Someone close to the top tier of al Qaeda in Iraq leadership has started to blab.
This much is clear after US and Iraqi forces carried out raids against 56 al Qaeda targets in the 48 hours after the death of the organization’s putative leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi:
U.S. forces conducted at least 56 raids on targets connected with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s al-Qaida in Iraq organization in the 48 hours after his death.Citing military officials, The Los Angeles Times reported the raids were intended to capitalize on the killing of al-Zarqawi by disrupting his network of fighters.
After bombing a dwelling where al-Zarqawi and five others were killed Wednesday, U.S. forces carried out 17 raids across Baghdad. Forces hit 39 more sites on Friday, said Maj. Gen. William B. Caldwell IV, the U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad.
Military officials displayed pictures of items seized in the raids—including weapons, uniforms and ammunition—and said at least 25 people were captured and one killed, the newspaper said. Hover, officials did not provide an assessment of the extent of damage from the raids on insurgent operations.
Given that our intel regarding AQI has been spotty in the past, this many raids in a time span of 48 hours indicates that one or more prisoners have given us priceless information that we have obviously put to good use.
And we can expect more of the same:
A U.S. military search of the destroyed safehouse where the al-Qaida in Iraq leader was killed Wednesday yielded documents and information storage devices that are being assessed for potential use against his followers, a military officer said.An M-16 rifle, grenades and AK-47 rifles also were found, according to the officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because results from the search have not been announced. The U.S.-made M-16 was fitted with special optics.
They also found documents and unspecified “media,” which the officer indicated normally means information storage devices such as computer hard drives and digital cameras or other data storage devices.
U.S. military spokesman Maj. Gen. William Caldwell said 39 raids were conducted across Iraq late Thursday and early Friday, including some directly related to the information they obtained from the strike against al-Zarqawi. Those were in addition to 17 raids carried out immediately after the terror leader was killed.
Can all of this mean that we have AQI on the run?
One has to conclude that while the terrorist group remains very dangerous and capable of mounting devastating attacks against Iraqi civilians, a shift in momentum may be in the offing for coalition forces and this one, bloody element of the insurgency may have been dealt a truly lethal blow.
It will be interesting to see how we exploit this wealth of information gleaned from the al-Zarqawi raid. The more cells we can roll up or, just as important, keep so busy running for their lives that they are unable to mount any attacks, the fewer Iraqi civilians will suffer from AQI’s relentless campaign to foment sectarian conflict.
Meanwhile, in one of the most grotesque displays of nauseating bias I have seen in a while, the press is trying to portray Zarqawi’s last moments in the most “heroic” way possible. They have picked up on the theme that even though he was dying, the terrorist mastermind was trying to get away and, in a dramatic account of his final moments, struggled against capture:
Iraqi police reached the scene first, and found the 39-year-old al-Zarqawi alive.“He mumbled something, but it was indistinguishable and it was very short,” Maj. Gen. William Caldwell, spokesman for U.S.-led forces in Iraq, said Friday of the Jordanian-born terrorist’s last words.
Iraqi police pulled him from the flattened home and placed him on a makeshift stretcher. U.S. troops arrived, saw that al-Zarqawi was conscious, and tried to provide medical treatment, the spokesman said.
“He obviously had some kind of visual recognition of who they were because he attempted to roll off the stretcher, as I am told, and get away, realizing it was the U.S. military,” Caldwell told Pentagon reporters via videoconference from Baghdad.
Al-Zarqawi “attempted to, sort of, turn away off the stretcher,” he said. “Everybody re-secured him back onto the stretcher, but he died almost immediately thereafter from the wounds he’d received from this airstrike.”
I like John Hinderaker’s take on this:
But the journalists who participated in the press conference, apparently by satellite, seemed to think they were on the trail of a Cover-Up. I saw most of the press conference early this morning. News of Zarqawi’s brief survival immediately led to questions about whether he had been finished off by the troops, and whether our soldiers had tried to render first aid. At one point, a reporter asked whether the published photos of Zarqawi’s face had been Photoshopped to make them look more like Zarqawi. I don’t think Caldwell had any idea what the guy was talking about; he said Yes, we decided to clean up Zarqawi’s face before photographing him. This led to a follow-up question about whether the photos had been digitally enhanced.
At this and other points in the press conference, Gen. Caldwell had the look, I thought, of a normal person who wonders whether he has been transported into a world of lunatics. It seemed that some of the reporters, at least, thought they were on to another “scandal”—Zarqawi murdered by U.S. troops! In cold blood, as Jack Murtha likes to say.
I am almost beside myself with disgust over this display. Words fail me when I contemplate the concern shown over this piece of human excrement compared to our own troops or even the Iraqi people who were butchered at his hands.
It is no longer a question of asking “Whose side are they on?” We know. We know.
UPDATE
Allah has some interesting updates over at Hot Air. Apparently, Zarqawi’s wife and infant son were also killed in the attack (via Times of London). And there is a question about whether or not Zarqawi’s long time spiritual advisor was also killed in the attack.
I’m sure we’ll hear more about both stories in the hours ahead as the press is still trying furiously to find an angle that will deligitimize the killing of Zarqawi and once again, make the Iraq storyline about the heartless American occupiers.
UPDATE II
Leave it to the two funniest people in the blogosphere to take the Zarqawi killing and make it into pure, comic gold.
Jeff Goldstein has an interview with the now dead terrorist that had me laughing so hard I almost emptied my bladder.
And the inimitable Scott Ott has the best political satire I’ve seen in a while: “Democrats Vow to Fight On After Zarqawi Loss.”
(HT: Doc Sanity)
11:07 am
How Important was Al-Zarqawi?
I am almost beside myself with disgust over this display. Words fail me when I contemplate the concern shown over this piece of human excrement compared to our own troops or even the Iraqi people who were butchered at his hands
...
11:17 am
Solemn Bush Hails ‘Severe Blow’ to Al-Qaida
President Bush says the death of al-Qaida leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in Iraq is “a severe blow” to
12:15 pm
You knew it would happen…
What’s the difference in these two stories?
Patrick Quinn from AP just changed his story and redirected the link to this updated one. SOB’s are low.
This is the original version which I debunked on the thread as well as urged others to email the editor:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1646849/posts?page=126
But I have to find a source that captured the whole page.
Now look at the difference, and he has other reporters listed below as well.
Iraqi raises questions on al-Zarqawi death
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060610/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_al_zarqawi
12:26 pm
Good people… until we raise the army, and project the power needed to control the region, the rest of this foolish talk is just smoke and mirrors. Reagan would have raised an army.
12:30 pm
This is the same antique MSM that with the assistance of every dim-wit in congress has been responsible for 2,000 or more of the American soldiers deaths along with thousands of Iraqi citizens. I think everyone of the suckers should be tried for treason and murder. Maybe we can get Ann Coulter to write another truthful article of book on the left. If she investigates then Murtha will be tied out over an ant hill for the slow death he so rightly deserves.
Like it or not, the American soldiers are dying to satisfy the left wing dim-wits ego’s. Zarqawi was only a tool of the left wing since they didn’t have the guts to go to Iraq and shoot the soldiers themselves.
1:39 pm
Pigeontracks: Notes from Around the Blogosphere
Now that I’m reasonably comfortable in my new roost, I figure its a good time to read—and pass on—some choice content around the blogosphere: Belle of the Brawl has a laugh-out-loud piece on Viagra. I think you’ll find it quite
6:05 pm
Ask li doc tou how important the left wing media was to an enemy that never won a battle to win a war.I’m still trying to figure how teddy bloatedkennedy sleeps at night with the thougt of all those”millions” of innocents who were slaughtered because of his cowardness.He led the charge to defund the vietnamese people,even after our pledge to continue to do so.Pol Pot, the killing fields,internment, all on his head.Shame on the coward.
8:39 pm
Sounds like he was trying to avoid martyrdom. He must have been an adherent of the Michael Moore Do As I Do School of Ethics.
8:40 pm
Sorry, I meant Do As I Say.
1:05 am
There is a good read at TigerHawk on just who may have rated out zman and why.
A must read
http://tigerhawk.blogspot.com/2006/06/selling-out-of-abu-musab-al-zarqawi.html
11:04 am
Another Crown Forum Sellout
“Chapter 12 – Like We’re Supposed To Care?
I have never seen children enjoying their incurable diseases so much.
It seems to be all the rage for witches of want with a so-called “terrible illness” to try and turn their maladies into some sort of whining, cause-celeb begathon for medicines and research to cure their condition or relieve their pain.”
I see a lot of aupport in here for Coulter…you all can be damn proud!! I mean really, is this how you all want to be defined? Bitter angry obnoxious bloviators who pick on widows and sick kids. Maybe next year your agenda of flag burning and stopping gay marriage will be put into the Constitution…naw. And let us not forget, the “Sodomized virgin” exception in South Dakota. Once upon a time, I voted for Reagan and Bush. Then came Teri Schaivo. Never again. CONGRATULATIONS!
We’ll win in the middle east when we raise an army large enough to fight the regional war there.
That will happen, eventually. Republican or Democrat in control. Just not with these guys in charge now who took the golden opportunity to build a huge army, and blew it.
1:39 pm
All you manage to do here, Rick, is to demonstrate how you are completely clueless about the appropriate role of the press in a free society.
Here is a hint for you. Take it as a cardinal rule – dont believe a word that anyone in the government says – at least not until you probe, question, examine every alternative, be the complete skeptic. It is only through the process of surviving such examination that any rational person can have confidnce that they are being told the truth. And it is only if government spokesmen know that their words are going to be subject to such examination, that they will be strongly disincentivized to BSing (or at least they will know they need to be damn good at it).
What is really shameful here is how you seem to think that reporters should simply accept as gospel truth whatever the government says (including the military). Have you learned nothing in your life?
1:50 pm
Tano:
What in God’s name are you blabbing about? I have no idea what you are referring to.
The appropriate role of the press in society is to report the facts as best they know them. ANd publishing the unsubstantiated charges from someone who couldn’t possibly have seen what happened does not fall into that category.
The press apparently was trying to create a storyline where Zarqawi died some kind of heroe’s death. In case you didn’t know it, this is how “news” is gathered. It isn’t only a question of the facts, the facts must also fit into a narrative that “marches” or is interesting. If that sounds more like creative writing to you than journalism, welcome to the early 21st century media business. It’s not even a question of right or left. It’s what will sell.
The fact that you don’t see this makes you a naive consumer of news. It isn’t so much the bias. It’s the storyline that needs to be outed.
3:39 pm
Sorry Rick, but if you seriously think that the MSM is trying to create a story line that “Zarqawi died some kind of heroe’s death”, then “delusional” doesnt even begin to capture the depth of your pathology.
Please explain yourself a bit better. You make the charge of the MSM trying to portray Zarq as a hero, and as evidence you give us a passage that consists entirely of quotations from Gen. Caldwell
What exactly are you saying? Is Gen. Caldwell in on the great conspiracy?
Must be, because after that passage, you move on to a quote from Powerlyin in which he is ranting about reporters acting as if there was a cover-up. Asking whether the face was cleaned up etc. Nothing there about Zarq being a “hero”. (Would he be a hero if he actually were stomped to death? Would he be a hero if he died in the bombing with minimal blood on his face? Where does this hero stuff come from?)
Sounds to me like basic sharp questioning of the type that any reporter should be doing when the government puts forth a picture and a verison of events and claims that this is the exact way it went down.
So please share. Where is the “hero-making”???
12:05 pm
Someone close to the top tier of al Qaeda in Iraq leadership has started to blab.
Or the NSA programs are working. Remind me – were you for or against those?
12:07 pm
I was for both of them.