“Ramadi War Zone Now Rare Bright Spot”
First, let me say I just love the use of the word “rare” as if a majority of Iraq’s provinces aren’t mostly stable. Anyway the good news continues,
For veterans of Ramadi, it seems like a different place and a different war.
Just last year, soldiers were breaking down doors, hunting insurgents and struggling to secure the city block by block. U.S. troops now are invited into the homes of sheiks for lunch.
Marines and soldiers also have adopted different roles: urban planners, community relations managers and political operatives.
“We’re knee-deep in counterinsurgency here,” said Marine Capt. Brian Cillessen, who’s in charge of a group of about 150 Marines living and working in a house they rent in southern Ramadi.
“We came here with a very conventional mind-set. We weren’t expecting this. … I joined the Marine Corps to be a point man on a patrol,” chuckled the San Juan, N.M., native.
Instead, Cillessen and his troops are conducting a census and registering weapons, repairing sewer systems, ensuring fuel for cooking and heat is sold for fair prices, approving contracts to build new schools, parks and playgrounds, and perhaps most important, cultivating relationships with Iraqi police and citizens.
But, but, but Bush had “no plan for the peace”!!!!! Aren’t we just indiscriminately killing women and children? Iraq was all kites and smiling kids prior to OIF, wasn’t it?
More,
As U.S. troops walk patrols, they’re swarmed by children asking for candy, chocolate or pencils. Basic phrases in Arabic — hello, how are you, what is your name — fly back and forth to the delight of both the children and adults.
Attacks, including those by small-arms fire, explosive devices, have decreased from about 30 a day in January to fewer than one a day now, according to the U.S. military. Last year, during the holy month of Ramadan, there were 442 incidents in the area; this year, there were four, the military said.
Occupiers!!! And here I thought all the troops were despised and busy guarding the (stolen) oil pipelines!
Democrats are going to have so much egg on their faces next year that if we had an objective media they would be mocked out of existence. Sadly they won’t be, but those “progressive” defeatists should be held account for their disgusting behavior.
— The Ace