Iraqi prisoner abuse courts martial begin - pictures released

[BBKing]

If they are punishing Iraqis for cooperating with the 'enemy', then why are they blowing up their own water/electricity/plants? Rather masochistic

Of course they are no longer their own water/electricity plants - they, or what's left of them after the US bombing, have been farmed out by the US to co-operative US corporations (entirely without a democratic mandate from the Iraqi people, of course). Blowing up civilian infrastructure of course achieves two key aims for the insurgents - it illustrates that the US aren't in charge and keeps the perceived blame for not having any power or water on the US, who are after all supposed to be in charge.

It's a mistake to think that the insurgents are merely bloodthirsty fanatics and criminals - they actually seem to understand the situation in their own country rather clearly, as well as being bloodthirsty fanatics and criminals, of course.

I don't believe there was a mandate from the Iraqi people to start selling their oil in dollars instead of euros either.

Oh, and
"Of the more than 1000 men aged between 15 and 55 who were captured in intense fighting in Falluja last week, just 15 are confirmed foreign fighters, General George Casey, the top US ground commander in Iraq, said on Monday."

Like I said, discredited, even the US military admit that.

I'd like to thank zovat for taking the time to reply properly - I have no objection to people holding strong views, after all I hold them myself, it's holding strong views while not being in charge of the facts that's dangerous, as George Bush proves every single day.

[punky]

Originally Posted by BBKing

"Of the more than 1000 men aged between 15 and 55 who were captured in intense fighting in Falluja last week, just 15 are confirmed foreign fighters, General George Casey, the top US ground commander in Iraq, said on Monday."

Like I said, discredited, even the US military admit that.

Seems to have changed his mind somewhat. Also, the fact that Iraqis are protesting is an amazing change. Not a big deal to us, but to them it is. You should know what would have happened to them if they did that with Saddam. They would have gone to Abu Gharib and would have had more than someone pointing at their genitals and laughing. Also check out: http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/1223/p01s01-woiq.html I think Casey was probably trying to save relations and not antagonise Syria when he said your quote. It isn't only the US military that believe Syria is unduly helping the insurgency. I am not saying it is solely foreign fighters though. Not everyone was tortured under Saddan as someone had to do the torturing, and there was masses of people involved in the regime people underestimate the amount of supports I think. I certainly don't believe many, if really any of the fighters are non-ba'athist Iraqis who only want what is best for their country.

If foreign fighters came from somewhere, then they can obviously go back somewhere, especially when they had a 3 week warning of a hitherto-unseen amount of sheer explosive force being concentrated on them. They moved onto Mosul apparently.