*IRAQ: latest news and developments

[Barking_Mad]

In Basra, an enemy lurks in the ranks

The most powerful and feared institution here in southern Iraq's largest city is a shadowy force of 200 to 300 police officers known collectively as the Jameat, who dominate the local police and who are said to murder and torture at will. They answer to the leaders of Basra's sectarian militias.

The militia infiltration in Basra's police force and government goes far beyond the Jameat. But it may be the most ominous example of the degree to which militias dominate Basra.

The extent of Jameat's power became clear in September when British troops in armored vehicles tried to rescue two special operations soldiers who had been abducted and taken to its headquarters in a police building in Basra.

According to three British soldiers there that day, 1,000 to 2,000 people rapidly gathered near the station, which the British troops had partly demolished in an effort to free the captives. The soldiers were ultimately rescued from a house nearby, where they were being held by Shiite militiamen.

The British soldiers said many in the mob had been armed with homemade gasoline bombs and grenades, and that the attack appeared to be a disciplined and coordinated response to the sacking of the Jameat headquarters. Iraqi men standing on cars ordered the mob to attack, they said, while rioters clambered on top of armored vehicles and doused soldiers inside with gasoline.

"This was not a spontaneous public action," said Major Andy Hadfield, a British company commander. "It was closely organized and closely coordinated by a series of agitators."

Basra has slipped under the rule of fundamentalist Shiite militias and political parties - many with strong ties to Iran - that enforce strict Islamic mores. The city has only 2,500 to 3,000 police officers, while estimates of militia ranks have reached as high as 13,000 in Basra and its environs.

 

[Barking_Mad]

British Army strikes back against the Shia renegades in Basra

British troops wrested Basra from the control of Iranian-backed renegades yesterday, arresting 12 police officers and suspected militia commanders in a series of overnight raids.

The operation followed a series of deadly bomb attacks on British forces that has destabilised one of Iraq's more peaceful regions.

Those detained were suspected of planting roadside bombs that have killed 14 British and American soldiers and civilians in the past two months. Tony Blair said on Thursday that the bombs were either supplied by the Iranian government or by its allies.

"This terrorism must be stopped and it is our right to protect ourselves and innocent citizens," said Brig John Lorimer, commander of the 12th Mechanised Brigade in southern Iraq.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Troops arrest mayor, giving rise to peaceful protests

MAHMUDIYAH, Iraq — U.S. and Iraqi forces arrested the Shiite Muslim mayor suspected of helping abduct rival Sunnis in this town south of Baghdad, prompting competing and peaceful protest marches on Friday by the town’s Shiite and Sunni communities.
Brig. Gen. Stewart Rodeheaver, commander of the Georgia National Guard’s 48th Brigade, said Mahmudiyah’s Shiite mayor is suspected of numerous illegal acts, and is being held at the brigade’s detention facility outside Baghdad. The town’s Sunnis believe, and U.S. officers seem to agree, that the mayor was involved in illegally abducting local Sunnis.

Mahmudiyah is part of the “Triangle of Death” south of Baghdad, where Sunnis and Shiites have engaged in a cycle of violence and intimidation that occasionally has seen Iraq’s political and sectarian conflicts turn deadly. Local Sunnis regularly tell U.S. officials that Iranian-backed Shiite militias are behind the violence. But Rodeheaver described the mayoral wrongdoing as simply “local tribal Sunni-Shiite” tension.

About 200 local Sunnis marched to the U.S. military base on Mahmudiya’s outskirts on Friday and presented Iraqi and U.S. military officials with a list of names of relatives they believed were abducted by Shiites posing as Iraqi security troops.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraqi bomber wrecks Shi'ite mosque, killing 25

HILLA, Iraq (Reuters) - A suicide car bomber drove at a mosque south of Baghdad on Wednesday as Shi'ites were marking the start of the holy month of Ramadan and brought part of the structure crashing down, killing at least 25, police said.

The death toll could rise as a roof had caved in and people were being dug out of the rubble in the darkness, they said. At least 87 people were wounded in the blast at Hilla, 100 km (60 miles) south of the capital.

Shi'ite worshippers, celebrating the start of Ramadan a day after Sunni Muslims, gathered at dusk; the bomber then drove up to the main entrance of the mosque and detonated explosives.

Iraqi and U.S. officials have voiced fears of an increase in violence ahead of the October 15 referendum on a new constitution, which Sunni Arab insurgents have vowed to wreck.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Demonstration in Warsaw demanding Polish troops back from Iraq

Hundreds of demonstrators assembled Thursday in Warsaw streets, demanding that Polish troops withdraw from Iraq.

The event, occurred prior to the presidential election scheduled for Oct. 9, is seen as aiming to draw the candidates' attention to the issue and make them clarify their stand during the election campaigns. The protestors first gathered in front of Warsaw's landmark building, the Palace of Culture, and then headed for the Presidential Palace, chanting slogans like "Stop the war in Iraq" and "No more blood for oil."

The organizers of the "Green 2004" demonstration said the rally would go on until the last Polish soldier is brought home. Poland has been a strong supporter of the US in Iraq. It sent combat troops for the 2003 war and currently commands a 4,000-strong multinational contingent that includes 1,500 Polish troops.

 

[oi2002]

Jackson Diehl in the WaPo on Iraqis' Broken Dreams:

That's why it was so sobering to encounter Makiya and Rahim again last week -- and to hear them speak with brutal honesty about their "dashed hopes and broken dreams," as Makiya put it. The occasion was a conference on Iraq sponsored by the conservative American Enterprise Institute, which did so much to lay the intellectual groundwork for the war. A similar AEI conference three years ago this month resounded with upbeat predictions about the democratic, federal and liberal Iraq that could follow Saddam Hussein. This one, led off by Makiya and Rahim, sounded a lot like its funeral.

Makiya began with a stark conclusion: "Instead of the fledgling democracy that back then we said was possible, instead of that dream, we have the reality of a virulent insurgency whose efficiency is only rivaled by the barbarous tactics it uses." The violence, he said, "is destroying the very idea or the very possibility of Iraq."

 

[oi2002]

Zbigniew Brzezinski considers Dubya's "suicidal statecraft":

That war, advocated by a narrow circle of decision-makers for motives still not fully exposed, propagated publicly by rhetoric reliant on false assertions, has turned out to be much more costly in blood and money than anticipated. It has precipitated worldwide criticism. In the Middle East it has stamped the United States as the imperialistic successor to Britain and as a partner of Israel in the military repression of the Arabs. Fair or not, that perception has become widespread throughout the world of Islam.
...
In a very real sense, during the last four years the Bush team has dangerously undercut America's seemingly secure perch on top of the global totem pole by transforming a manageable, though serious, challenge largely of regional origin into an international debacle. Because America is extraordinarily powerful and rich, it can afford, for a while longer, a policy articulated with rhetorical excess and pursued with historical blindness. But in the process, America is likely to become isolated in a hostile world, increasingly vulnerable to terrorist acts and less and less able to exercise constructive global influence. Flailing away with a stick at a hornets' nest while loudly proclaiming "I will stay the course" is an exercise in catastrophic leadership.

Yanks looking like Limey's! That's a low blow Z.Big.

 

[oi2002]

Pat Lang consider a piece by Amin Saikal in the IHT and in a cynical mood:

Our basic mistake in Iraq was to believe that Iraq was eagerly awaiting a social revolution that would sweep away the old and welcome the new in a kind of joyful French Revolution festival of retribution and enabling. The neocon Jacobins, true to their names, believed this most of all and somehow believed that the 12er Shia would be the instrument for the realization of this fantasy. These Shia were the same people who were angry at Saddam for not allowing them to beat themselves with chains and machetes on Ashura.

In the comments there's a link to a review of The Assassins' Gate: America in Iraq:

"The Assassins' Gate" is likely to be the definitive guide to one of the most outrageous scandals in U.S. history: the Bush administration's total failure to plan for the aftermath of a war of choice. That failure may have doomed the entire adventure. It cost the United States billions of dollars and hundreds of lives. Its cost to the Iraqi people and nation, which now faces a possible civil war, cannot be calculated. In a just world, Bush, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, Cheney, Rice, Feith and their underlings would be standing before a Senate committee investigating their catastrophic failures, and Packer's book would be Exhibit A.
...
In Packer's account, Wolfowitz is a fascinating, fatally flawed figure, an idealist who failed to take actions in support of his ideals. As Dick Cheney's undersecretary of defense for policy, Wolfowitz went along with Bush I's decision not to oust Saddam at the end of the first Gulf War. But he was haunted by that choice, and determined to rectify it. "More than Perle, Feith, and the neoconservatives in his department -- certainly more than Rumsfeld and Cheney -- Wolfowitz cared," Packer writes. "For him Iraq was personal." Packer holds Wolfowitz largely responsible for the Bush administration's failure to put enough troops into Iraq, and to plan for the aftermath.
...
Almost all these figures, starting with Scoop Jackson, shared a key obsession: Israel. "In 1996, some of the people in Perle's circle had begun to think about what it would mean for Saddam Hussein to be removed from the Middle East scene. "They concluded it would be very good for Israel," Packer writes. "Perle chaired a study group of eight pro-Likud Americans, including Douglas Feith, who had worked under Perle in the Reagan administration, and David Wurmser, who was the author of the paper produced under the group's auspices ... Afterwards the group was pleased enough with its work to send the paper to the newly elected Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu." The paper, "A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm," advocated smashing the Palestinians militarily, removing Saddam from power, and installing a Hashemite king on the Iraq throne.

The dangerous absurdity of this scheme (elements of which appeared in a later book by Perle and Bush speechwriter David Frum, modestly titled "An End to Evil") did not prevent it from being accepted by high officials of the Bush administration. "A few weeks before the start of the Iraq War, a State Department official described for me what he called the 'everybody move over one theory': Israel would annex the occupied territories, the Palestinians would get Jordan, and the Jordanian Hashemites would be restored to the throne of Iraq," Packer writes. The neocons were out-Likuding the Likud: Even Ariel Sharon had long abandoned his beloved "Jordan is Palestine" idea. That Douglas Feith, one of the ideologues who subscribed to such lunatic plans (the departing Colin Powell denounced Feith to President Bush as "a card-carrying member of the Likud") was in charge of planning for Iraq is almost beyond belief.
..
In effect, the far-right AEI was running the White House's Iraq policy -- and the AEI's war-at-all-costs imperatives drove the Pentagon, too. "'The senior leadership of the Pentagon was very worried about the realities of the postconflict phase being known,' a Defense official said, 'because if you are Feith or you are Wolfowitz, your primary concern is to achieve the war.'"
...
For example, Packer argues that Bush officials "were peculiarly unsuited to deal with the consequences of the Bush Doctrine" because, as Cold War hawks and believers in the unfettered use of American power, they had "sat out the debates of the 1990s about humanitarian war, international standards, nation building, democracy promotion ... When September 11 forced the imagination to grapple with something radically new, the president's foreign-policy advisors reached for what they had always known. The threat, as they saw it, lay in well-armed enemy states. The answer, as ever, was military power and the will to use it."

 

[oi2002]

Iran expecting to win again in Iraqi referendum:

The Islamic republic appears happy to keep a low profile ahead of the October 15 vote on Iraq's new constitution, with officials here confident that friendly Shiite or Kurdish groups will consolidate their already strong position, AFP reported.

In addition, Iran sees the vote as another step towards the departure of foreign troops, even if the clerical regime does not expect them to leave in the immediate future.

"Shiites are in a majority in Iraq and can be expected to act as a common force given the repression they suffered under Saddam," said Mohammad Ali Abtahi, a former Iranian vice president.

"And naturally, any free election or referendum will benefit the Shiites, the ideological allies of Iran," he told AFP. "Iran doesn't even have to do anything for that to happen".

 

[Barking_Mad]

Al-Qaida plan to seize control of Iraq

Osama bin Laden's deputy has sent a letter to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the militant leader in Iraq, setting out a blueprint for taking control of the country when American troops leave, according to US intelligence officials.

Fallujah expects large turnout in referendum to defeat charter

"Participation is aimed at driving back the cause of evil as this draft constitution is full of evil, we should stop the division of a unified country," Sheikh Abed Khalaf al-Zobaie, Imam of al-Ra'uof mosque in Fallujah, said in an interview with Xinhua.

Eight kidnapped Iraqis found dead

The bodies of eight Iraqis who apparently had been kidnapped were found Wednesday in Baghdad and Iskandariyah, 30 miles south of the capital, police said.

Mortar attack hits oil pipeline in northern Iraq

"A mortar round landed at 6:00 a.m. (0300 GMT) on a group of pipelines in al-Fatha area near Baiji, causing a huge fire and damaging part of an export pipeline which conveys oil to the port of Ceyhan in Turkey," the source said.

U.S. forces kill lecturer at Tikrit University

U.S. forces shot dead Umran Hamed, a lecturer at Tikrit University, in Duuz, about 100 km (60 miles) north of Tikrit, local authorities said.

Sheikh killed in Samarra

Gunmen on Tuesday killed Hikmet Mumtaz al-Baz, the sheikh of the Albu Baz tribe, in Samarra, 100 km (60 miles) north of Baghdad, local authorities said.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraq suicide bomber kills at least 30: police

MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) - At least 30 people were killed on Wednesday when a suicide bomber strapped with explosives blew himself up in a crowd of Iraqi military recruits at an army base in the northern town of Tal Afar, police said.

Police chief Najim Abdullah said at least 35 people had been wounded in Wednesday's explosion, which occurred one day after a suicide car bomb blew up in a crowded Tal Afar market, killing at least 24 people and wounding 36.

 

[Barking_Mad]

U.S. soldier opens fire on fellow troops

NASHVILLE, Tenn., Oct 13 (Reuters) - A U.S. soldier opened fire on a group of fellow soldiers during a morning exercise session at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, on Thursday but no one was injured at the Army base.

The soldier, whose name was not released, "is in custody after firing shots at a physical training formation" but no one was wounded, Fort Campbell said in a statement.

It provided no other details but said the matter was under investigation.

The facility, on the Kentucky-Tennessee border about 60 miles (96.5 km) northwest of Nashville, is home to the 101st Airborne Division that has served in Iraq.

 

[Barking_Mad]

More U.S. Troops Die in Iraq Bombings Even as Armoring Improves

Oct. 13 (Bloomberg) -- Roadside bombs are killing more American troops in Iraq, as the frequency and sophistication of insurgent attacks may be outstripping U.S. efforts to increase protection for soldiers.

So-called improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, killed 302 U.S. troops between Jan. 1 and Oct. 7, compared with 165 in the same period in 2004, according to Iraq Coalition Casualty Count, an Internet site with statistics based on official U.S. casualty reports. The number of U.S. armored vehicles in Iraq rose during that period to almost 39,600 from 16,548, according to the Army.

``It's a losing game because they can always build a bigger bomb,'' said Daniel Goure, vice president of the Lexington Institute, a defense policy research group in Arlington, Virginia.

The insurgents are no longer using simple munitions, said Anthony Cordesman, a defense analyst with the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington who has traveled to Iraq and written about the insurgency. Instead, they're using stacked landmines, several artillery shells wired together or specialized ``shaped'' charges that focus the area of impact and increase force, Cordesman said.

``The insurgents are already learning to counter `up- armoring,' and the Army can't possibly convert every truck or Humvee'' into an M-2 Bradley Fighting Vehicle or M-1 tank, Cordesman said.

Goure said the U.S. is ``at the upper limits'' of what it can do with armor. ``We've done a good job, because without the armor increases, the casualty rates would be five times as high,'' he said.

 

[oi2002]

John Robb on the size of the Iraqi insurgency again (~150,000) PDF. He adds this note:

This estimate also indicates that given our current assumptions and tactics, the US
prospects for a successful resolution of the insurgency, even within a decade, are very
low to non-existent. Typically, counter-insurgency requires at least an overwhelming advantage of conventional forces over insurgents (some estimates are as high as 10 or 20
to 1). We not only don’t have that, the insurgents outnumber us even if we include those
elements of the Iraqi military that are able to operate without US support (which
according to recent testimony by the US military to the US Congress, has declined from 3
brigades to only one) and the best case estimates of attrition we have inflicted. Most
important, successful counterinsurgency requires the willing cooperation of the public, or
a sizable fraction of them, to identify the insurgents and help locate their hiding areas and
bases of operation. Clearly we do not have this cooperation. To wit: Kurdish and Shiite
units undertook the only “successful” operations by Iraqi forces in Sunni areas. Until this
changes, the Sunni population will continue to provide manpower for the insurgency in
roughly the proportions shown above.

 

[oi2002]

There have been a few stories in the press about the US use of torture in Iraq and this Human Rights Watch article in the NYRB:

One officer and two noncommissioned officers (NCOs) of the 82nd Airborne who witnessed abuse, speaking on condition of anonymity, described in multiple interviews with Human Rights Watch how their battalion in 2003–2004 routinely used physical and mental torture as a means of intelligence gathering and for stress relief. One soldier raised his concerns within the Army chain of command for seventeen months before the Army agreed to undertake an investigation, but only after he had contacted members of Congress and considered going public with the story.
...
In Afghanistan we were attached to Special Forces[9] and saw OGA. We never interacted with them but they would stress guys. We learned how to do it. We saw it when we would guard an interrogation. I was an Infantry Fire Team leader. The majority of the time I was out on mission. When not on mission I was riding the PUCs. We should have had MPs. We should have taken them to Abu Ghraib [which] was only fifteen fucking minutes drive. But there was no one to talk to in the chain—it just got killed. We would talk among ourselves, say, "This is bad." But no one listened. We should never have been allowed to watch guys we had fought.

Group sadism is habit forming. I suspect the growing size of that rebellion is related to less to poor intelligence gathering than soldiers seeking a little stress relief at the expense of helpless prisoners.

 

[Barking_Mad]

US strikes kill '70 Iraq rebels'

Helicopters and warplanes bombed two villages near Ramadi in western Iraq on Sunday, killing about 70 people, the US military says. It said all the dead were militants, although eyewitnesses are quoted saying that many were civilians. One of the air strikes hit the same spot where five US soldiers had died on Saturday in a roadside bombing.

The US statement said a group of insurgents was about to place another bomb, although local people deny this. An F-15 warplane fired a precision guided bomb at the group, killing about 20 militants, the US statement said. Several witnesses quoted by Associated Press said they were civilians who had gathered near the wrecked US vehicle and 25 had died.

Coalition forces continue to aggressively pursue terrorists whose aim is to kill Iraqi civilians and coalition forces in and attempt to disrupt the political process. The victims were either standing around the wreck or scavenging bits of metal or equipment, witnesses said, as often happens after a successful insurgent attack. In a separate incident, the US military said it had killed a group of gunmen who had opened fire on a Cobra attack helicopter from the village of al-Bu Faraj.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Sunni Province Rejects Iraq’s Draft Constitution

Preliminary results show that Salahedin Province, which is dominated by Sunnis, has rejected the new Iraqi draft constitution with 71%, AFP reported citing a statement of a member of the local election commission

Five US soldiers killed by Iraq bomb: military

Five U.S. soldiers were killed in Iraq on Saturday when their vehicle was hit by an improvised bomb in the western city of Ramadi, the U.S. military said on Sunday.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraqis Probe 'Unusually High' Yes Tally

Iraq's election commission announced Monday that officials were investigating "unusually high" numbers of "yes" votes in about a dozen provinces...raising questions about irregularities in the balloting.

Americans deny firing on civilians as 70 die

The US military said the attacks on Sunday, near a site where five American soldiers died in a roadside blast on Saturday, killed 70 militants. But residents said at least 39 of the dead were civilians.

8 Bodies found in Mosul

In the northern city of Mosul, police found the bodies of eight men believed to be Iraqi soldiers shot through the head.

Two Iraqi soldiers killed in Baiji

Two Iraqi soldiers were killed and seven wounded when a roadside bomb struck a joint U.S and Iraqi army patrol in Baiji, 180 km (112 miles) north of Baghdad, an army source said.

Top Interior Ministry official killed southwest of Baghdad

A top Iraqi Interior Ministry aide was killed by insurgents southwest of Baghdad, said a ministry spokesman Monday...Colonel Saad Abbas Fadhil a security advisor at the ministry, was assassinated in front of his house in Saydiya late on Sunday.

Two policemen killed in Kirkuk

Two police officers were killed by gunmen in the northern oil city of Kirkuk, police said.

 

[Barking_Mad]

New Revelations by American Soldiers of Abuse in Iraq

"It's all over Iraq," Lagouranis told FRONTLINE. "The infantry units are torturing people in their homes. They would smash people's feet with the back of an axhead. They would break bones, ribs. That was serious stuff...."
"Most of the abuses around Iraq are not photographed," a soldier who requested anonymity told FRONTLINE. "And this makes it even harsher, because around Iraq, in the back of a Humvee or in a shipping container, there's no camera, and there's no one looking over your shoulder, so you can do anything you want...."

 

[Barking_Mad]

Total US dead - 1,978

 

[Barking_Mad]

Drive-by shooting kills adviser to top Iraqi politician

An aide to one of Iraq's top Sunni Arab officials is dead, the apparent victim of a drive-by shooting in Baghdad. Police say it happened as he was driving to work. They believe insurgents either drove up beside his vehicle and opened fire...

Are British troops at breaking point in Iraq?

Army sources are warning that the mood among soldiers of all ranks is at its gloomiest since the invasion in March 2003. The outlook has become darker as the war proves increasingly intractable and much more dangerous than troops had expected.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Blimey......

Iraq Insurgents Seize Korean Aid Worth US$3.5 Million

Some 14 trucks belonging to the Korea International Cooperation Agency loaded with aid and supplies were hijacked by a group of armed insurgents in Iraq last month, it was belatedly revealed on Tuesday.

A source in the Foreign Ministry said eight KOICA trucks were seized on Sept. 19 and another six on Sept. 21. The trucks carrying computers and Internet equipment worth around US$3.5 million for Iraq's 18 national colleges from Jordan to Baghdad were seized 150 km west of Baghdad. "There were no Koreans among the transport crews and the one local who was captured was promptly released, the source said.

Asked why the government only released the information now, the official said, We felt that if an account of the incident were published, the militants would have demanded more money for the return of the seized materials. We know who perpetrated the robbery, but revealing their identity is likely to make it harder to settle the situation.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Security incidents in Iraq, Oct 18

Oct 18 (Reuters) - Following are security incidents reported in Iraq on Tuesday, Oct. 18, as of 1255 GMT.

U.S. and Iraqi forces are battling a Sunni Arab insurgency against the Shi'ite and Kurdish-led government in Baghdad.

Asterisk denotes a new or updated item.

* MOSUL - An American soldier was killed on Tuesday by small-arms fire in the northern city of Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, the U.S. military said.

KIRKUK - One Iraqi Army soldier was killed and another three wounded when gunmen ambushed them in the downtown al-Wasiti district of Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, police colonel Yadikar Mohammed said.

RAMADI - The deputy governor of Anbar province Talib al- Dulaimi was shot dead by gunmen in the town of Ramadi, 110 km (68 miles) west of Baghdad. Doctor Hamdi al-Rawi from Ramadi hospital said his bodyguard was also killed in the attack.

BALAD - Police said they found the bodies of six poultry factory workers who were members of the Mehdi army, a militia loyal to Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, in a river bed at Balad, about 80 km (50 miles) north of Baghdad. Relatives said the men had disappeared 14 days ago.

MAHAWEEL - Three civilians were killed and another seven wounded on Monday night when gunmen attacked the al-Rahman mosque (Sunni) in the town of Mahaweel, south of Baghdad, police said.

BAGHDAD - Ayed Abdul Ghani, an adviser to Industry Minister Usama Abdul Aziz al-Najafi, a Sunni Arab, was killed by gunmen outside his home in Baghdad, police and interior ministry sources said.

RUTBA - Two U.S. marines were killed on Monday by small-arms fire near Rutba, 370 km (230 miles) west of Baghdad near the borders with Syria and Jordan. Four insurgents were also killed in the clash, the U.S. military said.

 

[Barking_Mad]

A British soldier has been killed by a roadside bomb in Basra, Iraq, the Ministry of Defence has confirmed.
The soldier, who has not been named, died as a result of injuries sustained in the blast at about 2323 local time on Tuesday - 2123 BST. The MoD said more details would be released once the soldier's next of kin had been informed. The death brings the number of British troops killed in Iraq to 97 - 64 of them as a result of hostile activity.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4355780.stm

 

[Barking_Mad]

US Auditors Say Violence in Iraq Hinders Reconstruction

U.S. government auditors say continuing violence in Iraq, and rising costs associated with it, continue to hamper reconstruction, as lawmakers renewed criticisms of government oversight of spending there. Testimony before a congressional committee Tuesday came a day before scheduled appearance on Capitol Hill by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice about the situation in Iraq.

As they have watched the costs of America's military involvement in Iraq increase since 2003, lawmakers have sharpened their inquiries into how money is being spent. Renewed questions in a House subcommittee hearing Tuesday refocused attention not only on controversies over alleged waste and fraud connected with contracts and money being spent, but on the implementation of reconstruction.

Citing undeniable progress in Iraq on the political front, (Republican) Congressman Christopher Shays faults what he calls naïve assumptions by U.S. planners, and faulty implementation resulting in escalating costs and scaled back projects:

"That cycle of rosy estimates and stunted outcomes exacts high political costs as well," Mr. Shays says. "Limited visible progress in improving basic services, frustrates Iraqis who wonder why a liberating coalition that conquered their nation in less than two months can't keep the lights lit after two years."

 

[Barking_Mad]

Baghdad Mayor Killed

Baghdad. The mayor of Baghdad Hatem Mirza Hamza and his driver were killed Wednesday in al-Durra neighborhood in the Iraqi capital, Interfax reported citing a statement of the Iraqi Interior Ministry. A group of gunmen opened fire in the car of the mayor and then escaped

Spanish judge issues arrest warrant for three U.S. soldiers over journalist's death

MADRID, Spain (AP) A judge has issued an international arrest warrant for three U.S. soldiers whose tank fired on a Baghdad hotel during the Iraq war, killing a Spanish journalist and one other, a court official said Wednesday.

Judge Santiago Pedraz issued the warrant for Sgt. Shawn Gibson, Capt. Philip Wolford and Lt. Col. Philip de Camp, all from the U.S. 3rd Infantry.

Jose Couso, who worked for the Spanish television network Telecinco, died April 8, 2003, after a U.S. army tank crew fired a shell on Hotel Palestine in Baghdad where several journalists were staying to cover the war. Reuters cameraman Taras Portsyuk, a Ukrainian, also was killed.

The Spanish judge said he issued the arrest order because of a lack of judicial cooperation from the United States regarding the case. U.S. officials insist the soldiers believed they were being shot at when they opened fire. Following the Palestine incident, Secretary of State Colin Powell said a review of the incident found that the use of force was justified.

Elections officials among 13 dead in Iraq

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) — Insurgents killed 13 people Wednesday, including three election officials tallying votes from Iraq's constitutional referendum and an American and a British soldier, in widespread attacks that coincided with the start of Saddam Hussein's trial, police said.

A bomb also went off at a famous monument in a Baghdad square honoring the 8th-century founder of Baghdad to whom Saddam often compared himself. The blast, which toppled the bust of Abu Jaafar Al-Mansour but caused no injuries, appeared to be a jab at the former dictator.

 

[Barking_Mad]

1 in 4 Iraq vets ailing on return

More than one in four U.S. troops have come home from the Iraq war with health problems that require medical or mental health treatment, according to the Pentagon's first detailed screening of servicemembers leaving a war zone. Almost 1,700 servicemembers returning from the war this year said they harbored thoughts of hurting themselves or that they would be better off dead. More than 250 said they had such thoughts "a lot." Nearly 20,000 reported nightmares or unwanted war recollections; more than 3,700 said they had concerns that they might "hurt or lose control" with someone else.

These survey results, which have not been publicly released, were provided to USA TODAY by the Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine. They offer a window on the war and how the ongoing insurgency has added to the strain on troops.

Overall, since the war began, about 28% of Iraq veterans — about 50,000 servicemembers this year alone — returned with problems ranging from lingering battle wounds to toothaches, from suicidal thoughts to strained marriages. The figure dwarfs the Pentagon's official Iraq casualty count: 1,971 U.S. troops dead and 15,220 wounded as of Tuesday.

 

[rennie]

The Irish jounralist Roy Caroll who writes for the Guardian is missing in Baghdad. apparently kidnapped.

 

[newharper]

Juan Cole interviewed by Tom Engelhardt

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=15&ItemID=8952

Part 1 of an interview with Juan Cole, that deals with his views on the runup to the war and the current position.

part 2 deals with scenarios of the future.

http://tomdispatch.com/index.mhtml?pid=29333

"I suspect it will come out that George W. Bush had wanted an Iraq War since he was governor of Texas -- "to take out Saddam," as he said. The various reasons he might have wanted this are undoubtedly complex. He had connections to the energy sector and so would be influenced by Cheney's kind of thinking, but there was a personal family vendetta too. You know, George Bush senior expected Saddam to fall after the Gulf War. By his own admission, he was very surprised when Saddam survived. I think he expected the Iraqi officer corps to -- quote unquote -- do the right thing, which tells you something about the American WASP elite, what their expectations are about politics. When someone fails miserably, they expect the rest of the elite to step in and remove the person. It didn't happen in Iraq and I think that was a blow to Bush family prestige. It may have been important for W to vindicate the family in that regard. "

 

[oi2002]

Sam Rosenfeld and Matthew Yglesias on the The Incompetence Dodge the Liberal Yank supporters of the war fall back on: the war was a fine idea it's just Dubya's pisspoor administration that cocked it up.

It's a postion taken increasingly by neocons.

It probably was a doomed venture from the start.