The Blood Flows in Iraq
08 March 2006 3:47 pm by Taylor Marsh
The Blood Flows in Iraq (cross-posted at firedoglake)
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Gunmen wearing what appeared to be the
uniforms of Iraqi Interior Ministry commandos stormed a private security company
in the capital Wednesday afternoon and kidnapped as many as 50 employees, an
official of the ministry said. In an atmosphere of spiraling lawlessness, at
least 47 people across the country were killed between Tuesday and Wednesday
nights. In the deadliest incident, the bodies of 18 men, all bound at the wrists
and blindfolded, were found piled in an abandoned minibus late Tuesday by a
U.S. military patrol in al-Mansour, a mixed neighborhood of Shiite and Sunni
Arabs in western Baghdad, the U.S. military said in a statement Wednesday.
Gunmen
Raid Baghdad Security Firm, Abduct 50 Employees
— Meanwhile, at Least 47 Killed
in Latest Wave of Iraq Violence
This is going from bad to worse, like the final beat of a stopping
heart.
Iraqis are being found bound, gagged and dead across Iraq, slayings no longer
an aberration but the norm. Whole families and people from the same religious
sect murdered with impunity.
In the middle of the carnage stands the U.S. military, between hell and the
blood waters.
Death squads operate in the light of day.
Reuters reported that thugs attacked at the home of Interior Ministry advisor
Maj. Gen. Moussa Salman in western Baghdad. Two of his bodyguards died.
At least some of the insanity seems to come compliments of the push back over
the Shiites' nominee for prime minister, Ibrahim Jafari, who is not backed by
Sunni Arab and Kurdish politicians. Juan
Cole (always) has more.
Meanwhile, Donald Rumsfeld has joined the estimable but checked out Joint Chiefs'
head Peter Pace in Iraqland, a place where reality is put on hold and every
fantasy is indulged. Yes, of course, gentlemen, the carnage is overstated. In
what world, by what measurement?
Via Emily
Messner, let's turn to some Iraqi bloggers… Iraq
the Model, with a conversation
he had with his dad about why the bombs were so loud in Baghdad. “Iraq
Democracy is a Farce,” is sobering. Also check out 24
Steps to Liberty.
“More than 1,000″ have been killed since the Golden Mosque bombing,
which for me was the
insurgents' Tet Offensive, for those of you willing to walk the metaphor
out.
The Pentagon confirmed 2,304 U.S. service personnel have died in Iraq since
March 2003. But what of the wounded? Senator John Warner said that between 25-30,000
have been wounded, some seriously maimed. That's not nothing, people.
Oh, and by the way, the AC-130
gunships are back, which can only mean escalation on all fronts, because
those babies don't exactly pick and choose their targets.
It looks like a new
type of war to me. Dare we call it civil?
