Great news out of Iraq recently. Not only is the surge working well (you know its working when the MSM ignores it) but there have been many recent arrests:
U.S. forces have arrested the two leaders of the network believed responsible for the brazen raid in Karbala by terrorists disguised as Americans, in which five U.S. soldiers were kidnapped and later killed in January, U.S. military officials said today.
In operations over the past several days in Basra and Hillah, coalition forces captured Qais Khazali, his brother Laith Khazali and several other members of the Khazali network, a splinter faction of the Mahdi army.
Senior U.S. military sources tell ABC News that hard evidence linking the Khazalis to the Karbala raid, including the ID cards of several of the dead American soldiers, was recovered at the scene.
The coalition also found evidence linking the men to Iran and to an arms smuggling operation that included the high impact Explosively Formed Projectiles, or EFPs, according to U.S. officials.
And it was also revealed that a "Saddam Fedayeen leader involved in setting up training camps in Syria for Iraqi and foreign fighters" was also arrested in Mosul. Officials declined to name the individual or describe the location of the camps in Syria.
And people were curious why Sadr ran like a widdle girl to Iran. He went to save his ass.
Bill Roggio points out that which our MSM ignores:
The violence in Baghdad remains low as further evidence emerges that Sadr’s Mahdi Army is breaking apart. The most high profile incident in Baghdad occurred after a Katyusha rocket slammed into a building next to the one where U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon was speaking. There were no casualties.
The unstated U.S. strategy to isolate Sadr and divide his Mahdi Army is moving forward. Sadr’s militia is "breaking into splinter groups," the Associated Press reports. About 3,000 Mahdi fighters are said to be "financed directly by Iran and no longer loyal" to Sadr. The splinter Mahdi forces have "crossed into Iran for training by the elite Quds force." Qais al-Khazaal, a former aide of Sadr, is said to be leading the faction.
Sadr’s power is derived from his control of the militia, combined with the political power he wields in the parliament. With Sadr in Iran, the Mahdi Army split, and some elements negotiating with the government, Sadr has becomes less of a threat to the government. The extremist factions that spin off are a threat, but these are elements that were never going to join the political process. Like al Qaeda, there are elements of the Mahdi Army that will fight until the bitter end.
Meanwhile I just now read a Michael Yon piece written in January where he writes an eloquent eulogy to a Iraqi hero. A man who saw a suicide bomber and gave his life, literally jumping on the grenade, so that others in his village could live.
He was dressed as a woman as he walked down the alley toward the mosque full of worshippers. It was Friday, just before Ashura, and the air was chilled.
The bomb strapped to his body was studded with ball-bearings so that he could kill more villagers as they gathered for prayer. The detonation would eviscerate and dismember those closest, shattering bones into fragments, but the ball-bearings would ensure lethality beyond the percussive edge of the blast wave, ripping through the flesh of people who might not have been knocked down by the explosion.
There were no soldiers in his path to stop him; no police to alert to the man in women’s clothes. There were only villagers. The man dressed as a woman was to be the agent of their deaths. He kept walking down the alley toward the mosque where more than one hundred people were praying, a mass murderer masquerading in a woman’s garb.
As the murderer dressed in women’s clothes walked purposefully toward his target, there was a village man ahead. But under the guise of a simple villager was a true Martyr, and he, too, had his target in sight. The Martyr had seen through the disguise, but he had no gun. No bomb. No rocket. No stone. No time.
The Martyr walked up to the murderer and lunged into a bear hug, on the spot where we were now standing.
The blast ripped the Martyr to pieces which fell along with pieces of the enemy. Ball-bearings shot through the alley and wounded two children, but the people in the mosque were saved. The man lay in pieces on the ground, his own children having seen how his last embrace saved the people of the village.
Michael then goes on to detail how the MSM sent nobody to check out the story (sound familiar?) instead they relied on heresay and phone interviews…cough Jamil Hussein cough….
In the retelling of terrorist attacks in Iraq, key details are often left out while others insinuate themselves into places they don’t belong. So it was for the thwarted bomb attack in this village, which quickly found its way into media reports, described as yet another incident of sectarian violence, which on some level it was.
In front of the walls pocked with craters from the ball bearings, truth was more nuanced. But apparently no journalists visited the village to find out what really happened and what it tells us about the people who live here. American commanders were so taken with the sacrifice that LTC Eric Welsh led a patrol up to the village, and after some time we found the mosque. LTC Welsh talked with the village men where the Martyr saved the people. I recorded the conversation. Please listen here.
It’s one more story that is ignored by our MSM, that which tells us how the Iraqi’s are growing stronger. How they are fighting back:
A senior Iraqi official has been quoted as saying the government was holding talks with some major insurgent groups that might be nearing a point where a number would join forces against al Qaeda.
Saad Yousif al-Muttalibi, director of international affairs in Iraq’s National Dialogue and Reconciliation Ministry, said the talks were designed to help drive al Qaeda out of the country.
“We’ve already established links and contacts with major insurgent groups,” Muttalibi told the BBC, according to a report on the broadcaster’s Web site.
“One of the aims is to join with them into the fight against al Qaeda. We are almost getting there and to join forces to attack al Qaeda to get them out of Iraq,” he said.
But alas, Murtha and his gang are still trying to outdo each other on who can be the fastest to run from a fight. Disgusting cowards one and all.
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Looks like some Democrat general in Iraq wants to throw Yon out of the theatre. Probably a ploy to turn sentiment against the war since the surge appears to be working. Don’t think that all general officers are behind the President … there are quite a few partisans in those ranks too.