Eric Umansky

Personal Service Announcement

Turns out I had bronchitis.  But now  I'm feeling the goodness of modern meds and should be  back up to speed by Monday.

I'm With Froomkin

I've had my differences with the WP.com's Dan Froomkin, but I think he's on to something with his most recent kvetch. If--as seems to be the case--President Bush really was warned of dissenting opinions about  the aluminum tubes he and other top officials later claimed were (unequivocally) intended  for  Saddam's  supposed nukes programs, and then top officials went about trying to cover up that warning...shouldn't there be sorta a big story and merit more than silence from the papers?

Here's a snippet from Murray Wass, who broke the story in the National Journal:

 

"Presidential knowledge was the ball game," says a former senior government official outside the White House who was personally familiar with the damage-control effort. "The mission was to insulate the president. It was about making it appear that he wasn't in the know. You could do that on Niger. You couldn't do that with the tubes." A Republican political appointee involved in the process, who thought the Bush administration had a constitutional obligation to be more open with Congress, said: "This was about getting past the election."

Why, again, isn't this worthy of being probed by the papers?

 

The U.S.'s Hail Mary in Iraq

The New Republic's Spencer Ackerman explains the U.S.'s (finally) smart strategy in Iraq:

Since Khalilzad arrived in Baghdad last year, he has worked tirelessly to curb the influence of Iraq's Shia majority, which has benefited from every previous step of the U.S.-backed political process.... But it would be a mistake to view Khalilzad as simply anti-Shia or pro-Sunni. Rather, he's trying to cobble together the balance of sectarian power that has so far eluded Iraq--an endeavor that, practically speaking, first requires Khalilzad's moves against the dominant Shia.

By the way, the strategy is better described as Ambassador Khalilzad's--one gets the White House itself is behind the curve and hasn't fully bought in. In any case, next read Swopa who gives more details on the strategy--namely an attempt to split the Shiites--and how it is already failing.

The AWOL Justice Dept.

The Justice Department has repeatedly gone after contractors who have bilked the U.S. in Iraq.  The question why it has repeatedly refused to do the same for contractors involved in abusing prisoners?

More soon...

Groom and Doom

The NYT has a pleasantly puffy piece about Oliver Platt and Hank Azaria, who it turns out are old buds and now hanging together on Showtime's Huff. A photo accompanies the story:

The caption (which isn't online) reads: "Oliver Platt and Hank Azaria, college friends, who are among the stars of the Showtime series Huff, at Sardi's." Then the credit (also only in print), "Lars Klove for the New York Times; grooming by Gita Bass." Eh, grooming? Is that standard operating procedure?   

Coalition Casualty Count

A day-by-day representation, done with an animated map.

Iraqi Gov't: No There There, II

An announcement Riverbend just saw on Baghdad TV:

“The Ministry of Defense requests that civilians do not comply with the orders of the army or police on nightly patrols unless they are accompanied by coalition forces working in that area.”

If a state is defined by its monopoly over the use of force...certainly not much of that here; we  don't even know which forces are "the state."

P.S. I've come down with a bad cold, so there's going to be minimal posting--and FWIW I'm not doing TP tonight.

Iraqi Gov't: No There There

Top Iraqi goverment officials are fuming over the  (still very murky) U.S.-led raid on religious complex in Baghdad that left about 20 dead.  "The killings there are an unjustified and flagrant attack," said interior minister (and militia-man-in-chief) Bayan Jabr.

But here's the thing: The raid included--indeed the shooting appeared to be done by--Iraqi troops. So what's going on? According to a Pentagon press release, the Iraqi unit was the "1st Special Operations Forces Brigade." I haven't found other references to that group, but many of the special forces units are relabeled Kurdish militia. So here's a guess: The brigade is Kurdish, didn't have much objection to raiding a Shiite religious site (perhaps rightly) and didn't exactly coordinate with higher-ups, who are almost exclusively Shiite. Again, just a guess.

Obviously, the top officials know that they'll lose street cred if they don't loudly complain about the raid. But just because it's in their political interest to oppose the raid, doesn't mean they're lying. Again the more likely scenario: The officials knew nothing about the raid, really do oppose it, and...and...it's just another small sign that the Iraqi government in many senses simply doesn't exist.

Also: I owe readers a defense/explanation of my stand on Iraq--such as it is--and why despite all the pessimism, I'm still queasy about calling for a withdrawal. Still on its way... but the short version: I think from a moral and strategic perspective we have an obligation to Iraq. That doesn't give us the answer to what should be done (to withdraw, or not, how quickly, etc). But it does give us the question. It's not what's best for the U.S., or at least not primarily that. The question should still be what would be best for Iraqis. We owe Iraqis that much.

   

Always Easy to Mix That Up

From the NYT:

In last Sunday's Op-Ed article about Donald Rumsfeld: His title is secretary of defense, not secretary of state.

Iraq's Iffy Army

We hear a lot these days that while Iraq's police are ethnically-based and essentially extensions of militia, the army is a different story. So exactly how broad-based is Iraq's army?

For the first time, I can across some actual stats on it, and I suspect you're not going to be to be hearing them in the president's progress reports anytime soon. Here's what strategy guru Anthony Cordesman concluded:

Only two of the 10 divisions as yet have something approaching sectarian and ethnic balance, and even this is weak. About 60% are Shi'ite dominated, and 20% are Kurdish influenced.

In other words, 80 percent of Iraq's army is dominated by one group or another--and those are the forces we're optimistic about.

Background: That quote comes from a "paper" Cordesman  sent out via email but hasn't posted on the Web. And no there weren't any footnotes or source listed.