It seems that while the Iraqi government is willing to call in our military for air strikes and the U.K. troops to fire rounds on the Madhi militia, they send two envoys to Iran to call an end to the violence. How is the Bush administration going to explain that one away?
Remember, it wasn’t too many weeks ago when Mahmoud Ahmadinejad received a red carpet welcome from the new Iraqi government. Iran’s president waltzed through Baghdad and met with al-Maliki and other Iraqi officials as if it were a coronation.
Only a week or two before President Bush had flown into Baghdad under cover of darkness. There were no public appearances. There was no red carpet. There was no fanfare. More recently, the Vice President and the Republican nominee John McCain walked around the Green Zone talking about all the progress we have made in Iraq while wearing flak jackets and helmets.
According to USA Today
In a possible turning point in the recent upsurge in violence, Muqtada al-Sadr ordered his Shiite militiamen off the streets but called on the government to stop its raids against his followers.
The government welcomed the move Sunday, which followed intense negotiations by Shiite officials, including two lawmakers who reportedly traveled to Iran to ask religious authorities there to intervene.
Well, that has to make the Decider happy. But, let’s face it, the War in Iraq is ours. It looks as if they will take peace, even if it’s temporary from wherever they can get it. Just who would have thought it would come from Iran?
It was reported
In an effort to curb the growing violence, two senior Shiite lawmakers close to al-Maliki — Hadi al-Amri and Ali al-Adeeb — traveled to Iran and asked authorities there to stop the flow of weapons to al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army, according to two officials.
The lawmakers — both of whom have close ties to Iran — also asked the Iranians to pressure al-Sadr to come up with a face-saving initiative, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject.
So, al-Sadr made a few demands and the Iraqi government traded a few promises for peace…. after the Iranians pressured the militia. Al-Sadr released a statement telling his Madhi militia to stop the killing and lay down their guns.
Scattered firing could be heard in central Baghdad hours after al-Sadr’s statement was released, and rockets or mortars were fired toward the Green Zone, where U.S. diplomats were holed up in the embassy at Saddam Hussein’s former palace and ordered to stay under hard cover as the sprawling area has come under frequent fire this week.
Bush, Cheney and McCain have touted the surge (the U.S. surge, not the Madhi surge) as a ”success”. I wonder how they will explain the following:
Also Sunday, a U.S. soldier and a Marine were killed in separate roadside bombings in Baghdad and in Anbar province west of the capital, the military reported. That raises to 4,010 the number of American service members killed since the war started in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
The U.S. military said separately that American and Iraqi troops unearthed 14 badly decomposed bodies in a mass grave on Saturday in Muqdadiyah, northeast of Baghdad. It was the second such find since Thursday, when 37 bodies were found.
Maybe, just maybe… it’s time to bring our troops home. It seems that peace and stability can’t be won with weapons. And, God forbid the Bush administration would try diplomacy. It appears that they would rather leave it to the Iranians.
