The Common Ills: Hejira

The US continues bombing Iraq with the Defense Dept announcing the following today:

Strikes in Iraq

Attack, bomber, fighter and remotely piloted aircraft conducted 20 strikes in Iraq, coordinated with and in support of Iraq’s government:

-- Near Fallujah, one strike struck an ISIL tactical unit and suppressed an ISIL mortar position.

-- Near Kirkuk, one strike struck an ISIL tactical unit and destroyed an ISIL heavy machine gun and an ISIL fighting position.

-- Near Kisik, one strike destroyed an ISIL assembly area.

-- Near Mosul, five strikes struck two separate ISIL tactical units and destroyed 18 ISIL fighting positions, three ISIL command and control nodes, two ISIL weapons caches, two ISIL tunnels, and an ISIL vehicle.

-- Near Qayyarah, one strike struck an ISIL tactical unit and destroyed two ISIL fighting positions.

-- Near Ramadi, seven strikes struck an ISIL tactical unit and destroyed three ISIL tactical vehicles, two ISIL vehicles, an ISIL vehicle-borne bomb, three ISIL buildings, two ISIL heavy machine gun positions, an ISIL fighting position, an ISIL staging location, suppressed an ISIL vehicle-borne bomb, damaged an ISIL staging location, and denied ISIL access to terrain.

-- Near Sinjar, two strikes destroyed two ISIL fighting positions and two ISIL light machine guns and denied ISIL access to terrain.

-- Near Sultan Abdallah, one strike struck an ISIL tactical unit and destroyed an ISIL fighting position.

-- Near Tal Afar, one strike struck an ISIL-used bridge.

Task force officials define a strike as one or more kinetic events that occur in roughly the same geographic location to produce a single, sometimes cumulative, effect. Therefore, officials explained, a single aircraft delivering a single weapon against a lone ISIL vehicle is one strike, but so is multiple aircraft delivering dozens of weapons against buildings, vehicles and weapon systems in a compound, for example, having the cumulative effect of making those targets harder or impossible for ISIL to use. Accordingly, officials said, they do not report the number or type of aircraft employed in a strike, the number of munitions dropped in each strike, or the number of individual munition impact points against a target.

Nothing ever changes in what passes for "strategy" -- which is why nothing ever changes.

The Islamic State?

On the run, are they?

Jason Ditz (ANTIWAR.COM) notes, "Weekend attacks by ISIS fighters backed by suicide bombers tore through Iraqi bases outside of Tikrit and Haditha, killing at least 33 security forces and wounding 22 others."

And Ramadi? BBC NEWS notes:

The BBC's Thomas Fessy, who has just returned from Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province, says there has been heavy fighting in the centre and north-eastern districts of the city, and the Iraqi forces have been taking casualties.
The Iraqi government said a week ago that it had "liberated" Ramadi from IS.

Ramadi, seven days after claims of 'liberation,' is still not liberated.

Maybe someday.

And maybe someday, the press could do its job?

Like maybe when reporting on Shi'ite outrage in Iraq over an execution in Saudi Arabia?

Maybe they could note how Haider al-Abadi's injecting his five cents yet when Human Rights Watch called for him to halt an execution of a secretary -- a woman tortured into a 'confession' -- Haider said he didn't interfere with the judiciary.

Maybe they could note how Nouri al-Maliki -- having a snit fit over the same execution in Saudi Arabia -- oversaw a huge increase in executions in Iraq?

Maybe they could note the hypocrisy and do a little shaming that might actually slow down executions in Iraq?

I'm traveling in some vehicle
I'm sitting in some cafe
A defector from the petty wars
That shell shock love away
-- "Hejira," written by Joni Mitchell, first appears on her album of the same name

The number of US service members the Dept of Defense states died in the Iraq War is [PDF format warning] 4497 (plus 10 in Operation Inherent Resolve which includes at least 1 Iraq War fatality).

The following community sites -- plus Jane Fonda and Jody Watley -- updated:

Like Maria Said Paz

Amen

4 minutes ago