Word: iraqi
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...reality of Iraq today comes into focus. The "surge" - the Bush Administration?s term for the security crackdown in and around Baghdad - is based on the assumption that Iraqi security forces are competent to do basic jobs such as guarding important structures. That is meant to free Americans for high-risk tasks, such as disposing of roadside bombs. But even before Samarra, there was a growing body of evidence that Iraqis aren't ready or willing to perform their appointed tasks. What does that imply for the U.S. military operation and when it might end? Or for the development...
...American soldiers patrolling Baghdad's dangerous neighborhoods are under no illusions; many treat Iraqi soldiers and policemen with suspicion sometimes bordering on hostility. Higher up the chain of command, there are still optimists, but even they are growing more cautious. Lieut. General Martin Dempsey, the American general until recently responsible for training Iraqi forces, gave a guarded assessment of their quality not long ago, telling of absenteeism and desertion from the ranks, and the scarcity of officers. Most of the Iraqi battalions in the surge are woefully undermanned, he said. Nonetheless, Dempsey maintained that the Iraqis would be "capable...
Percentage of Baghdad neighborhoods in which U.S. and Iraqi forces are able to "protect" and "maintain influence over" the population, according to the U.S. military...
...past week, a Catholic Chaldean priest and three deacons were killed in Mosul in northern Iraq, while another Chaldean priest and five parishioners have been abducted in Baghdad. Thousands of Christians are fleeing the war-ravaged country. However, for fear of risking a further deterioration of the situation facing Iraqi ethnic and religious minorities, few clerics are calling for immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops. Indeed, the official Vatican position is to support the Iraqi government. Nevertheless, the Vatican's official communique after the meeting with the American President cited the "worrying situation in Iraq." The Pope also raised another Mideast...
...Iran's role in Iraq is a different story. Some Iraqi and American officials are certain that Iran knows something about the kidnapping of the five British contractors on May 31. The sophistication of the attack - the kidnappers arrived at the Shi'a-run Ministry of Finance in 40 police vehicles - suggests the Iranians may even have been in on the planning. Moqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army, the group that most likely executed the kidnapping, answers to Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The theory is that the kidnapping was in retaliation for the British killing of a Sadr...