Read what you’re not reading about Iraq.

[igloo]

March 07, 2006, 8:34 a.m.

Extra! Extra!

Read what you’re not reading about Iraq.

By Bill Crawford

Coverage of the Iraq war continues to be overwhelmingly negative. If anything, the pessimism of the mainstream media has increased since the attack on the Golden Mosque in Samarra. This isn't because of any dearth of good news, though. For whatever reason, the abundant good work and progress accomplished each day in Iraq are either not reported or underplayed here at home.

Talk of civil war continues in the media even now, in spite of reports that life in Samarra is returning to normal, and in spite of the fact that last week General Casey said that the worst had passed, and that talk of civil war was overblown:

While Gen. George Casey said anything can happen, he downplayed suggestions the country is headed for civil war.

"Now, it appears that the crisis has passed," Casey said in a briefing from Baghdad with reporters at the Pentagon.

Also being downplayed is the resolve that the Iraqi people and their leaders have shown in not falling in to the trap the terrorists set for them when they bombed the Golden Mosque:

The Iraqi people as a whole saw this for what it is; a blatant effort to foment sectarian violence and promote the perception of civil war in Iraq. In all three counts the terrorists failed miserably and the people of Iraq won. Iraqi leaders such as Prime Minister Ibrahim Al-Jaafari and President Jalal Talabani immediately denounced the crime and demanded the Iraqi people not take the bait of sectarian violence, but instead use this moment to join against terrorism and for Islamic unity. Provincial councils in Basrah, Baghdad and elsewhere called for calm. The people of Iraq listened.

General Pace made the rounds on the Sunday talk shows and reiterated that Iraq was not on the verge of civil war. ABC News reported on this with the headline "General's Assessment of Iraq Questioned." The story questions if Pace is "glossing" over the situation:

The comments drew criticism that Gen. Peter Pace is glossing over problems in the three-year-old U.S. campaign.

It should come as no surprise that the person questioning General Pace's honesty is Democrat John Murtha.

During the same interview General Pace also noted the progress being made by Iraq's security forces:

"I would say they're going very, very well from everything you look at, whether it be on the political side where they've had three elections, they've written their own constitution, they're forming their government. You look at the military side where this time last year there were just a handful of battalions in the field, Iraqi battalions in the field. Now there are over 100 battalions in the field. They had no brigades. That's about 3,000 men each. Now they've got about 31 brigades. No matter where you look at their military, their police, their society, things are much better this year than they were last," he said on Meet the Press.

As the polls show, Americans are getting pessimistic about our mission in Iraq, and the mainstream media bear most of the blame for this. Responsibility for reporting the other side of the story in Iraq has fallen to the blogosphere. The following stories highlight the progress we have made in Iraq over the last two months, and the incredible work being done by the men and women of our armed forces, in concert with their coalition allies and the Iraqi Security Forces.

USAID now has a webpage listing some of our successes in Iraq. The entire list is here, but to give just a few examples:

USAID worked with a Kirkuk community to revitalize a local market. The market had degenerated and grown unsanitary. Now the market serves as an economic and cultural exchange with freshly paved roads and drainage system.

In December 2005, the Government of Iraq (GOI) passed legislation to establish a social safety net targeting Iraq's most poor and vulnerable. The social safety net initiative is an essential step in reforming national subsidies fuel, food, and electricity as required by the standby agreement signed with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Currently, these subsidy programs cost Iraq over $12 billion a year.

USAID's Iraq Civil Society and Media Support Program (ICSP) helped develop the National Iraqi News Agency, Iraq's first independent news agency. USAID equipped their Baghdad headquarters with cutting edge technology and trained their journalists in editing and international reporting standards. Amid a sea of noise and deception, NINA strives to be a voice of fair, honest, reliable reporting for Iraq.

The first Iraqi National Media Pool celebrated its successful instillation on September 29, 2005. The pool represents over twenty five Iraqi press bureaus and grants Iraqi reporters access to high profile stories and instills higher standards of objectivity and professionalism in reporting. "This is a real development for media in Iraq it enables us to get first hand information, which before was inaccessible."

The Department of Defense recently sent a report to Congress detailing our progress in Iraq. The report contained several important items not reported to the American people by the mainstream media. The talking points on Iraq continue to include the assertion that the Sunni insurgency is growing, but commanders on the ground in Iraq see it differently:

More Sunni Arabs are turning to the government, leaving hard-core insurrectionists more and more isolated, [assistant defense secretary for international security affairs Peter Rodman] said. "Obviously, they are participating vigorously in the political process."

The report also states that the Iraqi economy grew by 2.6 percent in 2005, and that Iraqi Security Forces continue to make substantial progress.

"We have no indications anywhere where an Iraqi unit has either surrendered — even down to platoon level — or where they have run," [Air Force Lt. Gen. Victor E.] Renuart said. He said the Iraqi army has a coherent capability to take control of situations and interface with police forces.

The U.S. Embassy in Iraq also issued a report citing the "remarkable" progress of the Iraqi Security Forces:

"In the first Fallujah operation, we tried to bring in one of the first Iraqi battalions into the fight. The troops never made it to the fight," [brigadier General Mark Kimmitt] said.

In contrast, the Iraqi army currently numbers 80 battalions, half of which are engaged actively in daily combat operations, the U.S. general said. "They are learning the cold lessons in combat, the harsh lessons in combat that is accelerating their development."

During February, Iraqi Security Forces acted independently in 31 percent of security operations:

Of the 435 company-level or higher operations conducted in Iraq last week, 31 percent were independent Iraqi operations, Army Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch, Multinational Force Iraq spokesman, said at a news briefing.

And as Iraqi Security Forces continue to improve, coalition and American troops continue to hand over real estate to them. In the town of Bayji, Iraqi Security Forces took control of Forward Operating Base Summerall. On the second of March, a ceremony marked the transfer of Forward Operating Base Constitution to the Iraqi army. The Iraqi general now in command thanked Americans for what we are doing for his country:

"The American forces are giving freedom back to the people of Iraq, just as they did in Japan, Germany and Korea," said Brig. Gen. Aziz, 3-6 Iraqi Army. "We are receiving this area of responsibility and the job to protect it. God willing, we will be able to do so."

In Mosul a dramatic drop in attacks has occurred since Iraqis took over security of the town:

The Iraqi public in Mosul is becoming less tolerant of the insurgency and are helping the Iraqi Security Forces locate the insurgents with tips, said [Col. Mike] Shields.

This rejection of the insurgency, along with increased pressure from Iraqi Army and Coalition forces, has led to a 57 percent reduction in total attacks since last January, said Shields.

The Iraqi police presence in Mosul has also significantly increased from a year ago. Today the Ninevah province has 14,000 policemen on duty, most who are trained locally at the Mosul Public Safety Academy.

Despite the ever increasing number of transfers to Iraqi Security Forces, members of the mainstream media continue to ignore the progress:

Continued a skeptical Katie [Couric]: "Having said that, will [the ability of Iraq to defend itself] ever happen, given the slow pace of this transfer of military authority to Iraqi forces?"

The Iraqi people not in uniform are also stepping up, and the number of tips about terrorist activity continues to grow. The mainstream media reports on every terrorist attack in Iraq daily, no matter how insignificant, but what they don't report are the stories of every day Iraqis who are putting their lives on the line to help secure their country.

During a recent operation, two shepherds located twelve munitions sites for Iraqi and American forces:

Two local sheepherders did just that, directing one search team of Iraqis and Americans to more than 12 sites, where munitions were discovered within a two-mile radius. High-explosive, phosphate and mortar rounds were among those discovered, which have all been used as weapons against Soldiers and Iraqis alike.

Examples of Iraqis tipping off security forces are numerous:

A tip from an Iraqi led to the arrest of a suspected terrorist south of Baghdad.

Two terrorists were detained after a tip from a local citizen. The two are implicated in numerous roadside attacks.

A large cache of mortar shells was discovered in Baghdad after a tip from a local.

U.S. soldiers in An Najaf were stopped by an Iraqi man who was standing by the side of the road with a sign that read "Stop." The man led the soldiers to a weapons cache.

A tip led to the death of al Qaeda's leader in northern Baghdad.

I could go on, but you get the point. If a mortar that lands in an empty parking lot inside the Green Zone, doing no damage, is newsworthy, then surely tips from Iraqis are newsworthy.

Even our troops serving in Iraq have noticed the problem with the information being reported by the media:

Sgt. First Class Mike Porter has a lot of stories like this. A bench jeweler at Occasions, Porter just came off a yearlong stint in southern Iraq with the National Guard. He's tired of the negative stories coming out of the national media and he insists there is much good being done in Iraq by Americans. His words back him up.

The media also can't be bothered to report on operations that prevent attacks, such as this one in Baghdad that led to the discovery of eleven roadside bombs before they could be used:

Baghdad Soldiers found and destroyed 11 roadside bombs and three weapons caches in the last 24 hours as well as conducted two major offensive operations resulting in the detention of 29 suspected terrorists.

In early February, a National Guard unit from Illinois discovered eleven weapons caches in less than two weeks, including one very significant cache:

The cache consisted of 470 60 mm mortar rounds, 360 82 mm mortar rounds, 43 57 mm rockets, 75 tubes of C3 explosives, 125 hand grenades, 7 50-kilogram bags of TNT, eight land mines, 250 mortar fuses, 500 artillery primers, 15 82 mm illumination rounds, 5 60 mm mortar systems, 1 82 mm mortar system, 11 rocket propelled grenade rounds, eight RPG, 50 anti-aircraft rounds, 20 sticks of TNT, four 12.7 mm machine guns, 1,000 7.62 mm rounds and additional items in the cache.

Every day our soldiers, with the help of Iraqi Security Forces, are capturing or killing terrorists, uncovering and destroying weapons caches, and perhaps most important, winning the trust of local Iraqis. For example, Al Anbar province, once a terrorist stronghold, is exhibiting signs of normalcy, and the Sunni tribes that live there are starting to cooperate with Iraqi and coalition forces. Terrorist attacks in the region are down significantly:

Insurgent attacks last week in the province dropped by more than a quarter, U.S. Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch said in a briefing here this week.

Every weapons cache we destroy is a victory for a safe and free Iraq.

The Arab League announced this week that it will be opening an office in Iraq:

The Arab League is to open its offices in Iraq for the first time since the US invasion three years ago. The League is seeking to play a bigger role in Iraq trying to bring about unity in the ranks of warring Sunni, Shia and Kurd communities.

Although al Qaeda in Iraq scored a propaganda coup with its attack on the Golden Mosque, conditions on the ground have been less than ideal for them. Al Qaeda's leader in northern Baghdad, Abu Asma, was killed in an operation conducted by coalition and Iraqi forces. Asma was connected to a cell that carried out suicide car-bomb attacks, and was in possession of explosive vests when he was killed.

In a town north of Baghdad, Sunni tribes placed a death warrant on Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and his followers after recent violence was attributed to them:

Faced with attacks against their sheikhs and clan members, a number of Sunni tribes from Hawija - an insurgent bastion in northern Iraq - have declared war on Al-Qaeda's frontman in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

"We shall fight all those who commit such attacks, notably Al-Qaeda," the tribal leaders said in a statement that has been circulating around Hawija.

In Anbar province and in Fallujah security operations netted 62 suspected members of al Qaeda, including a member of a cell responsible for a car bombing that killed a U.S. soldier:

Coalition and Iraqi forces operations in Iraq northeast of Fallujah and in Anbar province recently resulted in the detention of 62 suspects, military officials reported.

The suspects were captured after a raid on several al Qaeda safe houses.

A Saudi member of al Qaeda who participated in the attack on an oil facility last week in Saudi Arabia was recently captured in Iraq.

Our troops are handing al Qaeda defeats on a daily basis, and these self-declared "Lions of Islam" have resorted to attacking the softest of targets, children:

According to Muhammad, the report states that 64 children were killed and 57 injured in a total of 417 attacks on educational institutions since November 2005.

Additionally, more than 47 youngsters were kidnapped on their way to or from school for the same period. The report also noted that 311 teachers and government employees had been killed and another 158 wounded in attacks.

The Iraqi people will never rally around these murderers who indiscriminately kill women and children, and that is why the foreign terrorists will never achieve their goals in Iraq.

Another positive sign was the drop in the number U.S. casualties. January 2006 saw the lowest number of casualties in two years.

Iraq's economy is another bright spot for the country. According to the latest figures available, Iraq's GDP grew to $89.8 billion in 2004, more than double the 2003 figure of $37.92 billion. The real growth rate for Iraq's GDP in 2004 was 52.3 percent, the first increase since 2000's 15 percent. That means Iraq's economy was the fastest growing, in terms of real growth, in the entire world. Iraq's exports grew by more than $3 billion in 2004. And the inflation rate in Iraq fell to 25.4 percent in 2004, down from 70 percent in 2002.

USAID is working with the Iraqi government to install a financial system that will allow the government to operate within generally accepted accounting standards. The system should be online in time for the FY 2007 budget.

Reconstruction continues in Iraq, and Iraqi women are not being left out of the contracting process:

The Gulf Region Division (GRD) Water Sector Women's Initiative hosted its quarterly roundtable discussion recently. Eighteen female Iraqi business owners participated in the four-hour discussion on contracting procedures.

The workshops provide female Iraqi business owners with an understanding of the contracting process, including how to locate contracts up for bid and how to respond to debriefings.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is also working with the Iraqi State Ministry for Women's Affairs to help include women in the reconstruction:

Due to targeted efforts over the past year, over 250 Iraqi women-owned businesses have vetted contracts with GRD for reconstruction work, representing approximately $200 million of construction and non-construction contracts. The contracts range from full-scale engineering design and construction of buildings to digging of wells, to supply of construction and office materials, to custodial services. Each month, women-owned businesses compete for and earn approximately 15 new contracts in Iraq - revealing a pattern of slow-but-steady progress.

Here are some examples of the latest reconstruction projects (homepage here) in Iraq:

In Diwaniyah province, the last of 32 new police stations was completed:

The station has offices and sleeping rooms for the officers, visitation rooms, jails, bathrooms, parking area, perimeter wall, guard tower and emergency generators.

Renovations to the general hospital in Baqubah, Iraq are complete. Repairs included upgrades to the facility's water and sewage systems, a new incinerator, new backup generators, and repairs to the elevators. A clinic at the hospital treats up to 500 Iraqis a day.

In Diyala province, a hotel underwent $700,000 worth of renovations to turn it into a maternity hospital to serve the province's 350,000 residents. An Iraqi construction company performed all work on the project.

Iraq's electrical system continues to undergo a major upgrade:

1,500,000 residents of Basrah and potentially all Iraqi Citizens have more reliable power with the installation of Units #5 and #6 at the Khor Az Zubayr Power Plant together producing 250 MW to the national electrical grid.

The completion of underground feeder lines in Baghdad, Erbil, and Mosul cities will mean more reliable power to approximately 1,000,000 people.

The 150,000 people of Mashru, Al-Noor, and Al-Askary, Babil Province now have power to distribution kiosks (on-ground transformers) that the Ministry of Electricity will use to complete the connection of the surrounding homes and businesses to the grid.

More than 50,000 residents of Al-Hindiya, Karbala Province, and Mahawil, Babil Province now have more reliable power to their homes with the installation of 3km of distribution line, repairs to the lines, and three new 630kVA transformers.

Another 30,000 people living in Erbil, Erbil Province, now have reliable power to the local distribution network with the installation of 5km of electrical feeder lines providing power to a newly constructed 33/11kV substation.

20,000 residents of Mahalla 701 in 9 Nisan, Baghdad Province, now have electricity to their homes with completed upgrades to the existing system.

In health news, child mortality has dropped significantly since Saddam was deposed:

During Saddam Hussein's rule, estimates of child mortality rates hovered at 125 deaths per 1,000 births for children under the age of five. Diarrhea and acute respiratory infections accounted for 70 percent of the deaths. While the health situation for Iraqi children remains a concern, reports from the Ministry of Health and Environment indicate that the last year has witnessed an important drop in rates of disease among children under five, particularly for cholera and diarrhea. Current child mortality estimates by USAID and the Ministry of Health place the figure at 50 deaths per 1,000 births, which comports with data provided by the Central Intelligence Agency.

The U.S. Army Corp of Engineers now has a site dedicated to reconstruction. On the fifteenth and the last day of each month a comprehensive report on reconstruction is released. You can view the latest, dated January 30, here.

Reconstruction and security are all well and good, but the U.S. also needs to continue to work to form partnerships with the Iraqi people. When they aren't taking the fight to the enemy, our soldiers are taking the lead in winning the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people.

U.S. troops from Camp Adder provided new shoes for children at the Abu Tubar school, which was built by American forces. The shoes were purchased by the soldiers from Nike:

This mission, nothing really difficult for these soldiers and airmen, just another day to try and make a difference in the lives of young people. Young people who will one day become the future of Iraq and its desire to live in a democratic state. Maj. Kassebaum summed up the day.

"I put some shoes on some kid's feet and that's worth all the time I have spent over here."

In Hamrin, U.S. troops delivered soccer jerseys to young players in the town. The mayor was sure to express his gratitude:

"This makes me very happy," el-Jarbary said. "It is a good feeling knowing you military guys take care of the civilians."

U.S. soldiers recently delivered supplies to an orphanage in central Baghdad:

"Giving gifts to people is probably one of the best things we do here in Iraq," said Capt. Scott Ginsburg, civil affairs officer, Company A, 425th CA.

According to Ginsburg, every civil affairs mission is gratifying, and establishing good relationships is essential to help perpetuate peace for the Iraqi people.

"There are two sides to war," he said. "There is a lethal side and a non-lethal side, and obviously our job is to form great relationships with the people."

After a winter storm destroyed their homes, U.S. soldiers delivered large tents to five very happy Bedouin families:

The recipients of the tents indicated they appreciated the effort.

"You [Coalition forces] saved me from death to life," said Kadhem Utob, a retired farmer who watched as his shelters were loaded into the bed of a small pick up truck. "You are providing good support for the people of Iraq. I give thanks to you."

The Sunni community of Taji benefited from a health clinic put on by U.S. and Iraqi forces:

"We consider this a victory against the insurgency," added Saad. "We coexist with the people. (Our mission) is to secure the people. This time we're doing it medically."

I could go on and on, but I think I have made my point. The only way to combat the MSM's constant barrage of bad news is to stay informed about Iraq through alternative media sources, because for every negative event in Iraq, there are many more positive events that they ignore.

[destruction]

Reality scares you, does it? Neoconservatard.

Pentagon Admits It Lost 'War on Terror'

by URI DOWBENKO

Pentagon Admits It Lost 'War on Terror' Brig. Gen. Robert L. Caslen, the Pentagon's deputy director for the phony "war on terrorism," has admitted that the US has lost the war, according to a Washington Times report.

"'We are not killing them faster than they are being created,' Gen. Caslen told a gathering at the Woodrow Wilson Center," the Times reported.

Caslen however did not admit that the Pentagon was responsible for "creating" terrorists by its policy of the indiscrimate murder of innocent civilians in Iraq. The Pentagon calls that "collateral damage".

Caslen also admitted that the Pentagon was not even able to define the so-called "enemy" in what has become a defacto 21st century version of a war on Islam as well as the Second Coming of the Crusades.

According to Caslen, the Department of Defense now defines the so-called "enemy" in the phony war on terror as "a transnational movement of extremist organizations, networks and individuals that use violence and terrorism as a means to promote their end.

Terrorist growth overtakes U.S. efforts

By Sharon Behn

THE WASHINGTON TIMES

March 2, 2006

Thirty new terrorist organizations have emerged since the September 11, 2001, attacks, outpacing U.S. efforts to crush the threat, said Brig. Gen. Robert L. Caslen, the Pentagon's deputy director for the war on terrorism.

"We are not killing them faster than they are being created," Gen. Caslen told a gathering at the Woodrow Wilson Center yesterday, warning that the war could take decades to resolve.

Gen. Caslen said that two years ago the Department of Defense had not settled on a clear definition of the nature of the war. Moreover, because each government department had its own perspective, "we all had different strategies," he said.

The Defense Department now has defined the nature of the war, he said. The enemy, he said, is "a transnational movement of extremist organizations, networks and individuals that use violence and terrorism as a means to promote their end." It is not a global insurgency, the general said.

"We do not go as far as to say it is a global insurgency, because it lacks a centralized command and control," he said.

Groups such as al Qaeda, though, are constantly trying to increase their capabilities, and in some cases are outstripping the United States, Gen. Caslen said.

"We in the Pentagon are behind our adversaries in the use of communications -- either to recruit or train," he said. Compared with historical jihads, or enduring Muslim wars, this one "is accelerated because of its capability in communications."

The Pentagon official said Muslim thought ranges from secular and mainstream to extremist and intolerant.

The takfir (infidel) view of the world that falls under the Salafist teachings of the Sunni sect -- such as al Qaeda in Iraq -- is an example of the extremist view that condones violence to accomplish ideological ends, he said.

The general said the extremists' goal is to remove U.S. troops from Iraq and establish a radical state under Shariah, or Islamic law, remove what they consider the apostate governments of Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Egypt, and destroy Israel.

But the enemy has vulnerabilities.

"The ideology is not popular among most, even Muslims," he said. "We need to undermine support by amplifying the moderate forces and undermining the enemy's repressive and corrupt behavior."

Gen. Caslen said the government and military are working to integrate their strategies and plans, and that a national strategic presidential directive and homeland security presidential directive are being drafted to face the terrorist threat.

Leading the war on terrorism is Special Operations Command based in Tampa, Fla. The command is writing a military global campaign strategy with a specific plan to deal with each terrorist organization.

Gen. Caslen said a governmentwide plan to assign tasks and responsibilities to all U.S. government departments and the military also is being created.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/world/20060301-113323-8165r.htm

Now iggy....

If you cannot identify who your enemy is, how do you win a war?

How can you define winning a war when more terrorist organizations are coming to fruition moreso since 9/11? 30 more terrorist organizations have emerged since. Answer that!

If you cannot win the hearts and minds of the people of the country you have just invaded, how can a war victory be achieved?

When more terrorists are coming out of the woodwork faster than the Coalition are killing them, how can you say we are winning the war on terrorism?

Instead of running your mouth off in a childish 9 year old temper tantrum tangent, try being an adult and answer them in a civil manner. Show me you're a real man with real balls.

I'm pleased to shit your thread............

And shit on you...........

This is going to be interesting.

[igloo]

Some daily reports by Ralph Peters in Iraq.....good to see some positive reporting, at least for the sake of balance, and a tribute to those serving in the military

IRAQ: THE UNTOLD TRUTHS

Handling the chaos: Lt.-Gen. Abdul-Qadir, the commander of Iraq's ground forces.

March 7, 2006 -- BAGHDAD

AMONG the many positive stories you aren't being told about Iraq, the media ignored another big one last week: In the wake of the terrorist bombing of the Golden Mosque in Samarra, it was the Iraqi army that kept the peace in the streets.

It's routinely declared a failure by those who yearn for the new Iraq to fail. But an increasingly capable Iraqi military has been developing while reporters (who never really investigated the issue) wrote it off as hopeless.

What actually happened last week, as the prophets of doom in the media prematurely declared civil war?

* The Iraqi army deployed over 100,000 soldiers to maintain public order. U.S. Forces remained available as a backup, but Iraqi soldiers controlled the streets.

* Iraqi forces behaved with discipline and restraint - as the local sectarian outbreaks fizzled, not one civilian had been killed by an Iraqi soldier.

* Time and again, Iraqi military officers were able to defuse potential confrontations and frustrate terrorist hopes of igniting a religious war.

* Forty-seven battalions drawn from all 10 of Iraq's army divisions took part in an operation that, above all, aimed at reassuring the public. The effort worked - from the luxury districts to the slums, the Iraqis were proud of their army.

AS a result of its nationwide success, the Iraqi army gained tremendously in confidence. Its morale soared. After all the lies and exaggerations splashed in your direction, the truth is that we're seeing a new, competent, patriotic military emerge. The media may cling to its image of earlier failures, but last week was a great Iraqi success.

This matters. Not only for Iraq's sake, but because standing up a responsible military subordinate to an elected civilian government is the essential development that will allow us to reduce our troop presence in the next few years. Much remains to do - and much could still go wrong - but I, for one, am more optimistic after this visit to Baghdad.

Let's go deeper and probe into the growth of Iraq's army. On Saturday, The Post conducted an exclusive interview with the commander of Iraq's ground forces. It was Lt.-Gen. Abdul Qadir's first sit-down with the press - he's been a busy man.

The general looks like a vigorous, good-natured grandfather in uniform. But his affable dignity masks a heroic past. An armor officer with extensive battlefield experience, Qadir stood up to Saddam, stating that his adventure in Kuwait was destined to fail. The reward for his integrity - the patriotism of the honest soldier - was seven years in prison. Only his history of combat valor saved him from death.

Now Saddam's in prison and Qadir's determined to build a better Iraq.

SITTING in his office in the Defense Ministry - an ornate building whose marble halls and crystal chandeliers predate Saddam - Qadir beamed with pride at the performance of his troops over the previous 10 days.

"Not one unit had sectarian difficulties," he stressed. "Not one. And when we canceled all leaves after the mosque bombing - we expected trouble, of course - our soldiers returned promptly to their units. Now it is as you see for yourself: Iraqis are proud of their own soldiers."

Any nation would rather rely on its own forces than on a foreign military in its streets - no matter how well-intentioned that alien force may be. I asked the general when he thought American troops should leave Iraq.

"We must not be in too great a hurry for you to go," he said, stressing that patience and cooperation were crucial to ultimate success. American troop levels could be reduced in the next few years, but with over 40 years of military service - and as a member of an old Sunni-Arab military family - Qadir has no illusions about the challenges ahead.

Iraqi combat units have made significant progress, but sustaining that success depends on building a reliable logistics infrastructure, on building up communications and intelligence capabilities and on developing a training system that aims at Western standards.

Given the mess Saddam left behind, Qadir's mission is formidable. And the progress to date is impressive to any knowledgeable observer.

QADIR'S principal Ameri can adviser, Col. Tom McCool (whose family lives in Pelham), said of the recent mini-crisis, "It's a good-news story. The Iraqis performed every bit as well as we expected." A firm believer in the general's vision and abilities, McCool stresses that Qadir's a "true soldier," not a political hack, personally incorruptible.

Paraphrasing one of his own U.S. Army superiors, McCool said, "The Iraqi army has to build an airplane while it's already flying. And they're doing it amazingly well."

If Qadir and McCool are confident, so is Brig.-Gen. Dan Bolger, our Army officer charged with "assisting the Iraqis in forming their military." On the day of the Samarra bombing, Bolger expected trouble and headed out into the streets with the Iraqi military.

Instead of widespread strife in the districts of Baghdad he visited, he found "the most average day in the world."

BOLGER'S a story himself. He looks like a taller, more-muscular Gary Cooper and has a distinguished career behind him as an Infantryman. But he's also written a rucksack full of superb books ranging from military history to fiction, and he's one of the most respected thinkers-in-uniform of his generation.

He's the right man for his assignment. In an exclusive interview with The Post, Bolger stressed that the coverage of the past few weeks - and of the Iraqi army overall - had been just plain inaccurate.

Building a military from scratch and changing its culture profoundly is incredibly difficult, yet Bolger's impressed that, after some undeniable birth pains (before Bolger's tenure), the Iraqi army's development is accelerating impressively.

"We bail the Iraqis out less and less," he told The Post, observing that the Iraqis want to do things by themselves - although they'll need some U.S. support for the next few years. "They want us to make a long-term commitment," he said, referring not to a heavy U.S. troop presence, but to a mutually beneficial strategic partnership.

Sitting behind his desk in a Spartan office in Baghdad, Bolger exploded another myth - that the new Iraqi military's been infiltrated by militia members. "It's actually hard to penetrate the army," he said. "They're not garrisoned locally, but mixed into truly national units and deployed around the country." In the recent flare-up, sectarian issues had not been a problem in a single Iraqi unit.

Bolger mused about the terminology Iraqi officers employ. They refer to terrorists as "terrorists," but call the native insurgents "criminals" and despise them. He stresses that the Iraqis have it right: "The criminal element is an underestimated element in the violence. A lot of these people are just predators."

Bolger's a man whose judgment I trust, having known him for 20 years (we all knew back then that Dan was destined for high rank). If he's confident, I'm confident. And Dan believes that, if we have a reasonable amount of patience, the new Iraqi military will emerge as the best in the Arab world - and a firm ally in the region.

AS I head home after far too short a stay with our won derful soldiers, I can only offer Post readers my honest assessment:

Serious problems remain. No question about it. We'll hear more bad news (some of it may even be true). But from my heart I believe that the odds are improving that, decades from now, we'll look back and see that our sacrifices were worth it. I found Baghdad a city of hope, its citizens determined not to be ruled by terrorists, fanatics, militias or thieves.

We are doing the right thing.

Nor do I say this lightly. I just learned that the son of an old friend was seriously wounded in Iraq and evacuated to a military hospital in Germany (the latest news I have is that the young man will make a complete recovery - let's pray that it's so).

This is a gigantic struggle for indescribably high stakes. We're trying to help a failing civilization rescue itself, to lift a vast region out of the grip of terror and fanaticism, and to make this troubled world safer for our own citizens. Don't let anyone tell you we're failing in Iraq.

The future remains undecided, but the last few weeks may have been a decisive turning point - against our enemies. Iraqis, military and civilian, stood up for their own country, for reason, for peace.

What more could we ask?

Ralph Peters says he has been privileged to spend the last few weeks with America's men and women in uniform.

[igloo]

INFANTRY PATROL

March 6, 2006 -- CAMP LIBERTY, IRAQ

CAPT. Jeremy Gwinn's In fantrymen had a very good day. It started early, with Bravo Company's 2nd Platoon nabbing an insurgent tied to several assassinations. But as midnight approached there was still one mission to complete.

Acting on tips from local Iraqis, the soldiers of the 1st Battalion, 87th Infantry from Fort Drum had been rolling up a murder- and roadside-bombing-ring for weeks. In a violence-free raid, they'd just apprehended the elder member of a terror cell. Now the prisoner had to be transferred back to the headquarters compound for processing.

Capt. Gwinn spoke with me on a dark dirt road outside of the Abu Ghraib prison complex - where the detainee might or might not end up. Guarding the facility's outer perimeter is just one of the battalion's many missions. Bravo Company pulls that duty - and patrols a vast suburban sector, too.

Gwinn (of Lititz, Pa.) had plenty of experience to draw on. He'd already led his company through a year in Afghanistan. He has the aura and composure of a true combat leader.

One of his patrols had been hit with a roadside bomb an hour earlier. No injuries, no damage. Gwinn shrugged off the incident. "Most of the IEDs out here are ineffective," he said. "You don't hear much about that, though."

IT hadn't always been that way. After assuming control of their sector, 1-87 had cleaned up Dodge City.

The battalion has an elite reputation, earned the hard way. Its parent outfit, the 1st Brigade of the 10th Mountain Division, is the most-deployed brigade in the U.S. Army.

Covering a notoriously dangerous swath of western Baghdad and its suburbs, and working in partnership with Iraqi Army units, the brigade's losses over the last six months have been only six soldiers killed - one of whom died in a tragic accident while on leave in Texas.

A low casualty rate measures not only a unit's progress, but the quality of its leadership. The brigade's performance speaks for itself.

WE stood under a crescent moon, with the floodlights of Abu Ghraib glowing on the horizon. Black Sheep 6 - Capt. Gwinn - took a radio call. His 2nd Platoon was about to link up with us. I was hitching a ride on the tactical convoy delivering the prisoner to Camp Liberty.

First Lt. Scott Treadwell's men had made the collar early that morning, but they were still on duty late at night. The hours in Iraq are long, and the work remains dangerous enough. A few months ago, a serious IED had sheered off part of a Humvee along our route. There had been no severe injuries, but the driver of the wrecked vehicle didn't like the route much after that.

He was driving it again tonight.

As for prisoner mistreatment, it just doesn't happen in this Army, and it certainly doesn't happen in 1-87. The insurgent was blindfolded, flex-cuffed and given a well-protected seat - to keep him safe from roadside bombs that his own kind put in place.

THE ride into headquarters was another non-event. No civil war in sight. Just another jolting journey in a dusty Humvee, listening to soldier talk and the rasp of the radio. Our gunner stayed alert, though.

Instead of collapsing into sectarian strife, the brigade's area of operations had become quieter since the Samarra bombing. The people do not want any part of more violence.

The zone's big event had been a thousand-man demonstration by Sunnis and Shias together at the al-Rahman Mosque - to protest the media's overreaction to the flurry of attacks that followed the bombing of the Golden Mosque.

Forget the self-importance: Journalists are just fleas on the military dog. I was one more responsibility for 2nd Platoon's soldiers. Yet they were as gracious as they were weary. They treat us far better than most of us treat them.

OUR convoy took a jagged route through villages that were fast becoming suburbs, past ratty shanties and the odd row of up-market homes. Soon enough, we pulled into camp and the disciplined routine began. Our vehicles passed checkpoints, stopping to unload weapons. The base was still busy in the small hours. I had a bunk waiting for me. 2nd Platoon's soldiers had to get back on the road after their prisoner drop-off.

Inside the 1st Brigade's austere headquarters, a few staff officers and NCOs remained at work, monitoring reports from units in the field and preparing for the next day's ops. The relative calm let the ghosts slip in from the darkness with their tales of heroism and tragedy.

Like the City That Never Sleeps, 1st Brigade has endless tales to tell: How, during a firefight, Spec. Andrew Suchanek, a medic, shielded a wounded Iraqi policeman with his own body as he treated him, or any number of other anecdotes of valor under fire.

THERE have been tragedies, too. There are in every war and conflict. On Feb. 27, Staff Sgt. Dwayne P. Lewis, a "mountain of a man," fell in the line of duty. Grenada-born, Lewis loved three things: His family, lifting weights and the Army.

His scout element was moving through a rural yard at night. Fearing bandits, the Iraqi homeowner shot blindly into the darkness. A bullet pierced Lewis' throat. He "bled out" in three minutes. His comrades were still mourning him as I spent my too-short spell with the "Climb to Glory" Brigade.

AND then the vivid life al ways returns. Shortly after I showed up, the brigade presented me with a face that said, "I'm from New York City - you got a problem with that?" Staff Sgt. Adam T. Navarro, an Army Reservist serving in Iraq, is a member of New York's Finest in "real life." Born in Manhattan, raised in The Bronx and now a resident of Brentwood, Officer Navarro works in Queens.

He could serve as a symbol of NYC's heart and soul: A big-fisted bear with a great sense of humor, strong opinions and a fan not only of the Yankees, but of Yankee Stadium itself. (He's a Post fan, too. Back home, his morning ritual begins with the sports section.)

His police experience has been a great advantage in Iraq (as he puts it, "Never underestimate the value of a New York City cop"). A veteran of Bosnia, as well, he sees a common thread: No matter what the elites or the media say, "The poor are always happy to see U.S. troops."

He worries that the people back home aren't getting a true picture of Iraq. Navarro's a firm believer in the mission. "We just need to give it enough time," he insists.

Who am I to argue with a New York City cop?

Ralph Peters is with our troops in Iraq.

[igloo]

DUDE, WHERE'S MY CIVIL WAR?

March 5, 2006 -- BAGHDAD

I'M trying. I've been trying all week. The other day, I drove another 30 miles or so on the streets and alleys of Baghdad. I'm looking for the civil war that The New York Times declared. And I just can't find it.

Maybe actually being on the ground in Iraq prevents me from seeing it. Perhaps the view's clearer from Manhattan. It could be that my background as an intelligence officer didn't give me the right skills.

And riding around with the U.S. Army, looking at things first-hand, is certainly a technique to which The New York Times wouldn't stoop in such an hour of crisis.

Let me tell you what I saw anyway. Rolling with the "instant Infantry" gunners of the 1st Platoon of Bravo Battery, 4-320 Field Artillery, I saw children and teenagers in a Shia slum jumping up and down and cheering our troops as they drove by. Cheering our troops.

All day - and it was a long day - we drove through Shia and Sunni neighborhoods. Everywhere, the reception was warm. No violence. None.

And no hostility toward our troops. Iraqis went out of their way to tell us we were welcome.

Instead of a civil war, something very different happened because of the bombing of the Golden Mosque in Samarra. The fanatic attempt to stir up Sunni-vs.-Shia strife, and the subsequent spate of violent attacks, caused popular support for the U.S. presence to spike upward.

Think Abu Musab al-Zarqawi intended that?

In place of the civil war that elements in our media declared, I saw full streets, open shops, traffic jams, donkey carts, Muslim holiday flags - and children everywhere, waving as our Humvees passed. Even the clouds of dust we stirred up didn't deter them. And the presence of children in the streets is the best possible indicator of a low threat level.

Southeast Baghdad, at least, was happy to see our troops.

And we didn't just drive past them. First Lt. Clenn Frost, the platoon leader, took every opportunity to dismount and mingle with the people. Women brought their children out of their compound gates to say hello. A local sheik spontaneously invited us into his garden for colas and sesame biscuits.

It wasn't the Age of Aquarius. The people had serious concerns. And security was No. 1. They wanted the Americans to crack down harder on the foreign terrorists and to disarm the local militias. Iraqis don't like and don't support the militias, Shia or Sunni, which are nothing more than armed gangs.

Help's on the way, if slowly. The Iraqi Army has confounded its Western critics, performing extremely well last week. And the people trust their new army to an encouraging degree. The Iraqi police aren't all the way there yet, and the population doesn't yet have much confidence in them. But all of this takes time.

And even the police are making progress. We took a team of them with us so they could train beside our troops. We visited a Public Order Battalion - a gendarmerie outfit - that reeked of sloth and carelessness. But the regular Iraqi Police outfit down the road proved surprisingly enthusiastic and professional. It's just an uneven, difficult, frustrating process.

So what did I learn from a day in the dust and muck of Baghdad's less-desirable boroughs? As the long winter twilight faded into haze and the fires of the busy shawarma stands blazed in the fresh night, I felt that Iraq was headed, however awkwardly, in the right direction.

The country may still see a civil war one day. But not just yet, thanks. Violence continues. A roadside bomb was found in the next sector to the west. There will be more deaths, including some of our own troops. But Baghdad's vibrant life has not been killed. And the people of Iraq just might surprise us all.

So why were we told that Iraq was irreversibly in the throes of civil war when it wasn't remotely true? I think the answers are straightforward. First, of course, some parties in the West are anxious to believe the worst about Iraq. They've staked their reputations on Iraq's failure.

But there's no way we can let irresponsible journalists off the hook - or their parent organizations. Many journalists are, indeed, brave and conscientious; yet some in Baghdad - working for "prestigious" publications - aren't out on the city streets the way they pretend to be.

They're safe in their enclaves, protected by hired guns, complaining that it's too dangerous out on the streets. They're only in Baghdad for the byline, and they might as well let their Iraqi employees phone it in to the States. Whenever you see a column filed from Baghdad by a semi-celeb journalist with a "contribution" by a local Iraqi, it means this: The Iraqi went out and got the story, while the journalist stayed in his or her room.

And the Iraqi stringers have cracked the code: The Americans don't pay for good news. So they exaggerate the bad.

And some of them have agendas of their own.

A few days ago, a wild claim that the Baghdad morgue held 1,300 bodies was treated as Gospel truth. Yet Iraqis exaggerate madly and often have partisan interests. Did any Western reporter go to that morgue and count the bodies - a rough count would have done it - before telling the world the news?

I doubt it.

If reporters really care, it's easy to get out on the streets of Baghdad. The 506th Infantry Regiment - and other great military units - will take journalists on their patrols virtually anywhere in the city. Our troops are great to work with. (Of course, there's the danger of becoming infected with patriot- ism . . .)

I'm just afraid that some of our journalists don't want to know the truth anymore.

For me, though, memories of Baghdad will be the cannoneers of the 1st Platoon walking the dusty, reeking alleys of Baghdad. I'll recall 1st Lt. Frost conducting diplomacy with the locals and leading his men through a date-palm grove in a search for insurgent mortar sites.

I'll remember that lieutenant investigating the murder of a Sunni mullah during last week's disturbances, cracking down on black-marketers, checking up on sewer construction, reassuring citizens - and generally doing the job of a lieutenant-colonel in peacetime.

Oh, and I'll remember those "radical Shias" cheering our patrol as we passed by.

Ralph Peters is reporting from Forward Operating Base Loyalty, where he's been riding with the 506th Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division.

[igloo]

RIDING THE BUFFALO

March 3, 2006 -- HUNTING FOR IEDS IN BAGHDAD

FOWARD OPERATING BASE

LOYALTY, BAGHDAD

'BUFFALO interrogating," Staff Sgt. Morehouse called into his headset mike. Under a vehicle-mounted spotlight, an armored claw extended toward a sack lying by the roadside.

We were hunting for "improvised explosive devices," or IEDs, the crude-to-sophisticated bombs planted to kill or maim our troops. Riding in an aptly named "buffalo" - a big, ugly, tough vehicle produced in South Africa - we were the mother ship of a four-vehicle patrol prowling through the night in Indian country: East Baghdad.

And I may have been the safest man in the city. Not only because of the buffalo's armor and the steel slats welded to the hull to defeat rocket-propelled grenades. The real reason I felt as safe as hizzoner in his private washroom was the quality of the soldiers around me. All were experienced NCOs of the sapper company - the mine clearers and trailblazers - of the 506th Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division.

The 506th is the "Currahee!" outfit of "Band of Brothers" fame; its soldiers today are every bit as combat-ready and dedicated as the paratroopers who fought their way from Normandy to the Eagle's Nest.

The buffalo's claw poked the bag, testing it. Waiting for a blast to shake the vehicle.

Nothing.

Manipulating a hook attachment, Morehouse lifted the bag and, in a heavy-metal ballet, opened and emptied it. Only garbage -this time. But just to the south, a sack tied off the same way had been crammed with explosives.

Morehouse nursed the boom back into its traveling position, with 1st Sgt. Dan Bates guiding. The sapper company's "old soldier," Bates takes a bit of teasing about his "Mesopotamian" background: He's from Mesopotamia, Ohio.

"Mongoose hot!" comes over the headset.

"Iron Claw go!"

Our patrol resumed its crawl through nighttime Baghdad.

The Post doesn't give away our military's secrets, so we'll just say that the scout vehicle leading us was a great example of how your tax dollars keep soldiers alive. Another South African vehicle followed, an RG-31, an armored truck that looks like a collaboration between Mad Max and Bill Gates.

The buffalo was the alpha dog, though, the destroyer of terrorist hopes. Since the Currahee! boys (and gals) arrived in Baghdad on Jan. 5, the sappers have detected and neutralized IEDs as large as 64 pounds of explosives - a shaped charge powerful enough to take out any standard vehicle. They've saved unnumbered American - and Iraqi - lives.

Sometimes the process gets a little loud, though. Early on, two IEDs blew up while being "interrogated."

"Not the best way to find them," Bates noted.

We worked our way down Route Pluto, until recently a notorious "bomb alley." The 506th cleaned it up -literally. Removing the welcome-to-Baghdad piles of garbage that pass for local color, the Currahees made it harder for the terrorists to hide IEDs. First Lt. Jim Ashton's Assault and Obstacle Platoon frequently re-inspects the route at unpredictable intervals, keeping the bad guys off balance.

As we worked slowly between rows of ragged homes and ponds of stagnant water, the other members of the buffalo's crew, Staff Sgts. Henry Knell and Eric Johnson, help scan the grubby landscape. Each man has an amazing eye for detail and can spot an out-of-place chunk of concrete immediately. The ability's crucial: The more skillful insurgents disguise bombs as plain-vanilla rocks.

Long stretches of intense scrutiny are eased by Nascar-America banter on the intercom and attempts to get a rise out of the first sergeant. Top Bates doesn't bite; he's heard it all before. But there's general agreement that the most-shameful fate for any man is to drive a minivan. This is a real-man, big-engine brotherhood.

The convoy has marvelous surveillance gear. But old-fashioned spotlights still have their place: The beams flow over lone date palms and pitted walls. An abandoned bus looks like a perfect hide for an IED to me, but the buffalo's NCOs have an uncanny sense of things. They give the hulk a pass - and their judgment proves correct.

As hours pass, the inside-the-turtle-shell feel of body armor works on your back and you share the feeling of a century of soldiers as the band inside your helmet sweats through and grips tight. Again and again, the convoy halts, then deploys to inspect a suspicious object.

But it turns out to be "a quiet night on Pluto." Stray dogs watch us, bemused at the odd things humans do.

Thanks to the sappers, the terrorists have backed off from trying to disrupt the route. "No IEDs" is a crucial measure of success down in the 'hood. The only explosion reported over the radio net is somewhere else.

For all the rabid headlines about "civil war in Iraq," it's a relatively quiet night in Baghdad. The terrorists - counting on media support - are far from giving up. But they no longer have the initiative on the 506th's turf.

And that area includes over 4 million people in a huge swath of bad-ass Baghdad: notorious districts such as Sadr City and Salman Pak, and a potentially volatile mix of Sunni and Shia Arabs, as well as Kurds and Christians.

This is the heartland of the civil war that doesn't exist. In fact, it looked like quite a success story over the last week - but you didn't hear about that, of course.

The 506th's commander is Col. Tom Vail, "Currahee 6," an Airborne fireball whose favorite word is "nuance" when he speaks about Iraq. He prepared his subordinates for their Baghdad mission by making them study Islam, Middle Eastern culture and urban infrastructure. The effort pays off every day.

After the terrorists blew up that shrine in Samarra last week, you heard plenty about the violent confrontations between Sunni and Shia. But you didn't hear about the performance of the Iraqi army's 6th Division, the 506th's partner unit in eastern Baghdad. Largely composed of Shias, the 6th Division deployed its combat vehicles to protect Sunni mosques. Even in Sadr City, the violence never spun out of control. Casualties, yes, Armageddon, no.

Iraq does have a national army. It's getting better every day. Even as I write, they're taking casualties for their country.

Col. Vail and the soldiers of the 506th still face plenty of challenges, from civil-affairs operations and neighborhood diplomacy to tracking down terrorists and the looming need to disarm sectarian militias. The problems can seem almost overwhelming. But spend a little time around the 506th's troops, from Pfc. Chris Flippen of the sappers up to the senior staff, and you'll come away convinced that this mission will not fail.

Around midnight, I walked back into the compound through the familiar dust and exhaust of convoys coming home or preparing to roll out on yet another patrol. The snap of soldiers clearing their weapons punctuated the low growl of engines as war machines followed their ground guides. I heard the mundane sounds of an Army at war. And an anthem of freedom.

Ralph Peters is currently a guest of the 506th Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division.

[igloo]

BRINGING POWER TO THE PEOPLE

By RALPH PETERS

March 2, 2006 -- ONE of the most persistent myths about Iraq is that our efforts to im prove the electrical system failed. That's just plain wrong. The country's in far better shape than it was under Saddam.

But freedom always has a cost: In this case, the demand for power soared after Saddam fell — and crashed the grid. It's been a long, hard fight to get it back up.

Iraq never had an adequate power grid. Under the Ba'athist regime, Baghdad might have enjoyed power 18 or 20 hours a day, but other cities got three or four. One of the first things we did was to distribute power more equitably. Baghdad gets less, so its residents complain — but if you're in almost any other Iraqi city, you're far better off today than you were three years ago.

In the wake of the war, we faced two immediate problems:

* First: The grid was even more decrepit than the worst pessimists had suspected. Saddam never funded electrification adequately; spare-parts money from the Oil-For-Food program went to build palaces and monuments instead.

* Second: As soon as the borders opened, appliances flowed in, from refrigerators to air-conditioners to satellite dishes (the dishes are everywhere). Money came out from under a few million beds and the country went on a massive shopping spree that hasn't ended. As soon as the Saddam-era system was exposed to "normal" demands, it crashed.

Nonetheless, power generation last July averaged 5,300 megawatts; the top pre-war peak was 4,300. Just now, output's down to 3,900 to 4,200 megawatts— because the system's being serviced and upgraded to meet this summer's demands.

Power matters. As one ranking official (who preferred not to be named) put it, "Power is the Iraqis' No. 1 concern" and "the center of gravity" for our efforts. Power outages affect far more lives than terrorism does.

The insurgents and terrorists realize this. The progress to date has come despite frequent attacks on transmission lines and on the pipelines that fuel the power plants (another action that turns Iraqis against our mutual enemies).

Plus, as American managers frankly admit, Iraqis never had a culture of maintenance. Under Saddam, the attitude of employees toward state property echoed the Soviet Union: Nobody owned anything, so nobody cared about anything. You couldn't get a worker to change the oil. Iraq's developing better attitudes — but it takes time.

We also made some early misjudgments — for one, overestimating Iraqis' ability to manage sophisticated technologies. We brought in gas turbines whose control systems were beyond the local engineers' technical skills. (One U.S. official tells of showing computer models to a middle-aged Iraqi who broke down in tears as he realized his professional life had been wasted under Saddam — his country had missed the entire microchip revolution.)

Since then, we've simplified whatever we could. Still, as Corps of Engineers civilian David Leach puts it, "The industry standard moved so far [since Saddam took power] that even the least-sophisticated systems now available can be a challenge for Iraqis." (Leach, by the way, was the corps' New York metro-area engineer before volunteering for Iraq — and he's a veteran of the 9/11 recovery effort.)

Col. John Medeiros, an Air Force civil engineer, is convinced that "Iraqis want to succeed," and that "the job's getting done." He's impressed by the local thirst for knowledge after the information drought under Saddam. As for developing competent Iraqi managers, he calls it "escaping 'Insh'Allah' " — that is, the habit of shrugging off personal responsibility for getting a tough job done.

Medeiros points out another overlooked factor about our efforts: Many of our projects have been long-term; some major installations are only now coming on line (despite the challenges, 130 projects have been completed).

The challenge isn't just power generation, either. Everything was decrepit, from sub-stations to the power lines themselves. We faced a daunting task. And our fellow Americans in Iraq have done a far better job than they've received credit for doing.

We aren't just fixing it all while the Iraqis watch, either. We couldn't. The cost would be prohibitive, and rebuilding the entire power system was never our intention. Our goal was to jump-start the system, then teach Iraqis how to do it — and more and more projects are now carried out by Iraqi firms and ministries, with U.S. officials offering only supervision and advice.

Iraqis won't be fully content for years, of course. They desperately want to be part of the modern world — and that's going to take a long time. Meanwhile, they're finding workarounds. Many Baghdad neighborhoods have chipped in to buy communal generators to provide reliable power to their homes. Not the perfect system, but it buys time for development.

Significant problems remain, no question about it. Iraq was a ruined country. But things are going far better than you've been told.

Still, painting an idealized picture would be as dishonest as the left's claims that everything in Iraq's been a massive failure. We did get some things downright wrong. So I'll give the last word to Vicky Wayne of the Project and Contracting Office, an outfit working beside the Corps of Engineers' Gulf Region Division.

Vicky's a volunteer from San Francisco who took an 80 percent pay cut to help out in Iraq. "We set out on grand reconstruction projects," she said, speaking of our early missteps, "but Iraqis have no long-term visions. They wanted short-term relief. We could have done quick, easy things that would have mitigated the dissatisfaction." She also believes that the Iraqi expats the administration empowered "did terrible damage."

She's dead right. But we've made great progress, anyway. Because of magnificent Americans like Vicky Wayne.

Ralph Peters is on assignment in Iraq for The Post.

[igloo]

THE SEWERS OF BABYLON

By RALPH PETERS - In Iraq

March 1, 2006 -- BAGHDAD

OUR Humvees splashed through troughs of sewage, between ponds of filth that covered several acres. Shanties crowded on accidental islands fringed with stands of reeds. A stall selling brilliant vegetables did a brisk business at the edge of the sludge.

The Risalah slum is home to hundreds of thousands of Iraqis no one ever cared about. No one. Until the U.S. Army arrived. And tried to make their lives better. We were on our way to inspect a "minor" project to change the lives of the poor.

Slum life in Baghdad is grim, yet colorful. Garish shop-front ads blaze through layers of dust under the midday sun. Black-robed women scurry past loitering young bucks. Bent old men laze in castoff plastic chairs. Garbage is everywhere, in phenomenal amounts. It's a world of instant dilapidation.

According to the media, our three-vehicle patrol should have gotten nothing but hostile glares. Instead, we got a surprising number of friendly waves. The turret gunners remained alert, but all we saw were simple human beings trying to get on with their lives.

I rode with Lt.-Col. Joe Gandara, the commander of the Special Troops Battalion of the 4th Infantry Division's 4th "Cobra" Brigade. In two decades of service, Gandara's never faced a tougher job than this one: hands-on oversight of 45 "immediate-impact projects" strewn on both sides of the Tigris River. He does everything from monitoring new construction to struggling to convince Iraqis that maintenance really is important (the Iraqis run the gamut from the risk-your-life dedicated to deadbeats — Gandara sorts out the latter over time).

From top to bottom, Baghdad's culture is broken. It often seems to be every man for himself, and damn the world. Yet, that first impression deceives: More and more Iraqis are stepping up to build a better society.

Saddam didn't just ravage the physical infrastructure — he wrecked the moral infrastructure, too. The recovery will be long and often painful. But the patient wants to get better, something that's easily lost amid skewed headlines.

After inspecting a number of antiquated water-processing plants, where Gandara offered tough love and tools to Iraqi managers (he'll deliver expertise and spare parts, but won't do their work for them), we wrap up the tour at the far western edge of Baghdad, where the dug-in poor live in shanties, and new arrivals huddle in squats.

At the edge of a clotted irrigation ditch, we pull in beside a small compound. As they do at every site, threatening or not, the troops flow smoothly into a defensive posture, making it look far easier than it is. But even before we can set up a hasty perimeter, we're attacked. By a horde of children. Rushing out from the edge of the slum.

I'm no softie for kids; I like 'em best after they hit 30. But these ragged, dirty children even get to me.

Gandara and his men are here to save the children's lives. The "minor" project is a nearly completed "compact sewage-treatment plant." Built from scratch for relative pennies, the plant will drain the sewage that routinely backs up into alleys and homes while further polluting a wretched water supply.

Gandara and his NCOs handle the business end first, inspecting the progress on the site. Then it's the children's turn.

The colonel and his troops take along a bit of candy for the slum kids. More importantly, they hand out school supplies (these children's families can't afford a tablet).

Pens, notebooks, rulers: You'd think we're handing out gold coins. The NCOs are great about making sure the bigger kids don't make off with the bulk of the goods, teasing them a little but putting something into the smallest child's hands.

Of course, those notebooks will be used up and the pens will go dry. It doesn't do to exaggerate the good impression our soldiers might leave behind. That sort of thing can be readily forgotten. What really matters is that new weapon of war, a bare-bones sewage-treatment facility.

We hear no end of tales of failure in Iraq. But because of one small project (and there are hundreds such in Iraq), 10,000 of our fellow human beings won't have to live with sewage in their streets and shanties. That makes a real, human difference. Yes, it might be minor in the great schemes of global strategy. It won't make us loved throughout the Middle East. But America's soldiers make a profound difference in here-and-now lives. How many armies in history could make that claim?

We've all heard plenty about human-rights abuses. What about those 10,000 dirt-poor Iraqis whose children will have a chance to escape disease? The old regime wouldn't spare them a few pipes and pumps. Isn't exposing a child to cholera while building palaces for yourself a human-rights abuse?

By the way: I didn't see any of our self-righteous critics in the Risalah slum.

But I did see Sgt. Maurice Harris, Spec. Victor Tsung and PFC (hey, promote that guy!) Brad Sheets, along with their comrades in arms. They were soldiers to the core, mastering a new type of war. And they were great Americans.

For all the bad news you hear — much of it viciously skewed — Baghdad is a city of hope. And it isn't thanks to Saddam — or to those in the West who opposed a tyrant's overthrow.

Great job, GI!

Ralph Peters is in Iraq on assignment for The Post.

[ghhhhhost]

lmfao..man u r by far the most dillusional person on the boards...and that's sayin a lot considering this is a clubbing messageboard and mind altering drugs r prevalent amongst its members

[bxbomb]

ooops guess the worst isnt over

combine the daily death toll and negropontes comments the other day , and we should be in for a real summer of love

well at least cheneys comments of the insurgency being in its last throes are comming to fruition, civil war over an insurgency is much better

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A U.S. military patrol and Iraqi police discovered 23 bodies — many of them handcuffed and strangled — in various parts of Baghdad, authorities said Wednesday, while bombings, gunfire and other violence claimed at least seven other lives.

Among the reported deaths was a U.S. soldier who was killed by a roadside bomb Tuesday near the northwestern city of Tal Afar. Four other soldiers were wounded in the attack, the military said.

The unrelenting violence came amid a deepening political stalemate among Iraqi ethnic and religious factions that threatens the creation of a unity government U.S. officials hope can stabilize the country so foreign forces can start going home this summer. Underlining U.S. concerns, the ambassador held talks with a top Shiite leader Tuesday.

An American patrol found 18 of the bodies — all males — in an abandoned minibus Tuesday night on a road between two notorious west Baghdad neighborhoods. Most bore marks indicating they were hanged or strangled, and two were shot to death, said Dr. Mohanad Jawad at Yarmouk Hospital, where the bodies were lined up on stretchers in the morgue. Police believed at least two of them were foreign Arabs.

Police found the bodies of four other handcuffed and strangled men in an open field in east Baghdad on Wednesday. Another body, shot in the head, was found near a shop in an eastern suburb.

The gruesome discoveries followed a surge of sectarian violence unleashed by the Feb. 22 bombing of a sacred Shiite shrine in the central city of Samarra and reprisal attacks against Sunni mosques and clerics. Sectarian killing has diminished in recent days, but other attacks have increased, the Defense Ministry reported Tuesday.

A string of explosions Wednesday killed at least four people — including two young boys — in the capital, police said.

One bomb hidden under a parked car near the University of Technology detonated as police from the interior minister's protection force were driving through central Baghdad, killing two officers, police said. Five other people, including a policemen, were injured in the blast. The minister was not in the convoy at the time, police said.

Another bomb missed an American convoy on the northern outskirts of Baghdad and killed two Iraqi boys who were selling gasoline by the roadside, police said. He estimated their age at 10 or 11.

At midday, an Iraqi patrol saw four gunmen pull a man from the trunk of a car and shoot him to death in west Baghdad, police reported. They said the patrol tried to intercede, but the gunmen fired at them and fled.

The inability to agree on a broad-based government after December parliamentary elections is threatening to crush American hopes of beginning a troop pullout this summer. Washington policy holds that such a unity government would inspire sufficient loyalty from all parties to enable it to fight the raging insurgency by itself.

Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari declared Tuesday he would not be "blackmailed" into abandoning his campaign for a second term despite opposition from Sunni, Kurdish and some secular Shiite leaders who have vowed not to cooperate with him.

Al-Jaafari's Shiite United Iraqi Alliance, which has the largest bloc of lawmakers, asked President Jalal Talabani on Tuesday to delay summoning parliament into session until the dispute is resolved.

Alliance members are themselves divided over al-Jaafari, who won the Shiite nomination by a single vote last month, with the backing of radical anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Talabani, a Kurd, had hoped to bring the dispute to a head by convening parliament on Sunday. Under the constitution, parliament is supposed to elect a new president within 15 days of its first meeting. It then has 15 more days to approve the prime minister, and 30 days after that to vote on his Cabinet.

To convene the session, Talabani needs the approval of his two vice presidents, Abdil Abdul-Mahdi, a Shiite, and Ghazi al-Yawer, a Sunni. Abdul-Mahdi, al-Jaafari's main rival for the Shiite nomination, has declined to sign, for now.

An evening meeting Tuesday between the Kurdish faction in parliament and the Shiite Alliance failed to break the impasse.

Representatives of the main political blocs planned to meet at Talabani's office Thursday to discuss the standoff and decide a new date for parliament to meet.

Underscoring Washington's concerns over the deteriorating political situation, U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad held a meeting with Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, head of the powerful Shiite Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, one of the two dominant parties in the Shiite coalition.

The two met at al-Hakim's Baghdad home Tuesday to discuss "the current political situation concerning the formation of a new government and developments related to the alliance's candidate to head the Cabinet," the SCIRI Web site reported with an accompanying photo of the session. The U.S. Embassy did not immediately respond to a request for further information.

In an interview published Tuesday in the Los Angeles Times, Khalilzad said the 2003 U.S. ouster of Saddam Hussein had opened a "Pandora's box" that could see the violence and turmoil now gripping Iraq turn into an all-out regional war if American troops are withdrawn too quickly.

But narrowing the differences among Iraq's Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds has become an increasingly difficult task in the aftermath of the Feb. 22 bombing of the golden domed Shiite Askariya shrine.

Sunni politicians have accused the Mahdi Army, the Shiite militia loyal to firebrand cleric al-Sadr, of launching many of the revenge attacks against Sunni mosques and clerics with the blessing of the Shiite-controlled government security apparatus — charges denied by the government.

In a report Tuesday, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said U.S.-led coalition forces and Iraq's authorities may be violating international law by arbitrarily detaining thousands of people.

The report, which studied the situation in Iraq for the last three months, said its prison system remains a major concern and lamented that an investigation into allegations of torture in Interior Ministry jails had not been made public as promised.

As political negotiations stalled, the violence raged on.

A former brigadier in Saddam Hussein's army was shot and killed Wednesday in western Baghdad, police said.

A bomb exploded at the Basra headquarters of Iraq's South Oil Co., causing minor damage but no casualties. Crude production and exports were not affected, said Jabar Luaibi, the company's director general.

Also Wednesday, an Iraqi civilian was killed in a collision with a U.S. Bradley Fighting vehicle after failing to head warning signs to stop, the military said in a statement.

The death of the U.S. soldier that was reported Wednesday brought to at least 2,302 the number of U.S. military members who have died since the beginning of the war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. The figure includes seven military civilians.

Bombings, mortar blasts and gunfire killed 19 people Tuesday, and police also reported finding four bullet-riddled bodies — two with their eyes gouged out.

[igloo]

lmfao..man u r by far the most dillusional person on the boards...and that's sayin a lot considering this is a clubbing messageboard and mind altering drugs r prevalent amongst its members

Are you saying it is delusional to post some daily logs from someone WHO IS IN IRAQ, and reporting on stuff the mainstream NEVER gets to hear?

Perhaps good news/progress/call it whatever you want should not be reported, highlighted, talked about, discussed, etc?

Perhaps you are saying that any good news, progress, accomplishments are not true, or that those who do report it are lying or delusional....

Are you trying to say that our military does not deserve to be recognized for their efforts and achievements?

Are you trying to say that progress, accomplishments, etc should not be discussed because it is against your view of the war?

Are you trying to say that good news should not be mentioned because there is bad news?

Are you trying to say one is delusional because reporting from Iraq should provide the ENTIRE picture, not just the "if it bleeds, it reads" stuff?

Are you trying to say only the bad shit from Iraq needs to be the focus?

I wonder who is delusional--those who seek the entire picture (both the good and the bad), or those who still can't come to grips with the fact the mainstream media has been antiwar from Day One, is clearly anti-Bush, will only report on the bad, headline grabbing shit to fit their own agenda, and rather report on a car bombing 24/7, than anything that might be positive?.....Hmmm, I wonder who is delusional.

I wonder who is delusional---the person who seeks perepctive, balance, and objectivity from news from Iraq---or the person like you who calls "good news stories" delusional, or actually roots for failure, and takes joy in miserable news....

And coming from someone like you does nothing but talk bad about the U.S., yet takes advantage of everything the country offers---I don't think you have much credibility shitstain, nor should be passing comment from an obvious position of laughable hypocrisy......

Go away little leaguer.......be careful about slinging the word delusional around to desribe others--you are not smart enough to realize what an utter imbecile you sound like...

Fucking fool

[ghhhhhost]

nice ramble...just confirms ur lunacy

[ghhhhhost]

might i add

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4786744.stm

ITS GOING REAL SWELL OVER THERE SPANKY

[igloo]

ooops guess the worst isnt over

combine the daily death toll and negropontes comments the other day , and we should be in for a real summer of love

well at least cheneys comments of the insurgency being in its last throes are comming to fruition, civil war over an insurgency is much better

bxbomb---your post proves my point.

We get bombarded 24/7 with the bad news.....relentlessly.....but that should not mean that when progress is made, or when accomplishments are achieved, or when their is genuine good news, it is near impossible to find...

Or worse, when it does get reported---there are those who discount or ignore it because it does not align with their anti-war agenda, or because they are so blinded by Bush hatred, or because they are ignorant or just plain stupid........or the worse of the worse, they ignore it because they continually root for failure.

And the bad news rom Iraq should not be ignored either, nor should the administration fucks ups........but it should all be balanced and put in perspective.....with sustainability....

This is not a Bush/Hate Bush, or Rep/Dem, Pro-war/anti-war or NeoCon/Leftist thing......no matter what side of the aisle you are in, we should demand an EQUAL balance of reporting from the Mainstream media...

Our soldiers who have sacrificed, and carry the heavy burden with their families, deserve as much.......

This country is still debating the Iraq War, and the time for that is so passed it is ridiculous, and UNDERMINING--and for those of you who can't see that--YOU ARE DELUSIONAL....And the sad part is there is no alternative or constructive ideas coming from the anti-Bush, anti-war crowd...NOTHING (pull out now is intellectually bankrupt). More concerned with killing Bush, and projecting their own agenda than what is really good for the situation.

I had the honor of spending some time with someone this weekend who has done two tours in Iraq. He told me the biggest drain on morale there was the performance of the media, and teh fact the American people do not get the whole pciture.

Think about that, and the enormous ramifications that has, from the individual soldier all the way to how policy is formed or executed.

[igloo]

nice ramble...just confirms ur lunacy

Nice try jerkoff...what is confirmed is your nothing but a tool vomiting bullshit...again. And had it shoved up your ass....again.

Jerkoff

[bxbomb]

All my posts Ig are to bring up the fact , this was the wrong war and we should not be there ... thats it

My heart goes out to alll the troops becuse they are dying for the wrong cause.Im sure it doesnt help them to read only the negative and not some of the good they are doing there , but quite frankly i rather hear feel good stories of troops doing good over here helping Katrina victims or how they turned back 150 illegal immigrants at the mexican border

sorry dude wrong war, wrong country, wrong timing

thank cheney, wolfowitz and the boys for this mess and why the soldiers feel bad about waht their reading

[igloo]

All my posts Ig are to bring up the fact , this was the wrong war and we should not be there ... thats it

My heart goes out to alll the troops becuse they are dying for the wrong cause.Im sure it doesnt help them to read only the negative and not some of the good they are doing there , but quite frankly i rather hear feel good stories of troops doing good over here helping Katrina victims or how they turned back 150 illegal immigrants at the mexican border

sorry dude wrong war, wrong country, wrong timing

thank cheney, wolfowitz and the boys for this mess and why the soldiers feel bad about waht their reading

You seriously miss the point.....your opinion of wrong war, wrong country...blah, blah, blah is not the point anymore.....

Here is the reality that you and others don't seem to get....WE ARE THERE. Get it? Understand?

And because, in your opinion, Bush and gang fucked up, the problem should be made worse by the performance of the media and those on left, and antiBush brigade...what kind of fucking logic is that???

You are lost son.

[bxbomb]

You seriously miss the point.....your opinion of wrong war, wrong country...blah, blah, blah is not the point anymore.....

Here is the reality that you and others don't seem to get....WE ARE THERE. Get it? Understand?

im fully on point, and it is the POINT , the boys over there wouldnt be hearing all this negative press ( negative but almost all true)

time for the administration to own up and get us the fuck out of there before one of these legitamate (syria,iran,sudan,nkorea etc.)cauldrons boil over and were too spread thin to go and do something about it because were bogged down in some place we wanted to bring "democracy" to

the only winners in this whole iraq purple finger fiasco is Iran .... Go SHias

[igloo]

im fully on point, and it is the POINT , the boys over there wouldnt be hearing all this negative press ( negative but almost all true)

time for the administration to own up and get us the fuck out of there before one of these legitamate (syria,iran,sudan,nkorea etc.)cauldrons boil over and were too spread thin to go and do something about it because were bogged down in some place we wanted to bring "democracy" to

the only winners in this whole iraq purple finger fiasco is Iran .... Go SHias

Are you fucking stupid?????

You are so off point it is unreal. You claim you post your shit to "prove" the war was a mistake? Ever stop to think that maybe, just maybe your view may be a little different if you got the whole picture? Can your feeble mind comprehend that?

And retard--you keep ignoring the point--THEY ARE THERE, and this country should be getting the WHOLE PICTURE, not just the bad news. It is the least we owe to the soldiers, and+to ourselves....

Saying "the boys over there wouldnt be hearing all this negative press ...if they weren't there is such an idiotic, second grade comment it is unreal....

Again, with that fucked up, mind boggling stupidity---it should be made worse by the media and dickheads like you?

Again, because yor stupidity has hijacked this thread from its original point----there is progress...there is accomplishments...and there is good news...despite what 24/7 headlines and jerkoffs like you ignore....and they deserve to be heard and put into the entire picture...

And just maybe, just maybe, morons like you may gain a better understanding of a situation that will last decades, not in a soundbite that aligns itself with your intellectual capacity...

"time for the adminstration to own up and get out"....wow, what an overwhelming display of intelligence and alternitive thinking by you...must be so proud...

[bxbomb]

i pity you

go hunting with that drunk cheney

Are you fucking stupid?????

You are so off point it is unreal. You claim you post your shit to "prove" the war was a mistake? Ever stop to think that maybe, just maybe your view may be a little different if you got the whole picture? Can your feeble mind comprehend that?

And retard--you keep ignoring the point--THEY ARE THERE, and this country should be getting the WHOLE PICTURE, not just the bad news. It is the least we owe to the soldiers, and+to ourselves....

Saying "the boys over there wouldnt be hearing all this negative press ...if they weren't there is such an idiotic, second grade comment it is unreal....

Again, with that fucked up, mind boggling stupidity---it should be made worse by the media and dickheads like you?

Again, because yor stupidity has hijacked this thread from its original point----there is progress...there is accomplishments...and there is good news...despite what 24/7 headlines and jerkoffs like you ignore....and they deserve to be heard and put into the entire picture...

And just maybe, just maybe, morons like you may gain a better understanding of a situation that will last decades, not in a soundbite that aligns itself with your intellectual capacity...

"time for the adminstration to own up and get out"....wow, what an overwhelming display of intelligence and alternitive thinking by you...must be so proud...

[ghhhhhost]

Nice try jerkoff...what is confirmed is your nothing but a tool vomiting bullshit...again. And had it shoved up your ass....again.

Jerkoff

oh u definitely SURVVVVVVV'd me

[destruction]

Soldiers in Iraq know they are fighting and dying for a lie

March 1, 2006 02:26 AM / The Rant .

By DOUG THOMPSON

Nearly three-quarters of the American troops serving in Iraq think the U.S. should withdraw within the next year and 29 percent feel we should get the hell out of the war immediately, a poll of military personnel serving in country reveals.

This jives with emails I've been getting from soldiers over the past several months and it confirms that those serving on the ground in the war don't share the rosy optimism painted by the Bush administration about the invasion and occupation of Iraq.

"Man, this gig has FUBAR written all over it," says a Marine who has served in Iraq for seven months. "Morale is the pits and nobody in our unit thinks we should be here."

The poll, conducted by Zogby International, offers a rare look into the mindset of fighting men and women serving in a war zone. That mindset is, to say the least, reflective of growing American unrest over a war based on false information and outright lies.

Among the findings by Zogby:

* Only 23 percent agree with the President's position that we should "stay in Iraq as long as needed."

* 85 percent of those surveyed felt they were fighting the war "to retaliate for Saddam's role in the 9-11 attacks," although the 9-11 commission in 2004 found "no credible evidence" that Iraq had cooperated with al-Qaida in the attacks.

* 68 percent said they believed that the real reason for the war was simply to remove Saddam Hussein from power.

* 40 percent say the Iraqi insurgency is mostly homegrown, with very little foreign involvement - a direct contradiction of claims by the Bush administration.

* 55 percent flatly oppose using torture and other harsh interrogation methods on prisoners.

"Ninety-three percent said that removing weapons of mass destruction is not a reason for U.S. troops being there," says John Zogby, President and CEO of Zogby International. "Instead, that initial rationale went by the wayside and, in the minds of 68% of the troops, the real mission became to remove Saddam Hussein."

In another direct contradiction of stated White House policy, just 24% said that "establishing a democracy that can be a model for the Arab World" was the main or a major reason for the war.

Zogby interviewed the 944 soldiers at various locations throughout Iraq. Three quarters of the troops had served multiple tours and had a longer exposure to the conflict: 26% were on their first tour of duty, 45% were on their second tour, and 29% were in Iraq for a third time or more.

The Pentagon did not cooperate with Zogby in the survey and is trying to downplay the significance of the soldiers' responses but offered conflicting responses. In one released statement, the military brass said the troop comments were not valid because "troops in a combat zone are likely to express negative views of their situation."

Then Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Barry Venable tried a different spin.

"The poll's findings certainly aren't reflective of the attitudes we see displayed by the majority of troops, who are performing in a remarkable manner in a combat situation far from home," Venable said. I asked Venable's office for any polls the military had conducted on troop attitudes and morale and they admitted they had not done any surveys but added that they based their conclusions on reports from "commanders in the field."

Emails received almost daily from soldiers in the field confirm Zogby's findings and say Pentagon claims of success and high morale are, as one National Guardsman said: "Pure unmitigated bullshit."

Their emails, and now Zogby's findings, show these men and women who put their lives on the line day in and day out do so for a war they fully know was based on false pretenses and they are fighting and dying for a cause that doesn't exist.

[bxbomb]

igloo, im sure the the troops want more made up stories like Jessica Lynch and Pat Tillman to make themselves feel good ,or even more stories published in iraqi papers that werre paid for with even more US dollars

[igloo]

igloo, im sure the the troops want more made up stories like Jessica Lynch and Pat Tillman to make themselves feel good ,or even more stories published in iraqi papers that werre paid for with even more US dollars

Actually what they want is clueless blowhards who offer nothing like you to shut the fuck up, even has they fight to protect your right to be a jerkoff....

Now, your response here was disappointing, even for an imbecile like yourself....and a little shocking, considering the bar is set so low for you.....you obviously have not been reading your "How to be an antiwar, anti-Bush imbecile" manual....at least be a moron with some professionalism

You left out Halliburton, Daddy's revenge, war for oil, etc and the rest of the usual mindless rants that come from empty-headed schmucks with no capacity for thought like yourself.......

It was bad enough that your provided a brutal glimpse into obvious lack of intellect with your posts on this thread, but to not even throw in a "Bush lied" comment is disappointing..

C'mon blowhard, keep pace with your fellow morons...show some pride in the mental midget that you are!

[bxbomb]

its ok iggy, i know reality and the truth can be harsh some times.

You lost,your on the wrong side of it aND the history books will not treat you and your kind well ,but its ok Its only a club messageboard go ahave a drink with cheney and chill the fuck out

Actually what they want is clueless blowhards who offer nothing like you to shut the fuck up, even has they fight to protect your right to be a jerkoff....

Now, your response here was disappointing, even for an imbecile like yourself....and a little shocking, considering the bar is set so low for you.....you obviously have not been reading your "How to be an antiwar, anti-Bush imbecile" manual....at least be a moron with some professionalism

You left out Halliburton, Daddy's revenge, war for oil, etc and the rest of the usual mindless rants that come from empty-headed schmucks with no capacity for thought like yourself.......

It was bad enough that your provided a brutal glimpse into obvious lack of intellect with your posts on this thread, but to not even throw in a "Bush lied" comment is disappointing..

C'mon blowhard, keep pace with your fellow morons...show some pride in the mental midget that you are!