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| Iraq-Jordan |
| Foreign fighters on the rise |
| 2005-03-27 |
| Foreign fighters who have entered Iraq in recent months are making up a growing percentage of insurgents battling US troops and the country's fledgling security force, a senior US military commander said Sunday. In an interview with CNN, General John Abizaid, the commander of US Central Command which covers Iraq, said that while most of the insurgents appear to be Iraqis, "the percentage of foreign fighters over the past several months seems to have increased." He also said the insurgents' ranks likely include "former Baathist criminals." "It seems to be pretty well established that they tend to cross over from Syria, although we know that there have been some infiltrations from the Saudi border, there have been some from the Iranian border," Abizaid said. "The Syrians are not doing everything we've asked them to do," Abizaid said, adding that Syria's intelligence services are not being aggressive enough in dismantling "facilitation cells" inside Syria. Asked for an update on the ongoing US manhunt for Iraq's most wanted insurgent, the Al-Qaeda linked Jordanian Abu Masab Al-Zarqawi, Abizaid said Al-Zarqawi's followers were certainly operating in western Iraq. "I think ... you well understand that a big military organization like the US military are pretty good at pressuring the (insurgent) networks, and that is what we're doing. "A single manhunt is a difficult thing. Over time, we keep finding out more and more about his organization, we take more people out of it, and his time is running out," Abizaid predicted. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |
| #7 I thought MSM were LLL moonbats. |
| Posted by: Mrs. Davis 2005-03-27 11:07:12 PM |
| #6 Foreign fighters who have entered Iraq in recent months are making up a growing percentage of insurgents battling US troops and the country’s fledgling security force, a senior US military commander said Sunday. Not a problem. They can die too, like the ones that came before them. |
| Posted by: Bomb-a-rama 2005-03-27 10:33:49 PM |
| #5 It's from the Turkish press. For a while I thought it was from the Beeb, but checked the link. 'Nuff said. |
| Posted by: Alaska Paul 2005-03-27 9:10:19 PM |
| #4 I guess everyone has noticed that Mathematics and Logic are not strong suits among the LLL Moonbats... Same can obviously be said for the MSM, Turks, Arabs, et al... It's prolly a common genetic predisposition thingy. Got it? Better herd goats or go the "liberal arts" path... |
| Posted by: .com 2005-03-27 8:52:28 PM |
| #3 I think its a misleading headline and the reporter is an idiot. The commander said "the percentage of foreign fighters over the past several months seems to have increased." That simply means that the percentage of foreign fighters have increased - not that the numbers has increased (as the title suggests). Kind of like if there were 100 people there - ten of which are american (10%). 90 are killed including 2 americans leaving 8 americans (or 80%) and two non-americans (20%). This idiot reporter would report that there are more american fighters. |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2005-03-27 8:38:37 PM |
| #2 Foreign fighters who have entered Iraq in recent months are making up a growing percentage Sounds like the latter, TW, although the former could be true too. The key graf is Abizaid saying "The Syrians are not doing everything we've asked them to do." Getting nervous in Damascus, Assad? Oh, and about those bombings in the Christian part of Lebanon, you might want to keep in mind that Gen. Abazaid is a Christian Arab who studied for a time in Amman Jordan (still has friends there) and served in Lebanon w/ the UN Observers. He's got your number, boy. |
| Posted by: too true 2005-03-27 8:22:01 PM |
| #1 Foreign fighters who have entered Iraq in recent months are making up a growing percentage of insurgents Does this mean the number of locals fighting the new regime has dropped, or more foreigners have joined up? |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2005-03-27 8:08:17 PM |