M as in Mindboggler
 

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Nearly all of the [insurgency] attacks now in Iraq are the work of foreign jihadists and foreign terrorists.

[/ QUOTE ] This is so wrong I cannot even begin to respond.

If your purpose is to boggle minds, you are succeeding.

Bringing Cyrus Up To Date
 

Cyrus, obviously you are not completely up-to-date, so I'll fill you in: very recently the diehard Sunni remnants have encouraged Iraqis to vote and even protected them while voting. Meanwhile, Saudi terrorists continue to blow themselves up in Iraq; and in fact, the Saudi element now comprises the largest contingent of suicide bombers in Iraq. Attacks by Baathist remnants are now (very recently, that is) less frequent than attacks by foreign fighters.

To assist you in getting up to speed, Cyrus (after all, it is Christmastime), I've cut-and-pasted an excerpt for your reading pleasure:


(excerpt)December 19, 2005, 8:08 a.m.
"The Defeaticrats
Of hearts and minds, at home and in Iraq.

By Mark Steyn

Hands up, everyone who thinks Iraq’s a quagmire.

Not the Iraqi people: According to the latest polls, 70 percent think “life is good,” and 69 percent are optimistic that things will get even better in the year ahead. For purposes of comparison, they took a similar poll in Europe a while back: In France, 29 percent said they were optimistic about the future; in Germany, 15 percent. Sixty-three percent of Iraqis say they feel “very safe” in their own neighborhoods, which is more than the residents of Clichy-sous-Bois can say.

Well, okay, those cheerful Iraqis are probably Shiites and Kurds and whatnot. How about the Sunnis? For a small minority group that held a disproportionate and repressive grip on power for decades, they’ve been getting a more solicitous press from Western “liberals” than the white Rhodesians or South Africa’s National party ever got. But it turns out, after their strategically disastrous decision to stay home in last January’s vote, the Sunnis are participating in Iraq’s democratic process in ever greater numbers.

Oh, okay, so the Shiites and Kurds and Sunnis are feeling chipper, but in the broader Middle East the disastrous neocon invasion has inflamed moderate Arab opinion against America. Well, it’s true the explosive Arab street finally exploded the other day — with 200,000 Jordanians protesting in Amman, waving angry banners and yelling, “Burn in hell, Rumsfeld,” and, “You are a coward, Bush.” Whoops, my mistake: They were yelling, “Burn in hell, Zarqawi,” and, “You are a coward, Zarqawi.” If you want to hear someone yelling, “You are a coward, Bush,” you’ve got to go to Cindy Sheehan’s stakeout. And, in fairness to the network news divisions, it may be because so many of their camera crews have taken up permanent residence at the otherwise underpopulated Camp Cindy that they were unable to cover what was the largest demonstration against terrorism ever seen on the streets of the Middle East.

Oh, well. So the Shiites and Kurds and Sunni Iraqis and the Arab street are all on board, but come on, what about the insurgents? Everybody knows they’re winning . . . but, er, apparently they don’t. The Baathist diehard insurgents have split from the foreign al-Qaeda insurgents. While the latter denounced the Iraqi election as “a Satanic project,” the Saddamite remnants urged Sunnis to participate and said they’d protect polling stations from attacks by the foreign terrorists so that citizens could vote for their approved candidates (the leftover bits of Uday and Qusay, now running on the Psychotic Dictatorship Nostalgia Party ticket). This division between the foreign nutcakes and the domestic nutcakes is the biggest strategic split over the insurgency since Joe Lieberman respectfully distanced himself from Nancy Pelosi. . ."(end excerpt)

http://www.nationalreview.com/issue/...0512190808.asp

Wishful thinking, again
 

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Obviously you are not completely up-to-date. To assist you in getting up to speed (after all, it is Christmastime), I've cut-and-pasted an excerpt for your reading pleasure:
[Mark Steyn op-ed piece quoted]

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So you invoke a Mark Steyn editorial as evidence for your absurd claim that "nearly all of the [insurgency] attacks now in Iraq are the work of foreign jihadists and foreign terrorists".

What can I say.

Here is the news, straight up :


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CNN, December 23, 2005
Eight Iraqi soldiers were killed and 19 wounded Friday when gunmen attacked a checkpoint north of Baquba, on al-Adhaim highway.
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In addition, three unidentified bodies were found about 9 a.m. Friday in the al-Sina'ai neighborhood. The three had been shot to death.
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In al-Khalis town, about 25 kilometers north of Baquba, another body was found about 11 a.m. That person, who remained unidentified, had also been shot to death, the official said.
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On Thursday, gunmen killed four police commandos and wounded six others at an Iraqi police checkpoint in southern Baghdad.
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About an hour later, gunmen kidnapped three Iraqi women in southwestern Baghdad. The women, who work in the Green Zone, were abducted when the gunmen stopped their vehicle.


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Goddamn Saudis are everywhere. [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]

Re: Wishful thinking, again
 

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So you invoke a Mark Steyn editorial as evidence for your absurd claim that "nearly all of the [insurgency] attacks now in Iraq are the work of foreign jihadists and foreign terrorists".

What can I say.

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There seems to be a never-ending cadre of posters on this forum who delight in posting editorials as evidence for what they're arguing. I don't think I'll ever understand it. I'm not sure if it's just some futile attempt to give weight to their argument, borne out of laziness to check actual sources - or if they're just blissfully un-aware of what the hell an editorial is, and why it's not proof of anything.

Anyway, here comes the MMMMMM "Waaaahhhh!!! I said nearly all attacks! Stop misquoting me!!!!! This is a vicious attack on me that grossly distorts what I said!!!!!!!!!"

From the horses mouth
 

The fact is that the baathists and nationalists called a truce for the duration of the elections. They are using bullets and ballots (that is a quote from some report I read). However, I have linked in a couple of links for your perusal.

Arabic news

Here is an extract as translated by Juan Cole (www.juancole.com).



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Al-Hayat says that the "secular" guerrillas say that they had declared a 3-day truce so that Sunni Arabs could put representatives in parliament, but that they would now return to attacking US and coalition troops. It is suggestive that the two Sunni politicians doing best in this round are Adnan Dulaimi and Salih Mutlak, who may well be the Gerry Adams of Iraq.

It quotes Abu Maysar (age 52), a former member of the Baath Party and a militia leader in Fallujah as saying, "We will continue our armed struggle as long as the Occupation and the agents it brought with it continue in power." The secular guerrillas adopted a deliberate policy of encouraging a Sunni vote, and they pledged to protect the voters from reprisals by the Muslim extremists who opposed the electoral process. Abu Maysar maintained that the current Iraqi government is determined to wipe out the former Baath Party members. He said that if they just tried to play parliamentary politics, they would be like lambs to slaughter.

A local leader in the Army of Muhammad (made up of former Baath intelligence operatives) said, "This does not mean we are giving up our jihad. We consider that we will be, in the coming days, committing violence against the Americans and their supporters in the Iraqi army."




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Here is another report quoting the same arabic source.

Asia Times

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Moreover, former members of the Ba'ath Party and other militia leaders have lost no time asserting that despite the Sunni participation in the elections, their armed resistance to the American military occupation would be resumed. (Since the elections, 10 Iraqis, including five police officers and an American, have been killed.)

Al-Hayat quoted a Ba'ath communique condemning the elections as an American plot to divide Iraq along ethnic and religious lines and vowing that resistance would not end until US troops left Iraqi soil. So much for the delicate distinction that American spokesmen were making between "Ba'athists" and "Saddamists"

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Like I said before, you may wish to reassess your reading list, moving form propaganda to news and from opinion to analysis.

You are free to find your own Arabic transaltions of the referred to link as well.

Edit: Oops, I meant to reply to 6M's "post"

Re: Wishful thinking, again
 

Wrong again, Cyrus [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] -- that editorial was not invoked as supporting evidence; rather, it was just to help to bring you up to speed! The Iraqi people apparently have a much more positive view of the situation than you do.

Re: Bringing Cyrus Up To Date
 

"69 percent are optimistic that things will get even better in the year ahead. For purposes of comparison, they took a similar poll in Europe a while back: In France, 29 percent said they were optimistic about the future; in Germany, 15 percent."

I'm enjoying the debate, but just thought I'd stick my 2 cents in to point out that this is natural. If there were suicide bombers blowing people up every day in France or Germany, there'd probably be a higher percentage of people there who felt things would be not as bad next year. And if they weren't doing it presently in Iraq, there'd probably be a higher percentage of people who would not have a reason for feeling things would be better next year.

More on point, does anyone have any evidence about what percentage of the insurgents are outside agitators and what percentage are domestic? One of Murtha's points was that he believed the president is confusing the insurgency with terrorism. Is he correct?

Re: Bringing Cyrus Up To Date
 

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More on point, does anyone have any evidence about what percentage of the insurgents are outside agitators and what percentage are domestic?

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The much higher percentage was/is (at least until very recently) domestic insurgents. HOWEVER, most *[/i]very recent[/i]* attacks have been committed by foreign terrorists. This is the point I was trying to make to Cyrus.

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One of Murtha's points was that he believed the president is confusing the insurgency with terrorism. Is he correct?

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I think he has a point but it is a bit of an oversimplification. And the more recent developments: of former Saddam remnants voting, and even protecting other Iraqs who voted, is a very sharp development, which is possibly indicative of a pivotal tide shift.

Cyrus vanquished
 

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HOWEVER, most *very recent* attacks have been committed by foreign terrorists. This is the point I was trying to make to Cyrus.

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Yep. During the 3 day truce declared by the insurgents/baathists/nationalists for the voting perion, indeed any attacks were likely not their work. They had declared a temporary truce. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

However, that has ended.

So dear, dear, Cyrus remember -- exactitude in analysis and writing is very important. For three days out of the last couple of years the foreign jihadists were doing almost all the bombings.

Re: This board makes me laugh (a reality check)
 

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Over 80% of people like me agree that he’s doing a pretty good job based on the military vote in the last election. I don’t think he’s Abe Lincoln but he isn’t the devil either. Do you think 80% of the people like me are just too stupid to know better, or do we have an informed opinion?

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Anyone else spot the circular reasoning here?