Bush Wars
See other Bush Wars Articles
Title: Coordinated Attacks Strike 13 Towns and Cities in Iraq
Source:
NY Times
URL Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/26/w ... middleeast/26iraq.html?_r=1&hp
Published: Aug 25, 2010
Author: Anthony Shadid
Post Date: 2010-08-25 13:46:09 by war
Keywords: None
Views: 75983
Comments: 79
BAGHDAD — In one of the broadest assaults on Iraq’s security forces, insurgents unleashed a wave of roadside mines and a more than a dozen car bombings across Iraq on Wednesday, killing dozens, toppling a police station in the capital and sowing chaos and confusion among the soldiers and police officers who responded.
The withering two-hour assault in 13 towns and cities, from southernmost Basra to restive Mosul in the north, was as symbolic as it was deadly, coming a week before the United States declares the end of combat operations here. Wednesday was seemingly the insurgents’ reply: Despite suggestions otherwise, they proved their ability to launch coordinated attacks virtually anywhere in Iraq, capitalizing on the government’s dysfunction and perceptions of American vulnerability.
For weeks, there had been sense of inevitability to the assaults, which killed at least 51 people, many of them police officers. From the American military to residents here, virtually everyone seemed to expect insurgents to seek to demonstrate their prowess as the United States brings its number of troops below 50,000 here. But the anticipation did little to prepare security forces for the breadth of the assault. Iraqi soldiers and police officers brawled at the site of the biggest bombing in Baghdad, and residents heckled them for their impotence in stopping a blast that cut like a scythe through the neighborhood.
“A bloody day,” Khalil Ahmed, a 30-year-old engineer, said simply, as he stared at the cranes and bulldozers trying to rescue victims buried under the police station.
“From the day of the fall of Saddam until now, this is what we have — explosions, killing and looting,” he said. “This is our destiny. It’s already written for us.”
The assaults began at 8:20 a.m. when a pickup truck packed with explosives detonated in a parking lot behind the police station in the northern Baghdad neighborhood of Qahera. The police station collapsed, and the blast sheared off the top floors of nearby homes. Windows were shattered a half-mile away. One family was pulled out alive. Hours later, cranes and bulldozers tried to remove others trapped beneath the rubble.
Police officers kept angry residents from entering the scene.
“You get millions of dinars in salaries and you won’t let us help our families?” one youth shouted.
Another cried, “You just take money and don’t care about us!”
An Iraqi investigator walked by the scene.
“This is the state?” he muttered. “This is the government?”
Twice, soldiers and police officers brawled at the scene, and shots were fired in the air.
The rest of the capital was snarled with traffic, as police and army vehicles, sirens blaring, tried to break through the traffic jams. American soldiers in Humvees and armored vehicles, with a token Iraqi escort, drove through parts of the city.
For weeks, insurgents have carried out a daily campaign of bombings, hit-and-run attacks and assassinations against the security forces and officials, seeking to undermine confidence in their ability to secure the country. They remained the target Wednesday in attacks in Falluja, Ramadi, Tikrit, Kirkuk, Basra, Karbala, Mosul and elsewhere.
In one of the worst assaults, in the southern city of Kut, Iraqi officials said a car bomb detonated by its driver killed 19 people and wounded 87, most of them police, in an attack that destroyed the police station near the provincial headquarters.
In Diyala Province, five roadside bombs detonated in the morning in Buhriz, the first against a police patrol, a second against reinforcements who were heading to the scene and three others intended for houses belonging to policemen, officials said. They were followed by a car bombing that struck the provincial headquarters in Baquba, northeast of Baghdad, killing three people. Another car bombing struck a hospital in nearby Muqdadiya.
“The beginning of the storm,” said Saleh Khamis, a 38-year-old teacher in Buhriz.
In Ramadi, a car bomb tore through a bus station, killing eight people.
Under a deadline set by the Obama administration, the United States has brought its number of troops here to a little below 50,000, a presence it intends to maintain through next summer. The administration and the American military have sought to portray the partial withdrawal as a turning point in the American presence here, insisting that Iraq’s army and police are ready to inherit sole control over security here.
Military officials have said they believe that insurgents only number in the hundreds, and the military has issued a daily drumbeat of announcements that leaders and cadres in the insurgency have been arrested in American-Iraqi operations.
“The message the insurgents want to deliver to the Iraqi people and the politicians is that we exist and we choose the time and the place,” said Wael Abdel-Latif, a judge and former lawmaker. “They are carrying out such attacks when the Americans are still here, so just imagine what they can do after the Americans leave.”
The attacks come amid deep popular frustration with the country’s politicians, who have failed to form a government more than five months after elections in March. Shoddy public services, namely electricity, have only sharpened the resentment.
At the scene of the bombing in Baghdad, residents grimly swept up glass from storefronts. Others milled among the dozens of police and army vehicles. No one seemed to express optimism; most said they were bracing for more of the same.
“The situation doesn’t let us live our lives here,” said Mahmoud Hussein, a 26-year-old mechanic. “No water, no electricity no security. Every day it gets worse.”
Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest
Comments (1-14) not displayed.
.
.
.
#15. To: war (#13)
Iraq has LESS functioning infrastructure now than it did when we invaded and for that over 4000 Americans died. Iraq has fomented MORE terrorism not less and for this 4000 Americans died. Hmmmm...so this really a screwed up situation, the worst EVER in the history of the United states, primarily due to 4000+ dead????
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
Good morning. Wouldn't fucking know it by your continued shilling for the guy on this board.
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
Everyone but the most brain-dead Bushbot knew at the time that the "surge" was the equivalent of flooding the worst part of town with police, with the certainty that after they left things would be as bad as ever. It did make some nice photo ops for the Boy Blunder, though.
"How many confirmed NV Mig kills do YOU have general? I only have three." - Mad Dog, the village idiot's hemorrhoid.
Bush hands Obama a 5 run lead going into the top of the ninth inning and the reliever, Obama, gives up the advantage! What a fookin loser!
While I have been registered here for years it was not until this year that I began to post regularly. *
Fake turkey and all...
Nope. But I knew you'd see it from the most moronic point of view.
But I knew you'd see it from the most moronic point of view. Still care to clarify, or do you realize, again, that I have you.
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
Stay away from the keyboard when you're drunk, Nebby. We were told that iraq ould be paid for with oil revenues. We were told that we'd be greated as liberators. We were told that the safety of the region was at stake. We were told it would be a cakewalk. We were told that the insurgency was in its last throes. What more do you need? It was alll bullshit. Iraq and the region are LESS stable today. Occum's Razor tells us that the invasion was STOOOOPID.
Sure you are, you jump when I post...as you just demonstrated.
Obama's first all-by-his-lonesome budget, btw, calls for a $1.17 trillion deficit.
You jest? (laughing) Gee, I guess that means in his insanity, he thinks Korea was a 'great idea' or Vietnam, combined which cost us over 100,000 dead, and a helluva lot more money.
Obama's first all-by-his-lonesome budget, btw, calls for a $1.17 trillion deficit.
Exactly.
Obama's first all-by-his-lonesome budget, btw, calls for a $1.17 trillion deficit.
Gee, I guess that means in his insanity, he thinks Korea was a 'great idea' or Vietnam, combined which cost us over 100,000 dead, and a helluva lot more money. Exactly my point. Iraq 4000 KIA. A victory where were actually accomplished our stated military goals. Viet Nam: A cluster fuck which cost us 58,000+ and we were defeated. Funny how War finds Iraq to be the greater loss.
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
4000 KIA and you consider it a horrible loss? Sorry Eisenhower, it was a victory. We removed a dictator who was a destablizing influence on the world. And we did it cheap, unlike Johnson's CLUSTER Fuck which cost us 58,000 and we were run out of town on a mule in the process. Military history isn't your forte, is it? You seen to know very little about it.
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
Okay...I'll use your [il]logic...only 3000 died on 9/11. The point is...4000 Americans died to make the situation WORSE not better...and the number is irrelevant. We spent over 7 years there and never moved the nation forward and in most ways sent it, and the region, backwards.
Now tap your ruby slippers together three times Dorothy and maybe that bullshit will come true. The US, in it's insane thirst for all aspects of the oil market, is a far more destablizing force in the mideast than Saddam ever was. If he was so destablizing, neocon bullshit artist that you are, you should be able to explain to me why both Iraq and the region is more destable NOW than at any time while Saddam was in power. Thanks.
Well, like your bogus "stimulus" argument, not even democrats agree with you on that, much of the nation feels killing Sadaam and getting rid of his horrid sons was a "good thing". The nation's security was and has been enhanced by Sadaam being removed. Doing so at the cost of 4000 KIA is cheap, dirt cheap. Shit, son, by your fucked up logic WW2 was an even bigger waste of money and life than Iraq. How many guys we still have in Japan? Korea? Germany? Or is Math as well as History not your strong point? Sorry, but your entire narration with just about everything you believe in has been rejected by the nation. But, we'll see what the final poll says on Election day, shall we.
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
Sorry, we need the oil. "real politik" is how the world operates, not in some fantasy land where we don't go to war for oil.
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
That's all you produce, dwarf.
Viet Nam: A cluster fuck which cost us 58,000+ and we were defeated. Funny how War finds Iraq to be the greater loss. Not to mention Korea. Course posters like the anti groupie don't mention them, because both were brought to us via the Democrats.
Obama's first all-by-his-lonesome budget, btw, calls for a $1.17 trillion deficit.
You made that up, didn't you? Read the article again. The simple fact remains that Saddam, a$$hole that he was, was a known quantity in the region and he held the country together. Now, there are warring factions throughout the country, a deadlocked government, and 4 neighboring countries (Saudi, Iran, Syria, and Turkey) who all want a piece of the pie once we pull out. The security apparatus is totally broken. The Iraqi Police forces are untrained and corrupt. Many are hired through tribal connections, issued a uniform and a weapon, and sent to work. Insurgents easily pass through the many police checkpoints. The Iraqi Army doesn't have the equipment or the training it needs to provide internal security, much less national defense. That doesn't sound like security to me.
That doesn't sound like security to me. Of course not! The new government and security forces are in their infancy. Duh! Can you say "Articles of confederations"?????? Care to explain that historical fact?????
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
The "new" governement was elected on 7 March. Al Allawi won that election by a slim margin. Maliki has refused to step down. In essence, Maliki has deadlocked the government. It's non-functional- DUH!- We are now below 50,000 troops in country, the vast majority of which do not depart the basecamps. We no longer provide security in Iraq. It's their show now, whether they are ready or not. -DUH!-
But...but...but...Saddam's army was formidable!!!! Iraq has had 5 elections without seating a functional government. It did manage. however, to put guys on trial and excute them... Go figure...
Is it also acceptable for individual citizens to take what they need and use force if necessary, or just governments?
What historical fact is that, Nebby? That in an era where there was no mass communication and no mass system of transportation that within 18 months of ratifying the USCON, the US had scrapped one system of governbment, moved the See of that government, held elections and seated a fully functioning government? Here we are five going on six years later in Iraq.
I never cease to be amazed at how self proclaimed small government types love to see power exercised in its rawest form..."What's mine is mine and what's yours I can take at will..." They wholly ignore the fact that If we existed in the form the Framers expressed we'd have never fought a war in Iraq... That's why I call these guys "Convenient originalists"... Kind of like the inherent contradiction that the government can legistlate abortion, school prayer and marriage but not feed, clothe or tend to the health of the people.
I think Carter's energy policy was more in tune with the founding fathers. Kind of like the inherent contradiction that the government can legistlate abortion, school prayer and marriage but not feed, clothe or tend to the health of the people. Convenient is right - makes them feel like they're doin good by exercising governmental power over behavior they don't like just as long as it doesn't cost them anything important like money.
Riiight, cause the Founders thought gas lines were a good thing...(eyes rolling) Sheesh, goofy.
Obama's first all-by-his-lonesome budget, btw, calls for a $1.17 trillion deficit.
Far better than it was when Sadaam was in power. Sorry, Iraq is no longer an enemy, and we did it DIRT FUCKING CHEAP.
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
Liberation. We liberated them. They wholly ignore the fact that If we existed in the form the Framers expressed we'd have never fought a war in Iraq... That's why I call these guys "Convenient originalists"... Real Politik. Look it up and educate yourself.
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
Iraq has had 5 elections without seating a functional government. It did manage. however, to put guys on trial and excute them... Go figure... What pisses you off, unlike the myriad of Democratic Wars we've pissed away hundreds of thousands of good American lives and untold sums of money, Bush defeated Iraq, and did it on the cheap.
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
Since you haven't paid the price, it isn't up to you to decide if it was cheap or not.
You're out of your fucking mind. You really are insane if you think it's better now. Then again, you probably believe we found WMD's and that there were rape rooms and that the soccer team really WAS executed... As for dirt cheap? A trillion borrowed dollars and 4000 lives.
Iraq was the most liberal and open society in the mideast. It no longer is. We liberated them from what?
Iraq didn't invade us nor did they declare war on us and we were told that the war wasn't against Iraq but Saddam Hussein and terror. And you're out of your fucking mind if you believe that a trillion borrowed dollars and 4000 lives is cheap.
Clean water and reliable electricity. We also gave them an income tax - something they never had before, and gas lines.
Sometimes, the dumbest shit just falls out of your mouth... 5000+ dead, and 10x that amount seriously injured (crippled or disfigured)... Over a million dead, God knows how many of them were actual "insurgents," versus how many of them injured. How many children have to die, before their lives are no longer "cheap" to you? How many of our military troops- sent into a meat-grinder, with no real goal, and left out there to be chopped up by IEDs- have to die, before it's no longer "cheap" to you? Tell me, what value do you put on life? Your neighbors' life, the kids down the street, the kids shot up in the wikileaks video, or the thousands of other innocents killed (and documented) in the wikileaks files? IS there any value to life, in your eyes? Your statements are bizarre, not grounded in reality or tempered by an iota of ethics.
Yes, I can say from a historical point of view that the 4000 we lost in Iraq was far less than the 60,000 we lost in Viet Nam. Iraq= a resounding victory where Al Queda bled to death. Viet Nam= Democratic War where the nation lost 60,000 plus and nearly went bankrupt due to the huge cost of running a Democratic War.
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
Sorry, Obama's failed stimulus cost more than the Iraq war. And yes, Iraq was a great victory where we bled Al Queda to death.
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
You don't know of Sadaam's crimes? Your ignorance is outstanding! Breathtaking. Did you go to public school????
Clinton and Cuomo are the true bandits who lit the fuse to this economic crisis we're now in. All in the name of getting more minorities in houses: http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=12554
Comments (56 - 79) not displayed.
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/LatestIraq has no functioning government for which over 4000 Americans died.
#16. To: war (#14)
I've been syaing Obama is full of shit going back to the campaign in 2008.
#17. To: war (#0)
#18. To: Skip Intro (#17)
brain-dead
#19. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#16)
#20. To: Skip Intro (#17)
#21. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#15)
Hmmmm...so this really a screwed up situation, the worst EVER in the history of the United states, primarily due to 4000+ dead????
#22. To: war (#21)
Nope.
#23. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#22)
(Edited)
Still care to clarify, or do you realize, again, that I have you.
#24. To: Fred Mertz (#7)
I ain't your clerical assistant.
#25. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#9)
Care to support that statement with some facts?
#26. To: Ibluafartsky (#18)
#27. To: Badeye, War (#25)
You jest? (laughing)
#28. To: war (#23)
We were told that iraq ould be paid for with oil revenues. We were told that we'd be greated as liberators. We were told that the safety of the region was at stake. We were told it would be a cakewalk. We were told that the insurgency was in its last throes.
#29. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#27)
#30. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#28)
We removed a dictator who was a destablizing influence on the world.
#31. To: war (#29)
The point is...4000 Americans died to make the situation WORSE not better...and the number is irrelevant. We spent over 7 years there and never moved the nation forward and in most ways sent it, and the region, backwards.
#32. To: war (#30)
The US, in it's insane thirst for all aspects of the oil market, is a far more destablizing force in the mideast than Saddam ever was. If he was so destablizing, neocon bullshit artist that you are, you should be able to explain to me why both Iraq and the region is more destable NOW than at any time while Saddam was in power.
#33. To: war (#21)
the most moronic point of view.
#34. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#27)
Exactly my point. Iraq 4000 KIA. A victory where were actually accomplished our stated military goals.
#35. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#31)
The nation's security was and has been enhanced by Sadaam being removed.
#36. To: Sarajevo (#35)
The Iraqi Army doesn't have the equipment or the training it needs to provide internal security, much less national defense.
#37. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#36)
The new government and security forces are in their infancy.
#38. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#36)
Of course not! The new government and security forces are in their infancy. Duh!
#39. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#32)
Sorry, we need the oil. "real politik" is how the world operates, not in some fantasy land where we don't go to war for oil.
#40. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#36)
(Edited)
Care to explain that historical fact?????
#41. To: lucysmom (#39)
(Edited)
#42. To: war (#41)
They wholly ignore the fact that If we existed in the form the Framers expressed we'd have never fought a war in Iraq...
#43. To: lucysmom (#42)
I think Carter's energy policy was more in tune with the founding fathers.
#44. To: war (#40)
Here we are five going on six years later in Iraq.
#45. To: war (#41)
I never cease to be amazed at how self proclaimed small government types love to see power exercised in its rawest form..."What's mine is mine and what's yours I can take at will..."
#46. To: war (#38)
But...but...but...Saddam's army was formidable!!!!
#47. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#44)
Sorry, Iraq is no longer an enemy, and we did it DIRT FUCKING CHEAP.
#48. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#44)
Far better than it was when Sadaam was in power...
#49. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#45)
Liberation. We liberated them.
#50. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#46)
Bush defeated Iraq, and did it on the cheap.
#51. To: war (#49)
We liberated them from what?
#52. To: Nebuchadnezzar (#44)
Sorry, Iraq is no longer an enemy, and we did it DIRT FUCKING CHEAP.
Sorry, we need the oil. "real politik" is how the world operates, not in some fantasy land where we don't go to war for oil.
Mad dog gets "calibrated..."
#53. To: lucysmom (#47)
Since you haven't paid the price, it isn't up to you to decide if it was cheap or not.
#54. To: war (#48)
As for dirt cheap? A trillion borrowed dollars and 4000 lives.
#55. To: war (#49)
Iraq was the most liberal and open society in the mideast. It no longer is. We liberated them from what?
.
.
.
[Home] [Headlines] [Latest Articles] [Latest Comments] [Post] [Mail] [Sign-in] [Setup] [Help] [Register]