American generals didn't understand the culture of Japan either but after a couple of Atomic Bombs the Japanese listened up when General MacArthur declared martial law and told every Japanese male they had to report to a job every day and stay off the streets at night.

U.S. Intel Chiefs Paint a Grim Picture of Iraq
The situation on the ground is bad, say the CIA and Pentagon spymasters. But it could still get a lot worse

Wednesday, Nov. 15, 2006

Just in case the politicians needed reminding of the urgency of turning things around in Iraq, two of the nation's most senior intelligence officers on Tuesday delivered a gloomy assessment of the war. General Michael Hayden, director of the CIA, warned at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing that the sectarian violence between Iraq's Shia and Sunnis has gotten so out of hand it "now presents the greatest immediate threat to Iraq's stability and future." And the Pentagon's top spy, Defense Intelligence Agency director Lt. Gen. Michael Maples, testified with Hayden and was equally downbeat. "Although a significant breakdown of central authority has not occurred, Iraq has moved closer to this possibility," Maples said.

Hayden, however, has seen little that has pleased him the past eight months. In fact, he concluded, Iraq has been going steadily downhill since last February when the bombing of the al-Askari Shi'ite shrine in Samarra sparked a frenzy of sectarian killing. Hayden ticked off the problems: "There remains in Iraq today an active insurgency, a broad al-Qaeda offensive targeting us and Iraqis, criminality and lawlessness on a broad scale, rival militias competing for power."

Political leaders have been unwilling or unable to rein in militias or death squads. Meanwhile, Iran "is stoking violence" and al-Qaeda "continues to foment sectarian violence," he warned. "Even if the central government gains broader support from Iraq's communities, implementing the reforms needed to improve life for all Iraq will be extremely difficult."

Overall, insurgent attacks have more than doubled from January to October, from an average of 70 a day to an average of 180 a day. The recent U.S.-Iraqi offensive against insurgents and militias in Baghdad achieved only "limited success," he testified. Iraqi forces haven't been able to control areas U.S. forces have cleared for them. "Once coalition forces moved on, attacks returned to and even surpassed preoperational levels," the DIA chief testified.

But the intel chiefs are even more pessimistic over the prospects for Iraq if the U.S. is unable to ensure sufficient stability for the central government to exercise form of sovereignty over the country. The consequences of a failed Iraqi state would be "catastrophic" for Iraqis, Hayden warned. "It would plunge them deeper into chaos and the road out of it would be longer." The instability for the rest of region would be "almost as bad." The temptation of Iran and Syria to intervene "may become irresistible." And, Hayden worries, it "would embolden the worst of our enemies — certainly al-Qaeda."

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1560025,00.html

Wednesday, Nov. 01, 2006

Last Saturday, Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, according to one of his aides, warned the U.S. ambassador that he was "not America's man in Iraq." On Tuesday he drove home the point, ordering an end to the U.S. military cordon around the Baghdad Shi'ite stronghold of Sadr City — a demand with which the U.S. military complied. Although U.S. troops don't take orders from the Iraqi government, refusing to heed the writ of that democratically elected government would make the U.S. military presence in that country untenable. The U.S. did point out that it had been consulted by Maliki, although that discussion appears to have occurred less than an hour before the announcement was made.

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1553558,00.html

Blair admits Iraq war has been a disaster

TONY Blair has admitted the Iraq war has been a disaster in a ground-breaking interview with al-Jazeera, the controversial Arab satellite TV channel.

The Prime Minister's remarks - aimed at a largely Arab audience around the world - will be seized on by his critics as proof that the war was a mistake.

However, Mr Blair made clear he blamed insurgents for the chaos since the fall of Saddam. Challenged by Sir David Frost, the veteran broadcaster, that the western intervention in Iraq had "been pretty much of a disaster", he responded: "It has."

Mr Blair added: "There's a deliberate strategy - al-Qaeda with Sunni insurgents on one hand, Iranian-backed elements with Shia militias on the other - to create a situation in which the will of the majority for peace is displaced by the will of the minority for war."

His remarks came after a government minister last night apparently savaged Mr Blair's decision to invade Iraq. Margaret Hodge, the industry minister was said to have told Labour activists at a closed meeting that the decision to go to war was the Prime Minister's "big mistake in foreign affairs". She was also said to have attacked Mr Blair's "moral imperialism".

http://news.scotsman.com/politics.cfm?id=1708302006

It amazes me that people around the world can see thru the BS, but people living in the country can't

The problem is that the USA has decided to have a permanent set-up in Iraq, which is proved by that billion dollar embassy ( with it's own missle defense system) , and those sprawling American bases the size of cities. In a land where few construction projects have seen much success, those things are exceptional.

So what you are calling fragments of Iraq are still the area of the Sunni Triangle and Iran and Syrian supported Saddam loyalist who want to regain power and or continue the Jihad against the west.

It has already been said by Iranian President he is ready to set in motions situations that will lead to Armageddon.
So if this is what you have supporting the insurgency in the Sunni triangle no wonder that area is still not up to par with the rest of the country.

Having to fight the devil at every turn is a difficult task for the coalition troops. However, it is a job that must be done.

Kissinger: Victory in Iraq no longer possible

POSTED: 7:40 p.m. EST, November 19, 2006

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A U.S. victory in Iraq is no longer possible under the conditions the Bush administration hopes to achieve, but a quick withdrawal of American troops would have "disastrous consequences," former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger said Sunday.

President Bush has said the United States will remain in Iraq until the country's government "can sustain itself and defend itself," and a top Iraqi official disputed Kissinger's assessment of the three-year-old war in an interview with CNN.

But in a BBC interview Sunday morning, Kissinger said the U.S. course needs to be redefined -- and the breakup of Iraq could be the eventual outcome.

Kissinger served as national security adviser and secretary of state in the Nixon and Ford administrations and has advised the Bush administration on Iraq. In August 2005, he wrote in The Washington Post that "victory over the insurgency is the only meaningful exit strategy."

But on Sunday he said a military victory in Iraq was no longer in the cards.

"If you mean by clear military victory an Iraqi government that can be established and whose writ runs across the whole country, that gets the civil war under control and sectarian violence under control in a time period that the political processes of the democracies will support, I don't believe that is possible," he said.

His comments come as a commission led by another former top diplomat, James Baker, prepares to offer its recommendations for a change of strategy in the war. The conflict has become increasingly unpopular in the United States as the American death toll nears 2,900, while waves of sectarian violence over the past nine months have left thousands of Iraqis dead.

However, a premature withdrawal of all 140,000 American troops now in the country risks bringing about a "dramatic collapse" of Iraq and eventually require U.S. forces to return to the region, Kissinger said.
Iraqi ambassador disputes Kissinger's conclusions

Instead, he recommended an international conference with Iraq's neighbors, the permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and countries he said have a "major interest" in the outcome -- such as south Asian nuclear rivals India and Pakistan -- to craft a settlement.

"I think we need to separate ourselves from the civil war, and we have to move at some early point to some international definition of what a legitimate outcome is," Kissinger told the BBC. "By legitimate, I mean something that can be supported by the surrounding states and by ourselves and our allies."

The partition of Iraq on ethnic lines "might be an outcome," he acknowledged, "but it might be better not to organize it that way on a formal basis."

Samir al-Sumaidie, Iraq's ambassador to the United States, disputed Kissinger's conclusions. He said his government still could prevail over the chaos of a largely Sunni Arab insurgency, sectarian militias and Islamic fighters who swear loyalty to the al Qaeda terrorist network.

"I think a lot of people in Iraq, the members of the government and the members of the policy council for national security all believe that the situation is retrievable," he told CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer."

"It's doable, but we need to have support of the right kind," al-Sumaidie said. "Now we have a lot of pressure on us, not only from our regional neighbors who are interfering, but pressures from our own friends."

Voters' dismay over Iraq contributed to the Democratic takeover of Congress in the November 7 midterm elections. The incoming chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. Carl Levin, has called for a "phased redeployment" of U.S. troops as a way of pressuring Iraq's government to make the political compromises needed to end the violence.

"You want to make the point to the Iraqis that, folks, you've got to take responsibility for your own country," said Levin, a Michigan Democrat. "We cannot do it for you."

But Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona, repeated his argument Sunday that more U.S. troops, not fewer, are needed in Iraq. He told ABC's "This Week" that such an increase would put "a terrible strain" on the Army and Marines. "But there's only one thing worse, and that is defeat," he said.

McCain is expected to be the ranking Republican on Levin's committee in the new Congress and took the first step toward a possible presidential bid in 2008 last week. He said the United States has been losing the war in Iraq and that American troops have been "fighting and dying for a failed policy."

"There's no good options," he said. "But the consequences of failure are severe, and I believe that we must do what's necessary to prevail. And I understand how terrible this is. The young men and women who are in the military today, and God bless them, they'll respond if called upon to."

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/11/19/iraq.kissinger/index.html

Bush noncommittal on Iraq troop deployment

POSTED: 9:52 a.m. EST, November 20, 2006

BOGOR, Indonesia (AP) -- President Bush said Monday he hasn't decided whether to send more troops to Iraq or begin bringing them home, saying he is awaiting the military's recommendations.

But despite the deep dislike of the war in Indonesia and other Muslim countries, Yudhoyono declined to directly criticize it or call for an immediate end to the U.S. presence in Iraq. He advocated only "a proper timetable" for "the disengagement of U.S. military forces and other coalition forces from Iraq."

Bush was asked about proposals by some members of Congress, including 2008 presidential hopeful John McCain, R-Arizona, to send more troops to help the roughly 140,000 already there stabilize the country and curb rising sectarian violence.

I haven't made any decisions about troop increases or troop decreases, and won't until I hear from a variety of sources, including our own United States military," the president replied.

Gen. Peter Pace, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is at work on a thorough review of options for Iraq, which figured heavily in the loss of control of Congress by Bush's Republican party earlier this month. As a result, many Democrats are calling for a phased withdrawal -- something Bush has refused -- and an independent bipartisan panel is compiling recommendations for the president, too.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/11/20/bush.asia.ap/index.html

Stay in Iraq, says Pentagon panel

A US military review of strategy in Iraq is likely to back a limited troop increase focused on training, officials have told the Washington Post. Senior defence officials said a review panel appeared to favour an option dubbed "Go Long", the paper reported.

Other plans - "Go Big" and "Go Home" - were seen as less plausible, the officials said.

Two other reviews are under way, one by the White House, the other by a bipartisan panel of experts.

Continued violence in Iraq was a key factor in the Republican defeat in mid-term polls and US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's resignation. On Monday, the US military said two more of its servicemen had died in Iraq - a marine who was killed in an attack in Anbar province and a soldier who died in a roadside bombing in south-eastern Baghdad.

Hybrid plan

The review panel's study, commissioned by Gen Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has all but rejected a massive scale-up of operations in Iraq, the unnamed officials told the Post. More troops would be required to do this than the US military and fledgling Iraqi security forces could provide, they said.

But the Pentagon group had also concluded that a swift withdrawal of US troops would be likely to push the country into full-blown civil war, the sources said. The officials said the panel was likely to favour a hybrid plan that cut the number of troops in combat roles while expanding US efforts to train and advise Iraqi security forces, the officials said.

Under the plan, an initial boost of 20,000 - 30,000 soldiers to the 140,000 already on the ground would be followed by longer term cuts, to as few as 60,000 troops, the newspaper reported.

(snipped redundant quotes from Montreal's post)

Reviews

The military panel's reported recommendations bear similarities to comments made last week by Gen John Abizaid, the top US commander for the Middle East. He said he did not believe either raising or reducing US troop levels will help ease the conflict in Iraq.

But he said he was still optimistic the country could be stabilized and that he believed the US could "accelerate" the training of Iraqi forces to within the next year. The Iraq Study Group, co-chaired by James Baker who served as secretary of state under President Bush Sr, is expected to issue its findings next month. President George W Bush's National Security Adviser, Stephen Hadley, has confirmed that he is also carrying out a review of US policy in Iraq for the White House.

I say more troops or needed to occupy the Iran and Syria borders so they can not send military aid to the insurgents. Keep the pressure on until Iraqis can defend their government.

November 22, 2006

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The new Marine Corps commandant said Wednesday that the longer than anticipated pace of operations in Iraq and Afghanistan is putting an unacceptable strain on his troops.

Gen. James Conway said the service is unable to meet its goal of giving Marines twice as much time at home as in a war zone.

He said unless the demand on the corps eases, he may have to propose increasing the size of the force. (Watch as Gen. Conway describes the possible "negative consequences" of the pressure Video)

Currently there are 180,000 Marines on active duty and about 40,000 in the active reserves. Marine units serve seven-month deployments in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Conway, who led Marine units into Iraq in 2003 and served on the Pentagon's joint staff, said his troops should get 14 months of relief before they are sent back.

Typically, however, they get only seven or eight months home before being returned to combat, he said.

Assuming the Marines' top job little more than a week ago, Conway told reporters at a Pentagon roundtable discussion that he sees two ways to alleviate stress on troops.

"One is reducing the requirement [of a set deployment time]. The other is potentially growing the force for what we call the long war," Conway said.

Some units are serving their fourth tour in Iraq, and the strain on their families has raised concern that Marines will start leaving the service when their enlistments are up.

"There is stress on the individual Marines that is increasing, and there is stress on the institution to do what we are required to do, pretty much by law, for the nation," he was quoted by The Associated Press as saying.

The current rotation of troops to Iraq is also limiting training, he said.

"We're not sending battalions like we used to for the mountain warfare training, the jungle training," he told reporters. "We're not doing combined arms exercises that we used to do for the far maneuver-type activities we have to be prepared to do."

Conway said he doesn't know whether an expected adjustment in strategy in Iraq will result in the need for more Marines, so he's holding off on making any formal recommendations.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/11/22/us.marines/index.html

November 24, 2006

Bombs kill 138 in Baghdad's Sadr City

• Baghdad International Airport closed until further notice
• The Iraqi Interior Ministry imposes an 8 p.m. curfew for Baghdad
• Iraq's health minister says 138 killed, 200 wounded in Baghdad's Sadr City
• Gunmen attack the Iraq Health Ministry in Baghdad, police say

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- A savage string of apparently coordinated bombings erupted Thursday in Sadr City, a Shiite slum of Baghdad, killing 138 people.

Police called it the deadliest single strike in Iraq since the war began more than three years ago.

Bombs and mortar shells struck Sadr City at 15-minute intervals, beginning about 3 p.m., according to The Associated Press, with the first bombing hitting a vegetable market. (Watch flames, chaos in Sadr City Video)

Shiites responded almost immediately, the AP reported, firing 10 mortar rounds at the holiest Sunni shrine in Baghdad, the Abu Hanifa Sunni mosque in Azamiya. The attack killed one person and wounded 14 others, the AP said.

Leaders from Iraq's Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish communities issued a televised appeal for calm, according to the AP.

Witnesses told CNN that people on loudspeakers at Shiite mosques in urged residents to donate blood for the wounded in Sadr City.

Earlier reports indicated 144 people were killed and 206 were wounded, but an Iraqi Health Ministry official on Friday who surveyed the aftermath said the death toll stood at 138, with more than 200 people wounded in the blasts.

Health Minister Ali Shammari said six car bombs detonated in the attack.

"This is a bloody day," he said.

The Interior Ministry imposed a curfew for Baghdad starting at 8 p.m., an hour earlier than the usual overnight curfew begins. It's unclear how long the curfew extension will last.

An Interior Ministry official said Baghdad's International Airport has been closed till further notice.

"As of right now, we have no reports of Iraqi army or coalition force casualties. There are no U.S. units in Sadr City," U.S. Lt. Col. Christopher Garver said.

He said the 9th Iraqi Army and coalition advisers are on the scene. U.S. helicopters flew over but did not engage any targets, and there has been no reported fighting involving coalition forces.

"There have been reports of residents randomly firing weapons after the [car bomb] detonations," said Garver, who added conditions had calmed down.

Thursday's violence came a day after a U.N. report about Iraq that underscored the unbridled sectarian violence in Iraq. The report said that 3,709 civilians were killed in violence in Iraq in October -- the highest monthly toll since the war's start. (Full story)

Thursday's attacks, launched within the course of half an hour, were part of a spasm of violence that shook two Baghdad bastions of support for anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr -- the Sadr City slum in the Iraqi capital's northeast and the Health Ministry compound, controlled by the cleric's political movement.

At least 30 gunmen thought to be from a Sunni neighborhood attacked the Health Ministry, police said.

U.S. military commanders suspect al-Sadr's movement is at the center of sectarian fighting in the capital over the past year.

There were no immediate details about casualties at the ministry compound, which is in central Baghdad's Bab al-Mudham area.

At least three mortar rounds landed inside the compound, police said, and the gunmen tried to break into it and fought with ministry security guards.

A Health Ministry official said the attackers came from the nearby Sunni neighborhood of Fadhel and that they also struck the Shiite Endowment, which manages Shiite institutions around the country.

There were other attacks earlier this week on Health Ministry officials. A deputy minister was kidnapped Sunday, and another official escaped injury Monday when gunmen opened fire on his convoy and killed two of his guards.

- Ibid

U.N.: Iraqi civilian death toll reaches new monthly high


• The U.N. says more than 7,000 Iraqi civilians died in September and October
• October was deadliest month since the 2003 U.S. invasion, the report says
• Sectarian strife and terrorism are to blame for the violence, the report finds
• Attacks have risen against journalists, women, minorities and professionals

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Insurgent attacks in Iraq killed 3,709 civilians last month, making October the deadliest month since the war began in 2003, according to U.N. figures.

The U.N. Assistance Mission in Iraq, which issues bimonthly human rights reports on the war-torn country, came out with its findings for September and October on Wednesday.

September had 3,345 civilian deaths -- which, along with October, would bring to 7,054 the number of violent deaths during the two-month period, according to the U.N. tally.

Baghdad alone had no less than 4,985 deaths, "most of them as a result of gunshot wounds," said the U.N. Assistance Mission, using figures provided by the Iraqi Health Ministry.

The figures were slightly higher than in July and August, when 6,599 civilians were killed.

The number of civilian deaths has been rising all year since the February bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra, north of Baghdad, with sectarian violence escalating greatly after that attack.

Sunni-Shiite hostilities, with revenge killings, mosque attacks, and militias and death squads prominent, were central to Iraq's problems, the report found.

The report attributes the grinding violence to "terrorist acts and sectarian strife, including revenge killings, fueled by insurgent, militia and criminal activities."

Such attacks "are the main source of violence in the country, adversely affecting the displacement of individuals and entire communities," it said.

And that "violence in Iraq has been increasingly acquiring a sectarian nature, with each attack generating a surge of revenge attacks in Baghdad and around the country."

In addition, civilians face "roadside bombs, drive-by shootings, kidnappings, police abuse, crime, military operations and cross fire between rival gangs, or between insurgents and police and MNF-I (Multi-National Forces-Iraq)," the report said.

The report noted "allegations of criminal and militia infiltration into the police," adding that "the inability of law enforcement agencies and the justice system to protect the population of Iraq" enables "militias and criminal gangs to operate with growing impunity."

The U.N. mission said it welcomed tougher vetting of police personnel by the Iraqi Interior Ministry.
Journalists, other groups targeted

Among the ominous developments noted in September and October:

# Media were victims of attacks. Eighteen journalists were killed during this period, and two satellite TV stations -- Al-Shaabiya and Al Iraqiya -- were attacked.

# Minorities have been attacked, including Christians, Sabean-Mandeans and Palestinian refugees.

# More women have been subjected to religious extremism or honor killings, and non-Muslim women have been "forced to wear a head scarf and to be accompanied by spouses or male relatives."

# Professionals -- such as judges, lawyers and intellectuals; political, tribal and religious leaders; government officials; and members of security forces -- have been targeted.

# Education has suffered, with schools not opening, and teachers and students "forced to leave the country."

# Mass kidnappings of civilians, with bodies being subjected to torture and execution-style killings. Witnesses have seen perpetrators wearing militia attire and police or army uniforms.

# The number of missing persons has risen.

# Security concerns persist in the detention of prisoners, with "arbitrary detention, grievous conditions of detention, allegations of torture and mistreatment" and prisoners.
Grim demographic changes

The sectarian violence has affected entire communities and spurred thousands to flee their homes, the report said.

"In some areas, neighborhoods have been split up or inhabitants have been forced to flee to other areas or even to neighboring countries in search of safety," it said.

Sectarian violence has led to the displacement of more than 418,000 people, and military operations have forced 15,240 to leave their homes since the February shrine bombing, the report said, citing estimates from the U.N. refugee agency.

In addition, 1.6 million have left the country altogether since 2003, and some 100,000 per month have left Iraq during the past few months, the report said, again citing estimates from the office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/11/22/iraq.report/

Sumer (or Šumer) was one of the earliest civilizations, located in the southern part of Mesopotamia (southeastern Iraq) from the time of the earliest records in the mid 4th millennium BC until the rise of Babylonia in the late 3rd millennium BC. Sumer together with Ancient Egypt and the Indus Valley Civilization is considered the first settled society in the world to have manifested all the features needed to qualify fully as a "civilization".

It's NOT the US that invaded Iraq
It's NOT the US that won't admit it was wrong

It was George and Donald and Chaney.
THEY are NOT the US.

Over 70% of the US DOES NOT support him so please don't lump us all in with them.

As wrong as he is, Bush has at least stuck to his position.