I saw this post at The Sandbox – a very interesting on-the-ground analysis of the effect of the surge. The kind of thing that our media doesn’t have time for, what with all the news about Anna Nicole’s baby daddy, the Duke non-rape case. (Yes, they should cover the VA Tech massacre, but there’s no need for wall-to-wall coverage on this. They could limit it to, say, 10 hours a day, and we’d still know just as much as we do now.)
THE WINDS OF AL-ANBAR
Name: Teflon Don
Posting date: 4/17/07
Stationed in: Ramadi, Iraq
Milblog url: acutepolitics.blogspot.comThe intra-Sunni fighting in Al-Anbar province is continuing, and the violence is rising. I’ll try my hand at laying out some of the recent events, and explain a little bit of how the various elements you may hear about in the news are related. I’ve distilled a fair bit of material from Bill Roggio, other sources, and personal knowledge. I don’t have a lot of time, so this will probably be sloppy and fairly unedited. …
There are thirty-one major tribes in the Al-Anbar province. Of those thirty-one, twenty-five support the Anbar Awakening effort of the Anbar Salvation Council — the social and political gathering of sheiks and former insurgents who oppose terroism in Al-Anbar. Of the six remaining tribes, the Iraqi government, Coalition Forces and the Anbar Salvation Council are attempting to split two off from the Al-Qaeda umbrella organization, Islamic State of Iraq. Those two tribes are the Al-bu Issa and the Al-Zuba’a. Both have started to fight against Al-Qaeda, and are beginning to pay for it dearly. One chlorine bomb detonated in the Al-bu Issa region of Falluja, as I wrote before, injuring 250 civilians.
Imagine that, al Qaeda is killing Iraqis for siding with us! Who knew? Other than people who read milblogs, that is…
I’ll go out on a little bit of a limb and say that the insurgency is quickly approaching a tipping point. If things continue as they are right now, our military won’t need a surge to chase the terrorists out of Anbar — the citizens will do it for us, which is as it should be. It’s beginning to show already: more local tips, more police recruits (far more than anticipated) — and sadly, in bigger and more desperate Al-Qaeda attacks.
Emphasis added. This is one report of many on the milblogs that say we have momentum on our side for a change. Is it all sweetness and light, a Michael Moore kite-flying utopia? No. And it won’t be for a long time. Depending on who you ask, we were fighting an insurgency in Germany after WWII for 2 to 10 years. And that was after we pretty much destroyed most of the country, fought a no-holds-barred war with no effort whatsoever to win anyone’s heart or mind. Our goal was to win a military victory, not an emotional one. None of this rebuilding during the war, thankyouverymuch. Today’s troops have a much harder mission, basically fighting with one hand tied behind their backs, yet the writer still says –
Color me hopeful.
That’s all I have for now. Keep reading, watch the news, and keep your eyes to the sky. I’ll try to keep writing about the winds here in Al-Anbar. They are changing.
The Sandbox keeps the politics out of it, and just serves as a “command-wide milblog, featuring comments, anecdotes, and observations from service members currently deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. This is GWOT-lit’s forward position, offering those in-country a chance to share their experiences and reflections with the rest of us. The Sandbox’s focus is not on policy and partisanship (go to our Blowback page for that), but on the unclassified details of deployment — the everyday, the extraordinary, the wonderful, the messed-up, the absurd.” The posts there will inspire you and make you weep with frustration and pain for the sacrifices the troops are making, but most of all you can get the rest of the story that the media won’t tell you.
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