Petraeus says Iraq "surge" working: paper

HUGE FUCKING SURPRISE!!!1!! And that's 'nough said.

The U.S. troop surge in Iraq has thrown al Qaeda off balance and led to a reduction in sectarian violence and bombings, the U.S. commander in Iraq was quoted on Friday by an Australian newspaper as saying.

"We say we have achieved progress, and we are obviously going to do everything we can to build on that progress and we believe al Qaeda is off balance at the very least," General David Petraeus told the Australian in an interview after briefing Australia's defense minister, Brendan Nelson, in Baghdad.

Via Boston Globe.

WH to Offer Troop Cuts, Sorta

Yes its basically a shell game. They'll remove some troops, but it only means the number will fall back to before the SURGE™ began.

The scoop of the day award goes to The New York Times for breaking the story of what the White House plan will be in September after Gen. David H. Petraeus delivers his report [wink, wink] on progress in Iraq.

...

Steven Lee Meyers and Thom Shanker pen the front-page scoop for the Times with the news that the White House will propose gradual troop cuts beginning next year, but they're expected to fall well short of Congress' demands. The goal is not to end the war, but to counter public pressure for a quick and total withdrawal and try to win support for "a sustainable footing" at least through the end of President George W. Bush's term in office. Although it will be billed as a new strategy -- what is that, the seventh now? -- it doesn't much sound like it, as it would probably return troop levels to the 130,000-strong force in Iraq before the surge, which is unsustainable past April 2008 anyway because of deployment requirements, according to the Pentagon. It is a new strategy in order to keep wavering Republicans in Congress on board, however. What's unclear is how the mission for the remaining troops might change.

So basically they are saying, "Hey, Amurcins are too stoopid to unerstan' what we're reely doin'."

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Top Al-Qaida leaders had fled before U.S.-led offensive began

You see the thing is, al-Qaeda is so stupid they have to read about an imminent attack in the newspapers or they have no idea its coming. When is the US military going to quit underestimating al-Qaeda fighters?

The American general commanding troops battling to clear fighters serving with Al-Qaida from Baquba said Friday that 80 percent of the top Al-Qaida leaders in the city fled before the American-led offensive began earlier this week, just as the Al-Qaida leadership fled Al-Fallujah ahead of the American offensive that recaptured that city in 2004.

Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno, the second-ranking American commander in Iraq, told reporters that leaders of Al-Qaida in Iraq had been alerted to the Baquba offensive by widespread public discussion of the American plan to clear the city before the attack began. He portrayed the Al-Qaida leaders' escape as cowardice, saying that "when the fight comes, they leave," abandoning "mid-level" Al-Qaida leaders and fighters to face the might of American troops - just, he said, as they did in Al-Fallujah.

Some American officers in Baquba have blamed the Al-Qaida leaders' flight on public remarks about the offensive in the days before it began by top American commanders, including Gen. David Petraeus, the overall commander in Iraq. But Odierno cast the issue in broader terms, saying Al-Qaida leaders were bound to know an attack was coming in light of President Bush's decision to pour nearly 30,000 additional troops into the fight in a bid to secure Baghdad and areas around the capital that have been insurgent strongholds. That included Baquba, which lies 40 miles north.

"Frankly, I think they knew an operation was coming in Baquba," Odierno said in a teleconference with Pentagon reporters from the American military headquarters in Baghdad. "They watched the news. They understood we had a surge. They understood Baquba was designated as a problem area. So they knew we were going to come, sooner or later."

Still, he implied American commanders may have played a part by flagging the offensive in advance. "I think they were tipped off by us talking about the surge, the fact that we have a problem in Diyala province," he said.

Jesus H Christ in a TV commercial, but reports have been coming out of Iraq for years about how the Iraqi police and military have been infiltrated by Al-Qaeda. The country's crawling with spies.

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*&^%$^&!!!!!!!!

Not my headline. Not my style. I use the fucking words.

Gotta have fodder for the ol' SURGE™.

The day I'm supposed to get out of the Army has been pushed back 13 months and 16 days.

(from Fun With Hand Grenades)

UN Secretary-General escapes Iraq blast unharmed

Anyone care to go over with me how the SURGE™ is supposed to make everything safer or how well its going?

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon was unharmed, but ducked behind the podium after a rocket or mortar landed near Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki’s office today while the two men were speaking to reporters at a Baghdad news conference.

Small chips of debris floated down from the ceiling above the UN chief after the big explosion rattled the building in the Green Zone.

Yes, inside the Green Zone. The Fort Knox of Iraq.

Note to military: You need not mention the insurgents are getting better, more sophisticated, smarter and dangerous. Its obvious as hell.

(courtesy link)

284!

Jesus H Christ on a road trip. Tell me again how well the SURGE™ is going, Bush, Cheney, anyone? Please leave Iraq.

A suicide attacker blew himself up in a cafe northeast of the capital Wednesday, killing 30 people as a wave of violence left 90 Iraqis dead throughout the country.

The bloodshed persisted as Iraqi security forces struggled to protect more than 1 million Shiite pilgrims streaming toward the holy city of Karbala for annual religious rituals that begin Friday. The pilgrims are facing a string of attacks along the way that have claimed at least 174 lives in two days — among 284 killed across
Iraq since Tuesday.

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Iraq blasts kill 63, send grim message

Ya get a sense the SURGE™ ain't working? Just asking.

Militants struck back Sunday in their first major blow against a U.S.-led security clampdown in Baghdad with car bombings that killed at least 63 people, left scores injured and sent a grim message to officials boasting that extremist factions were on the run.

So maybe the crackdown isn't quite the "brilliant success" al-Maliki claimed?

I've said before and will repeat here. The...US...will...not...win. The...US...can...not...win.

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US push opposed in Washington, not Baghdad

Uh, the SURGE™ is working great because the insurgents aren't out there. Duh!

Does Bush and the military think the insurgents are as stupid as they think Americans are?

A US and Iraqi drive to wrest back control of Baghdad from illegal militias was meeting little resistance on the ground, but the war plan faced a barrage of opposition in Washington.

On the first weekly day of Muslim prayers since the operation was launched, American and Iraqi police and military units were Friday pushing into central city districts that have been the scene of recent sectarian carnage.

The operation started making headway just as lawmakers in the US House of Representatives prepared to vote on a motion to criticise President George W. Bush for sending extra American troops to carry it out.

This non-binding resolution will not prevent the White House from pushing ahead with its "surge" strategy of increasing US troop levels by 21,500, but could pave the way for tougher legislation down the line.

The vote was to take place later Friday.

In Baghdad, there was no sign of organised resistance, although one Iraqi unit was hit by a roadside bomb on the Mohammed al-Qasim highway, leaving one officer dead and a soldier wounded, a defence ministry official said.

"We've got no large scale attacks today, there have been some sporadic small arms fire engagements," said US military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Scott Bleichwehl, confirming troops had not faced major opposition.

A column of US armoured vehicles accompanied by Iraqi police headed into an administrative area of Rusafa near the Shorja market, where on Monday more than 70 people were killed by a devastating series of car bombs.

Bleichwehl said patrols would be on the look out for more car bombs in Rusafa, Baghdad's central commercial area, and carry out weapons searches further north in Sunni and Shiite neighbourhoods of the Adhamiyah district.

"We have operations ongoing in the majority of the security districts, with a focus in Adhamiyah and Rusafa," he told AFP. "I don't have the number of individual patrols but it's in the thousands."

International analysts said it seems Shiite militia and Sunni insurgent groups had decided to keep to the shadows and prepare their next move during the sweep, which was announced in detail two months ago.

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Stop the SURGE™

Action you can take vis à vis the SURGE™.

Think Progress is keeping track of where every member of Congress stands on escalation — but we need your help. Call your members of Congress, ask their position, then use this form to send us their responses.

Please include your real name and zip code in your email. You can reach the Capitol switchboard toll-free at 800-614-2803. Just provide your zip code or ask for your members of Congress by name.

The logistics of a SURGE™

This is a pretty good article about the problems of logistically supporting 140,000 fighting personnel. If Bush sends in 21,000 more soldiers he needs thousands more to support them. And keep in mind that anyone in Iraq is a target.

As the theater commander Gen. John P. Abizaid told Congress last week, psychologically and bureaucratically, the budget, the personal lives of the soldiers and the institutions involved can't shoulder nor sustain any significant increase.

...

Someone has to operate the gyms, the internet cafes, provide the hot meals and hot water, the amenities that far too many in uniform expect and "require" at their bases. It is just a reality of U.S. military culture that the build-up (and the care and feeding of) the desk warriors and sustainers in the Green Zone, at Camp Victory at the old Saddam International Airport and at mega-bases like Balad is mightily responsible for the military failure on the ground.

But ol' bubble boy doesn't worry about such trifles. He's on a mission to salvage his legacy.

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The SURGE™ is on

Although not the SURGE™ your king had in mind.

Picture via Anything They Say. Go there for the details.

Can you imagine this scene at your local mall? Just asking.

Preparing for failure on SURGE™

Could this be thought of as a self-fulfilling prophecy or just monumental skepticism?

Deep within the bowels of the Pentagon, policy planners are conducting secret meetings to discuss what to do in the worst-case scenario in Iraq about a year from today if and when President Bush's escalation of more than 20,000 troops fails, a participant in those discussions told me. None of those who are taking part in these exercises, shielded from the public view and the immediate scrutiny of the White House, believes that the so-called surge will succeed. On the contrary, everyone thinks it will not only fail to achieve its aims but also accelerate instability by providing a glaring example of US incapacity and incompetence.

The profoundly pessimistic thinking that permeates the senior military and the intelligence community, however, is forbidden in the sanitized atmosphere of mind-cure boosterism that surrounds Bush. "He's tried this two times - it's failed twice," speaker of the house Nancy Pelosi said on January 24 about the "surge" tactic. "I asked him at the White House, 'Mr. President, why do you think this time it's going to work?' And he said, 'Because I told them it had to.'" She repeated his words: "'I told them that they had to.' That was the end of it. That's the way it is."

Of course the SURGE™ will fail. That's precisely the reason it should be stopped before it happens. Telling the military it has to work is hardly useful. Its nothing more than wishful thinking and that's a hell of a poor way to conduct foreign policy.

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7 GOP Senators Back War Debate

Will wonders ever cease? My head's spinning.

Senate Republicans who earlier this week helped block deliberations on a resolution opposing President Bush's new troop deployments in Iraq changed course yesterday and vowed to use every tactic at their disposal to ensure a full and open debate.

In a letter distributed yesterday evening to Senate leaders, John W. Warner (Va.), Chuck Hagel (Neb.) and five other GOP supporters of the resolution threatened to attach their measure to any bill sent to the floor in the coming weeks. Noting that the war is the "most pressing issue of our time," the senators declared: "We will explore all of our options under the Senate procedures and practices to ensure a full and open debate."

One wonders why they were against the proposed debate earlier and now are open to it.

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First Lt. Ehren Watada: hero

Wow! I sure didn't see this coming, but am pleased it did. Bush's attack on Iraq was an illegal invasion and occupation and I admire Watada's courage to risk imprisonment rather than engage in it any longer.

From everything I've read quoting him, First Lt. Ehren Watada is no coward. He's not afraid of combat. He's in this predicament because of his conscience and convictions.

In a stunning defeat for military prosecutors, Lt. Col. John Head, the military judge presiding over Watada's court-martial, said he had no choice but to declare a mistrial because military prosecutors and Watada's defense attorney could not reach an agreement regarding the characterization of a stipulation agreement Watada signed before the start of his court-martial. The government characterizes the stipulation agreement as an admission of guilt by Watada for "missing movement" and making statements against the Iraq war that resulted in charges of conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman.

Eric Seitz, Watada's attorney, said the stipulation Watada signed, however, was by no means an admission of guilt by his client. Rather, it was a statement of fact that his client believed the Iraq war was illegal, and that he refused to deploy to the region with his unit because of his beliefs.

Lt. Col. Head said he wanted to question Watada regarding the agreement to gain a better understanding of what Watada's state of mind was when he signed it, but Seitz would not allow the judge to question his client unless he knew the questions in advance. Head said if he could not question Watada to ensure the accuracy of the document he signed prior to the start of the court-martial, he would have to throw out the agreement, meaning the charges against Watada would become null and void.

Issues surrounding the stipulation agreement came up when military prosecutors asked the judge to provide the military panel (similar to a civilian jury) deciding Watada's fate with additional instructions before they returned a verdict.

Head said the basis of the additional instructions could result in questions about the "stipulation of fact" regarding Watada's reasons for refusing to deploy to Iraq. The judge did not indicate the substance of the additional instructions the defense asked him to provide.

Head excoriated military prosecutors in open court for producing the stipulation agreement hours before he declared the mistrial. He said he would allow the government to reopen the case against Watada, but it's unclear whether the military will do so. Even if the case is reopened, it could be months before it ends up in court.

Won't break out the champagne yet because my guess is the military will reopen the case. Watada would set a precedent for many others to follow. Other soldiers could do exactly the same things Watada did to avoid being sent to Iraq which would put a real crimp in Bush's planed SURGE™.

Hey, maybe it will be the soldiers and not Congress who kill Bush's plan.

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This can't be good news for the SURGE™ troops

What it amounts to is Bush's SURGE™ is sending all these young people into a meat grinder.

More American troops were killed in combat in Iraq over the past four months - at least 334 through Jan. 31 - than in any comparable stretch since the war began, according to an Associated Press analysis of casualty records.

Not since the bloody battle for Fallujah in 2004 has the death toll spiked so high.

The reason is that U.S. soldiers and Marines are fighting more battles in the streets of the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, and other cities. And while hostile forces are using a variety of weaponry, the top killer is the roadside bomb.

In some respects it is the urban warfare that U.S. commanders thought they had managed to largely avoid after U.S. troops entered Baghdad in early April 2003 and quickly toppled the Saddam Hussein regime.

And with President Bush now sending thousands more U.S. troops to Baghdad and western Anbar province, despite opposition in Congress and the American public's increasing war weariness, the prospect looms of even higher casualties.

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When will they ever learn? When will they ever learn?

Bush was warned al-Qaeda was determined to attack US.

Bush was given detailed information about how to protect US after the 9/11 attack.

Bush was told our ports are not properly protected.

Bush was told he needed many more troops than planned in Iraq to have any chance for success.

Bush was given detailed information about how to handle the disaster in Iraq.

Bush was told a SURGE™ would not work.

Now Bush has been given information about the dangers of global warming.

Bush didn't use the information from the first six reports. Why does anyone think he would act on the seventh? Just asking.

The Bush administration says a new United Nations report on the dangers of global warming is very valuable, but stopped short of calling for mandatory government controls on greenhouse gasses.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [IPCC] released a study Friday warning that human activities are 'very likely' to blame for global warming, and that the world can expect the trend to continue.

U.S. Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said the Bush administration welcomed the report, but repeated the administration's opposition to mandating caps on the emission of greenhouse gasses. Greenhouse gasses are produced by fossil fuels and carbon-intensive industries.

I will post this slowly so even the most obtuse amongst us can understand.

Bush. Doesn't. Care. What. The. Fuck. The. Facts. Are.

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