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US "Advisors" Engage in Baghdad Combat
NBC's Richard Engel rode across the Kuwaiti border with the "last US combat battalion" in mid-August. On the 31st of that month, President Obama declared that the US troops were done with combat operations in Iraq-Nam. Yesterday, the Green Zone government, after standing on its own two feet for almost five whole days, called for US help in fighting extremists in Baghdad. This time, no Yanks got hurt. Next time, they may not be so lucky.
According to the Associated Press,
In Sunday's assault, six militants wearing explosives vests and matching track suits and armed with machine guns and hand grenades pulled up at a checkpoint with an explosives-laden car, said a senior Iraqi military intelligence official who was inside the building at the time. The six assailants left the car and started shooting, killing a soldier at the checkpoint, he said. Guards at an observation tower returned fire, killing four militants, while two entered a building in the military compound. Iraqi soldiers shot and killed a seventh attacker who was driving the vehicle, causing the car bomb to explode, the official said. The blast left behind a gaping crater in the ground. The fighting came to an end after the two assailants who breached the compound ran out of bullets and detonated their explosives vests, the official said. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to reporters.
In short, it was rather a nothing of an attack. A handful of suicide bombers tried to take out a check point and infiltrate a base. Small town cops in Nebraska could handle it without dropping their donuts. The Iraq-Namese lost their nerve and called in their big brother. US military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Eric Bloom said the Iraqi military had also requested help from helicopters, drones and explosives experts in addition to ground troops who provided suppressive fire. The request was certainly excessive.
The body count in the attack is 12, including 4 Iraq-Namese soldiers. Another 36 were wounded. The New York Times reported "The attack struck the same headquarters where a suicide bomber had penetrated the heavily defended perimeter less than three weeks ago and detonated explosives amid a group of army recruits. The death toll in that attack eventually rose to 57, with dozens more wounded." A free bit of advice to the locals in Baghdad; the extremists will hit this site again before 'September ends -- get ready.
This journal has said before that the Green Zone government is prepared to fight to the last American, and it appears that the Iraq-Namese security forces take the same view. It is telling that the New York Times reported that the attack had convinced at least one civilian official that the al-Maliki government had fallen to a coup. It is now 6 months since the elections, and there is no government yet. One must conclude that the lack of a government has become a security problem. Even the greatest patriot would have trouble putting his life on the line for a government that hasn't been formed yet.
The parallel with Vietnam has largely been overdone by leftists around the world. However, there is one compelling similarity. The South Vietnamese forces were fighting for a government they didn't believe in. The al-Maliki government is nothing to write home about, and it is a mere caretaker. Its successor is unlikely to be any better. The extremists are prepared to die for their cause. The government's forces are not, based on the decision to call in the Yanks. The odds in favor of a Shi'ite takeover led by Moqtada al-Sadr have shortened.
© Copyright 2010 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.
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