The present-day U.S. military qualifies by any measure as highly professional, much more so than its Cold War predecessor. Yet the purpose of today’s professionals is not to preserve peace but to fight unending wars in distant places. Intoxicated by a post-Cold War belief in its own omnipotence, the United States allowed itself to be drawn into a long series of armed conflicts, almost all of them yielding unintended consequences and imposing greater than anticipated costs. Since the end of the Cold War, U.S. forces have destroyed many targets and killed many people. Only rarely, however, have they succeeded in accomplishing their assigned political purposes. . . . [F]rom our present vantage point, it becomes apparent that the “Revolution of ‘89” did not initiate a new era of history. At most, the events of that year fostered various unhelpful illusions that impeded our capacity to recognize and respond to the forces of change that actually matter.

Andrew Bacevich


Tuesday, May 29, 2007


Security Incidents for Tuesday,May 29, 07

Iraqis ride past a damaged Sunni mosque in Baghdad. (Ceerwan Aziz/Reuters)

(1) MNF-Iraq is reporting the deaths of two Task Force Lightning soldiers in a helicopter crash in Diyala Province on Monday, May 28th. Although the body of the release does not state whether the incident was a result of enemy action or a case of mechanical failure, the title of the release does say "Task Force Lightning Soldiers attacked".

(2) MNF-Iraq is also reporting the deaths of six Task Force Lightning soldiers when "explosions" occurred near their vehicles in Diyala Province on Monday, May 28th. Three other soldiers were wounded in the attack.

(3) Yesterday, we had placed Arkansas National Guardsman Spc. Erich Smallwood in one of these slots for lack of a better place to put him. As Smallwood doesn't appear to match any other previously announced death, we've moved him to a slot of his own and are considering him a new death, not previously reported.
(4) MNF-Iraq is reporting the deaths of two Multi-National Division - Baghdad soldiers in an IED attack in a southern neighborhood of Baghdad on Monday, May 28th.

(5) The British Ministry of Defense has now posted confirmation of the death of a 1st Battalion Royal Anglian Regiment soldier from enemy action in Helmand Province on Monday, May 28th. The NATO posting for the death can be found here.


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In Country:
#1: Escalating fighting and sectarian violence are forcing hundreds of families in Iraq to flee their homes on a daily basis, aid agencies say. According to a report released on Sunday by the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), an estimated 822,810 Iraqis are now displaced within their country.


Baghdad:
#1: Gunmen wearing police uniforms abducted at least three western lecturers from a finance ministry building in Baghdad today. The German computer experts were addressing ministry personnel in the city centre building when the kidnappers burst in, a witness told Reuters. Led by a police major, the gunmen entered the conference room shouting: "Where are the foreigners, where are the foreigners?" the witness said.

Five Britons are among a group of foreigners kidnapped in Baghdad Tuesday, the BBC reported. The Foreign Office had said earlier that it was 'urgently' looking into reports that four British security guards were among a group of seven Westerners kidnapped in Iraq. All seven, including three computer programmers thought to be German, were reportedly taken from a finance ministry building in central Baghdad, said the Foreign Office. But the BBC reported later that their correspondent had been told by sources in the Iraqi capital that five Britons and one German were involved.

#2: Earlier today, at least 22 people were killed and 55 others wounded in a bomb explosion in a parked bus in central Baghdad, police said. The blast happened near a major intersection in Tayaran Square, a busy commercial area usually filled with markets. Many day workers, mostly poor Shias, often wait in the square for work.

#3: A civilian was killed and five people were wounded in a car bomb attack targeted the Iraqi police in downtown Baghdad on Tuesday, a well-informed police source said. "A booby-trapped car parking at the busy downtown Baghdad square of Taiyaran, detonated around 1:00 p.m. (0900 GMT) near a police patrol," the source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity. The attack killed a civilian and wounded five others, including two policemen, the source said.

#4: A second car bombing in the Amil district in western Baghdad killed 15 people and wounded 36, police said. No further details on the second blast were immediatly available. Cars were riddled with shrapnel, pushcarts flipped upside down and smoke rose into the sky, witnesses said. Firefighters rushed to the scene and rescuers tried to pull the wounded out of cars, they said.

Casualties from the car bomb explosion that took place on Tuesday afternoon in Baghdad’s southwestern neighborhood of al-Aamal increased to 37, including 22 dead and 15 wounded, a security source said.

Diyala Prv:
#1: An American helicopter went down in restive Diyala province, killing two soldiers.

#2: Six Task Force Lightning Soldiers were killed when explosions occurred near their vehicles while conducting operations in Diyala Province, Monday. Three other Soldiers were also wounded in the incident and were taken to a Coalition Forces’ medical treatment facility

Baquba:
#1: The Baaquba public hospital received 21 unidentified bodies on Tuesday, a medic from the Diala health department said. "The hospital's forensic medicine received 21 bodies found by policemen or reported by residents in the city," the source, who asked not to be named, told the independent news agency Voices of Iraq


Suwayra:
#1: Police retrieved the bodies of five men, two of whom were decapitated, from the Tigris river in the town of Suwayra, 40 km south of Baghdad, police said


Basra:
#1: Unidentified gunmen opened fire at Capt. Munther Rahim in the area of al-Jumhuriya in Basra on Monday evening, killing him instantly," the source, who refused to be named, told the independent news agency Voices of Iraq (VOI) by telephone. He said Rahim used to work as director of a criminal intelligence department in Basra.

#2: In a separate incident two policemen were wounded during the early hours of Tuesday when a Joint Coordination Center building in al-Haikimiya, central Basra, came under shelling attacks, the source added.

#3: Another policeman was injured in clashes on Tuesday between the British forces and gunmen in the area of al-Qibla, (8 km) west of the city," the source said


Balad:
#1: police patrols in Balad district, Salah al-Din, found on Tuesday a civilian's body that showed signs of having been shot, the source said, giving no further details


Samarra:
#1: In other violence, gunmen in Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad, set up fake checkpoints on the outskirts of the city and abducted more than 40 people, most of them soldiers, police officers and members of two tribes that had banded together against local insurgents, police said.


Shurqat:
#1: Two policemen were killed and three others wounded when an explosive charge went off near their patrol in the city of al-Shurqat, 80 km south of Mosul, on Tuesday, a police source said.

#2: (?) Gunmen killed two policemen and wounded three in the town of Shirqat, 80 km south of Mosul, police said.


Kirkuk:
#1: Unidentified gunmen killed the editor-in-chief of a weekly newspaper published in Kirkuk in front of his house in the predominantly-Turkoman neighborhood of al-Musalla, northern Kirkuk, a police source said. "Mahmoud Hassib al-Qassab, the editor of al-Hawadeth weekly, was an ethnic Turkoman and the fourth journalist to be killed in Kirkuk this month," the source told the independent news agency Voices of Iraq


Mosul:
#1: U.S. warplanes pounded a residential area in Mosul wounding four civilians, a police official in Ninewa province said on Tuesday. "U.S. aircraft bombarded the al-Islah al-Ziraaie neighborhood, southwest of Mosul, on Monday night, seriously wounding a woman and three men," Brig. Abdul-Kareem al-Juburi, director of the Ninewa police command's operations room, told the independent news agency Voices of Iraq (VOI) on Tuesday. The attack also caused severe damage to a number of residential buildings, Juburi added.


Al Anbar Prv:
Fallujah:
#1: Unknown gunmen booby trapped the bridge linking al-Amiriya and al-Khalidiya city, 30 km southwest of Falluja," the source, who refused to have his name mentioned, told the independent news agency Voices of Iraq (VOI). The perpetrators planted explosive charges at the edge of the bridge, which caused severe damage to the structure when detonated. However, the source did not indicate whether any casualties resulted from the blast.

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