Just like Saddam's army did back in 2003.
While this capture is tremendous news, the violence will never end.
Our goal isn't to 'end' the violence. Our goal with the surge is to give us time to build up the Iraqi Army and put them in bases around Iraq to let them take the reigns and slowly destory the insurgency.
We have done IMHO a very uneven job of building up the Iraqi Army. If we want the surge to do what we want it to we need to really build up the Iraq Army this year.
Ok. Yeah. So your analogy says, then, that when the little guys melt into the background, that their leaders then end up being executed 3 yrs later?
Great! Then the "surge" will give us some new youtube videos of insurgent hangings in 2010. Looking forward to it.
No kiddin'. Zero violence is impossible to achieve in ANY country. Have you seen US crime statistics lately? What is your point?
Agreed. When it was first announced that Mookie had fled to Iran and violence was diminished, I commented that his thugs were sitting in Baghdad's street cafes, in street clothes rather than all-black, sipping sweet tea, and watching the Petraeus's surge from the sidelines.
Hopefully we had some pretty good intell prior to going in on where to find some of al Sadr's and al Qaeda's top leaders...and that appears to be the case.
Will we get 'em all? Nope. Will we stop the recruiting of new ones? Nope. Should we target Mookie with a bullet or a noose? Yep.
The point of my post is still valid. Iraqi violence is down, but since the surge: Democrat on Democrat violence is up 80%