In Iraq, each outrage supercedes the last
As we sit and watch the media going crazy over this "millenarian cult" battle in Najaf, I find my mind slipping backwards. Wasn't it just a week ago that US troops were kidnapped and killed in Karbala? Do we have any answers as to who was behind that?
How about the bombing of Al-Mustansiriya University two weeks ago or the Shia market bombing that killed 200 a month ago?
What about the carbomb last Thursday that killed three? Or the daily execution of dozens in the streets?
None of these attacks is ever resolved.
The pace of the violence is now coming so quickly that each act of violence is superceded by the last. The hospitals are choked with wounded and the morgues are overflowing with dead.
If a Shia dies in a bombing, then all Sunnis are responsible. If a Sunni body is dumped in garbage along the side of the road, all Shia must pay.
Truth no longer matters. No one really knows who is behind any of the attacks anymore. It is no longer about individual culpability. The Iraqis now simply blindly blame the other side.
This is the nature of civil war.
(Reuters) - Bombers killed 36 people in two attacks on majority Shi'ite worshippers marking the religious ritual of Ashura on Tuesday amid heightened tensions between Iraq's Shi'ites and once politically dominant minority Sunnis.....
Also in Baghdad, mortars rained down on the mainly Sunni district of Adhamiya, killing 17 and wounding 72, a police source said.
(Reuters) TUZ KHURMATO - Five worshippers were killed when a rocket propelled grenade hit a Shi'ite mosque in the town of Tuz Khurmato, 70 km south of Kirkuk, police said.
BAGHDAD - Three mortars killed 11 people and wounded 28 more in Zaafaraniya, southeast of Baghdad, a police source said.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb killed one person and wounded three others in al-Baladiyat district in eastern Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb in Hurriya, a mainly Shi'ite neighbourhood in northwest Baghdad, killed one person and wounded 14 more, a police source said. Another police source said five were in killed in the attack and 25 wounded.
BAGHDAD - A bomb planted inside a minibus killed four people and wounded five others near al-Mustansiriya Square in northeastern Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb killed one person and wounded three others near a square in Sadr City district in eastern Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb targeting a police patrol wounded two policemen near Qahtan Square in Qadisiya district in southwestern Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - Three university professors and a student were kidnapped in the Khadimiya district in northern Baghdad when they were on the way home from a seminar at a law college on Sunday, a Higher Education Ministry official said.
How about the bombing of Al-Mustansiriya University two weeks ago or the Shia market bombing that killed 200 a month ago?
What about the carbomb last Thursday that killed three? Or the daily execution of dozens in the streets?
None of these attacks is ever resolved.
The pace of the violence is now coming so quickly that each act of violence is superceded by the last. The hospitals are choked with wounded and the morgues are overflowing with dead.
If a Shia dies in a bombing, then all Sunnis are responsible. If a Sunni body is dumped in garbage along the side of the road, all Shia must pay.
Truth no longer matters. No one really knows who is behind any of the attacks anymore. It is no longer about individual culpability. The Iraqis now simply blindly blame the other side.
This is the nature of civil war.
(Reuters) - Bombers killed 36 people in two attacks on majority Shi'ite worshippers marking the religious ritual of Ashura on Tuesday amid heightened tensions between Iraq's Shi'ites and once politically dominant minority Sunnis.....
Also in Baghdad, mortars rained down on the mainly Sunni district of Adhamiya, killing 17 and wounding 72, a police source said.
(Reuters) TUZ KHURMATO - Five worshippers were killed when a rocket propelled grenade hit a Shi'ite mosque in the town of Tuz Khurmato, 70 km south of Kirkuk, police said.
BAGHDAD - Three mortars killed 11 people and wounded 28 more in Zaafaraniya, southeast of Baghdad, a police source said.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb killed one person and wounded three others in al-Baladiyat district in eastern Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb in Hurriya, a mainly Shi'ite neighbourhood in northwest Baghdad, killed one person and wounded 14 more, a police source said. Another police source said five were in killed in the attack and 25 wounded.
BAGHDAD - A bomb planted inside a minibus killed four people and wounded five others near al-Mustansiriya Square in northeastern Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb killed one person and wounded three others near a square in Sadr City district in eastern Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb targeting a police patrol wounded two policemen near Qahtan Square in Qadisiya district in southwestern Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - Three university professors and a student were kidnapped in the Khadimiya district in northern Baghdad when they were on the way home from a seminar at a law college on Sunday, a Higher Education Ministry official said.
posted by mikevotes at
8:38 AM
6 Comments:
In Iraq, each outrage supersedes the last
That's who it works. The opposing parties forget why they started hating each other and find their motivation in yesterdays outrage. It becomes a self-propelling machine of hate and death. A machine for which Bush is happy to fuel with other peoples blood.
By
-epm, at 9:49 AM
It's the inertia of civil war.
And, I don't think you can stop it at this point.
Mike
By
mikevotes, at 10:30 AM
I don't think WE can stop anything directly or militarilly. We can do little more than stick our finger in the dike...
By
-epm, at 10:35 AM
But it's an undersized finger and there keep being more and more holes.
The US is no longer leading events on the ground.
I think that's the whole Bush strategy, to try to reclaim that controlling status, but at best right now, the US is fourth in terms of influence.
Mike
By
mikevotes, at 10:38 AM
Which begs the question: Has the US become irrelevant (or at most an irritant) in the larger scheme of things, with regard to the indigenous actors and their plans?
Conversely, will the absence of US forces in the neighborhoods really result in the WW III scenario predicted by the White House? Perhaps we have too narcissistic a view of our own power. Perhaps "the enemy" does not quake in his boots in the shadow of the US military as we so self-absorbedly think he should? Perhaps our leaving gives "the enemy" one less thing -- one less excuse -- to kill his neighbor or to hate his government.
I'm not sure I'm expressing my self clearly.
By
-epm, at 2:32 PM
Did you see the article I posted last night from the SFChron questioning the premise of regional war upon pull out?
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/01/28/MNGCJNQHOI1.DTL
I don't know if I fully agree, but it is an interesting read.
Within Iraq, if we pull out the Shia will roll out and crush the Sunnis or the Sunnis will be forced to the table.
The third possibility is the messy, Saudis supporting a continued Sunni terror/insurgency.
Those are my guesses.
Mike
By
mikevotes, at 3:15 PM
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