2006-06-15

Iraq using 'treasure' of al-Zarqawi info

National Security Adviser Mouwafak al-Rubaie also said he believed the security situation in the country would improve enough to allow a large number of U.S.-led forces to leave Iraq by the end of this year, and a majority to depart by the end of next year. "And maybe the last soldier will leave Iraq by mid-2008," he said.

I'd say that's news everyone can be happy about.

"We believe that this is the beginning of the end of al-Qaida in Iraq," al-Rubaie said, adding that the documents showed al-Qaida is in "pretty bad shape," politically and in terms of training, weapons and media.

"Now we have the upper hand," he said at a news conference in Baghdad. "We feel that we know their locations, the names of their leaders, their whereabouts, their movements, through the documents we found during the last few days."

All-in-all, good news.

6 comments:

Nadir said...

Bring the troops home NOW!

Unknown said...

End poverty NOW!

Cure cancer NOW!

Balance the budget NOW!

Fix Detroit NOW!

Make the Detroit Lions Super Bowl contenders NOW!

Lower my cable TV rates NOW!


I know they're all unreasonable requests, but you started it.

Paul Hue said...

Six: Liberals and leftists are very naive and immature in their desires and demands, don't you think?

In this case, though, Nadir is demanding something that a particular person could actually grant, and which I lack a certainty about. Bush could pull all troops NOW!, and this indeed might result in the best possible outcome. I lack a certainty about either options here.

The other leftist demands don't fit into this catagory as far as I'm concerned, except perhaps the damand to balance the federal budget (do the leftists actually demand this?), which I think may be possible by cutting many fedl programs (lowering fedl spending), and lowering and simplifying the tax system (increasing fedl tax income).

Paul Hue said...

Six: Expect the lefties to claim that this is a big hoax designed to boost Bush's numbers. This will beg the question: why doens't Bush jsut hoax the entire war, or at least stage a succession of hoaxes?

Nadir said...

Bush HAS staged a succession of hoaxes. They are the reason we have troops in Iraq in the first place!

Bring the troops home NOW is not an unreasonable request. Simply constructing an orderly timeline for withdrawl and putting it in play would mean certain victory for the Republicans in November.

Unfortunately, the US has no intention of leaving Iraq. Once "security" is restored, they may draw troops down, but there will be a US presence in Iraq until the Iraqis drive us out.

Paul Hue said...

Nadir: In your last sentence, the word "us" does indeed mean the US, because US troops do represent the citizens of the US, via the democratic mechanisms that resulted in the troops existing where ever they are. But your term, "the Iraqis", can only apply to agencies resulting from democratic mechanisms, not ad hoc collections of strong men.