The Common Ills: Iraqi military continues to defy the prime minister's order?

Thursday, September 18, 2014

Iraqi military continues to defy the prime minister's order?

Violence continues today in Iraq with multiple examples including the 6 corpses discovered dumped in the streets of Tuz Khurmato. And the residential neighborhoods of Falluja continue to be bombed daily. NINA notes that today's bombings left 4 civilians dead and twenty more (including two children) injured.

Those are the bombings that new Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi ordered stopped on Saturday. They didn't stop. Not even for a day.

The point we've been making is that the press (and the US Congress) needs to determine did al-Abadi lie about giving an order (which would reflect poorly on him as the new leader, lying out of the gate) or was his order ignored?

If his order was ignored, this is very serious because the Iraqi military has refused a direct order from the prime minister meaning it is no longer under civilian control -- meaning the US doesn't need to be training it, arming it or assisting it.

While everyone in the US has worked hard to avoid the issue, it's being raised in Iraq today. National Iraqi News Agency reports:

MP Hamid al-Mutlaq, for the coalition of Alwataniya demanded the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces Haider Abadi to proceed to accountability of military leadership, who violated his orders by carrying out indiscriminate bombing on residential areas in Fallujah of Anbar and Yusufiyah of Baghdad.

In other news the western press is largely ignoring -- as is the US Congress -- Barack is sending US troops and weapons to a country that has no one to head the security ministries.

al-Abadi's nominees for Minister of the Interior and Minister of Defense failed to get voted in by Parliament on Tuesday.

It was an embarrassment and the Parliament rushed to insist they'd vote again on Thursday.

A source in Parliament tells NINA that the vote has yet again been postponed.

These are not minor issues, they are not side issues.

I'm opposed to further war on Iraq.

But even those for it should be concerned about what Barack is getting the US into when Iraq continues to have no heads for the security ministries and when it appears al-Abadi's direct orders to the military were and continue to be disobeyed.

And for anyone late to the party who wants to e-mail that it will just take a week or two for Iraq to get a Minister of Defense or Minister of Interior, maybe.

Maybe so.

But thing is we heard that song and dance at the start of Nouri al-Maliki's second term as prime minister (2010 to 2014) and he never nominated anyone for those post and made it through the whole term without having heads for the security ministries.

The following community sites -- plus the Guardian, Antiwar.com and Jody Watley -- updated: