…but you wouldn’t know it from the mainstream media.
Military.com ran a story from our friends at Stars and Stripes which reported the Marines plan to hand over “Provincial Iraqi Control” of al Anbar province on Saturday (June 29).
Once the most violent place in Iraq, Anbar province will come under Provincial Iraqi Control on Saturday, a senior military official said Monday.
So far, nine Iraqi provinces are under Provincial Iraqi Control, or PIC, in which Iraqi security forces perform day-to-day operations and U.S. troops provide assistance as needed, the military official told reporters.
“When you PIC a province, the coalition force goes into what we call an operational overwatch: They’re there, essentially as a security blanket,” the official said.
Though the Washington Post ran a story on its Web site today which lead with the heinous attempt by AQI to disrupt the handover by bombing a provincial council meeting and killing an estimated 20 (which hits pretty close to home for me because I met some of these tribal leaders in the very place where the bombing occurred — see the picture above), the paper edition did not have a story on the handover, nor did the New York Times.
Remember, these were the papers that jumped on the leak of a Marine Corps Intelligence report in September 2006 that Anbar was lost. Wrote the NYTimes:
As the situation has deteriorated, insurgent attacks have increased. The report describes Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia as an integral part of the social fabric of Anbar.
Aside from being flat out wrong on that assessment, the stories painted a grim picture of the situation in Anbar and help solidify impressions (with an election coming up just a month later) that Iraq was a lost cause.
But how times have changed. Anbar is flat out boring to go visit anymore. Believe me, I was there for two months in 2005–2006 and I know how violent it was.
And you know I went back in January and now Marines are itching to ditch their protective gear and whining louder and louder about coming home or heading to a real fight in Afghanistan. But why can’t the regular media bring themselves to report such a development. Anbar was the headquarters for al Qaeda in Iraq for years — now it’s secure enough to hand over to Iraqi control…before eight other provinces…That’s news.
Ok, off my soapbox now.
– Christian
ROTFLMAO…I might steal that quote from you Jeff…it is so true. More people know the staqte of Britaany’s personal life then they know the TRUE state of affairs in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Hey Christian!
I’ve been asked by a few people (cause they know I read this sort of stuff) how Iraq is really doing now.
I have a hard time saying that its doing okay because I know from what I read that it’s okay… but honestly, the overall picture. I think a post about the overall picture would be a good read. You don’t really hear much about Iraq in the mainstream media.… and the sites you read show a huge decline in casualties. But I think casualty numbers don’t tell the whole story.
There has been little of the true news out of Iraq, because the MSM is covering for Obama and hoping no one will notice until the election is safely past, and their candidate is in the Oval Office.
FYI here is the article from todays NYT
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-iraq.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=anbar+province&st=nyt&oref=slogin
you know what realy pisses me off?
ppl dont realize that terrorism is here to stay for at least the next 100yrs mosty likly for far far longer.
because of the actions of some of our allies in giving in to the enemy terrorism has been shown to work in some cases.thanks guys
bombs will be going off in iraq until islam is reformed and extremism accualy frowned upon by islamic leaders.…or there i no more insentive.
we must win the war on terror we cant hide behind the shores or isolationism anymore they dont care about neutality human rights or even there own ppl.
and as long as amadinajad continues to hold power iraq will forever be in a state of war
so i ask those of you who think we should run this is going to show the world what we are.….do we stick by those who ask for our help and help us or do we betray them and hide because its “to hard” or “to expensive” or its not our problem?
I think all the anti-media comments are off base. If its such a big damn deal, then its up to the military/government to make it a big deal. Was there a press conference? Did the president talk about it? Nope. Let’s face it, our public outreach in this war has been one big fat fail. Plus, I know we’re all big military people, but there are actually *gasp* other stories going on too. People in the Midwest who’s houses are flooded are probably making the argument that they aren’t getting enough coverage. There is only so much print space or air time to go around. Media bashing is just too easy in my book. It lets us off the hook and able to indulge in the fantasy that we didn’t screw anything up and all setbacks are their fault.
Oh lets be realistic in 2006, AQ was pretty firmly entrenched in Anbar. It wasn’t until the tribal leaders figured out that they were going to be the big losers and/or they could be bought off in this that AQ lost their power. The Anbar awakening isn’t just about purple finger.
That old trope about an irreducibly defeatist “mainstream media” is inaccurate and starting to get a bit tired.
The antimilitary slant of the media (print, TV, etc) is pretty well founded.
Hell, their (reporters) OWN ideal is to act as an adversarial institution vis a vis the government, which is nicely in tension with any pretense to ‘objectivity’ (which is being abandoned even in journalism schools). The military is part of the government. And therefore the press is adversarial to every military press conference and effort to get out their word, and a host of other things.
You guys might be tired of “[t]hat old trope” but it’s the very essence of what the press professes to aspire to.
Well said, Brad.
I do my best, shipmate
.
@Kris Alexander: “Hell, their (reporters) OWN ideal is to act as an adversarial institution vis a vis the government…“
Please don’t make me laugh.
If reporters actually *did* act as “an adversarial institution vis a vis the government” we wouldn’t be in this stupid mess in Iraq (or probably Afghanistan).
Doesn’t anyone remember Judith Miller of the NY Times?
Holy cripes.
the press has swung from believing everything the govt says to believing nothing.
its a natural phase after being lied to, part of the ‘all of the people, some of the time’ rule.
@diablotakahe: the press has swung from believing everything the govt says to believing nothing.
And about time, I suggest. That’s the job of a good journalist: to believe nothing anyone says without verifying it.
The press’s job isn’t to take government handouts and publish them uncritically.
There’s an old saying in journalism, “if your mother tells you she loves you, check it out.“
If only we had journalists that would follow that maxim in all cases with all sources (left, right, and in between), we might have fewer wars for our service members to go fight and die in.
And wouldn’t that be nice?
“Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia“
I love that one. Has the NY Times ever been honest about anything?
Kris Alexander said: “Let’s face it, our public outreach in this war has been one big fat fail.“
——-
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