another day in iraq

At least 150 people killed in Baghdad, with several bombs going off around the Iraqi capital. The Iraqi goverment said this proved the fighting in Tal Afar had badly hurt the Sunni insurgency. Juan Cole sees it differently. The insurgents retreated from Tal Afar (for that matter, so did most city residents) before US troops could bring them fully to battle. And boom, the insurgents immediately inflict the second-bloodiest day since Saddam fell on Shiites in Baghdad. (BTW, unlike earlier US offensives in Fallujah, Tal Afar got very little coverage -- mostly because of the Katrina mess.)

So we control more or less the Green Zone in Iraq, and can't seem to take the battle to the insurgents without them being tipped off in advance. And turning to Cole for the last word, "... the guerrillas' ability at this late date to mount such a shatteringly effective operation in the capital itself is why the pitiful and arrogant Project for a New American Century fantasy of just crushing the Sunni Arabs of Iraq is a K Street wet dream generated by intellectual adolescents, not a realistic policy."