Juan Cole is sounding the alarm here. He points to an AP report about heavy fighting in Karbala.The US used heavy firepower in the sacred Shiite city, destroying half of the historic al-Mukhayyam Mosque not so far from the shrine of the Prophet's martyred grandson,...

On the Nick Berg Beheading Col. Lounsbury writes what I think may be the definitive post here. Lounsbury quotes the Washington Post: The persistent violence contrasts sharply with U.S. officials' optimistic calls for private companies to invest in Iraq. Over the past...

Just as a quick footnote to the April 29 article about Balkans and the EU: the BBC reported that EU's Commissar - er, Commissioner - Chris Patten was in Belgrade pressuring Serbia to submit to ICTY's demands. "He said compliance with the court was a key step on...

Spearheading the movement that clamored for US (and Western) intervention in Bosnia in the early 1990s - and Kosovo in 1998-99 - has been a diverse group of people united around a desire to stamp out "genocide" and "ethnic cleansing". Naturally, their definitions of...

I suppose Tony Parsons' apology of sorts in yesterday's Daily Mirror is a giant step forward on the road to that warmonger's redemption. And yet, his argument is tained by a simple fact that his comparison (Slobodan Milosevic and Tony Blair) is facetious. Parsons...

"Next Door to Mohammed Atta”: The Mossad apparently warned their American counterparts several times about the terrorists, especially about al-Midhar. … Apparently not until shortly before September 11 did the CIA recognize that al-Midhar was dangerous and asked law...

The claim is that it is revenge for the torture of detained Iraqis in US military prisons. The video showed five men wearing headscarves and black ski masks, standing over a bound man in an orange jumpsuit - similar to a prisoner's uniform - who identified himself as...

This is a good post by Steve Gilliard referencing Juan Cole on the subject of the Spanish refusal to accept the suicide mission to bring al Sadr in "dead or alive," which was what the Bushie Americans asked them to do. Steve points out that the US military is acting...

Several blogging soldiers have pointed out how egregiously bad was Donald Rumsfeld's inability to cite the chain of command leading from the "six morons" to the top. A non-military person would be likely to miss this: Arkhangel: I saw Don Rumsfeld's testimony today,...

I hate to tell you this, Micah, but the current right-wing schtick is becoming impossible to parody. It's like Michael Bérubé wrote:INSULT-UPON-INJURY, New York (AP)-- Conservative commentators have induced a "satire crisis" for liberal and progressive bloggers in...