Here are few tidbits from your own link, which establish that my comment is quite correct, not that you'd care to acknowledge this fact, I suspect.
"...a largely Iraqi-based operation with critical support from foreign elements."
"the insurgency is led and populated almost entirely by Iraqis, many of them former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party,"
Huh...Baath Party. Popular insurgency? Perhaps not, eh? Certainly it's not surprising that they fight. Turns out that "almost entirely" means perhaps half or more of the major attacks and most beheadings and such.
"The foreign fighters' attacks tend to be more spectacular..."
"We do believe that the major players are in Zarqawi's network, and that's why we're focusing our operations against him," Lynch said in a recent interview. "We believe that the most lethal piece of the insurgency here is the terrorist and foreign fighters. And it's because of the level of violence they're willing to go to to accomplish their objective, which is to derail the democratic process and discredit the Iraqi government."
"...local nationals, the Saddamists, the Iraqi rejectionists, are much more problematic," said Maj. Gen. Joseph J. Taluto, commander of the Army's 42nd Infantry Division. His unit, which lost 59 soldiers during its tour here, was based in the northern city of Tikrit, Hussein's home town, before transferring the region to the 101st Airborne Division this month.
"It may be overstated by some, but that does not mean they don't exist," he said. "It is critical to get the help from countries where these people come from, to stop the flow."
"The enemy in Tall Afar consists mostly of local fighters, with a small but dangerous network of Takfirist foreign leaders, financiers and propagandists," said Lt. Col. Paul Yingling of the 3rd Armored Cavalry, referring to adherents of another radical branch of Islam. Once the regiment arrived "and began to operate with the Iraqi army in the city, the foreign component of the insurgency became much more cautious," he said."
"the relative influence of foreign and Iraqi elements of the insurgency is difficult to measure because accurate numbers are hard to come by."
I'll be darned, I guess my strange notion that we are fighting Al Qaeda in Iraq is true. Don't you think those Islamic websites which document the suicide attacks of foreign Al Qaeda fighters are true? Surely true, I'd say, indeed. And no, that we fight Saddam's Baathists and such too, doesn't escape me.
Dan B. |
