Baghdad offensive to begin: U.S. officers-unlike anything this city has seen.

[rodeodance]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070205/ts_nm/iraq_offensive_dc;_ylt=AlvnUfa963Cy5B6eK_FDaYbMWM0F;_ylu=X3oDMTA3b2NibDltBHNlYwM3MTY-

Baghdad offensive to begin: U.S. officers

By Dean Yates Sun Feb 4, 9:02 PM ET

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A U.S.-Iraqi campaign to stabilize Baghdad will begin soon and the offensive against militants will be on a scale never seen during four years of war, American officers said on Sunday.


Briefing a small group of foreign reporters, three American colonels who are senior advisers to the Iraqi army and police in Baghdad said a command center overseeing the crackdown would be activated on Monday.

"The expectation is the plan will be implemented soon thereafter," Colonel Doug Heckman, senior adviser to the 9th Iraqi Army division, said at a U.S. military base in Baghdad.

"It's going to be an operation unlike anything this city has seen. It's a multiple order magnitude of difference, not just a 30 percent, I mean a couple hundred percent," he added, referring to previous offensives that failed to stem bloodshed.

.........

[Breeze54]

1. oh...gheeze....

and a new gung-ho commander.... damn.

[Hissyspit]

2. Fallujah Redux. Algiers Redux... n/t

[coalition_unwilling]

61. Hue 1968 Redux . . . n/t

[Hissyspit]

69. That's the Vietnam one I was trying to remember. Thanks. n/t

[grytpype]

3. The insurgents and militias will just disappear until the raids are over.

We can't win. Not possibly.

[Zhade]

52. We shouldn't, either. We're in the wrong. So, so in the wrong.

Bring the soldiers home. Charge any and all who committed war crimes - and indict/impeach/imprison (in that order) this administration!

[fooj]

4. More war crimes?

:cry:

[kedrys]

5. 'scuse me while i go over here and puke

More meat for the grinder...on both sides. :grr:

[napi21]

6. OH DAMN! Are we back to shock and awe AGAIN? n/t

[babylonsister]

14. No, it's supposed to be on the Q T.

No one will know.

:eyes: Except the ABC broadcast I heard about this tonight.

No one. Will. Know.

[az chela]

21. Well we know now!!!!!!

My best friends son called from the Anbar province 5 days ago and said they were being moved this weekend couldnt say where.Uhhhhhhhhh GUESS

[KoKo]

7. Great! They announce this and whip up more dissent in Iraq...

by shooting off their mouth like Wild West Cowboys or Rambo...sheesh..

[Contrite]

11. Like schoolyard bullies.

Meet me after school and I'm gonna smash your face in . . . intimidation anyone?

[saigon68]

47. Its a lost cause

[Olney Blue]

8. Are we winning yet?

:sarcasm:

[sakabatou]

9. Something smells very wrong

It's like the workers who were protecting Iron Twon in Princess Mononoke and got killed by their "ally's" mines. :tinfoilhat:

[Zhade]

53. Way to use an obscure reference!

:D

(Though I've never seen Mononoke Hime, I got it, sort of.)

[Whoa_Nelly]

10. More blood soon to be spilled

Yeah...a really good plan, Georgie... Just can't tell how it's any different than before.

:cry: :mad:

[zonkers]

12. Before was just a dry run. Now, we really mean it.

[0007]

48. Another O.J. type of offense will show those bastards who's

in charge here, huh?

[Journeyman]

13. Unlike anything they've seen? More than "Shock & Awe". . .

the "greatest offensive in the history of warfare" (or whatever bullshit they peddled back in the days before Mission Accomplished)?

Our military is undoubtedly very effective, very professional, and very determined, but man, the public relations arm sucks.

[coalition_unwilling]

63. Given that almost every utterance out of their mouths is a lie, I suspect

that this one is also. I see this more as akin to Stalingrad, where the German army of von Paulus spent weeks and months clearing the city block by block, only to be encircled by the Soviet army of Marshall Zhukov. Not an exact historical parallel, I'll grant you, but one that I find oddly comforting, even as I know exactly what hell awaits our soldiers, much like the hell that awaited the foot soldiers of von Paulus' army.

[killbotfactory]

15. And when this "surge" fails to stabilize Baghdad, then what?

[rodeodance]

32. Recall that Condi would NOT answer that question. They make it up as

they go along.

[Skink]

16. Is this what happened in Vietnam?

Not that anything happened.

[IndianaGreen]

22. It was called pacification back then

the results will be the same in Iraq as it was in Vietnam.

[Trajan]

17. This is sad .....

'The Pacification Of Baghdad' will one day be a lesson .....

I greatly doubt it will be a happy recollection ...... rarely do pacification efforts end well for innocents ....

[junior college]

18. Urban guerilla warfare is totally psycho

There's like 7 million people in Baghdad. WTF are we doing?

[ninkasi]

19. This means that

terrified Iraqi women and children will have their doors kicked in, and if they have weapons, which most Iraqis do considering the violence there, the men in the family will be taken to prison, and their valuables will be looted. That's what happened before, and it will happen again, and more blood will flow. Bush and Cheney will strut and smirk, and count their swelling bank accounts, and the world loses. It's important, you see, to help them establish a democracy they don't seem to want. :sarcasm:

[az chela]

23. I have never been so ashamed about anything as I am about this

massacre caused by our government

[bdamomma]

36. we once should for something now we are a terrorist state

:cry:

[babylonsister]

27. That's what the US might do; with the civil war raging, who knows what else

will happen?:( And who knows if our troops might inspire more violence?

[Zhade]

54. Prison if they're LUCKY.

:cry:

[IndianaGreen]

20. The US military did this thing in Hue, destroy the city in order to save it

The only thing that will come out of this misguided enterprise will be countless innocent civilians killed, and more recruits for the resistance.

[Amonester]

41. 'n more boys 'n girls "$acrificed" for helliburton&Co'$ bottom line

which is so important for darth cheneyous$elf 'n exxonMOBill&Co'$ have-mores.

NO BLOOD FOR OIL! :cry:

[tridim]

24. Is the Dick wagging the dog?

To cover for his potential perjury in Federal court next week?

Gawd, next week is going to be scary.

[azurnoir]

25. Stabilize Baghdad?

It sounds like military double speak for de-populating the city, who are insurgents well the Shia' or the Sunni of course. I agree with the poster who compared this to Hue, destroying a city to save it.

[Karenina]

28. Bingo. Population reduction.

[maryallen]

34. When NOBODY OCCUPIES a city ...

It's much easier to control.

[Pachamama]

42. And I guess BushCo. thinks that ruling through terror will make democracy blossom too...

:puke:

I feel sick...this is going to take so many lives on both sides - for what? Just more violence and terror?

It's never going to stop....and they (BushCo.) doesn't want it to stop....

[nicknameless]

26. Spending munitions = war profits

And more war crimes.

[ShortnFiery]

57. Why? You don't think those 500 lb bombs are going to blow up themselves, do ya? n/t

[nicknameless]

67. Heh. Don't give the cabal any ideas.

;)

[Eugene]

29. BBC: US urged to accelerate Iraq plan

Last Updated: Monday, 5 February 2007, 11:16 GMT

US urged to accelerate Iraq plan

Iraq's Sunni vice-president has urged Washington to speed up the deployment
of extra US troops to stop what he called "round the clock" killing.

Tariq Hashimi told the BBC that previous security drives had failed because
they had too few combat troops.

-snip-

Mr Hashimi, Iraq's most senior Sunni politician, said if promised troops did
not materialise soon, the situation could deteriorate even further.

He was also scathing about the Iraqi government's own response to the violence,
saying it was slow and unprofessional, while he blamed the increase in attacks
on Iran, arguing that the recent bombings were so large a government had to be
involved.

-snip-

Full article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6330715.stm

[sofa king]

30. Sigh.

[sendero]

31. And what will we get?

We'll get a huge increase in American casualties, a huge increase in Iraqi casualties, and virtually no change in the insurgent activity.

This isn't Pottery Barn, this is the Guggenheim. What has been broken cannot be fixed.

[jakem]

33. What is it going to take-

for the house & senate to do the right thing?!

[Pachamama]

44. Don'tcha know? We "Get" Democracy there and we get to protect ourselves by "fightin them there, so

they don't come here"...

What bullshit....I am so disgusted as I read this news....

Slaughter, Fallujah Redux....Is the US responsible yet for Genocide? It sure feels like we are going in that direction.....

[bdamomma]

35. more dead and more ethic cleansing

we are creating more terrorists than ever before.

[MGKrebs]

37. So did we build a whole bunch of new prisons over there,

or are we not taking prisoners?

[Barrett808]

38. "a couple hundred percent" is not "an order of magnitude"

"a couple hundred percent" == 2x
"order of magnitude" == 10x

So which is it?

[slowry]

43. Wondered the same thing.

Maybe he's a robot, thinking in binary...

[classysassy]

39. More shock and oh my

to liberate the Iraqis,stop the bs and come home you warmongers

[psychopomp]

40. RIP to the hundreds of dead men, women and babies

who have *yet*

to die.

[Javaman]

45. Let me predict the outcome...

more people dead.

[damntexdem]

46. 'Shock and awe' maybe?

Now there's something Baghdad has never seen. ;-)

[yellowcanine]

51. Followed by unrelenting violence. Yes, that will be quite unlike anything seen before

in Baghdad, I am sure. You can't make this shit up.

[ShortnFiery]

56. Dammit! Where's our Representatives?!?

We should VOW to vote for all the in-place Democratic Representatives' CHALLENGERS in their next primaries (with only a handful of exceptions) IF THEY DON'T GET OFF THEIR DEAD ASSES AND STOP THIS SLAUGHTER!!!

STOP THIS SLAUGHTER - ON BOTH SIDES!

What the hell did we vote a Democratic Congress in if they are doing little more than "play nice?" :grr:

[LynnTheDem]

49. Fallujah IV

But as long as George W. bUsh's oil is safe!

[Zhade]

50. Lidice, anyone?

There are going to be so many innocents murdered.

"Non-binding resolution" MY FUCKING ASS. I'm holding EVERYONE who fails to stop this accountable, regardless of party - and that means ME, too.

[ShortnFiery]

55. Great. More kicking in front doors of homes ...

more in this seemingly never ending cycle of death and destruction, complements USA and the Shiite Iraqis. :(

Oh yeah, that will win the Iraqi people's hearts and minds - reminding them of the occupation. :eyes:

[GeorgeGist]

58. Shock and Awe...

Part two?

[progressivebydesign]

59. Then what? What does this achieve?

Do they think a surge of military in one City will change anything, other than make more of our troops a target? I get nervous whenever I hear of these offensives, I think Fallujah where they sealed off the city and killed thousands.

[durtee librul]

60. Any one wanna take bets

on how 'well' our M$M covers this redux?

Someone needs to start asking the tough questions here and I for one, have called my congress people and told them to get off their dead asses and STOP this crap. No-one and I do mean NO-ONE who is in office right now will get my vote if they don't stop. The gravy train is on it's last rails with this bunch of wannabees..

And to all of you out there who sit back and say, "well, it's only been a month, give them a chance," tell that to your grandchildren....if we are lucky enough to survive WWIII that Bushco is determined to start.

[La_Fourmi_Rouge]

62. Baghdad = Algiers on steroids

The French finally left Algeria after widespread revulsion at the tactics of the French Army, including but not limited to TORTURE and MASS MURDER. Does the American Public have the stomach for the fight? I think not! I hope not!

The Battle of Algiers

The entire film is available and should be required viewing for the voting public of the USA.

[coalition_unwilling]

64. Baghdad = Vietnam on crack! n/t

[Jonathan50]

65. This guy doesn't have a clue.

"It's a multiple order magnitude of difference, not just a 30 percent, I mean a couple hundred percent," he added, referring to previous offensives that failed to stem bloodshed."

An order of magnitude means x10.

Multiple order (sic) of magnitude would mean x100 or x1000

Two hundred percent doesn't even approach a single order of magnitude.

[buddysmellgood]

66. I see dead people.

[knight_of_the_star]

68. So it begins

More sacrifices to be laid at the altars of the Gods of Blood and Murder, the real Gods of Bush and Cheney.

[pat_k]

70. Bush's "war against all" is "a blunder of Hitlerian proportion" --Col. Macgregor

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=36309">Bush's Three-Front War Blunder
by Gareth Porter, Inter Press Service, 25-Jan-07

WASHINGTON, Jan 25 (IPS) - George W. Bush's State of the Union address appears to confirm other indications in recent weeks that the president is not merely sending more troops to Iraq to do more of the same, but has adopted a new strategy of fighting all three major Iraqi Arab political-military forces simultaneously.

Bush hinted strongly that he has decided to make Moqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army a major military target of the increased U.S. troop presence in Baghdad, while continuing to wage war against both al Qaeda and its Sunni extremist allies, on one hand, and the non-jihadist Sunni resistance, on the other. . .

One veteran military expert on Iraq, retired Army Colonel Douglas Macgregor, told IPS that Bush's new policy is a "war against all" in Iraq and called it "a blunder of Hitlerian proportions".

Macgregor likened the policy of fighting all three Iraqi anti-occupation forces at once to Adolf Hitler's insistence on continuing a two-front war against the Soviet Union and the Western powers during World War II, which is widely regarded as having ensured the defeat of Nazi Germany.

Macgregor is no stranger to military planning in Iraq. He led combat troops in destroying a brigade of Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard troops in the most significant tank battle of Desert Storm in February 1991 and prepared a proposal for a limited duration attack on Baghdad at the request of a personal representative of then Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld in autumn 2001.

"It is ideology pushing violence to extremes," Macgregor says of the latest turn in Bush's Iraq policy. "They are trying to reverse the damage they have already done to themselves by having built up a Shiite state and army. But it is too late and it is bound to be counterproductive.". . .

The well-informed CNN Baghdad correspondent Michael Ware has just reiterated that warning about taking on the Mahdi Army. On Wolf Blitzer's The Situation Room Jan. 24, he said U.S. troops can no longer crush the Mahdi Army. That army, Ware observed, "is much more than just a force, it's a movement. And it has mobilised the great disenfranchised, impoverished Shia population." The Sadrist "genie is out of the bottle", he warned, and "it can't be put back in". . .

A little over a week before the State of the Union address, New York Times reporter John Burns quoted an unnamed U.S. military official who had been involved in negotiations with the Iraqi government over security operations as saying, "We are implementing a strategy to embolden a government that is actually part of the problem. We are being played like a pawn.". . .

An article by reporter Nancy Trejos in the Washington Post Jan. 13 described the scene as Shiite soldiers belonging to the Iraqi army's 6th Division, which is responsible for security in central and south Baghdad, celebrated the 86th anniversary of the creation of the army. They shouted "Moqtada! Moqtada!" -- the openly anti-U.S. Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr -- in the same breath as the five major historical figures of the Shiite faith. The Iraqi interpreter for the U.S. advisers to the unit remarked, "Sounds like the Mahdi army is in the tent."

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=36309">More. . .

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/print.php?id=138571">Iraq: Who did the US military massacre near Najaf?
by James Cogan, 03-Feb-07

Whether the slaughter outside Najaf was inflicted on a cult, anti-government tribesmen or a combination of both. . . The scale of the massacre is a warning of what is being prepared as US operations are stepped up in Baghdad under Bush's planned "surge". . .

The outcome was a slaughter. Iraqi officials claim that 263 sect members were killed and another 400 taken prisoner—of whom 210 were wounded. . .

. . Major General Hussein Kamal, the Iraqi interior ministry undersecretary for security, told Associated Press: "They started surfacing two years ago as a political movement in southern Iraq and gained followers. In the end they carried arms against the state." The Soldiers of Heaven, the Iraqi government insists, intended to enter Najaf posing as Ashura pilgrims, kill the clerical hierarchy, take control of the Imam Ali mosque and proclaim the Mahdi’s return. The apparent aim was to trigger a wholesale uprising against the US occupation. . .

Abdulimam Jabbar, a representative of the Soldiers of Heaven in Basra, has denied that the sect was involved at all. He told Azzaman: “This is part of a propaganda campaign to discredit our group”. The sect, he declared, was "peaceful and does not believe at all in violence”. This was supported by Reider Visser, the editor of the Iraqi history website http://www.historiae.org, who told Reuters there "was no record of them using violence in the past".

Cockburn has suggested in the Independent that the accusation that the Soldiers of Heaven were involved is an attempt by the Iraqi government to cover up its use of US airpower to slaughter tribal opponents. He reported: “The messianic group led by Ahmad al-Hassani, which was already at odds with the Iraqi authorities in Najaf, was drawn into the fighting because it was based in Zarqa and its presence provided a convenient excuse for what was in effect a massacre. The Hawatim and Khaza’il tribes are opposed to the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) and the Da’wa Party, who both control Najaf and make up the core of the Baghdad government.”

According to sources cited by Dahr Jamail, the tribes have called for the building of a united movement to oppose the sectarian civil war taking place between Sunni and Shiite extremists and to end the control of the government by Shiite fundamentalist parties.

As the controversy developed, the Iraqi government embellished its conspiracy theory yesterday with accusations that Ahmad al-Hassan was in fact a former intelligence operative of Saddam Hussein’s Baath regime. Contradictory claims were made by officials, with some asserting he had links to the Sunni extremists of Al Qaeda, and others declaring he was financed by the Shiite regime in Iran. . .

The illusions that existed a year ago have been dashed. Social conditions have worsened; sectarian tensions have burgeoned into civil war; and the US military is increasing its troop numbers. The resulting alienation and anger is aggravating the numerous currents of opposition that exist toward the US occupation and its puppets in Baghdad.

Whether the slaughter outside Najaf was inflicted on a cult, anti-government tribesmen or a combination of both, it demonstrates that the illegal American presence in Iraq can only be continued by repression and indiscriminate killing in every part of the country. The scale of the massacre is a warning of what is being prepared as US operations are stepped up in Baghdad under Bush’s planned “surge”.