The Afghanizing of Iraq

Krugman notes that a funny thing happened when we turned over "sovereignty" of Iraq to Iraqis -- nothing much changed in terms of the security or reconstruction situation, but the American media lost interest. Like Afghanistan, whom we'd promised to liberate and rebuild, Iraq is quickly becoming another forgotten country, far away and mysterious.

The media silence allows Bush to claim that he's achieved a moral victory in Iraq, that questioning his conduct of the war is defeatest, and that he's made the country "safer." It allows commentators on the right to claim that American casualties are on the decline. Wrong. 42 American casualties in June; 54 in July. And because the mainstream media is increasingly unconcerned and ignorant of the "facts on the ground" there, they accept those claims at face value.

And things have, once again, turned ugly.

The heaviest fighting occurred mainly in Najaf, a Shiite holy city and Sadr stronghold 100 miles south of Baghdad, where the Health Ministry said 19 people were killed and 111 were wounded during fighting Thursday and early today, The Associated Press reported.

A Marine helicopter was shot down there on Thursday, but the crew members, many severely wounded, were evacuated safely, the United States military reported.

Sporadic clashes were reported in Basra, the largest city in southern Iraq, where British forces killed two militiamen. But Baghdad, even in the Shiite slum neighborhood of Sadr City, appeared to be mostly quiet until 11:15 p.m., when three large explosions, probably from mortars, rocked the city's center. Small-arms fire followed.

One American serviceman and several insurgents were killed in Najaf, where marines fought alongside Iraqi police and National Guard troops. At least a dozen more soldiers and dozens of insurgents were wounded in both Baghdad and Najaf.

Today the U.S. military said two marines from the 11th Expeditionary Unit were killed in Najaf on Thursday. It gave no further details.

Look, I don't know that John Kerry has a plan of action for improving conditions in Iraq. It's possible that Bush, Rumsfeld, Bremer, and Cheney have fucked things up so badly that it's beyond short-term repair. But the failure of the Bush administration to honestly appraise the situation and candidly explain that they have no plan beyond reacting to insurgencies means that "staying the course" we're currently on is leading us into a ditch that gets deeper and deeper every day.

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Madame Cura and I are off for a week's vacation so posts may be few and far between over the next week or so.