Busting The Myth That Al Qaeda Will Simply Appear Elsewhere In Iraq
As I said earlier, Al Qaeda cannot survive in Iraq without the complicity of a host population. It relies on this population to provide housing, food, recruits, support personnel, materiel, cover of all manner, including a general population within which to blend, transportation…you name it. Without these things, Al Qaeda cannot survive. Without a host body, no parasite can.
The Kurds are not receptive to Al Qaeda, and have sufficient numbers and means to avoid forced complicity. This is why Al Qaeda, though able on rare occasion to strike in Kurdistan, have never established a base there. The scenario is the same in the Shiite south. Al Qaeda had transformed Al Anbar province into a home at large, and portions of it into a shaky Isalmic State of Iraq. Because Al Anbar is a Sunni province, and Al Qaeda is a Sunni organization, Al Qaeda enjoyed there the complicit host population it needed. But after years of struggle, and for a variety of reasons, including the deft U.S. maneuver of the literal bribing of local tribes with Saudi Arabia as its go-between and co-financier, Al Qaeda was ultimately militarily routed from its little kingdom, its Islamic State of Iraq ignominously overthrown.
When the mole was whacked in Fallujah, it popped up in Ramadi, and solidified control over the rest of the Anbar province. The mole has been whacked in Ramadi. The mole has gone to it’s last hole, the mixed Sunni/Shiite environs of Baghdad. Remember, as far as Al Qaeda goes, no Sunnis = no home, no home = no Al Qaeda. We are currently whacking the holy living shit out of the mole in the last hole. Al Qaeda cannot survive in Kurdistan. Al Qaeda cannot survive in the Shiite south. And the Sheiks of Al Anbar who chased them out will not have them back. They will find some refuge in the lawless border areas, around the bandit’s routes between Iraq and Iran. But there will not be much to sustain them, and literally caught between Al Sadr’s Shiites and an Iran who was willing to support them when they had some real power, but who will not have much use for a lame duck Sunni militia trapped in a pocket of forgotten desert, Al Qaeda will die like every other lifeform that requires more sustenance than that harsh environment can provide.
Now there’s some mopping up to be done in Al Anbar, particularly Fallujah which has seen small bits of Al Qaeda pop up. But only small bits. And we are not yet finished in Diyala et al. And yes, there will be pockets, small cells of handfuls of men still vainly trying to regain the glory days when they ruled half the country, but the Islamic State of Iraq is finished.
Unless of course, we abandon the country before the new situation can be exploited to the Iraqi government’s political advantage.
Remember how so very recently President Bush was warning that if we left Iraq, it would remain a haven for Al Qaeda? And the Dems were saying there was no Al Qaeda there at all? As the fact that Al Qaeda was literally running an Islamic State of Iraq, with its own schools, social and justice systems in Al Anbar was revealed to the world over the last few months, the President was validated in a way that no one has acknowledged. Everyone thought he was taking out of his neck, laying out a paranoid and unrealistic scenario about the future, about a time in which Al Qaeda might be able to create a base from which to launch further attacks against the West. Little did the world realize that he was not merely right in predicting the future, but that the future was already here, that Al Qaeda’s Iraqi terrorist kingdom was already in existence. Thank God we didn’t leave. Or Al Qaeda might still reign over Al Anbar. And be using the province’s resources and manpower to strike America wherever it had run to.
So the next time some anti-victory leftist scoffs at Operation Phantom Thunder and smugly asserts that Al Qaeda will just go elsewhere, ask him where, exactly? And ask him how in the f*** he expects Al Qaeda to survive there.
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Don’t forget we also attacked aq in Somalia recently, this wack a mole game is global
http://www.shabelle.net/news/ne3075.htm
http://worlddefensereview.com/pham062107.shtml
June 25th, 2007 at 6:02 amBut according to Harry Reid, the surge isn’t working. What an asshole!
June 25th, 2007 at 6:45 amSteve in NC
Remember - there is no GWOT according to the democrats.
June 25th, 2007 at 7:24 amExcellent post and I agree completely that the moles are running out of places to hide. Could Tikrit be the end game?
June 25th, 2007 at 7:37 amoh yea that’s right, I was reading bumper stickers again
Damn, this is all so confusing, I prefer to have the important people tell me what to think. The fountain of wisdom from an ambulance chasing lawyer cannot be questioned.
June 25th, 2007 at 7:56 amWhat a great report to read on Monday morning.
June 25th, 2007 at 8:03 amI hope it gets sent to every major MSM location in the country, as well as the dem national headquarters.
God bless our MILITARY HEROES,and the REPORTER of this story.
PAT… this message is for you:
FIBERAL ALERT!
From the Adam Carolla show just a little bit ago:
Teresa Strasser was commenting on a pro-Iraq war song then said how the surge wasn’t working and how you don’t hear about it all that much… as if the pentagon and Bush suppress the bad news of the surge and it is a failure…
Thought you’d like to know since you’ve got all the real news of the surge…
June 25th, 2007 at 8:23 amYeah, but it is only a bumper sticker campaign…at least that’s what pretty boy floyd thinks? Or is it the Breck girl? Gee, I get so confused without all the Dems and their MSM weapons of mass distraction not buzzing in my ears all the time.
Nice report Pat. Well said, well written.
June 25th, 2007 at 8:29 amEverything you said is true, but lets not forget that the IA and Police forces are usually no match for aQ and can be bought and terrorised also. As long as aQ can keep people more afraid of them (and pay them off) there will always be areas where they can hide and rebuild.
Bribery is part of the ME, and always has been, it’s use in concert with a threat against your family works most of the time almost anywhere.
We can’t stay there and hold their hands and give them air support forever.
And they know that.
Papa Ray
June 25th, 2007 at 8:37 amWest Texas
USA
Never did completely buy the totally innocent civilian population story.
June 25th, 2007 at 9:09 amGreat article, sound analysis. Would be nice if we could encirlce the moles in Iraq and squeeze their greasy heads like so many pimples.
June 25th, 2007 at 10:44 amDan said:
“Yeah, but it is only a bumper sticker campaign…at least that’s what pretty boy floyd thinks? Or is it the Breck girl?”
I prefer, “Silky Pony,” myself.
Papa Ray said:
“As long as aQ can keep people more afraid of them (and pay them off) there will always be areas where they can hide and rebuild.”
Well, then, I guess we’ll just keep on killing the cockroaches wherever we find them. I can deal with that. One less Islamofascist asshole on the face of this earth is a good thing anyhoo.
June 25th, 2007 at 10:59 amThe rats are making a run for Kirkuk, Salah A Din and Ninevah provinces now. Particularly Mosul I am guessing. We need to rush units up to the north along the Kurdistan border and march back down south towards Baghdad clearing every village in the path. Pat is correct- AQI needs a compliant Sunni population to survive and those are becoming fewer and fewer
June 25th, 2007 at 11:07 amI know this isn’t related to this post but did anyone else see this?
Boy: Taliban Recruited Me to Bomb Troops
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8Q01SKG0&show_article=1&catnum=-1
Being a father of small children, this really pissed me off. These are not humanbeings we are fighting. They are walking, talking, breathing DEMONS and as such should be sent right back to HELL!
June 25th, 2007 at 1:44 pmI am already excited about my husband’s R&R leave in a few weeks—then I read this awesome post. It’s a good day for me!!
June 25th, 2007 at 3:50 pmThanks, Pat!!
Hell, now we got Russ Whinegold (oops I meant Fiengold),Neil Aborcrombie, and Diane Watson crying we should get out of Afghanistan (”Inevitable: Some Democrats now calling for withdrawal from Afghanistan”) article on Hot Air.
These political defeatist bafoons need to be smaked, shot, or tortured! Arrrrrrrggg, there goes my blood pressure. These idiots just want to hand over our freedoms.
Later guys….I have to go shoot something!
June 25th, 2007 at 6:41 pm400 AQ killed in Somalia, nice.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=463962&in_page_id=1811
Terrorist sleeper cells said to be planning attacks in the UK have been unmasked after the bodies of Britons killed in US bombing raids in Somalia were identified by a top-secret SAS mission.
The four British men were among an estimated 400 people killed in a series of American air raids on Al Qaeda training camps in the war-torn East African state in January.
In March, British and US special-forces troops were secretly sent back into the region to take DNA samples from the exhumed remains of more than 50 of those killed during the attacks.
June 25th, 2007 at 8:11 pmWill the fairness doctrine apply to the MSM, or only conservative news? This should be on MSM>
June 25th, 2007 at 8:33 pmWhat a birthday gift for me to read this article! Pat I think your reporting is the reason that a depressed soul like myself can look at the future and continue to remain optimistic . . . How can one man who used to be a hollywood pimp be so much fucking smarter than the dhimmicrats? HOW THE FUCK DO THESE PEOPLE GET ELECTED!?
June 25th, 2007 at 8:52 pmPat,
I think you may have missed your calling. For starters, you should have been a LRS-D commander. Your sophic ability, keen intuition, and astute powers of observation cause me to marvel. Sorry to gush, but good Lord, man. You’re so damn dead on all the time it’s a little freaky.
Every time I hear one of these great stories confirming the fact that we’re winning, I can’t help but hear Led Zeppelin’s “Immigrant Song” over and over in my head.
June 25th, 2007 at 10:27 pmHere’s an excellent Kilcullen summary of the plan and the purpose and the progress.
June 26th, 2007 at 2:44 pmlacobus:
“I prefer, “Silky Pony,” myself.” That’s too damned funny. ROFLMAO.
June 26th, 2007 at 5:55 pmWhack-A-Mole is a false metaphor. It does NOT explain islamism.
Metastatic cancer is a much better metaphor. Leave it alone and it festers and metastasizes (spreads cells to create new tumors). Any oncologist will tell you that agressively pursuing cancer is the right course of action either through surgery or chemotherapy. However, some of the newest and most exciting treatments for cancer are activating the host’s own immune system against the mutant genetic material that is the cancer.
Operation Phantom Thunder is a healthy dose of chemotherapy. Better yet is when “The Awakening” spreads throughout the host and the immune system of Iraq rises up to kill the cancer.
June 28th, 2007 at 5:23 am