All the talk about how calm Iraq is now thanks to the surge only indicates how dumbed-down our definition of “calm” has become. A suicide bomber blew himself up near a police station northeast of Baghdad Dec. 4, killing at least eight and wounding 30. The attack occurred as police were gathered at the station in Jalula, Diyala province, with Kurdish peshmerga troops who came to the area as part of a security crackdown. The dead included four Iraqi police, two Kurdish troops and two civilians, police said. (AP, Dec. 4) On Dec. 5, car bombs killed at least four across northern Iraq. The most deadly was in Kirkuk, where explosives hidden in a parked car killed three Kurdish troops in a passing convoy. (AP, Dec. 5) On Dec. 6, eight peshmerga troops and three gunmen from an unknown militant group were killed in a battle at Khanaqin, Diyala. (Reuters, Dec. 6)
See our last post on Iraq and the struggle in Kurdistan.
Terror meets Gates
The New York Times reports that the total killed in car bombs Dec. 5—the same day Defense Secretary Roberts Gates arrived in Iraq for an unannounced visit—was 22.
Terror also greeted the Secretary in Afghanistan.
Sunni civil war in Diyala
Twenty-five people were killed Dec. 7 in attacks in Diyala. A woman wearing a vest packed with explosives killed 16 in a suicide attack of local headquarters of the 1920 Revolutionary Brigades in the town of Muqdadiya—a former insurgent group the US has won over to the battle against al-Qaeda. (NYT, Dec. 8; Reueters, Dec. 7)
See our last posts on the Sunni civil war and Washington’s Sunni strategy.
Definition of calm in Iraq
Hi Bill,
just found your blog, are you still running it?
I would be interested in your thoughts on the level of calm in Iraq currently. My belief is that we are heading for some troubled waters in the north, The so called Mosul campaign against AQ-I seems to be losing ground whilst tensions in Diyala between Iraqi army and Peshmerga is set to escalate. Throw the recent Kirkuk tension over the election law into the mix and I see trouble in September when the parliament returns from recess.
Paul