lebanon or Gaza -- and there are ominous signs that they are -- the Israeli-Palestinian crisis, the world's most dangerous and intractable problem, may become completely unsolvable.

The irony is that without our help, the jihadists would be struggling to survive. As Gilles Kepel, a French expert on radical Islam, argues in "The War for Muslim Minds," very few Muslims, no matter how radical, support al-Qaida. "Beyond the circle of Bin Laden and Zawahiri and their supporters and admirers ... the majority of Islamists and salafists, let alone most of the world's Muslims, no longer see the commando action carried out by 'the umma's blessed vanguard' against the twin towers and the Pentagon as fulfilling the promise of jihad," Kepel writes. "On the contrary, after the first few seconds of enthusiasm for this blow to America's 'arrogance,' most Muslims saw the massacre of innocents on Sept. 11 as opening the door to disorder and devastation within the house of Islam."

The suggestion that we now leave a bunch of fanatical mass murderers alone may strike most Americans as cowardly and morally contemptible. But what we want are results, not self-righteous campaigns that make matters worse. Bush's righteous war has failed. To leave jihadists alone is not to appease them. It is to plan their isolation and eventual extinction more precisely.

In response, hawks argue that the jihadists will hate us and try to destroy us no matter what we do. "We weren't bothering them before 9/11, and they killed 3,000 Americans!" they shout angrily. "The war is on, and we have to win!" Leaving aside the historical myopia involved in the claim that America's foreign policies had nothing to do with 9/11, and the inconvenient fact that Bush's crusade has greatly strengthened the jihadists, this argument still runs up against the painful reality that it has now become clear that this is one war we can't win.

To be sure, there are rare cases when military action against radical Islamists may be necessary and effective. The U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan, for example, was both justifiable according to just war doctrine (on the grounds that the Taliban regime, which was harboring al-Qaida, constituted an imminent threat) and could turn out to be successful, although there are increasingly ominous signs. But Afghanistan is a unique case. Every other country in the region is far more problematic.

Similarly, I'm not saying that if a group of high-ranking al-Qaida operatives suddenly decided to tell the CIA that they were going to pose for a group photo in a field in the Northwest Territories of Pakistan, we shouldn't blast them all to heaven with a Hellfire missile. But in the real world, these kind of golden opportunities almost never present themselves.

After we leave Iraq, as we inevitably will, we need to do three things to fight the "war on terror" effectively. First, we need to ratchet down our apocalyptic and moralistic rhetoric and recognize the jihadist enemy's true, relatively modest dimensions. This ain't no Soviet Union we're fighting here -- it's a bunch of guys in caves. Second, we need to use military force as a last resort. As Iraq has shown, occupation and war create more jihadis than they capture or kill. Instead, we need to use intelligence and police forces to break up jihadist terror networks. Finally, we need to address both the Arab/Muslim world's self-created pathologies and its legitimate grievances, both of which contribute to jihadism. War supporters make much of the pathologies, but have almost nothing to say about the grievances -- chief among them the festering Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the greatest source of Arab/Muslim rage against America.

There's nothing radical about any of these ideas. They are essentially the ones proposed by the Iraq Study Group, whose long-range policy recommendations would set America's Mideast policies on a rational course.

Ironically, the Bush administration has begun to embrace some of these ideas -- alas, too late. By partnering with Sunni insurgents who are sick of the violent nihilism of al-Qaida radicals, U.S. forces in Iraq have had some success in isolating hardcore jihadists from Iraqi nationalists. This kind of hardheaded realism, with its tacit acknowledgment that moralistic labels are counterproductive (today's Sunni allies were yesterday's terrorists), points toward the more rational and pragmatic policy we need to embrace in the region as a whole.

It is very hard for Americans to admit that there are some enemies that are best left alone. Our tendency to moralistic self-righteousness, our refusal to admit defeat and our belief in our invincible military all conspire against such an admission. But until we realize this, we are likely to be tempted to engage in future adventures -- like a war against Iran -- that are likely to prove even more disastrous than Iraq.

Even a superpower has areas where it cannot impose its will. The limits of American power have been shown in the Middle East. It's time to get out, protect our own borders, do some diplomacy and police work, and let things cool down. And they will cool down. The jihadist moment is too insane and self-destructive to last. Like a wildfire, the best thing to do is starve it of oxygen.

In short, it's time for a tactical retreat. Tactical retreats don't look good on a president's legacy sheet, and they don't inspire stirring patriotic songs. But they can save armies -- and nations.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/142136

Originally Posted by Pink Splice

http://www.salon.com/opinion/kamiya/...aq_withdrawal/Even a superpower has areas where it cannot impose its will. The limits of American power have been shown in the Middle East. It's time to get out, protect our own borders, do some diplomacy and police work, and let things cool down. And they will cool down. The jihadist moment is too insane and self-destructive to last. Like a wildfire, the best thing to do is starve it of oxygen.

In short, it's time for a tactical retreat. Tactical retreats don't look good on a president's legacy sheet, and they don't inspire stirring patriotic songs. But they can save armies -- and nations.

Ummm.... It's time? Only now? It has been time for years. It never wasn't time.

Originally Posted by Pink Splice

I never post dissenting opinions from mine :

http://www.economist.com/opinion/dis...ry_ID=11535688

Iraq
Iraq starts to fix itself . . .

Even if things are slowly, structurally "getting better" is it really worth +$10 billion/month, the death and maiming of our soldiers, and the degradation of our military posture and readiness? Even if this optimistic assessment is correct, we're still likely talking about several YEARS of this level of commitment, or close to it. One does not need to be an expert or a genius to see this rate of "improvement" and extrapolate forward. So is another half trillion dollars, a few thousand more soldiers killed & wounded, God knows how many thousands more soldiers mentally tormented, and another few years of overall military weakness worth this sh*t?

Yes, pulling out will be a disaster. There will likely be multiple wars and indeed genocide. Furthermore our enemies will be enbolded, and our political, military, and financial prestige will be damaged. There is no sugarcoating it.

But who is to say something like that isn't going to happen anyway, either when we do finally leave years from now, or even while we are still there? If Iraq has taught us one thing, it's to never underestimate how f*cked up a place it can be. Right now we have bribed everyone by arming them to the teeth: we are arming the Shi'ites to build their "Iraqi" army, and we are arming the Sunni's to ostensibly fight Al Qaeda. Iran is throwing in arms to the Shi'ites as well, for good measure, and generally to the miltias least under "government" control. Everyone is getting much better armed than ever before. Can you say powder keg? And do I even need to mention how utterly screwed up it is that we STILL can't get their oil capacity and electric grid up to even pre-war capacity?!?!?!?!?! WTF?

It is clear, to me anyway, that if we are truly serious about fixing that place up and getting out, we need a much larger commitment ASAP of troops and resources and just get the damn job done right. The sooner we get it done, the sooner we can get back to a more defensible global military posture, the sooner we can have some part of our reputation salvaged, the sooner we can stop throwing money down a black hole, and the sooner the Iraqi people can have lives worth living.

But we know THAT's not going to happen. The Neocons, petro-imperialists, and their apologists are going to tell us to keep on with the "surge" and "improvement" and yada, yada, yada. And if Bush were to actually propose what actually needs to get done to make this work, the Dem's will blow the GOP to Kingdom Come in the upcoming election, fit they don't anyway.

So the only option I see is pulling out as thoughtfully as possible and then when the sh*t inevitably hits the fan, put those responsible on trial: Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Feith, Wolfowitz, Tenet, and whoever else. Give them to the Hague if we find them guilty here and let them have a turn, at least then there lives will be spared since the "enlightened" Europeans don't have a death penalty and won't give them back to us if are likely to fry them.

Let's get into Afghanistan for real, kick @ss in the Pakistan's Northwest frontier if need be, and kill us some Taliban and Al Qaeda scum and let's get Osama bin Laden's maggot-ridden head on a pike at Ground Zero for Christ's sake. It's about f*cking time, don't you think?!?

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/...ain/index.html

Officials: Iraqi councilman kills U.S. soldiers

* Story Highlights
* Councilman shoots at U.S. troops southeast of Baghdad, official says
* U.S. troops fire back, killing councilman, Iraqi officials say
* U.S. military, Iraqi Interior Ministry differ on number of deaths, other casualties
* Ten also die in mortar attack on an anti-al Qaeda in Iraq group

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- An Iraqi city council member opened fire on U.S. forces outside Baghdad on Monday, killing two soldiers, U.S. officials said.
Iraqi soldiers stand guard at a checkpoint Monday in Amara, where an offensive is under way against militants.

Iraqi soldiers stand guard at a checkpoint Monday in Amara, where an offensive is under way against militants.

Two U.S. soldiers were killed in a small arms fire attack near Salman Pak early Monday afternoon, the U.S. military said in a statement. Three others soldiers and an interpreter were wounded, the statement said, which added that soldiers killed the gunman.

The attack happened as the soldiers were leaving the Salman Pak Nahia Council building, the military said.

An Iraqi Interior Ministry official said the incident happened after U.S. soldiers and local officials had attended a ceremony to open a park in al-Madaen, also known as Salman Pak.

After the soldiers entered al-Madaen's city council building, a city council member opened fire on the soldiers with an AK-47, an Iraqi Interior Ministry official said.

The U.S. forces returned fire, killing the city council member, according to two Interior Ministry officials.

"The attacker came out of his car with an AK-47 rifle in his hand and started firing on the American soldiers until he was killed by the return fire," said Hussein al-Dulaimi, 37, who owns an agricultural machine shop across the street, according to The Associated Press.

Al-Madaen is located about 25 miles (40 km) southeast of Baghdad's city center.

In other violence, a mortar attack killed at least 10 people Sunday evening in northern Iraq, according to a military operations command in Diyala province.

Three mortars hit an office and checkpoint of the U.S.-allied predominantly Sunni fighters, known as the Awakening Councils or Sons of Iraq.
Don't Miss

* Female bomber kills 16 near government complex
* Officials: Pentagon to report drop in Iraq war violence

The attack happened in al-Adhaim in Diyala, 31 miles (about 50 kilometers) north of Baquba, the province's command said Monday.

The 10 slain were all members of Awakening Councils. Twenty-four members of the group also were wounded.

Awakening Councils, also called "Concerned Local Citizen" groups, are comprised of mostly Sunni fighters who have turned on al Qaeda in Iraq.

The mortar attack comes on the verge of a U.S. report that will say violence in Iraq declined in the early part of 2008, according to officials familiar with the report. The Pentagon's upcoming report to Congress, which could be released as early as Monday, will cover events in Iraq from mid-February to mid-May.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said Monday that Iraqi forces will continue "victorious security operations" against al Qaeda in Iraq and other suspected Sunni targets, including "gangs of the former regime," in Diyala and the northern city of Mosul, according to a statement from al-Maliki's office.

He spoke during a visit to the southern city of Amara, the capital of Maysan province, where Iraqi security forces are staging a major offensive against Shiite militants.
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He met with tribal leaders from Maysan in Amara and vowed to "strike with an iron fist anyone who disobeys the law."

Iraqi security forces started the push against militants last week in Maysan, a region that borders Iran. There has been speculation that weaponry destined for Shiite militias has come through Maysan from Iran.

http://www.salon.com/wires/ap/us/200...obe/index.html

Jun 24th, 2008 | SAN ANTONIO -- An Army officer and his wife have pleaded guilty in a money laundering scheme involving contracts in Iraq, the U.S. Justice Department said Tuesday.

Maj. John Cockerham, 43, pleaded guilty to one count each of bribery, conspiracy to commit bribery and money laundering, the Justice Department said. His wife, Melissa, 41, pleaded guilty to a count of money laundering.

The pleas were taken on Jan. 31, but weren't unsealed until Tuesday, the Justice Department said.

John Cockerham admitted taking or being promised more than $9 million in bribes for awarding contracts while stationed in Kuwait, the Justice Department said. He was responsible for awarding contracts worth millions of dollars including those for bottled water.

Once he agreed to take the bribes, Cockerham told contractors to pay his wife, sister and others to hide the activity, the Justice Department said.

Melissa Cockerham admitted that she accepted more than $1 million in illegal bribe payments on her husband's behalf and that she stored it in safe deposit boxes at banks in Kuwait and Dubai, the Justice Department said.

A trial for John Cockerham's sister, Carolyn Blake, is set to begin Oct. 27.

As part of the plea agreements, the government said it would drop two counts of bribery and a count of conspiracy to obstruct justice against John Cockerham and a count of conspiracy and a count of conspiracy to obstruct justice against Melissa Cockerham.

Messages left for the attorneys listed in court documents as representing the Cockerhams were not returned Tuesday.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/01/wo...hp&oref=slogin

Wounded Iraqi Forces Say They’ve Been Abandoned
Michael Kamber for The New York Times

On the day United States forces arrived in Baghdad in April 2003, Hussein Ali Hassan, a sergeant in Saddam Hussein's army, was hit by a tank round. More
By MICHAEL KAMBER
Published: July 1, 2008

BAGHDAD — Dawoud Ameen, a former Iraqi soldier, lay in bed, his shattered legs splayed before him, worrying about the rent for his family of five.


Mr. Ameen’s legs were shredded by shrapnel from a roadside bomb in September 2006 and now, like many wounded members of the Iraqi security forces, he is deeply in debt and struggling to survive. For now, he gets by on $125 a month brought to him by members of his old army unit, charity and whatever his wife, Jinan, can beg from her relatives. But he worries that he could lose even that meager monthly stipend.

In the United States, the issue of war injuries has revolved almost entirely around the care received by the 30,000 wounded American veterans. But Iraqi soldiers and police officers have been wounded in greater numbers, health workers say, and have been treated far worse by their government.

A number of the half-dozen badly wounded Iraqis interviewed for this article said they had been effectively drummed out of the Iraqi security forces without pensions, or were receiving partial pay and in danger of losing even that. Coping with severe injuries, and often amputations, they have been forced to pay for private doctors or turn to Iraq’s failing public hospitals, which as recently as a year ago were controlled by militias that kidnapped and killed patients — particularly security personnel from rival units.

No one knows the exact number of wounded Iraqi veterans, as the government does not keep track. In a 2006 report by the Congressional Research Service, Maj. Gen. Joseph Peterson, the American commander in charge of Iraqi police training, said that in just two years, from September 2004 to October 2006, about 4,000 Iraqi police officers were killed and 8,000 were wounded.

That number does not include soldiers in the Iraqi Army, who are far more numerous than the police and, Iraqi commanders say, have suffered injuries at a far greater rate.

In a February 2006 speech to the Council on Foreign Relations, the report states, Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the secretary of defense, said that Iraqi security forces were being killed and wounded at “roughly twice the rate of all coalition forces.” If that rate held up, the number of wounded Iraqi veterans might well surpass 60,000.

Iraqi government officials say that the wounded are being treated well, and that a law providing for veterans’ care is being drafted. In the interim, they said, wounded veterans will receive their full salaries from the Ministry of Defense.

“The wounded soldiers from the M.O.D. still get their salaries after the incidents, depending on the reports from the medical committees,” said a spokesman for the Defense Ministry, Staff Maj. Gen. Muhammad al-Askari. “We are waiting for the Service and Pension Law for the veterans from the Iraqi Parliament, but they still get paid during that time.”

The veterans interviewed for this article disputed General Askari’s statement and said they were paid only a small fraction of their salaries, or nothing at all. They described the government’s treatment of them as at best indifferent and at worst vindictive.

On the day United States forces arrived in Baghdad in April 2003, Hussein Ali Hassan, a sergeant in Saddam Hussein’s army, was hit by a tank round. With his legs crushed and burns covering much of his body, Mr. Hassan was taken to a Baghdad hospital, where his left leg was quickly amputated.

But in the chaos that broke out after the fall of the Hussein government, the staff fled the hospital. “The looters stole beds and ripped the pipes from the walls around me,” Mr. Hassan said.

His friends and family cared for him until the staff trickled back. Weeks later, after doctors told him the hospital was rife with infectious bacteria, his family hastily took him home.

An Italian organization was arranging a visa so that Mr. Hassan could fly to Italy for care. But with violence rapidly mounting in the fall of 2003, the group closed its doors before the visa request could be completed.

In need of more surgery, Mr. Hassan borrowed money and embarked on a series of operations at Al Jabechi, a private hospital in Baghdad, eventually spending about $13,000 of his own money, he said.

“I could have waited months in the public hospitals, and the care is very bad there,” he said.

Mr. Hassan says that in the five years since he was wounded, his repeated requests for a disability pension have been ignored. Two weeks ago, however, he learned that he had been awarded a pension of about $165 a month for his 23 years of military service (though nothing for medical care and no acknowledgment that he is disabled, he said).

Before the approval of his pension, Mr. Hassan says that he had heard only once from the government, when a health official solicited a $3,000 bribe to approve his travel to Germany for medical care. He refused the request.

He says it does not help his cause that he was a member of Mr. Hussein’s Sunni-dominated army, anathema to the current Shiite-led administration.

To repay his debts and support his family, Mr. Hassan has been driving a taxi, his walker clattering in the roof rack as he plies the streets of Baghdad. With Iraq’s high unemployment rate, he considers himself lucky to have a job.

With the uncertainty of government pensions and Iraq’s desperate economic plight, some wounded security force members have stayed on active duty, knowing it is their only hope of making a living.

Nubras Jabar Muhammad, a 26-year-old soldier, was shot by a sniper in May 2007 as he was on duty at a Baghdad checkpoint. He nearly bled to death, losing a kidney and part of his liver, while suffering damage to his right hand. His torso is scarred, and two fingers are locked in a permanent curl.

He says he still has shrapnel lodged in his back, and rarely sleeps through the night. He has trouble digesting food. But the army refused him a disability pension, claiming he was able-bodied, and he was forced to return to active duty after nine months. He says he has already spent about $2,100 of his own money on operations, selling jewelry and a pistol to raise the cash.

Though he had instructions from his doctors to avoid standing for long periods, the army quickly returned him to checkpoint duty, where he is on his feet all day long in temperatures up to 120 degrees. “I demanded that my superiors give me a desk job,” Mr. Muhammad said. “They told me if I keep complaining, they’ll kick me out of the army.”

Dr. Waleed Abdul Majeed, who has extensive experience treating wounded soldiers, says he believes that they are getting adequate care. But he concedes that they have to wait for it, in part because three military medical centers under the Hussein government have been closed.

“Now the burden is on civilian hospitals,” he said. “It would be better if we had a military hospital. The soldiers are taken good care of in the beginning, but there is no follow-up.”

But with many physicians having been driven away by sectarian militias, there may not be enough competent doctors remaining to staff the hospitals. “At least 25 percent of our doctors have left the country,” Dr. Majeed said. “I see 120 to 150 patients in a day; 30 to 40 need operations every week, so they just have to wait. And prosthetics is a big problem. The Ministry of Health does not have the specialized equipment for this.”

Before the American troop increase, which contributed to improved security in Baghdad, many hospitals were controlled by armed factions that tortured and assassinated members of the security forces in their beds.

Nubras Jabar Muhammad, the sniper victim who was forced to return to duty, fled a public hospital that was controlled by the Mahdi Army militia of the rebel Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr.

“They would come in the night and give you injections to kill you,” he said. “I was scared of being murdered, so I left.”

Hussein Ayad Ali was a 22-year-old member of a Judicial Police commando unit in 2005 when shrapnel from a grenade ripped into his legs and stomach. Soon after, his new battalion commander saw a note in Mr. Ali’s file about a fight he had as a 16-year-old. As he lay at home recovering from his wounds, Mr. Ali says, he was notified that he had been fired because of his “criminal background.”

“The army knew about this all along,” he said of the fight. “I told them when I signed up, but only after I was wounded did they kick me out.”

Despite what they have suffered, most of the veterans interviewed said they were proud of their military service. “I consider my injury an honor,” said Mr. Ameen, the paraplegic army veteran. “I am only sorry the government does not pay attention to us.”

Just half a mile down the street, Col. Ali Farhan shows up each morning at his police station, even though he lost his left leg below the knee from a bomb explosion in November 2006.

Well connected, he was able to remain on active duty rather than try to scrape by on a disability pension of $200 a month, a third his regular salary. He says he works partly for the money and partly because he is proud of his contribution to Iraq, he said.

But, he added: “I lost a leg and can barely walk. I see on TV in the U.S. they lose two legs and they are running races. Why don’t they do the same for us in Iraq?”

http://hosted.ap.org//dynamic/storie...MPLATE=DEFAULT

Originally Posted by Pink Splice

http://hosted.ap.org//dynamic/storie...MPLATE=DEFAULT

I guess that undercuts the "we may have to be in Iraq for fifty years" stuff.

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

I guess that undercuts the "we may have to be in Iraq for fifty years" stuff.

I'll bet that we either get an acceptable status of forces agreement from the Iraqis, or our overwhelming need to be there will vanish. Allowing US troops to be prosecuted in Iraqi courts and subject to Iraqi justice won't fly for a nanosecond.

and CNN:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/...ain/index.html

This one is from the Washington Post. The article reflects two major shifts in the Iraq War. First, the people of Iraq are sick enough of the killing that the killers are having problems keeping their safe houses safe. This is a major victory on the 'hearts and minds' front.

The second is a shift in tactics, forming a new sort of 'fusion team' that unites people with many different skills from many different organizations. You might have a CIA guy flying the drone, the FBI guy analyzing clues, the Treasury guy following the money while the Army guy provides muscle.

I don't know that the new tactics and organization would work without the locals being far more willing to point out terrorist safe houses, but between the two factors, if you believe the reporting, there is a significant shift going on in this particular Friedman Unit.

U.S. Teams Weaken Insurgency In Iraq For discussion purposes...

Uthman, whose given name is Salim Abdallah Ashur al-Shujayri, was one of the bigger fish to be landed recently in a novel anti-insurgent operation that plays out nightly in Baghdad and throughout much of Iraq. U.S. intelligence and defense officials credit the operation and its unusual tactics -- involving small, hybrid teams of special forces and intelligence officers -- with the capture of hundreds of suspected terrorists and their supporters in recent months.

The "fusion cells" are being described as a major factor behind the declining violence in Iraq in recent months. Defense officials say they have been particularly effective against AQI, which has lost 10 senior commanders since June in Baghdad alone, including Uthman.

Aiding the U.S. effort, the officials say, is the increasing antipathy toward AQI among many ordinary Iraqis, who quickly report new terrorist safe houses as soon as they're established. Fresh tips are channeled to fast-reaction teams that move aggressively against reported terrorist targets -- often multiple times in a single night.

"Wherever they go, they cannot hide," said a senior U.S. defense official familiar with counterterrorism operations in Iraq. "They don't have safe houses anymore."

"The second is a shift in tactics, forming a new sort of 'fusion team' that unites people with many different skills from many different organizations. You might have a CIA guy flying the drone, the FBI guy analyzing clues, the Treasury guy following the money while the Army guy provides muscle." --- Bob, that's starting to sound like police work! Is someone finally coming back around to that model of terrorist-hunting? Three cheers!

Originally Posted by The Grey Badger

Bob, that's starting to sound like police work! Is someone finally coming back around to that model of terrorist-hunting? Three cheers!

Sounds like. I'm just happy to see them trying new stuff. A crisis is about picking up lessons learned, learning to fight today's battles, not refighting the battles of the prior crisis.

But I'm still thinking the decisive moment was when Al Qaida's manual on managing chaos was made public. The basic theory was for AQ to disrupt civilization such that the overt government could not provide services, then AQ would have 'charity' organizations provide the missing services, to win the hearts and minds. When the Sunni community leaders started reading how AQ intended to cause chaos indefinitely, to disrupt the community for years or decades, it soured people's attitudes towards AQ. That's when the Sunni Awakening started, and the established Iraqi government started building support.

It is still fragile, still reversible. Still, there seems to have been a culture change, a shift in values, not just a change in tactics, weapons and manpower levels. It might be real.

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

Sounds like. I'm just happy to see them trying new stuff. A crisis is about picking up lessons learned, learning to fight today's battles, not re-fighting the battles of the prior crisis.

But I'm still thinking the decisive moment was when Al Qaida's manual on managing chaos was made public. The basic theory was for AQ to disrupt civilization such that the overt government could not provide services, then AQ would have 'charity' organizations provide the missing services, to win the hearts and minds. When the Sunni community leaders started reading how AQ intended to cause chaos indefinitely, to disrupt the community for years or decades, it soured people's attitudes towards AQ. That's when the Sunni Awakening started, and the established Iraqi government started building support.

It is still fragile, still reversible. Still, there seems to have been a culture change, a shift in values, not just a change in tactics, weapons and manpower levels. It might be real.

In the end, it wasn't the surge, it was the urge. The Iraqis are tired of war, and tired of being manipulated. Good for them.

Now, does that leave us as protectors or merely cheerleaders? I assume that McCain thinks the former and Obama the latter. IMNSHO, we need to help the Iraqis do it themselves ... and leave as soon as feasible. Call it 'declaring victory', if that's what it takes.

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

Sounds like. I'm just happy to see them trying new stuff. A crisis is about picking up lessons learned, learning to fight today's battles, not refighting the battles of the prior crisis.

But I'm still thinking the decisive moment was when Al Qaida's manual on managing chaos was made public. The basic theory was for AQ to disrupt civilization such that the overt government could not provide services, then AQ would have 'charity' organizations provide the missing services, to win the hearts and minds. When the Sunni community leaders started reading how AQ intended to cause chaos indefinitely, to disrupt the community for years or decades, it soured people's attitudes towards AQ. That's when the Sunni Awakening started, and the established Iraqi government started building support.

It is still fragile, still reversible. Still, there seems to have been a culture change, a shift in values, not just a change in tactics, weapons and manpower levels. It might be real.

Compassionate conservatism? Faith-based?

Doubt, Distrust, Delay The Inside Story of How Bush's Team Dealt With Its Failing Iraq Strategy

Bob Woodward for the Washington Post delves into the internal politics among the White House and Army as things were going from bad to worse in Iraq in 2006. A longish read. Interesting, but not earth shattering.

That line from Cool Hand Luke comes to mind. "What we have here is a failure to communicate."

Originally Posted by Pink Splice

Compassionate conservatism? Faith-based?

I'm not one to blame either God or American religious conservatives for Al Qaida in Iraq's tactics and morality.

Still, yes, I am not overly confident that God and various religious conservative movements are in sync on the concept of compassion.

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

I'm not one to blame either God or American religious conservatives for Al Qaida in Iraq's tactics and morality.

Still, yes, I am not overly confident that God and various religious conservative movements are in sync on the concept of compassion.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grover_Norquist

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

I'm not one to blame either God or American religious conservatives for Al Qaida in Iraq's tactics and morality.

Still, yes, I am not overly confident that God and various religious conservative movements are in sync on the concept of compassion.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starve-the-beast

Originally Posted by Pink Splice

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grover_Norquist

Wouldn't it be ironic if Grover Norquist drowned in a bathtub?