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


Friday, March 19, 2010

War News for Friday, March 19, 2010

Rice regrets how US prioritized rebuilding in Iraq:


Reported security incidents

Baghdad:
#1: The officials say the roadside bomb went off Friday morning near a market in Baghdad's teeming Shiite district of Sadr City. The explosion killed three people and wounded seven.The officials say the bomb was hidden under a heap of trash and detonated as shoppers started arriving.

#2: In the second attack, gunmen shot dead an Iraqi soldier in southern Baghdad after breaking into his house.

#3: One civilian was wounded on Friday morning by a roadside bomb explosion in northern Baghdad, a police source said. “The bomb exploded on the main street in al-Tarmiya region, northern Baghdad, injuring one civilian, who was carried to a nearby hospital for treatment,” the source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency, giving no further details.


Mosul:
#1: A truck driver was killed and his son wounded by unidentified gunmen fire in southern Mosul city on Thursday, according to a local police source in Ninewa. “The gunmen opened fire at a truck near Dorat al-Sowas area in southern Mosul, killing its driver and wounding his son and escaping to an unknown place,” the source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.

#2: Police forces found two unknown bodies in southeast of Mosul, according to a security source. “The forces found the bullet-riddled bodies late Thursday (March 18) in a village in al-Namroud district in southeast of Mosul,” the source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency. “The corpses bore signs of gunshot wounds to the head and the chest,” he added.

#3: One Iraqi soldier was killed and three more were wounded on Friday in a bomb blast in western Mosul, according to a police source. “An improvised explosive device went off targeting an army vehicle patrol in 17 Tamouz neighborhood in western Mosul, killing a soldier and injuring three others,” the source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.



Afghanistan: "The Forgotten War"

Posted by whisker at 4:40 AM

1 comments:

Dancewater said...

Rice is a piece of shit.

Seven years now we have been engaged in this evil in Iraq, and I think we will see quite a few more years.

May God forgive us for allowing our politicians to do this massive and vast evil.

March 19, 2010 at 8:36 AM

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