Juan Cole - June 20, 2005

The United Nations Strategy as a Resolution of the Iraq Crisis

The United States has failed militarily in Iraq, and the situation there is deteriorating rapidly. A protracted guerrilla war is increasingly becoming an unconventional civil war. The US can mount operations against infiltrators on the Syrian border, but cannot permanently close off those borders. The US can prevent set piece battles from being fought by militias. It cannot prevent night-time raids. Seven bodies showed up Sunday in East Baghdad, executed. They were almost certainly victims of this shadowy sectarian war.

The United Nations Strategy as a Resolution of the Iraq Crisis

The United States has failed militarily in Iraq, and the situation there is deteriorating rapidly. A protracted guerrilla war is increasingly becoming an unconventional civil war. The US can mount operations against infiltrators on the Syrian border, but cannot permanently close off those borders. The US can prevent set piece battles from being fought by militias. It cannot prevent night-time raids. Seven bodies showed up Sunday in East Baghdad, executed. They were almost certainly victims of this shadowy sectarian war.

45 Dead, Dozens Wounded in Guerrilla Attacks
Restaurant Bombing Mocks Operation Lightning

The Associated Press reports that a guerrilla wearing a bomb belt walked into a restaurant near the Green Zone in downtown Baghdad that was popular with Iraqi police and soldiers, and detonated his payload, killing 23 and wounding 45. Patrick Quinn writes,

' The Baghdad bomber detonated his explosives-laden vest at the Ibn Zanbour restaurant, 400 yards from the main gate of the heavily fortified Green Zone _ U.S. and Iraqi government headquarters. The cafe was popular with Iraqi police and soldiers. The dead included seven police officers. The bodyguards of Iraqi Finance minister Ali Abdel-Amir Allawi and 16 other police were injured, police and hospital officials said. The minister was not in the restaurant. '

Fixing the Intelligence Around the Facts Part Deux

AP has gotten hold of the text of some more Downing Street Memos.

Mark Danner at Tomdispatch.com has further thoughts about the Downing Street Memo and reactions to the dismissals of its significance in the mainstream press.