According to the reports, massive explosions all over Iraq today:
More than 100 people were killed in a string of bombings and ambushes in Iraq today in the worst large scale violence since May and June, and the Al Qaeda group in Iraq said that it was launching a nationwide campaign of suicide bombings in retaliation for an American-Iraqi military offensive against insurgents in the northern city of Tal Afar.
The Al Qaeda statement, published on a militants’ Web site, did not claim responsibility for a specific attack but said: “We would like to congratulate the Muslim nation and inform it the battle to avenge the Sunnis of Tal Afar has begun,” according to Reuters.
Some of the attacks today were directed against Shiites, signifying they were the latest in a campaign by Sunni insurgents who are bent on exploiting sectarian divisions across Iraq.
Two militant groups had issued warnings of attacks against Shiites in retaliation for the offensive in Tal Afar. Although Kurdish pesh merga fighters took the lead among the Iraqi forces in that attack, most rank and file Army soldiers are Shiite, as is Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, who ordered the campaign in Tal Afar.
The most serious attack took place in the Khadhimiya district of northern Baghdad at a place where large numbers of laborers typically gather in the morning in hopes of being hired for the day. A suicide bomber lured a crowd of men eager for labor to his minivan, and then blew it up just before 7 a.m., killing at least 80 people and wounding 162 in Khadhimiya, a Shiite neighborhood.
It continues to bewilder me that this small minority group chooses to attempt to provoke a civil war against the majority…
Tim F
It’s not hard to imagine when yopu think that after holding the catbird seat for decades the Sunni stand to become the red-headed mules of the Iraqi confederation. If this constitutional process goes along smoothly they know full well that they’ll get shafted.
Pretty much the only thing the Sunni have right now is vast caches of weapons and extensive military training from the Saddam years. They don’t have enough political muscle but they sure as shit have the ability to make the rest of Iraq miserable into the indefinite future.
The general plan being, (1) sow chaos and drive out the Americans, and (2) hope that chaos brings a better deal of the cards than a constitution does. It’s not what you’d call a visionary strategy but it seems to be the direction they’re headed.
Al Qaeda in Iraq has more or less the same strategy, except that they’re hoping that chaos will let them do in Iraq what the Taliban did in Afghanistan.
Andrew Reeves
Did I mention that I really detest Wahabbis? At least Shi’ite terrorists and rebels tend to stick to military targets.
Eural
Yeah – its crazy for a small minority to provoke a civil war against a majority. Except when it works, just ask the Nazis or the Bolsheviks. In fact weren’t our Founding Fathers a minority early in the American Revolution until an inept British government handed them popular support (and even then rather limited) through its policies? This should have been a tough but managable job. You can blame Rumsfeld and the rest of the neo-cons for turning it into a disaster and handing Bin Laden a publicity coup he never dreamed of before 9/11.
Lines
We’re winning their hearts and minds, just have to pick them off the street, off the walls, out of the mortar.
CJ
It’s not so crazy when you consider that it worked for them the last time and that they were able to ride the tiger for a very long time.
CJ
TallDave
We’re blessed with awfully stupid enemies. Every time they do this it just makes them even less popular, and the population more willing to support a crackdown on them.
Lines
It never worked for the Palestinians, why would it work for the Sunnis?
Tim F
A dictatorship is not a popularity contest. They would happily settle for being feared.
Anderson
Sunnis are a great majority in the Muslim world but happen to be a minority in Iraq. So they can count on favor & support from Syria, Arabia, Egypt, etc. Anytime the Shi’a heretics get blown up, that’s a score for the Sunnis. (Of course not all Sunnis think like this, but enough do.)
So the Sunni minority in Iraq has the motive to fight & win support from their fellow Sunnis, particularly as Iraq’s Sunni neighbors cannot be excited about Iraq’s becoming a close ally of the arch-Shi’a nemesis, Iran.
srv
Yes, but even worse for SA is the idea of a Shi’a dominated gov’t on their north border, next to the Shi’a population in SA. Who just happen to live where most of the oil is.
But I’m sure our SA (911 fundies) allies once again only have our best interests in mind.
scs
I guess the Sunnis never heard the saying “you catch more flies with honey than vinegar”. If the Sunnis want a share of the oil wealth, I think they better play nice and work out a deal, instead of hoping for the whole pot again. Basically, I think the militants are all overgrown Boy Scouts and enjoy the fighting and bombing. Much more fun than worrying about providing jobs to your people and cleaning up the garbage from the streets.
stickler
Some people think that we’re talking about California or Vermont here:
Hello, this is Mesopotamia. It’s been handed back and forth by armies and empires since the dawn of civilization. Hell, they invented civilization. And “playing nice” in that part of the world has been proven a losing proposition for millennia.
Remember, too, that the Ba’ath party wasn’t, originally, a “Sunni” movement, it was a pan-Arab, nationalist movement (co-founded by Arab Christians). In Iraq, Saddam’s government tried with some success to foster national identity — based on resistance to outsiders, spanning all sectarian communities. I’ll bet that many of the Ba’athists in the insurgency would tell you that they’re fighting for “all” Iraqis, not just the Sunnis. (I don’t know if I’d believe them, but I’m not living in their neck of the woods: the question is, do enough Iraqi Shiites, Christians, Turkmen, et al, believe them.)
scs
.
Yes I can see that their strategy has worked out very well for them, given their high standard of living and successful governments.
RSA
I vaguely recall a survey taken in Iraq indicating that Sunnis in Iraq are generally not even aware that they are a minority in the entire country. This sounds slightly nuts to me, so maybe my memory is off.
Boronx
It continues to bewilder me that this small minority group chooses to attempt to provoke a civil war against the majority
Imagine, if you will, that Saddam’s intelligence service ( Mukhabarat? ) was not destroyed in the invasion, but had survived underground, hidden from view, infilitrating its enemies and biding its time until the Americans leave the field.
Anderson
Well, in this country, 50 years ago, it was common to distinguish between “Southerners” and “Negroes,” the former being white of course.
stickler
Scs:
Well, until 1991, Iraq had one of the highest standards of living in the region. And they sort of invented the idea of the “university” in Baghdad. As far as successful governments go, well, not every country has had the historic good luck to be bordered by only Mexico and Canada. They had their borders drawn for them by the British, you know. Same people who gave them their government (until 1958, anyhow).
Do you get all of your knowledge of the world from Fox News, or from News Max?
scs
I don’t even know what News Max is. And Stickler, having the highest standards of living in the Middle East ain’t no big deal. Any wealth they get from oil is concentrated in a minority. Ask the Shiites in Iraq what their standard of living was before 1991. The invention of the university, if done there, was done hundreds, maybe thousands of years ago at a time when the Middle East was a more liberal place. Even Mohammed was supposed to be somewhat liberal for his time and believed in women’s rights. Not an endorsement of radical Islam and kind of over the statute of limitations. Where do you get your news, Stickler, Baghdad Bob?
stickler
Hey, scs:
There’s this thing called the “Internets” where you can find out all kinds of neat information. I hear there’s even some kind of company called “Google” that might help you nail that timeline down a little.
And provided you have access to actual printed books, or even a modern American university, you might be able to find out more about Iraqi living standards, regional history, and the relative “liberalism” (!) of Mohammed, or the Middle East. You could perhaps start by defining the word “liberal,” and seeing if Hammurabi or the Assyrian Empire or the Caliphate meet any modern English definitions of that word.
I’m not going to do your research for you. But before you talk out your ass about the Middle East, you might want to find out some basic facts.
goonie bird
Im sure his royal ashat TED KENNEDY will blame bush you know how these liberals get when their being stupid
scs
Well you got me Stickler. You’re right. I don’t know the year of the establishment of the first university ever that was established in Baghdad. I knew it had to be before 12th century, as that was when I had the impression that the first universities were established in Sorbonne, Bologna, and Oxford. So your university was either hundreds of years old, or before the year 1005, which would make it thousands of years old. So I took your advice and I looked it up. What did I find out? That you don’t know what you are talking about! Following is the entry in Wilkipedia.
So what you were talking about did not ring a bell because you were wrong. Anyway, Stickler, don’t waste my time. I’m just stating common knowledge. That post was not intended to be a dissertation on the Middle East. The actual year that this “university” was established is not important. What’s important is whatever it is that you were thinking about was a loooooong time ago. My point stands uncorrected.
stickler
Ah, scs, I have had angry and blinkered students like you in my classroom before.
You rely on Wikipedia. Nice start, if you’re plagiarizing in eighth grade. Very clever. But, um, there are other sources out there.
I’m again not going to do your research for you. One Google search is not enough to earn a C- here. A Wikipedia search is an improvement (ah, but be careful of your sources!), though it is important to consider other possibilities.
Have you ever come across the name Omar al-Khayyam? Or perhaps the Bayt al-Hikmah (the House of Wisdom)?
No?
How about that subversive Arabic word, “algebra”?
Okay, that’s three Google searches. While you scrabble around looking for an explanation (which you wouldn’t have needed if you’d finished your tenth grade world history course), I’ll have a glass of “al-coohol.”
Ah.
scs
Dude, don’t act smarter than you are.
scs
And by the way, I am guessing you are a foreign blogger, I’m guessing a Muslim country. Because I’m sorry Stickler, Omar al-Khayyam or Bayt al-Hikmah is not real big here in 10th grade curriculum.
stickler
So you didn’t look any of it up. Wow! Color me shocked.
I grew up outside Spokane, Washington. And, yes, that part of the country isn’t exactly part of the leading edge of our modern culture. But “foreign?” Where the hell are you from, you illiterate and ill-educated numbnuts?
And, by the way, have you actually completed the 10th grade? What shit are they shoveling you in your public school?
Steve S
Iraq is going well. Nothing to see here, everything is fine.
Looks to be about time that our troops can come home now with peace and prosperity and democracy breaking out all over Iraq.
Tim F
I don’t know about tenth grade, but I have a copy of the Rubiayat on my desk right now. It’s hardly an obscure text.
scs
Hey Stickler, don’t call me ‘uneducated’. You were the one who was wrong about the first university being in Baghdad. I think you need to brush up on YOUR education. Try looking things up more before you make things up. I suggest a Google search. At least have the guts to admit you’re wrong instead of having a tantrum. Until you grow up, there’s no use ‘speaking’ with you.
ImJohnGalt
Man, I long for incivility Friday-Wednesdays.
DougJ
It’s wrong to say it’s either winning the war on terror or funding aftermath of Katrina. We have to do both that means we’ll have to cut spending where else to make sure we are fiscally prudent with the taxpayer’s dollars.