Iraq Overview
Between cleaning out Fallujah, crushing the takeover attempt in Mosul, and raiding a key mosque in Baghdad today, seems like a good week for the future of Iraq. This article offers several interesting tidbits:
-a number of Muslim clerics have been arrested for inciting terrorism-related violence. This seems a smart move. Get them silent and off the loudspeakers. Make an example for others.
-"Three policemen also were killed Thursday when masked gunmen set up a checkpoint in eastern Mosul and shot them when they displayed identification, Gouran said."
Bizarre. If you came up to a checkpoint manned by masked men, would you show your IDs and attempt to pass? would you if you were a cop?
Were the policemen armed? What are the rules for them to engage bad guys? A strange story, and certainly more here than is reported.
- "U.S. troops sweeping through the city west of Baghdad found what appeared to be a key command center of terror mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, along with a separate workshop where an SUV registered in Texas was being converted into a car bomb and a classroom containing flight plans and instructions on shooting down planes."
-what does registered in Texas mean? Did they actually call the TX DMV? Or were there just a bunch of TX license plates laying around? Why would the insurgents have these? if they were attempting to move pre-made carbombs to the US, it seems easier to move them first, then make them into bombs, then steal some license plates.
posted by Chester at 11/19/2004 04:06:00 PM
2 Comments:
A couple of thoughts...
With regards to the media, could we describe them as "write the story first, ask questions later"
As it relates to the US occupation of Fallujah, there is an intelligence treasure trove there and the raids/detentions of these clerics...are they a coincidence so soon after the Battle of Fallujah?
On an aside will The Marines Hymn add a verse for the Battle of Falluja? Based on what I've read, this battle was a defining and pivitol battle in the history of warfare...
Why an SUV with Texas license plates? What is it that all those special forces dudes hired as "private contractors" drive? What kind of vehicles do active SF dudes drive around in? American SUVs.
I'd be curious as to what kind of license plates are on many of the ones are guys are driving. One way or the other, most of those SUVs originated in the US. There are a LOT of suburbans and blazers there. Even the Japanese vehicles probably were originally purchased in the US before being sent over.
A car bomb that someone would mistakenly let into a secure area could be a real mess. Such a disguise could certainly delay proper response time by several seconds. And in a firefight, that's a long time.
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