Dirty Wars in Baghdad
We know Iraq has been the scene of several wars in recent years. But it seems increasingly clear that it has been a set of dirty wars.
Al-Hayat reports in Arabic that Ali al-Lami, an Iraqi politician, protege of Ahmad Chalabi,and member of the Debaathification Committee,is being charged by a high unnamed American official with providing information on Iraqis to the "special groups" (Iranian-run cells within Iraqi Shiite militias like the Mahdi Army), which was useful to them in assassinating these individuals.
Now that is "debaathification" with extreme prejudice!
The official said al-Lami made regular trips to Iran, Lebanon and Russia (?!) in support of the aims of Iranian intelligence.
So what is being alleged is essentially that the United States (Rumsfeld & Paul Bremer) installed on the Debaathification Commission a secret agent of Iran who was running Iran-backed death squads based on the information to which he became privy by virtue of being on the commission! The same article carries allegations by Ahmad Chalabi that the car used in the attempted assassination against him last week came from an Iraqi government ministry.
This isn't a government,it is a mafia movie: The Godfather IV!
So you've been having Iran-backed assassination teams running all over the place killing Sunnis and helping ethnically cleanse them so Iran can nail down Baghad as a Shiite city, extending the region of Shiite dominance in Iraq west and north. And they have been working out of government ministries and agencies!
Of course we knew about the Sunni Arab death squads, which the US calls "al-Qaeda" if they are anti-American and "Sons of Iraq" if they take our money.
Now for yet another set of death squads. It is increasingly clear from press reporting, and from Bob Woodward's new book, that the Surge was not just 30,000 extra troops building blast walls.
The Surge was a dirty war. It was a vast effort at identifying, finding and assassinating the leaders of the Sunni Arab resistance.
Robert Parry writes:
' A third factor, which Woodward argued may have been the most significant, was the use of new highly classified U.S. intelligence tactics that allowed for rapid targeting and killing of insurgent leaders. Woodward agreed to withhold details of these secret techniques from his book so as not to undercut their continuing success.'
That is, US officers in Baghdad were playing Col Mathieu in a rerun of the Battle of Algiers, tracking down and killing the members of the Sunni resistance cells with ever increasing efficiency.
Crowing about the success of Surge wouldn't look so pretty if you were actually celebrating an assassination campaign.
Or, since the originally US-appointed Ali al-Lami was helping the Iranians to kill Sunni guerrillas, as well, we should say assassination campaigns in the plural.
One caveat: The French won the Battle of Algiers in the capital of their colony, 1954-1960. By 1962 they had nevertheless been forced out of Algeria anyway, by nationalist fighters outside Algiers. I am not saying the same thing will necessarily happen in a pacified Iraq. But it could.
McClatchy reports political violence in Iraq on Monday:
' Baghdad
Eleven civilians were injured by a roadside bomb in al Shabaka intersection in Palestine Street in east Baghdad around 7:00 a.m.
Around 7:45 a.m. Gunmen In New Baghdad neighborhood in east Baghdad opened fire targeting a vehicle for the ministry of displaced people migrants injuring four employees (3 females employees and the driver of the vehicle).
The guards of the minister of displaced people and migrants opened fire randomly in al Muthanna airport Street in downtown Baghdad killing a woman and inuring six civilians.
A civilian was killed and two people (a civilian and a policeman) were injured by an IED that targeted a police vehicle in al Wathiq intersection in Karrada neighborhood in downtown Baghdad around 8:30 a.m.
Two civilians were injured by an adhesive bomb that was attached to a vehicle of the emergency battalion in Palestine Street around 2:00 p.m.
Gunmen threw a grenade towards a sedan car in Qahtan intersection in west Baghdad injuring two civilians who were in the car.
Police found one unidentified body in Sadr city.
Nineveh
On Sunday evening; a parked car bomb exploded in Qaiyara area south of Mosul targeting the commander of Hammam al Aleel training camp Colonel Yaseen Majeed. Majeed was injured with another two companions.
Two policemen were injured by an IED in Dorat al Yarmouk neighborhood in Mosul city on Sunday evening.
Gunmen opened fire upon the house of the deputy of Mosul governor Khisro Koran (Kurdish politician from the PDK Party) in al Faisaliyah neighborhood in east Mosul city. No casualties were reported.
A member of Rabi’a Sahwa council in of west of Mosul was injured by an adhesive bomb that was attached to his car on Sunday evening.
Gunmen killed a traffic police near his house in al Hadba’a neighborhood in west Mosul on Monday morning
A policeman was killed and four civilians were injured by a parked car bomb that targeted a police patrol in Bab Sinjar area west of Mosul city around 12:00 p.m. ten cars were damaged by the explosion.
Policemen opened fire upon a suicide car bomber who tried to attack a police check point in Um al Rabiain area west of Mosul city around 1:00 p.m.
Diyala
Gunmen attacked the house of Raad Rasheed; the Sahwa leader in Shirween area north of Baquba on Monday morning. The gunmen kidnapped Rasheed. While the patrols from the Iraqi army were chasing the kidnappers, a roadside bomb exploded. Three Iraqi soldiers were injured.
A civilian was killed by US army when he came from a bystreet driving his car towards US forces in downtown Baquba around 11:30. US military confirmed the incident.
Salahuddin
Two people were killed and four others were injured when a suicide car bomber attacked a police checkpoint in Biji city north of Tikrit city around 4:30 p.m.
Basra
A civilian was injured by a roadside bomb that targeted a convoy of the MNF in Baghdad Street in west Basra around 9:00 p.m.'
Labels: Iraq
posted by Juan Cole @ 9/09/2008 12:57:00 AM
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13 Comments:
By 1962 they had nevertheless been forced out of Algeria anyway, by nationalist fighters outside Algiers. I am not saying the same thing will necessarily happen in a pacified Iraq.
I had thought you realised that we are quite close to that anyway. At least the French had the sense to fight only one war at a time. The US has two hot wars, a third cold, and is threatening a fourth.
Anyway what is this about "pacified"? Not your normal language about Iraq.
One may be permitted to doubt the efficacity of the so-called secret intelligence techniques, if they had anything like the success of what Woodward was allowed to reveal - that is, that Maliki has been bugged. That was a complete failure, as I said here Saturday, judged by the results: the failure to predict that Maliki would refuse to sign the SOFA. A major failure of intelligence, if ever there was one.
Of course we knew about the Sunni Arab death squads, which the US calls "al-Qaeda" if they are anti-American and "Sons of Iraq" if they take our money.
The Surge was a dirty war. It was a vast effort at identifying, finding and assassinating the leaders of the Sunni Arab resistance.
One caveat: The French won the Battle of Algiers in the capital of their colony, 1954-1960. By 1962 they had nevertheless been forced out of Algeria anyway, by nationalist fighters outside Algiers. I am not saying the same thing will necessarily happen in a pacified Iraq. But it could.
I hope it does. And I believe it will. The Neocons put all of this in motion to begin with. The voice of Robert H Jackson rings out in prophecy over the "US' permanent bases" in Iraq just as it did in epitaph to the Thousand Year Reich.
During the trial at Nuremberg, the chief American prosecutor, Robert H. Jackson, stated:
To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole.
I hope, and I believe, that we will yet see Bush, Cheney, Feith, Powell, Rice, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and the rest in the dock at the Anglo-American War Crimes Tribunal at the Hague, if we cannot manage to hold it in this country ourselves.
Just look at what this creep [excuse my undiplomatic language!] has been up to. Can't someone convince him to take early retirement?
"Aliyev made it clear that he values [good] relations with Washington, but that he is not about to start an argument with Russia," the Kommersant report said, adding that Azerbaijani aides described Cheney as becoming "extremely irritated" by Baku’s decision to adopt a "wait-and-see position."
Compounding Cheney’s displeasure, immediately following the discussions Aliyev reportedly telephoned Russian leader Dmitry Medvedev to inform the Kremlin about the substance of the US energy stance. Mammadyarov later departed for Moscow for further diplomatic discussions.
In a fit of pique, Cheney skipped a reception held in Baku in his honor, according to Azerbaijani sources.
This guy is a danger to the country.
The idea that the US is assassinating leaders they regard as the enemy isn't very surprising. Or, unfortunately, shocking anymore. It seems of a piece with the whole war effort, the general approach of the Bush administration to just about everything, for that matter. One might even say that these targeted assassinations are better than bombs that kill a lot of innocent civilians. Not that the targets are necessarily worse or better than other politicians.
Thank you for clarifying what the Surge really is. I think this is 'too much information' for Americans to process(assasinations, ethnic cleansing, bribery, etc. and NO reconciliation) so repugnant to US 'honor'.
In the words of Robert Gates, it is 'despicable'.
So we will go into the election with the American people left to chant slogans, understanding nothing.
John Pilger wrote that the real death squads in the GZ are saddamist sunni opportunists who joined the US project.
No iraqi is naive as to the influence the baath still have in Iraq. This witch hunt of Al Lami as well as the recent kerfuffle over the red crescent leadership is yet more proof that the baath still have huge influence in Baghdad.
Special groups my arse, as you yourself have said many times Juan, why are there still almost no Iranians in US custody in Iraq, while the arab nations are more than well represented.
Iran is not the worst actor in Iraq, not by a long shot.
I see no reason why you would take the time to post reports on violence against civilians in Iraq. Who cares about them? When we have a new president, we're out of there and if they decide to kill themselves, so be it. Let them be the animals they are.
Oops -- are we on the left supposed to think that way?
Dirty wars, flying to Russia? Impossible right? Just a liberal media myth?
I am reminded of Edwin Wilson.
Juan Cole: "Now for yet another set of death squads. It is increasingly clear from press reporting, and from Bob Woodward's new book, that the Surge was not just 30,000 extra troops building blast walls.
The Surge was a dirty war. It was a vast effort at identifying, finding and assassinating the leaders of the Sunni Arab resistance."
Calls to mind OPERATION PHOENIX, the CIA-run Special Forces operation in South Vietnam to "identify, find, and assassinate the leaders of" the Viet Cong. Same people, same playbook.
This is a query regarding your Salon article linked below:
Regarding fundamentalist anti-abortion positions, you write that they derive from a "literalist religious impulse". Although I am no scholar in the relevant areas, I am unaware of a fundamental-level religious text that speaks to the subject, and would be interested to learn the basis of the fundamentalist stance on this subject.
While it is good to see the issue of US-backed death squads coming to light, it is hardly surprising to anyone who has been paying attention.
Many of Bush's people in Baghdad and Washington have links to the notorious death squads in Nicaragua and Honduras: Otto Reich, Negroponte, etc.
Then there are the US-controlled assets like former PM Iyad Allawi, a CIA asset who (according to an Australian journalists witness) personally shot prisoners dead to teach Iraqi police how to "handle" them.
Personally, I believe the USA organised death squads to promote a civil war as an excuse to remain in Iraq for decades. I mean, if there had not been an explosion of violence after Saddam's removal, would the USA still be there pushing for that ever-elusive oil deal?
Not only did the Surge follow the Anbar Experiment (Iraq terrorist paid $300 per month to cease terror) by 8 months, Bush withheld any initiative to increase troop levels until Shiites had ethnically cleansed Sunnis from north Baghdad. When that occured, Shiites lacked enemies; Sunnis needed US support in order to hold their decreasing positions in the Sunni Triangle, and nearby.
Once there was a relative halt in the reopened 1400 year old civil war, the US was able to use the Shiite majority to turn on Shiite minority groups like the Mahdi Army. Meanwhile, in Sunni areas, much intelligence came in on foreign arabs. Once identified, they were slaughtered.
The Surge had less to do with the decline in violence than other factors, which can be blamed on the US. Still US military blogs are trumpeting a major success. Frankly, the US armed forces is as much a one-party (Republican) entity as was Stalin's Red Army a Communist Party group.
In any case, given a 7 point increase in the McCain vote, without a discussion of issues, American democracy is becoming as much of a joke as the so-called "freedom" lovers of the Georgian puppet. Read how a US ally fixed an election (actual report is on the OSCE website):
http://fe1.ca.news.a1.b.yahoo.com/s/reuters/080909/n_world_reuters/international_georgia_osce_dc
Wasn't there a story a couple years ago about the "El-Salvador" option being used in Iraq?
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