Bloody Sunday

By Capt. Fogg

(Just another day in the life and death of Iraq XXXIII.)

I can't believe the news today
Oh, I can't close my eyes and make it go away
How long...
How long must we sing this song?
How long? How long...

The Army Times lists a flurry of Iraqi violence Sunday:

* A bomb left in a bag struck a small bus carrying people to work in a predominantly Shiite area in Baghdad, killing seven passengers and wounding 15.

* A parked car bomb also exploded outside a restaurant in eastern Baghdad, killing one person and wounding five, according to police.

* A suicide car bomber targeting an Iraqi army patrol killed one woman and wounded five other people in the northern city of Mosul.

It was a big improvement over Saturday.

Saturday saw a Blackhawk helicopter shot down killing 12 Americans and a raid on Provincial Headquarters in Karbala by a group of Insurgents dressed as Americans, that resulted in the deaths of five American soldiers.

The 2nd Brigade of the 82nd Airborne Division, consisting of about 3,200 soldiers are now arriving in the Baghdad area and will, according to the official statement, "assist Iraqi Security Forces to clear, control and retain key areas of the capital city in order to reduce violence and to set the conditions for a transition to full Iraqi control of security in the city".

No suggestion as to how a few more troops will be able to influence the balance of power here, but assist is the key word we need to look at. It contains the assumption that Iraqi Security Forces have the manpower, training and will to have any effect whatever and it suggests that the burden will not be directly on the shoulders of US troops who might, one supposes, be there to show them how to clean their weapons after a hard day's patrol. That's two lies in one word.

Throughout the Vietnam debacle we were told that we were there as advisers and that we were in the process of training the Vietnamese and turning the fight over to them. Call me a cynic, but I think we're being lied to again. It doesn't take a Nostradamus to predict that there will be a series of little schemes used as ploys to demand silence of the public and give hope to the hopeaholics long enough so that the final ignominious collapse of the misbegotten enterprise will occur only after the Texas Tyrant leaves office and can then be blamed on "liberals" by Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, William Kristol, and Fox News.

Broken bottles under children's feet
Bodies strewn across the dead end street
But I wont heed the battle call

(Cross-posted at Human Voices.)