The Blue State

Iraqis are not standing up

As Bush has often said, as Iraqis stand up, we will stand down.  But what happens if Iraqis never stand up?  According to General Petraeus' testimony yesterday, US forces are actually maintaining their increased security role, not diminishing it.  In that regard, little has changed since the surge began.  This morning, the New York Times outlined the lack of growth among Iraq's police forces:

The chart on Iraqi security force capabilities, however, showedrelatively little change over the last year in the number of IraqiArmy, National Police and Special Operating Force battalions that arefighting side by side with the Americans. Approximately the same numberare taking the lead in security operations or are “fully independent.”

So obviously the question of the day is who will take over the security role once the troop surge ends next July?  If Iraqis are not ready, then it will be interesting to see what Bush spins as why the troop surge was a success.

Military Dot Com Update.

From time to time we post a 'Military.comUpdate'. Military.com is a true bipartisan, for the troops, pull no punchessite. If anyone knows of another site similar to this (military based) pleaselet us know in the comments section.

A.F.Weighs Cut in Special-Duty Pay to Thousands:  ARLINGTON, Va. —Air Force leaders are considering cutting special-duty assignment pay forthousands of airmen by $75 per month. Budget constraints are forcing officialsto review the special-duty assignment pay, or SDAP, program and reduce theallowance by one level for airmen working in 35 Air Force Specialty Codes,according to a news release issued Friday. Read on...

My 2 Cents: We have Soldiers, Airmen, Marines and Sailors on welfareand receiving food stamps, I'd like to see Melanie Morgan, Hannity, O'Reilly andthe rest of the FOX crew jump on this one when "supporting thetroops". If they want to make some cuts, how about starting on "TheHill", or stop losingtrack of $9 Billion in Iraq?

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57% of Iraqis back attacks on US troops

Should it matter what the Iraqi people think about our occupation?  Should it matter that a majority of them condone violence against our brave men and women?  Should it matter that President Bush and the neoconservatives want to keep our troops in harm's way regardless of what Iraqis think?

In a new poll conducted by three news agencies, Iraqis voiced their disapproval of the foreign occupation:

57% to 43%, those polled back “attacks on coalitionforces.” This broke down to 93% of Sunnis in favor, 50% of Shia, and 5%of Kurds. In contrast, only 7% of the sample supports attack on Iraqiforces.

Asked separately, 48% said attacks by al-Qaeda in Iraqon U.S. forces were "acceptable" with 51% finding them unacceptable.Yet only 1% backed al-Qaeda attempts to take over any areas. Sosympathy for al-Qaeda was extremely low -- except when it comes tohitting U.S. troops.

The poll was conducted in mid-August by ABC News,Britain's BBC, and Japan's public broadcaster NHK. More than 2,000Iraqis were interviewed.

By 46% to 35% the Iraqis believed that a U.S. pullout would make a civil war LESS, not more, likely.

Here are some of the other findings of the poll:

-- 63% say the U.S. invasion in 2003 was wrong, up from 52% in March

-- 79% say they oppose U.S. and Coalition forces in Iraq, up 1% since March

-- 47% want U.S. troops to “leave now,” up from 35% in March

--72% said the U.S. presence is making security “worse,” up from 69% in March.

-- 75% said they still felt not safe in their neighborhoods, virtually unchanged since March.

Yes, this does matter.  $12 billion in U.S. Treasury money each week goes to save a country that hates us, when people down in New Orleans are still waiting for their government to fulfill a promise.  We have a serious priority problem, and it is sad that we will have to wait more than 400 days for a true change of direction.

So we can be clear about what Petraeus said

According to General David Petraeus, the surge will end in July of 2008 -- not in the spring, as some of the media had previously reported:

Seven US soldiers killed in West Baghdad

Not a mention of this during the hearing or on any news network:

Seven U.S. soldiers were killed and 11 injured in a vehicle accident in western Baghdad on Monday, the U.S. military said.

Still, Petraeus claimed today that security in Baghdad is better since the troop surge began:

Coalition and Iraqi operations have helped reduce ethno-sectarianviolence as well, bringing down the number of ethno-sectarian deathssubstantially in Baghdad and across Iraq since the height of thesectarian violence last December.

Actually, that is not true.  As far as civilians in Baghdad were concerned, the last two months have been bad:

428 Iraqis were murdered in Baghdad in August, their bodies dumped inthe streets. In July, 612 Iraqis were murdered, according to theInterior Ministry.

I don't believe a word of what was said today by Petraeus and Crocker.

Petraeus picks and chooses

The Petraeus-Crocker hearing is coming back from intermission.  I caught most of it.  For the most part, I was unimpressed with some of the questioning on the part of the Democrats.  They could have done a better job of putting their foot down and challenging some of David Petraeus' vague statements.

Crocker and Petraeus cited gains in certain areas, such as Anbar and Northern Iraq, yet left out the fact that the security situation has gone backward in Southern Iraq, West Baghdad and even certain portions of Northern Iraq.

Also, it was either Petraeus or Crocker that bragged about Iraq's electricity coming back up to speed, despite clear evidence that shows otherwise.

I will post clips from the hearing later today.  Feel free to comment and give your take.

The Anbar Anomaly

First of all, the surge had nothing to do with the success in Anbar.  US troops are not even surging there.  They are surging in Baghdad and now Diyala, with between little and no success.  Even so, the Administration thinks they can use the developments in Anbar as an example of a strategy to implement elsewhere.  But as Time's Michael Duffy points out, the political success in Anbar is truly unique, and there was lots of tactical "luck" involved:

It is a little startling that the Sunnis, whom the U.S. tossed frompower in 2003, are being showcased by Washington as its favorite newallies. Bush and Petraeus have trumpeted the fact that Sunni insurgentsin western Iraq who were once allied with al-Qaeda against the U.S.have joined forces with the Americans against the terrorists. These newalliances were in part the result of luck. Al-Qaeda violentlyoverplayed its hand and started randomly killing Sunnis who refused toally themselves with the terrorist organization. And in some places,America won the Sunnis over the old-fashioned way: by paying them. Thequestion is how widely the Anbar model can be applied elsewhere. It iseasy to forget that Anbar is the one part of Iraq that is largely Sunniand thus doesn't suffer from the same kind of civil strife that upendsorder in other parts of the country. And if Anbar was truly secure andready for a handover, Bush might be able to pull out the more than20,000 Marines stationed in the province and send them elsewhere. Inreality, no one thinks that is possible.

Therefore, it would be flawed to take the lessons learned in an all-Sunni era of the country and think you can apply them to Shiite or mixed areas with the same success.

The only universal lesson in Anbar is that political stability causes military stability, not the other way around.

Sacramento School District fires teacher for serving in Iraq

A Reserve officer who followed through on his duty to serve in Iraq was let go by the Sacramento School District once he returned.  Edward O'Gilvie, the teacher, is taking the matter to court:

An officer in the U.S. Army Reserves has sued the Sacramento, Calif.,school district, saying he was denied his old job when he returned fromactive duty.

Edward O'Gilvie found a job in Chicago. But hesays he is making less money than he was as an assistant principal atKennedy High School in Sacramento and had to pay to get a master'sdegree and to move, The Sacramento Bee reported.

Because it's a public school district, I really didn't expect a problem with getting my job back, O'Gilvie said. I was hurt, shocked. It was the last thing I expected when I came back.

O'Gilvie, who was mobilized for two years, filed a lawsuit in court on August 3rd.  The school district refused to comment.

According to the Sacramento Bee, what the school district did was against federal law:

Federal law is clear that soldiers returning from service within fiveyears of leaving a job generally are entitled to get that job back orbe given an equivalent position, said Jerrold Jurin, Californiacoordinator for Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve, a Departmentof Defense organization that promotes cooperation between servicemembers and their employers.

Feel free to email the Sacramento City Unified School District to voice your concerns.

Iraqi forces flee police station in Western Baghdad

Bush has said that as Iraqis stand up, the US will stand down.  But the exact opposite has happened since the troop escalation began.  As US troops have stood up, Iraqis stood down.

This weekend, Iraqi forces disbanded a police station in western Baghdad.  A significant chunk of the Iraqi capital is now in complete anarchy:

Iraqi and U.S. authorities have disbanded an Iraqi police station in a tense west Baghdad neighborhood after it failed to prevent"insurgent and criminal activity" in the area, the U.S. military  announced Saturday, according to AP.

The military said the disbanding of the Khadra police stationoccurred on Wednesday when officers were given their last pay check andtold to report to the central police station for reassignment.

The announcement comes after a string of independentassessments in the United States that point to severe problems withelements of the Iraqi police.

So what is going on in western Baghdad?  According to the September 10th edition of Newsweek, Shiite militias have gained strength this summer and are driving Sunnis out of the Iraqi capital:

Thousands of other Sunnis like Kamal have been cleared out of thewestern half of Baghdad, which they once dominated, in recent months.The surge of U.S. troops—meant in part to halt the sectarian cleansingof the Iraqi capital—has hardly stemmed the problem. The number ofIraqi civilians killed in July was slightly higher than in February,when the surge began. According to the Iraqi Red Crescent, the numberof internally displaced persons (IDPs) has more than doubled to 1.1million since the beginning of the year, nearly 200,000 of those inBaghdad governorate alone.

And this puts us on the road to political reconciliation -- how?

Cartoon: State of the surge

(Click for larger view)

By Andrew Wahl, OffTheWahl.com, The Wenatchee World

GeneralPetraeus’ “State of the Surge” report isn’t due for at least a few moredays, but already politicians are in full spin cycle based on what theythink he’ll say. Meanwhile, U.S. soldiers (to say nothing ofIraqi civilians) continue to be killed and wounded at an alarming rate.This situation was the impetus for this week’s toon, “The Surge MarchesOn …” (color version) [Archive No. 0727b], the third in my series ofSurge-related toons using the silhouette of the iconic toy soldier. Theprevious two can be seen on the OtWP Blog this week. Stop by and let meknow what you think of the series:

Till next week,
Andrew