Archives for October 2007

Colin Kahl of Georgetown University writes: ‘There will be 100-130K troops in Iraq when Bush leaves. The number will depend largely on who wins the factional infighting between the White House and MNF-I (Petraeus) on the one hand, and CENTCOM, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Secretary Gates on the other hand. The former want […]

British PM Gordon Brown, in Baghdad and Basra for consultations with PM Nuri al-Maliki, with British commanders, and with his US allies, announced that he would withdraw another 1,000 British troops from Basra by Christmas. A majority of the British public wants all the troops out now, but the US is putting enormous pressure on […]

Iraqi authorities are not only accusing Blackwater guards of an unprovoked shooting of 11 persons at Nisur Square on Sept. 16, but also of engaging in an hour-long firefight with Iraqi police later that day. The firm appears to have deployed attack helicopters in the firefights. The NYT reports that a new congressional report on […]

A wave of violence rolled over the northern city of Mosul (pop. 1.5 million, Iraq’s second largest) on Sunday. A member of the Ninevah Provincial Council and his three body guards were assassinated by machine gun fire; gunmen killed two policemen in the east of the city; armed men killed two people in a market; […]