For U.S. Unit in Baghdad, An Alliance of Last Resort

[applegrove]

For U.S. Unit in Baghdad, An Alliance of Last Resort

By Joshua Partlow
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, June 9, 2007; Page A01

BAGHDAD, June 8 -- "The worst month of Lt. Col. Dale Kuehl's deployment in western Baghdad was finally drawing to a close. The insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq had unleashed bombings that killed 14 of his soldiers in May, a shocking escalation of violence for a battalion that had lost three soldiers in the previous six months while patrolling the Sunni enclave of Amiriyah. On top of that, the 41-year-old battalion commander was doubled up with a stomach flu when, late on May 29, he received a cellphone call that would change everything.

"We're going after al-Qaeda," a leading local imam said, Kuehl recalled. "What we want you to do is stay out of the way."

"Sheik, I can't do that. I can't just leave Amiriyah and let you go at it."

"Well, we're going to go."

........SNIP"

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/08/AR2007060802879.html?hpid=topnews

[applegrove]

1. The only way they found peace in South Africa and Northern Ireland

was to include some of the "rebels" in the talks. Let us hope this is the start of the American withdrawl.