I haven’t posted a great deal about the operations being conducted in Iraq against militia factions in the Basra area by Iraqi security forces supported by U. S. and, presumably, MNF-1 forces.
BAGHDAD - U.S. jets widened the bombing of Basra on Saturday, dropping two precision-guided bombs on a suspected militia stronghold north of the city, British officials said.
Maj. Tom Holloway, a British military spokesman, said U.S. jets dropped the two bombs on a militia position in Qarmat Ali shortly before 12:30 p.m.
Basra is Iraq’s commercial and oil hub, and militant followers of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr have been battling Iraqi and coalition forces in the southern city since Tuesday.
“My understanding was that this was a building that had people who were shooting back at Iraqi ground forces,” Holloway said.
The number of people killed in the latest strikes was not yet known, he said.
Iraqi police said that earlier in the day a U.S. warplane strafed a house and killed eight civilians, including two women and one child. They spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to release the information. The U.S. military had no immediate comment on the report and it was not possible to independently verify it.
British jets also have been providing air support in the area. The British military had no immediate information but said it also was looking into the reports of civilian casualties.
American forces launched their first airstrikes in Basra Friday as Iraqi troops struggled against strong resistance in the nation’s commercial center and headquarters of the vital oil industry. Clashes there have sparked retaliatory fights in Baghdad and other Shiite cities.
The simple reason is that I don’t know that there’s much to be made of it. It would be interesting to know precisely which Iraqi security forces were taking part in the operations but that information hasn’t seemed to have been forthcoming. As I’ve mentioned before, the Badr-dominated Interior Ministry has its own army.
I don’t understand the thinking of those who see some sort of hypocrisy or inconsistency or signs of collapse in the activity. The ability to prioritize isn’t hypocrisy it’s just commonsense.
Much of this stuff was a foregone conclusion when the U. S. invaded Iraq in 2003. It’s a matter of demographics. Iraq has a majority of Arab Shi’ites. Basra is Iraq’s largest Shi’ite Arab city (other than Baghdad) as well as the chokepoint of the southern Iraqi oil industry. If the central government is to survive it will need to reduce any groups that challenge its authority, particularly in the vicinity of Basra. That includes Shi’ite militias as well as foreign fighters, Ba’athist restoriationists, and Sunni militias.
That the various Shi’ite groups have Iranian support should be a surprise to no one. The Iranians have cannily exploited their sectarian ties to the various Shi’ite factions and, as best as I can tell, are playing the groups against one another. If we have any brains we’ll do the same thing but I’ve seen no evidence that we’ve the subtlety to pull that off.
So we’ll probably support the Maliki government down the line and it’ll be every bit as awful and every bit as aligned with Iran as a Sadrist government would be.
Generally, I agre with Tariq Alhomayed’s view:
If the ‘Knights’ Assault’ operation was aimed at protecting the whole of Iraq, then there would have been grounds for genuine reconciliation between the multitude of sects in Iraq through Nouri al Maliki’s government. When Iyad Allawi’s government laid siege to Najaf so as to pursue the Shia Mehdi army, it was also simultaneously crushing the terrorist Sunnis in Fallujah – the situation then is very different from now. This is why what is taking place in Iraq today can be summed up as one party trying to get rid of the competition, however they are all under the same umbrella and it is executed in a manner reserved for Mafia movies!
Still, I think we’d be prudent to acknowledge the suspicions held by Sunni Arabs in the region of an Iranian-dominated Iraq while treating them with skepticism. The Iraqi Shi’ites have their own interests, too.
译文:
告诉大家
我没有公布大量有关伊拉克安全部队在巴士拉地区反对民兵派系行动的消息，据推测，这支部队背后的支持者是美国和多国部队。
英国官员透露，巴格达－美国战斗机在周六的时候，扩大了对巴士拉的轰炸范围，往城市北部的一处被怀疑是民兵组织据点的地方投掷了两枚精确制导炸弹。
英国军方发言人汤姆霍洛韦少校也说，美国战机是当天临近12：30的时候，往卡尔马特阿里民兵据点投下两枚炸弹的。
巴士拉是伊拉克的商业枢纽和石油中心。自周二以来，以激进教派分子萨德尔(Muqtada al-Sadr)为首的民兵组织已经与伊拉克以及联军部队在城市南部交战。
霍洛韦说：“我的理解是，这是一个建筑，里面的人正在往地面上的伊拉克军队射击。”
他说，目前还不知道，在最近的袭击中的死亡人数。
伊拉克警方说，当天早些时候，一架美国战机扫射一所房子，导致8名平民死亡，其中包括2名妇女和1名儿童。他们不愿意透露姓名，因为他们没有授权发布消息。美国军方还没有立刻对此报道发表评论，同时这是不可能独立核实的。
英国战斗机也对该地区提供了空军援助，英国军方还没有即时的资料，但其声称，他们也正在研究平民伤亡报告。
由于伊拉克军队在国家商业中心和重要石油工业总部顽强抵抗斗争，美国军队在周五的时候发起了在巴士拉的第一次空袭。冲突已经引发了巴格达和其他伊拉克城市的报复斗争。
原因很简单，就是我不知道还有许多工作有待做出的。令人感兴趣的是，想确切了解哪些伊拉克安全部队正在采取行动，但资料似乎没有表明这正在举行。正如我已经提过，巴德尔主导的内政部拥有自己的军队。
我不明白的是，那些在这一行动看到某种形式的虚伪或不一致或崩溃迹象的人的思想，优先次序的能力不是虚伪，只是常识而已。
当美国在2003年入侵伊拉克的时候，大部分东西已成定局。这是一个关于人口统计数据的问题了。伊拉克大多数人属于阿拉伯穆斯林什叶派，而巴士拉是伊拉克最大的什叶派阿拉伯城市（除巴格达外），以及伊拉克南部石油工业的咽喉如果中央政府想要生存，它需要减少挑战其权威的任何团体，特别是在巴士拉附近的，包括什叶派民兵以及外国战士，复兴党分子和逊尼派民兵的武装。
伊朗支持各什叶派团体，这已经不稀奇了，我最好的理解就是，伊朗人已经很精明地利用了他们与各什叶派的宗派关系，利用其他派别打击另一个派别。如果我们有大脑，我们会做同样的事情，但我没有发现能表明我们已经神不知鬼不觉地做了的证据。
所以，我们很可能会全力支持马利基政府。到时它将会成为像萨德尔政府（Sadrist government）一样的——有点可怕，又不与伊朗结盟的政府。
概括的来说，我赞同塔里克（Tariq Alhomayed）的观点：
如果“骑士突击”行动旨在保护整个伊拉克的话，那么伊拉克将有理由通过萨达姆政府（Nouri al Maliki’s government），在众多的教派中达成真正的和解。当阿拉维的政府为了追赶什叶派迈赫迪军，而包围纳杰夫等的时候，它同时也粉碎在费卢杰的恐怖分子逊尼派穆斯林――当时和现在的情况是非常不同的。这就是为什么今天在伊拉克发生的，可以概括成一党试图摆脱竞争的缘故，然而它们却都处在同样的保护伞下，这是黑手党电影里面保留的一种处决方式！
我仍然觉得我们要审慎行事，在承认逊尼派阿拉伯人在伊朗主导的伊拉克地区怀疑的同时，消除他们的怀疑。伊拉克什叶派也是有其自身的利益的。