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POPSMugtada al-Sadr keeps the truce for now.... Cont.... Such tales abound. Sudani said she'd heard of troops bursting into a woman's home and arresting her four sons, as a soldier threw the mother to the ground and put his boot on her head. Iraqi troops are said to have seized gasoline canisters from a Sadr City resident and distributed them to others, claiming they were from the government. Ali Jassim, 30, another resident, said his cousin's phone rang at a checkpoint with a ringtone containing a chant about Sadr. When soldiers heard it, they slapped him, he said. Sadr's militia, the Mahdi Army, has suffered a series of setbacks since last spring. It lost control of Basra, Iraq's second-largest city, and the southern city of Amara after Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki ordered his forces to retake those areas. Many charge that Maliki is waging a political war against his former allies in time for fall's provincial elections.
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POPSAmara; The Case Of The Invisible American War Machine; And What, We Used To Call "Censorship" Cont... Gone is all that nasty documentation of American soldiers imposing themselves on either innocent or opposition-sympathizing Iraqi civilians as embedded photographers were known to relay two or three years back. (In a particularly egregious example, you might even recall the raid in February '07 where the Iraqis -- who were supposed to lead the mission by barely showed up -- caused American Staff Sgt. Hector Leija to pay with his life ... further leading the military to flip out that the NYT dared even document the whole obscene mess.)
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POPSSome Iraqi News Not Reported By "The Media" Meanwhile Bill Roggio reports that a released Gitmo detainee is back to the front and is responsible for attacks inside Iraq : The detainee, Abdullah Salih al Ajmi, drove a armored truck packed with explosives into a Iraqi army base and detonated it, killing 13 Iraqi army soldiers and wounding 42. http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2008/06/released_guantanamo.php Just the tip of the iceberg I’m afraid after our courts release a large chunk of these guys. Al Qaeda in Iraq, through its puppet organization the Islamic State of Iraq, released its latest propaganda video on June 23. The video contains a montage of attacks throughout Iraq, and features two Kuwaiti al Qaeda operatives who conducted strikes in Mosul. One of the operatives was released from the US military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The Islamic State of Iraq used footage taken at Combat Outpost Inman by this reporter in Mosul in March of this year.
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POPSThe Surge is....oh no, not again! "And the GAO report finds just that, that the Bush administration has no plan for what to do next. With the 18-month surge coming to an end in July, the report says that the administration has not set out "strategic goals and objectives in Iraq for the phase after July 2008 or how it intends to achieve them" and "an updated strategy is needed for how the United States will help Iraq achieve key security, legislative, and economic goals." The report acknowledged that violence was down in May (after rising in March and April) and attributed the reduction to three factors: "1) the increase in U.S. combat forces, 2) the creation of nongovernmental security forces such as the Sons of Iraq, and 3) the Mahdi Army's declaration of a cease fire." What do these three conditions have in common? They are all temporary and unlikely to continue in the future.
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POPSObama's Plan For Defeat But Obama and the Democrats would forfeit every one of these successes to a declared policy of fixed and unconditional withdrawal. The disconnect between what Democrats are saying about Iraq and what is actually happening there has reached grotesque proportions. Obama will keep pulling out his 2002 speech opposing the war. But McCain's case is simple. Is not Obama's central mantra that this election is about the future not the past? It is about 2009, not 2002. Obama promises that upon his inauguration, he will order the Joint Chiefs to bring him a plan for withdrawal from Iraq within 16 months. If McCain cannot take to the American people the case for the folly of that policy, he will not be president. Nor should he be.
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POPSSadr Organizing Force to Liberate Iraq from US Occupation It's a war for independence and self government which will likely gain him major support from other groups as well. They vow to only fight the U.S. occupation forces. You see "Operation Iraqi Freedom" has not made them free, but enslaved and under a US puppet government that also is increasingly dissenting. This will make Sadr a national hero and end the "sectarian" violence always claimed in US propaganda.
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POPSHow to Effectively Win a War on Terror Winning is the most effective way to end bloodshed as is proven by this report. Taking the offensive in fighting against radical insurgent forces is making Iraq more peaceful not less like some would have us believe. Making the effort to resist the terror attacks is working. Keep up the good work guys and gals.
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POPSMilitary Matters: Iraq state fantasy The truth about Iraq and 4GW conflicts that the GOP and the Pentagon (and their supporters) don't get: "Because there is no state in Iraq, there is also no government. Orders given in Baghdad have no meaning, because there are no state institutions to carry them out. The governmental positions of Iraqi leaders have no substance. Their power is a function of their relationship to various militias, not of their offices. Maliki has no militia, which means he is a figurehead. "
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POPSGreen Zone looking like Sitting Duck
I was just thinking how the recent fighting in Baghdad, focused around the Green Zone and Sard City, had comparisons to the Tet Offensive in Vietnam, and those pictures of the US helicopters fleeing of the roof of the Hanoi US embassy. As a sidenote, It is interesting how an indigenous force uses the terrain and the weather while an occuping army fights against it. Could you imagine the US Army planing actions around sandstorms? I read that in Vietnam the Vietnamese quickly realized US actions, especially air strikes, always took a break for lunch. The USA should negotiate some final political settlement and get out of Iraq. I note there is a lot of the now-common propaganda between the lines involving latest battles, such as the idea the US is battling an "army." It is not an "army." It is a militia. It's made up of citizen soldiers mainly from their own neighborhoods. Compared to the US Army they are like fleas on the back of a dog; fleas that are apparently hard
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POPSMichael Moore Endorses Obama for "Decency" Funny, we have the same name (I had it first) and I usually like Michael's stuff--except when he tries to go "establishment", like wearing a suit and gettin a haircut--just let it fly, man!
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POPSSadr exerts religious influence This is the problem -- Sadr has more control over his followers than the government has over it's citizens ... it's been like this for decades, under Saddam. It isn't going to change in the near future...
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POPSNo nation... There is no nation-state when religious offiliation trumps nationalism... Not that either form of dogma is "good" ... but for the political process to work, people have to believe they are first part of a nation... For many Iraqis religious affiliation defines their identify...
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POPSThe Shia problem... We traded a Sunni tyrant for a Shia majority in Iraq that will be closely aligned with Iran... Both the Mahdi army and the Badr corps are funded, trained and have close ties to the Iranian Qods force... Although Maliki is attempting to do the right thing banning armed militia parties from government (they can be only one "army" in a nation-state), the effort is likely to cause his downfall. Iraq is simply not ready to be a representative democracy. These people place far more importance on religious matters than political reconciliation. The fast we realize this and get out the better...
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POPSIraq: From One Dictator to Another? "Over a thousand Iraqis got killed and more than that number wounded just for a game of chess between warlords," Mohammad Alwan, a lawyer in Baghdad, told IPS. "All of them call for dissolving militias while they keep militias of their own. Most of those in power in the government are militia leaders."
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POPSManufactured Martyrdom - Iran "Kills" Aide to Muqtada al-Sadr It is significant Washington is being blamed and not the administration of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in Baghdad as Tehran is using this to inspire more hatred (attacks) against the foreign led occupation. It is also significant this took place in the religious center of Najaf which will inspire even more hatred. This comes right after Thursday's statement by the Sadr movement saying they were "under siege" and warned they will end the ceasefire they imposed last August. Tehran is setting the stage for more attacks against the remaining British-U. S. troops in the country, an offensive Iran will be entering at least by launching missiles from Iran at UK/US bases.
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POPSPat Buchanan Warns War with Iran Imminent The recent Petraeus testimony set the table. Read this entire article to see how. Buchanan masterfully uncovers what was just done, and how the neocon's desired war can be started before Bush is out! (Note the players, such as Lieberman in particular, who is at McCain's side now constantly).
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POPSIraqi Air Force Lifted By Support Missions In 1991, the Iraqi air force had 16 bombers, including Tu-22 and Tu-16; 360 fighter ground attack craft, which included J-6, MiG-23, Su-7, and Su-20; and 275 fighters, including the MiG-21, Mirage and MiG-29. Today, it has 17 reconnaissance planes, three transport planes and only several aircraft for training. Despite the shortage, the recovery of the Iraqi air force over the past few years is considered a successful endeavor for Iraq-U.S. relations. Since November 2006, the U.S. Air Force has been aiding Iraqi military commanders in an effort to get the fledgling branch to solely take on military operations. "We will continue our relations and future as friends," said Gen. Barzanji, he added that "Iraq will one day be a good example for the rest of the Middle East."
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POPS Q&A: Who is Moqtada al-Sadr?
(continued)>>>Shi'ite guerrillas, who continued the insurgency. Where is he now? Sadr is believed to have moved to Tehran last year and is studying to become an ayatollah in the holy city of Qom. He is said to have married an Iranian woman. It is not clear how much control he exercises over the Mahdi army. A substantial part of the army still takes its orders from the Qods Force of Iran's Revolutionary Guards. The ceasefire has been repeatedly tested by the "special groups", but Sadr's call for a civil revolt appears to have been prompted by the necessity of surviving the most aggressive bid by Iraq's security forces to assert the state's authority in Basra. What happens next? The Iraqi army, despite its British and American training, does not have the organisation or discipline to drive his followers out of towns and cities. The best that can be hoped for is that Sadr supporters will acquiesce to a stronger security force and establish their support in provincial
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POPSSeries Of Rockets Or Mortars Hit Green Zone In Baghdad Nearly 10 blasts were heard in the sprawling area in central Baghdad starting about 6:15 a.m., and the U.S. public address system there warned people to "duck and cover" and to stay away from windows. Maj. Brad Leighton, a U.S. military spokesman, confirmed the Green Zone was hit by indirect fire, the military's term for a rocket or mortar attack, but could not immediately provide more details.
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POPS The Return Of Thousands Of Baghdad Residents They fled to Syria six months ago, leaving behind what had become one of the capital's more dangerous districts — west Baghdad's largely Sunni Khadra region. They had been living inside a vicious and bloody turf battle between al-Qaeda in Iraq and Mahdi Army militiamen. Azawi said things began changing, becoming more peaceful, in August when radical anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr ordered his Mahdi Army fighters to stand down nationwide
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