A temporary "Surge"
with temporary benefits:
Violence is increasing in Iraq, raising questions about whether the security improvements credited to the increase in U.S. troops may be short-lived.
Car bombs in Baghdad on Monday killed at least 11 people and injured a prominent leader of one of the country's most influential American-allied tribal militias.
The Ministry of Electricity announced that power to much of the nation, already anemic, is likely to lag in coming days because insurgents had blown up transmission facilities and natural gas pipelines that fuel generators.
CBS News confirmed that two of its journalists are missing in Basra, in Iraq's south.
A leading parliament member warned that budget disputes have paralyzed the legislature.
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, finishing a two-day visit to Baghdad, said that he was likely to advocate a pause in troop withdrawals to evaluate the situation after the last of the additional troops sent here under President Bush's so-called surge strategy had left later this year.
The paralyzed legislature is the clearest sign of the failure of the surge, whose stated goal was to bring about a window of security for the government to actually start doing something and assert its authority.
That plan was thrown out the window as soon as the US decided instead to take advantage of the "awakening" in Anbar and allow local leaders free reign to pacify their own territories. Those alliances of convenience, so heavily touted as successes by the pro-war crowd, are now starting to break down.
Later, Sheik Ali Hathem al Suleiman al Duleimy, who was injured in the attack, went on Iraqi TV and declared war against his enemies. He said that his militia, many of whose members are paid by the United States, no longer would allow the U.S. or Iraqi government to interfere with its work.
His comments came as similar U.S.-allied groups in nearby Diyala province continued to refuse to work with American or Iraqi government forces until the provincial police chief is removed. On Monday, hundreds protested in Diyala to demand the chief's removal.
No matter. I'm sure this is all just the desperate actions of dead-enders in an insurgency in its last throes, same as all of the other attacks have been for the last five years. Odd how they can maintain that desperation for so long.
The "surge" succeeded in its only real objective; it guaranteed that the Iraq War will be dumped on the next president's lap.
