Juan Cole

Ahmadinejad Uses Bush’s Tactics Supreme Jurisprudent Ali Khamenei gloated Saturday that the Iranian public had “humiliated” Bush by electing hard liner Mahmud Ahmadinejad as president. But in fact, the campaigning style of the two men suggests that in some ways they are soul mates. Newly elected Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad won in some part by […]

Mosul Police Station blown Up, many Dead 31 Killed Saturday, Dozens Wounded Mosul: A suicide bomber detonated his payload at the central police station in Mosul on Sunday morning, bringing down part of the wall and killing at least 5 persons, 4 of them officers. At least 7 were wounded. The rubble was still being […]

6 US Military Personnel Killed, 13 Wounded at Fallujah Women Targeted A bomber targeted a Marine convoy near Fallujah coming back from a checkpoint, then guerrillas sprayed machine gun fire. They killed 6 Marines, including 4 women, and wounded 13, 11 of whom were women. The American women were deployed at the checkpoint to pat […]

Student Unions [in Iraq] Call for Withdrawal of Occupation Troops Gilbert Achcar kindly sends along his translation of this newspaper article: ‘ Student Unions [in Iraq] Call for Withdrawal of Occupation Troops Baghdad – Abdel-Wahed Tohmeh – Al-Hayat, June 24, 2005 11 Student Unions approved the call made on al-Jaafari’s Government to set a timetable […]

Does Karl Rove Hate our Liberties and Way of Life? ‘ At a Manhattan fund-raiser Wednesday night, the flamboyant architect of Bush’s two presidential campaigns and now White House deputy chief of staff told members of the Conservative Party of New York State: “Conservatives saw the savagery of 9/11 in the attacks and prepared for […]

Jaafari in Washington Weeping Madman in Sweltering Baghdad Robin Wright and Jim VandeHei of the Washington Post profile the meeting of Ibrahim Jaafari with George W. Bush. As reported here yesterday, on Thursday morning back in Baghdad, four bombings left 17 dead and 70 wounded. (-Al-Sharq al-Awsat). Richard Reeves predicts that the US will be […]

Al-Duri Leads Baath Birth of His Daughter in Mosul Izzat Ibrahim al-Duri [al-Douri] just had a daughter in Mosul, according to al-Hayat. The article says, roughly: Al-Hayat has learned from sources close to Iraq’s armed groups that the former vice president of the Revolutionary Command Council and the present Secretary-General of the dissolved Baath Party, […]

UN and Trying Bush More on my UN Option for Iraq. By the way, someone over at the Kos discussion (scroll down) said that there “was no civil war” when the US withdrew from Vietnam. But mainland southeast Asia from the mid-70s is a pretty stark cautionary tale. Khmer Rouge take-over of Cambodia, genocide (one […]

Stirling Newberry on UN Option And the Great Oil Price Shock of Gulf War IV Stirling Newberry doesn’t think the UN has enough troops for Iraq, either; and he instances the Congo as an example of things going bad. “What’s wrong with staying in: Realistically any change of occupation policy will require a change of […]