*IRAQ: latest news and developments

[Barking_Mad]

300 Iraqi soldiers abandon unit in Samarra

At least 300 Iraqi soldiers abandoned their 750-man unit after they were deployed to Samarra earlier this month as part of a U.S.-Iraqi operation to retake the militant-controlled city. Like similar incidents earlier this year in Fallujah and Baghdad's Sadr City, the desertions are prompting coalition officers to improve training for Iraqi recruits.
U.S. and Iraqi officials said Iraqi forces are needed to help retake and hold the toughest insurgent strongholds, including Fallujah, where as many as 1,000 militants are believed to be entrenched. Releasing the militants' grip on these areas will be key to holding elections, scheduled for January, and handing security over to Iraqi forces.

The Oct. 1-2 offensive in Samarra was the first major test of newly trained and equipped Iraqi security forces since April, when several battalions of national guard and army troops refused to fight in Fallujah and Baghdad's Sadr City after revolts.

Since then, the U.S.-led military coalition has upgraded training and provided more equipment and weapons to their Iraqi counterparts. Coalition officials point out that the remaining 450 soldiers in the Iraqi Army's 7th Battalion performed bravely during the two-day battle in Samarra. The operation, which involved 2,000 Iraqi forces and 3,000 U.S. soldiers, succeeded in taking back the city about 60 miles north of Baghdad.

"Those are the guys who did well in Samarra," said British Army Brig. Nigel Aylwin-Foster, deputy commander of the coalition office for training and organizing Iraq's armed forces. He said the deserters were spooked by an attack on Sept. 19, about a week after they had been deployed from Baghdad. A car bombing at a checkpoint killed one of the battalion's officers and injured eight soldiers, Aylwin-Foster said. About 100 deserted afterward.

 

[Barking_Mad]

News from yesterday

U.S. fighter jets, artillery pound targets in Fallujah
U.S. jets and artillery pounded targets in the southern and eastern part of Fallujah - the major stronghold of Sunni insurgents - around sundown Friday as residents were taking the traditional meal that breaks the daily fast during Ramadan.

256th to move from Kuwait to Iraq
The 256th Infantry Enhanced Separate Brigade is in Kuwait, getting ready to head to Iraq. The brigade, made up of four-thousand soldiers with its headquarters in Lafayette, left the US last month for the Middle East.

CENTCOM: Detainee Dies At Camp Bucca
A security internee died Tuesday evening, Oct. 19, of unknown causes at Camp Bucca, near the Iraqi town of Umm Qasr. An autopsy is pending to determine the cause of death.

Clashes in Iraq's Samarra Kill at Least Six
At least six civilians were killed and 11 U.S. soldiers wounded in clashes in Samarra Wednesday, a northern Iraqi town the U.S. military said it had pacified following an offensive earlier this month.

Car bomb explodes in central Baghdad
A car bomb shook Baghdad at sunset Wednesday, and a large plume of smoke could be seen rising from the western bank of the Tigris river. There were no reports of casualties among U.S. troops or damage to their equipment in the blast ...

Four children killed in Samarra car bomb Four children were killed and 20 people injured when a car bomb exploded in the path of a US army convoy near a nursery school in the Iraqi city of Samarra on Wednesday, medics and police said.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Marines tire of war, lack of supplies

QAIM, Iraq (AP) - The sound of the Black Hawk medical helicopter is an ominous sign for the Marines patrolling this forgotten western corner of Iraq that borders Syria. It means one of them is seriously wounded or killed by their elusive enemy. The sound of a roaring engine, shattering evening calm, is immediately followed up with a quick whisper among the troops, trying to find out who it was - this time.

At this Marine base, at the far west of the restless Anbar province only miles from the Syrian border, the news spreads quickly. "We are losing guys left and right," said Cpl. Cody King, 20, of Phoenix, not hiding his anger. "All we are doing around here is getting blown up."

....

Gunnery Sgt. Jason Berold says the rules, as they are now, are frustrating. Unless they see insurgents shooting at them or have what they call positive identification, there’s little the Marines can do. "All we are doing is getting Americans killed, and we cannot do much about it," King said. The other Marines in the room nodded in approval.

"None of us are scared of going out ... as long as you get one bad guy." Because of the existing rules of engagement, though, the only thing left after the incidents is to "pick up your dead and wounded and get out of there as soon as possible," King said.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraq: US assault underway on Fallujah

In recent weeks there has been speculation in the press as to whether the American-led occupation forces in Iraq would attack Fallujah before or after the November 2 US presidential election. The question has become something of a moot point. The roads out of Fallujah have been cordoned off by US forces, all talks have broken down, the city is being bombarded every night by US air strikes and 1,000 marines are engaging Iraqi resistance fighters in the outer suburbs.

A bloody battle in Fallujah has begun—accompanied by a major escalation in the violence across Iraq—largely behind the backs of the American people and the world as a whole. The New York Times reported Monday: “The escalation of fighting in Fallujah came as hundreds of [Iraqi] insurgents arrived from other cities for a long-anticipated offensive by US forces, according to witnesses.” An anonymous US military official gloated to the Boston Globe that the Iraqis preparing to defend Fallujah “are definitely going to fulfill their jihadist dream of going to heaven, because they’re going to die pretty quickly”.

A Fallujah resident told the Arab cable network Al Jazeerah on Sunday: “US helicopters and armoured vehicles are bombing the city in an attempt to destroy its infrastructure, with no consideration for whether its targets are resistance fighters or civilians.” Observers in Fallujah told Al Jazeerah that ambulances have not been able to reach the areas where the fighting on the ground is taking place. Among the confirmed civilian casualties in the past week are a family gunned down at an American checkpoint and a young girl killed when US artillery demolished her home..........

..........The repression is threatening to unleash a massive reaction. The main national Sunni religious leadership, the Association of Muslim Scholars, which opposes the occupation and claims to speak for as many as 3,000 Sunni mosques, has called for a nation-wide campaign of “civil disobedience” to force the US-led forces to stop bombing Fallujah.

The Association warned last Friday: “If the interim government and the occupation forces do not respond to the civil disobedience campaign, Muslim scholars and representatives of all Islamic and national groups will declare holy war over Iraq and declare a mobilisation against the occupation troops, as well as all those collaborating with them.”

The ferment in the Sunni population provoked Iraqi interim president, Ghazi Ajil al-Yawar, to warn against any attack on Fallujah: “We learn one thing in Iraq—that blood causes more blood. It will send ripples as far as Mosul, which has the biggest Sunni Arab population, three million plus, which is living in a very tense situation right now. It is very dangerous.”

 

[Barking_Mad]

Baghdad bus attacked by gunmen

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Gunmen have fired on a bus carrying Baghdad airport employees to work, killing four people and wounding 11 in a brazen assault on Iraqis helping to revive a vital link in Iraq's reconstruction. The attackers strafed the bus with gunfire as it was passing through a Baghdad neighbourhood shortly after 7 a.m. on Thursday, carrying about 25 people to work at Baghdad International Airport, on the western outskirts of the capital.

"The bus was riddled with bullet holes. There was broken glass everywhere," said an airport employee who asked not to be named. She said most of the passengers were office workers. Staff at Yarmouk hospital in central Baghdad said they had received 11 wounded, some of them in critical condition.

CIA INVOLVEMENT AT ABU GHRAIB

Witnesses also told the court on Wednesday that the CIA sometimes directed abuse at the prison, and that orders were received from the military command to toughen interrogations. The evidence, from an officer and a chief warrant officer who served at the jail, is among the strongest so far in the Abu Ghraib trials pointing to more senior involvement in the abuse and direct orders from above to "break" detainees. The Pentagon has said the abuses that took place were the work of a few "bad apples" acting on their own initiative.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraqis still made to wait hours at gas stations

Surge in number of cars, insufficient gas stations, coupled with many street vendors are reasons behind long queues. Pressed for time, Ahmad Hussein refuses to spend hours queuing for petrol at one of Baghdad's teeming gas stations so he takes his car to a street vendor where it costs six times as much to fill up. "Have you ever seen anything like this in a country that is floating on a sea of oil?" the 60-year-old businessman demanded as he stood on the roadside watching a scruffy boy pour petrol into his tank from a plastic container - a scene that is commonplace across the capital.

A good read from a journalist who has been inside Fallujah

Falluja in their sights - As soon as British troops are redeployed, the US will again turn the city into a bloodbath

Fallujans have now been offered a choice: hand over the outsiders they dislike (mostly Arabs) who are protecting them from the outsiders they really hate (the Americans), or get blown apart by the world's most lethal killing machine, the US marines. Zarqawi's influence on the resistance has been wildly exaggerated - indeed, many people in Falluja don't even believe he exists, and most find the non-Iraqi Arabs' brand of Salafi fundamentalism at odds with their local Sufi traditions. Today, many Fallujans are tired even of their own mujahideen, but trust the US army even less, and with good reason. Recently, a Bush administration official told the New York Times the bombing was driving a wedge between the citizenry and the non-Iraqi fighters. If, indeed, the civilian population is being bombed for this end, this is a grave war crime.

 

[Gumbert]

A good read from a journalist who has been inside Fallujah

Falluja in their sights - As soon as British troops are redeployed, the US will again turn the city into a bloodbath

think an assault on Cardiff.

jeezus..

 

[Barking_Mad]

Unannounced U.S. searches in Iraq find nobody home in rebel towns

YUSUFIYA, Iraq Nobody tends the stalls at the main market under the big painted signs. Nothing moves on the streets. No one answers when U.S. soldiers pound on the flimsy metal gates of the houses. No objections are raised when the soldiers peer into kitchen pantries or, their heads cocked with suspicion, pull the dust cover off a television set that is being stored in the corner of a living room.

Out of the hundreds of homes here and in a neighboring town, Mulla Fayyad, most were empty when the soldiers descended at dusk and began an overnight search, house by house, for insurgents and their weaponry. Families were at home in only a small number of houses, perhaps a few dozen. It is not as though no one lives here.

....But as the night wore on and nothing of value turned up, some of the young Americans in uniform seemed to grow bored. They fired several times at one lock but failed to open it. A few moments later, a soldier stepped forward, made a tremendous swing with a crowbar and fell on his behind. The group roared with laughter.

One soldier said, "This isn't even a mission anymore," saying he and his colleagues were "just doing whatever we want." As the soldiers tromped down the street, a lone Iraqi boy leaned out of the shadows in one doorway and silently took it all in. On this street, at least one resident had remained.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Crazy, crazy, crazy.

Why is war-torn Iraq giving $190,000 to Toys R Us

Since Saddam was toppled in April, Iraq has paid out $1.8bn in reparations to the United Nations Compensation Commission (UNCC), the Geneva-based quasi tribunal that assesses claims and disburses awards. Of those payments, $37m have gone to Britain and $32.8m have gone to the United States. That's right: in the past 18 months, Iraq's occupiers have collected $69.8m in reparation payments from the desperate people they have been occupying. But it gets worse: the vast majority of those payments, 78%, have gone to multinational corporations, according to statistics on the UNCC website....

But the UNCC's corporate handouts only accelerated. Here is a small sample of who has been getting "reparation" awards from Iraq: Halliburton ($18m), Bechtel ($7m), Mobil ($2.3m), Shell ($1.6m), Nestlé ($2.6m), Pepsi ($3.8m), Philip Morris ($1.3m), Sheraton ($11m), Kentucky Fried Chicken ($321,000) and Toys R Us ($189,449). In the vast majority of cases, these corporations did not claim that Saddam's forces damaged their property in Kuwait - only that they "lost profits" or, in the case of American Express, experienced a "decline in business" because of the invasion and occupation of Kuwait....

 

[Barking_Mad]

The piece states that an estimated 80% of people have left the city - acording to a Falluja resident.

Failure in Fallujah

"Violence begets violence," says Salim. "Of course we are against these terrorist operations. No Muslim would allow himself to cut someone's throat. Our holy book says: 'If you capture someone, you must feed them, even with your own food.' " But just as Salim rejects Zarqawi's methods, he also believes that Fallujah has been unfairly singled out for attack.

"We hate anyone who comes to [occupy] our city. Most people refuse to allow foreign [fighters] to go there," says Salim. "There are many operations across Iraq – car bombs, mortars, everything – not just in Fallujah. Why do they insist [on targeting] Fallujah, and one man?" Salim says his experience is common to many Fallujans, who have been rattled by weeks of nightly airstrikes and fearful expectations of an imminent U.S.-led military siege and push on the city that promises heavy casualties on both sides.

When the U.S. Marines engaged the Fallujah resistance for three weeks last April – in the aftermath of the killing and mutilation of four American contractors – more than 100 marines and 600 Iraqis died. U.S. forces have since ceded the city to the resistance. The result is new fear that is tearing at family social fabric, which Iraqis say has only hardened attitudes against American efforts.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Not directly Iraq related but hey......more Cheney scare tactics.

Cheney: Terrorists May Bomb U.S. Cities

CARROLL, Ohio - Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites) on Tuesday raised the possibility of terrorists bombing U.S. cities with nuclear weapons and questioned whether Sen. John Kerry (news - web sites) could combat such an "ultimate threat ... you've got to get your mind around."

"The biggest threat we face now as a nation is the possibility of terrorists ending up in the middle of one of our cities with deadlier weapons than have ever before been used against us — biological agents or a nuclear weapon or a chemical weapon of some kind to be able to threaten the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans," Cheney said. "That's the ultimate threat. For us to have a strategy that's capable of defeating that threat, you've got to get your mind around that concept," Cheney said.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Interesting read.

Post-war planning non-existent

WASHINGTON - In March 2003, days before the start of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, American war planners and intelligence officials met at Shaw Air Force Base in South Carolina to review the Bush administration's plans to oust Saddam Hussein and implant democracy in Iraq. Near the end of his presentation, an Army lieutenant colonel who was giving a briefing showed a slide describing the Pentagon's plans for rebuilding Iraq after the war, known in the planners' parlance as Phase 4-C. He was uncomfortable with his material - and for good reason.

The slide said: "To Be Provided."

A Knight Ridder review of the administration's Iraq policy and decisions has found that it invaded Iraq without a comprehensive plan in place to secure and rebuild the country. The administration also failed to provide some 100,000 additional U.S. troops that American military commanders originally wanted to help restore order and reconstruct a country shattered by war, a brutal dictatorship and economic sanctions.

In fact, some senior Pentagon officials had thought they could bring most American soldiers home from Iraq by September 2003. Instead, more than a year later, 138,000 U.S. troops are still fighting terrorists who slip easily across Iraq's long borders, diehards from the old regime and Iraqis angered by their country's widespread crime and unemployment and America's sometimes heavy boots.

"We didn't go in with a plan. We went in with a theory," said a veteran State Department officer who was directly involved in Iraq policy.....

....."We've finally got our act together, but we're all afraid it may be too late," said one senior official who's engaged daily in Iraq policy.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Robert Fisk's piece on Margaret Hassan

The heroine who offered hope for Iraq

Margaret? Margaret Hassan kidnapped? She who said to me that soon, very soon, "there will be more than one lost generation" in Iraq?

Is there no end to the kidnappers' targets? Margaret Hassan was abducted at 7.30 yesterday morning on her way to work running Care International's Iraq operation. Soon afterwards, Arabic al-Jazeera television showed her sitting in a room looking calm, if concerned. It also showed close-ups of her identification papers and said an unnamed Iraqi group claimed it had kidnapped her.

Margaret was the enemy of United Nations sanctions on Iraq. She is the symbol of all those who believe that Iraq - a real, free, unoccupied Iraq - has a future; and all we can be told is that she, too, has joined the legion of the unpersons, the "disappeared", the list of those who, because of their language or the colour of their eyes or their nationality, have slipped into Iraq's dark hole.

The ultimate disgrace yesterday was to hear British diplomats who supported those deadly sanctions weeping their crocodile tears for "Margaret".

Tony Blair rushed to say Britain will do all that it can to secure her release. "There is really a limit at this stage what I can say to you, but obviously we will do whatever we can," he said, while standing beside the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, in London.

"It shows the kind of people we are up against that they are prepared to kidnap somebody like this. We do not know which group it is." But Mr Blair, remember, fully supported the sanctions which Margaret loathed. And, of course, he supported George Bush's invasion that led to the chaos that has engulfed Iraq.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Wounded Soldier Talks About War Experience

A soldier sent home to recover from his wounds, Army Spc. Marcos Aragon, 20, of Riverbank sat in a comfy armchair on Friday and talked about his experiences in Iraq. He looked pale and drawn, and walked slowly with a cane. He was severely injured in September when an Iraqi drove a truck packed with explosives into his camp and blew it up. The soldier next to him was killed. Aragon was flung several feet by the blast. He sustained a shattered jaw, broken eardrums, nerve damage and shrapnel wounds in his face, arms and legs.....

..."When I left school, I didn't know what I wanted to do," he said. "Basic training was tough. But once I got through that and into the regular service, I found the Army is a job just like any other. You do what you're supposed to and there's no problems."

Being on the front line in Iraq is totally different from the training he underwent at Fort Hood, Texas, he said. "You're a moving target. You're not safe anywhere. Even in the rooms where we sleep, you can hear the helicopters and the shooting at night. You open the door in the morning and immediately smell the gunpowder." Every day, he would hear over the radio about friends being wounded or killed, but the camaraderie of soldiering makes it bearable.

 

[Barking_Mad]

The Cost of War (pdf)

Billions of dollars have been earmarked to restore the basic infrastructure of the shattered nation, but running water, electricity and food are still in short supply.

Ta Soldiers 'Sent to Iraq Despite Failing Weapons Tests'

Nearly 1,000 Territorial Army soldiers were sent to fight in Iraq despite failing their weapons test, a court martial heard today. A total of 949 part-time soldiers failed to achieve the required standard or were trained by instructors who had not passed the test themselves, the hearing was told.

But because the figures were only based on records over an eight-month period the number could have been as high as 2,300, the court was told. The figure was revealed during the court martial of reservist Lance Corporal Ian Blaymire, who is charged with the manslaughter of a colleague while serving in Iraq. Sergeant John Nightingale, 32, a reservist from Guiseley, West Yorkshire, died almost instantly after being hit at point-blank range in the chest by a bullet from a A2 rifle in the Shabah Military Camp in Iraq on September 23 last year. Blaymire, 23, a plumber from Leeds, is charged with his manslaughter and was appearing at a court martial at Caterick Garrison in North Yorkshire. The hearing was told that reservists had to acquire a “skilled” mark in their weapon test before being deployed to a war zone. But many soldiers who had only achieved “average” grades and should have been failed were sent to the Gulf.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraqi Insurgents in Fallujah Clash With U.S. Marines Near City

U.S. Marines clashed with Iraqi rebels outside Fallujah today, exchanging rocket and small-arms fire with rebels inside the insurgent stronghold, the U.S. military said in a statement e-mailed from Iraq.

Mortar Rounds Explode in Mosul Near Allawi

Mortar rounds exploded near Prime Minister Ayad Allawi on Thursday as he visited this northern Iraq city, but there were no reported injuries in the attack. In Baghdad, three employees from Allawi's office ... were gunned down Thursday.

Explosions heard in central Baghdad

A series of loud explosions wereheard in central Baghdad shortly after sunset on Thursday andsirens wailed in the Green Zone, witnesses said. It was not immediately known what caused the blasts or if therewere any casualties.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Jesus, even in India you get hit by Iraqi shells

Iraq war junk gets dumped in India

CALCUTTA, India, Oct. 21 (UPI) -- Sept. 30 was just another day for Santosh Khushwaha and Lal Chand, two metal scrap melting workers at Bhushan Steel, a medium-sized steel products maker near Delhi in India. Till about afternoon that is, after which both their lives changed forever.

A loud explosion in the scrap yard they were working knocked them unconscious and when they woke up they found themselves in a hospital with pieces of shrapnel in their bodies. Ten others in the same scrap yard were killed by the explosion with eight dying on the spot, not knowing what hit them. Another 11 sustained injuries, which later proved fatal for two.

Although in a poor country like India such incidents hardly attract the kind of uproar this one did -- because hundreds die every year from similar industrial accidents that go unnoticed -- this incident let lose a wave of panic. That's because the hunt for reason behind this blast led to a startling revelation; the blast was not an ordinary industrial mishap but was caused by an exploding shell while handling a consignment of imported scrap of war junks.

Perennially starved of feed stock, Indian steel mills have found plenty of cheap fodder in Iraqi war junk. But along with mangled pipes and twisted rods, India has also become the favorite dumping ground for dangerous war debris.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Ironic, dont you think?

US takes Iraq off terror black list

The United States has dropped its last remaining terror-related designation on Iraq, removing it from its black list of "state sponsors of terrorism" by formally rescinding a Saddam Hussein-era determination that carried sanctions with it. US Secretary of State Colin Powell acknowledged the move would have little practical effect as all of Washington's terrorism penalties on Iraq had previously been suspended, but said it was an important symbolic act for Iraq's interim Government.

"I hereby rescind the determination of September 13, 1990 that Iraq is a country which has repeatedly provided support for acts of international terrorism," Mr Powell said in a notice published in the Federal Register. "This action is a further step to cement the partnership of the United States and Iraq in combating acts of international terrorism, and is an act of symbolic importance to the new Iraqi government," he said.

Oil imports, sabotage cost Iraq seven billion dollars so far

BAGHDAD, Oct 21 (AFP) - Attacks on Iraq's oil infrastructure and its import of oil products due to insufficient refining capacity has cost the country seven billion dollars since March 2003, Oil Minister Thamer Ghadban said Thursday. The country spent 200 million dollars per month for imports, which translates to 2.4 billion dollars a year, Ghadban said. Insecurity and frequent attacks on pipelines and other oil infrastructure have hampered efforts to develop the country's rich-resource further and bring in much-needed hard currency, the minister explained.

"Sabotage affects our production capacity, which averages 2.8 million barrels per day (bpd), of which 2.1 million bpd is from southern fields and about 700,000 bpd from the north," he told reporters. "We also seek to bring our exports up to 1.8 million bpd, a level which we have reached in the past but slipped below due to security problems."

 

[Barking_Mad]

Several killed in US attack on Falluja

Renewed assault by US forces on the Iraqi city of Falluja has killed seven people and wounded three others, according to hospital officials. The general hospital's Dr Saleh Hussein said on Friday that most of the victims had been evacuated from the Shuhada district. US marine spokesman Lieutenant Lyle Gilbert said troops carried out new air raids late on Thursday and opened artillery fire at arms caches in south-eastern parts of the city.

The marines earlier said they were eliminating weapons warehouses in the area, considered a hub for supporters of the Jordanian-born fugitive Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. "It's artillery you hear ... and AC-130 aircraft are engaging known weapons caches in southern Falluja," Gilbert said.

US now wants more troops in Iraq

Amid escalating violence in Iraq and a reported withdrawal of the New Zealand contingent, the top US commander has signalled a striking reversal of policy and acknowledged more US troops are needed in Iraq. General John Abizaid, head of US Central Command, had initially stated that the security gap could be filled by Iraqi security forces and more international troops deployed to protect the UN-organised elections. But his remarks after closed-door sessions with congressional armed services committee members late on Wednesday in Washington raised the prospect that the US may have to enlarge the 140,000-strong force deployed in Iraq, at least during the elections.

"I think we will need more troops than we currently have to secure the election process in Iraq that will probably take place in the end of January," Abizaid told reporters. The statement is in contrast to recent calls to "bring our troops home", and may signal a new chapter in the Iraq debate between Democrats and Republicans. The issue of whether the US has committed sufficient forces in Iraq to impose order is a touchy one for President George Bush, who has come under fire from Democratic challenger Senator John Kerry for Iraq's slide into bloodshed.

"But it is our belief that those troops will be Iraqi troops. And they may be additional international troops that arrive to help out as well, as part of the United Nations mission," he said. "And so I don't foresee a need for more American troops, but we can't discount it."

 

[Barking_Mad]

This has to be a big problem for the US - I wonder how many Iraqi insurgents are embedded with the US forces around Fallujah?

Insurgents Infiltrate Iraqi Forces

WASHINGTON - Iraq's new security forces are heavily infiltrated by insurgents, and the guerrilla groups have access to almost unlimited money to pay for deadly attacks, according to a U.S. defense official who provided new details on the evolution of the rebels. A significant part of the insurgents' money is coming from sympathizers in Saudi Arabia, and the Saudi government is neglecting the problem, said the official, who was authorized by the Pentagon to speak on the issue this week.

.........

The official described a country where a fearful citizenry doesn't fully accept the concepts of Western law and order and remains unwilling to take their future into their own hands, where police are often corrupt and the security forces are "heavily infiltrated" by insurgents. In some cases, members of the Iraqi security services have developed sympathies and contacts with the guerrillas; in other cases, infiltrators were sent to join the groups, the official said. U.S. military analysts foresee little chance of the insurgency evaporating during the next few years, the official said. Attacks have increased by about 25 percent since the beginning of Ramadan, the Islamic holy month that began last weekend, with most of the attacks car bombs and strikes on civilians, rather than direct assaults on U.S. forces.

"The overall resistance in Iraq is popular and is getting more popular in the Arab world," said Vince Cannistraro, a former counterterrorism chief for the Central Intelligence Agency.

On the back of that article, this one is also worth a peek.

Iraqi insurgents no riffraff

U.S. finds groups bigger, better-financed than once thought -

Senior American officials are beginning to assemble a new portrait of the insurgency that has continued to inflict casualties on American and Iraqi forces, showing that it has significantly more fighters and far greater financial resources than previously estimated. When foreign fighters and the network of a Jordanian militant, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, are counted with home-grown insurgents, the hard-core resistance numbers between 8,000 and 12,000 people, a tally that grows to more than 20,000 when active sympathizers or covert accomplices are included, according to the American officials.

These estimates contrast sharply with earlier intelligence reports, in which the number of insurgents has varied from as few as 2,000 to a maximum of 7,000 fighters. The revised esti-mate is influencing the military campaign inIraq, but has not prompted a wholesale review of the strategy, officials said. In recent interviews, military and other government officials in Iraq and in Washington said that the core of the Iraqi insurgency now consists of as many as 50 militant cells that draw on "unlimited money" from an underground financial network run by former Baath Party leaders and Saddam Hussein's relatives.

 

[Barking_Mad]

US fire killed two Fallujah girls

Two young Iraqi girls have been killed when their car came under US fire near the rebel-held city of Fallujah, according to an Iraqi who helped rescue four people wounded in the incident

US raids kill family of 6 Iraqis, clashes in Samarra (from Wednesday)

Reuters television footage showed men chanting "There is no God but Allah!" as they carried the body of the father through the rubble of the razed family home in the town of Falluja on Wednesday. "Is this the gift that (interim Prime Minister) Iyad Allawi is giving to the people of Falluja?" asked one man, pointing to the small bodies of two of the children lying in the trunk of a car. "Every day they strike Fallujah."

........the Committee of Muslim Scholars, an influential association of clerics, warned it would call a boycott of Iraq`s January elections if the US army launches a major assault on Fallujah. "It is unacceptable to use the pretext of elections to invade towns. We will call on Iraqis to boycott the polls and to consider the results null and void in case of operations in Fallujah," the group said after a meeting in Baghdad. It called on the US military to halt all air and artillery strikes on the city in western Iraq.

The association said its meeting included political figures who endorsed the statement but did not publish their names. Among the participants was Iraq`s Islamic Party, which sits on the interim government. The committee labeled the campaign against ?insurgent? hotspots in some areas north and west of Iraq "a war of extermination led against the Iraqi people by the forces of the occupation with the help of government and militia forces."

Fallujah has the right "to resist the occupation", it said.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Tigris tales - Ghaith Abdul-Ahad

Iraq is stuck in a cycle of violence and despair to which no one can see an end ... sorry, am I boring you?

Here I am, back in London, sipping vodka-martinis, reading a very nice book, lying on the sofa and working very hard to forget the past two months in Baghdad. I'm trying, but all people do here is ask me the same questions over and over again: "Is it really bad down there in Baghdad?" "Is it like what we hear in the news?" Two months ago, I would have said, "It's not that bad", but now I answer: "No, it's fucking worse." From here, Baghdad and its violence seems unreal; a million light years away. Apart from the usual ducking down every time a door slams, there is nothing to remind me of the horrors there. In any case, even when, during London dinner parties, people ask me about Baghdad, they wait impatiently for me to finish my why-Iraq-is-so-messed-up lecture, before launching into a conversation about a bloke called Harry who cheated in some exam and how property prices are going to collapse.....

....It seems that both the insurgents and the Americans have agreed that violence is the best way to take each other on. To solve Iraq's problems both want to kick each other out of Iraq. Neither know what the Iraqis want.

The Iraqis themselves seem unable to comprehend what is happening; most are totally disenchanted with American efforts - if any exist - to help rebuild the country. These feelings are exacerbated by the American actions on the ground and are, in turn, translated into hatred - in the best case, mere apathy - towards the Iraqi government and its US backers. The insurgency feeds on this hatred. With more hatred comes more violence, with more violence more Iraqis die and with more death, the economic disaster continues. The cycle goes on and on and no one seems to be able to break it.

Salam Pax has written 7 pieces for the Guardian whilst visiting Washington. Ive just read the first one and its a good read, and quite amusing. The other pieces are linked on the web site.

The Baghdad Blogger goes to Washington: day one

Since walking around the White house was out of the question, I thought maybe I'd go inside to find a black stone to kiss, the next step in this, my pilgrimage to the capital that wants to bring freedom and democracy to the malnourished, undereducated third world.

I locate a guard and ask about White House tours. She tells me these have to be arranged through my senator. Oh, shucks. Now, how am I going to get in touch with John D Negroponte all the way back in the US ambassador's dugout in Baghdad?

edit: The second one is worth a quick peek..

In August last year I got an email suggesting I took a look at a weblog being written by an American soldier in Iraq: "I hope we uncover all the banned weapons that we said were here," it said. "I hope we find it all, every last bit: then all of this will have served a glorious purpose that no one can argue with."

"I need to know that I helped unplug a dangerous beast before it struck. I need to know that for all those that have died, their deaths were not in vain. I need to know that we have prevented horrendous events from transpiring . . . and I want all of this to go down in history as 'the right thing to do'."

Sergeant Sean was writing his blog, Turningtables, from Baghdad. It was funny, it had a very distinctive voice, and somehow it did not fit with the Terminator image of American soldiers in Baghdad. A couple of days ago, I emailed Sean to ask whether he could hook me up with a soldier who was in Baghdad and is now in the DC area. I wanted to sit down with an American soldier over beers and talk about Iraq. Since there is no chance of this happening in Baghdad any time soon, this trip to the US would be my opportunity.

And guess who lives and works in the DC area after finishing his six-year enlistment? Sean - Mr Turningtables - is here himself, and he said he would be glad to meet me. We had dinner together and talked about a million things. You have no idea how strange it feels that we share so much in common. When I told him I would never actually approach an American soldier on the street in Baghdad, he told me that if we were in Baghdad he would probably be talking to me with his gun pointing at me because he would be scared shitless. Yet there we sat, drinking beers together.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Im confused with the figures on this one - the percentages add up to more than 100% !

Clerics Most Popular in Any Iraqi Election

Popular Iraqi support for the nation's interim leaders has fallen below the level of support enjoyed by religious leaders.

And that fact, revealed in a U.S.-financed survey, dims the prospects that Baghdad's moderate, secular administration will beat the clerics in a national election, currently set for January, the Washington Post reported Friday.

The poll, which was based on 2,000 face-to-face interviews among all ethnic and religious groups nationwide Sept. 24-Oct. 4, indicates Iraqi support for the government of Ayad Allawi has fallen to about 43 percent who believe it is effective, down from 62 percent a few months ago.

The survey found the most popular politician is Abdel Aziz Hakim, leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, followed by Allawi at a distant second and firebrand cleric Moqtada Sadr in third.

The poll found 51 percent of Iraqis would vote for Abdel Aziz Hakim, leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, 47 percent would vote for Allawi and 46 percent would vote for Sadr.

Four Iraqis killed by roadside bomb

Four Iraqis were killed by a roadside bomb Thursday night on a road south of Baghdad, police and medics said Friday. "Four people were killed when their car hit a roadside bomb as a US military convoy was passing by in the Latifiyah area," said police Sergeant Ali Maliky.

.....Meanwhile, two US soldiers and an Iraqi were wounded in a US-Iraqi operation against suspected insurgents near a mosque in the northern city of Mosul, said the US military. "Multinational forces have secured the area around the Al-Nurain mosque, while Iraqi national guard soldiers have gone into the mosque searching for terrorists believed to have taken sanctuary inside," a statement said.

"No multinational forces have or will enter the mosque. The search is being conducted wholly by Iraqi national guard soldiers." The military said insurgents fired small arms, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars at Iraqi and US forces. And military officials in Copenhagen said three Danish soldiers were wounded Friday when two roadside bombs exploded next to their vehicles in separate incidents southwest of Basra. None of the injuries were life-threatening.

 

[Barking_Mad]

U.S. soldiers attacked from yesterday

...a number of U.S. soldiers were wounded when bombs exploded in the main highway in al-Miqdadiya northeast Baquba. Witnesses said that the blast severely destroyed two U.S. military vehicles. In a separate incident, two U.S. military vehicles were also destroyed when another bomb went off in the main highway in the Karma area in northeastern Falluja. Following the blasts, U.S. forces sealed off the area and raided a nearby house, capturing a man and two women.

Macedonian Iraq hostages 'killed'

The families of three Macedonians taken hostage in Iraq say they have been told by their government they are dead. The workers - Dalibor Lazarevski, Zoran Naskovski and Dragan Markovic - were kidnapped on 21 August near Baghdad.

Denial over more troops for Iraq

Defence chiefs have denied claims that another Scottish regiment is on standby to go to Iraq. The Black Watch are already there and are being redeployed into a US sector near Baghdad. As a result, the Scots Guards will take up the Black Watch's position in Basra from next month. But suggestions that the Royal Scots, based in Edinburgh, could head to the region in January have been rejected by the Ministry of Defence (MoD). A spokeswoman said the Royal Scots are due to become the UK's high readiness reserve battalion, but insisted they could be sent anywhere in the world and said there were no plans for its soldiers to be Iraq.

 

[dov]

Insurgents

Do you think that was Saddams plan all the time, pullback his Iraqi army "insurgents" and patiently wait and do what they are doing now? Who labeled them "insurgents" anyways? They seem to be pretty powerful to be able to have almost the total amount of the troops of the most powerful country in the world running around in circles. Insurgents dosn't sound quite right for such a power.

 

[jeff_leigh]

Do you think that was Saddams plan all the time, pullback his Iraqi army "insurgents" and patiently wait and do what they are doing now?

yes i do saddams generals were renowned throughout the middle east for thier guerrila warfare tactics (they were in even in lebanon training the PLO in the early eighties) i'm just suprised the american military intelligence didn't take this into account

 

[oi2002]

Levin Report blasts Pentagon on Iraq

Doug Feith, a Pentagon Neo-Con, hates America enough to provide the President with actively deceitful reports.
The tail end of the report which dissects Feith’s duplicitous manipulation of intelligence on Saddam and AQ is worth reading.

What sort of patriot knowingly omits an FBI report of Atta being in Florida at the time of the Prague meeting? Well not one that serves American interests. Feith's mouthpiece Hayes has already written a blustering rebuttal, and he's surely right that this is a partisan report, but on the Prague meeting he's made so much of he now is silent.

 

[tim]

50 Iraqi soldiers shot and US killed

Odd story this, troops taken off a bus and shot, seemingly without resistance. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3948675.stm

 

[bigfish]

CIA-Mossad False Flag Terrorists Threaten to Kill Margaret Hassan

http://kurtnimmo.com/blog/index.php?p=369

Do you think Tony Blair, the Bushian poodle, will save Margaret Hassan’s life and pull British troops out of Iraq?

Do you think Elvis lives in a UFO and will return to cut a new album?

“Please, please I beg of you, the British people, to help me. I don’t want to die like Bigley,” Margaret Hassan tearfully pleaded on a videotape broadcast on al-Jazeera. “Tell Mr. Blair to take the troops out of Iraq and not bring them here to Baghdad.”

It’s now obvious. Either the resistance in Iraq is so stupid they can’t put their shoes on in the morning without help or the people who kidnapped Hassan work for the CIA and Mossad. No matter who is kidnapped and beheaded—well, of course, with the exception of the Bush twins or Euan and Nicholas Blair—the United States and Britain are not leaving Iraq.

Kidnapping and beheading contractors is one thing. But kidnapping and beheading Margaret Hassan, who has selflessly dedicated years of her life to help impoverished Iraqis, will be quite another. Such a brutal and heartless act will send the intended message: the Iraqi resistance is comprised of monsters and serial murderers—and there can be no response other than wiping them from the face of the earth.

Hassan’s kidnapping is preparing the way for the Fallujahization of Iraq after Bush is re-appointed or Kerry is elected—massive, unremitting, and terrible mass murder of all who resist the occupation, including women, children, and old people.

http://www.williambowles.info/spysrus/cia_mossad.html

It makes absolutely no sense.

Margaret Hassan, director of the humanitarian group CARE International, who has joint British-Iraqi citizenship, was kidnapped yesterday morning in Iraq. Although nobody has claimed responsibility for abducting Ms. Hassan, the immediate assumption is she was grabbed by the Iraqi resistance or al-Zarqawi, the latter accused of all manner of barbarity, including beheading kidnap victims.

But why would the resistance kidnap somebody who has provided humanitarian assistance to the people of Iraq for 25 years? Is it possible the Iraqi resistance wants to deny the Iraqi people humanitarian assistance?

Of course not.

In America, the corporate media answers the above question every day—the Iraqi resistance is fanatical, murderous, nothing more than a loose confederation of terrorists, criminals, Islamic madmen, demented sadists who blow up car bombs in crowded market squares and kill women and children, their own neighbors.

However, there is another possible explanation: the kidnapping of Margaret Hassan is part of a counterinsurgency operation devised to make the resistance look bad and thus turn world opinion against it.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Tons of Iraqi explosives missing

Nearly 350 tons of conventional explosives have vanished from a former military complex in Iraq, the UN says. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said the explosives vanished from the al-Qaqaa facility near Baghdad during looting after the invasion. It added that the explosives could be used in powerful conventional weapons or to detonate nuclear devices. An IAEA spokesman said the agency was expected to inform the UN Security Council of its concerns on Monday.

The explosives are thought to have been taken from the al-Qaqaa complex, 25 kilometres (16 miles) south of Baghdad, at some point after 9 April 2003. The IAEA said the US-led coalition had been warned about the danger posed by the explosives on several occasions. It says the coalition forces were specifically told to keep the material secured.

The IAEA spokesman said the Iraqi interim government had alerted the agency about the missing explosives on 10 October. The coalition forces in Iraq were informed on 15 October through the US administration, he said. "Our main concern is that if the materials fall into the wrong hands they could be used to commit terrorist acts," the spokesman added. He said the explosives had been monitored by the IAEA until the US-led invasion of Iraq, after which point it had not been allowed to access the site. The agency earlier this month raised concerns over the disappearance of nuclear equipment and materials from Iraq's main nuclear site, Tuwaitha.