Iraq Civil War: "I hope they kill each other." No Exit.

[Clara T]

So who blew up the mosque? Is this another example of divide and conquer? So from where do the death squads emanate? Are there historic parallels? Have we seen similar strategic patterns from some of the same actors in other parts of the world at another point in history? Cui bono?



The perfect controlled demolition. Take a good look at the picture above because I will tell you what I see.
I see a damaged dome caused by an explosion set very professionally that the two minarets from the both sides weren’t effected by the explosion.

Not even one single “gold plate” fall down from the minarets while the explosion was so heavy that caused the collapse of the dome.Tell me, Is this work of few terrorists who wants to finish the job as fast as possible?

The one who did this, entered the mosque comfortably carrying explosions, he had all the time to study the construction of the building and find the perfect angles to set the explosions in a way that only the dome will be destroyed.This is a professional, controlled demolition and the bombs set by demolition experts.

<snip>

Was the mosque explosion a continuation in the US and Shiite “dialog” but this time the US uses a “harsher language”?.

http://www.roadstoiraq.com/?p=726

Henry Kissinger summarized the current Iraq strategy best when he offered his remedy for the ongoing conflict between Iraq and Iran in the 1980s. Kissinger said blandly, "I hope they kill each other."

[madrchsod]

1. check my post on the latest from iraq

[beachmom]

8. Can you provide a link to your post?

I took a quick look and couldn't find it. Thanks!

[madrchsod]

13. second page on gd i think

[hvn_nbr_2]

10. Read my important information on all this. nt

[mike_c]

2. bingo....

eom

[CrazyOrangeCat]

3. Wow.

"Harsher language", indeed.

[Clara T]

7. Exit Strategy: Civil War

Once again this is classic divide and rule: the objective is the perpetuation of Arab disunity. Call it Iraqification; what it actually means is sectarian fever translated into civil war. Operation Lightning - the highly publicized counter-insurgency tour de force with its 40,000 mostly Shi'ite troops rounding up Sunni Arabs - can be read as the first salvo of the civil war. Vice President Dick Cheney all but admitted the whole plan on CNN, confidently predicting that "the fighting will end before the Bush administration leaves office".

But the destiny awaiting this counter-insurgency may be best evaluated by comparing it to Gillo Pontecorvo's 1966 classic, The Battle of Algiers - one of the most influential political films ever, and supposedly a "must see" at the Pentagon. The French in Algeria in the early 1960s did indeed break the back of the guerrillas - but in the end lost the Algerian war. Talking about Vietnamization - the precursor to Iraqification - the Vietcong's Tet offensive in 1968 was lethal, but the counter-insurgency - Operation Phoenix - was even more lethal. In the end, though, the US also lost the war.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/GF10Ak03.html

[beachmom]

4. At first I thought it was Zaqawri, but usually he uses truck bombs

Perhaps the Iranians? I also heard that Saddam's best troops would be able to pull off something like this. If you are inferring that America had anything to do with this, well that's over the top for me. Plus, even if you think the Bush administration is capable of such a horrendous act, they're way too incompetent and would have screwed it up or gotten caught.

Read all of the Iraqi bloggers for different insights. They're all over the place, really, and I guess I think there is true mystery involved here, and I would like to know for sure without a shadow of a doubt who did this. It was done to the Shiites, but also to all Iraqis and mankind to destroy such a fine work of architecture. Not to mention that it would be like destroying a building that Christians felt sure that Jesus would return to some day.

A couple of blogs:

www.healingiraq.blogspot.com
www.ejectiraqikkk.blogspot.com
www.aviraqi.blogspot.com
www.astarfrommosul.blogspot.com

[Clara T]

14. Whose Bombs Were They?

It was a bold assault that strongly suggests the involvement of highly-trained paramilitaries conducting a well-rehearsed plan. Still, that doesn’t give us any solid proof of what groups may have been involved.

The destruction of the Samarra shrine, also known as the Golden Mosque, has unleashed a wave of retaliatory attacks against the Sunnis. Overnight, more than 110 people were reported killed by the rampaging Shia. More than 90 Sunni mosques have been either destroyed or badly damaged. In Baghdad alone, 47 men have been found scattered throughout the city after being killed execution-style with a bullet to the back of the head. The chaos ends a week of increased violence following two major suicide bombings directed against Shia civilians that resulted in the deaths of 36 people.

The public outrage at the desecration of one of the country’s holiest sights has reached fever-pitch and its doubtful that the flimsy American-backed regime will be able to head-off a civil war. It is difficult to imagine that the perpetrators of this heinous attack couldn’t anticipate its disastrous effects. Certainly, the Sunni-led resistance does not benefit from alienating the very people it is trying to enlist in its fight against the American occupation. Accordingly, most of the prominent Sunni groups have denied involvement in the attack and dismissed it as collaboration between American and Iranian intelligence agencies.

A communiqué from "The Foreign Relations Department of the Arab Ba’ath Socialist Party" denounced the attack pointing the finger at the Interior Ministry’s Badr Brigade and American paramilitaries. The Ba’ath statement explains: "America is the main party responsible for the crime of attacking the tomb of Ali al-Hadi . . . because it is the power that occupies Iraq and has a basic interest in committing it."

"The escalation of differences between America and Iran has found their main political arena in Iraq, because the most important group of agents of Iran is there and are able to use the blood of Iraqis and the future of Iraq to exert pressure on America. Iran has laid out a plan to embroil America in the Iraqi morass to prevent it from obstructing Iran’s nuclear plans. Particularly since America is eager to move on to completing arrangements for a withdrawal from Iraq, after signing binding agreements on oil and strategy. America believes that without the participation of "Sunni" parties in the regime those arrangements will fail. For that reason 'cutting Iran’s claws’ has become one of the important requirements for American plans. This is what Ambassador Zalmay spoke of recently when he declared that no sectarian would take control of the Ministries of the Interior or Defense. Similarly, America has begun to publish information that it formally kept hidden regarding the crimes of the Badr Brigade and the Interior Ministry."

http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_532.shtml

"The only viable strategy, then, may be to correct (Iraq’s) historical defect and move in stages toward a three-state solution: Kurds in the north, Sunnis in the center and Shiites in the south" --Leslie H. Gelb, president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations; from "Three-state Solution" NY Times 11-25-03.

[gordianot]

5. If you want a war that will go on forever, find a place with constant war.

[Clara T]

9. Or a place that is constantly at War...

"War, it will be seen, is now a purely internal affair. In the past, the ruling groups of all countries, although they might recognize their common interest and therefore limit the destructiveness of war, did fight against one another, and the victor always plundered the vanquished. In our own day they are not fighting against one another at all. The war is waged by each ruling group against its own subjects, and the object of the war is not to make or prevent conquests of territory, but to keep the structure of society intact. The very word 'war', therefore, has become misleading. It would probably be accurate to say that by becoming continuous war has ceased to exist."
"1984", Chapter 9

...with everything.

[Nutmegger]

6. I feel so bad to the Iraqi people...

Kissinger, this corrupt bastard; he should go to Iraq and know what it's like to live there day in and day out.

[Clara T]

11. U.S. Envoy Zalmay Khalizad (PNACer) Warns Iraq to Unify Government

U.S. Envoy Warns Iraq to Unify Government

By ROBERT H. REID

BAGHDAD, Iraq Feb 20, 2006 (AP)— The U.S. ambassador delivered a blunt warning to Iraqi leaders Monday that they risk losing American support unless they establish a national unity government with the police and the army out of the hands of religious parties. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad delivered the warning as another 24 people, including an American soldier, died in a string of bombings, underscoring the need for the country to establish a government capable of winning the trust of all communities and ending the violence.

Such a government is also essential to the U.S. strategy for handing over security to Iraqi soldiers and police so the 138,000 U.S. troops can go home. But talks among Iraqi parties that won parliament seats in the Dec. 15 election have stalled over deep divisions among Shiites, Sunni Arabs and Kurds. During a rare news conference, Khalilzad said division among the country's sectarian and ethnic communities was "the fundamental problem in Iraq," fueling the Sunni Arab-dominated insurgency and the wave of reprisal killings.

"To overcome this there is a need for a government of national unity," which "is the difference between what exists now and the next government," he said. The outgoing government is dominated by Shiites and Kurds.

Khalilzad said Iraq's next Cabinet ministers, particularly those heading the Interior and Defense ministries, "have to be people who are nonsectarian, broadly acceptable and who are not tied to militias" run by political parties

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=1642262

And this quote from Zalmay:
"A sectarian government who run their own ethnical militias to be incharge of the security (in Iraq) will not be acceptable",  such announcement should be addressed in secret meetings and not through "Satellite TV channels", such public announcement will rally and moblize the shiia supporters of the "list 555" (Shiite alliance party).

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

12. The same country that blew up the USS Maine

perhaps?