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WASHINGTON, Feb. 19, 2008 – The Afghan government, with assistance from U.S. and international forces and nongovernmental agencies, has made great progress over the past year in providing health care to the country’s population, a U.S. Army physician posted in Afghanistan said today. “The impact of medicine on stability (operations) cannot be underestimated,” Army Col. (Dr.) Jeffrey Johnson, the 82nd Airborne Division’s top doctor and command surgeon for Combined Joint Task Force 82’s eastern regional command, told Pentagon reporters via satellite hookup from Bagram Air Base, located north of the Afghan capital city of Kabul. People’s access to health care...

A year ago, when neither the war nor political reconciliation was going well, the Bush administration reluctantly agreed to 18 benchmarks for judging progress in Iraq. And the Democratic Congress eagerly wrote the benchmarks into law, also requiring the administration to report back in July and September on whether the benchmarks were being met.

The Los Angeles Times editorial board not only contradicts its previous editorials on Iraq, today's editorial contradicts itself. After pushing for withdrawal from Iraq on the basis that the US and Iraqis had made no real political progress, today they argue that we should withdraw because political progress has undeniably begun. And in conclusion, they wind up arguing for exactly the opposite: It has taken nine bloody and difficult months, but the deployment of 30,000 additional U.S. troops appears at last to have brought not just a lull in the sectarian fighting in Iraq, but the first tangible steps toward...

1st business expo in Iraq since 2003 draws crowd Bradley Brooks Associated Press Feb. 17, 2008 12:00 AM BAGHDAD - Nattily dressed Iraqi businessmen mingled Saturday with a few of their American counterparts at the first business exposition to be held in Baghdad since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. About 260 vendors - almost all Iraqi - set up booths on the ground floor of the Green Zone's al-Rashid Hotel, which still bears the scars of a 2003 rocket attack. Hundreds of visitors crammed the hallways, picking up brochures and free candies from the booths of businesses mostly reflecting the...

BAGHDAD — Iraq’s Prime Minister said US and Iraqi forces have chased Al-Qaeda in Iraq out of Baghdad since a security crackdown began a year ago, and he promised to pursue insurgents who have fled northward. Underscoring the rising violence in northern Iraq, a double suicide bombing targeted Shiite worshippers Friday as they left weekly prayer services in the northwestern city of Tal Afar, killing at least four people and wounding 17, officials said. Police said guards at the Juwad mosque prevented a larger casualty toll by opening fire on the two attackers, including an elderly man, before they could...

Greetings Jim, Today is the one year anniversary of the launch of operation 'Rule of Law' or the ‘Surge’ as we know it. Iraqis are celebrating all over Iraq and especially in Baghdad for this occasion. Military parades were held in Baghdad with a commemorative laying of flower wreaths at the tomb of the unknown soldier. What a difference a year makes! This was possible thanks to all of the effort and sacrifices of our men and women and the efforts and sacrifices of the Iraqis, who trust our military and their military more than their own government (this a...

Attacks by insurgents and rival sectarian militias have fallen up to 80 percent in Baghdad and concrete blast walls that divide the capital could soon be removed, a senior Iraqi military official said on Saturday. Lieutenant-General Abboud Qanbar said the success of a year-long clampdown named "Operation Imposing Law" had reined in the savage violence between majority Shi'ites and minority Sunni Arabs dominant under Saddam Hussein. "In a time when you could hear nothing but explosions, gunfire and the screams of mothers and fathers and sons, and see bodies that were burned and dismembered, the people of Baghdad were awaiting...

Yesterday I noted the action by the Iraqi National Assembly in passing significant reform legislation, and predicted that opponents of our engagement in Iraq would shrug it off. Perhaps that was too cynical, as at least one anti-war platform has grudgingly acknowledged it as a major step forward. When the New York Times admits it, what can Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi say? Good news is rare in Iraq. ... Only if you read the New York Times. But I digress .... But after months of bitter feuding, Iraq’s Parliament has finally approved a budget, outlined the scope of provincial...

The U.S. military has captured al Qaeda documents that reveal al Qaeda in Iraq is crumbling. In this special edition of Frontpage Symposium, we have assembled a distinguished panel to discuss the significance of this discovery. Our guests today are: Bill Roggio, the editor of The Long War Journal who has embedded in Iraq and Afghanistan, and is the president of Public Multimedia Inc., a non-profit seeking to improve coverage and understanding of the Long War. Roggio: The documents were seized during a series of raids against al Qaeda in Iraq safehouses in Salahadin province. US, Iraqi and Coalition special...

The Iraqi National Assembly passed more reform legislation today, addressing a series of concerns that had American politicians impatient for progress. They have authorized provincial elections and provided limited amnesty for mainly Sunni detainees in Iraqi custody. The bill provided the finishing touch on the legislative session: Iraq's parliament on Wednesday passed three key pieces of legislation that set a date for provincial elections, allot $48 billion for 2008 spending, and provide limited amnesty to detainees in Iraqi custody. The three measures were bundled together for one vote to satisfy the demands of minority Kurds who feared they might be...

Al-Qaeda in Iraq faces an "extraordinary crisis". Last year's mass defection of ordinary Sunnis from al-Qaeda to the US military "created panic, fear and the unwillingness to fight". The terrorist group's security structure suffered "total collapse". These are the words not of al-Qaeda's enemies but of one of its own leaders in Anbar province - once the group's stronghold. They were set down last summer in a 39-page letter seized during a US raid on an al-Qaeda base near Samarra in November. The US military released extracts from that letter yesterday along with a second seized in another November raid...

Al-Qaeda leaders admit: 'We are in crisis. There is panic and fear' Al-Qaeda in Iraq faces an “extraordinary crisis”. Last year's mass defection of ordinary Sunnis from al-Qaeda to the US military “created panic, fear and the unwillingness to fight”. The terrorist group's security structure suffered “total collapse”. These are the words not of al-Qaeda's enemies but of one of its own leaders in Anbar province — once the group's stronghold. They were set down last summer in a 39-page letter seized during a US raid on an al-Qaeda base near Samarra in November. The US military released extracts from...

The military revealed two documents discovered by American troops in November: a 39-page memo written by a mid- to high-level Al Qaeda official with knowledge of the group's operations in Iraq's western Anbar province, and a 16-page diary written by another group leader north of Baghdad. Click here for the English translation of the diary. (PDF) Click here for the original version of the diary. (PDF) In the Anbar document, the author describes an Al Qaeda in crisis, with citizens growing weary of militants' presence and foreign fighters too eager to participate in suicide missions rather than continuing to fight,...

WASHINGTON, Feb. 10, 2008 – Documents released by U.S. military officials in Iraq detail the deterioration of al Qaeda in Iraq, as hundreds of its fighters have deserted to fight alongside the coalition or have been killed or captured. Navy Rear Adm. Gregory J. Smith, a Multinational Force Iraq spokesman, briefed reporters today on a letter and a diary recovered in raids by coalition forces, both thought to be written by senior leaders of al Qaeda in Iraq. The documents are believed to have been written last year, and detail a shift in support as citizens who formerly supported al...

On Nov. 3, U.S. soldiers raided a safe house of the insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq near the northern city of Balad. Not a single combatant was captured, but inside the house they found something valuable: a diary and will written in neat Arabic script. "I am Abu Tariq, Emir of al-Layin and al-Mashadah Sector," it began. Over 16 pages, the al-Qaeda in Iraq leader detailed the organization's demise in his sector. He once had 600 men, but now his force was down to 20 or fewer, he wrote. They had lost weapons and allies. Abu Tariq focused his anger...

BAGHDAD (AP) - A diary and another document seized during U.S. raids show some al- Qaida in Iraq leaders fear the terror group is crumbling, with many fighters defecting to American-backed neighborhood groups, the U.S. military said Sunday. The military revealed two documents discovered by American troops in November: a 39-page memo written by a mid- to high-level al-Qaida official with knowledge of the group's operations in Iraq's western Anbar province, and a 16-page diary written by another group leader north of Baghdad. In the Anbar document, the author describes an al-Qaida in crisis, with citizens growing weary of militants'...

BAGHDAD, Feb. 7, 2008 – Iraqi police expansion in Baghdad has reached an all-time high in the past six months, and with new recruits filling the ranks, police forces are improving by the day. As 18th Military Police Brigade police transition teams assess improvements with the numbers of Iraqi police officers and rule-of-law operations at the station level, the brigade’s soldiers have begun a transition into a “systems approach” to move the Iraqi police headquarters to the next level of performance in securing the future of the Iraqi people. Brigade officials call the new approach the enhanced police transition team....

WASHINGTON, Feb. 6, 2008 – Much progress in the security, local governance and economic realms has been achieved in the Iraqi city of Narhwan over the past four months, a senior U.S. commander posted there said today. “We’ve seen significant gains at the local level in governance” in Narhwan and its environs, Army Lt. Col. Mark Sullivan, commander of the 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Battalion, 10th Field Artillery Regiment, said during a conference call with military analysts. Efforts to bring together city council officials, local tribal leaders, police, and Iraqi government representatives have paid off, Sullivan said. Now, everyone’s concerns...

One of the many shops Company C, 2nd Battalion, 4th Infantry Regiment, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division has assisted in opening and sustaining in southern Baghdad's Doura neighborhood, Jan. 29. The "Warriors" are currently attached to Task Force Dragon of Fort Riley, Kan. Photo by Pfc. Nathaniel Smith, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division. BAGHDAD — Teamwork is something often talked about, but not always executed. ‘Loners’ may not understand the necessity of collaboration between different forces toward a common goal. All they need to do is look at Company C, 2nd Battalion, 4th Infantry Regiment, 4th...

In a very surprising thread posted tonight on Ekhlaas terrorist forum, the largest terrorist forum on the internet, the author of the thread was calling for urgent help to the terrorists in Iraq. He said that the last bastion controlled by the terrorists in Baghdad has fell in the hands of the US and Iraqi forces. He described the situation in Iraq as very dangerous and very difficult. He said that weapons are few but men are even fewer.This thread on Ekhlaas terrorist forum is a very surprising admission of defeat and confirms without any doubt that they are running...