khaosworks | Iraq keeps bringing it on

U.S. Soldier Killed in Iraq Attack
Mon Jul 14, 8:34 AM ET
By Andrew Gray

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The United States lost its 32nd soldier in postwar combat in Iraq Monday, underscoring the hardships a U.S.-backed Governing Council faced in quashing Iraqi resentment as it began work choosing a leader.

A group that said it was an Iraqi branch of the al Qaeda network claimed responsibility for attacks on U.S. soldiers in an audio tape broadcast Sunday but its rhetoric was more reminiscent of former president Saddam Hussein's Baath Party than Osama bin Laden's group.

The U.S. military is braced for a surge in attacks this week to coincide with anniversaries linked to Saddam, his Baath Party and Iraqi nationalism.

In the latest incident, assailants targeted a convoy of military vehicles in the central al-Mansour area of Baghdad at around six a.m., a military spokesman said.

Witnesses said one vehicle was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade and another by machinegun fire. Blood stains on an armored Humvee vehicle and the crumpled cab of an army truck bore testament to the attack.

Dozens of U.S. troops searched the area as helicopters hovered above. Soldiers searching an abandoned house in the area found a light machinegun probably used in the attack.

Thirty-two U.S. soldiers have been killed in Iraq since President Bush declared major combat over on May 1.

The war is over, and American soldiers are still dying. Tommy Franks says that US troops might be staying in Iraq for four years. It is becoming more and more apparent that even if the Bush administration did not lie to get America into the war, it got America into the war based on reasons that have turned out to be, at best, mistaken. So, how long can the American public tolerate having their sons die for a mistake, in a place where it should never have gone into in the first place and where it doesn't belong and its people don't want them there?

It's beginning to look a lot like 35 years ago, don't you think?