From Richard Miniter, PJM:
American forces in Iraq now hold some 300 prisoners tied to Iran’s intelligence agencies, Pajamas Media learned from both diplomatic and military sources.
This is believed, by both sources, to be a record number of prisoners tied to Iran. Virtually all were captured in the past two months.
This week’s seizure of 15 British sailors by Iran in the contested waters of the Shattab al-Arab, the ship channel that divides Iraq and Iran, may have been payback for the capture of record number of Iranian operatives inside Iraq. “It may be a bargaining chip,†one diplomatic source said.
The intelligence community is still debating whether the unlawful detainment of British sailors was ordered by Iran’s government or was presented to it as a fait accompli by relatively low-level Iranian Revolutionary Guards officers.
The roughly 300 prisoners held in Iraqâ€â€the number grows frequentlyâ€â€are either Iranian nationals or Shiites recruited from neighboring countries that are employed one of its almost two dozen intelligence or paramilitary services.
The record haul of Iran-linked prisoners may not be a sign of Iran’s increasing involvement in Iraq. The Islamic Republic’s participation in the Iraq war, which includes funding, arming and training both Shiite and Sunni militias, has been known to be significant for some time.
More likely, the large number of Iran-linked prisoners reflects a change in tactics following the arrival of Multinational Force Iraq commander Army Gen. David H. Petraeus. Previously, Iranians and other foreigners could not be picked up without a provable connection to terrorism. Now, American and allied forces are encouraged to seize militants based on a reasonable suspicion of involvement in insurgent attacks. This is consistent with Iraqi law.
The number of bombings associated with Iran-backed groups seems to be declining, although both sources cautioned it is too soon to be sure.
The Pentagon received “considerable pressure†from officials in the State department and CIA to release some or all of the Iran-linked prisoners to facilitate discussions between Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Iranian officials. Apparently, Gen. Petraeus sharply disagreed, saying that he intends to hold the prisoners “until they run out of information or we run out of food,†according to our sources who heard these remarks through channels.
[my emphasis]
Those who favor diplomacy in dealing with Iran surely will find this news of Petraeus balking at both Foggy Bottom and the (hardly non-politicized) CIA further proof of unilateral cowboyism—and another reason Why They Hate Us™ .
But diplomacy with Iran—remember our recent talks?—is dependent on Iranian cooperation and mutual trust between Ahmanintojihad and the Us, and so far, the US (and the UN, for that matter) has no reason to trust the Iranians to do much more than continue to buy time for their nuclear program through various and sundry low-level provocations designed, my guess is, to keep attention focused elsewhere: Iran as agent provocateur in Iraq; Iran as financier to terror groups operating inside Iraq, Syria, etc.
Petraeus is taking the same hard-line that Bush has tried to take; and while no one can say for certain if the information the US military is hoping to extract from these prisoners is purely localized—intent on dealing with Iran’s involvement with Iraq insurgency—or more wide-ranging, it is nevertheless a pretty sound tactic to get everything one can from Iranian foreign nationals before they are used as leverage to achieve other goals. After all, these prisoners weren’t kidnapped, as is the case with the British sailors Iran is holding. Instead, these were captured fighters / organizers inside Iraq who were facilitating, in some way or another, attacks on US military and Iraqi civilians, the hope being that they could either start a civil war, or else play to that portion of Western governments (most notably, our own liberal Democrats) by creating enough havoc to convince them that the fight isn’t worth the aggravation or the cost in lives.
I was widely (though unfairly, I think) ridiculed by several lefty blogs for noting that Iran has considered itself at war with us since 1979. Just because no one speaks about it in such terms doesn’t make it any less the case—and no, I don’t find the observation troubled in the least by our dealings with Iran in the 80s. We were acting pragmatically—as “realists,” if you prefer—which doesn’t negate Iran’s steady stance toward us, the Great Satan, which has never changed since the Embassy takeover, a series of tentative cooperations that served mutual interests in the interim notwithstanding.
alpo posts an inane, uninformed threadjack attempt in 5…4…3…2…
Like the palis, best to just kill them when you see them. Saves a lot of time and trouble.
Free the Jihad 300!! Or is that the something-or-antoher-six? Or should that be Mumia? Oh what the Hell, free somebody, save the whales and kill that kraut polar bear cub!
We are also still technically still at war with North Korea. Can we just nuke NK and Iran and close out the account. I hate unfinished business!
I love it when the left does a voice-over on reality.
Like when Ahmadamnutjob says he wants to destroy Israel, and the Western left apologists jump in front of the camera and say, “no, no, no he doesn’t!”
I think the swirling core of the far left got so used to making excuses for the Soviets that it just became habit.
OBL: “We planned this glorious attack.”
Left: “No he didn’t.”
OBL: “What?”
Left: “It was a CIA plot.”
OBL: “No it wasn’t, we did it!”
Left: “Osama builds roads and schools.”
OBL: “Hey, what are you…”
Left: “SHHHH!”
OBL: “Don’t shush me! I’m a jihadi warrior!”
Left: “LALALALALA! Nobody listen!”
OBL: “Hey!”
Now we see it all over with Iran.
Personally, I hope we nab those 15 Brits back with minimal lossage and Iraq gets some control over its border.
Though I’m thinking maybe the US, great though we are, may not be the best “border control” tutors in the world.
Merovign,
Are you saying that teaching Iraq to grant citizenship to all undocumented guest workers is not the way to go?
BTW:
Without enough provocation that the legislature would have no choice but to react – and it would take a lot with this legislature – if we go to open war with Iran, Bush provides the fait accompli for his impeachment. Don’t believe for a moment the Iranian government doesn’t realize this. If things go on at a low level of provocation from the Iranians, we’re limited to low level response. They’ll keep it below congress’ rather high threshold. Whether rogue elements in their own country exceed the threshold is a matter I expect the Iranian government is concerned about.
Somewhere along the line the administration let the narrative shift away from Iraq being a campaign in the war to being the war. If we’re unlucky, history will see that as Bush’s great failure.
The Iranian leadership is attempting a form of brinkmanship that it is not equipped to carry to the end. The history of the Islamic dicatorship of Iran is one of miscalculation after miscalculation. Eventually, the dimwitted mullahs and their proxies will run into an unexpected difficulty that will be the end of them.
Any US Congress that attempted to impeach a US president in the middle of war might find that Washington DC could turn a great deal more inhospitable than Baghdad. Nancy Pelosi is moronic enough to attempt it–don’t get me wrong–but I feel she has people around her who would probably physically restrain her if need be. For their own well-being if for no other reason.
I was widely (though unfairly, I think) ridiculed by several lefty blogs for noting that Iran has considered itself at war with us since 1979.
No, that ridicule was fair. And why do you want to have Iranian blood on your hands, in addition to that of all the Iraqis killed thanks to chickenhawks like you?
The above comment was brought to you by “We Are Too Obvious to Reality To Feed Ourselves”, a wholly owned subsidiary of Silly Socialists Inc.
If Petraus actually stood up to State on the iranian prisoners, then I’m really starting to admire the man.
I read the title and thought:
Is Ayatollah Ali Khamenei still dead?
It is nice that Iran is once again a refuge for the people who fled Iraq when Saddam was in charge.
Lew Clark is right. Those 300 Iranians are just undocumented workers caught up in the U.S. occupation war hysteria. And that makes their imprisonment RACIST!
Even though the observation was true.
In fact, because it was true.
Those 300 Iranians just want to WORK at killing the occupiers. Another job Americans just won’t do! Right Alphie? There’s an open job for you in Bahgdad right now.
tw: day95
I thought that whole chickenhawk thing was based quite specifically on not going and killing Iraqis. Marge, the narrative is broken! Call MoveOn and see if they can fix it.
Is Ayatollah Ali Khamenei still dead?
Still dead:
http://tinyurl.com/y5n9qk
klrfz1,
The only way the surge will be a success is if Petraeus gets the Iraqi securiy forces to take charge of Iraq’s security.
If Petraeus is squandering his surgebucks playing the role of America’s last Iraqi Viceroy, as this report seems to indicate, he might as well come home now.
We’re way past the point where America should be deciding who should and who shouldn’t be allowed in Iraq.
Alphie,
Your a little out of your league advising General Petraeus on military strategy. Run over to Marthastewart.com and advise her on party accessories. Go where you know what your talking about.
Why are the dirt berms finished already?
Alphie, when you were using the handle “Monkeyboy,” was it intended as a reference to Buckaroo Banzai? Because that would certainly be a point in your favor, if true.
Yes, and succeed. This House would see an attack on Iran right now as fait accompli, bow to the nutroots, and proposing an article of impeachement. It would go to the senate, get bounced against the War Powers Act, and likely die there, but it would probably play out long enough to effectively cripple the rest of this administration’s term.
Remember that I’m talking about the US declaring open war against Iran based on provocations already existing. Doesn’t hold if the Iranian government slips up themselves or allows rogue elements to. Al Fin puts it as a matter of brinkmanship, and it’s apt. I don’t think that Bush has the political currency given this legislature to take it past that unless the Iranians do first. So brinkmanship will be the name of the game with the Iranians for some time to come.
A lot of forces are holding facets of the WoT in stasis right now. Any one of those forces shift and things could precipitously devolve very quickly and with unpredictable consequences.
BRD made that point a while back concerning another massive attack on native soil, but the same concerns apply elsewhere.
Did you notice how alp*ie didn’t ask me any questions. He knows that scrotumic method ain’t gonna work on me.
Will it, alphie?
It was monkyboy, not “monkeyboy”! Jebus, can’t you wingers get nothing rihgt!
What’s your favorite color, klrfzq?
Maybe if we parade them around for, say, 444 days, things will seem even?
Problem faced by the administration here is that the average day-worker, career employee at State and at Langley is decidedly opposed to its politica and diplomacy, and will do everything in his/her power short of open insubordination to keep the current administration from doing anything foolish (say, like winning in Iraq, or showing up Iran).
TW: I just found Alphie’s brain!
Good God, I love a
nonmoralist. One can just hear the “sniff” when they are about to voice a truism.My mother’s blue-haired friend always did that just before whispering a titillating comment on someone’s sexual habits.
Will you be mine Alphie? We could play bridge and discuss really important things. With sherry.
Alphie sez:
“What’s your favorite color, klrfzq?”
Alphie, you’re not a… bridgekeeper, are you?
We’re not going to get into figuring out if we’re speaking of African or European swallows, are we?
BRD
All colors are EQUAL. You RACIST!
This is a bit unfair. The media unleashed an intense proactive campaign to frame relations with Iran to forestall any forceful action Bush might take. They hauled out Flynt Leverett to create a newspeg to further that campaign (note the correction on the latter from the WaPo that furthers Jeff’s point above). Democrats ran with the ball. At the last second – mission accomplished – the Democrats avoided leaving obvious fingerprints on their campaign to enfeeble Bush’s military options. For Bush and the administration to have countered this blitzkrieg would have required foregrounding a possible conflict with Iran in a way that would both risk amplifying the media’s propaganda and endangering progress towards UN sanctions on Iran’s nuclear program.
That said, I think you’re exactly right about where the bar is set now.
BRD – Remember, it makes all the difference whether the sparrow is laden or unladen. Or operating in conjunction with another sparrow.
Um klrfzq, I don’t think alp*ie was talking to you. I think that was just a typo. See a right hander like alp*ie will occasionally not reach far enough with his left little finger and hit the q key instead of the 1 key. Just a typo. So BUTT OUT CLOWM! And stop accusing everyone of being a RACIST. It’s JUST IMPOLIGHT!
tw: local39
A union organizer of undocumented Iranians in Bahgdad: alp*ie.
Seems to me that given 2500 intervening years, what with compound interest and all, 300 ain’t nearly enough.
happyfeet,
I have no issues with what you’ve described as the process. I’d still like to think that the administration wasn’t powerless to resist that process. It would not have taken all that much if pressure had been applied at the right points.
I am being a little unfair to my own beliefs though. I don’t yet think the narrative is hopelessly skewed. The self-congratulatory attitude from the left over both the 11/06 elections and the appropriations bill and what it will mean to them as events unfold is not only misplaced, but will burn them big time.
alpo, someday the passive voice is going to turn on you, gut you, then eat your liver with some fava beans and a nice chiaaaaanti.
I’m guessing, based on the email, that this brainfart wandered in from matt stoller land.
klrfz1, I must polightly disagree. Here is Dr. Sanity’s post the proves what I say about alphie.
Also here’s another important post that supports my postion as well.
tw: show47
The ball’s in your alley.
Apparently sending a Greek to mess with Persians still works.
Maybe I’ve seen the movie too many times, but isn’t maybe time to build a special wall at some of the Iranian border checkpoints…
Well, if the Dems are successful in cutting funding for our troops, I hope ‘prisoner food’ is the first supply that is cut. Then blame the Congress for starving the prisoners.
Can we please start bombing them before they can nuke back ?
I think Jeff is Alphie- it takes a certain intellect to come up with screeds that stupid.
“Problem35” – I’ll shut up if I’ve hit the nail on the head.
Matt, Esq. Are you really a lawyer? Nuking anyone pre-emptively seems like a bad idea.
cynn – he said bombing them, not nuking them. Maybe a small distinction, but a distinction, nevertheless.
We’ve got plenty of alternatives in our bag of tricks, and we really, really don’t care to turn the Middle East into so much glass, regardless of what the trolls say.
TW: ask67 anybody
I would redcommend that you turn the Middle East to glass; the world would be smoother to deal with.
Yeah, “you.” Unleash your personal nuclear arsenal already, would “you”?
If you turned much of the Muddle East to glass, it would reflect the heat of the sun back to itself, and cause a new ice age. And I would ride a carriage drawn by penguins, whilst swathed in garments made from the shaven nay-nays of Muslim girls.
Hey, its not like they’re gonna quit doing it, y’know. May as well take advantage of the ‘new fur’.
Save an Ermine or two.
Now that would be cool.
Especially with Slim Pickens as my personal B-52 pilot.
Nukes are illegal and immoral and can only be used on that damned kraut polar bear cub, Dick Cheney and anyone else that Bill Mahr considers unpatriotic. Wise up Rethuglicans.
Fortunately, t appears that soon the Republican Party will no longer be a cancer on the American body politic:
http://tinyurl.com/222vuy
Of course, this doesn’t mean that any PW readers have to stop being idiots. It just means that you guys won’t be especially relevant in the future.
Well, that’s settled. The last time I heard rhetoric like this was 1974-1976.
Tell me, wise one, how that all turned out.
Hint: It begins with an “R”.
I have to point out that the survey Stupid refers to was taken before this vote on war funding. In all honesty some of us are feeling a little less confident since Friday. As a matter of fact we’ve been mopping up the flop sweat with a mop here at the commune all week end, but what the hey? Even if we can’t starve a bunch of American soldiers we can still kill the polar bear cub while we’re in power can’t we? If we can’t the terrorists have all ready… yada, yada, yada.
Oh, hell, you genius commenters at PW have totally persuaded me that George II is the BEST PRESIDENT EVA!!11. Polling among the rest of America totally bears out the conclusions of the geniuses here:
http://tinyurl.com/c58ql
PS: I’m probably being polite by referring to the rednecks who post here as “conservatives.” A better characterization probably would be “People willing to eat out Bush’s asshole regardless of any lies he tells.”
aw, I’m going to go cry myself to sleep now.
Well, that’s that then. I’m convinced. I will miss eating out Bush’s asshole but if that’s what it takes to be relevant…
Well, if that’s the “liberal” POV, I guess the left must be girding its loins for the aftermath of the shortest political summer in history.
Yet another lefty who apparently can’t read. We recognize Washington, Lincoln, TR, FDR, Reagan, Jackson, and Jefferson as being in a first tier.
Clinton? Not so much.
Carter? Heh.
And the party ascendant is the one, who in my lifetime alone, has thought to nominate George McGovern, Jimmy Carter, Walter Mondale, Michael Friggin’ Dukakis, Bubba, Al Gore, and John Friggin’ Kerry to be President.
But who’s counting?
OK–who wants pie?
wishbone—it’s not like they have a better list. I’ve probably mentioned this before,but here in California the Democrats sent out a flyer before the special election toting Democratic party values.
On the cover, they showed FDR, Truman, and JFK. No LBJ, no Carter, for damn sure, no Clinton.
If they’re embarrassed by their own leaders of the past half-century, it’s no wonder they’re crabby about ours…
CAS,
OMG, an article from MYDD relating to polls & another referencing another poll regarding the economy… hmm you’d thing “stupid†would have given up on polls after the 2000, 2002 & 2004 elections but then again since the Democrats haven’t adjusted their fiscal policy since the Johnson Administration & every fiscal prediction made from tax revenues to the effects of tax cuts have been proven miserably wrong again & again. Care to discuss last year’s talking point of the deficit that is going to be reduced 3-4 years earlier than predicted, I’m guess you don’t. Especially since, the Pelosi lead faction is now looking at raising taxes across the board, removing child tax credit & bringing back the death tax – all wonderful economic viewpoints that aided in their removal from congressional power before. Of course adding additional costs & spending to a supplemental military financing bill probably won’t boast their poll numbers, which incidentally are lower than George II. Great points stupid! Maybe you can explain how the Party that is a cancer has won 7 of the last 10 Presidential Elections or the fact that George II received more votes than any other President ever. Once again, the trolls seem to rely upon conjecture & for some reason neglect or recognize that subtle difference that separates opinion from facts. I’d ask for a response but some how the latest rantings from KOS regarding the upcoming elections or fiscal policy just doesn’t concern me, he’s a little too NEDTASTIC!!! To be taken seriously. Call us red-necks all you want, but much like your dreams of seeing the troops pulled from Iraq, Rove or Cheney marched off to prison or Bush impeached, much like your last standard bearer – stained dress Clinton – your little dreams of American conquest may once again fall a little short of your initial predictions. Maybe you’d be better off making a new giant paper BUSHITLER mask for your next rally or protest…. But better hope that the opposition doesn’t actually produce greater numbers again.
If you went into geostationary orbit around the moon, would you have to call it lunastationary?
No, you could name it after yourself: klrfaqstationary.
Don’t look now, c.a. stupid.
I see school let out early today and Mom left the computer unattended.
Now young man, YOU DO YOUR HOMEWORK!!!
Hey! I was right all along.
This little troll wants Matt’s vision of disarming America and replacing it with New Deal pork.
Sorry, maybe I wasn’t clear but I have no desire to nuke Iran. I think we should have been (conventional) bombing their nuclear facilities from the getgo instead of letting the UN handle it but then, I’m a warmonger. The Arab world recognizes strength and it understands fear – unfortunately, our country projects neither at the moment, which is why Iran is getting away with it.
Personally, I think the Iranian government is on the verge of .. something… either implosion or collapse -look at their economy, the problems with Russia, the high unemployment rate, young people who are more interested in western culture than jihad. My fear, however, is that the madman who currently run the country will be inclined to go out with a bang and thus, the importance of not allowing IRan to have a nuclear weapon cannot be overstated. Also, in the event the mad Mullahs and their handpuppet do the unthinkable, its the Iranian people who will suffer in the long run.
Once again we’re treated to another episode of “ I’m progressive and thoughtful and you’re not. And to prove that I’m progressive and you’re a thug, I’ll call you names like redneck and sneer at election results that I don’t like” (George II).
Meanwhile Alphie will again dismiss the right of Iraqis to live without being attacked in their schools by referring to ‘surgebucks’. That’s really funny.
You know Alph, I keep offering to help you take your show on the road, and try out your material in say, Kirkuk, or at a funeral for children who were murdered by bombers. But you don’t seem keen on the idea. Why is that?
personally, I think a few KEWs would be an excellent choice for Iran’s nuclear facilities…minimum damage to other targets a good test… I hope it will not come to that, but religious fanatics are much more dangerous like good old fashioned totalitarian crazies like the PRK.