Killings in northern Iraq confound U.S. forces

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/GEO934715.htm

BAGHDAD, Nov 29 (Reuters) - Some have been chopped up and dumped by the side of the road, others shot through the head and piled in a cemetery, victims of a campaign of killings U.S. forces are struggling to contain.

For the past two weeks, insurgents in the northern city of Mosul have been steadily eliminating members of Iraq's security forces and civilians.

It is not clear what the killers' objective is -- apart from to strike fear into the public and the fledgling security authorities ahead of elections at the end of January.

By creating a climate of fear, the insurgents seem to hope Iraqis will be too scared to cast their votes and the election will lose its legitimacy. In that respect, the campaign of intimidation in Mosul may be a test case for the rest of Iraq.

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[Stella_Artois]

1. 80% of Iraqi police in Mosul have left

under threat of execution.

Who is in control in Mosul ? When the police have run away ?

How vulnerable are queues of voters to terrorist attack ?

[w13rd0]

2. Do we have any reason...

...to think the "insurgents" would accept the legitimacy of the victor in a US run and rigged election any more than they accept the present clan of puppets? Why then is there this prevailing notion that this is all about these "elections"?

[HawkerHurricane]

3. The killer's objective...

is the elimination of collaborators; collaboration with a occupying power is always a capital offense.

[wolfgirl]

4. "Confound" US forces?

It's very easy to understand...the people are doing everything in their power to get the US out..any idiot could figure that out...except the Idiot in Chief and his yes-men.

[pberq]

11. Dem support

What about the support (or at least silence) among Democrats for the continuing debacle in Iraq?

Here's what I said on another thread:

To those who say we "have to stay the course" now that we're there, here's my response:

If the U.S. would turn Iraq over to the UN with a definite timetable for withdrawal, we would be doing the best we could given the current chaos. What could be worse than what is happeing there now?

It doesn't take a military genius to understand that the way you win a guerilla war is to break down support from the general population. Whatever small support was left after Abu Graib has got to be gone now after the massacre in Fallujah.

The fact is, Bush and his minions could care less about winning the hearts and minds of Iraqis. They only want to install a puppet regime so they can control the oil. And for Democrats to support this is insane.

[NNN0LHI]

13. There are only about 30,000 UN peacekeepers total

Lot of those are already American and British. I am not sure what the UN could do in Iraq at this stage of the game?

Don

[bowens43]

5. "It is not clear what the killers' objective is"????

It's very clear. The objective is to eliminate those who aid the occupiers. No doubt they are seen as traitors and enemy combatants by the resistance. If our country was invaded and occupied and Americans began aiding the invaders they would be killed.

It's not that difficult of a concept.

[Plaid Adder]

15. Yeah, that's a stunningly stupid sentence.

Of course it's clear what their objective is: to intimidate the collaborators. No occupation can function without the cooperation of at least some of the indigenous population. If it becomes clear that cooperating with the US puppet regime = grisly and horrendous death, then you're going to have a lot fewer collaborators, and eventually the US will have to give up on the occupation. That's obviously why they're doing this. WTH else would they do it?

Sigh,

The Plaid Adder

[Sara Beverley]

6. It really isn't eve clear who is doing the killing!

Something is mighty fishy about these killings and messages from a yet-to-be-seen Al-zwagari. Insurgents want to strike fear but not resentment from the very people whose support they need. Think outside the box folks. Who or what group would love to paint the insurgents and the most vile folks while at the same time killing as many Iraqis as possible and while destroying the infrastructure of what was once the gem of civilization and ME?

I contend that what is going on is much more sinister than the obvious.

[ilovenicepeople]

17. I agree Sara(HOWDY by the way)

Cui Bono?

[flamingpie2500]

7. The beginning of a Civil War. Thank you so much GW

What else could be the result of Iraqi's killing Iraqi's?

[Massachusetts]

9. Agree

Juan Cole and others in the "know", have warned about this for quite sometime.

[BadGimp]

8. re: It is not clear what the killers' objective is ...

wow

[Tempest]

10. BushCo should easily understand this

This is exactly what was done by Reagan, Bush Sr. and Negroponte in Central America.

A campaign of fear and intimidation using murder.

As American as apple pie.

[dbt]

12. It's the COLONIALISM, stupidz!

Time to buy a vowel, innit?

:freak:
dbt

[demgrrrll]

14. Dagnabbit what in blue blazes is going on over there..Whenever they

can't spin some atrocity it becomes confusing or confounding, hard to understand, perhaps we will never know.

[alcuno]

16. Several weeks ago there was a story about 31 Iraqi NG kidnapped

from their hotel in Western Iraq; they had been training in Jordan. I never heard another word about it from our crack US media. Does anyone know what happened to them? When I hear about bodies turning up in Mosul I think of that story.