Irak: Forstærkningen virker

Fortrinligt interview med den amerikanske øverstbefalende i Irak, General Petraeus af Hugh Hewitt.

Mens politikerne i Washington er ved at gå i panik ved tanken om den tilstundende valgkamp, så passer Petraeus og hans tropper deres arbejde. Et enkelt snip:

HH: General, what about the losses on the enemy? You mentioned that hundreds of al Qaeda fighters have been killed in the last couple of months, but are they suffering losses in the thousands every month? Or is it hundred, two hundred? What kind of force reduction’s going on there?

DP: Yeah, as you know, we try to avoid body counting, but inevitably, obviously, it is something we keep track of, because we’re trying to have some sense of the damage that we are doing to al Qaeda-Iraq, its affiliates, other Sunni insurgent groups, and also certainly to the Shia militia extremist elements. And the answer to that in a general sense is that they are losing many, many hundreds of their, of these different elements each month, certainly since the onset of the surge.

En god indføring i den nye strategi kan læses her.

Men én ting er hvad generaler og strateger siger og gør. Hvad mener soldaterne på jorden? Her er Michael Yon et fantastisk øjenvidne. Yon har fulgt de amerikanske tropper helt egen hånd siden krigen startede. Han er ikke ansat af medierne, men skriver for egen regning og risiko. Af samme grund har han nogle temmelig skrappe restriktioner på på brug af citater fra hans blog. Ingen af hans fotos og højst et kort klip fra hans tekst. Det er begrænsninger som jeg vil respektere, netop fordi han er helt afhængig af traffik og donationer.

Et enkelt citat vil jeg dog gerne bringe:

Seeing “God is Great” written on the Iraqi flag might provoke some to protest “Why did we come here just to stand up a country who would write such things on their flag?” But I sat there in that meeting, which was completely civil and professional, and I thought about another flag, the one flying over South Carolina. Some people call that flag “heritage,” while others call it “hateful,” “painful” and “demeaning.” And today in that meeting, I thought about the descendants of slaves who are now top military commanders in the American Army, and in that moment I knew that Iraq could make it.

Læs hans reportage fra "Operation Arrowhead Ripper" her og klik videre i øverste højre hjørne for de efterfølgende kapitler.