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Our occupation of Iraq and the fragile surge has been all but blacked out in the U.S. media, but thankfully, the foreign press is still out there trying to bring the truth to the rest of the world. A big part of the surge was the Awakening Project. The goal of the project was to pay Sunni and former insurgents to fight al Qaeda and drive them out of their towns. The result is 80,000 angry men and a surge on the brink of collapse.
Despite spending some $12 billion dollars a month in Iraq, the Bush administration has failed to pay most of the Awakening members and their patience is all but gone. Thousands of men have given up and walked away from the program and resentment toward the U.S. has reached a boiling point. This video from The Guardian is a real eye opener as they go inside these groups and let them tell their stories in their own words.
They hear news accounts that the U.S. military is taking credit for the surge and they are angered. They feel that they are doing the dirty work that Americans should be doing and they feel they’re being used as propaganda to sway the U.S. presidential elections. Senator John McCain has staked his entire presidential campaign on Iraq and the success of the surge. I hope that he, along with all Americans, has the chance to watch this video and see the real surge.
No Trackbacks To “The Guardian: The Surge May Be On The Verge Of Collapse“
Frist.
Sorry Logan, just my opinion, but I would assume with the financial mess of recent weeks, you’d be hard pressed to find any Americans that really care much about what is going on in Iraq, except to blame them for the economy sinking. Definitely a video worth watching though for those that do care.
And, of course, they get to keep their shiny new rifles, right?
We’ve rearmed factions that will ultimately turn against us. Brilliant.
Well gee whiz, after you get finished paying KBR for multicolored embroidered towels, infectious bathing water, and faulty wiring that electrocutes our solidiers, there’s just no money left to pay the people you’re pretending aren’t actually the ones keeping the violence down. What’s a Bushie to do??
Their incompetence will sink them in the end.
Their incompetence has caused over a million deaths.
No matter what Bush says, history will never vindicate his reputation.
Nothing - no presidential library, no glowing hagiography - will right the wrongs his incompetent leadership unleashed on Iraq.
I am furious at that man every fucking day.
Just think. Had the U.S. simply done business with the Middle East over the past century there wouldn’t be any Al Qaeda at all.
It’s incredible to imagine what the world might have looked like if we hadn’t sought full global hegemony. We should have listened to Eisenhower:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=8y06NSBBRtY
Blowback’s a bitch.
Lied to, cheated, and double-crossed by the incompetent Bush administration … imagine that.
It’s more of the Bush “Midas” Touch - anything he touches turns to shit.
He praised the one sheik who stood up to fight al-Qaeda … and al-Qaeda offed him inside of a couple of days.
He’s called the economy strong, and it’s turned to mud.
He’s praised the surge, but his pet general, Petraeus, says the Iraqis aren’t working hard enough, and Cheney had to go give ‘em a pep talk.
Now, he’s praised the ‘Anbar Awakening,’ and we hear that it’s really falling apart.
Three failed companies and the bungled management of a MLB team really told us everything we needed to know, but people didn’t pay attention.
this is from a dispatches documentary on channel 4 the other night, download the whole thing here-
http://onebigtorrent.org/torre.....atches-avi
Two centuries of war history and still we thought THIS time war would solve all our problems…
American Voters to John McCain:
“what now Einstein?”
Obama cannot win you idiots. I cannot believe that the Democrats are blowing this one big time.
[please don’t start something I’ll have to finish…………………Site Monitor]
Read about the US Occupation from another perspective and see if what bush and cheney fits with what the people living there have to say.
This is a great article!!
FOCUS IRAQI VOICES
‘Iraq is a war-torn nation’
By Faruq S. Ziada
Five years later, Bush says his decision to go to war was the right one [AFP]
“They feel that they are doing the dirty work that Americans should be doing …”
Yes, because why should Iraqis have any interest in cleaning up Iraq? It’s not like they live there or anything… oh, wait. I can understand the part about them wanting due credit, but to think that their nation’s stability is the responsibility of Americans — or that Americans are even capable of bringing it there — is just silly.
If the US promised to pay them for their efforts, they should follow through. But the fact that these people need to be paid in the first place for something which is in their best interest is kinda disturbing. That’s like paying me to finally visit the doctor so I can deal with the large, painful, ominous tumor growing on my torso. As if I’m doing you a favor.
This election should be a cakewalk but… The Democrats have bought into the repubs lies about hillary and now they are going to lose.
What would it matter if McCain sees the film?
He has his orders and he’ll carry them out.
Yes, the Guardian, that bastion of journalistic integrity. Yawn.
ConcernedHusseinCanuck @ 2:
Geez CC…alot of us do care. ALOT. I will concede though, that there are alot that don’t give shit about anything that isn’t right in front of them.
Arm local militia’s, and then anger them. Wonderful.. are they worried history won’t will repeat itself and therefore going that extra mile? I mean.. wtf?
liberalHUSSEINmoderation @ 18:
I realize you and a number of posters on here do. But the way things are going, and have gone, people pay little attention except when making talking points. It’s sad. Actually no, strike that, tragic. But with people struggling just to live in both your country and mine, they don’t have the time or energy to give to this disaster that deserves it.
I know when my company is back geared up after this winter finally finishes, I never have much time to watch the tv news, or be online, and neither does my spouse.
anon123 @ 19:
“But this time will be different!” is a standard excuse for drunks.
Never mind that the Brits armed locals when fighting in Afghanistan, then lost some of their best troops when they got religion and defected.
Never mind that we armed the mujahadeen and they turned into the Taliban.
This time will be different!
Surge this Bush.
RickinSF @ 16:
McCain would fall asleep.
Captain Kangaroo @ 23:
Or want to go shopping with Lindsy Graham.
If the Republicans ran Jesus Christ and the Democrats ran Hitler the Democrats would still win!!! The Republicans can’t even win with Rush Limbaughs voter fraud!!!
Yes how rude of them to not want to clean up the mess WE created!!!
Religious leaders, police officers, doctors, last time I checked they all got paid!?!?!?!?
THANK YOU GUARDIAN! One of the LAST reliable THINKING news sources!
When I sit down and think “What would I do to fix this?” I come up blank. There is no solution - it’s too far gone and too complicated. Staying won’t work, leaving won’t work, supporting one side won’t work. They hate the U.S. more than ever! What are the other options???
As stated earlier, the uniquely Republican blend of arrogance + incompetance is (remains) the fatal flaw in the US occupation. I don’t think we have no money left over to pay these guys $300 per month. To the contrary, I think its quite likely that $300 per head per month was paid - but it often doesn’t get to them. I doubt we’re letting each man come up and collect. It goes to some higher up Iraqi to distribute. Maybe they do, maybe they don’t.
And, no, I’m not trying to blame Iraqi corruption either. After all, who has been aiding/installing Chalabi-types into positions of power? What kind of example of corruption & kickbacks do our contractors make for Iraqi society? What occupying power would have only 11 Arabic speakers out of 900 embassy employees in Baghdad? The list goes on and on.
Republican arrogance/incompetance - from Bremer’s firing all Iraqi police/army/civil-employees back in 2003, letting KBR farm out all the rebuilding efforts,to not understanding the political/religious players in Iraq’s society, through to this short-sighted arming/training of potential future combatants - will be our undoing. This is what happens when Republicans place party loyalty above all else. And it costs lives: in Iraq, in New Orleans, in coal mines.
BTW, I have relatives from the old Soviet Union. This type of mismanagement by loyal party hacks who don’t know or care about doing their civic jobs is exactly what they hated about the USSR. Now we’re duplicating it here.
Instead of bringing the “troops” home, I think the soldiers (hired killers) should stay there and go to work killing for another country. Maybe they can start a war with the Blackwater hired killers.
Thanks for this clip. What an explosive mess Bush and his incompetent cronies have brought upon that poor country. Seems the civil-war will erupt again soon.
How is it possible that the media completely follows whatever is coming out of Washington? Would they not dig a bit deeper to find the truth? All in the US beleive the surge is working…..Yikes.
RH Potfry @ 17:
As opposed to the Washington Times or The National Review or The Weekly Standard or The American Enterprise Institute or The Heritage Foundation or Fox “News”?
RH Potfry @ 17:
You should then point out all of their errors. Odd that you chose not to do so. It is always a clever tactic to claim that the source is unreliable when you have absolutely nothing else to say. It is the “You are a poopy-head” approach and most impressive.
[deleted. check your attitude. see the commenting policy. sitemonitor]
I’m confused, I thought our tax dollars were being spent to pay the al-Sadr Shiites not to attack us. You mean our billions are also being pissed away to keep the Sunnis quiet too?
Kimble @ 35:
Surge working great? For an alternative view take a look here:
http://arabwomannews.blogspot.com/
Be sure to scroll down and take a look at the pictures. Don’t turn your head. NSW
YourMom @ 28:
Stationing the whole fricking Bush Administration in a tent in Anbar Province.
But seriously (and sadly), you’ve got it in a nutshell.
I think our only option is withdrawal - and to take our lumps for having gone in without a mission or an effective strategy (we needed both a practical military aspect and a means of engaging the Iraqi populace as well as the government). And, for all that the GOP likes to whine about people who feel they’re entitled to something, the way we’ve handled this situation has done nothing but create a dependent nation.
That means coming to terms with the very things the Bush Administration thought they were fighting against. We’ll be looking at an unstable local government that can be exploited by a number of factions, though I’d worry about al-Sadr, Iran, and al-Qaeda Iraq in that order - the first leads to a theocratic state under Shari’a Law, which will then seek out its like-minded brethren in Iran.
We will be facing a backlash throughout the Middle East - we demonstrated nothing but arrogance in tromping into Iraq and thinking ‘democracy’ consists of throwing an election and seating a parliament. But the other Middle East countries have seen an unpleasant side of America - the ‘we’ll come in and fuck with your countries because we’re serving a higher cause (Democracy, Christ Jesus, or Capitalism, take your pick)’.
There’s really no sense to the ‘if we pull out, it will embolden them and they’ll come here’ - because it treats terrorists as if a) there are finite numbers, and b) they are so stupid they’ll line up to enter Iraq, just because we’re there. Our opposition in Iraq is not so much the cream of al-Qaeda’s forces, but opportunistic thugs reaping the benefits of a deer-in-the-headlights leadership.
Strategically speaking, they’re mobile and we’re not - so we’ve lost the initative and any hope of victory. (But the chickenhawk brigades and the 101st Chairborne assure us a will-to-victory is enough.)
That a Leftie newspaper should engage in such wishful thinking is not at all remarkable.
Nor particularly important. The fact is that the surge is working, and the nutball Left just can’t stand it.
Bye Bye McCain. With the collapse of the Awakening Project goes his candidacy; into the sewers of Iraq. Although we would have all hoped that this project would have been successful, McCain was showing off his C student intelligence when he pinned everything on “the surge”.
The Sunnis know what the story is. No ’surge” of 30,000-40,000 American troops would ever make any practical difference in Baghdad and definitely would not have made any difference throughout the entire nation at all. The Sunnis know that they are the bulwark that the Bush Administration is reliant upon. To offset the Iranian backed Shia the Bush Administration has to arm, and arm heavily the Sunni faction. The Sunnis can name their terms because they know also that without them, the Bush Administration’s scheme falls apart. So, the Sunnis can and will make huge demands that apparently are not being met. They can simply walk away if those demands are not met and let the Americans tangle with the Shia again.
How ironic, the Bush Administration entered Iraq under the guise of removing the Sunni dominated Hussein Government only to be heavily arming them afterwards.
ConcernedHusseinCanuck @ 20:
Yeah we’ll all miss you.
are you telling me that for $800,000 per day we could have an Iraqi fighting force that is clearly on our side? Why have an Iraqi Army for that price when for 500 times more you can have an American occupation that continues to foment anger and aggression towards us?
When all these neocons eventually meet their maker, I wouldn’t be surprised if he says “no” and turns them away. Because my maker is a peace loving God, not a God of endless war and suffering.
John Faber @ 40:
I’m sorry Mr. Faber but there is no 30,000-40,000 extra troops alive that would have made any difference. That was simply a political show. The real moves were the payoffs and arming of the Sunnis and the deals cut with the Iranian backed Shia. Al Sadr still has the cease fire in place. If Sunni the “Awakening Council” walks away the Iranian backed shia will have no choice but to renew the fighting. If that happens then the Bush Administration will be right back to square one.
Bush couldn’t even tie his own shoes, much less run a war.
John Faber @ 40:
Of course the surge is working. That’s why McCain had to find a different marketplace to go for a stroll in. That’s why Kyra Phillips had Iraqis lining up around the block to tell her how wonderful life is in Iraq.
And I can’t wait to hear Petraeus’ song-and-dance in a couple of weeks.
But I’m sure you think things will be better in six months.
What the right can’t stand is that this ugly little war is getting in the way of them bathing their corrupt asses in oil. Like a complete rube buying into the old ’stick it out at the gaming table’ nonsense, you’re losing your shirts. (Your souls were sold to someone else when you weren’