Pirate's Cove

Does anyone else have the sneaky suspision that the NY Times big shots, along with most of their staff, are spending an abnormal amount of time lately at cocktail parties and martini lunches because of all the good news coming out of Iraq? I bet their dentists are going to be happy with all the extra money that will be coming in due to the teeth grinding, too!

In the latest article of good news, they attempt to water it down by telling us that the terrorists, excuse me, insurgents from foreign countries, are just moving on to other cities

Sunni insurgents pushed out of Baghdad and Anbar Provinces have migrated to this northern Iraqi city and have been trying to turn it into a major hub for their operations, according to American commanders.

A growing number of insurgents have relocated here and other places in northern Iraq as the additional forces sent by President Bush have mounted operations in the Iraqi capital and American commanders have made common cause with Sunni tribes in the western part of the country.

The insurgents who have ventured north include Abu Ayyub-al Masri, the leader of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, a predominantly Iraqi group that American intelligence says has foreign leadership. American officials say the insurgent leader has twice slipped in and out of Mosul in Nineveh Province to try to rally fellow militants and put end to infighting.

“We have seen some migration of Al Qaeda,” said Col. Stephen Twitty, the commander of the Fourth Brigade Combat Team, First Cavalry Division, which is returning to the United States after 13 months here. “What has driven that are the operations down south.”

So, The Surge is working as planned. Now, we need the Iraq politicians to get it together. Of course, considering what our Democrat led Congress has done…….

American and Iraqi units have been able to hold off the insurgents and disrupt their planning. But they have not been able to decrease the rate of attacks in Mosul, which has held stubbornly steady over the past year even as attacks have fallen in Baghdad and Anbar Province, according to an analysis by American officers.

That has prompted American and Iraqi commanders to propose the return of two Iraqi battalions that were sent from western Mosul earlier this year to bolster Iraqi forces in Baghdad. Such a move would increase the Iraqi troop strength here by 1,400 troops or more, according to estimates by American officers, and enable the Iraqis to establish more outposts in some of the more violent areas of the city.

So what we have here is the Times attempting to say “OK, the Surge in Baghdad worked because all the bad guys went to Mosul. Iraq is lost, let’s run.”

But what the commanders really want are more troops. And, as Baghdad and the small other numbers of areas that have issues settle down, which they are doing, more can be moved to Mosul, as well as Iraqi troops and policeman. And, by all indications, and the increase in Rolaids and Pepto Bismal sales, The Surge is working.