Nothing is happening at Najaf and Fallujah. Negotiations have broken down, but the Army and Marines are just sitting there. It seems that, if they were going to attack, they would have done that days ago. It's like the US is paralyzed. They know they can't move forward and they can't admit to moving back. I wonder what is going on with the Generals when they are behind closed doors. Are they planning their retreat? The supply lines are cut off or, at best, severly hampered. Is this the lull before the storm or are the rats going to desert the sinking ship?

Spain's New Government Orders Iraq Withdrawal

Spain's new Socialist prime minister, moving swiftly to fulfill a campaign pledge, today ordered the withdrawal of Spanish troops from a U.S.-led coalition in Iraq as soon as possible. His predecessor denounced the action as a victory for terrorists who bombed trains in Madrid three days before last month's elections. Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, whose Socialist Party scored a surprising win in the March 14 elections, announced the pullout order in a televised speech hours after his new government was sworn in. The new prime minister said he had directed his defense minister, Jose Bono, "to do what is necessary for the Spanish troops in Iraq to come home in the shortest time and in the greatest safety possible."

[more]

  thanks to Eschaton

Revolts in Iraq Deepen Crisis In Occupation

In the space of two weeks, a fierce insurgency in Iraq has isolated the U.S.-appointed civilian government and stopped the American-financed reconstruction effort, as contractors hunker down against waves of ambushes and kidnappings, according to U.S. and Iraqi officials. The events have also pressured U.S. forces to vastly expand their area of operations within Iraq, while triggering a partial collapse of the new Iraqi security services designed to gradually replace them. The crisis, which has stirred support for the insurgents across both Sunni and Shiite communities, has also inflamed tensions between Arabs and Kurds. U.S. officials said they are reconsidering initial assessments that the uprisings might be contained as essentially military confrontations in Fallujah, where Marines continue their siege of a chronically volatile city, and Najaf, where the militant Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr has taken refuge in the shadow of a shrine. "The Fallujah problem and the Sadr problem are having a wider impact than we expected," a senior U.S. official involved in Iraq policy said. In Baghdad and Washington, officials had initially concluded that addressing those problems would not engender much anger among ordinary Iraqis. "Sadr's people and the people of Fallujah were seen as isolated and lacking broad support among Iraqis," the official added. Instead, the official said, "The effect has been profound."

[more]

No shit, Sherlock.

An Attack on Najaf "Will be Zero Hour of a Massive Popular Uprising": al-Khaz'ali
by Juan Cole

The Board of Muslim Clergymen (a Sunni group) announced its support for Muqtada and asked all Iraqis "to the expel the Occupation," on a day of relative calm in Fallujah. (The Board of Clergymen, led by Abdul Salam al-Kubaisi, has played an important role in negotiations between the city leaders of Fallujah and the US, but it has been consistently opposed to the US presence in the country). Muhammad Ayyash al-Kubaisi, the Board's representative outside Iraq, told al-Arabiya satellite television that all Iraqis who oppose the forces of Occupation, including Muqtada al-Sadr, are working for the same goal. He said that the Board had issued fatwas requiring an end to US occupation. He said Iraqis would not allow themselves to be divided along religious lines and ruled, and that the Shiite resistance has stiffened the resolve of the Board. The Scotsman also reported on the breakdown of negotiations with some pessimism, and noted that ' The pressures appeared to be taking their toll on US Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, who appeared to briefly lose consciousness during a press conference yesterday. Kimmitt left the podium, apparently feeling unwell, but returned a short time later. '

[more]

Najaf Crisis and International Implications
Iran: US Will Pay a 'Heavy Price'
by Juan Cole

Meanwhile, the British military is extremely concerned about the possibility of a general Shiite uprising in Basra, according to the Telegraph: ' the commander of British troops in southern Iraq, Brig Nick Carter, admitted that he would be powerless to prevent the overthrow of Coalition forces if the Shia majority in Basra rose up in rebellion. Brig Carter, of the 20 Armoured Brigade, who has been in Iraq for four months, said British forces would stay in Basra with the consent of local Shia leaders, or not at all. Last month, 14 British soldiers were injured in Basra, at least three seriously, when they came under attack from demonstrators armed with petrol bombs, rocks and a grenade. "A crowd of 150,000 people at the gates of this barracks would be the end of this, as far as I'm concerned," Brig Carter said. "There would be absolutely nothing I could do about that . . ." During an interview in Basra last week Brig Carter acknowledged that the Coalition's presence in southern Iraq was entirely dependent on the goodwill of the local Shia Muslim leader, Sayid Ali al-Safi al-Musawi. He represents Ayatollah Sistani, Iraq's leading Shia cleric. "The moment that Sayid Ali says, 'We don't want the Coalition here', we might as well go home," Brig Carter said. '

[more]

Rantisi and Najaf
by Juan Cole

The Sunday Herald correctly points out that the Israeli murder of Abdul Aziz Rantisi, the head of the political wing of the Hamas party, on Saturday, will cause further trouble in Iraq. With al-Anbar province tense and US troops surrounding Najaf, one could not imagine a worse time for Bush to give a green light to Sharon for further provocations. One can only conclude that neither Ariel Sharon nor Bush and his Neocon advisers give a fig about the lives of US and Coalition servicemen in Iraq. Otherwise, they'd stop with the theatrics. If the Israelis had wanted to arrest Rantisi, they could have. They pulled off Entebbe. This extra-judicial murder of political opponents is just showing off, and it is of course ethically despicable and a war crime for which one only wishes Sharon could be made to stand trial in the Hague. If Rantisi could have been proved to have committed an act of terrorism, he should have been arrested and tried in Gaza for murder. I condemn violence by Palestinian leaders just as I do that done by Israeli ones, and do not have a problem with terrorists being punished for killing innocent people. I do have a problem with political rivals whacking one another unnecessarily, especially when it is likely to get some of my friends killed. [...] Anyone who doubts that events in various places of the Muslim world are related should consider that the siege of Fallujah even appears to have provoked a firefight between Jordanian and US peacekeepers in the UN contingent at Mitrovica, Kosovo. So much for the UN saving the US in Iraq. Who's going to keep peace among the peace keepers?

[more]

How serious is the supply situation. It looks very serious.

U.S. Closes Long Sections of 2 Routes to Baghdad

The United States military command on Saturday closed down long stretches of two strategic highways leading to Baghdad, as American troops labored against insurgent attacks that have severely reduced the flow of food, fuel and other supplies into the capital. The closings appeared to confirm the effect of two weeks of heightened violence in Iraq. American soldiers, stretched thin, have already been deployed in large numbers to contain serious and unresolved uprisings in the cities of Falluja and Najaf. Now they have been sent to face the growing problem of keeping crucial sections of highway open for the passage of critically needed convoys reaching the Iraqi heartland from Turkey, Jordan and Kuwait. [...] On Saturday, travelers heading north to Baghdad on the main highway from Kuwait saw at least three highway bridges destroyed in a 60-mile section immediately south of the capital. Munadel Abdul Ellah, 44, a Hilla resident who drove to Baghdad on Saturday, said large numbers of American helicopters flew overhead and hundreds of troops patrolled the roads. "It's a very bad situation," said Mr. Ellah, who spent nearly eight hours making a round trip that usually takes only two hours. "There were so many troops on the highway. It was like when they first came to occupy the airport last year during the war." American forces had already effectively lost control of long sections of the 375-mile highway leading west from Baghdad to Jordan. The road runs through the battle zone around Falluja, 35 miles west of the capital. Ambushes near Falluja and the adjacent city of Abu Ghraib have destroyed numerous convoys carrying fuel and other supplies for American troops in the past two weeks. [...] But a senior American official said Saturday that the cutoff in supplies reaching the American occupation authority's headquarters in Saddam Hussein's former Republican Palace in central Baghdad were approaching a critical point. Canteens feeding 2,000 people, civilians as well as military personnel, may soon be forced to serve combat rations in plastic sleeves, known as meals ready to eat. [...] American officials said early last week that Kellogg Brown & Root, a private American military contractor and a Halliburton subsidiary, had stopped all convoys running into Iraq after the ambush on a fuel convoy at Abu Ghraib on April 9 of this year.

[more]

Steve Gilliard has some observation son the above...

Guerillas block highways, CPA forced to eat MRE's

The guerillas are winning. They have cut the supply lines and US forces are unable to get what they need. Sure, they can airlift critical supplies, and dodge SAM's, but cutting the highway is a major deal and will limit combat operations. We are on the verge of a disaster, a Chosin Resevior-like disaster, in Iraq. The US should be able to keep supply lines open with their forces. Now that they can't, we may have to fight our way out. This is a very serious, extremely serious, development. Logistics is the way armies operate. Forget the tactics, if you can't eat and change uniforms, you can't fight effectively. If the guerillas have blocked the main supply lines from Kuwait, they have achieved a victory which is 200 times more important than their stand in Fallujah. The generals behind the guerrillas have figured out that we can't do two things: fight the guerillas on their turf and feed ourselves. We're going to have to choose. Which is why going after Sadr was so incredibly bone stupid. Alienating the Shia means every mile of our supply lines could face attack. Once again, CENTCOM says stupid things, while the facts say something else. The NVA never cut the supply lines to MACV. The insurgents are threatening to starve Baghdad or at least make food resupplies difficult. That's a massive deal, it's probably the most important development of the war to date.

[more]

Talking Points Memo

From my friend in Iraq, late in the afternoon of April 16th, local time... Dear Josh, I would like you to share with your readers that the four abducted Italian bodyguards worked for me. They were people I had brought in to provide close protection for my former company's contractors. Fabrizio, who was executed, was a great guy and it appears he died with honor, knowing what was about to happen. If the rumors are true that he stated "Cosi Morare Un Italiano - Here is how an Italian man dies" well it would be just like him ... all of the others Incusori, Bersagalieri, Alpini and other Italians have such honor filled sayings tattooed on their arms and chests ... The guys were returning home to Italy from Baghdad via route 10 to Amman. I don't know why they thought they could make it and I am racked with guilt for not having been there to weigh in on such a simple decision ... it would have been NO! Fly royal Jordanian! Everyone would have gone home happy and safe. They and the other Italians who worked for us were/are consummate professionals and our staff loved them. I can only hope the others make it home in safety and this madness of abduction ends. I am headed back to Baghdad now and my family is terrified. If I am not there things will swiftly fall apart as our Iraqi staff are loyal and have offered to protect us with their families and their lives. However I need to give them much more training. So for now I am too grief stricken to assess whether this was worth the adventure that is Fallujah but all I ask is ... how can we assault a city of 300,000 and not have the largest east-west highway secure for logistics and commerce by Military Police?? Allah only knows how many people were killed by ignoring a basic military principle ... secure your lines of communications and supply!

[more]