UPDATE #2 In spite of Kevin Drum and the NY Times certainty that Maliki has lost this battle, others have a different opinion. Why is the Left so eager for defeat ?
UPDATE: Here is more on the situation in Iraq with the Iraqi Army and Sadr. Lots of mixed messages and reluctant optimism from a press that does not want us to win.
You would not know it from this New York Times story but the fighting in Basra this week is good news. The Shiite majority Iraqi government is cracking down on Shiite militias that have taken over Basra, with Iranian assistance and are hampering operations of Iraq’s massive port facilities.
In Basra, American and British jets roared through the skies, providing air support for the Iraqi military. A British Army spokesman for southern Iraq, Maj. Tom Holloway, said that while Western forces had not entered Basra, the operation already involved nearly 30,000 Iraqi troops and police forces, with more arriving. “They are clearing the city block by block,” Major Holloway said.
This is what skeptics have been saying the al Maliki government would never do. They are doing it and, of course, the skeptics are not reporting the crucial facts. This is the next “milestone” in the march to Iraqi self-government.
The Times reporter contacted Mahdi Army leaders who say: “They are trying to finish us,” the commander said. “They want power for the Iraqi government and Sciri.”
OF COURSE they want power for the Iraqi government ! It looks as though Sadr has figured out that he had better keep the truce since the Iraqi Army is holding together. He would be smashed if he chose to fight and he knows it. This is the end game.