"The U.S. Defense Department called it "a very bad day in Iraq."
In the deadliest of the attacks, a parked car bomb detonated in a crowd of workers at the Sadriyah market in central Baghdad, killing at least 116 people and wounding 145, said Raad Muhsin, an official at Al-Kindi Hospital where the victims were taken.
A police official confirmed the toll, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release the information.
Among the dead were several construction workers who had been rebuilding the mostly Shiite marketplace after a bombing destroyed many shops and killed 137 people there in February, the police official said." Yahoo New
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In what is clearly a coordinated demonstration of capability, suicide and other bombers struck all over Baghdad today to show the world and the Shia Arab population of Baghdad that the Petraeus/Kagan/Keene plan for the pacification of the city will not succeed without a tremendous fight in the course of which many Shia will suffer.
The bridge demolitions last week were undoubtedly part of the plan for this counter-offensive. As can be seen from the BBC chart below, there are many advantages to be derived by the insurgents from isolating East Baghdad from the increasingly Sunni Arab western side of the city.
It will be interesting to see how this campaign develops over the coming months. pl
Interesting paper on working with tribesmen. I assume that our work to date has been a mixed bag, we may be doing better on that score in Anbar.
One topic not covered: how do outsiders deal with inter-and intra- tribal feuding? One consequence of the focus on honor is the prevalence of vendetta. Is neutrality possible?
Posted by: searp | 28 April 2007 at 06:50 PM
SEARP
A tough thing. If you are Kirkbride, Peake or Glubb then you can play God and build a tribal conglomeration for their their king.
In your position I think you will have to take sides or sobody will like you. Just make sure hat they believe in you.
By the way, I knew Glubb. pl
Posted by: W. Patrick Lang | 28 April 2007 at 08:00 PM