GIs in Sadr City caught between warring Iraqi sides

Three weeks after U.S. troops were ordered into the sprawling Shiite Muslim slum of Sadr City to stop rockets from raining down on the U.S. Embassy compound in Baghdad’s Green Zone, they’re caught in crossfire between Shiite militiamen and the mostly Shiite Iraqi army.

American soldiers who try to move around this urban area, even in the U.S. Army’s state-of-the-art Stryker armored vehicles, risk being ambushed. The soldiers in a platoon from the 25th Infantry Division quickly learned that holding a position puts them in the line of fire from both the Mahdi Army militia and the U.S.-backed Iraqi forces.

The American soldiers can’t go on the offensive from the run-down two-story house they commandeered in south Sadr City, but must hunker down and wait to get shot at.

An Iraqi family evacuated the house just before the fighting started. It has rats and clogged toilets but no electricity or hot water, and no air conditioning or heating. The American soldiers have had one shower and barely a change of clothes since they got here.

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Operation Cassandra

Admiral Fallon’s (forced?) resignation was the last
warning we are likely to get of an attack on Iran.
It does not mean an attack is certain, but the U.S.
could not attack Iran so long as he was the
CENTCOM commander. That obstacle
is now gone.

Vice President Cheney’s Middle East tour is another indicator. According to a report in The American Conservative, on his previous trip Cheney told our allies, including the Saudis, that Bush would attack Iran before the end of his term. If that report was correct, then his current tour might have the purpose of telling them when it is coming.

Why not just do that through the State Department? State may not be in the loop, nor all of DOD for that matter. The State Department, OSD, the intelligence agencies, the Army and the Marine Corps are all opposed to war with Iran. Of the armed services, only the Air Force reportedly is in favor, seeking an opportunity to show what air power can do. As always, it neglects to inform the decision-makers what it cannot do.

Full story:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/lind/lind137.html

Economist: Iraq War Will Eventually Cost US Taxpayers Up To $5 trillion

February 28, 2008 – Washington DC — The Iraq war
will cost Americans between $3 trillion and $5 trillion,
including military spending, broader economic costs and
decades of benefits and medical care for combat veterans,
a Nobel prize-winning economist told the Joint Economic
Committee on Thursday.

For Georgians, that translates into between $86.5 billion and $144.1 billion, based on the state’s current share of national tax payments, according to calculations by the National Priorities Project, a research organization based in Northampton, Mass., that examines the local impact of the federal budget.

The upper end of the national estimate is nearly double what the same economist, Joseph Stiglitz, projected just two years ago. He attributed the dramatic increase to the continuing intensity of the war, which began five years ago next month, and the likelihood that operations there would continue for at least another year.

The war’s gravest toll has been paid in blood. Fighting in Iraq has so far taken the lives of 3,973 U.S. troops and left nearly 29,300 wounded. Its staggering expense, however, has already dwarfed the 2003 White House war estimate of $60 billion, and the price continues to rise.

Full story:
http://www.veteransforcommonsense.org/ArticleID/9450

60% of officers feel military is weaker now than five years ago

Today, the U.S. military is engaged in a campaign that is
more demanding and intense than anything it has
witnessed in a generation. Ongoing wars in Iraq and
Afghanistan, now entering their fifth and seventh years
respectively, have lasted longer than any U.S. military
engagements of the past century, with the exception of
Vietnam.

More than 25,000 American servicemen and women have been wounded and over 4,000 killed. Additional deployments in the Balkans, on the Korean Peninsula, and elsewhere are putting further pressure on the military’s finite resources. And, at any time, U.S. forces could be called into action in one of the world’s many simmering hot spots—from Iran or Syria, to North Korea or the Taiwan Strait.

Yet, even as the U.S. military is being asked to sustain an unprecedented pace of operations across the globe, many Americans continue to know shockingly little about the forces responsible for protecting them. Nearly 70 percent of Americans report that they have a high level of confidence in the military, yet fewer than 1 in 10 has ever served. Politicians often speak favorably about people in uniform, but less than one quarter of the U.S. Congress has donned a uniform. It is not clear whether the speeches and sound bites we hear from politicians and experts actually reflect the concerns of those who protect our nation.

Full story:
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=4198

The Air Force Reaches for the Sky

The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have worn down
the nation’s ground forces, stretching those serving
in the Army and Marines and wearing out their gear
at an unprecedented rate. So, it’s no surprise that the
nation’s ground-pounders would be seeking the most
from the ever-cooperative members of the House
Armed Services Committee. For years, that Pentagon-
pleasing panel has asked the services to send it a wish
list – lawmakers prefer to call it an “unfunded
requirements list” – of budget items they desire but
which have not been approved by their penny-
pinching civilian overseers, i.e. the Defense
Secretary and the President.

Earlier this month, the Army stepped up to the plate and asked for $4 billion more than the $141 billion it is slated to receive in 2009. The Marines asked for $3 billion more than their proposed ration of $25 billion. The Navy asked for $5 billion to be added to its bottom line of $124 billion. But all those sums added together don’t equal the – hold your breath, dear taxpayer – $19 billion that the Air Force wants over and above its $144 billion request. 

Full story:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20080222/us_time/theairforcereachesforthesky 

US military to deploy thousands of its interceptor missiles globally

Not only does this threaten Russia, but every other country
not aligned with the Washingon-London-Tel Aviv Axis. -Ed.

Russia ’s Foreign Affairs Minister Sergei Lavrov believes
that the US administration plans to deploy elements of
its missile defense system in many countries of the world.

“Most likely, we will hear them talking about hundreds and even thousands of interceptor missiles in different parts of the globe, including Europe,” Lavrov said in and interview with the Polish Gazeta Wyborcza newspaper. 

Full story:
http://english.pravda.ru/news/russia/kremlin/08-02-2008/103957-interceptor_missiles-0 

U.S. soldiers continue to commit suicides bidding farewell to their patriotism

The number of suicides committed in the U.S. Army continues
to grow. As many as 121 servicemen committed suicide in
2007, which marked the increase of more than 20 percent
as opposed to 2006.

Suicides continue to overshadow the army service in the
United States despite numerous efforts taken during the
recent years to improve the mental state of American
servicemen. Many of them make a decision to bid farewell
to this world because of the never-ending wars in Iraq
and Afghanistan.

Full story:
http://english.pravda.ru/world/31-01-2008/103785-soldiers_suicide-0