Taliban Killed, Buildings Destroyed in Early Morning Firefight

Release Number: 07-01-03P

BAGRAM AIR BASE, Afghanistan – Afghan and Coalition forces killed 10 Taliban militants and destroyed two buildings in an air and ground engagement early this morning in Helmand Province.

There were no Coalition casualties in the firefight.

A Coalition convoy was ambushed by Taliban militants in the vicinity of Gereshk. Coalition forces fought back from the ground and employed close air support to destroy the buildings from which enemy forces were firing.

“Taliban forces clearly lost this engagement, and will continue to lose throughout Afghanistan,” said Army Maj. Christopher Belcher, a Combined Joint Task Force-82 spokesperson. “Peaceful Afghans are beginning to realize how harmful the Taliban are to their way of life, and they will no longer tolerate these criminals in their midst.”

Medical Outreach Operation Helps Iraqis

U.S. and Iraqi Soldiers teamed up April 20 to provide Iraqi citizens with basic medical care during a medical operation in Khatad Village, Iraq.

“The MEDOP allows us to see a perspective very foreign from the battlefield,” said U.S. Army Maj. Dimitri Cassimatis, a surgeon with the 1st Squadron, 89th Cavalry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division (Light Infantry), “We see mothers and fathers bringing in their children – (they are) worried about their health.”

While most of the people had routine health complaints some were sent to the Civil Military Operations Center where they could receive continual care.

“Today we are treating and giving out medication for common illnesses,” said Sgt. William Bradshaw, a 1-89th military transition team medical trainer. “The CMOC is staffed with doctors that can do more for the Iraqis.”

While the main goal was to provide basic medical care for the Iraqi people, there was an opportunity for both the Soldiers and the Iraqi people to get to know each other better.

Read the Rest...

Operation Commando Dive Nets Suspects, Guns

BAGHDAD — A multifaceted coalition operation in the Shubayshen area, just south of Baghdad, led to the detentions of almost 50 individuals and a number of cache finds, April 21.

Operation Commando Dive incorporated several units’ operations from the2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division (Light Infantry) out of Fort Drum, N.Y., as well as the 4th Brigade, 6th Iraqi Army Division.

Operation Eagle Dive was conducted by the Iraqi army “Baghdad Eagles” brigade in conjunction with U.S. Army’s 2nd Battalion, 15th Field Artillery Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team. The effort netted 33 detainees, most suspected of building and planting improvised explosive devices.

Caches found during the operation contained two machine guns, two shotguns, six AK-47 rifles, two ski masks, 27 mortar rounds, 280 57mm rockets, four 155mm rockets, nine 12-volt batteries, multiple mortar fuses, three IEDs, 500 hand grenades, four 82mm mortar tubes, a large rocket, and six rocket-propelled grenade launcher sights. Additionally, numerous IED initiation devices and 30 DVDs of al-Qaeda propaganda were discovered.

Read the Rest...

U.S. MilitaryTraining Iraqi Military Health-Care Workers

By Helen Hu
Stars and Stripes

BAGHDAD — A plain building with barred windows and stacked-up chairs symbolizes the U.S. Army’s hopes for training Iraqi military health workers.

Steps away from one of the country’s busiest emergency rooms, the structure is being turned into a schoolhouse with laptop computers and high-tech dummies that breathe and bleed.
About 30 Iraqis have been trained in American-style emergency medicine under a program at Ibn Sina Hospital, which is run by the 28th Combat Support Hospital.

The program’s goal is to polish the trauma-related skills of doctors, nurses, pharmacists and other health workers so the Iraqis can resume control of Ibn Sina, a center formerly used for the care of Saddam Hussein’s family and Iraqi government officials, according to Maj. Murray Kramer, a coordinator with the Army Reserves’ 3rd Medical Command, which manages the program.

The students, all men, serve in the Iraqi army and are picked by the Ministry of Defense to participate in the $250,000 program, which spans 13 weeks but might be cut to eight.

Read the Rest...

72 Suspected Terrorists Detained

MULTI-NATIONAL FORCE-IRAQ
COMBINED PRESS INFORMATION CENTER
Release A070429a

BAGHDAD, Iraq – Coalition Forces captured 72 suspected terrorists and discovered bomb-making materials Sunday during a constellation of overnight raids targeting the al-Qaeda in Iraq network.

In a massive synchronized effort, Coalition Forces descended on targets in Anbar and Salah ad Din provinces to disrupt the al-Qaeda network. Operations in Samarra alone uncovered 36 individuals with alleged ties to al-Qaeda terrorists.

Near Karmah, intelligence reports led Coalition Forces to 20 five-gallon drums of nitric acid and other bomb-making materials.

“Coalition operations like these continue to chip away at the al-Qaeda in Iraq network, and we will continue to target them as long as they continue to injure and kill the innocent people of Iraq,” said Lt. Col. Christopher Garver, MNF-I spokesperson.

Cavalry Foils Insurgent Attack at Tarmiyah Huda Girls’ School

Multi-National Corps – Iraq
Public Affairs Office, Camp Victory
RELEASE No. 20070430-06

By Spc. Jeffrey Ledesma
1st Cavalry Division Public Affairs
Multi-National Division – Baghdad PAO

CAMP TAJI, Iraq – Multi-National Division – Baghdad Soldiers foiled an insurgent attack comprised of numerous improvised explosive devices targeting an all-girls’ school north of Baghdad April 28.

Soldiers with 2nd Battalion, 8th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Brigade CombatTeam, 1st Cavalry Division, discovered a command wire leading from the school’s outer perimeter to one of the rooms at the Huda Girls’ School, inTarmiyah, Iraqi. Inside the room, the cavalry troops discovered five artillery shell explosives.

The insurgent’s planned attack, in opposition of the construction of the school, also included two large explosive-filled propane tanks buried underneath the school’s floor and numerous projectiles emplaced underneath electrical conduits in front of each classroom.

The unit believes Al Qaeda extremists, operating in the area, are responsible for the emplacement of the explosives in an effort to thwart the progress the local government has made to improve the lives of the people ofTarmiyah.

Read the Rest...

Iraqi Security Forces Launch Raid Seeking Capture of Suspected Death Squad Leader

Multi-National Corps – Iraq
Public Affairs Office, Camp Victory
RELEASE No. 20070430-01

Multi-National Corps – Iraq PAO

Baghdad – Iraqi Special Operations Forces have launched a raid aimed at the capture of a key individual linked to alleged death squad activity and attacks against coalition forces in Basrah.

He is believed to be a rogue element of the Jaysh-Al-Madhi (JAM) militia in the Basrah area. The detainee is also alleged to be responsible for providing JAM with funding and weapons and assisting in the recruitment of new members.

The Iraqi SOF initiated the raid with coalition forces present as advisors.More details on this operation will be released as they become available.

Coalition, Iraqi Forces Conduct Intel Driven Operation

Multi-National Corps – Iraq
Public Affairs Office, Camp Victory
RELEASE No. 20070430-02

1st Cavalry Division Public Affairs
Multi-National Division – Baghdad PAO

BAGHDAD – Iraq security forces with Coalition Forces supporting conducted an operation to capture several high-value individuals who were reportedly meeting in the Kadamiyah area April 29. The targeted operation was conducted after receiving specific intelligence about the meeting.

Soldiers from 2nd Brigade, 1st Infantry Division established a security cordon around the area while waiting for Iraqi forces to get in position. Shortly after setting up the cordon, Coalition and Iraqi forces began receiving small arms fire. Insurgents began burning tires in the streets south of the Al Sadr Mosque and near a children’s hospital. The mosque and hospital did not catch fire, and later, emergency responders were able to extinguish the fire with coalition help.

Several individuals were detained as a result of the operation and were turned over to the Iraqi security forces. Coalition Forces did not enter the mosque and withdrew from the area with the Iraqi forces after conducting the operation.

Polar Bears, Golden Dragon Discover IEDs, Weapons Cache

Multi-National Corps – Iraq
Public Affairs Office, Camp Victory
RELEASE No. 20070430-08

2nd BCT, 10th Mtn. Div. (LI) PAO,
Multi-National Division – Center PAO
BAGHDAD— Coalition forces discovered two improvised explosive devices anda weapons cache southwest of Baghdad today.

Soldiers from B Company, 2nd Battalion, 69th Armor Regiment, 3rdInfantry Division from Fort Benning, Ga., currently attached to the 4th Battalion,31st Infantry Regiment “Polar Bears,” and the 2nd Battalion, 14th InfantryRegiment “Golden Dragons,” both units of the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10thMountain Division (Light Infantry) from Fort Drum, N.Y., discovered the weapons.

The first IED was discovered by 2-69 Armor Soldiers southwest ofYusufiyah at 9:35 a.m. local time.

Soldiers of D Co., 4-31 Inf. discovered another IED in the vicinity ofRushdi Mullah at 10:05 a.m. local time, while conducting a dismounted patrol.The IED was found near a wood line in a white plastic bag.

In another incident, the Golden Dragons found a weapons cache nearRushdi Mullah.

The cache consisted of three rocket-propelled grenade rounds, a bag filledwith unknown types of explosives, three bags of crystalline powder and threelarge blasting caps.

The cache and IEDs were destroyed by the explosive ordnance teamduring a controlled detonation.

11 Suspected Terrorists Detained

MULTI-NATIONAL FORCE-IRAQ
COMBINED PRESS INFORMATION CENTER
Release A070430a

BAGHDAD, Iraq – Coalition Forces detained 11 suspected terrorists Monday during raids targeting the al-Qaeda in Iraq network.

Coalition Forces continued to crack down on the al-Qaeda in Iraq network, detaining 10 suspected terrorists near Samarra.

In Baghdad, Coalition Forces captured one suspected terrorist. Intelligence reports indicate he was allegedly a part of a local operation to acquire bomb-making materials.

“Al Qaeda in Iraq uses explosives to kill and maim innocent Iraqis, and the security forces striving to protect them, almost every day,” said Lt. Col. Christopher Garver, MNF-I spokesperson. “Removing these explosives and the terrorists who use them is a top priority.”

Web Reconnaissance for 04/30/2007

A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention.


In the News: (Registration may be required to read some stories)
Turkish crowds slam Islamist candidate - As many as 1 million people marched yesterday in Turkey's largest city, Istanbul, demanding that the Islamist ruling party withdraw its choice of Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul to be the next president. (READ MORE)

U.S. force aims to secure Africa - The United States hopes by year's end to establish an Africa Command that will anchor military operations across a continent seen to be of increasing strategic importance and threatened by transnational terrorists. (READ MORE)

Edwards pitches Clinton-era taxes - Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards said yesterday raising taxes for higher-income families back to their levels under the Clinton administration is a floor, not a ceiling, and he would consider even higher tax increases. (READ MORE)

Maliki's Office Is Seen Behind Purge in Forces - A department of the Iraqi prime minister's office is playing a leading role in the arrest and removal of senior Iraqi army and national police officers, some of whom had apparently worked too aggressively to combat violent Shiite militias, according to U.S. military officials... (READ MORE)

Clinton's PowerPointer - It was fairly simple, Mark J. Penn said calmly to Vice President Al Gore, reporting the findings of an exhaustive survey he had conducted in the early stages of the 2000 presidential campaign. Voters liked Gore's policies. They just didn't like Gore. (READ MORE)

Report Faults China On Rights Failures - The 2008 Olympic Games have become a catalyst for more repression in China, not less, according to an Amnesty International report released today and aimed at pressuring the Beijing government a year before the start of the world's premier sporting event. (READ MORE)



From the Front:
Acute Politics: Longest. Route. Ever. “My platoon now holds the Alpha Company (and probably the Task Force) record for the longest mission. We spent almost 40 hours outside yesterday and the day before. I'm not sure how much ground we covered, but I would estimate something close to 200 kilometers. We found lots of IEDs, blew up caches, got in a firefight, got blown up, stuck, tired, muddy and gross. More on that soon (with pictures!).” (READ MORE)

Omar: Artillery in Baghdad. “This ‘U.S. launches artillery barrage in Baghdad’ explains what those loud sounds we heard this morning were except that what we heard in northern Baghdad were the sounds of the shells being fired not exploding. It’s interesting how huge the difference between the two sounds is. I remember the sound of outgoing artillery from the days March 2003. At that time, Saddam’s Iraqi army deployed artillery units inside residential neighborhoods to ‘protect’ them from within civilian homes.” (READ MORE)

LTC Richard Phillips: Week 15--A Week to Forget “Some weeks should pass without comment. Too hard, too dark, too sad. Week 15 is one such week. I'm sure there will be others.” (READ MORE)

The Calm Before the Sand: Doubt “The time between mortar attacks used to be measured in days, even weeks. Now it's measured in hours. The days have been hot, and long. I've worked 12 to 14 hours a day, at least, for several weeks now. Only recently have I begun to enjoy some downtime, and had time to think about anything but cleaning my weapon or calling my wife.” (READ MORE)

Afghanistan JAG: Minefields in Afghanistan “According to statistics released by British de-mining agency the Halo Trust, Afghanistan is the most mined country in the world. They also estimate that over 500,000 mines still lie dormant in this country. Other agencies estimate that the number could be as high as ten million. An anti-personnel land mine is generally designed to maim an adult. The theory is that you tie up an army's resources when you wound a person instead of killing him.” (READ MORE)

Michael J. Totten: The View from the North "My colleague Patrick Lasswell and I interviewed on camera Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga Colonel Salahdin Ahmad Ameen in his office in Suleimaniya, Kurdistan, Northern Iraq. Colonel Salahdin spoke to us about his experience as an anti-Baathist guerilla fighter during Saddam Hussein’s genocidal Anfal Campaign – when 200,000 people were killed and more than 5,000 villages were destroyed. In one fight he recounts for us, 300 Peshmerga beat an entire Iraqi brigade of slave soldiers in battle and suffered only one casualty." (READ MORE)

Michael Fumento: February Firefight at Mizan "Approximately 40 Taliban are detected during daylight about 10 kilometers northwest of FOB Mizan. A jet could be called in on their position, dropping bombs and firing missiles and almost certainly killing some of them. But some of them isn't good enough out here. When you get the chance to kill or capture some, you try to kill or capture every last one of them. No airstrike can promise that on a group of men spread out precisely to avoid heavy casualties from the air or artillery. You have to go in and get them. A task force is quickly put together. It comprises Army Special Forces, a unit of the 10th Mountain Division, and B Co. 1-4 Infantry." (READ MORE)

Michael Yon: Desires of the Human Heart, Part II "A short journey with an American army unit, at war Part 2 of 2 - With each new day, the 1-4 tightened up security in and around the Babel College.That’s Major Baer in the big college kitchen. He works hard, and likes to talk about his wife back home. Major Baer is proud to be married to her, that’s for sure. He just keeps on talking about her, and then goes back to work." (READ MORE)



On the Web:
Donald Lambro: No longer unbeatable “Hillary Clinton's negatives keep climbing, raising new questions about her electability and improving the prospects of her chief rivals for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination.” (READ MORE)

Robert D. Novak: Hagel on Iraq “Sen. Chuck Hagel returned from his fifth visit to Iraq to join Senate Democrats last Thursday as one of two Republicans voting to begin withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq.” (READ MORE)

Michael Barone: Feeling Safe Isn't Safe “The murders two weeks ago at Virginia Tech naturally set off a cry in the usual quarters -- The New York Times, the London-based Economist -- for stricter gun-control laws.” (READ MORE)

La Shawn Barber: Homosexuals, Hate, and the Gospel “Last week, the House Committee on the Judiciary passed a bill that would expand the federal definition of so-called hate crime to add homosexuals and people confused about their gender to the list of protected classes.” (READ MORE)

Carol Platt Liebau: The demise of the lady “Perhaps there was one piece of good news that emerged from reports about Rosie O’Donnell’s crass and vulgar presentation at last Monday’s Matrix Awards luncheon:” (READ MORE)

Kevin McCullough: Why Feminist Mommies are like Pimps “Another story hit the headlines this week but did not get the graphic portrayal of the Baldwin case on cable, radio, and gossip pages on the internet. It was a small story about a split between actresses Lindsay Lohan and Keira Knightley.” (READ MORE)

WSJ Review & Outlook: Dutch Rub-Out “World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz faces an ‘ad hoc committee’ investigating his alleged ethics violations today, but it seems the committee has reached its conclusions even before he has a chance to defend himself. This fits the pattern of what is ever more clearly a Euro-railroad job.” (READ MORE)

John Fund: When Talk Isn't Cheap “Campaign finance laws are increasingly becoming a tool to suppress political speech, and the courts are finally waking up to the danger. Last week a unanimous Washington state Supreme Court struck down an outrageous interpretation of a law that had been used to classify the antitax comments of two Seattle talk-radio hosts as ‘campaign contributions’ subject to regulation--that is, suppression--by local prosecutors and officials who disagreed.” (READ MORE)

Dafydd: And Why the Sea is Boiling Hot, and Whether Pigs Have Wings “Just a small point to make in this story, which is mostly about a speech Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-Carpetbag, 95%) made to leftist activists in California. I pass lightly over her fabrications about President Bush -- she seems to believe that Bush's people put up that ‘Mission Accomplished’ sign on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier in order to claim (prematurely) that the entire Iraq War was finished -- to commence taking victory laps. She is belied by Bush's speech itself, the transcript of which is readily available: ‘In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed. And now our coalition is engaged in securing and reconstructing that country.’” (READ MORE)

Ed Morrissey: Good News In Anbar “Just as the Democrats have raised the white flag on Iraq, the New York Times reports that the surge strategy has started paying off in Anbar. Shops have reopened, people have moved back, and everyone's challenging the insurgents except Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi (via Memeorandum):” (READ MORE)

Flopping Aces: The Haditha Hoax “Lots of new information is coming out on the Haditha Marines, which I have written about extensively over the last year. First, one of the Marines has had his charges completely dropped due to some evidence, well...a ton of evidence, that has come out that may exonerate them all:” (READ MORE)

Don Surber: Wrong argument “Sebastian Mallaby’s column in the Washington Post today demonizes opponents of illegal immigration by making it appear as though they oppose immigration itself. That is like saying one opposes driving if one opposes DUI.” (READ MORE)

Bill Roggio: Iraq Report: Major operation against AQI network, Sadr's silence “Today was yet another relatively quiet day inside Baghdad. There were no major, mass casualty bombings, the largest acts of violence was a roadside bomb which killed two. The U.S. Army launched an artillery barrage at targets in ‘a known Sunni stronghold’ but there is no further information on the targets or casualties.” (READ MORE)

Fjordman: The End of the American Dream? “In March 2005, US President Bush, Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin and Mexican President Vicente Fox announced the establishment of the ‘Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America.’ This was meant to implement a common border-facilitation strategy to improve the ‘flow of people and cargo at our shared borders.’ As next steps were mentioned: ‘We will establish Ministerial-led working groups that will consult with stakeholders in our respective countries. These working groups will respond to the priorities of our people and our businesses, and will set specific, measurable, and achievable goals.’” (READ MORE)

Ian: (Video) Murtha suggests impeachment if President doesn’t “compromise” “Rep. John Murtha suggested the possibility of impeachment to “influence” the President to ‘compromise’ over funding for Iraq. Is it just me or does John Murtha sound like Vito Corleone? Does Murtha not know he is talking about impeaching the President of the United States because he is not compromising with the will of the far-left of Congress? That’s neither a high crime nor even a misdemeanor, which are the behaviors that are supposed to trigger impeachment.” (READ MORE)

Stefania Lapenna: Bassiji/Hezbollah militia's crackdown on 'immoral' women “Here are more photos of the crackdown on the women wearing ‘immoral dresses’. Notice that it's not only in Tehran, but all across Iran, too. The police, Bassiji/Hezbollah militia, are the very same 'people' who burn Israeli and US flags, pelt Western embassies, shout ‘Death to Israel, America’, call for the execution of hostages, etc. And are called ‘students’ by the ignorant MSM. By seeing this third series of photos, you may have realized who these ‘students’ really are.” (READ MORE)

Rantings of a Sandmonkey: Done “Today is going to be the day that I've been dreading for quite sometime now. Today is the day I walk away from this blog. Done. Finished. There are many reasons, each would take a post to list, and I just do not have the energy to list them. As anyone who has been reading this blog for the past month, I think it is apparent that things are not the same with me. There are reasons for that: One of the chief reasons is the fact that there has been too much heat around me lately. I no longer believe that my anonymity is kept, especially with State Secuirty agents lurking around my street and asking questions about me since that day.” (READ MORE)

Right Wing Nut House: A Clarification or Two “Maybe I should get into the stock prediction business. As I fully expected, some on the right are in full throated howl over my suggestion that we alter our mission in Iraq. The predictable response of the slack jawed yawpers doesn’t necessarily depress me, although I am not insensate to the barbs . Their personal attacks (in lieu of answering my points with intelligent counters) reveals how truly bereft they are of any understanding of what it will take for the efforts of our troops in tamping down the violence to bear fruit. Also as I predicted, the left has attacked me for not advocating a complete withdrawal. There are also those who have ‘congratulated’ me for ‘finally’ seeing it there way.” (READ MORE)

Cassandra: But It Had The Ring Of Truthiness! “Yesterday the editorial staff highlighted Michael Scheuer's excellent takedown of George Tenet's accusations that Condi Rice ignored his urgent warnings about al Qaeda: ‘Now a "frustrated" Tenet writes that he held an urgent meeting with Rice on July 10, 2001, to try to get "the full attention of the administration" and "finally get us on track."’ There's just one problem with this - Tenet's own testimony to the 9/11 commission:” (READ MORE)

Jay Tea: And then what? “President Bush is planning on vetoing the Iraq funding bill, citing the presence of a deadline for withdrawal. So, just what would happen if the United States withdrew from Iraq? Initially, I think it would be fairly calm. There would be some attacks against our forces, as the various and sundry factions would each try to get the ‘final’ attack on us that gives them the bragging rights for ‘driving out the infidels.’ After that, though, there would be a brief calm period, as the factions work out their strategies. It would be the calm before the storm - or, as a certain French monarch said, ‘le deluge.’ ‘Bloodbath’ would be a bit of an understatement.” (READ MORE)

Atlas Shrugs: SANDMONKEY Speaks! To Atlas “I met with Sandmonkey (at an undisclosed location) and commiserated. He is as charming and clever as you might expect from the ‘writer of an extremely cynical, snarky, pro-US, secular, libertarian, disgruntled sandmonkey.’ Fabulous. But his words of premonitory warning gave me great pause. He has scorn for the ‘new Democrats’ that sold out reformers and activists and destroyed fledging movements of democracy. Upon learning of his blog departure, I was heartbroken. Look, the blogosphere and the fighters for liberty and democracy lost a warrior when Sandmonkey backed away from the keyboard, signed off on his blog and wrote his last post here.” (READ MORE)

Have an interesting post or know of a "must read?" Then send a trackback here and let us all know about it. Or you can send me an email with a link to the post and I'll update the Recon.

Web Reconnaissance for 04/28/2007

A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention.

This is the Weekend Edition of the Web Reconnaissance it is updated periodically throughout the weekend as time and family permits.


In the News: (Registration may be required to read some stories)
Rice Deputy Quits After Query Over Escort Service - Randall L. Tobias, the deputy secretary of state responsible for U.S. foreign aid, abruptly resigned yesterday after he was asked about an upscale escort service allegedly involved in prostitution, U.S. government sources said. (READ MORE)

U.S., Japan Reiterate Warning to N. Korea - CAMP DAVID, April 27 -- President Bush and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe threatened North Korea on Friday with the possibility of new sanctions unless Pyongyang abides by its promise to shut down its nuclear program, while Bush invited senior lawmakers to the White House next week to discuss... (READ MORE)

CIA Held Al-Qaeda Suspect Secretly - An Iraqi man accused of being a key aide to Osama bin Laden and a top leader of al-Qaeda was arrested late last year on his way to Iraq and handed over to the CIA, the Pentagon announced yesterday, in what became the first secret overseas detention since President Bush acknowledged the existence of... (READ MORE)

Clinton Campaign Tries to Keep Heat on Obama Over Debate Response - The first Democratic presidential debate did little to change the shape of the 2008 race, but it provided a post-debate flash point Friday between the campaigns of Illinois Sen. Barack Obama and New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton over the issue of fighting terrorism. (READ MORE)

Bush invites Hill leaders to war talks - President Bush yesterday invited congressional leaders to the White House to discuss redrafting a new war-spending bill next week, and warned Democrats he is willing to wield his veto power repeatedly to block troop-withdrawal deadlines for Iraq. (READ MORE)

Saudis foil plot to attack kingdom - Saudi Arabia announced yesterday that an anti-terrorism sweep netted 172 Islamic extremists and had stopped plans to mount air attacks on the kingdom's oil refineries, break militants out of jail and send suicide attackers to kill government officials. (READ MORE)

Courts swamped by flood of cases in alien crackdown – Illegal alien-related felony cases are swamping federal courts along the southwest border, forcing judges to handle hundreds more cases than their peers elsewhere. (READ MORE)



From the Front:
The Online Chaplin: No Souls Lost “This morning I was talking to one of the soldiers from the TOC. I asked him, ‘Was it a good night?’ He responded, ‘What do you mean?’ I quickly added, ‘Did anyone die in the AO (area of operation)?’ ‘Did I have a good day?’, used to mean other things: no conflict with co-workers, no conflict with spouse, and just a general well-being about things. You know a kind of ‘Don’t worry, be happy,’ day. Nothing stressed you out. It was calm - a good day. Not any more the stakes are higher.” (READ MORE)

IraqPundit: "The present government is not competent." “USA Today reported this week from Baghdad that Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is in ever deeper political trouble. "A broad range of prominent Iraqi lawmakers say they have lost confidence in Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's ability to reconcile the country's warring factions," the paper reported. Al Maliki's ineffectiveness has been a major problem for some time. In order to maintain himself in office, for example, he long provided cover to Moktada Al Sadr's thugs, because Al Sadr's parliamentarians were an essential part of the Shiite coalition keeping Al Maliki in office.” (READ MORE)


On the Web:
Tom Borelli: Just Say No to Barney Frank’s Say on Pay “Reflecting the hostile anti-business sentiment of the Democratic majority in Congress, the U.S House of Representatives recently passed the ‘The Shareholder Vote on Executive Compensation Act’ on April 20.” (READ MORE)

Diana West: The 'limited' war for 'hearts and minds' “Someday, when the war in Iraq has become a historical episode, we will tally up the lessons learned -- if, that is, we ever learn any. Here are two worth mastering because failing to do so probably means we will no longer exist.” (READ MORE)

Robert D. Novak: McCain's complaint “Sen. John McCain, who was the darling of the political press corps during the 2000 election cycle, complains to friends that he is getting much rougher treatment from the news media than his competitors for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney.” (READ MORE)

Lawrence Kudlow: Al-Qaida Is the Problem in Iraq “According to the top American commander in Iraq, al-Qaida's No. 1 priority is defeating the United States in Iraq.” (READ MORE)

Naomi Schaeffer Riley: Who Would Jesus Pick? “Rudy Giuliani didn't score many points with social conservatives last week when he issued this impassioned endorsement of the Supreme Court's decision to uphold a federal ban on ‘partial-birth’ abortion: ‘I agree with it.’ He certainly didn't win over Richard Land, who has said he would never vote for Mr. Giuliani. When people ask the Southern Baptist Convention's representative in Washington why the former New York mayor's promise to appoint strict constructionist judges if he's elected president isn't enough, Mr. Land replies: ‘If he'll lie to two wives, what makes you think he wouldn't lie to you?’” (READ MORE)

Jules Crittenden: Al Qaeda-Cowed Nation Indicts U.S. Soldiers “It was only a matter of time. Charges of homicide and ‘crimes against the international community’ from a Spanish court against LTC deCamp, Maj. Philip Wolford and Sgt. Shawn Gibson in the death of Jose Cuoso in the Hotel Palestine in Baghdad, April 8, 2003. This is absurd, and shows a gross disregard for the facts. Unfriendly investigations by Reuters, Reporters Sans Frontieres and the Committee to Protect Journalists, in addition to the U.S. military’s own investigation, failed to turn up evidence of murder.” (READ MORE)

Bill Roggio: Taliban/al Qaeda camp targeted in North Waziristan “An unidentified explosion in the border village of Danda Saidgai in North Waziristan killed three Pakistanis and wounded four on Friday morning. While the incident seems relatively small on the scale of events in the region, the location of the strike and those involved makes the case more than interesting. The explosion certainly took place at a Taliban or al Qaida camp. Pakistani authorities claim the explosion was cause by a 'work accident' - an explosion of a terrorist bomb factory, while locals claim either a missile strike from Afghanistan or an air strike firing upwards of 5 missiles struck a home and two nearby religious schools, which were empty at the time. The explosion (or explosions) occurred at around 3:30 am local time.” (READ MORE)

Greyhawk: Appeal for More Hype “Chap asks, ‘Funnily enough I don't see anything about information war in the good LTCOL's article. Where's the IW/PA/PSYOPS love?’ Heh. I suspect that like me, Chap sees it between every line of the subsequent coverage. But perhaps I'm simply transferring my own suspicions...” (READ MORE)

A Soldier's Mind: “I’m Still Willing To Die For That Inch…” “Has anyone ever wondered about the personal strength and dedication it takes to be a soldier, fighting in Iraq or Afghanistan? Has anyone ever wondered where our troops have the intestinal fortitude to fight against seemingly insurmountable odds, against the terrorists in those countries? Has anyone ever wondered how our troops manage to continue to ‘soldier on’ when all they hear in the media is about how they should give up the fight and come home?” (READ MORE)

Ed Morrissey: Tenet A Little Foggy On The Details “I haven't had the chance to read the book by former CIA chief George Tenet, which Harper Collins will release next week, but it has generated its share of controversy. His top-level insider's account of the pre- and post-9/11 efforts against terrorism have current Bush administration officials unhappy -- and in at least two cases, pointing out deficient fact-checking. Tenet misidentifies a key figure in an argument he makes about how back-channel analyses started, and then neglects to mention his own analysis:” (READ MORE)

Dadmanly: Second Thoughts and Generalship “Call it all some considerations of the second draft of history, all relating to how we have conducted our military efforts in Iraq, how we’ve adapted, and where we stand now. The mainstream media (MSM) delight in stories like this. They move from darling to darling, from one convenient message to another, and find ways to highlight and stress those particular threads of military commentary and opinion that supports their own biases, or the partisan aims of those they seek to assist.” (READ MORE)

Don Surber: London bombings? What London bombings? “The U.S. military announced on Friday that it captured Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi (aka, Abu Abdallah). He is the mastermind behind the 7/7/2005 bombings in London. But you would not know it by reading the New York Times, the Washington Post or the Associated Press.” (READ MORE)

Have an interesting post or know of a "must read?" Then send a trackback here and let us all know about it. Or you can send me an email with a link to the post and I'll update the Recon.

Coalition Forces Detain Nine

MULTI-NATIONAL FORCE-IRAQ
COMBINED PRESS INFORMATION CENTER
Release A070427b

BAGHDAD, Iraq – Nine suspected terrorists are in Coalition Forces custody Friday after raids to disrupt al-Qaeda in Iraq operations around the country.

Near Salman Pak, Coalition Forces detained a suspected terrorist known to associate with al-Qaeda in Iraq and lead a group responsible for kidnapping Iraqis.

Coalition Forces detained five suspected terrorists in Mosul who are allegedly involved in a group responsible for making and using vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices, and attacks on the Iraqi Army, Iraqi Police and Coalition Forces.

In Baghdad, Coalition Forces detained an individual suspected to facilitating the movement of foreign fighters and IED-making materials.

Two suspected terrorists were detained near Ramadi when Coalition Forces found them with weapons and IED-making materials.

“Coalition Forces are continuing to disrupt the networks that make and use deadly IEDs to harm Iraqis and those who are trying to build a stable Iraq,” said Lt. Col. Christopher Garver, MNF-I spokesperson.

Operation Commando Dive Leads to Detentions, Cache Finds

Multi-National Corps – Iraq
Public Affairs Office, Camp Victory
RELEASE No. 20070427-11

Multi-National Division – Center PAO
2nd BCT, 10th Mtn. Div. (LI) PAO

BAGHDAD — A multifaceted-coalition operation in the Shubayshen area, just south of Baghdad, led to the detentions of almost 50 detainees and a number of cache finds April 21.

Operation Commando Dive incorporated several units’ operations from the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division (Light Infantry) out of FortDrum, N.Y., as well as the 4th Brigade, 6th Iraqi Army Division. Operation Eagle Dive was conducted by the 4/6 IA “Baghdad Eagles” inconjunction with 2nd Battalion, 15th Field Artillery Regiment, 2nd BCT, and netted 33 detainees, mostly suspected of involvement with improvised explosive device manufacture and emplacement.

Caches found during the operation contained two machine guns, two shotguns, six AK-47s, two ski masks, 27 mortar rounds, 280 57mm rockets, four155mm rockets, nine 12-volt batteries, multiple mortar fuses, three ready-to emplaceIEDs, 500 hand grenades, four 82mm mortar tubes, a large rocket, and six rocket-propelled grenade launcher sights. Additionally, numerous IED initiation devices and 30 DVDs of Al-Qaeda propaganda were discovered.

Read the Rest...

Petraeus: Interrogations Reveal Iranian Influence in Iraq

By Sgt. Sara Wood, USA
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, April 26, 2007 – Through interrogations of key detainees in the past month, the United States has learned a great deal about Iranian involvement in terrorist activities in Iraq, specifically the financing and training of insurgent groups, the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq said here today.

The interrogation of leaders and members of the Qazali terror network who have been in detention for more than a month revealed that Iran provided the network substantial funding, training on Iranian soil, advanced explosive munitions and technologies as well as arms and ammunition, and in some cases advice and even a degree of direction, Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander of Multinational Force Iraq, said in a Pentagon news conference.

When these terrorists were captured, coalition forces discovered a number of documents describing attacks on U.S. forces, including a 22-page memorandum that detailed the planning, preparation, approval process and conduct of the Jan. 20 attack on the Provincial Joint Coordination Center in Karbala, Iraq, that killed five U.S. soldiers, Petraeus said.

“Our sense is that these records were kept so that they could be handed in to whoever it is that is financing them,” he said. “And there's no question, again, that Iranian financing is taking place through the Quds force of the Iranian Republican Guards Corps.”

The U.S. has learned more about Iranian involvement in Iraq through the detention of one of the heads of the Sheibani network, which brings explosively formed projectiles into Iraq from Iran, Petraeus said. This leader’s brother was in Iraq, and was the conduit who received munitions from Iraq and distributed them among the extremist elements.

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Iraqi Police Becoming 'Very Capable' at Law Enforcement, Official Says

By Tim Kilbride
Special to American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, April 26, 2007 – Iraq’s growing police force is technically competent and functioning as it should within the country’s legal system, a top U.S. police trainer said yesterday.

The operational problems they have experienced are primarily the result of an unusually tumultuous security situation in Baghdad and elsewhere, said Army Brig. Gen. David Phillips, deputy commander of the Civilian Police Assistance Training Team and the senior military police officer in theater.

“I believe the Iraqi police are getting very capable in handling the law enforcement type mission and traffic mission. The problem you have is ... that there’s a lot of terrorists and insurgents who want to see them fail,” Phillips said, speaking to online journalists from Baghdad.

The Iraqi army, Phillips explained, is trained to contend with terrorism.

“When you compare the Iraqi army, who are over here fighting in an insurgency and against terrorists, we are training the police to perform law enforcement,” he said. “The training we give them – although they get tactical training – is primarily focused on being a police officer.”

Under normal conditions, Phillips said, the police would be engaged in “investigating crime and traffic patrols.”

In these capacities, the general said, the police are performing dramatically better now than even two years ago, when Phillips was last deployed to Iraq. He cited examples of traffic cops waving his convoy through traffic circles, and patrol officers walking their beat in a Baghdad neighborhood while local children played nearby.

With nearly 170,000 regular police on the country’s rosters, Phillips noted that in many areas of the country the Iraqi security forces operate virtually independently of U.S. and international guidance.

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Web Reconnaissance for 04/27/2007

A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention.


In the News: (Registration may be required to read some stories)
Senate Sends War Timetable To Bush's Desk - The Senate approved a $124 billion Iraq war spending bill yesterday that would force troop withdrawals to begin as early as July 1, inviting President Bush's veto even as party leaders and the White House launch talks to resolve their differences. (READ MORE)

Candidates Unite in Criticizing Bush - Democratic presidential candidates largely set aside their differences here Thursday and presented a united front of opposition to President Bush and his Iraq policy, urging the president not to veto newly passed legislation that sets a timetable for beginning the withdrawal of U.S. forces from the conflict. (READ MORE)

Army Officer Accuses Generals of 'Intellectual and Moral Failures' - An active-duty Army officer is publishing a blistering attack on U.S. generals, saying they have botched the war in Iraq and misled Congress about the situation there. (READ MORE)

U.S. Wants to Limit Guantanamo Detainees' Access to Lawyers - The Bush administration is urging a federal appeals court to clamp down on Guantanamo Bay prisoners' ability to see their attorneys and obtain government records to help argue their innocence. (READ MORE)

Russia to Suspend Compliance With Key European Pact - President Vladimir Putin said Thursday that he was suspending Russia's obligations under the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty, ratcheting up a tense standoff with the NATO alliance over U.S. plans to build a missile defense system in Eastern Europe. (READ MORE)

Senate OKs deadline in war funding - The Democrat-led Senate yesterday gave final approval to an emergency war-funding bill that sets troop withdrawal deadlines for Iraq, a measure that neither congressional chamber passed with enough votes to override President Bush's promised veto. (READ MORE)

With 18 months to go, 8 Democrats begin debate - Democrats hoping to become the next U.S. president made their most visible pitch yet to voters last night, with the war in Iraq dominating their first debate, the earliest election-season forum in modern history. (READ MORE)

'They know they are getting out' - Flight medics, pilots and crew chiefs know the chances of saving a wounded soldier are best if he receives medical attention within a crucial "golden hour" -- or maybe 90 minutes -- after being injured. (READ MORE)

Durbin kept silent on prewar knowledge - The Senate's No. 2 Democrat says he knew that the American public was being misled into the Iraq war but remained silent because he was sworn to secrecy as a member of the intelligence committee. (READ MORE)

Border chief defended on 'no confidence' - U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner W. Ralph Basham says a "no-confidence" vote against Border Patrol Chief David V. Aguilar by leaders of the agency's rank and file is "derisive, detrimental and blatantly unfair." (READ MORE)



From the Front:
Desert Flier: Day Flight “Flew my first day mission a few days ago. Iraqi Police came in with a gunshot wound to his abdomen. After three hours in the OR, we had to remove his spleen and part of his pancreas. There was shrapnel lodged near his vertebra, but we were able to safely remove it without causing any neurological compromise. He ended up losing a lot of blood before and during the case, and we couldn't wait until nightfall to fly him to Al Asad.” (READ MORE)

JD Johannes: Replicating Success "As the Marines of Weapons platoon fanned out under a starlit night to begin the census, they did not grumble about a census being a BS Op. They have seen how effective census data can be. The Previous Deployment - The 3rd Battalion of the 6th Marine Regiment was at the tip of the spear in some key operations in Western Al Anbar and were part of Operation Steel Curtain." (READ MORE)

Omar: Why Are the Democrats Doing This?"Instead of trying to come up with ideas to help they try to halt the sincere effort to stabilize Iraq and rescue the Middle East from a catastrophe.I am Iraqi and to me the possible consequences of this vote are terrifying. Just as we began to see signs of progress in my country the democrats come and say ‘well, it’s not worth it, so it’s time to leave’." (READ MORE)



On the Web:
WSJ: Review & Outlook: Africans for Wolfowitz “One of the most revealing subplots in the European coup attempt against World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz is who is coming to the American's defense. The rich European donor countries want him to resign, while the Africans who are the bank's major clients are encouraging him to stay.” (READ MORE)

Peggy Noonan: We're Scaring Our Children to Death “This week saw a small and telling controversy involving a mural on the walls of Roosevelt High School in Los Angeles. The mural is big--400 feet long, 18 feet high at its peak--and eye-catching, as would be anything that ‘presents a colorful depiction of the rape, slaughter and enslavement of North America's indigenous people by genocidal Europeans.’ Those are the words of the Los Angeles Times's Bob Sipchen, who noted ‘the churning stream of skulls in the wake of Columbus's Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria.’” (READ MORE)

Kimberly A. Strassel: Tort Tribute “Most Republicans viewed Barney Frank's recent hearing on subprime mortgages as nothing more than typical Democratic corporation-bashing--and nobody is happier about that than Barney Frank. The House Financial Services chief is surely grinning that so few picked up on his bigger purpose: bestowing a big, wet smooch on the trial bar.” (READ MORE)

A Soldier's Mind: Yet Still, Boots On The Ground “Soldier On” “Today General David Petraeus had some very important information to share with members of Congress. Apparently, many of them felt that what he had to say, wasn’t important enough for them to hear. Among those noticeably absent was the Speaker of the House. Petraeus didn’t try to sugarcoat his message, but instead provided an honest assessment of progress in Iraq. As he was speaking, the Senate was busy passing legislation to start bringing our troops home, before their mission in Iraq is complete. Legislation that the President has promised to veto. I find it extremely telling, that they’re willing to make judgements, based on their political agendas, instead of taking the time to listen to what General Petraeus had to say.” (READ MORE)

The Belmont Club: The Taliban Leave a Calling Card “The Taliban spring offensive is here. The AP reports: ‘The Taliban conducted a raid in Afghanistan's volatile south and took control of a provincial district, killing five people including the district chief and the head of the district police, the deputy governor said Friday. According to the NATO/ISAF site, Ghazni contains a PRT team and is in the American sector of responsibility. Ghazni is also in the newest of the ISAF "expansion areas" and may have been one of the most vulnerable.’” (READ MORE)

Dafydd: Go, Joe! “I've been reading the speech that Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT, 75%D) gave on the Senate floor, passionately arguing against the surrender bill that the fatuous Democratic majority in Senate and House have just passed (Power Line has the complete transcript). And I came across this passage that quite literally made my mouth fall open. It's so obvious once Lieberman points it out... but I must confess, I never realized it until I read Lieberman saying it. You will be as stunned as I, I predict (all emphasis added):” (READ MORE)

Crazy Politico: ERA Won't Fix Any Of These Problems “So, I'm reading the Op/Ed pages lately, and there has been a growing clamoring, now that Democrats control Congress, to get the Equal Rights Amendment back on the front burner. This weeks report that women start making less money than men straight out of college is the latest report to get feminists up in arms, and declare that an Amendment to the Constitution is the only solution. In today's Washington Post Martha Burke and Eleanor Smeal argue that ‘gender gaps’ in education, health care, and political positions will somehow magically disappear with the passage of the ERA. Salaries will somehow become comparable, differences in health insurance rates will go way, suddenly political participation will be based on population distribution.” (READ MORE)

Dadmanly: One Signature Away “Senator Barack Obama says that we are ‘one signature away from ending this war,’ making the remarkable statement in the first debate of democrats for the 2008 Presidential Election. Not to be outdone in the visualize peace exercise, Senator Hillary Clinton repeated her promise, that ‘if George Bush doesn't end the war, as President, I will.’ A central assumption of both of these naive positions is that the US fights ‘George Bush's war’ in isolation. If we weren't there, nobody in Iraq would be blowing people up. If we weren't there, Iraqis would work out there differences. If we weren't there, terrorists would stop being terrorists, or at least, go on to unidentified other targets elsewhere in the world, but in places that we just don't need to worry about either.” (READ MORE)

Don Surber: What they meant to say at the Dem debate “The first Democratic presidential debate was a huge success because few Americans actually saw the 8 candidates who showed up. The Democrats cleverly chose the least-watched cable TV news station — MSNBC, which hoped to use the debate to double its audience so that it could finally draw half of Shep Smith’s audience.” (READ MORE)

Bill Roggio: Al Qaeda in Iraq's Diyala Campaign “As Iraqi and Coalition forces build their forces to strike al Qaeda in their base in Diyala, the terror group is hitting hard at existing combat outposts in the violence-racked province. Over the past several days, al Qaeda in Iraq has conducted several suicide strikes at U.S. and Iraqi combat outposts, police stations and Army checkpoints throughout the province. The latest attack occurred today in the city of Khalis. A suicide bomber rammed his car into an Iraqi Army checkpoint. Ten Iraqi Soldiers were killed in the strike.” (READ MORE)

Jules Crittenden: March of the Morons “We live in a time of great moronitude. Morons, everywhere, rising from their morasses, massing and moving forward. In their multitudes, the morons march inexorably to the moronocy. The road is not easy. Some will fall by the way. Others, struggling moronically, will rise to blithering new heights of moronality.” (READ MORE)

Amy Proctor: GEN Petraeus Praises Iraqi Resilience “Bottom Line Up Front: GEN David Petraeus spoke the most freely at his briefing with the press this morning after most of the news networks returned to regular coverage. GEN Petraeus, Multi-National Force-Iraq commander, gave a statement and took questions this morning from the press corps in DC. Of course, the headlines that came out of that briefing were: ‘Things may get worse before they get better’, and ‘The operational environment in Iraq is the most complex and challenging I have ever seen’. Those are certainly true, but not the whole story.” (READ MORE)

Kat in MO: Information War: The Media as a Weapon “Michelle Malkin points to an article about the media in assymetrical warfare. There were a number of very significant points in this paper that did not lambast the media so much as chide it for pretending that it is objective and does not take part in the war. In many respects, it points out that the very nature of competitive media forces it to abandon it's journalistic integrity for sensationalism. It did abandon these ethics and routinely published historonic stories and faked images as a true representation of the war. And, once the images and stories were out, repairing the damage was practically impossible.” (READ MORE)

Kim Zigfeld: Cold War, Part II “It's very difficult to explain how anyone could ever have thought that Russia would simply ‘give up’ its hostility towards the West and its values and institutions just because it ‘lost’ the Cold War, and could therefore ‘never go back’ to Soviet values. Where did this insane idea come from? Is it just frenzied Western arrogance? If the West had lost the Cold War, would we have simply repudiated democracy and adopted a communist dictatorship?” (READ MORE)

Allahpundit: Saudis bust seven terror cells, arrest 172 “I’ve read the AP, BBC, and Reuters reports on this story and nowhere does it say the cells were linked, so this may have been a sort of ‘Five Families’ operation to hit a bunch of different people simultaneously while their guard was down. Come to think of it, none of them specify when the arrests were made, either. It could be that they’ve been busting people continuously over the past six months and only chose to go public today. 172 people, though. That’s a lotta jihad. From Reuters:” (READ MORE)

Dan Riehl: Bill O’Reilly, Defeatist? “Iraq won't become a Somalia. It will be far worse. It will either become an Iranian client state, or the center of a regional Sunni Shi'ite civil war. And for those who think watching rival Muslim factions murder one another is just fine with them, think again. The world economic implications of such a conflict will make Carter's gas lines look like a Gas and Go Express. Many of the world's economies will buckle under the strain of ever soaring energy costs.” (READ MORE)

ROFASix: Why Iraq? “What I would like someone to address is whether what we do in Iraq is worth it? I don't mean the $6.3 billion a month we spend there as much as the other costs. Does a pro or anti-US Iraq really affects US security? When you look at the region, the Saudis, Israelis and Pakistanis are our 'friends' because we are a major trading partner or we freely transfer to them our wealth to prop up their governments. The rest of the region are openly hostile, or at best ambivalent toward the US. We have proven for years that foreign aid does not buy friends, yet we continue to do it under a number of different guises.” (READ MORE)

John Hawkins: 10 Differences between Conservatives And Liberals “Conservatives and liberals approach almost every issue with completely different philosophies, underlying assumptions, and methods. That's why it's so hard to find genuine compromise between conservatism and liberalism -- because not only are liberals almost always wrong, their solutions almost always make things worse. With that in mind, let me take a few moments to explain some of the key differences between liberals and conservative to you.” (READ MORE)

Victor Davis Hanson: Is The War on Terror Over? “Do we still need to fight a war on terror? The answer seems to be no for an increasing number in the West who are weary over Afghanistan and Iraq or complacent from the absence of a major attack on the scale of 9/11. The British Foreign Office has scrapped the phrase ‘war on terror’ as inexact, inflammatory and counterproductive. U.S. Central Command has just dropped the term ‘long war’ to describe the fight against radical Islam.” (READ MORE)

Oliver North: Americans Now Love Losers? I'm Not Buying It. “If Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is right, nearly 60 percent of Americans agree with him that the war in Iraq is already lost. And if he is correct in saying that losing the war will increase Democrat majorities in future elections, then it may be fair to conclude that Americans now love losers. I'm not buying any of it -- and neither are the troops who are fighting this war.” (READ MORE)

David Limbaugh: There Are “Lies,” and Then There Are Lies “As someone who has criticized the Bush Administration for not fighting back enough against relentless Democrat attacks and disinformation, I was delighted by Vice President Cheney's overdue dress-down of the Peter-principled and unprincipled Senate majority leader, Harry Reid.” (READ MORE)

Patrick J. Buchanan: The Squalid Politics of War “Majority Leader Harry Reid is being lacerated, and justifiably so, for a pair of statements about the war in Iraq. The more widely quoted is the ‘war is lost’ remark of April 19, which, read in context, amounts to a charge of rankest cynicism against President Bush and his War Cabinet.” (READ MORE)

Rich Lowry: Lost on Iraq “Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid had a bright, shining moment of honesty when he said that the war in Iraq is lost. He unburdened himself of what he and many of his colleagues have long believed about the war. Now if only Democrats saw fit to continue with their truth-telling. Then they would acknowledge that their mandate for a U.S. withdrawal beginning in October is a policy predicated on our defeat, and that they don't think anything can or should be done about Iran and al-Qaida feasting on a prostrate Iraq and the country possibly descending into genocidal bloodletting.” (READ MORE)

Have an interesting post or know of a "must read?" Then send a trackback here and let us all know about it. Or you can send me an email with a link to the post and I'll update the Recon.

“Our Nation is not at War, Our Military is at War, America is at the Mall.

So says Cpl Neil Frustaglio USMC in response to Sen Harry Reid:

I was saddened after I was injured to find out that some of the good that we had done while there didnt even make a newspaper back home. We delivered over a million dollars worth of medical supplies to Iraqi hospitals in Ramadi. Hired Iraqis to take things into their own hands and clean up their streets. And helped rid the streets of the city of IEDs that not only hurt the Marines and soldiers but the citizens as well. I guess our humanitarian efforts dont make for a good newspaper article back here in America, where people are more concerned with traffic on their way to work or a long line in one of their trendy coffee shops. After all who really cares if we are making the lives of the people of another country better if Americans are more concerned with their mindless daily trifles.

One great quote I recently heard about the war in Iraq was this:

“Our nation is not at war, our Military is at war, America is at the mall.”

Roughly put that is the war in Iraq. The American people simply don’t care what is really happening in Iraq. If they did they would look deeper and talk to the troops who have served there. Instead they rely on the news media for their flawed information.

And what’s worse than America not caring is our politicians who are supposed to know what is going on using the troops as a political lever to flaunt their own opinions and electoral goals. How many Democrats are in office today that go there because they didnt support the war in Iraq? Using the ignorance of civilian America to launch
themselves onto a political platform.

Go to HotAir and read the rest...then follow Bryan's advice and forward the letter on to your Representatives in Washington, at your State Capital and local Government. Reid knows he is wrong about Iraq, but he is more concerned with winning votes than winning a war. He needs to be censured at a minimum and removed from office.

Making Iraq's Future Brighter: Operation School Supplies

By Tech. Sgt. Kevin Williams
506th Air Expeditionary Group Public Affairs

KIRKUK AIR BASE, Iraq (AFNEWS) -- No more pencils, no more books ... literally. Airmen from the 506th Air Expeditionary Group here are doing what they can to put these and other needed supplies back in the hands of Iraqi children.

Operation Iraqi School Supplies is a program where school supplies are donated to local Iraqi students who wouldn't otherwise have what's needed for a good education. Airmen made solicitations to organizations in the U.S. to send the most basic, and much needed, items students need for education.

"The supplies come from all over the U.S.," said Senior Airman Misty Edwards, a 506th AEG chaplain assistant. "(Items came) mostly from schools, church groups, companies and individuals. We even received supplies from a biker organization."

In all, Airman Edwards said they received 4,000 pounds of supplies during the Air Expeditionary Force 5 and 6 cycle. She expects that number to be about 5,000 pounds by the end of her tour next month.

Volunteers are crucial to the operation, Airman Edwards said. They are needed to collect and sort donations, bag and inventory the supplies, and coordinate the deliveries. Once the supplies arrive at Kirkuk Air Base, organizing them and getting everything ready for delivery is a top priority for volunteers throughout the base.

Most of our volunteers are from the fire department, Airman Edwards said. They come out two days a month. For the most part, we will have about eight people every time.

Read the Rest...

Seabees Build Command Outpost in Al Anbar Province

By Lt. Jeffery Moore and Lt. James Barlow
Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 28 Public Affairs

AL ANBAR PROVINCE, Iraq, April 25, 2007 — The Seabees of Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 28 finished construction of a combat outpost for Marine Regimental Combat Team 2 and Weapons Company, 1st Battalion, 2nd Marines, in Iraq’s Al Anbar province, April 24.

When the Marines asked for help, the battalion was ready to respond. Dating back to the early days of World War II, the Marine Corps and the Navy’s Seabees have enjoyed a long tradition of shared service, which includes having to endure the same harsh frontline conditions. Today’s struggle in the global war on terrorism is no different.

These combat outposts, or COPs, help bring stability to regions plagued by Iraqi insurgents. They serve as a staging point for regular patrols and weapons cache sweeps, and allow the Marines to respond quickly to any situation that might arise. COPs also afford Marines the ability to eat, sleep and work in relative safety.

Normally, COPs are constructed by Marine Combat Engineering Battalions, but this time, Seabees from NMCB 28 got the call. Adding to the uniqueness of this mission, the Seabees were given only 48 hours to plan and stage prior to the start of the mission.

The battalion put together a detachment of 39 personnel for the mission, led by Lt. Mike Wilkinson, Civil Engineer Corps officer. Within the limited timeframe, they prepared a camp layout, pulled the necessary 12 truckloads of material together, staged 24 pieces of equipment and started the mission.

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Army National Guard Unit Saves Lives in Africa

By Petty Officer 2nd Class Sunday Williams,
U.S. Navy Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa,Public Affairs

CAMP LEMONIER, Djibouti, April 25, 2007 — Clean water is scarce in Africa, however the 1132nd Engineer Detachment, Well Drilling, unit out of Mooresville, N.C., is changing that one well at a time.

The 1132nd, named the “Mud Hogs” by their training unit out of North Dakota, is the first Army National Guard well drilling unit created and deployed. The unit arrived in Djibouti January 24 to clean and decontaminate water to make it drinkable, drill wells and in the end save lives.
Staff Sgt. William Brown explained the unit is currently working on their first project in the Yoboki District.

“We are fixing a well that was put in the district two years ago,” said Brown. “It was put in by the 747th Army Reserve Well Drilling unit out of Montana as a hand-pump well.”

Brown said not long after the 747th put in the well, they had to go back to the well site and change it to a solar-powered well. “We heard through the villagers that the well was broken and they could not get water from it, so we went out to the site.”

Due to climate and the area, Brown said the well stopped working and people passing through the site tried to fix it themselves and ended up damaging it beyond use.

Read the Rest...

Web Reconnaissance for 04/26/2007

A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention.


In the News: (Registration may be required to read some stories)
House OKs war funding with pullout - The Democrat-led House last night narrowly passed a $124 billion war-funding bill with a timetable to pull out troops from Iraq, voting hours after top U.S. military commanders made a personal appeal to congressional leaders not to meddle in war strategy. (READ MORE)

Dow soars past 13,000 - The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged nearly 136 points yesterday to close above 13,000 for the first time as investors dismissed concerns about rising energy prices and a slowing economy to focus instead on the strong performance of multinational corporations... (READ MORE)

Red Crescent chief calls on U.S. to push for aid - With more than 850,000 people displaced and on the move within its borders, Iraq is in the midst of a major refugee crisis and the United States has an obligation to help resolve it, the head of the Iraqi Red Crescent Organization said yesterday. (READ MORE)

House Passes Iraq Pullout Timetable - The House last night brushed aside weeks of angry White House rhetoric and veto threats to narrowly approve a $124 billion war spending bill that requires troop withdrawal from Iraq to begin by Oct. 1, with a goal of ending U.S. combat operations there by next March. (READ MORE)

Baghdad's Fissures and Mistrust Keep Political Goals Out of Reach - U.S. military commanders say a key goal of the ongoing security offensive is to buy time for Iraq's leaders to reach political benchmarks that can unite its fractured coalition government and persuade insurgents to stop fighting. (READ MORE)


From the Front:
Michael Yon: Desires of the Human Heart, Part One “Gunshots ring out at three in the morning as I write these first sentences. Gunshots, providing muse and meter for this dispatch home to America. Gunshots, three of them. The war is close. All of the more than one-hundred photos in this dispatch were taken in proximity to the three main structures visible in this photo. In the left background, smokestacks bellow columns of soot into the air. In the middle is the Church, amazingly unscathed in the middle of a war zone, and slightly to the right of that, in the background, is a minaret the enemy has used as a fighting position.” (READ MORE)

Acute Politics: VBIEDs at the Gate “We rolled back to Ramadi early Sunday afternoon, after a long rotation out to Falluja. I took my personal gear and my 240B machine gun into the barracks, and stopped in to say hello to my medic buddy. I was headed back out to the 5-ton dump truck that we use to transport gear for another load of rucksacks and bags when the air split with a loud craaack-BOOM, and the ground shook underfoot. Everyone flinched towards the ground, and someone dryly cracked ‘That didn't sound like outgoing.’” (READ MORE)

Duke in Iraq: Duke asks "Why?" “Caring for the wounded and sick children of war I have many opportunities to see the families who are devastated by how their child has been drawn into this conflict of men. In war there are times when children are innocently harmed when a bomb or a bullet goes astray or when children are being housed with terrorists. Unfortunately, what is becoming more common here is the purposeful targeting of areas that are known to have children present e.g., markets and streets near schools. It is hard to understand the mind of the person who would purposely target the innocent.” (READ MORE)

MasterGunner: And The Army Goes Rolling Along… "Well, the talk about the “Great Surge Of 2007” has died down a little, and now the big news is the extensions of Active-Duty military tours in from twelve to fifteen months. Believe me, being on the ground, with a 9mm strapped to my hip, and dust on my boots, I have heard all manner of crying and whining. But I have also seen guys shrug, smile, and drive on with the mission. Why?" (READ MORE)



On the Web:
Joe Katzman: In Praise of Senator Biden: Survivable Rides for the Troops “Senator Biden [D-DE] took some deserved heat the other day for saying something really stupid, not exactly an uncommon occurrence for a politician. What is uncommon is an effort by a politician that actually makes a difference on the ground, and fulfills a moral calling. Which Senator Biden has also done recently... and so I'd like to cover that road less traveled, instead.” (READ MORE)

Daniel Henninger: Blacksburg's Silver Lining “In the wake of an event such as Virginia Tech, our system moves heaven and earth to figure out what went wrong and how to make sure it doesn't happen again. This of course is what we did after September 11 and after the botched response to Hurricane Katrina.” (READ MORE)

Fred Thompson: Rewriting History a Classroom at a Time “By now, we're used to people like Iranian President Ahmadinejad denying that the holocaust ever happened, even while he and his regime promise not only the destruction of Israel but the elimination of Jews internationally.”(READ MORE)

Mitt Romney: The Fundamental Flaws in the McCain-Feingold Law “Washington's back-scratching political class apparently sees it differently. A few years ago, they locked arms around a measure sponsored by Senators John McCain, a Republican, and Russ Feingold, a Democrat, imposing unprecedented restrictions on the political activities of everyday Americans. (READ MORE)

Christopher Hitchens: Jefferson Versus the Muslim Pirates “When I first began to plan my short biography of Thomas Jefferson, I found it difficult to research the chapter concerning the so-called Barbary Wars: an event or series of events that had seemingly receded over the lost horizon of American history.” (READ MORE)

Cliff May: Hacks or Flacks? “Journalists are often accused of bias. Rarely do journalists level that charge against themselves. But the 35,000 members of Britain’s National Union of Journalists (NUJ) have done exactly that. Call them prejudiced, call them unprofessional. You can’t say they aren’t candid.” (READ MORE)

Donald Lambro: American resilience fuels global prosperity “The world is in the midst of an economic boom that is raising living standards, creating jobs and improving the quality of life for billions of people. That's not the story or picture we see on the nightly news shows, where the world is torn by civil war, terrorism, death, destruction and unending poverty.” (READ MORE)

Ann Coulter: Nuts in the crosshairs “For cranky right-wingers who think politicians don't listen to them, this week I give you elected Democrats running like scared schoolgirls from the media's demand that they enact new gun control laws in response to the Virginia Tech shooting.” (READ MORE)

Rich Galen: Investing in Failure “Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid (D-NV) has declared ‘this war is lost’ and has made a great deal of pretending to have decided when and under what circumstances US troops will effect their retreat from Iraq.” (READ MORE)

William F. Buckley: Superstitions of Democracy “The rapture in 1960 over the independence of Nigeria seems incredible, and was always that, but three words -- anti-colonialism, independence and democracy -- were all that was thought to be needed to justify the jubilation. Nigeria had thrust away its colonial ties and would lead the way to the democratization of Africa.” (READ MORE)

The Belmont Club: The Dark Continents “Great and regional power politics have arrived in the dusty, but strategically important Horn of Africa. The Agonist, recently returned from Ethiopia, believes the recent attack on a Chinese oilfield shows that Beijing, voracious for fuel, must now pay for its growing role in Africa. The Washington Post apparently agrees. ‘It must now decide how much to get involved in other countries' internal security issues.’ Ethiopia is in a similar position regionally, having incurred the wrath of its neighbor Eritrea among others. Somalia has blamed Eritrea for sponsoring the oilfield raid, and the Strategy Page explains that in the civil war in Somalia, Eritrea and the Islamic rebels support one faction and Ethiopia supports the other. And the nations, once on opposite sides, soon begin to search for ways to attack each other.” (READ MORE)

Dafydd: The Mything Link “So the Democrats on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, in a snit, have subpoenaed Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice: They demand she some and testify about pre-Iraq war intelligence -- and about one element in particular: ‘Republicans accused Democrats of a "fishing expedition." But Democrats said they want Rice to explain what she knew about administration's warnings, later proven false, that Iraq had sought uranium from Niger for nuclear arms.’ Ah, we come around once more, in the fullness of time, to arguing over President Bush's famous ‘sixteen words’ from his 2003 State of the Union address:” (READ MORE)

Ed Morrissey: House Disregards Petraeus, Votes For Withdrawal “The House rejected the message from General David Petraeus, the man the Senate sent just three months ago to command the American forces in Iraq, and voted for a supplemental spending bill that will require the start of an American withdrawal by October 1. It passed on the barest of majorities and has no hope of surviving a veto, but the Democrats insist that they will play this game of chicken all the way to its conclusion:” (READ MORE)

Confederate Yankee: Sometimes, He Makes Me Laugh “Dana Milbank, that is, not his target, Dennis Kucinich: ‘“I do not stand alone,” Dennis Kucinich said as he stood, alone, in front of a cluster of microphones yesterday evening. The Ohio congressman, a Democratic presidential candidate, was holding a news conference outside the Capitol to announce that he had just filed articles of impeachment against Vice President Cheney. But subsequent questioning quickly revealed that Kucinich had not yet persuaded any of his 434 colleagues to be a cosponsor, that he had not even discussed the matter with House Democratic leaders, and that he had not raised the subject with the Judiciary Committee.’” (READ MORE)

Don Surber: Aborting the press “In reading Dr. Howard Dean’s ignorant statement calling for an end to having press coverage of the political campaigns, I was struck by what a childish, self-absorbed little man the former governor of Vermont truly is. But first, the report from the Associated Press: ‘Dean: Bar Media and Candidates Will TalkThe head of the Democratic Party said Wednesday that the best way to get presidential candidates to talk frankly about issues is to lock out the media.’” (READ MORE)

Bill Whittle: Under Old Management “Something profound happened after I posted SEEING THE UNSEEN, Part 2. The tone of the messages I received from all of you was very different than those I got back in the glory days of 2003, when I was knocking out a major essay every two weeks. No, these all had a very strong common theme, and it has moved me very greatly. Almost all had the same core message: ‘I thought I was all alone. I thought I was the last sane person on the Earth. I didn’t think anyone else could see how bad things have gotten. Thank you.’” (READ MORE)

Bill Roggio: Al Qaeda in Iraq's Diyala Campaign “Terror group is striking hard at military targets prior to the onset of the Diyala Campaign - As Iraqi and Coalition forces build their forces to strike al Qaeda in their base in Diyala, the terror group is hitting hard at existing combat outposts in the violence-racked province. Over the past several days, al Qaeda in Iraq has conducted several suicide strikes at U.S. and Iraqi combat outposts, police stations and Army checkpoints throughout the province.” (READ MORE)

Baron Bodissey: A Democratic Muslim “Naser Khader is an honest-to-Allah moderate Muslim, an outspoken critic of radical Islam, and a member of the Danish parliament. He has taken great risks by forming the Democratic Muslims (Demokratiske Muslimer), a political organization dedicated to the integration of Denmark’s Muslims with the country’s democratic political institutions. The controversy over the suppressed PBS documentary has brought Naser Khader to the attention of policymakers here in the United States, since he is one of the Muslims featured in the film. He also happens to be visiting the USA this week, as reported in this article in Sunday’s Jyllands-Posten [my translation]:” (READ MORE)

Gribbit: Hunter- Reid’s Gotta Go “I’m convinced that Fred Thompson will announce his candidacy for the Republican nomination for the Presidency soon, but in the event that he doesn’t, Duncan Hunter’s stock shot up with his statement calling for Senator Reid’s resignation.” (READ MORE)

Jules Crittenden: The People Have Spoken! “After 100-and-I-don’t-care-how-many days of pointless posturing, the House passes a meaningless surrender bill 218-208. The mandate, the will of the American people and their enthusiasm for surrender, failure and genocide in Iraq, etc., expressed here turns out to be a margin of 10 votes, or about 2.3 percent of those voting. The 110th Congress has been intensely interested in symbolism, as it seems to be incapable of acting in a substantive manner.” (READ MORE)

The Lasso of Truth: Whither Conservatism “It’s been stewing for some time now -- my resentment over what I like to call the Liberal-not-so-lite tone of this so-called Conservative government and the not-so-conservatives who support their wishy-washy, I-wanna-get-elected agenda. I’m not the only one, but you’ll have to forgive me if sometimes, I start to wonder. With very few exceptions, I have heard little more than resounding silence from those among us who were so vocal, when it was the Liberals slathering our hard earned tax dollars on every small-minded, big-budgeted piece of nanny-state garbage. Where are those voices of protest now?” (READ MORE)

Bryan Preston: Carbon offsets: A “green gold rush” “Big news from the Financial Times: Al Gore’s centerpiece strategy for letting the rich live rich while buying a soothed conscience is nothing but a scam. ‘Companies and individuals rushing to go green have been spending millions on “carbon credit” projects that yield few if any environmental benefits.’” (READ MORE)

Neptunus Lex: The Tillman “fraud,” and all that “My second job in a line squadron as a young lieutenant was to serve as the squadron Personnel Officer. Hard, administratively technical and thoroughly thankless, it was not the kind of job that hard charging strike fighter pilots lusted after. But while I was still too junior for one of the more prestigious ‘finishing’ jobs in Ops, I had sufficiently proven myself in my ‘starter’ job as the Aircraft Division Officer that the squadron leadership felt that they could trust me in one of the few junior officer billets that could actually get a commanding officer fired: The PersO job came with the ‘Personnel Reliability Program’ as a collateral duty, and any CO who allowed that program to get porked away could be assured that no band would be playing at his change of command.” (READ MORE)

Patterico: Memo to 2008 Democrat Presidential Candidates: How We Fight Terrorism Is a Legitimate Issue, So Quit Whining and Deal with It “Democrats have “rebuked” Rudy Giuliani for these remarks on terrorism on the Sean Hannity show: ‘Here is the thing that the Democrats do not get and all these attacks and the things Harry Reid is doing and the Presidential candidates indicate. They do not seem to get the fact that there are people, terrorists in this world, really dangerous people that want to come here and kill us. That in fact they did come here and kill us twice and they got away with it because we were on defense because we weren’t alert enough to the dangers and the risks. … They want to take us back to not being as alert which to me will just extend this war much, much longer.’” (READ MORE)

Stefania Lapenna: Islamic repression in the streets of Iran (Updated) “A female Bassiji is rebuking a brave Iranian woman who removed her headscarf on a street of Tehran. This picture should prove to you that Iranian women are as much liberal and modern as the women in any Western nation. Wait until the Mullahs' regime falls, you will be seeing amazing scenes on the streets of Iranian cities. If it's true the saying according to which a picture is worth a thousand words, then this one is. And keep in mind that she's not the only woman who tries to defy the Islamists by taking out the veil.” (READ MORE)

Scott Johnson: Tehran calling “Eli Lake and Richard Miniter have both interviewed Osman Ali Mustapha, a former Kurdish police officer who was recruited as a spy for the Iranians. Lake notes the issuance of Iranian green cards to terrorists in Iraq. Miniter observes that Mustafa’s story ‘reveals the human side of the insurgency.’ As for the terrorist green card, Miniter reports: ‘Higher-ranking terrorist leaders are given laminated cards that make them untouchable by all Iranian officials, aside from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. Mustafa was told that these cards were issued on the personal orders of Ali Khamane’i, Iran’s ruler.’” (READ MORE)

Dan Riehl: Democrats Will Fight ... For Surrender “A slight majority of Congressional Democrats have shown that they do have some fight in them, unfortunately only when it comes to seeing how quickly they can pull off a behind the lines surrender while our troops continue to fight our enemies in Iraq. They have sealed their fate and any notion that they support our troops must come off the table now.” (READ MORE)

Right Wing Nut House: The Trouble with Harry III “If I were George Bush right about now, I’d wrap my arms around Harry Reid and give him a great big kiss on the cheek. And I might even consider sending Speaker Pelosi a dozen roses, thanking her for playing her part to perfection in this Democratic Party defeatist extravaganza. For in truth, the Democrats are handing the President the one thing he desperately needed in order to maintain the surge, veto the Iraq supplemental with its timetables and withdrawal stipulations, and unite the Republicans as they haven’t been since.” (READ MORE)

John Hawkins: Self-Serving Liberal Propaganda About The Media Coverage In The Run Up To The War In Iraq “Bill Moyers is doing a special to promote a line of self-serving, liberal propaganda that has been kicking around for a couple of years: that the mainstream media wasn't tough enough in the run up to the war in Iraq. Here's Tom Shales with some of the ‘highlights’ from this claptrap: (READ MORE)

Jay Tea: Any way the wind blows... “One of the defining moments of the 2004 presidential campaign was John Kerry's explanation that we wasn't a waffler, wasn't a flip-flopper, wasn't indecisive. The killer quote, to many was his infamous ‘I actually did vote for the $87 billion -- before I voted against it’ explanation of his two seemingly conflicting votes on funding for the Iraq war. It seems that attitude is contagious, and has infected House Majority Leader Harry Reid.” (READ MORE)

ShrinkWrapped: Who Are We Fighting in Iraq? "By The Democratic leadership in Congress has determined we have lost the war in Iraq and imagine that they can leverage the American people's legendary impatience and relative ignorance to electoral victory in 2008. They may well prove to be correct in their assessment of the domestic political stakes involved in the ongoing turmoil in Iraq, but their positions on the war remain incoherent and evidence of serious ignorance of the nature, strategic thinking, and psychology of the enemy. Amir Taheri points this out today in Iraq: Who's Winning, Harry?" (READ MORE)

Knee Deep in the Hooah!: Why? Well, why not? "I have been mulling over the various responses we have heard from our friends, family, loved ones and strangers about the news that Bryan has decided to change his career path and join the military. We have had the gamut of responses ranging from 'What in the world are you thinking?' to 'Why would you leave XYZ Company for the military?' Well there are a whole host of reasons, and I am thinking of turning the tables on folks. From now on when people ask 'Why in the world did your husband join the military?' I am going to say 'Why in the world would he not join?' I may go a step further and say 'Why haven't you joined?'" (READ MORE)


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