Didn't GeeDub say something about 'shock and awe??

13 soldiers killed over 3 days

By Amit R. Paley
The Washington Post

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Thirteen U.S. soldiers have been killed in Baghdad since Monday, the American military reported, registering the highest three-day death toll for U.S. forces in the capital since the start of the war.

The latest losses — four soldiers who were killed at 9 a.m. Wednesday by small-arms fire in northwest Baghdad — are part of a recent spike in attacks against U.S. forces that have claimed the lives of at least 24 soldiers and Marines since Saturday, the military said.

The number of planted bombs is "at an all-time high," said Maj. Gen. William Caldwell, a military spokesman, defying U.S. efforts to stanch the sectarian bloodshed in Baghdad that threatens to plunge the country into civil war.

"This has been a hard week for U.S. forces," Caldwell said. "Unfortunately, as expected, attacks have steadily increased in Baghdad during these past weeks." Independent databases showed the three-day toll for U.S. troops to be the highest in Baghdad so far.

U.S. military officials said the surge in violence could be attributed partly to the increased exposure of American forces as they patrol the streets of Baghdad to try to quell reprisal killings between Shiites and Sunnis. The number of troops in the capital has doubled since June to support the Iraqi government's new security plan, said Lt. Col. Barry Johnson, another military spokesman.

"When you go into bad neighborhoods, you'll have more attacks," said Lt. Col. James Gavrilis, a Special Forces officer and expert on the Iraq insurgency.

Ali Dabbagh, a spokesman for the Iraqi government, said another likely cause for the spike in U.S. deaths was a recent call by the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq, Abu Hamza al-Muhajir, encouraging Iraqis in the current holy month of Ramadan to "eliminate the infidels and the apostates."

Seventy-four soldiers and Marines were killed in Iraq in September, representing the highest monthly toll since April, when 76 died, according to the Iraq Coalition Casualty Count. As of Wednesday, at least 2,736 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. The figure includes seven military civilians.

The disclosure came on another day of horrific violence for Iraqis, with at least 59 people killed in separate incidents across the country, Iraqi police said. The single deadliest attack took place in Ramadi when a suicide bomber exploded his car at an Iraqi army base, killing at least 19 people and wounding 10, a police official said.

Also Wednesday, a top aide to anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr said al-Sadr has specific information that U.S.-led coalition forces plan to launch a major attack on Sadr city, a Shiite slum.

"They want to turn it into mass graves similar to the previous ones conducted by the former regime," said the aide, Saheb al-Amery.

The United States and al-Sadr have clashed frequently since the 2003 invasion.

Our government doesn't want to publically acknowledge that this has turned into a civil war. 100 civilians die everyday. It is estimated that this country will be a fixture in Iraq for years to come. And more of our soldiers are losing their lives.

World
Tuesday, Oct. 10, 2006
Dozens of bodies found in Baghdad


BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi police found 50 bodies dumped across Baghdad on Tuesday, apparent victims of sectarian death squads, and a bombing at a bakery in the capital killed 10 people in the biggest single attack of the day.

The discovery of the bodies, many tortured and all shot, brought to at least 110 the number found in Baghdad in the past two days, an Interior Ministry official said.

A bomb placed under a car outside a bakery in the mostly Sunni Arab southern Baghdad district of Doura reduced the shop to rubble and killed 10 people, many who had been queuing outside to buy bread, police said.

At least 25 others were killed in bombings and hootings
around Iraq, police and Interior Ministry officials said.

Iraq has been gripped by Sunni-Shi'ite bloodletting since the bombing of a revered Shi'ite Muslim shrine in February. The United Nations estimates 100 Iraqis die violently every day.

The violence rages on largely unchecked despite U.S.
efforts to build up Iraq's fledgling security forces, a major security crackdown in the capital and a series of peace plans by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's four-month-old government.

Dozens of explosions rocked the capital for several hours on Tuesday night, alarming residents more used to sporadic mortar and rocket attacks, but the U.S. military said the cause was a fire at an ammunition dump at a U.S. base in southern Baghdad.

"The fire ignited tank and artillery ordnance as well as small arms ammunition," the military said in a statement.

U.S. military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Christopher
Garver told Reuters the cause of the fire, which lit up the night sky, was under investigation.

CLAIM

The Islamic Army in Iraq, one of a number of militant
groups operating in the country, claimed responsibility for the attack.

"The Islamic Army ... (launched) rockets and mortar bombs ... at a base for the occupying American forces. Explosions could be heard in Baghdad," said the statement signed by the group and posted on a Web site often used by Islamist militants.

There were no immediate reports of casualties. A spokesman for the 4th Infantry Division, Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Withington, said the base had been safely evacuated.

Three U.S. Marines were killed in action in Anbar province in western Iraq on Monday, the U.S. military said. Anbar is the heartland of the Sunni insurgency against Maliki's Shi'ite-led government and U.S. forces.

The deaths brought to at least 37 the number of U.S. troops killed in Iraq since the start of October.
The U.S. military said on Tuesday it killed seven
insurgents in an air strike on a building in Ramadi, capital of Anbar, after U.S. troops came under "extremely heavy fire."

U.S. officials had predicted a surge in violence during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which began in late September.

Maliki's government is under growing pressure, particularly from Washington, to rein in sectarian militias, several of which are tied to parties within his own government and are accused of infiltrating the police to provide cover for killings.

Most of the bodies found dumped in Baghdad's streets had been shot in the head execution-style and bore signs of torture, typical features of sectarian death squad killings that the Interior Ministry says claims about 50 lives a day.

A ministry official had earlier reported the discovery of 60 bodies in the 24 hours until Tuesday morning, but a further 50 were found during the day, officials said.
(Additional reporting by Aseel Kami and Mariam Karouny)

This message has been edited. Last edited by: EbonyRose,

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BLACK by NATURE, PROUD by CHOICE.
Before there was ANY history, there was BLACK history.

BUY BLACK!!!

Army: Troops to stay in Iraq until 2010
By LOLITA C. BALDOR, Associated Press Writer



The U.S. Army has plans that would keep the current level of troops in Iraq — about 15 brigades — through 2010, the top Army officer said Wednesday.

The Army chief of staff, Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker, cautioned that people not read too much into the planning, because it is easier to pull back forces than to get units prepared and deployed at the last minute.

"This is not a prediction that things are going poorly or better," Schoomaker told reporters. "It's just that I have to have enough ammo in the magazine that I can continue to shoot as long as they want us to shoot."

His comments come less than four weeks before congressional elections, in which the unpopular war in Iraq and the Bush administration's policies there are a major campaign issue.

Last month, the top U.S. commander in the Middle East, Gen. John Abizaid, said the military would likely maintain or possibly even increase the current force levels through next spring. There are 141,000 troops in Iraq, including about 120,000 Army soldiers.

In recent months the Army has shown signs of strain, as Pentagon officials have had to extend the Iraq deployments of two brigades in order to bolster security in Baghdad and allow units heading into the country to have at least one year at home before redeploying.

Schoomaker said he has received no new guidance from commanders in Iraq as to when the U.S. will be able to begin reducing the number of troops there. Last year officials had hoped to be down to about 100,000 by the end of this year, but escalating violence and sectarian tensions have prompted military leaders to increase forces.

He also said the Army will have to rely on the National Guard and Reserves to maintain the current level of deployments. When asked about concerns that reserve units are struggling to get the training and equipment they need before going back to Iraq, Schoomaker said that no troops would be sent into war without needed resources.

U.S. to rethink Baghdad peace efforts
By CHRISTOPHER BODEEN, Associated Press Writer


The U.S. military acknowledged Thursday that its two-month drive to crush insurgent and militia violence in the Iraqi capital had fallen short, calling the raging bloodshed disheartening and saying it was rethinking its strategy to rein in gunmen, torturers and bombers.

The admission by military spokesman Maj. Gen. William B. Caldwell came as car bombs, mortar fire and shootings around the country killed at least 66 people and wounded 175. The dead included the Anbar province police commander, slain by gunmen who burst into his home in Ramadi.

The U.S. military also announced the deaths of three U.S. troops in fighting, raising the toll for American troops in October to 74. The month is on course to be the deadliest for U.S. forces in nearly two years.

The high death tolls this month for both Americans and Iraqis have pushed the long and unpopular war back into the public eye in the United States, forcing the Bush administration and the military to address difficult questions in the final weeks of the midterm U.S. election campaign.

Vice President Dick Cheney said the United States was not looking for a way out of Iraq. "I know what the president thinks. I know what I think. And we're not looking for an exit strategy. We're looking for victory," Cheney said in an interview posted on Time magazine's Web site Thursday.

Caldwell told reporters the U.S.-Iraqi bid to crush violence in the capital had not delivered the desired results, with attacks in Baghdad rising by 22 percent in the first three weeks of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan when compared to the three previous weeks.

"In Baghdad, Operation Together Forward has made a difference in the focus areas but has not met our overall expectations in sustaining a reduction in the level of violence," Caldwell said at a news briefing. He was referring to the security sweep, which began Aug. 7 with the introduction of an additional 12,000 U.S. and Iraqi troops into Baghdad.

"The violence is indeed disheartening," he said.

Caldwell said U.S. troops over the last week were forced to launch a second sweep of southern Baghdad's Dora district after a surge in sectarian attacks. At least eight people, including four policemen, were killed in bombings and shootings in Dora on Thursday, police said.

"We find the insurgent elements, the extremists are in fact punching back hard, they're trying to get back into those areas," Caldwell said.

He said security plans were being reviewed for the sprawling, low-rise capital of 6 million people, where rival Shiite and Sunni Muslim sects live in uneasy proximity to each other and the bodies of victims of sectarian death squads are found dumped on the streets each morning.

"It's clear that the conditions under which we started are probably not the same today and so it does require some modifications of the plan," Caldwell said.

His gloomy assessment came amid tensions between the United States and the nearly 5-month-old government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

Frustration over al-Maliki's failure to crack down on sectarian groups could be exacerbated by revelations that the prime minister ordered U.S. troops to release Mazin al-Sa'edi, a top organizer in western Baghdad for radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Caldwell said al-Sa'edi was freed after being detained Wednesday with five aides for suspected involvement in Shiite violence. Al-Sadr's al-Mahdi Army has been blamed for sporadic attacks and for inspiring groups kidnapping and killing Sunnis.

The newly reported U.S. deaths included a Marine and a soldier killed in Anbar province in the Sunni heartland west of Baghdad and another soldier who died in a roadside bombing near Balad, the city north of Baghdad where at least 95 Sunnis and Shiites were killed in five days of revenge attacks.

Caldwell said the spike in violence was in line with past increases during Ramadan. But he also said a more aggressive stance toward insurgents was leading to more engagements — and more U.S. deaths.

Among those taking part in the security push, Maj. Ken Slover of the 172nd Stryker Brigade said the higher death toll was a result of the presence of greater numbers of U.S. soldiers in Baghdad.

"We're out in the woods, we're out there looking for the enemy," said Slover, who on Thursday was overseeing the distribution of 50 gasoline generators and food packages in western Baghdad.

"When there's more presence, there's more chance" of casualties," Slover said.

The Stryker Brigade's yearlong tour in Iraq was extended by 120 days when they were recently shifted to Baghdad.

As U.S. troops focus on crushing insurgent and militia activity in central Iraq, the northern cities of Mosul and Kirkuk have seen a significant increase in violence. Most attacks have been blamed on Sunni Arab militants fighting to block the cities' feared integration into the Kurdish-controlled region in the north.

On Thursday, police in Mosul shot to death a suicide bomber driving a truck at high speed toward a police post, said Col. Khalaf Ismail. Although the post was saved, the gunfire ignited fuel and explosives on the truck, killing 12 people and wounding 25 — mostly motorists lined up for gasoline at a nearby service station. Col. Abed Hamed al-Jibouri said 42 cars were destroyed in the blast.

In Kirkuk, a suicide bomber attacked a bank where civilians and army soldiers were waiting to get their wages. Twelve people, including four troops, were killed and 47 were wounded, said police Brig. Sarhat Qader.

Interior Ministry spokesman Brig. Abdul-Karim Khalaf said militants of al-Qaida in Iraq suffered unspecified losses in clashes with security and tribal forces in Ramadi, 70 miles west of Baghdad.

He said as many as 60 al-Qaida gunmen arrived Wednesday in 17 vehicles and remained there for 15 minutes before being forced to flee.

Witnesses in Ramadi confirmed the basics of Khalaf's account, but added that the masked gunmen staged a military-like parade, carrying banners exhorting people to support an Islamic state in Iraq. They said mosques used loudspeakers to rally support for the new state.

The Mujahedeen Shura Council — an umbrella organization of insurgent groups that includes al-Qaida in Iraq — said in a video Sunday that it has established an Islamic state made up of six provinces, including Baghdad.

Insurgents are not known to control any territory. However, the Ramadi parade pointed to their growing confidence in a city where U.S. and Iraqi forces have a heavy presence.

In the largely peaceful, Shiite-dominated south of the country, a fight broke out Thursday pitting Shiites against each other in Amarah. Clashes erupted between members of the Mahdi Army and policemen trying to stop the fighters from storming their headquarters. Nine people were killed, including six militiamen, and 59 were wounded, police and hospital officials said.

Our Commander-in-Chief's reply!!

Bush: I won't change strategy in Iraq
By DEB RIECHMANN and KEVIN FREKING, Associated Press Writers



President Bush conceded Friday that "right now it's tough" for American forces in Iraq, but the White House said he would not change U.S. strategy in the face of pre-election polls that show voters are upset.

With Republicans anxious about the potential loss of Congress — and with conditions seemingly deteriorating in Iraq — Bush addressed the question of whether he would alter his policies.

"We are constantly adjusting our tactics so that we achieve the objective, and right now it's tough, it's tough," Bush said in an Associated Press interview.

Bush met with Gen. John Abizaid, the top U.S. commander in the Middle East, at the White House for a half-hour Friday afternoon. The White House said Abizaid already was in town and Bush asked him over. The president also will consult by video conference on Saturday with Abizaid at U.S. Central Command in Tampa, Fla., and with Gen. George Casey, who leads the U.S.-led Multinational Forces in Iraq, to determine if a change in tactics is necessary to combat the increasing violence.

Despite calls for change, Bush said, "Our goal has not changed. Our goal is a country that can defend, sustain and govern itself, a country that which will serve as an ally in this war. Our tactics are adjusting."

There were fresh signs of Republican doubts about the war. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (news, bio, voting record) of Texas, who holds a seat deemed safe for the GOP, said in a campaign debate Thursday she would have voted against the war had she known ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein possessed no weapons of mass destruction.

Democrats also kept up the pressure on Bush. In a letter to the president, a dozen House and Senate Democratic leaders urged him to bring home some U.S. troops and force the Iraqis to take more responsibility for their security. The Democrats said Bush should do more to pressure Iraqi leaders to disarm militias and find a political solution that would curb violence.

"The steadily mounting sectarian violence, growing insurgency and escalating casualty figures in Iraq are unacceptable and unsustainable," the Democrats said. "We urge you to change course, level with the American people and join with us to develop a policy that will work before the situation in Iraq is irretrievable."

Presidential spokesman Tony Snow said that while Bush might change tactics, he would not change his overall strategy.

"He's not somebody who gets jumpy at polls," Snow said of Bush.

Bush, at a political fundraiser in Washington for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, railed against Democrats who criticize the war. Calling the Democrats the party of "cut and run," Bush said voters need to ask: "Which political party has a strategy for victory in this war on terror?' "

As of Friday, the U.S. combat death toll in Iraq during October stood at 75 — possibly heading for the highest for any month in nearly two years. Now in its fourth year, the war has claimed the lives of at least 2,786 Americans. Approval of Bush's handling of Iraq has dipped to 37 percent among likely voters in the AP-Ipsos poll early this month, down slightly from 41 percent last month.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said the Iraqi government must become less reliant on the United States to handle security. He also said U.S. officials are working with the Iraqis to develop projections on when that might happen.

"It's their country, they're going to have to govern it, they're going to have to provide security for it, and they're going to have to do it sooner rather than later," Rumsfeld said.

"The biggest mistake would be to not pass things over to the Iraqis, create a dependency on their part, instead of developing strength and capacity and competence," he said.

Doubts about the effectiveness of current tactics have risen, and the U.S. military has said its two-month drive to crush insurgent and militia violence in Baghdad has fallen short. Attacks in Baghdad rose by 22 percent in the first three weeks of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, compared with the three previous weeks.

On Friday, the Shiite militia run by the anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr briefly seized control of the southern Iraqi city of Amarah in one of the most brazen acts of defiance yet by the country's powerful, unofficial armies. Tom Casey, deputy spokesman at the State Department, said the United States was urging the Iraqis to make sure that security in Amarah was returned to the government.

"The flare-up of violence in Amarah points out that our strategy to quell the violence in that country is failing," said Rep. Ike Skelton (news, bio, voting record) of Missouri, the ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee.

This is another very real toll that the Iraq conflict is taking on our troops. I'm not in favor of an immediate pull-out ... but, I'm not so sure it would be a bad thing to get them out of there in a hurry, either.

Soldier gets 90 years in Iraq rape case

By RYAN LENZ, Associated Press Writer
Fri Nov 17, 6:49 AM ET

A soldier who was sentenced to 90 years in prison for conspiring to rape a 14-year-old Iraqi girl and kill her and her family said he knew his actions would harm support for the U.S. military's mission in Iraq.

At his sentencing Thursday, Spc. James P. Barker, one of four Fort Campbell soldiers accused in the March 12 rape and killings, begged Iraqis not to cast judgment on other troops.

"I do not ask anyone to forgive me today," he tearfully told the judge. "I don't know how that would be possible after what I have done. I do ask the Iraqi people not to blame my brothers still fighting in Iraq."

Barker pleaded guilty Wednesday and agreed to testify against the others to avoid the death penalty.

The killings in Mahmoudiya, a village about 20 miles south of Baghdad, were among the worst in a series of alleged attacks on civilians and other abuses by military personnel in Iraq.

Under the plea agreement, Barker got a life sentence but will not serve more than 90 years in prison, said Lt. Col. Richard Anderson, the military judge presiding over the court-martial. He will be eligible for parole in 20 years.

Barker, 23, showed no reaction when the sentence was read. Afterward, he smoked a cigarette outside as a bailiff watched over him. He grinned but said nothing as reporters passed by.

Military prosecutors declined to comment after sentencing because the three other soldiers have yet to be tried.

In his closing statement, Barker said stressful conditions in Iraq made him angry and violent.

"To live there, to survive there, I became angry and mean. The mean part of me made me strong on patrols. It made me brave in fire fights," he said. "I loved my friends, my fellow soldiers and my leaders, but I began to hate everyone else in Iraq."

Some of Barker's fellow soldiers testified on his behalf, describing weeks with little support and sleep while manning distant checkpoints.

"The bottom line is they were not giving the soldiers the tools, were not giving the soldiers the combat stress treatment, were not giving them enough troops on the ground to fulfill their mission," defense attorney David Sheldon said after the sentencing.

Capt. William Fischbach, the lead prosecutor, told the court that such conditions were no excuse for Barker, who led the group to the family's house, and that no one deserved such unspeakable horrors.

"This burned-out corpse that used to be a 14-year-old girl never fired bullets or lobbed mortars," Fischbach said as he held pictures of the crime scene.

The defendants are accused of burning the girl's body to conceal the crime.

Sgt. Paul E. Cortez, 24, has deferred entering a plea, and Pfc. Jesse V. Spielman, 22, will be arraigned in December. Both are members of the 101st Airborne Division along with Barker and could face the death penalty if convicted.

Pfc. Bryan L. Howard, 19, also deferred entering a plea at his arraignment in October. He does not face the death penalty.

Steven Green, 21, pleaded not guilty last week to civilian charges including murder and sexual assault. The former private was discharged for a "personality disorder" before the allegations became known, and prosecutors have yet to say whether they will pursue the death penalty against him.

In earlier testimony, Barker described in detail how he raped Abeer Qassim al-Janabi with Cortez and Green before Green killed the girl, her younger sister and parents.

"Cortez pushed her to the ground. I went towards the top of her and kind of held her hands down while Cortez proceeded to lift her dress up," he said. "Around that time I heard shots coming from a room next door."

Barker did not name Spielman and Howard as participants in the rape and killings but said Spielman went along to the house knowing what the others intended to do. Prosecutors said Howard had been left behind at a checkpoint.

Iran says will help U.S. if it quits Iraq
Sun Nov 26, 2006 9:17 AM ET

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Sunday Iran was ready to help the United States and Britain in Iraq but only if they pledged to change their attitude and withdraw their troops.

The remark comes amid growing calls for Washington to engage Iraq's neighbors, Iran and Syria, to help prevent Iraq plunging into civil war.

A senior U.S. official said this month Washington was "in principle" ready to discuss Iraq with Iran but said the timing of such talks was unclear. Ahmadinejad has previously said he would talk but only if Washington changed its behavior.

"The Iranian nation is ready to help you get out of that swamp (in Iraq) on one condition ... you should pledge to correct your attitude," Ahmadinejad said in a televised speech to a parade of the Basij religious militia.

"Go back and take your forces to behind your borders and serve your own nations," he added.

Ahmadinejad regularly condemns the U.S. occupation of Iraq and complains about U.S. bases in the region. Washington accuses Iran of seeking to foment unrest, while Iran blames the violence on the presence of U.S. troops.

The Iranian president also criticizes what he says is a hostile U.S. and British attitude to Iran, particularly over its disputed nuclear programme.

Western countries, including the United States and Britain, accuse Iran of seeking to develop atomic bombs, a charge Iran denies. It says its aim is to generate electricity.

Ahmadinejad urged countries in the region to work together to expel foreign forces from their soil.

"Let us put our hands together and expel enemies who are against humanity from our countries and our sacred lands," he said.

Iran has in the past called for a security pact between Iran and other regional states, but Gulf Arab countries, dominated by Sunni Muslims, have long been suspicious of Shi'ite Muslim Iran's intentions in the region.

---------------------------------------

Okay ... now things are heating up for ol' GeeDub. He's on the hot seat for real! The world is watching. And, if left to his own devices, he still could show himself to be a fool yet again! I doubt the new Congress is going to let anything crazy happen, though. But I do get a sense that this Iraq disaster is going to take on a whole new direction soon.

What this media fails go make any mention of is that there already is civil war going on over there. Maybe the U.S. gov't just doesn't know what it is, or something ...doesn't recognize it when it's staring them in the face? It certainly wouldn't be the first time.

But, also today, The Iraqi gov't decided to try to assert their authority by saying that they are calling an end to the violence and will hunt down the killers of the latest attacks. That will be interesting when half of both the police force and the military [i]are the killers in the latest attacks!

Yeah, the great Bush plan is going right down the toilet. And I have a feeling that the Dems are going to play the "America has spoken" card to the Repubicans in order to get through whatever plan they may come up with. The U.S. needs Syria and Iran to really straighten out what it has started in the Middle East. They know what to do. And to refuse to even talk to them about it is just complete lunacy.

But, I think we are watching GeeDubya's legacy happen. This is history in the making. And with a man like him, getting embarrased is probably worse than getting impeached. That's the Texas way. Go figure.[/i]

Hmmmm ... maybe somebody heard me!

quote:

NBC calls Iraq conflict 'civil war'

By DAVID BAUDER, AP Television Writer
Mon Nov 27, 6:59 PM ET

NBC News on Monday began referring to the Iraq conflict as a civil war, adopting a phrase that President Bush and many other news organizations have avoided.

Matt Lauer said on the "Today" show that "after careful consideration, NBC News has decided that a change in terminology is warranted, that the situation is Iraq with armed militarized factions fighting for their own political agendas can now be characterized as civil war."

The network's cable news outlet, MSNBC, drummed the point home repeatedly by using the phrase "Iraq: The Civil War" on the screen.

There are different criteria for defining a civil war. Webster's New World College Dictionary defines it simply as "war between geographical sections or political factions of the same nation." Some political scientists use a threshold of 1,000 dead, which the current conflict has long since passed.

Full Story


----------------

Powell: Iraq could be 'considered a civil war'.

AP Video

I'm thinking this is the biggest crock of crap that I've heard out of the White House since the WMD madness!! It was Rummy and his friend's idea in the first place to go to war ... and now I'm supposed to believe he "saw the light" 2 days before he resigned? and decided to leave instead of implement this great master plan that had come into his mind??


Rumsfeld memo admits Iraq strategy failing



WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told President Bush before he resigned that the administration's strategy in Iraq was not working and he proposed changes, including possible troop reductions, The New York Times reported Saturday.

"In my view it is time for a major adjustment. Clearly, what U.S. forces are currently doing in Iraq is not working well enough or fast enough," Rumsfeld said in the classified memo, dated November 6. The Times posted a copy of the memo along with an article about it on its Web site.

The Pentagon confirmed the memo's authenticity but declined to comment further. (Watch what Rumsfeld memo suggestsVideo)

Rumsfeld, as a planner and defender of Bush's Iraq strategy since well before the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003, has been a leading public face of the war. His memo adds to the voices calling on Bush to make a significant shift in strategy as the White House, the Pentagon and a congressionally created study group consider changes.

Rumsfeld outlined several options in the memo for policy changes, including reductions in U.S. forces and bases in Iraq as well as a recasting of the U.S. mission and goals there, but he endorsed no specific recommendations. (Watch destruction caused by Baghdad car bombsVideo)

He said, however, a multiparty conference modeled after the 1995 Dayton, Ohio, talks that led to a peace agreement ending the Bosnian war was a "less attractive" option, as was continuing on the current path.

The memo was dated a day before Democrats captured control of Congress in midterm elections amid voter dissatisfaction over the Iraq war, and two days before Rumsfeld's resignation was announced.

Rumsfeld's language was echoed in remarks Bush made on November 8 when he announced the resignation. Bush said it was time for a change in Iraq and Iraq policy was "not working well enough, fast enough."

Rumsfeld remains in office pending Senate confirmation of former CIA Director Robert Gates, nominated by Bush to succeed him.

The study group, co-chaired by former Secretary of State James Baker, is expected to urge a gradual withdrawal of U.S. combat troops when it makes its report Wednesday.

There are about 140,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, and more than 2,800 have been killed since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.
'Want to hear all advice'

Bush has indicated he will look closely at -- but not necessarily heed -- the study group's findings and insisted he was not looking for a "graceful exit."

"I want to hear all advice before I make any decisions about adjustments to our strategy in Iraq," Bush said in his radio address Saturday.

Bush pledged to seek bipartisan consensus on the way forward in Iraq, and offered conciliatory words but no concessions to critics of his Iraq policy.

Among the proposals outlined in the Rumsfeld memo were positioning substantial U.S. forces near the Iranian and Syrian borders to reduce infiltration and reduce Iranian influence on the Iraqi government.

Many in Washington hope the bipartisan Baker commission will give Bush a way to start extricating the U.S. forces from what is increasingly being viewed as a sectarian civil war.

But State Department and National Security Council officials told foreign diplomats Wednesday not to expect any major policy shifts, no matter what the group recommends, The Washington Post reported, citing unidentified diplomats familiar with the private briefing.

The group's proposals -- said to include a U.S. shift away from a combat role over the next year or so, and a regional conference that could lead to talks with Iran and Syria -- will carry significant weight even if Bush chooses to ignore them.

Long accused by Democrats of ignoring their advice on Iraq, Bush in his radio address acknowledged violence there was unsettling for many Americans.

"Success in Iraq will require leaders in Washington -- Republicans and Democrats alike -- to come together and find greater consensus on the best path forward. So I will work with leaders in both parties to achieve this goal," he said.

Bush will hold talks Monday at the White House with a powerful party leader of Iraq's Shi'ite majority, Abdul Aziz al-Hakim.



Find this article at:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/12/02/rumsfeld.memo.reut/index.html

Iraq court upholds Saddam death sentence

By CHRISTOPHER TORCHIA, Associated Press Writer
Tue Dec 26, 10:46 PM ET

Iraq's highest court rejected Saddam Hussein's appeal Tuesday and said the former dictator must be hanged within 30 days for ordering the killing of scores of Shiite Muslims in 1982.

The sentence has already stoked Iraq's sectarian rage, with the Shiite majority demanding Saddam's death and his fellow Sunni Arabs calling the trial tainted.

"From tomorrow, any day could be the day" Saddam is sent to the gallows, the chief judge said. Saddam was condemned to death for his role in the execution of 148 Shiite Muslims from the small northern town of Dujail, after a 1982 assassination attempt.

The decision came on a particularly bloody day in Baghdad, where at least 54 Iraqis died in bombings and police discovered 49 apparent victims of sectarian reprisal killings. Separately, the U.S. military announced the deaths of seven American soldiers.

In upholding the sentence, imposed Nov. 5, the Supreme Court of Appeals also affirmed death sentences for two of his co-defendants, including his half brother. And it said life imprisonment for a third was too lenient and demanded he be given the death penalty, too.

Saddam's hanging "must be implemented within 30 days," said Aref Shahin, chief judge of the appeals court. "From tomorrow, any day could be the day of implementation."

The White House called the ruling a milestone in Iraq's efforts "to replace the rule of a tyrant with the rule of law."

"Saddam Hussein has received due process and legal rights that he denied the Iraqi people for so long. So this is an important day for the Iraqi people," said deputy White House press secretary Scott Stanzel, who was aboard Air Force One flying from Washington to Waco, Texas.

Some international legal observers, however, called Saddam's trial unfair because of alleged interference by the Shiite-dominated government.

The ruling raised doubts about whether other victims of Saddam's ruthless regime — including families of Kurds gassed in the late 1980s — will ever testify in court about their suffering.

But the announcement delighted Shiites, who endured persecution under Saddam and are eager to remove a symbol of the old regime.

Some Shiites are concerned that insurgents, many of them Sunni Arabs, will try to disrupt or prevent the execution.

"We were looking forward to this day so as to achieve justice, though it comes late," said Ali al-Adeeb, a Shiite lawmaker. "The government should speed up implementing the verdict in order not to give any chance to the terrorists."

Under Iraqi law, the appeals court decision must be ratified by President Jalal Talabani and Iraq's two vice presidents. One of the two deputies is, like Saddam, a Sunni Arab.

Talabani, a Kurd, has said he is opposed to the death penalty. But he previously deputized Vice President Adil Abdul-Mahdi, a Shiite Muslim, to sign execution orders on his behalf.

Abdul-Mahdi has said he would sign a death warrant for Saddam.

The Sunni vice president, Tariq Al-Hashimi, has also pledged to support Saddam's execution as part of a deal that gave him the job last April 22, witnesses at the meeting told The Associated Press in October.

Raed Juhi, a spokesman for the High Tribunal court that convicted Saddam, said the judicial system would ensure Saddam is executed even if the presidency does not ratify the decision.

"We'll implement the verdict by the power of the law," Juhi said.

He did not elaborate on the statement, which implied that Saddam's case might divide the government.

Saddam is being held at Camp Cropper, an American military prison close to Baghdad's airport. The U.S. military has had Saddam Hussein in its custody, on behalf of the Iraqis, since his capture. Military officials, however, were not able to say Tuesday whether the former dictator is being turned over to the Iraqis now, in anticipation of his execution.

It's not clear where the hanging will take place. It might occur at Camp Cropper or, perhaps, at a Baghdad prison where the new Iraqi government has carried out other executions. It's also uncertain if the public or press will be allowed to witness the hanging, or if the execution will be announced only afterward.

Human Rights Watch, an international rights group, said figures in the U.S.-backed Iraqi government had undermined the credibility of Saddam's trial. Those officials publicly criticized a judge early in the case, leading to his resignation.

The rights group also cited other "political interference."

"Imposing the death penalty, which is indefensible in any case, is especially wrong after the unfair proceedings of the Dujail trial," said Richard Dicker, director of the group's International Justice Program.

As an example of Iraqi government interference, Dicker noted Mouwafak al-Rubaie, Iraq's national security adviser, announced the decision of the appeals court before the court itself did.

Al-Rubaie told AP of the decision about an hour before the chief judge announced it.

Shiite residents of Baghdad had no doubts about the fairness of the verdict. "We are very happy," said Riyah Abdul Sattar in Sadr City, a neighborhood where Shiite militias are strong. "We will get rid of him for sure."

There was disappointment, though, in Tikrit, a mostly Sunni Arab city north of Baghdad that lies near Saddam's hometown of Ouja.

"It is a political verdict that has no relation to law or justice," said Saad Ibrahim Khelil. "I do believe it's a kind of pressure against the (Sunni-led) resistance."

The appeals court also upheld death sentences for Barzan Ibrahim, Saddam's half brother and intelligence chief during the Dujail killings, and Awad Hamed al-Bandar, head of Iraq's Revolutionary Court, which issued the death sentences against the Dujail residents.

The court concluded that the life sentence given former vice president Taha Yassin Ramadan was too lenient, and returned his case to the High Tribunal for reconsideration. Ramadan was convicted of premeditated murder.

"We demand that he be sentenced to death," said Shahin, the chief appeals judge.

At his trial, Saddam argued that the Dujail residents who were killed had been convicted in a legitimate Iraqi court for trying to assassinate him.

Saddam's televised trial was watched throughout Iraq and the Middle East as much for theater as for substance. The fallen dictator was ejected from the courtroom repeatedly for political harangues, and his half brother once showed up in long underwear and sat with his back to the judges.

Three defense lawyers and a witness were murdered during the course of its 39 sessions.

Saddam is currently in the midst of another trial, charged with genocide and other crimes during a 1987-88 military crackdown on Kurds in northern Iraq.

An estimated 180,000 Kurds died during the operation. That trial was adjourned until Jan. 8.

Saddam was captured while hiding in a hole in the ground near his home village north of Baghdad in December 2003, eight months after he fled the capital ahead of advancing American troops. He had a pistol in the hole, but never fired.

Sad way to end the year.

U.S. troop deaths reach 3,000

Story Highlights
•NEW: Soldier was wounded in Al Anbar province
•NEW: Bush: American will not have "died in vain"
•NEW: 3,000th soldier died Wednesday in Texas military hospital

CRAWFORD, Texas (CNN) -- A U.S. soldier died earlier this week of wounds suffered in a roadside bombing in Iraq, the Pentagon reported Sunday.

According to a count kept by CNN, the death of 23-year-old Sgt. Edward Shaffer, of Mont Alto, Pennsylvania, was the 3,000th American military fatality reported since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003.

Shaffer was wounded November 13, 2006 by a roadside bomb in the western Iraqi city of Ramadi, where U.S. troops and insurgents trade fire on a near-daily basis.

Shaffer was a member of the Army's First Armored Division, based in Friedberg, Germany. He died Wednesday at Fort Sam Houston, Texas, outside San Antonio, according to the military.

More than 22,000 other U.S. troops have been wounded in Iraq since the war began nearly four years ago.

The grim milestone arrived a day after the execution of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, whose government collapsed as U.S. troops entered Baghdad, and as President Bush ponders a change of strategy in the increasingly unpopular conflict. (Read full story)

President Bush has vowed that Americans killed in the nearly 4-year-old war will not have died in vain, the White House announced Sunday.

"The hardest decision the president ever has to make is to send our men and women into harm's way," White House deputy spokesman Scott Stanzel said in a statement released Sunday.

"The president believes that every life is precious and grieves for each one that is lost. He will ensure their sacrifice was not made in vain."

Commanders in Iraq announced that a U.S. soldier was killed Saturday in Baghdad, bringing the American death toll to 2,999.

More than 22,000 others have been wounded since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003, according to Pentagon figures.

The war has also claimed the lives of about 250 allied troops, more than half of them British.

Estimates of Iraqi dead range from about 50,000 to several hundred thousand.

Bush initially argued the U.S.-led invasion was necessary to strip Hussein's government of stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons and to halt efforts to develop a nuclear bomb -- programs Baghdad had been required to give up after the 1991 Persian Gulf war.

U.S. inspectors later determined Iraq had indeed dismantled its weapons programs during the 1990s, though its leaders had tried to conceal some weapons-related research from the United Nations.

Now, the administration says U.S. troops must remain in Iraq to protect the country's new government from a persistent insurgency and a wave of sectarian violence, which has raged for most of the past year.

Bush has repeatedly called Iraq the "central front" in the war on terrorism, which began after the al Qaeda's terrorist network's 2001 attacks on New York and Washington.

"We will be fighting violent jihadists for peace and security of the civilized world for years to come," Stanzel said. "The brave men and women of the U.S. military are fighting extremists in order to stop them from attacking on our soil again."

The U.S.-led war in Afghanistan, where remnants of al Qaeda and its Taliban allies are still battling U.S. and NATO troops five years after the attacks, has claimed 353 American and 156 allied lives.

The independent commission that investigated the 9/11 attacks found no "credible evidence" that Iraq had aided al Qaeda in the attacks, which killed 2,749 people.

But Islamic militants loyal to al Qaeda have joined the insurgency against American troops in Iraq and have launched numerous attacks on Iraqi civilians since the fall of Baghdad.

Observers say improvements in body armor and battlefield medicine have helped limit the death toll.

The 1950-53 Korean War left more than 36,000 Americans dead and more than 100,000 wounded, while the Vietnam War claimed 58,000 American lives and left 153,000 wounded between 1964 and 1973.

The war in Iraq has now lasted longer than U.S. involvement in World War II, which claimed more than 405,000 lives as the United States and its allies battled Germany, Japan and Italy.



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http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/12/31/iraq.deathtoll/index.html

U.S. military: Iraqi lawmaker is U.S. Embassy bomber




BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- A man sentenced to death in Kuwait for the 1983 bombings of the U.S. and French embassies now sits in Iraq's parliament as a member of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's ruling coalition, according to U.S. military intelligence.

Jamal Jafaar Mohammed's seat in parliament gives him immunity from prosecution, but Washington now says he supports Shiite insurgents and acts as an Iranian agent in Iraq.

Repeated efforts to reach Jamal Jafaar Mohammed for comment through the parliament, through the ruling Shiite Muslim coalition and the Badr Organization -- the Iranian-backed paramilitary organization he once led -- have been unsuccessful.

A Kuwaiti court sentenced Jamal Jafaar Mohammed to death in 1984 in the car bombings of the U.S. and French embassies the previous December, which killed five people and wounded 86.

He had fled the country by then, but Western intelligence agencies also accuse him of involvement in the hijacking of a Kuwaiti airliner in 1984 and the attempted assassination of a Kuwaiti prince.

Jamal Jafaar Mohammed won a seat in Iraq's Council of Representatives in the U.S.-backed elections of December 2005. He represents Babil province, south of Baghdad, in the parliament.

But U.S. military intelligence in Iraq has approached al-Maliki's government with the allegations against Jamal Jafaar Mohammed, whom it says assists Iranian special forces in Iraq as "a conduit for weapons and political influence."

A U.S. Embassy spokesman said officials are actively pursuing Jamal Jafaar Mohammed's case with their Iraqi counterparts. Al-Maliki has urged American intelligence officials to share their information with Iraqi lawmakers, who could strip Jamal Jafaar Mohammed of his parliamentary immunity.

"We don't want parliament to be a shelter for outlaws and wanted people," al-Maliki told CNN. "This is the government's view, but the parliament is responsible. I don't think parliament will accept having people like (him) or others currently in the parliament."

Al-Maliki's political party, Dawa, claimed responsibility for the Kuwait bombings at the time but now disavows them. The Iranian-backed Shiite Muslim party was forced into exile under former dictator Saddam Hussein, who was executed in December.

The prime minister says the situation is embarrassing -- not only to his government but to a U.S. administration that holds up Iraq's government as a democratic model for the region.

Top U.S. officials, including President Bush, have accused Iran of meddling in Iraq by fomenting sectarian violence and providing arms to illegal militias. Bush has authorized U.S. troops to use deadly force against Iranian agents in Iraq to defend American or allied forces, and the administration's increasingly tough warnings to Tehran have raised concerns that the 4-year-old Iraq war could spread.

Al-Maliki told CNN last week that the United States and Iran should stop using his country as a proxy battleground, accusing Iran of targeting U.S. troops in Iraq but saying he doesn't want U.S. forces to use Iraq as a base to attack Iraq's neighbors.



Find this article at:
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/02/05/iraq.lawmaker/index.html