27 March 2008

Iraq News (27 March)

The Good: Operations by the Iraqi Security Forces continue to target criminal militia groups in Basra (NY Times has a pretty good summary). Militia fighting has sprung up all over southern Iraq and Baghdad with the help of their Quds Force enablers. The Prime Minister has set a deadline of 72 hours for the enemy in Basra to lay down their arms. Here's to the courage and bravery of our coalition and Iraqi brothers and sisters to put down this lawlessness once and for all. People often opine about who's right and who's wrong in this complex environment, but in my case, I'm fully supporting the people going after the thugs that are shooting at me. Perhaps that constitutes a bias, but hey, what are you gonna do. Very decisive and tough times...

The Bad:
Two soldiers were killed yesterday, and many people were killed or injured (mostly Iraqi civilians who are only trying to live their lives) in Baghdad due to mortar fire.

The Ugly: Turns out three congressional Dems had their trip to Iraq in 2002 funded by none other than Saddam himself! A flabbergasted McDermott spokesman responds that it was all about the Iraqi children and he was unaware of any conflicts of interest. Why do Dems always talk about the children? Wall Street Journal talks about the security situation in Iraq being threatened on multiple fronts.

Iraqi Police in Action

4 comments:

Bag Blog said...

I have often wondered how Dems can say they want to “save the children” or its all about “human rights” but then turn around demand that we “pull out” of Iraq? Isn’t that like abandoning the children and saying to hell with human rights. Or maybe the Dems are all talk and no do.

David M said...

The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the blog post From the Front: 03/27/2008 News and Personal dispatches from the front lines.

Catherine McHenry said...

Um, just to clarify, US Foreign Policy supported the rise of Saddam Hussein's government. Hussein took power in 1979. Foreign policy gaffes occur on both sides of the aisle. At the time (Iran and Iraq had waged a brutal war with one another) the US officially backed neither country, but preferred a secular Hussein over a religiously-based Khomeini.

source=http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/#docs

Document 6: United States Interests Section in Iraq Cable from William L. Eagleton, Jr. to the Department of State. "Meetings in Baghdad with Foreign Minister Hammadi," April 12, 1981.

As the Reagan administration continues efforts to improve relations with Iraq, the U.S. interests section in Baghdad asks for more information from Washington "so as to be able to take up with the Iraqis on suitable occasions a wide array of issues of mutual interest."

Carry on.

Nixon said...

Catherine,

Yeah but the Dem visit was well after Saddam invaded Kuwait, and when he was sanctioned. We sure didn't support Saddam's strategic blunder of trying to annex Kuwait.