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, November 11, 2008

War News for Tuesday, November 11, 2008

Nov. 8 airpower summary:

Nov. 9 airpower summary:

China to help develop Iraq oil field:

Iraq Kirkuk Oil Flow To Turkey Down At 250,000 B/D - Shippers:

U.S. building bases in Afghanistan to aid drones:

U.S. to expand airfield in Kandahar:


Reported Security incidents:

Baghdad:
#1: Three day labourers were killed and another 14 wounded when a bomb went off in an empty lot where they were waiting for work near Palestine street, one of the main thoroughfares of Baghdad.

One blast hit a truck delivering newspapers on Palestine Street in the predominantly Shiite eastern section of the Iraqi capital

#2: Another person was killed and five others were wounded when two mortar rounds aimed at a police station in northern Baghdad struck near a housing construction site where they were working.

#3: In the centre of the capital a roadside bomb struck an electricity company vehicle, wounding a passenger and five bystanders.

while the second bomb struck a line of newspaper vendors waiting nearby to collect the papers to supply neighborhood newsstands, police said.

#4: A roadside bomb targeted a police patrol in Zafaraniyah, southeast Baghdad at noon, Tuesday injuring six people including three policemen.


Diyala Prv:
Mullayah:
#1: Three soldiers from the 1st Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division, were injured when a booby-trapped house exploded Sunday in Diyala province, according to a report in Stars and Stripes. All were flown to Balad, Iraq, for treatment and were listed in stable condition Monday. The soldiers were on patrol in the town of Mullayah, northeast of Baghdad, when a house they were entering blew up, according to the independent newspaper that covers the U.S. military.


Amarra:
#1: A policeman was killed by unidentified gunmen in central al-Amara city on Tuesday, a security source in Missan province said. “Unknown gunmen opened fire at a Missan Police Command’s Quick Intervention Corps personnel in al-Majidiya area, central Amara, killing him instantly,” the source told Aswat al-Iraq.


Mosul:
#1: Meanwhile, in the northern city of Mosul 15 people were wounded in a car bomb attack against an Iraqi police patrol, said the US military, which considers the volatile city Al-Qaeda in Iraq's last urban stronghold.


Dohuk Prv:
#1: Turkish air force and artillery bombarded the villages on the strip near the Turkish border in Amidi district late Monday and early Tuesday. No casualties were reported.


Afghanistan:
#1: Pakistan's security forces on Tuesday continued to pound the militant hideouts in the troubled Bajaur tribal agency on the Afghan border, killing six more militants. The security forces pounded militant hideouts with heavy artillery in Khar area of Bajaur agency, and six militants were killed during operation, said private television Geo, quoting official sources.

#2: Pakistani security forces retrieved all the 15 trucks which were hijacked by the Taliban earlier on Monday while they were en route to Afghanistan to deliver goods to US-led coalition forces. At least two Taliban fighters were killed in the operation carried out to retrieve the trucks. We have successfully recovered all the trucks … two militants were killed and five wounded in the operation, a foreign news agency report quoted official Rahat Khan as saying.
13 of the trucks contained wheat and two were carrying military vehicles. The trucks were seized at four places along a road leading to the Afghan border, the Daily Times quoted official sources as saying.

#3: An Afghan governor says a suicide bomber tried to kill a government official in southwestern Afghanistan but killed only himself. Ghulam Dastagir Azad, the governor of Nimroz province, says the attacker walked up to his deputy as he was coming out of his house in the provincial capital of Zaranj and detonated the bomb. Azad says only the bomber died in the blast Tuesday. A few nearby houses were damaged.

#4: At least three people were killed on Tuesday when a blast occurred near a stadium in northwestern Pakistan's city of Peshawar, local television reported. The explosion took place outside Qayyum stadium of Peshawar, capital city of North West Frontier Province, when the concluding ceremony of a inter-provincial games was underway, sources said.


Casualty Reports:

Cpl. Sean Phillips was shot in the head by a sniper Nov. 17, 2004, while serving in Iraq.
As a result of his brain injury, Phillips, 25, developed aphasia, a partial or total inability to understand words and use language. But in the last year, his vocabulary has nearly tripled, Phillips' father said.

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