War With Iran
I thought us Crusaders were the hated occupier, the common enemy. Al Qaeda, on the outs with Sunnis in Iraq and eager to change the subject, declares war on Iran. Moqtada al-Sadr, on the outs with Shiites in Iraq, runs there. Fascinating topic, but first, something about Iran’s great concern over the “psychological abuse” of detainees. No, silly, not the hundreds of foreign nationals Iran and its proxies have illegally seized, publicly humiliated, beaten, tortured, and/or murdered:
AP:
Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman said yesterday that five Iranian agents seized by the U.S. military in Iraq have complained about “psychological pressures” in detention.
Mohammad Ali Hosseini’s comments come a day after Iranian diplomats met with the detained Iranians in Iraq for the first time.
“The five (detainees) during the meeting were complaining about the Americans regularly breaking promises for their release,” Hosseini said. “This was one of the psychological pressures that they complained about.”
He did not provide other examples of psychological pressure. The United States has not publicly promised to release the five Iranians, detained Jan. 11 in Irbil.
Talk about whiners! The U.S. hasn’t even paraded these guys, released any humiliating detainee vid, or rounded up “students” to burn effigies outside the Iranian embassy in Baghdad, let alone threatened espionage trials, penalty hanging. You think Iran sounds ridiculous with its lame complaints about “psychological abuse,” check this out. Kamangir reports Iran’s capture of 14 U.S. spy squirrels. Same link will fill you in on the 12th Imam’s use of UFOs in a diabolical … sorry, bad choice of words … plot to subvert infidel government.
OK, back to the business at hand. Not how Iran has tried to use Iraq’s factions against us in Iraq. How Iraq’s factions are using Iran against each other.
Roggio on Moqtada’s bolt back to Iran:
Sadr’s flight from Iraq and return to Iran comes as Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki issued an unusually strong statement calling for Sadr’s Mahdi Army to disarm, and Iraqi security forces continue to battle his Mahdi Army in southern Iraq.
“We have heard statements from officials in the Sadr movement that they are against using arms and that they condemn those who hold weapons,” a statement issued from the prime minister said, AFP reported. “This puts us in front of a fact we must face courageously: If those are Sadrists, then Sadrist leaders disavow clearly those who carry guns … Therefore, these gunmen are infiltrated Saddamist and Baathist gangs and robbers using this movement as a front,” Maliki said.
Well, I’d suggest they’re more likely Iranian stooges using the Iranian proxy as a front, but whatever, it sound like someone is beginning to get serious about dealing with Shiite militias. Or Saddamist holdouts, as he prefers.
Sadr first left for Iran in January shortly after the announcement of the Baghdad Security plan, and returned to Iraq on May 25, over four months later. Since his return, Sadr has attempted to position himself as a moderate, nationalist leader, but with little success. He has flirted with the Anbar Awakening movement, and negotiated with Sunni political parties. His Sadrist bloc withdrew from Prime Minister Maliki’s government, and abandoned its six cabinet level positions. The Sadrist bloc’s 30 members have also boycotted parliament.
Sadr held two rallies, both of which had poor showings, and had to cancel a July 5 march to Samarra to protest the attack on the Shia holy site of the al Askaria mosque. Sadr’s spokesman claimed the Iraqi government wouldn’t provide security, but based on the past poor showing of his demonstrations, there are questions that Sadr may have harmed his image with another poor showing.
AP on al-Baghdadi’s announcement of hostilities with Iran:
The leader of an al-Qaida umbrella group in Iraq warned Iran in a new audiotape released Sunday to stop supporting Shiites in Iraq, giving leaders in the neighboring country two months to severe ties or they would face a “severe war.”
Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, who leads the Islamic State in Iraq, said his Sunni fighters have been preparing for four years to wage a battle against Shiite-dominated Iran.
“We are giving the Persians, and especially the rulers of Iran, a two month period to end all kinds of support for the Iraqi Shiite government and to stop direct and indirect intervention … otherwise a severe war is waiting for you,” he said in the 50-minute audiotape. The tape, which could not be independently verified, was posted on a Web site commonly used by insurgent groups.
Iran gets two whole months. That sounds like al-Qaeda in Iraq isn’t in much of a position to follow through, and expects everyone to have forgotten by the time September rolls around. The article mentions the Iraqi government’s ties with Iran, and the U.S. accusations that Iran has been arming Shiite militias. It doesn’t mention U.S. accusations that Iran has also armed Sunni terrorists.
The al-Qaeda threat of war vs. Iran renders this Fars report somewhat ironic:
Addressing a meeting here on Sunday themed “Revival of Revolutionary Islam in Mesopotamia; Iraq Today, Challenges and Prospects”, Hossein Ahmadi, secretary of the meeting, underlined that establishment of stability and security in Iraq serves the interests of the Islamic Republic of Iran as well.
He further noted resistance of the Iraqi nation against colonialist states, and said that leadership of religious authorities and clerics has played a significant role in Iraq’s continued resistance against enemies.
No wonder Iran is so eager to restart talks with the Great Satan.
Meanwhile, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s analysis of Sunni insurgent media reports deep divisions that can be exploited by counterinsurgency forces, as well as growing anti-Shiite hate speech. Which a lot like a reaction to the fact that Sunnis are increasingly aligning themselves with the Shiite-dominated Iraqi government, a demonstrable threat to Sunni extremists.
More on why al-Qaeda is trying to change the subject from Michael Yon in Baquba, where he reports that the major fighting appears to be over. After a brief flurry of relatively decent reporting, the major news organizations certainly seem to have lost interest. Too bad. Yon suggests there’s an important story there:
The big news on the streets today is that the people of Baqubah are generally ecstatic, although many hold in reserve a serious concern that we will abandon them again. For many Iraqis, we have morphed from being invaders to occupiers to members of a tribe. I call it the “al Ameriki tribe,” or “tribe America.”
I’ve seen this kind of progression in Mosul, out in Anbar and other places, and when I ask our military leaders if they have sensed any shift, many have said, yes, they too sense that Iraqis view us differently. In the context of sectarian and tribal strife, we are the tribe that people can—more or less and with giant caveats—rely on.
Most Iraqis I talk with acknowledge that if it was ever about the oil, it’s not now. Not mostly anyway. It clearly would have been cheaper just to buy the oil or invade somewhere easier that has more. Similarly, most Iraqis seem now to realize that we really don’t want to stay here, and that many of us can’t wait to get back home.
… on 05 July, or D + 16, after the meeting, Iraqi leaders including the Deputy Governor of Diyala, and also Abdul Jabar, one of the Provincial chair holders, headed to some of the most dangerous areas in Baqubah on what Americans would call “a meet and greet.” At first the people seemed hesitant, but when they saw Iraqi leaders—along with members of their own press—asking citizens what they needed, each place we stopped grew into a festival of smiles.
The people were jubilant …
On D +1 and for those first few days of Operation Arrowhead Ripper, the Iraqi leaders seemed mostly inert. But now on D+16, only about two weeks later, they are out politicking, showing their faces in public, letting the people know they are in charge. And, unlike the tired cliché of a politician in a parade, they truly have been working behind the scenes. I know because I sit in on the meetings, and listen to the progress reports as items on the lists get checked off. I hear the whining as each section of Baqubah seems to think they are the forgotten ones. “Why the Sunni getting help first?” they ask. But then in another neighborhood, “Why the Shia getting help first?” But I watch the sausage-making.
The whole thing here.
Topics: Iran, Iraq, al qaeda, military
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 7:54 am on Monday, July 9, 2007
12 Responses to “War With Iran”
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July 9th, 2007 at 9:09 am
Rove you magnificent bastard….Getting the Sunni infidels fighting against the Shia infidels and vice versa.
What you say, they have been doing the above for CENTURIES? Well let us stand back and watch, (after fostering, inciting and generally making sure it comes to fruition) should be great fun, for the Great Satan, no?
July 9th, 2007 at 9:48 am
Spy squirrels, hmm? Well, I guess we now know what this was all about now. Field training.
As for the UFOs, can’t say. It’s possible somebody jacked some surplus from Wright-Pat’s Hangar 18 and sold it to the Iranians. If so, the Imam’s probably out of luck, as that stuff’s obsolete.
July 9th, 2007 at 12:37 pm
“Since his return, Sadr has attempted to position himself as a moderate, nationalist leader, but with little success. ”
Whenever al Sadr takes on the moderate “I’m cooperating” persona, it seems to me a situation of pure expediency. He’s not too bright, but never no mind, he has fanatical support of some of Iraq’s worst brain dead. He seems to have Iranian puppetmasters, who will use him as long as he’s useful.
Moqtada is a moderate like Iran & Arachnidjihad (aka Maynard) aren’t working hard towards a nuclear weapon.
July 9th, 2007 at 2:00 pm
“He’s not too bright, but never no mind, he has fanatical support of some of Iraq’s worst brain dead.”
A winning political strategy in more places than Iraq?
Does he cut brush, too?
July 9th, 2007 at 2:20 pm
Damn it Rebecca…I knew there was some spooky stuff @ WP. You and wronwright (wonders where wron got the last part of his nic)
July 9th, 2007 at 2:24 pm
Moron
Imbecile
Idiot
Invertebrate
Amoeba
Pond Scum
July 9th, 2007 at 2:26 pm
Oh damn
Alphie should have been on the bottom of the above..DAMN! Have to start making two columns.
July 9th, 2007 at 2:33 pm
Now, now, El Cid.
Don’t get mad just because al Sadr is using Bush’s shtick.
Death to the heathens had been in use long before Bush and al Sadr came along.
July 10th, 2007 at 4:17 am
Cid, you forgot “stupid.” Just plain stupid. Nothing for that, so I hear. Ignorance can be cured, but stupid . . .? Poor thing.
July 10th, 2007 at 5:44 am
salty
Yep what ‘they’ say is ignorance can be overcome by teaching, but stupidty is straight to the bone.
Just for you, salty…
Moron
Imbecile
Idiot
Stupid
Invertebrate
Amoeba
Pond Scum
Alphie
Did i place that to high?
July 10th, 2007 at 5:56 am
OH! “pond scum” is one that was suggested from another Blog. I cannot take credit for it.
Keep those cards, suggestions and letters coming folks…;).
July 11th, 2007 at 1:00 am
So Alphie, have you a link to a quote of Bush saying “Death to the heathens” or something similar? No you don’t , because Bush never said it. Bush, in fact, is just the opposite. He, and the dreaded neocons, are just about the only people in the world who believe that Muslims, especially Arabs, are fully human adults. With the exception of a few people like Tony Blair and Natan Sharansky everybody else thinks they are a bunch of ragheaded wogs who are incapable of living under halfway decent, consensual government. They believe the Arabs need the strong whip hand of a bloodthirsty, kleptocratic tyrant like Saddam or they will just make a pig’s breakfast of things, and become pains in the ass to themselves and everybody else. And of course the k;leptocratic tyrant will cut swet deals with the elites of the countries that act on those beliefs, like Chirac, de Villepin, Putin, the crooks at the UN involved in the Oil-for-Fraud program, and the Chicom leaders.
So Bush and theneocons are the opposite of the slanderous picture of them presented by people like you Alphie, and you and the slanderers are the ones who would consider the Arabs less than fully human heathens.