Instead of the continual accusations of Iranian interference can't we please have some evidence presented at a world news conference?

Proof of an irrefutable nature would give Iran a political 'black eye' and wake other nations up.

Posted by: Abu_Lahab at April 7, 2008 8:31 AM

"Proof of an irrefutable nature would give Iran a political 'black eye' and wake other nations up."

Would it really? I doubt it.

Posted by: Elric66 at April 7, 2008 8:35 AM

Every Shi'a faction has been linked to Iran, at different times. Sadr never fled to Iran; Al-Hakim, on the other hand, whose Badr Brigade had the most to gain from Maliki's order for "government" (a word that needs to be examined to see what it really describes) troops to attack members of Sadr's Mahdi Army, did.

Information presented in this way, by the American reporters or military, sets up a little drama where it may seem that Moqtada al-Sadr is Iran's man, and by implication, other Shi'a are not. It is a kaleidoscope, with constantly shifting alliances, and enmities, with allies becoming enemies and, as easily, becoming allies yet again, to fight a common enemy. The cast includes several different kinds of Shi'a (economic differences help to explain different loyalties, with the Shi'a underclass of Baghdad being Sadr's main support), several different kinds of Sunnis, the Kurds (who in turn have two different tribal leaders), and in between them all, the terrified Christians (some nostalgic for the firmness of Saddam Hussein), smaller groups defined ethnically (the Turkomans), or as very small religious groups (the Yazidis, the Mandaeans, the Armenians). In all of this, there is only one thing for the Americans to be thinking about. It is not whether the tribes of Anbar Province like Maliki, or whether the Badr Brigades can be trusted more than the "government" police, or whether any Muslims in Iraq at all can be trusted to offer unfeigned support, not merely temporary support for money and arms, to the Americans.

There is only one issue. What will, in the end, weaken the Camp of Islam? Not in Iraq alone, but outside Iraq. Will it be the Americans remaining, spending another trillion, in order to guarantee that Iraq holds together, that Shi'a and Sunnis inside (and outside) Iraq no longer fight, that the Kurds give up their ambitions for independence, that people in Iraq become "prosperous" because, even though the Iraqi government appears to have no intention of spending the $100 billion it has accumulated in the last two years, the Americans are going to be willing to spend that kind of money in order to justify the whole Iraq venture, like someone whose investment turns out to have been folly, but he cannot sell, cannot withdraw, cannot allow himself to recognize that folly because it is so big, and it now implicates so many?

Posted by: Hugh at April 7, 2008 8:36 AM

No! Iranians in Iraq? How can this be? Did we invade the wrong country? Or does it really matter which Islamofacist state you invade?

Posted by: tanstaafl at April 7, 2008 9:10 AM

Iran needs to be punished and Moqtada al-Sadr needs a vacation on a Carribean island.

Posted by: Sounder at April 7, 2008 9:16 AM

Make no mistake about it, but the biggest prize that Iran would love to have and is determined to get is Iraq. With Iraq it gives them a grip on some of the largest oil fields in the world, it gives them a strong geographical position to confronting Israel, and though they have been giving support through Syria to Hezbollah,they also have aspirations of eventually dominating Syria, and Lebanon. Iran Knows very well that there are alot of Americans, and American politicians who don't have the stomach to see this through, so they will continue to work at poking America's Achilles Heel.

Folks if we bail out of a weakened Iraq this is exactly what will happen and any ability to stabilize this Middle East region will have been completely lost.

Posted by: Mackie at April 7, 2008 9:49 AM

Abu Lahab wrote above:
"Instead of the continual accusations of Iranian interference can't we please have some evidence presented at a world news conference?

Proof of an irrefutable nature would give Iran a political 'black eye' and wake other nations up."

That was done already - a couple of years ago, by the British Army, who is stationed near Basra.
They showed on national TV roadside bombs which had not detonated and which were made with Iranian components.

No 'black eye' for Iran then - and 'other nations' stayed fast asleep.

I'd say its a bit off to doubt the professional assessment of military personnel on the ground, who know whereof they speak, and demand 'proof' as if they were in court.

Nice try - but methinks someone else needs to wake up before defending the indefensible.

Posted by: Calon Lan at April 7, 2008 9:51 AM

Hugh

You are preaching to the choir, however what about other sites that are supposed to be anti-jihad? Do they get it as well? Let us see:

Example: LGF stories on Iraq in the last two weeks:

(1) Holy Brothel (Apr. 2nd.) (Michael Yon)
(2) Sgt. Matt Maupin is dead (Mar. 30th)
(3) NJ Star-Ledger Paleocon Potshots (Mar. 29th): In this story Mr. Johnson makes fun of the paleocon Paul Mulshine. Yes, Mulshine gets this right when he states:

"All of us intelligent conservatives of the old school - a group that seems to include me, Pat Buchanan and not many others - would have the same reaction to this sort of thing: What was that dimwit George Bush thinking when he decided to create a democracy in Iraq? The inevitable result was the rise of Islamic fundamentalists. And now here’s the Little Green Footballs crowd lamenting the fact that the Islamists are doing what one would expect them to do in a democracy."

That is the same thing Hugh and Robert has said for years. Johnson called him a "moonbat" for saying this...

Is Mr. Spencer a paleocon/moonbat/isolationist as well for advocating this same position? Is Hugh Fitzgerald as well?

(4) IPT Photos: Dem Congressmen on Saddam-Funded Trip (March 27th)

(5) Democratic Congressmen Flew to Iraq on Saddam's Dime (March 27th)

(6) Zombie: Iraq War 5th Anniversary, San Francisco (March 25th)

(7) HuffPo Dances on Soldiers' Graves (March 24th)

(8) Media Trumpeting Another Grim Milestone (March 24th)

That is it. I guess Basra gets no mention. Not important! Nothing to see here! Yet this is what was predicted! Listen, I am not saying LGF does not get it on all the other issues facing Jihad, or that they are not a great source of information, but when it comes to the battle in Iraq they are so off base it boggles the mind. The problem is Iraq is hindering getting the truth out about Islam. People who buy into this idiotic campaign have to also then accept that the core tenants of Islam are good. How else can you explain our strategy in Iraq? Giving Muslims a democracy and trusting them to do democratic things means you have accepted the idea of a peaceful Islam. That it is only the terrorist who have hijacked it, and the true Islam will come forth and Iraq will be a shining example for Islam to follow. I cannot look into the mind of Charles Johnson, but how else can you be for the war in Iraq? To spend billions upon billions of dollars in Iraq and yet allow Islam to play such a role in the Iraqi constitution, political parties, business dealings, social set up….on and on. Yet anyone who dares to bring up the idea that Iraq is failure due to Islam is labeled: Paleocon? Moonbat? Cut and Runner? Isolationist?

I am sorry if it offends people, but someone has to say it….LGF is clueless about Iraq and thus is semi-clueless about Islam.

Posted by: greatcometof1577 at April 7, 2008 9:53 AM

Ladies and Gentleman,
The optimum word for the Americans in Iraq is "Played." The Americans have been played by the Iraqi politicians, tribes, clergy, and the Iraqi bloggers too. Yes, all those brave Iraqi bloggers and their words of Democracy and Freedom, who instead of joining the Iraqi Army etc., and fighting por liberté et égalité, ran off to Graduate Schools in the U.S., LOL. The Americans have been played by the Turks, Saudis, Iranians, and Kurds. And the amusing thing is, if you ask the average Iraqi or Mid Easterner themselves, they would say the opposite - in their feverish anti-American, anti-Jewish fervor, they ascribe the events in Iraq to an American Neo-Con-Zionist plot to attack Islam.

Posted by: Mister Ghost at April 7, 2008 10:29 AM

I guess Maliki will have to call off his date with Beasty Boy Ahmadinijad. Breaking up is so very hard to do, and they made such a lovely couple. But it's just a lovers spat, they will get over it. The love triangle between Beasty, Maliki and Al-Sadr, must be confusing to the average Shi'ite's living in the area. First they say they do, and then they don't, then they say they will but then they won't. Who is a good and faithful Iraqi muslim supposed to follow?
Al-Qaeda I suppose, at least Ben Laden does not appear to be involved in love triangles.
I wonder how much of this Allah will put up with before he puts his foot down. The house of Shia is in dis-array. You know how Allah gets when he comes home to a mess...

Posted by: duh_swami at April 7, 2008 10:57 AM

a related article
Australia news
WAR WITH IRAN. IS IT INEVITABLE AND NEAR?
http://www.australia.to/story/0,25197,23040466-955,00,00.html

Posted by: abinitioadinfinitum at April 7, 2008 11:01 AM

Maliki already showed proof that Muslims stick together, no matter what. Here is Maliki, who is supposed to be advancing democracy in Iraq and he's holding hands with Ahm-whatever who is a total tyrant. Makes no sense except that they have a Muslim brotherhood of their own.

Posted by: Madame Vengier at April 7, 2008 11:42 AM

Why should Iran do anything? We are giving them Iraq and sacrificing thousands of American lives and a trillion dollars and countingin the process while making ourselves into a Paper Tiger for all the world to see. Some more mornings I read the paper and think I've woken up in a nuthouse.

Posted by: poetcomic1 at April 7, 2008 11:44 AM

"Moqtada al-Sadr, the radical Shi’ite cleric, has called for 1m people to march on Baghdad on Wednesday"

I've always been an advocate for staying the course in Iraq, but if al-Sadr can produce 1m marchers, demanding we leave Iraq, then I think it's time we leave.

When there's a counter-march of 1m Iraqis asking us to stay, I might change my mind.

It's time those people make their feelings known, one way or the other.

Posted by: rational at April 7, 2008 11:51 AM

If al-Sadr produces one tenth of one million Iraqis it will be time for us to go. Just think what those on the other side (assuming they really exist) could have done with Iraq in the last five years had they had half the mettle of al-Sadr and his minions.

Posted by: PMK at April 7, 2008 12:26 PM

greatcometof1577 said

People who buy into this idiotic campaign have to also then accept that the core tenants of Islam are good.

That may well believe that "all religions are the same", and that all religions are forces for good (in a Judeo-Christian sense). But an alternate possibility is that the supporters of the "Light Unto the Islamic Nations" project in Iraq buy into the (Judeo-Christian) belief that "all people are the same, we all want the same things, we all share the same values". What I've heard expressed is the belief that the "vast majority" of Muslims are "peaceful"; it is only a "few extremists" who are holding them hostage and forcing them (or tricking them) into committing these violent acts.

One could believe that Islam is not good, but that most Muslims don't really believe in it. They need our "help" to be freed from the tyranny of being forced to pretend to believe in Islam, so they can fulfill their "true" (Judeo-Christian) aspirations.

Personally, I share your belief that it's crazy talk. I think the "vast majority" of Muslims in Iraq (and everywhere else in Dar al-Islam) have displayed their beliefs in poll after poll, in enraged deadly riot after enraged deadly riot. I think that "helping" them is putting ourselves at great risk. I think the Muslim religion, with it's mandate to slaughter the non-Muslims wherever they find them, is no more similar to Christianity than was the Aztecs' cult of human sacrifice.

Posted by: special_guest at April 7, 2008 12:53 PM

OT http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23994651/ 9 Terror suspects escape Moroccan jail.

Is it just me or do they seem to escape a lot?? Guess Muslims guarding Muslims isn't the answer.

Posted by: gymgal at April 7, 2008 12:56 PM

Thank G*d the Aztecs weren't the ones with billions of barrels of oil under their land, or we might not be installing foot-baths in our airports and schools, but sacrificial altars, in the name of "multicultural sensitivity".

It could have been worse.

Posted by: special_guest at April 7, 2008 1:00 PM

Thank G*d the Aztecs weren't the ones with billions of barrels of oil under their land, or we might not be installing foot-baths in our airports and schools, but sacrificial altars, in the name of "multicultural sensitivity".

It could have been worse.

It is worse. How much better off we all would be had all of the Middle Eastern oil been in Mexico.

Posted by: Spirit Of 1683 at April 7, 2008 2:16 PM

greatcometof1577 writes:

"The problem is Iraq is hindering getting the truth out about Islam. People who buy into this idiotic campaign have to also then accept that the core tenants of Islam are good."

Yep.
Frederick Kagan, a well-known neo-conservative, just attempted to "debunk" your "myth" about Islam in National Review Online:

"Myth: Iraqis are not ready for democracy; it was an error for Bush ever to imagine that the U.S. could impose Western values on an Arab (or Muslim) state.

"As for the notion that democracy is incompatible with Islam, tell it to the hundreds of millions of Muslims in Turkey, India, Indonesia, and Europe who have embraced it. As for the notion that democracy is inappropriate for Arabs, the enthusiasm with which the liberal elite that insists on the universality of its own moral relativism engages in such overtly racist argumentation is astounding. More concretely, the millions of Iraqis who risked their lives to vote in previous elections and the polls showing that upwards of 90 percent of Iraq’s Sunni Arabs intend to vote in upcoming provincial elections suggest that Iraqis don’t agree. Many of the other counts of the inevitability argument spring from some version of this hyper-sophisticated racist viewpoint — Iraqis are too corrupt for legitimate government; they won’t fight because they’re weak, lazy, or just would rather have us do it; they won’t take responsibility for their state or security; and so on. To each argument there is an on-the-ground rebuttal (like the tens of thousands of Iraqis who have died fighting al-Qaeda and Iranian-backed militias, for instance), but this talking point isn’t really about on-the-ground realities; it’s about preconceptions that can be very hard to sway."

http://tinyurl.com/6mgpp2

So now, we folks on Jihad Watch are "racist" for suggesting that there's a problem with bringing democracy to the fundamentalist Muslims of Iraq.

I wonder if Dr. Kagan is bothered by Muslims, even in Western countries, agitating to live under Sharia rather than under Western civil law.

Posted by: Steven L. at April 7, 2008 2:53 PM

As Hugh has written so eloquently over the past months/years, about "weakening the Camp of Islam," I can only say "Amen." However, my question is: has the US Government ever put forth that it's intent is too weaken (I would say destroy would be better) the Camp of Islam? As the forces of PC, the Bush Administration and most of the usual standard bearers of this government/culture have made very clear (including John McCain's defense of NOT mentioning Barack Hussein Obama's middle name), there can be no real discussion of Islam and its interface with the West. And certainly no discussion of Jihadism and Islam in the same breath. We are in Iraq to remove a brutal dictator and build democracy for its people, yes? Fight Al Qaeda, yes? But deal with Islam, no.

Posted by: HOV Dummy at April 7, 2008 3:28 PM

"I think that the world changed about nine, ten months ago. And I think the single event in that change was the visit to the gulf by Vice President Cheney, where he went to line up the allied ducks in a row behind the possibility of action against Iran. And instead of getting acquiescence, the United States got defiance, and instead ducks in a row the ducks basically went off on their own"

This is an observation from Dave Marash, the news correspondent who just quit his job at Al Jazeera.

Posted by: Rob at April 7, 2008 3:41 PM

We are in Iraq to remove a brutal dictator and build democracy for its people, yes?
by HOV Dummy

Mission accomplished. Saddam is dead and so are Uday and Qusay. The Baathist regime has been toppled. A democratically elected government is in place in Baghdad. The people of Iraq have a chance to build a decent future for themselves and their descendants. It's their fight now. What they choose will tell us whether we were right to go in and do what we did.
If they side with the Islamists we should walk away and never look back.
If they ask for our help in defeating the Islamists we should be prepared to offer it, only if they show us they want the same thing.

Posted by: PMK at April 7, 2008 3:54 PM

PMK said

If they ask for our help in defeating the Islamists we should be prepared to offer it

Beware of the case of Islamist Group #1 asking for help in defeating Islamist Group #2.

Posted by: special_guest at April 7, 2008 4:36 PM

"No! Iranians in Iraq? How can this be? Did we invade the wrong country?"

Sadly, yes we did.

Posted by: Ian at April 7, 2008 5:46 PM

Maliki should be given some credit for taking his Army to Battle on a Mission well within his right as a leader of a demoncraticly elected Government. The effort may have been nothing more than a probing attack to test and expose the Enemys tactics and strengths. The need for American Air assets is not surprising. They are part and parcel of the tactics we teach them. This is the type of support everyone wants our involvement limited to. Why then question its use?

Was it not Sadar who called for a cease fire? Some reports have enemy casualties of 1200 dead, wounded and captured. The City was still surrounded and operations were continuing. More than likely against Iranians and their proxies in Iraq. Losses of 1200 would render a Regiment combat ineffective.

I suggest we give Sadar a few more "victories" like this and the problem will pretty much go away. Especially if he dies in one of them.

Dead and wounded of 1000 could very well represent a causality rate of 75% of all forces engaged. Given their nature of reaching Paradise it is not beyond the realm of possibility.

There was enough information available to have easily made Sadar the Loser. The choice was theirs to make.

Let us not forget that Sadars forces and local support were also low on food and water.

The Press seem to like Perfuming some Skunks. While neither have an odor worthy of complimenting.

Posted by: flowerknife_us at April 7, 2008 8:36 PM

slightly OT but watching the news tonight about the interruptions to the Olympic Torch and an advertising flunkie was being interviewed about the conflict for companies like Coke to be affilitated with the Olympics being held in Beijing and the situation in Tibet. This woman concluded by saying, and I paraphrase, China is powerful and no ones wants to challenge it. Hmmm. What a concept - being feared rather than liked/loved.... if only the US.....

Posted by: HOV Dummy at April 7, 2008 9:24 PM