Powell: Iraq Will Be Quiet for Jan. Vote/Military Set on Pacifying

[papau]

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/news/news-iraq-tactics.html

U.S. Military Set on Pacifying Iraq Before Elections
By REUTERS Published: September 13, 2004


BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. offensives in rebel-held Iraqi cities in recent weeks are part of a major push to wrest them from insurgents before the end of December to allow local security forces to oversee elections, U.S. commanders said.

The battle plan, drawn up last month, focuses on the major trouble spots -- Tal Afar, Samarra, Falluja, Ramadi and parts of Baghdad -- but is nationwide in scale and has economic as well as military aspects, according to senior military officials.

``The overriding strategy is to gain local security control in all the cities throughout Iraq by the end of December,'' U.S. Air Force Brigadier General Erv Lessel, the deputy director of operations in Iraq, told Reuters in an interview.

``That local control has to do with getting capable Iraqi security forces -- police backed up by Iraqi National Guards -- and competent local authorities in control of the cities so that life can go on, so that reconstruction can continue, so that elections can take place.''<snip>

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-US-Iraq.html

Powell: Iraq Will Be Quiet for Jan. Vote

[leesa]

1. "pacifying"...this sounds like a disaster in the making.

What an idiot Powell is!