U.S. Boosts Its Use of Airstrikes In Iraq

[gateley]

Source: Washington Post

The U.S. military conducted more than five times as many airstrikes in Iraq last year as it did in 2006, targeting al-Qaeda safe houses, insurgent bombmaking facilities and weapons stockpiles in an aggressive strategy aimed at supporting the U.S. troop increase by overwhelming enemies with air power.

Top commanders said that better intelligence-gathering allows them to identify and hit extremist strongholds with bombs and missiles, and they predicted that extensive airstrikes will continue this year as the United States seeks to flush insurgents out of havens in and around Baghdad and to the north in Diyala province.

The U.S.-led coalition dropped 1,447 bombs on Iraq last year, an average of nearly four a day, compared with 229 bombs, or about four each week, in 2006.

"The core reason why we see the increase in strikes is the offensive strategy taken by General Petraeus," said Air Force Col. Gary Crowder, commander of the 609th Combined Air Operations Center in Southwest Asia. Because the United States has sent more troops into areas rife with insurgent activity, he said, "we integrated more airstrikes into those operations."

more

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/16/AR2008011604148.html?wpisrc=newsletter

---

Sigh.

[stillcool]

1. Article from June...

US Doubles Air Attacks in Iraq
By Charles J. Hanley
Associated Press
June 5, 2007
http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issue...
Four years into the war that opened with "shock and awe," U.S. warplanes have again stepped up attacks in Iraq, dropping bombs at more than twice the rate of a year ago. The airpower escalation parallels a nearly four-month-old security crackdown that is bringing 30,000 additional U.S. troops into Baghdad and its surroundings - an urban campaign aimed at restoring order to an area riven with sectarian violence. It also reflects increased availability of planes from U.S. aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf. And it appears to be accompanied by a rise in Iraqi civilian casualties.
In the first 4 1/2 months of 2007, American aircraft dropped 237 bombs and missiles in support of
ground forces in Iraq, already surpassing the 229 expended in all of 2006, according to U.S. Air Force figures obtained by The Associated Press.
"Air operations over Iraq have ratcheted up significantly, in the number of sorties, the number of
hours (in the air)," said Col. Joe Guastella, Air Force operations chief for the region. "It has a lot to do with increased pressure on the enemy by MNC-I" - the Multinational Corps-Iraq - "combined with more carriers."
--------------------------------
Examples of attacks, as reported in the Air Force's daily summary:
-Last Friday, an Air Force F-16 fighter dropped a guided 500-pound bomb near the northern city of Tal Afar that destroyed a vehicle laden with explosives to be used as a bomb.
-The day before, an F-16 dropped a similar bomb on "an inaccessible building being used by insurgents" near Samarra, north of Baghdad, with "good effects."
-Last Wednesday, another F-16 dropped bombs on "an illegal bridge and an insurgent vehicle in Baghdad."

Police and other Iraqi sources sometimes report civilian casualties in such airstrikes that are not
reflected in the official U.S. accounts. Air Force Col. Gary Crowder, deputy director of the regional air operations center, said such casualties "pale in comparison" with civilian casualties from ground combat. "In Iraq, we minimize our deployment of air-delivered weapons in populated areas," he said. Crowder, Guastella and Cox were interviewed outside Iraq at the regional U.S. air headquarters.
--------------------------------------------------------
Air attacks in Iraq are still relatively low compared with the numbers of weapons dropped in
Afghanistan - 929 this year as of May 15.
http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/iraq/occupation/2007/0605bombardment.htm

[wtmusic]

3. Either airstrike casualties pale in comparison to those from ground combat...

or it's hard to see suffering from 20,000 feet.

[coalition_unwilling]

4. Everyone should read the post-Tet chapters of Stanley Karnow's "Vietnam", specifically

with an eye to what happened during Nixon's so-called "Vietnamization" strategy.

To wit, as Nixon withdrew U.S. ground combat forces from Vietnam after January, 2969, the U.S. Air Force and its puppets in the South Vietnam Air Force drastically ramped up bombing raids in South Vietnam. Civilian casualties skyrocketed during these expanded air attacks.

Since there are so many obvious and not-so-obvious parallels between Vietnam and Iraq-nam, I wonder where the GI Resistance movement so common in Vietnam is in Iraq. I have heard anecdotal reports of troop mutinies and "search and avoid" missions in Iraq. But troop morale and unit cohesion still seems quite high compared to same in post-'69 Vietnam.

[Hestia]

6. Yep, you oughta watch "Sir, No Sir" about this very thing - military couldn't

trust the GI's to actually go out on missions - they did airstrikes from Guam. Hellava dvd - netflix has it.

[coalition_unwilling]

11. I've got "Sir, No Sir" on my list. I am currently working with

members of Iraq Veterans Against the War in Los Angeles. They are doing important work in GI counseling right now. So yet another parallel to Vietnam, i.e., VVAW.

[wtmusic]

2. "better intelligence gathering" -- bullshit

More like: "If we rain enough destruction down we're likely to get an insurgent or two". :grr:

[Deny and Shred]

5. Good way to force new contracts - use existing ordinance

Only a year left, keep those munitions factories a-hummin'.

Military Industrial Simplification

[L0oniX]

7. 40,000 pounds of bombs and the surge is working. pfffft !

I guess that will make the military industrial corporations happy.

[tabasco]

8. 1. Keep the troops on-base to reduce casualties.

2. Tell everybody the "surge" is working since the casualties are down.
3. Bomb the shit out of the place instead.

As long as the oil is secure, the Bush cabal doesn't care what happens to Iraqis.

[gratuitous]

9. Home of the Brave my sweet Aunt Fanny

What's brave about dropping bombs from 20,000 feet up on unsuspecting people who can't fight back and can't get away? This is what America means to the rest of the world? Thanks a fucking heap, George W. Bush. Burn in hell, asshole.

[wtmusic]

10. .

:thumbsup:

[Supersedeas]

12. along with the boost in collateral damage

[otohara]

13. I Feel Sick - And Where Are The Pictures

I want proof that we are "flushing out" the bad men and not women and children.