Al-Qaeda In Iraq Reported Crippled

Wow! Before I head into work, I wanted to throw this up real quick. After reports of declining casualties, we now get reports from military that our enemy is crippled! I know the liberals don’t want to hear it, but victory is starting to look like an achievable objective!

The U.S. military believes it has dealt devastating and perhaps irreversible blows to al-Qaeda in Iraq in recent months, leading some generals to advocate a declaration of victory over the group, which the Bush administration has long described as the most lethal U.S. adversary in Iraq.

But as the White House and its military commanders plan the next phase of the war, other officials have cautioned against taking what they see as a premature step that could create strategic and political difficulties for the United States. Such a declaration could fuel criticism that the Iraq conflict has become a civil war in which U.S. combat forces should not be involved. At the same time, the intelligence community, and some in the military itself, worry about underestimating an enemy that has shown great resilience in the past.

“I think it would be premature at this point,” a senior intelligence official said of a victory declaration over AQI, as the group is known. Despite recent U.S. gains, he said, AQI retains “the ability for surprise and for catastrophic attacks.” Earlier periods of optimism, such as immediately following the June 2006 death of AQI founder Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in a U.S. air raid, not only proved unfounded but were followed by expanded operations by the militant organization.

There is widespread agreement that AQI has suffered major blows over the past three months. Among the indicators cited is a sharp drop in suicide bombings, the group’s signature attack, from more than 60 in January to around 30 a month since July. Captures and interrogations of AQI leaders over the summer had what a senior military intelligence official called a “cascade effect,” leading to other killings and captures. The flow of foreign fighters through Syria into Iraq has also diminished, although officials are unsure of the reason and are concerned that the broader al-Qaeda network may be diverting new recruits to Afghanistan and elsewhere.

The deployment of more U.S. and Iraqi forces into AQI strongholds in Anbar province and the Baghdad area, as well as the recruitment of Sunni tribal fighters to combat AQI operatives in those locations, has helped to deprive the militants of a secure base of operations, U.S. military officials said. “They are less and less coordinated, more and more fragmented,” Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the second-ranking U.S. commander in Iraq, said recently. Describing frayed support structures and supply lines, Odierno estimated that the group’s capabilities have been “degraded” by 60 to 70 percent since the beginning of the year.

AJ Strata predicts:

Bush will be vindicated long before the November 2008 elections. And watch as the electorate makes as big a shift here in the US as the Iraqis did a few months back. Hold onto your hats ladies and gentlemen, it is going to be a wild political ride for the next 12 months.

Prarie Pundit:

Politically, this should be a serious blow to Democrats who only weeks ago were desperate to declare defeat and retreat. It certainly demonstrates their lack of judgment and their lack of character in standing up to the enemy. The same can be said for squishy Republicans like Chuck Hagel. All though votes the Senate Democrats insisted on over the spring and summer have put them on record as being on the wrong side of history and Republicans need to start reminding voters of the positions taken by these losers.

Captain Ed:

At the strategic level, the situation is really reversed. The Islamists base their entire system on the supposition that God (Allah) has ordained them to beat the infidel and recover the ummah for Islam. They can’t afford to be seen to have lost land to the infidels, because it would disprove their entire raison d’etre. If they can’t hold the ummah, then they’re not chosen by Allah at all.

A defeat in Iraq (and Afghanistan) will strip them of their legitimacy among Muslims. They cannot abide defeat and retreat, because they cannot run from the ummah and claim at the same time to be its holy defenders. That’s one reason among several why victory in Iraq is so critical — and why it’s critical to get it right in declaring it.

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Posted by Jay on October 15, 2007 7:11 am

» Filed Under News, War On Terror

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Comments

4 Responses to “Al-Qaeda In Iraq Reported Crippled”

Mohawk on October 15th, 2007 10:23 am

I am in the process of making as many Crow pies as necessary to feed the dems their due!
Angryflower on October 15th, 2007 10:45 am

“I know the liberals donâ€™t want to hear it”

I’m a liberal and I’m happy to hear about dead terrorists.

But keep up the stereotypes, it’ll help you win votes.
Otter on October 15th, 2007 5:42 pm

What’s STACLU running for, angry?
Jim on October 15th, 2007 6:37 pm

I’m a liberal and I am happy to hear about dead terrorists too. Doesn’t stop me from wondering, though, if we wouldn’t have been better off refraining from creating the conditions for Al Qaeda in Iraq to form in the first place by invading a country where they didn’t even exist! Let’s not forget that they are not the same people who attacked us on 9-11. They are different people who are mad at us for different reasons and who basically just signed on to the Al-Qaeda franchise. If we are the cause of the disease, isn’t it a little bit riduculous to whoop it up and declare ourselves victors when we make some progress against it? It’s like starting your own house on fire, having everyone tell you how stupid you were to do it, then bragging when you start to get control of the blaze.