The US military says sectarian killings up in Baghdad

This story isn't really a surprise, but after all the recent efforts to play down the numbers of sectarian killings, this inevitable admission is news.

Sectarian killings have surged in parts of Baghdad not yet included in a security offensive, the U.S. military said Thursday, while bombings and other insurgent attacks killed four American soldiers and wounded 25 in the capital region.

And from the Department of Duh,

"The terrorists and death squads are clearly targeting civilians outside of the focus areas," Caldwell said.

How dare they avoid the four neighborhoods in Baghdad where the US is operating? (Sorry, probably not the right tone here, but the miltary is announcing this widely predicted outcome as if it were a surprise, and I don't really know how to express that.)

There are some new stats on Together Forward. It looks like the various combatants moved their weapons, too. In the five and a half weeks "In areas that have been part of the operation, U.S. and Iraqi forces have cleared more than 52,000 buildings, found 32 weapon caches, detained 91 people and seized more than 1,200 weapons."

They have captured a "name" Al Qaeda guy, al-Liby, which is something, but thus far the obvious whack-a-mole analogy seems to be holding true.