Operation Iraqi Maelstrom
What hath Bush wrought? Conditions in Iraq continue their downward spiral toward utter chaos, yet we hear the same empty rhetoric from Bushco about freedom, progress, and democracy. Face it, folks: American forces have been unable to stabilize Iraq and Iraqi forces are often as much a part of the problem as those labeled "terrorists" and "insurgents." It won't be long before al-Maliki becomes little more than "Mayor of the Green Zone," denying the possibility of civil war even as mortar shells explode around him. In the meantime, how many more Americans and Iraqis will have died for a cause long lost?
It's time to abrogate the "Pottery Barn" principle--we may have broken it, but we can no longer afford to buy it.
OUT
NOW!!!!!
CNN.com - Gunmen kill 14 Pakistani, Indian pilgrims in Iraq - Sep 2, 2006
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Bombings and shootings were reported Saturday across Iraq, a day after a Pentagon report warned that an increase in sectarian violence had dealt a setback to the country's stability.Technorati Tags: Iraq, war, civil war, chaos, Bush, lies, OUT NOW, Pentagon
At least 14 pilgrims were killed when gunmen halted a bus headed to the holy Shiite city of Karbala, forced them to leave the bus and then shot them, an Iraqi Interior Ministry official said Saturday.
The pilgrims killed -- 11 Pakistanis and three Indians -- were traveling on a highway west of Ramadi on Friday, the official said.
In northeastern Baghdad on Saturday, two nearly simultaneous explosions killed two people and wounded 19, an emergency police official said.
After the first bomb exploded in the residential neighborhood of Waziriyah, Iraqi police officers and pedestrians rushed to the scene to help the wounded.
Minutes later, a second bomb detonated in the same area, wounding a number of people -- including two police officers, the official said.
In Baquba, gunmen killed three traffic police officers near a bus station Saturday.
Also in Baquba, about 37 miles (60 km) north of Baghdad, two people were wounded when gunmen opened fire on their car in a drive-by shooting, police said.
North of Baquba in Muqdadiya, gunmen shot and killed two men in center of the city.
Saturday's bloodshed capped a violent week that saw numerous Iraqis killed, including 62 in a wave of Baghdad bombings on Thursday.
The Pentagon's latest quarterly progress report for Iraq notes a 15 percent jump in attacks and a 51 percent increase in Iraqi casualties. It calls the level of violence a "setback" affecting "all other measures of stability, reconstruction and transition."
The congressionally mandated report -- which covers the months of June, July and August -- notes, "Sectarian tensions increased over the past quarter manifested in an increasing number of execution-style killing, kidnappings and attacks on civilians."
The report came only days after Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki told CNN that he does not foresee a civil war in Iraq and said the violence in his country was abating. "In Iraq, we'll never be in civil war," al-Maliki said.
