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BAGHDAD, Oct. 19, 2006

U.S. Fails To Curb Baghdad Violence

Attacks Up 22% During Ramadan Despite U.S.-Iraqi Efforts

By Alfonso Serrano
  • Play CBS Video Video Reserves Redeployed To Iraq

    The Bush administration's "stay the course" strategy means a lot more U.S. soldiers will have to spend a lot more time in Iraq. As David Martin reports, the Pentagon has issued another call-up.

  • Video Iraq Violence 'Disheartening'

    The U.S. military spokesman in Iraq delivered what was likely the bleakest assessment yet of the situation. David Martin has more.

  • Video Iraq's Deadly Month

    Only On The Web: With his strategy under fire and elections weeks away, President Bush is dealing with an extremely gruesome month in Iraq. Bill Plante reports.

    • The wreckage of a car bombing in Baghdad, Oct. 19, 2006.

      The wreckage of a car bombing in Baghdad, Oct. 19, 2006.  (AP)

    • Iraqi police officers secure the area in Mosul, 225 miles northwest of Baghdad, on Oct. 19, 2006, after a suicide car bomb hit a major police station in the northern city.

      Iraqi police officers secure the area in Mosul, 225 miles northwest of Baghdad, on Oct. 19, 2006, after a suicide car bomb hit a major police station in the northern city.  (AP Photo/Mohammed Ibrahim)

    • An Iraqi police officer stands guard outside a main police station in Mosul, Oct. 19, 2006, after a suicide car bomb attack.

      An Iraqi police officer stands guard outside a main police station in Mosul, Oct. 19, 2006, after a suicide car bomb attack.  (AP Photo/Mohammed Ibrahim)

    • Saddam Hussein in court, Oct. 19, 2006.

      Saddam Hussein in court, Oct. 19, 2006.  (AP)

    • A relative shouts for help in Yarmouk hospital in Baghdad, moments before the woman died from injuries from a car bombing, Oct. 19, 2006.

      A relative shouts for help in Yarmouk hospital in Baghdad, moments before the woman died from injuries from a car bombing, Oct. 19, 2006.  (AP)

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  • Interactive Battle For Iraq

    The government, the insurgency, key players, background and photos.

  • Interactive Attacks Map

    Details on the insurgency and terrorism that has continued to take lives since the fall of Saddam.

  • Who's Who Iraq Insurgency

    More on the militant groups behind the insurgency in Iraq and their motivations.

(CBS/AP)  The 2-month old joint U.S.-Iraqi bid to crush violence in the Iraqi capital "has not met our overall expectations," as attacks in Baghdad rose by 22 percent in the first three weeks of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, the U.S. military spokesman said on Thursday.

Despite that 22 percent, General William Caldwell insisted violence and progress exist side by side, rattling off statistics such as more that 700 weapons caches discovered since July.

But the fact that the insurgency can take loses like that and still step up its attacks against American troops in what it believed to be an attempt to influence the November elections in the United States is also a measure of its strength and resilience, reports CBS News national security correspondent David Martin.

"The enemy knows that killing innocent people and Americans will garner headlines and create a sense of frustration," Caldwell said.
Listen to CBS News correspondent Cami McCormick's report on the military's assessment.
The spike in violence during the month of fasting was "disheartening" and the Americans were now working with Iraqi authorities to "refocus" security measures, Caldwell said.

"In Baghdad, Operation Together Forward has made a difference in the focus areas but has not met our overall expectations in sustaining a reduction in the level of violence," Caldwell said at a weekly news briefing.

Meanwhile, the White House is emphatically rejecting two proposals aimed at ending the war in Iraq. Press Secretary Tony Snow says the idea of dividing Iraq into Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish regions is a "non-starter." He also says a phased withdrawal of U.S. troops — perhaps by five percent every two months — is not under consideration. "You withdraw when you win," Snow said.

Snow was commenting on ideas reportedly being looked at by a blue-ribbon panel chaired by former Secretary of State James Baker. The commission is to report its findings after the elections. But Baker has said there are alternatives other than "stay the course and cut and run."

In other developments:

  • Military doctors say it's become common practice to recycle soldiers with mental disorders back into combat, reports CBS News correspondent Sharon Alfonsi. One study estimates that about 16 percent of soldiers returning from Iraq have PTSD. But military officials say they don't keep tabs on how many troops still fighting have been diagnosed.

  • Iraq's prime minister says Saddam Hussein's execution would help undermine the insurgency, as the ex-president's genocide trial heard more testimony Thursday of poison gas attacks on Kurdish villages two decades ago. "Definitely, with his execution, those betting on returning to power under the banner of Saddam and the Baath (Party) will lose," Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki told reporters Wednesday in Najaf.

  • Two more U.S. soldiers were killed in combat, one in restive Anbar province and a second near Balad, the U.S. military reported Thursday. The deaths raised the American toll for October to 72, putting the month on course to be the bloodiest month for U.S. forces in nearly two years.

  • With U.S. troop levels stuck at 140,000 and no end in sight to the war, the Marines have decided they will have to activate 600-man reserve combat battalions and send them back for a second tour in Iraq, reports CBS News national security correspondent David Martin. It will be the first time a reserve combat unit has had to go back a second time and it's one more sign of the stress the military is under.

  • The family of the murdered chief of police intelligence in the southern Maysan province struck back Thursday against his suspected killers, kidnapping the teenage brother of a local militia commander and vowing not to free him unless the culprits turned over, police said. The showdown between the two Shiite militias has the potential to develop into an all-out conflict between the heavily armed groups.

    The gloomy assessment of the Baghdad operation, which was set in motion with the deployment of an extra 12,000 U.S. and Iraqi troops on Aug. 7, was issued at a time of perceived tension between the U.S. military and administration and the nearly five-month-old government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

    Caldwell said, for example, that U.S. forces had been forced to release a captured top organizer for radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr on Wednesday, a day after he was detained on suspicion of "illegal" activities.

    He said Mazin al-Sa'edi, a top organizer with the Sadr Movement political party in western Baghdad, was set free on the demand of al-Maliki. Al-Sa'edi had been detained along with five of his aides for suspected involvement in Shiite militant violence.

    Continued



    ©MMVI, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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    More From Iraq After Saddam

    Add a Comment See all 119 Comments
    by mjv2944 October 20, 2006 12:56 PM EDT
    Bush is not an evil man, just dumb, and hardheaded. It appears he doesn't listen to sound advise and believe me Henry Kissinger is NOT full of good advise. He started a war on a lie and continues to wage it. He and his cronies are the only WMD's in Iraq.
    Reply to this comment
    by drgoodwin12 October 20, 2006 12:06 PM EDT
    Read this article before you post it is not biased and is written by a conservative in a conservative newspaper.It does not bode well for the STAY THE COURSE strategy and it is not an oped.
    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/19/AR2006101901907.html
    The article is free to read you just have to create an account,no money involved.So please read.
    Reply to this comment
    by October 20, 2006 10:29 AM EDT
    Just as the justification for an invasion was based on lies, so has the aftermath of the invasion.

    Bush would like you to believe that terrorist groups like Al Qaeda are responsible for attacks against American Troops - the reality is that religious militias - Shia and Sunni - are behind the majority of the attacks.

    Bush was warned before he went to war that after Saddam was removed from power, there would be power struggles between the various religious/ethnic groups.

    He chose to ignore them and the result is that Americans are dying because of his policies.

    The responsibility for the invasion of Iraq and the aftermath lays firmly on his shoulders.

    He wanted war at any cost and he got it.

    The man who couldn't be bothered turning up for his own military responsibilities is now happy to send American sons and daughters to die in a war that he, a known coward, started.

    Meanwhile, Bush is safe at home while they are dying and his friends and campaign contributors are becoming richer of the bodies of American troops.

    In a war that Bush wanted - he had and has no answers.

    All he has is blood on his hands.
    Reply to this comment
    by October 20, 2006 10:04 AM EDT
    bmallen3 wrote:

    "This set of comments is so full of nonsense it is pure fiction. Nobody lied, Bush is not evil, The US is not evil, terrorist want to kill you whether you negotiate with them or not, none of the writers have a clue about the Middle East nor any solutions to the terrorist problem..."

    And clearly, you have no clue either.

    And apparently, even the truth doesn't seem to ring any bells with you.

    Back to the old head in the sand routine for you.
    Reply to this comment
    by cofmanaaron October 20, 2006 6:14 AM EDT
    What to do about Iraq? Maybe good intelligence and targeted bombings of terrorists would work better than ground occupation. Wouldn't it stop any developing military threat that might appear after we would withdraw troops? I don't mean, of coarse, Isreali-style bombings, but it seems to me that we might have gotten Osama if we'd just sent a few jets to the training camps before 9/11 when Tenet briefed Ms. Rice about the threat. Hmmmm, WMD factories can be blown up.
    Reply to this comment
    by cofmanaaron October 20, 2006 6:07 AM EDT
    Oh, and the fact that Halliburton and defense contractors that the Bush family partly owns profits hugely from this situation didn't hurt when there could have been any doubt in Bush's mind about the intelligence he 'decided' upon. Hey, there's an explanation for Katrina too, Bush likely undermined FEMA or outright told them to back off so Halliburton could make big bucks cleaning the mess up. Republicans have always preferred the market to government programs. Any question? After all, why else is Halliburton ripping us off by all accounts while the government lets them off the hook?
    Reply to this comment
    by cofmanaaron October 20, 2006 5:42 AM EDT
    Bush isn't evil, true, but I seriously think that he let his personal emotions get the best of his judgement concerning Iraq. Past and present. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that he disagreed with George senior about stopping at Basra while Bush Jr. was thinking about what to do after 9/11. It was the right war, but the wrong target. He let Iraq and the 'failure' of his father in bringing the Mideast in line through Iraq get to him, and now he can't admit to himself that he's lost and he screwed up the chance to fight the war on terror successfully. Joe Klein paraphrases Woodward in Time: "if he dumps Rumsfeld, isn't George W. Bush tacitly admitting that his dad was right about a lot of other things too, like choosing not to overthrow Saddam Hussein in 1991?" And just today we learn our reservists are going back for a second round and the way it looks a draft is not far off. God help us, and may some of us open our eyes and grow some brains and some *****. Throw the idiots out!
    Reply to this comment
    by frankly6 October 20, 2006 2:48 AM EDT
    Has it occured to you that we were not attacked by Iraq? That no terrorists were there before we attacked Iraq? Do you know that all of our intelligence agencies now agree that our presence there is only helping extremists recruit more extremists and made us all less safe. They wrote a very detailed report about it and someone had to leak it because Bush didn't like how it reflected on his "stay the course" strateginimummmm... Doesn't it make you want to scratch that thick head of yours that the man who is really responsible for 9/11 is not only still at large but Bush could care less? Here's what Bush says about Binladin: "I don't know where he is and you know I don't really think about him much".

    You say the people in this forum don't have a clue about terrorism or the Middle East. Well we would all love to hear what you know about how and why we ended up in this mess and how we get out. Maybe you can tell us who the terrorists are, where they're from, and what they want. It would be extremely enlightening I'm sure. If you can write a paragraph with some original thought rather than talking points or some tired, empty, rediculous slogans you heard on fox news I will be extremely impressed.
    Reply to this comment
    by radiob-2009 October 20, 2006 1:53 AM EDT
    To nynative1340 I see you have read and are well informed.It is to bad that to many people who post here have not read anything.They simply blindly listen to the mantra.Good Post
    Reply to this comment
    by radiob-2009 October 20, 2006 1:48 AM EDT
    To ozilot the majority of killings taking place in Iraq now are from the militias.Just trying to keep you correct on who is considered the greater threat.Read the Washington Post article.It is far more detailed than this one and it does not praise anybody.It is actually one of the most informantive articles written without bias.It is not Fox News.
    Reply to this comment
    by radiob-2009 October 20, 2006 1:41 AM EDT
    A litle bit of history on Iraq.It was by all accounts the birthplace of the garden of eden.Read your bible,it is there.Now let us step forward to the year 1982,Saddam Hussein is in power and he has gained that position by killing his opposition.Yet throughout the eighties we considered him an ally,helped him build his military into one of the strongest in the middle east(Russia also helped)and continued to support his regime until 5 days after he invaded Kuwait.There were only two presidents during this time period where he commited mass genocides of the Kurds and gassed the Iranians.A litle more history here,we had one ambassador to Iran And Iraq.You know the name.He assisted in the selling of weapons to both countries.All this talk about the blood of U.S. soldiers and ordinary Iraqis is now to supposed to be on our hands as stated by a previous poster because we oppose the current Iraqi War.It is obvious to most people that if you support a dictator who commits genocide against his own people then you are complicit.Few people here have said CUT AND RUN or STAY THE COURSE.The majority of people realize that neither course is sane.Time is running out to change direction and if we do not change our policy then we will be left with the above mentioned policys which will result in an Islamic State and a haven for terrorist.Read the Washington Post and Times,Woodwards book along with the N.I.E. report.
    Reply to this comment
    by getcentered October 20, 2006 1:23 AM EDT
    One thing I KNOW is, I don't really know why G.W. Bush sent US service men and women to be killed and maimed in Iraq. We do have some smart people in our government, but they%u2019re not in the White House, that I know too.

    Most of the experts, Bush and Chenney had at their disposal, said going to Iraq is a mistake.

    DOE: "The tubes cannot be use for a centrifuge"
    CIA: "NO yellow cake connection"
    NSA: "no contact between Iraq and Al Qaeda"
    Pentagon: "Taking Iraq will be a long a hard fought guerrilla warfare exercise"

    Funny, I don't remember hearing much of this dissent in the run-up to "The GOP/Bush Iraq War".
    Why? I don't know, but I do know that Republicans were and are in power everywhere in our government.

    Message to Bush, Chenney, Rumsfeld, and all the rest of the White House fools:

    I put the blame solely in your hands for the cursory war in Iraq, which you and your sloppy administration led us into.

    I WANT FAMILY OF MINE TO COME HOME ALIVE FROM IRAQ. I NEVER WANT CURSORY LEADERS PUTTING MY FAMILIY IN HARMS WAY, WHEN I DON'T KNOW WHY OR FOR DISPUTED REASONS.

    Shame on Republicans for their lack of imagination, their poor performance as leaders and their willful ignorance when adapting policies that effect the lives of every American.

    We have to do everything in our power to remove these incompetent leaders from power.
    Americans need to vote with their minds and not their emotions so Congress can be made up of leaders that will do the same.
    Reply to this comment
    by nynative1340 October 20, 2006 12:39 AM EDT
    ...continued from below...

    Conservative or liberal, you don't have to attack those who disagree with your view. This is the U.S.A; we are allowed to do that.
    On the other hand, I can say whatever I want about the President; he's no longer my Commander in Chief, and he could never fill the shoes of any of the Commander in Chiefs I served under, from Ike to "wild Willy."
    Reply to this comment
    by nynative1340 October 20, 2006 12:36 AM EDT
    Gosh, some of you sound a lot like that hate peddler Ann Coulter. The difference is, she gets paid quite well to peddle that right-wing hatred of anyone who doesn't see it her way.

    This is supposed to be a board where we can have a discussion or debate without attacking each other. I think that's what the rules are.

    Left or right, liberal or conservative, progressive or 'status quo', one can't help but notice that Bush's approval ratings are extremely low. You've got to notice that the approval ratings for the 'conservative led' Congress, Senate and House, are at a rock-bottom embarrassing 16 percent.

    Conservative or liberal, you've got to know that planning a war only ten days after becoming president is not a conservative action. The 'liberal' media has been very kind to Bush in not pursuing this fact.

    Conservative or liberal, you've got to know that lying to go to war is not a conservative action.

    Conservative or liberal, you've got to know that attacking a nation that didn't attack us is not a conservative action.

    Conservative or liberal, you've got to know, that a dim-witted C-average student with no real business acumen, a 'businessman' who never turned a profit in the oil business, could not possible have the skills necessary to lead a democracy of nearly 300 million free-thinking people. (He did turn a profit in selling the Texas Rangers, but the citizens of Arlington Texas took a big one in the shorts over the stadium deal.)



    Reply to this comment
    by diamtool October 19, 2006 11:40 PM EDT

    Warning! WARNING!
    any one who dares call our Glorious Leader a liar is possibly an ENEMY COMBATANT and may be detained, tortured and shipped to Guantanamo without evidence or trial.
    George Bush was selected by OUR LORD to rule our Country in these end of days. therefore we have given him exclusive and absolute power to determine who is an ENEMY COMBATANT and they of course HAVE NO RIGHTS as humans!
    Vice Chancellor Cheney und Field Marshall Rumsfeld may also determine ENEMY COMBATANTS to be tortured.
    PRAISE OUR GLORIOUS LEADER OR YOU COULD BE NEXT!

    GOD BLESS OUR TROOPS
    GOD FORGIVE GEORGE BUSH
    Reply to this comment
    by laurieleemoo October 19, 2006 11:37 PM EDT
    okay---gotta go---i have definitely had enough of you liberals for today. Tomorrow is another day. See ya
    Reply to this comment
    by laurieleemoo October 19, 2006 11:34 PM EDT
    excusemcsgt----how is my statement insane (just because you are part of the problem and disagree with me---does not make me insane. IT IS A FACT--------A COLD REALITY------SORRY YOU HAVE A PROBLEM WITH THE TRUTH. You liberals have the blood of those people on your hands. What---you don't think these insurgents our sitting here listening to you people----they watch our news and you all are feeding them with your hate campaign---it makes them feel that what they are doing is not so bad after all--because, hell---'the american people hate Bush today----so they tell themselves they Must be right and it only encourages them. If you can not see that you people are even more stupid than I originally thought.
    Reply to this comment
    by angryliberal-2009 October 19, 2006 11:21 PM EDT
    CBS knows it too. The fact is that the only thing these Mooslems can do to kill people is blow themselves up too or use a sniper rifle and drive away real quick. Those are acts of desperation not the act of a winning team.

    They will surley be surprised when the 72 virgins they'll see will be nuns with shot guns.
    Reply to this comment
    by angryliberal-2009 October 19, 2006 11:18 PM EDT
    Attacks have increased during the month of Ramadan every year. Anyone with a brain knows that muslims kill each other more during the Holy Month.
    Reply to this comment
    by diamtool October 19, 2006 11:08 PM EDT

    sounds like some people still have 9/11 and iraq mixed up. still no connection. guess the news doesn't get around so fast to some places. funny, seems like it's always the people that need an excuse for the Iraq mess that get mixed up with the facts om 9/11. but they mention it alot, anyway.
    Afghanistan, the taliban and al queda were responsible for 9/11. They are all still in business. we've handed that job off to nato.
    so we can concentrate on Iraq.
    Where we are stuck in a civil war between ancient enemies.
    Remember when we had "broken the back of the insurgency"
    and they were "a few dead enders"
    and "Bring em on"
    That's not strong on security- that's just stupid,
    heckuva job georgie!

    God Bless Our Troops
    God forgive George Bush


    Reply to this comment
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