Iraq on the front pages

I used to complain that I thought Iraq didn't get enough coverage, but I didn't appreciate the costs it was going to take for Iraq to make it to the front pages.

US death toll in Iraq hits 103.

(AFP) "With the US death toll in Iraq passing 100 this month and mid-term elections just days away, the Pentagon said the US force in Iraq has grown to 150,000 troops, the biggest it has been since January."

(NYTimes) "Though American officials would describe Mr. Hadley’s talks only in the vaguest of terms, one option widely discussed in Washington and Baghdad in the days before his arrival, according to American and Iraqi officials, is a substantial increase in the number of American and Iraqi troops patrolling Baghdad......" (accomplished by extending deployments. The article says further that no announcement will be made until after the election.)

(Copy Editor pointed out yesterday that the 4th ID is due to rotate out soon.)

(AP) "Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Tuesday ordered the lifting of joint U.S.-Iraqi military checkpoints around the Shiite militant stronghold of Sadr City and other parts of Baghdad." (I'm assuming this is part of some agreement struck with Hadley who arrived in Baghdad yesterday for emergency meetings.)

"CBS News has learned exclusively that Gen. George Casey, the U.S. Commander in Iraq, is expected to recommend the size of Iraqi security forces be increased by up to 100,000." (Video.)

(WaPo) "Seventy percent of the Iraqi police force has been infiltrated by militias, primarily the Mahdi Army, according to Shaw and other military police trainers."

(LATimes) "Growing numbers of American military officers have begun to privately question a key tenet of U.S. strategy in Iraq — that setting a hard deadline for troop reductions would strengthen the insurgency and undermine efforts to create a stable state."