The SF Chronicle, in an AP report, claims:

"The American air support marked a sharp escalation in the fight — so far led by Iraqi security forces — to cripple armed factions that the Pentagon accuses of links to Iran."

Delusion or lie???

How about the US pushing the Iraqi government to go against al-Sadr in an attempt to provoke an Iranian reaction? That would justify an attack by the US on Iran.

Devious minds think alike--or minds conditioned by the subtexts of the present administration.

How about the US pushing the Iraqi government to go against al-Sadr in an attempt to provoke an Iranian reaction?

This would make sense if al-Sadr were the Iranian-backed Shiite faction. But he's the Iraqi nationalist; Maliki and the ISCI have much deeper ties to Iran.

I think the admin just trying to prop up their lackey here. Taking sides in the civil war, as it were.

Uh, if Cheney told Maliki to do this, why is Bush criticizing Maliki on TV today?
.

maybe Sadr is committing to the cease-fire so as not to give Bush/Cheney an overt excuse to target him with US military?

VP Cheney is incapable of blessing anything. He does not bless, he dictates.

Since Americans receive almost no objective reporting from Iraq, it is difficult to decipher what is going on. Most likely everything the US does in Iraq is intended to increase its power there. Taking on al Sadr or the Sadrists in Basra does not contradict that overiding principal of the US' occupation of Iraq.

My concern is the confrontation with Sadrists is taking place in Basra. This indicates the strategic lines of communication in the South of Iraq are being protected from possible insurgent disruption, which could be a real possibility if the US attacks Iran. I hope I am wrong and the confrontation with al Sadr by Malachi is motivated by the coming provincial elections.

How will they account for 2 million internally displaced people in the elections?

First, Cheney's visit came ten days ago and this operation seems to have been in the planning stages for several weeks. My guess is that this operation is Maliki's idea, not ours, and Cheney merely offered his blessing and a promise of U.S. air/ground support.

The Cheney's "not involved" theory, whereby Cheney never helped Bush with those energy crisis BS talks in the very beginning of the Bushie reign, never sat in on those energy task meetings, never preached to the AEI about all the wonderous Iraq oil contracts dancing in their heads, never talked to royal Saudi family either, never talked to Tim Russert and said that Bush was merely the presidental face either.

Nay, Cheney wouldn't do any of that shit (my ass). BTW it sounds exactly like something Karl Rove though up. "Cheney? Cheney who?"

No cred from me, alas, and I don't believe in showing my work: But I say, I certainly hope the Sadrists sweep to power. It would be a counterpoint to and a comment on the swinishness of the Bushites.

Of course, I don't know who or what is "better" or "less evil" in Iraq (asides from our evil "war," or rather, occupation). I don't think anyone can really determine that. So the prime consideration is how to screw Bush.

Second, I continue to be slightly mystified that Muqtada al-Sadr continues to make such soothing noises.

Uh, because he doesn't need armed conflict to propel himself to power? As I hear it told, his side was cruising to a political victory in October.

Maliki is attacking now because he's weak. Only weak people (and drug-addled trust-fund babies) start wars, you know.

So, instead of stuffing ballot boxes, Maliki is going to stuff coffins, and he expects us to do most of it for him.

Nice.
.

a) The US government is fucking everything up again.

b) Badly. More US troops will die and nothing significant will be accomplished.

You're welcome.

-IMU

I highly recommend Patrick Cockburn's new book "Muqtada" which I just finished reading. It really sheds light on the background to this and illuminates Sadr's shifting strategies.

BTW, has anyone seen McCain new ad?

The "I was a POW" Ad that TPM is currently showing at that website. Holy mackerel, you got-a-be-an idiot to be a Repug. What is it with them and the need for completely stupid presidents?

Holy mackerel, you got-a-be-an idiot to be a Repug. What is it with them and the need for completely stupid presidents?

Well, a democratically constituted government tends to get in the way of fucking everyone you can for whatever you can simply because you can, so they see government as the problem (when they're not begging for government contracts).

So, it's important to sabotage democracy at every step, and democracy is weakest when the electorate is dumbest.

The parasites need the stupids so that no one fucks up their scams, it's as simple as that.
.

My guess is that this operation is Maliki's idea, not ours, and Cheney merely offered his blessing and a promise of U.S. air/ground support.

You're free to believe that, but I think the history of the Bush administration's relationship with ISCI says differently. I find it highly doubtful that al Maliki would take this step without strong encouragement, not just permission from the US government.

Cheney didn't have to go to Iraq to plan the attack, and what the hell would Cheney know about military strategy anyway? This has been planned for months, and the Bushies wanted to push it off as the ISCI militias handling it on their own. However, this time it doesn't appear the press is playing along.

Want to understand what's going on in Iraq now?

Read Juan Cole's blog quoted in Kevin's piece.

Read Patrick Cockburn in today's Independent
http://www.independent.co.uk/

Cliff notes version: Cheney fearful Sadr will win upcoming elections. Told Maliki to destroy Sadr. Cheney doesn't like Sadr because Sadr wants the US out.

News from US (Cheney): Surge is working, we're killing the criminals (Sadr militia), freedom is on the march. And,as George Bush said,"People don't know how good the US really is."

OT:

(Me-Again: Watching that stuff is a stark reminder to me that I feel lost in some kind of bizarro world. Sometimes I get over America'd by ads like that. Kind of like, you know, it just makes me proud to be an American, in America, thinking about America, reciting the word, America, and continually god blessing America and all us Americans in a truly American way whilst living the American dream, breathing our fresh American air, drinking our cool refreshing American water, and keeping the world safe, prosperous and as much as is possible, American.)

I have heard rumors that Bosnian snipers have landed and are taking potshots at Sinbad. Sinbad is reportedly upset at this turn of events, especially because he will now need to eat a brown bag lunch, when he was hoping to make it to the Olive Garden in Basra. Meanwhile, Hillary is eagerly waiting for the provincial elections so that she can declare victory and claim the Basra delegates.

While I'm no Iraq expert, I'm also guessing that Sadr keeps making noises about the ceasefire because he's pretty confident he can survive this offensive and then can easily go on to win elections.

If the ceasefire breaks down he'll be taking a lot more direct attacks from the U.S., not just assaults in support of P.M. Maliki. We're probably killing some of his people now, but the fact that the U.S. also makes noises about the ceasefire holding up means that unlike Maliki we're just as happy to focus on the "special groups."

Just wondering what was the deal that was made with Iran back during Ronnie Raygun`s occupation of the White House.

Just wondering ya know if there were any arms merchants involved...

"History can save your ass." - William Gibson

Last week Sadr tipped everybody off that he knew this was coming, at least anybody willing to listen.

Although he was still verbally committing to a cease-fire he very specifically made the point that members of the Mahdi army had every right to defend themselves.

If the US really wanted a strong, independent Iraq, it could do worse than promote Sadr's cause. Of course, this administration doesn't really wnat a strong, independent Iraq.

I think that Sadr's soothing noises are addressed at the Iraqis, so he looks like the good guy. It keeps his options open: if the government has a fair regional election, his people take power in the south. If they don't, the Shiite public backs him in his battle against the Maliki-Hakim alliance.

I wonder about the timing of this offensive in terms of John McCain's visit to Iraq. I'm not implying McCain had anything to do with the choosing to go on this offensive or not, but that I can't help but suspect that the offensive starting right after his visit to Iraq doesn't seem to be a coincidence. It couldn't have looked good if the worst of this had been going on when McCain was touring Iraq.

Best guess is that Cheney was there to negotiate. So the real question is, what did Maliki promise Cheney in return for US military support against Sadr/the Mehdi Army?

Who really gives a fuck what is at the bottom of it?

I long thought that the apocryphal Pottery Barn analogy held true. But it has become painfully obvious that the bumper sticker trumps all - Iraq, Arabic for Vietnam.

I firmly believe that there is no way to move forward as a nation on any number of issues until we extricate ourselves from Iraq and Afghanistan, where the initiative and any hope of success was lost the minute we invaded Iraq.

We can't help Iraq, even if we had a half a million troops there. As I've said before, Iraq is not a real country. The three main groups never would have come together as a country on their own accord. Nothing we can say or do at this point will fix it.

I love how they scheduled the elections right before the American elections so that the media can cover them as a great accomplishment of the hard-nosed Republicans and McCain can get a 5-10% boost in the November election as a result.

Oy, this stuff is complicated. I’m going to try to (over) simplify this for myself by analogy. Iraq has three “political parties:” Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites. One of the 18 major milestones that we have set for the Iraqis to meet is to hold provincial Parliamentary elections. The Maliki administration has been blocking a bill for holding elections because he fears that his faction of the Shiite party does not have enough popular support to defeat the Sadr faction of the party.

Just by coincidence, he receives a visit from Vice President Cheney, and suddenly he decides to agree to hold elections. Immediately following this magnanimous political gesture, he amasses the might of the Iraqi army, and begins killing-off the Sadr faction of the party in Basra. In the words of “U.S. officials:” “Maliki himself is firing ‘the first salvo in upcoming elections [.]’"

So Iraq is beginning the long march down the road to Democracy, and we could think of the current situation as the “Basra primaries.” Maliki is down in the popular vote, but he will do whatever it takes to win… At first, the U.S. (wisely, IMO) stayed out of the intra-party dispute, until it started to look bad for their candidate…

I guess if I wanted to carry the analogy to ridiculous lengths, I’d compare our soldiers to – what – the Super Delegates?

The Iraq debacle needs to be constantly fueled, the killing must continue.

There is no other reason.

We think we can analyze human stupidity and somehow establish peace by waging war.

The whole mess in Iraq will get better, but first we have to kill another million or so civilians there.

God bless the surge!

Best guess is that Cheney was there to negotiate. So the real question is, what did Maliki promise Cheney in return for US military support against Sadr/the Mehdi Army?

I would turn that question around: what did Cheney promise Maliki in exchange for Maliki's support in attacking al Sadr?

The GWB adminstration is pursuing a policy of hostility toward Iran.

ISCI, closely allied with Iran, wants US troops to stay in Iraq.

Sadr, who emphasizes his independence from his Iranian co-religionists, wants US troops to leave Iraq.

What does that tell us about the wisdom of the adminstration's Iraq policy?

The most interesting visit is not Cheney's, but Ahmadinejad's several weeks earlier. That seemed like a very congenial visit and casts a whole lot of doubt on any assertion that Maliki's attack on Sadr is in anyway inimical to Iran's interests.

It's not just Basra, the attacks against the Sadrists include US led assaults on Sadr City. After years of training, the ISF is facing a militia more heavily armed than them. So,they need air support from the US. Yeah, the ISF has really stood up and is an independent force.
Interesting that our coalition partner stays holed up at the Basra airport.

Want to establish Iraq cred? Going with option b),(acurate predictions), here's the formula:

Given any action about to be taken -- elections, the surge, etc. -- first look at the stated goals as laid out by the planners of said action.

Now lay out best & worse case scenarios. Best case being that the stated goals will be achieved. The worst case being total failure (failure could be just that the stated goals weren't met or, to be less charitable, that the actions(s) taken actually made things worse).

Then throw in, say, four other scenarios that fall somewhere between total success & total failure.

Pick the second-to-worst scenario as your prediction. You won't be very popular & will be largely ignored by the MSM & probably be branded as a 'nay-sayer', but (& here's the kicker) you'll be right more often than you're wrong. Unfortunately, in this day & age, being right most of the time isn't what gains you "cred".

First, we need to recognize that these militias did not exist in Iraq prior to the 1991 Gulf War. The U.S. allowed them to come in and take root. An interview – between Charlie Rose and Sinan Antoon and Ali Fadhil, an Iraqi professor and Iraqi journalist, respectively, currently living in the U.S., pretty much tells the story. Click here and let them tell the story.

This blog, quoted from DeLong, says that one reason the US supports SCIRI/ISCI/SIIC is that they speak English and Sadr's boys don't:
Link

Since we are tossing round ideas, I think this escalation against Sadr is about getting McBush elected in Nov. The Iraqi election is in Oct, so plan on plenty of triumphalism from the admin and their various media outlets. Sadr will be a shell of his former self after US troops, er I mean, Iraqi National forces Falusize his forces. This "Knight's move" consolidates Maliki's National Power and diminishes Sadr's hope of attaining Iraqi leadership in the election. He knows this and has repeatedly called for talks. Sure, we'll talk, Sadr old boy, when your forces are ground to a pulp. The Iraqi elections are held, the people are happy with their blue fingers and McBush rides that horse to the White House saying Iraq was tough but we persevered and finally won, while Barak continued to bleat about withdraw.

Falusize

U.S. aircraft join Basra fight

Sadr represents the poor (majority) Shia, Dawa/SCIRI-SIIC-ISCI-whatever represents the (minority) middle class Shia. There is a class dimension to this that isn't talked about much. We're backing the known relatively moneyed establishment government that wants us to stay. They are more like our GOP and we're familiar with the palms that need to be greased already. Sadr is a populist that wants us to go away and is perhaps likely to try to sue us later. So we want him to go away and not win the elections and cause us embarassment. Dawa/SCIRI-SIIC-ISCI-whatever wants him to go away as well. Even Iran doesn't trust him. He is making all the peace noises, because that is the only way he can win and we (and Maliki) know that. So, he has to be poked with a stick into fighting back-then we nail him. Just my 2 cents.

Let us remember the denouement in Viet Nam. It came quickly and poorly reported as the stooge government went into general collapse causing a panicky run for the exits. The present adventure carries the real possibility of something like this occurring. If the southern cities fall into the Sadrists' hands then anything is possible. I am sure there are withdrawal-under-fire plans already made but it would be a debacle of unprecedented proportions, much more obviously a defeat of American arms than Korea, Viet Nam or even the War of 1812. The domestic reverberations would be extraordinary in light of all the deception that has gone on since day one. I sense it is a matter of when and not if, there being no earthly way to turn this into a triumph of even the most phony sort. It might even make the Bush I's Highway of Death look like a picnic in the desert in retrospect. Need some serious reporting on this rolling defeat for "the government of Iraq".... some on Israeli sites (the offensive is stalled and petering out, both major pipelines southward blown up and on fire), more to come from Britain this evening I trust. We may finally be entering the twilight of this odd imperial folly...

This is one of the best analyses I have found on the Web concerning the debacle in Iraq. The final thing I will say about what is happening now is that the clear loser in all of this is John McCain. As goes Iraq, so goes John McCain’s candidacy.

Basically we want them to continue to fight each other so we can continue to keep our forces for refereeing and containing these fights.

Nothing new here.

Second, I remain slightly mystified that Muqtada al-Sadr continues to make such soothing noises.

If al-Sadr and the Mehdi forces went on the offensive, and the Mehdi forces were squashed (quite likely), al-Sadr would lose a lot of influence.

Al-Sadr doesn't need to defeat Maliki and the ISF. All he needs to do is limit Maliki's and the ISF's gains. (Don't forget al-Sadr reiterated the right to self defense.)

That would burnish al-Sadr's credentials as the defender [of the poor, the downtrodden, the weary, etc.] and position Maliki as the big bad aggressor.

What's going on?

An attempt to gain a political base with violence.

How will it turn out?

Not well

al-Sadr would lose

Thousands, tens of thousands or more might die when the US begins destroying Sadr City. The firepower the US can bring down on the people of Baghdad, as was brought down on Fallujah, is being avoided out of al Sadr's compassion, the compassion of the Shiites, and fear of mass immolation. We can burn their fucking asses into history. The terror of the US forces is more than just considerably deadly. We can use the latest, most expensive weaponry to degrade the people of Sadr City into ash. Most Americans do not consider Fallujah in their politics, but Shiite Iraqis do. The most populous and poorest class of Iraqis know what it is like to be oppressed. Iraq's Shiite's history is one of accommodation and oppression. Americans do not understand what is the purpose of Iraq's destruction, except that some profit justifies its demolition. And so the work continues.

Two more observations:

(1) Iraqi government forces are not fighting in Basra and are fleeing in large numbers.
(2) Sadr only needs to stay alive and limit his losses - he doesn't need to "win" [although that word has lost all of it's meaning with regard to Iraq]. Maliki will be painted as a sock puppet of the Americans (which he is) and Sadr burnishes his image as a defender of the people.

America? We are so fucked and this crisis makes that abundantly clear. Our options now are to engage in a mass slaughter of innocent civilians by bringing in AC-130 gunships (ala Fallujah) in Basra and Sadr City or let the Iraqi government go down to defeat and allow Iraq to be Balkanized into a dozen enclaves at war with one another.

I'll bet John McCain's Depends are even fuller than usual these days...

Like most Americans, the only person I beat with regard to Iraq cred is GWB.

My take, which has not changed in four years, is that we took the side of the Shiites in Iraq, more specifically, Shiite Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq. We have no choice but to take sides as long as we are there. If we are foolish and ignorant, which we are, we may occasionally take other sides, even Sunni, but for the most part we are against them.

As the primary military power in Iraq, we are responsible for the chaos and destruction of Iraq.

Congratulations to GWB and all my fellow Americans that support him. You know who to take sides with in Iraq, who deserves to live and die, how to make all the other important decisions for the Iraqis, and how long we should stay to prevent a blood bath. Anybody who doubts this should consider the wisdom the same folks applied by invading Iraq in the first place.