Condoleezza Rice in Baghdad

When the war was being planned Condoleezza Rice stood with the hawks when she was the President's security adviser. Some feel that she has metamorphosed into pragmatist with her move from the White House to the State Department. It was a pragmatic idea to make a surprise stop in Baghdad as the U.S. Senate deadlocked on whether to repeat a symbolic rebuke that the U.S. House handed Bush on Friday when it opposed the administration's deployment of additional combat troops to Iraq.


Her visit occurred a day after the U.S. House of Representatives renounced President George W. Bush's latest strategy to resolve the four-year-old war in Iraq, passing a nonbinding resolution that disapproves of his decision to send about 21,500 more U.S. troops to the conflict. Most of those troops are being dispatched to Baghdad.

The U.S. House vote was the strongest rebuke of a president during wartime since Congress in 1970 rescinded the Gulf of Tonkin resolution that authorized military action in Southeast Asia.

Bush's approval rating stands at 32 percent, tied for his lowest standing in Associated Press-Ipsos polling, and most people in the United States find fault with his handling of the nearly four-year-old Iraq war.

"Some do not think that this was the right war to fight, and others think that we in the administration haven't fought this war quite right," but still support U.S. forces and others in harm's way." Rice said. "I keep hearing and reading the American people don't want to fight this war anymore. I don't think that's right. The American people want to know that we can succeed,"

Problematic Maliki

Rice met with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and U.S. officials in the protected Green Zone that houses the U.S. embassy.

Of Maliki, Rice said she has been ``quite impressed with his performance.''

Although Rice used her visit to publicly praise the Iraqi government's role in a new security crackdown in Baghdad, an Iraqi official said she was more critical in private.

Nouri al-Malikibecame prime minister in May 2006, and his time in office has been defined by a surge in sectarian violence and lack of progress in improving services, curbing soaring unemployment and fighting crime.

In July of 2006 al-Maliki was quoted as declining to condemn Hezbollah and blamed the violence in Israel and Lebanon, triggered by Hezbollah’s kidnapping of two Israeli soldiers, on “Israeli aggression.” Making matters worse, Iraqi parliament Speaker Mahmoud al-Mashhadani accused Jews of masterminding killings in Iraq that were carried out by Sunni or Shiite insurgents

Last November, a Bush national security adviser had expressed doubts about the Iraqi prime minister's ability to end sectarian tensions ahead of a meeting between Bush and Maliki in Amman, Jordan. A confidential White House memo leaked in November questioned his ability to deal with the violence, and the Iraq Study Group report, prepared by a bipartisan commission, recommended that Washington should reduce military and political support to his government if it fails to make progress in curbing the violence.

In January of this year Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said in a published report that he wishes he could leave office before his four-year term is up and would not run again."I didn't want to take this position," al-Maliki told the Wall Street Journal in an interview. "I only agreed because I thought it would serve the national interest, and I will not accept it again."

And though Rice spoke approvingly of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's leadership, she urged Iraqi officials to enact laws to fairly administer the country's vast oil reserves.

Rice's message to the Iraqi's:

"The American people want to see results and aren't prepared to wait forever," Rice said during a 30-minute conversation with reporters in U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad's living room. "But we're also not saying to the Iraqis: 'Get it done by X date or else.' That's not the way one treats a partnership in these difficult circumstances."

Rice met with al-Maliki and President Jalal Talabani and later had lunch at the U.S. ambassador's residence with a group that included the Kurdish deputy prime minister and the country's foreign minister.

"The Baghdad security plan is just beginning to unfold, and I think it's important to realize it wasn't ever intended to be a sort of single day -- it was intended to ramp up over time.''

Rice told Iraqi government leaders Saturday that the contentious debate in Washington over President Bush's war strategy reflects U.S. doubts that democracy will prevail over violence.

"Some of the debate in Washington is in fact indicative of the concerns that some of the American people have ... if the Iraqi government doesn't do what it has said it will do," Rice said she told leaders from all of Iraq's factions.


Meeting with US troops:

In a talk with U.S. personnel in Baghdad, Rice described their mission as essential ``for the security and well-being of the United States.''

Rice acknowledged the debate about the war in the U.S. and told the soldiers and civilians that their sacrifice is ``appreciated.''

This comes in contrast to Presidential hopeful Senator Barak Obama, who got his candidacy off to an inauspicious start by saying last weekend that the war “should have never been authorized, and should have never been waged, and on which we've now spent $400 billion, and have seen over 3,000 lives of the bravest young Americans wasted.''


Whats happening now:


Iraqi and U.S. forces expanded searches in Baghdad and cleared neighborhoods of suspected militants this past week in an operation to beef up security in Iraq as violence between Shiite and Sunni Muslims continued.

Rice said the joint operations were ``off to a good start, " and that she was `Impressed'.

But then Rice told Iraqi leaders that the Baghdad security operation needs to "rise above sectarianism" and noted that no U.S. or Iraqi forces have yet moved into the capital's major Shiite militia stronghold, the Iraqi official said.

The official said Rice told Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that the initial stage of the crackdown, which began Wednesday, appeared to focus on Sunni areas and had left Sadr City, stronghold of the Mahdi Army militia, nearly untouched.

Explosions last week in Baghdad killed at least 59 people on the first anniversary of the blast at the Shiite Muslim al-Askari mosque in Samarra, an event that triggered a wave of bloodshed between Shiites and Sunnis. The United Nations has said the sectarian violence last year left 34,452 civilians dead.


Then on Sunday following Rice's visit there were twin explosions in an open-air market that claimed 62 lives and a third blast that killed one. The first blast tore through a produce market in the mostly Shiite area of New Baghdad, toppling the wooden stalls and leaving pools of blood and vegetables trampled in the chaos. Minutes later, another car bomb exploded near a row of stores.


More than 129 people were injured, including many women who were shopping, said police and rescue officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the media.

Victims were carried to hospitals on makeshift stretchers or in the arms of rescuers.

Another car bomb in the Shiite enclave of Sadr City left at least one dead and 10 wounded, police said.

It was by far the deadliest day since the security sweeps began. On Thursday, a string of car bombs killed seven civilians on the first full day of the house-to-house searches for weapons and suspected militants.

The U.S.-led teams have faced limited direct defiance as they set up checkpoints and comb neighborhoods. But that could change as they move into more volatile sections of the city. The next could be Sadr City, a stronghold of the Mahdi Army militia loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

U.S. soldiers pressed closer to Sadr City on Sunday and the reception changed noticeably. In previous days, Shiite families opened their doors to welcome the troops _ feeling that the American presence would be a buffer against feared attacks from Sunni militia.

On Sunday, in areas closer to Sadr City, parents slapped away the candy and lollipops given to children by soldiers.

Iran & Syria borders

The borders with Iran and Syria _ shut for three days as the plan got under way _ reopened Sunday. But new and strict rules will apply.

Moussawi, the plan's spokesman, was quoted in the Azzaman newspaper as saying the crossing points to the two nations would be open for only several hours a day and under "intense observation."
In Tehran, Syrian President Bashar Assad held talks with Iranian leaders, including President Mahmoud Ahamedinejad. The two leaders are generally on opposing sides of Iraq's sectarian divide: Iran backs the majority Shiites, and Syria is seen as a key supporter of Sunnis.Iran denies any role in the US claim that Iraqi militants receive aid and supplies from Iran, including parts for lethal roadside bombs targeting U.S. forces.Iran also denies that the anti-American cleric al-Sadr has crossed over from Iraq into Iran.

Next on Rice's agenda

Rice is due to meet with Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni Sunday and with Palestinian and Israeli officials Monday ahead of a three-way summit with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Feb. 19. That summit is designed to jumpstart negotiations toward the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.

That mission was complicated by last week's announced power-sharing pact between the U.S-backed Palestinian President and Hamas militants whom the Bush administration considers terrorists.
-posted by Paul Grant (follower of Basho)

4 Blasts Kill 78 In Iraq Markets

4 Blasts Kill 78 In Iraq Markets
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By DAMIEN CAVE The New York Times


BAGHDAD, IRAQ - Four back-to-back explosions at two markets in central Baghdad killed at least 78 people and wounded 155 Monday, charring drivers in their cars, shredding shops and setting ablaze a seven-story building full of clothing stores that burned for more than six hours, witnesses and officials said.

The blasts - three at Shorja market, the capital's largest bazaar, and one at Bab al-Sharji a few blocks away - struck shortly after Iraq's Shiite-led government marked the anniversary, by the Islamic calendar, of an attack last year that destroyed a revered Shiite mosque in Samarra. That bombing, which shattered the shrine's golden dome, set off a wave of sectarian violence in Iraq that has yet to be extinguished.

Monday's attacks, given their timing and severity, seemed designed to fuel the country's sectarian hatreds and upstage the new U.S.-Iraqi security plan for Baghdad.

One thunderous explosion could be heard in the middle of an upbeat outdoor news conference on security in Iraq given by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki in the Green Zone, roughly two miles from the markets. He did not flinch or address the sound. "I'm very hopeful that the Iraqis will work together to support the Iraqi security forces and police" - boom! - "who are in charge of the operation," he said.

The bombings only underscored the challenge he faces in trying to inspire public confidence as sectarian violence continues.

The Shorja attack was at least the fifth there since August.

It came on a day when the Iraqi High Tribunal ruled that Saddam Hussein's former Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan should follow his former boss to the gallows within several weeks, despite objections from U.S. officials who fear that another hanging so soon after Saddam's would undermine the credibility of al-Maliki's government.

The High Tribunal initially sentenced Ramadan to life in prison for his role in the killing of 148 Shiites in the town of Dujail in 1982, but an appeals court in December sent the case back, directing that he be executed.

At the Shorja market, where a roadside bomb, a car bomb and a truck bomb blew up just after noon, people directed their anger at Sunni insurgents, who have frequently taken credit for similar attacks.

Ali Hassan Flayha, a merchant from the market who saw the blasts, said the insurgents wanted only destruction, to stop daily life, kill as many people as possible and keep the public angry at the Iraqi and U.S. governments.

"The insurgents won't let us do our work," he said. "They are shooting at us, kidnapping our workers, starting fires, just to keep us away from the market."

Bloodied bodies have become a familiar sight, he said, but government protection has not.

"The goal of the insurgents is to show us that the government is weak," he said. "We understand. They're right."

Witnesses said that one of the bombs at the Shorja market was concealed in a pickup truck that parked outside the Abu Hanifa building, a seven-story concrete structure with shops and restaurants on the first floor and wholesale clothing businesses filling the rest of the structure.

The explosion set the building on fire, witnesses said, trapping workers amid mannequins and clothing that burned like kindling and belched out smoke.

On the diplomatic front, Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad dismissed U.S. accusations that Iran was arming Shiite militants in Iraq, saying Iran was opposed to "any kind of conflict" in Iraq.

"Our position for Iraq is very clear," he told ABC's "Good Morning America." "We are asking for peace, we are asking for security, and we will be sad to see people get killed, no matter who they are."

On Sunday, U.S. officials in Iraq showed journalists weapons they said had been made by Iranian factories and had been used to kill 170 Americans in the past three years. They accused Iran's leaders of authorizing the smuggling of such weapons into Iraq.

Ahmadinejad refused to address the accusation directly, but he rejected the charges by saying the Americans were trying to find a scapegoat for their problems in Iraq.

"I think that Americans have made a mistake in Iraq and unfortunately are losing, and this is a shame for Americans of course, and that's why they are trying to point their fingers to other people, and pointing fingers to others will not solve the problem," he said.

A Foreign Ministry spokesman, Mohammad Ali Hosseini, was more direct in denying the accusations. He called the charges baseless and said the evidence had been fabricated.

"Such accusations cannot be relied upon or be presented as evidence," he said. "The United States has a long history of fabricating evidence. Such charges are unacceptable."

Askariya Shrine Bombed

Before and after the bombing.

The US must decide how the country of Iraq should be governed after they toppled Saddam's government. Initially the plan was to produce one government- run at first by the Us and then handed over to an elected Iraq government policed and directed by the US military. However if the US military were to loose control- by Iraqis requesting the US leave or by a change in control in American politics, and the country was left to it's own then the potential that a radical anti- American government could come to power and the US would be no better off than we started. There is even potential for a uniting between Iran and Iraq which would make the US (and Israel ) in a far worse position.

The solution: break Iraq up into three smaller states- The dissolution of Iraq into a Shi'ite state, a Sunni state and the separation of the Kurdish part.

What would be the justification? That the Iraqi's just can't get along as a unified country. So it has been suggested that the destruction of this shrine was actually done by the US/British to stir up infighting, or a civil war. That has been accomplished.

The last memo from Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld ends with :
¶Assist in accelerating an aggressive federalism plan, moving towards three separate states — Sunni, Shia, and Kurd. (See memo here-bottom of page)- poated by Paul Grant (follower of Basho)

Askariya Shrine Bombed

“A large explosion heavily damaged the golden dome of one of Iraq’s most famous Shiite shrines Wednesday, spawning mass protests and triggering reprisal attacks against Sunni mosques,” reports the Associated Press. “It was the third major attack against Shiite targets this week and threatened to stoke sectarian tensions. Shiite leaders called for calm, but militants attacked Sunni mosques and a gunfight broke out between Shiite militiamen and guards at the offices of a Sunni political party in Basra. About 500 soldiers were sent to Sunni neighborhoods in Baghdad to prevent clashes between Shiites and Sunnis, Army Capt. Jassim al-Wahash said.”

It makes absolutely no sense for Sunnis to bomb Shia mosques; this would be akin to Baptists bombing Catholic churches. Sectarian violence, dividing Iraqi society, does not serve Iraqis, either Sunni or Shia. It does, however, serve the occupation forces and also begins to realize the plan sketched out in Oded Yinon’s “A Strategy for Israel in the Nineteen Eighties” (the balkanization of Arab and Muslim society and culture), an objective shared by Jabotinsky Likudites and Straussian neocons.

“No group claimed responsibility for the 6:55 a.m. attack on the Askariya shrine in Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad, but suspicion fell on Sunni extremist groups such as al-Qaida in Iraq led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. The shrine contains the tombs of two revered Shiite imams, descendants of the Prophet Muhammad.” Of course, it stands to reason the bombing was carried out by “al-Qaida in Iraq” and the dead Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, in other words it was a black op carried out by the Anglo-American occupation forces, designed specifically to create religious violence, the worst sort. Only vicious and crazed Muslims would blow up the remains of descendants of the Prophet Muhammad—or American, British, and Israeli intelligence operatives or their double agent Arab lunatics, or crazies incited by Rumsfeld’s Proactive Preemptive Operations Group (P2OG), designed to “stimulate” terrorist reaction.

Recall the remarks of an anonymous senior military officer on April 22, 2004, declaring a spate of bombings in Basra had “all the hallmarks” of “al-Qaeda.” Several months later, two British “undercover soldiers” wearing “traditional Arab headscarves” were caught red-handed by Iraqi National Guard “driving a booby trapped car loaded with ammunition.”

Michel Chossudovsky: “Has the US [and Britain] created as part of a covert intelligence operation, a bogus ‘resistance movement’ made up of its own Al Qaeda sponsored ‘terrorists’? Their suicide attacks target Iraqi civilians rather than the US military. The suicide bombings tend to encourage sectarian divisions not only within Iraq, but throughout the entire Middle East. They serve Washington’s interests. They contribute to undermining the development of a broader resistance movement uniting Shia, Sunni, Kurds and Christians against the illegal occupation of the Iraqi homeland.”

The Askariya shrine that was bombed Wednesday is among Iraq's most sacred sites for Shiite Muslims, drawing pilgrims from around the world.

It contains the tombs of the 10th and 11th imams, Ali al-Hadi who died in 868, and his son, Hassan al-Askari, who died in 874.

Both are descendants of the Prophet Muhammad and Shiites consider them to be among his successors. The landmark golden dome was completed in 1905 under Muzaffar al-Din Shah.

The shrine is near the place where the last of the 12 Shiite imams, Mohammed al-Mahdi, disappeared. Al-Mahdi, known as the “hidden imam,” was the son and grandson of the two imams buried in the Askariya shrine. Shiites believe he is still alive and will return to restore justice to humanity.


The shrine is in Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad, one of four Shiite holy cities in Iraq, which has majestic ruins stretching along the eastern bank of the Tigris river.

It was built by Caliph al-Mutasim in 836 to replace Baghdad as the capital of the Abbasid Caliphate, and abandoned by Caliph Al-Mutamid in 892.

Samarra also is the site of the ninth century Great Mosque with a 170-foot spiral minaret that is one of the most recognized landmarks in Iraq. The town also holds remains of the residence built by Caliph Al-Mutasim in 835.