The Common Ills: Elise Labott makes clear that US journalists have learned nothing from the Iraq War

Sunday, December 04, 2016

Elise Labott makes clear that US journalists have learned nothing from the Iraq War

Today it was more of the same -- violence in Iraq with the US government thinking more violence will be a solution.

The US Defense Dept announced:

Strikes in Iraq
Attack, bomber, fighter, rotary and remotely piloted aircraft and rocket artillery conducted seven strikes in Iraq, coordinated with and in support of the Iraqi government:

-- Near Huwayjah, three strikes disabled a bridge and destroyed five ISIL-held buildings.

-- Near Mosul, three strikes engaged two ISIL tactical units; suppressed an ISIL tactical unit; damaged a land bridge, an ISIL-held building, and 16 supply routes; and destroyed a mortar, a weapons cache, four ISIL-held buildings, a command and control node, an explosives factory, and a heavy machine gun.

-- Near Rawah, a strike destroyed an ISIL vehicle bomb factory.

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 a 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. Ground-based artillery fired in counterfire or in fire support to maneuver roles is not classified as a strike.

It's day 48 of the operation to liberate or 'liberate' Mousl.

Remember back in that October State Dept press briefing when a journalist termed it a "slog" and CNN's Elise Labott (still thinking she'll soon be Mrs. John Kerry) screeched "NO!"?

Martin Chulov (GUARDIAN) insists:

The startling progress of the first few weeks of the campaign to take Iraq’s second city, the terror group’s last urban stronghold in Iraq, has given way to a numbing reality: Isis will not surrender Mosul, and Iraq’s battered military will struggle to take it.
Since Iraqi forces entered Gogali, a light industrial neighbourhood, in mid-November, the advance has slowed. “When we started, we were talking weeks,” said Hussein. “Now, we hope it will be by early in the new year. But these guys are not cowards. They kill as easy as they breathe.”

Saif Hameed and Ulf Laessing (REUTERS) note that "the military's campaign is likely to stretch well into next year as it seeks to recapture a city where the jihadists are dug in among civilians and using a network of tunnels to launch waves of attacks."

Elise Labott planning to revise her shouted (and stupid) opinion?

I don't know what's more shocking: Elise's rosy view of Iraq or that nearly 14 years after journalists' rosy views on Iraq have never panned out, Elise still thinks propaganda is the way to go?

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