The secret war in Iraq

The Stars & Stripes reports that the US is again engaged in Iraq against those al-Qaeda insurgents who were decimated once, but they’ve seemed to be in engaged in an upsurge in recent months;

Riding in armed convoys, al-Qaida’s affiliate, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, has intimidated towns, assassinated local officials, and last week killed the commander of the Iraqi Army’s Seventh Division and more than a dozen of his officers and soldiers as they raided an al-Qaida training camp near Rutbah, in Anbar province.

The surge in violence stands in contrast to earlier assurances from senior Obama administration officials that Iraq was on the right path, despite the failure of American and Iraqi officials in 2011 to negotiate an agreement for a limited number of United States forces to remain in Iraq.

According to the Times, Iraq’s foreign minister has floated the idea of having American-operated, armed Predator or Reaper drones respond to the expanding militant network. But Maliki, who likely will seek a third term as prime minister and who is sensitive to nationalist sentiment at home, has not formally requested such intervention.

So, this is what? The third time we’ve committed military force to Iraq in the last two decades? This time it’s a piecemeal fire-fighting operation, eating away at the edges of the bad fellows. that should work like every other time we when we just decided unilaterally that the war was over until getting the opinion of the enemy. We set a bad example for the Iraqis who are fighting a reactive battle instead of seizing the initiative. The drone war doesn’t seem to have any noticeable effect, so let’s just keep doing that to make it look like we’re doing something.

Category: Terror War