Op-Ed: Sadr City Awakens

Posted May 4, 2008 by Citizen Journalist

Mark L Harvey in Politics | 40 comments | 248 views

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I have written on the Anbar Awakening before many times and the events that lead to the Anbar Awakening is being applied to Sadr City. As Basra was cleared of Iranian Quds Forces and remnants of the Mahdi Army, so is Sadr City.

We have been hearing from the defeatists in this nation we call America that Sadr City is another fall of Saigon battle and that the end is near with the defeat of the United States Armed Forces in Iraq by Al Qaida. When I hear such nonsense and drivel, my Warrior's Blood begins to simmer and builds to a raging boil.

The blathering nonsense such as this and those that espouse such anti-American garbage obviously pay no attention to the men in battle and those that are embedded with the troops nor do they pay any attention to The Truth as it unfolds. As The Truth hits these anti-Americanists in the face they become less and less able to ignore it and refute it with facts - they refute it with old lies and repeated wishful thinking attributes of silly vermin.

Basrah has fallen to Iraqi (primarily) and American Forces with the Mahdi Army, Iranian and criminal elements severely routed, captured and killed. Sadr City is in the process of falling to Iraqi (primarily) and American Forces. As we learned from the Anbar Awakening, the same tactics are now being utilized in Sadr City.

Bill Roggio writes in the Weekly Standard a few days ago:

The Battle for Sadr City is on. Several weeks ago, U.S. and Iraqi forces took control of the southern third of the city and began constructing concrete barriers to secure the area. Since U.S. and Iraqi forces moved into Sadr City, units have conducted patrols and distributed humanitarian aid to the Iraqis living in the neighborhoods. The U.S. military is also conducting aerial patrols of Sadr City, and is striking at Mahdi Army fighters as they plant roadside bombs, move weapons, and gather for attacks.

This has provoked a violent response from Muqtada al Sadr's Mahdi Army, which is struggling to prevent the Iraqi government from maintaining a foothold in Sadr's power base in Baghdad. Over the past several days, Mahdi Army fighters have grouped for mass attacks. Each time U.S. and Iraqi forces beat them back, inflicting heavy losses on the enemy while suffering few of their own. [...]

This action is indeed long overdue but we have our politicians to thank for this, don't we? The self-vaunted Mahdi Army is being eviscerated on a daily basis and none too soon I will add. I knew when some sort of cease-fire was arranged with Mookie that it was a mistake but the political pressure required it. This is what happens when ignorant politicians get in the way of winning a war. Politicians, from this Grunt's viewpoint are not the brightest light bulbs in the house nor are they the sharpest tools in the shed.

Bill Ardolino of The Long War Journal writes: Iraqis begin to 'despise' the Mahdi Army in Baghdad's Rusafa district. As peace-loving Iraqis always do...

[...] But Thornburg attributes most of the improvement in his area in southern Rusafa to the Sons of Iraq, the local neighborhood watchmen who are paid by the US. The Sons of Iraq program was started here seven months ago by local leaders and the 82nd Airborne, the unit last responsible for the southwestern half of Rusafa, which is essentially downtown Baghdad. Local Sons of Iraq leaders claim they were "the first Shia Awakening" against militias and al Qaeda. [...]

[...] "Right now because of the fighting Sadr City, people have started to despise [the Mahdi Army] because of the situation they created," said "Rammie," an Army interpreter raised and living in Rusafa. "People have started to know the truth of [the Mahdi Army] as kidnappers, killers, carjackers, and agents of the Iranian government. But the recent fighting against the [Iraqi security forces] means they are also against the government. They are not trying to just fight the invasion forces as they claim, but they fight whoever interferes with their mafia activity." [...]

The Mahdi Army and Mookie Al Sadr have over-played their hand and they are finished in Iraq. We know it. They know it. Iran knows it. The problem is, the uneducated in this country that want to replace our way of life with some morphed form of virulent socialist-communist ideology mixed with a sprinkling of anarchy refuse to accept The Truth.

As in Al Anbar Province, when the people of Iraq are given the choice of Freedom or oppression, the people in Sadr City - as in Basra - will choose Freedom.

As will I.

The original story of the Anbar Awakening can be found here.

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Op-Ed: Sadr City Awakens

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