Word: bergner
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...success of the American surge. The U.S. maintained that line today even though it was clear that the "criminal gangs" battling government forces in Basra were identifiable as elements of the Mahdi Army. In a military briefing in Baghdad on Wednesday, the U.S. military spokesman Maj. Gen. Kevin J. Bergner continued to define the Mahdi Army as those parts of it that observe the cease-fire while those that ignore it were referred to as criminal elements...
...Bergner said the U.S. was showing "restraint" in its actions against militants in Baghdad, saying it was directing its efforts against "criminals who dishonor Sadr's pledge of honor." Sadr's Mahdi Army, though, has always reserved the right to defend itself, raising the question of whether mainstream elements of the militia were standing and fighting in Basra without officially rejecting Sadr's directive...
...larger question, though, is how many "criminal elements" can ignore the cease-fire before the cease-fire becomes meaningless as a practical matter. Even as Bergner characterized the fight as a battle between the Iraqi government and "criminals," rockets launched from the militia's Sadr City stronghold poured into the Green Zone for the fourth straight...
...mostly stayed out of the fighting, preferring to let the Iraqi government and Iraqi troops take the lead. Bergner would not comment on whether the Americans would become involved more directly if the Iraqi government could not complete its Basra operation. "I would say," he said, "that's a very hypothetical question at this time...
...with the specifics of Turkey's campaign against the PKK. At a press conference Wednesday spokesmen for the U.S. military and the American embassy repeatedly said that questions about the raids should be asked of the Turkish and Iraqi governments, not the U.S. military in Iraq. Maj. Gen. Kevin Bergner said that American military cooperation with Turkey comes through the U.S.'s European Command; American forces in Iraq are under a separate regional chain of command. Philip Reeker, the U.S. embassy's spokesman, stressed that the raids were "Turkish decisions." He cast the U.S. in the role of observer, saying...