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 5, 2009

War News for Tuesday, May 05, 2009

May 3 airpower summary:

May 2 airpower summary:

May 1 airpower summary:

Afghans allege dozens of civilian deaths:

Taliban patrol northwestern Pakistan town:

Jihad Unspun A Phoney CIA Website

3 SKorean soldiers convicted of bribery in Iraq:

Porous Border With Pakistan Could Hinder U.S. Troops:

Pakistani army flattening villages as it battles Taliban:


Reported Security incidents:

Baghdad:
#1: Around 8 p.m. a gunman threw a grenade on a police check point at the intersection of Saidiyah-Dora on Monday. Four policemen were killed and three others were wounded.

#2: Around 8:50 p.m. a roadside bomb targeted an American patrol in Shola- Huriyah intersection on Monday. No casualties reported.

#3: A sticky explosive device went off under a container in front of al-Doura refinery in southern Baghdad, injuring three people and setting three containers ablaze, a police source said. “A sticky improvised explosive device, planted under a container at the inlet of the Doura refinery in southern Baghdad, went off on Monday (May 4), injuring three and setting three containers ablaze,” the source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.

A bomb attached to an oil tanker exploded on Monday in a parking lot belonging to the Doura oil refinery in southern Baghdad, wounding three people, police said.

#4: Iraqi soldiers killed a Sunni Arab fighter from a U.S.-allied local militia unit and arrested his brother during a raid in Abu Ghraib, a predominantly Sunni district on the western outskirts of Baghdad, Iraqi police said.


Diyala Prv:
#1: Iraqi security forces have killed more than 30 Islamist militants in a new military operation in the restive province of Diyala, a security official said on Tuesday. Colonel Salam Ahmed Najim, a spokesman for security operations in Diyala, said that Iraqi police and army were in the fifth day of the new operation targeting Sunni Islamist al Qaeda and other militants in Diyala, northeast of Baghdad. He said 31 suspected militants were killed on Monday alone. Since the operation began, security officials in Diyala said, 60 people have been arrested, including three women, and militant safe houses have been identified.

#2: A roadside bomb targeted a convoy of cars for a couple celebrating their wedding around 6:15 on Monday. One person was killed and 6 others were wounded.


Mosul:
#1: A policeman was killed on Monday by unknown gunmen in central Mosul, a police source said.“Unidentified gunmen on Monday (May 4) opened fire on a policeman in Bab al-Toubn region in central Mosul, killing him on the spot,” the source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.

#2: Police found 3 dead bodies in Intisar neighborhood in Mosul on Monday.

#3: A civilian was wounded on Tuesday in a bomb explosion in western Mosul, according to a security source. “An improvised explosive device went off on Tuesday (May 5) targeting a U.S. vehicle patrol in al-Maash marketplace in western Mosul, injuring a civilian,” the source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.

#4: Gunmen killed and a policeman in downtown Mosul city on Tuesday morning.

#5: A roadside bomb targeting an Iraqi police patrol killed a civilian in western Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.



Afghanistan: "The Forgotten War"
#1: Earlier Tuesday, a suicide bomber rammed a vehicle carrying troops near Peshawar, the capital of North West Frontier Province, killing one paramilitary soldier and four civilians, police official Ghafoor Khan Afridi said. Another 21 people, including 10 troops and police and two children, were injured, Afridi said.

Five people including four security personnel killed in a suicide attack in Khyber Agency on Tuesday.According to police sources, four security personnel were killed in an attack on Bara Qadeem checkpoint.

#2: Afghan security forces backed by Western warplanes battled insurgents in western Afghanistan on Tuesday after Taliban fighters publicly executed three former government employees. Fighting in Farah province, a vast desert area near Iran, began on Monday after the Taliban publicly executed the three ex-government employees to punish them for cooperating with the state, provincial governor Rohul Amin told Reuters. Later the same day, Afghan security forces backed by foreign air power launched raids in the Bala Boluk district of the province. Four Afghan security forces members and about 25 insurgents had been killed so far, Amin said. The head of public health and hospitals in Farah province, Abdul Jabar Shayeq, said 11 civilians and three policemen had been admitted to hospital with wounds from the fighting. The civilians included seven children and three women.


Casualty Reports:

In 2007 Spc. Donald Woodard Jr. was on his second deployment to Iraq. While driving a truck into the combat zone to repair a broken-down vehicle their group hit an improvised explosive device. In the moment of the blast the gunner was thrown off the truck. Lt. Tracy Alger, the third man on the truck, was killed. Woodard sustained third-degree burns across most of his body and is in recovery at Brooke Army Medical Center at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas

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