Security improvements bringing people back to their homes in South Baghdad…
With security improving, local economies flourishing and community reconstruction underway, Iraqis who once fled their South Baghdad homes in fear are now returning to the villages they deserted.
This is a good sign, said Maj. Mark Bailey, the officer in charge of the Multi-National Division – Center governance cell.
“Once people are convinced that security is good in their area, they come back,” said Bailey, who is with 401st Civil Affairs Battalion, attached to 3rd Infantry Division. “If they own a business, they re-open their business, which helps the economy.”
Out of the approximate 18,700 Iraqis who left their homes, it is estimated that 10,450 have returned, according to MND-C records.
via Hot Air we find that the Iraqis are making further progress in reconciliation.
Most of those released were Sunnis who had been low-level army officials or former members of Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party. They were among thousands of Iraqis who were arrested without charges by coalition and Iraqi forces. The discharges signal “a return to some sense of normalcy,” said U.S. Army Col. David Paschal, commander of the 1st Brigade Combat Team of the 10th Mountain Division, who attended the ceremony. “At some point, the fighting must stop.”…
The prisoners are being freed under an amnesty law passed by Iraq’s parliament in February. More than 52,400 detainees in government custody have applied for their freedom. Of those, nearly 78%, or more than 40,000, were granted amnesty. More than one in five, though, were denied because they are being held for crimes not covered by the law. These include killing, kidnapping, rape, embezzling government funds, selling drugs and smuggling antiquities.
Ed Morrissey says of this:
This marks yet another benchmark in the Maliki government’s progress in meeting the political benchmarks set by Congress. It also defuses a longstanding point of friction with the Sunni tribes who have complained loudly about the imbalance in treatment for their communities by Baghdad. Their efforts to work within the political system have paid off, and their win in gaining amnesty for so many detainees will encourage them to work within the democratic system rather than conduct insurgencies against it.
Day by day, week by week, Iraq is making the progress we all want to see on all fronts. Security, Economic, and Socio-Political.
That this isn’t bigger news isn’t a surprise. After all, we need to know when Hillary knocks back a cold one, or someone finds yet another radical in Obama’s past.
This marks yet another benchmark in the Maliki government’s progress in meeting the political benchmarks set by Congress. It also defuses a longstanding point of friction with the Sunni tribes who have complained loudly about the imbalance in treatment for their communities by Baghdad. Their efforts to work within the political system have paid off, and their win in gaining amnesty for so many detainees will encourage them to work within the democratic system rather than conduct insurgencies against it.
If only we could convince the people, who thinks Bush stole the 2000/2004 elections, of that.
Kieth, I’m curious what you make of this case study examining competing ways of framing one of the war’s “successes.”
It’s left intentionally open-ended, but I think the point is an important one: in a conflict where perception matters more than reality (this was played out in our many debates over “meta-narratives”), how essential is it to examine in depth the validity of competing narratives? I know I tend to instantly distrust rosy pictures of the war because of my own biases, just as some authors here tend to instantly distrust negative pictures of the war for the same reason. Comparing accounts side-by-side is a practice I’ve seen only rarely undertaken, especially with regards to Iraq. I think the fundamental uncertainty at play: whether single steps of progress mean much in the light of recent and ancient history, whether there are other fundamental processes at work that might push such progress in a better or worse direction… it’s all damned tough to see in advance.
It’s kEIth, not kieth… Although it’s a common mistake
Well, I see them all as pieces of a very complex puzzle. And far from trying to paint a rosy picture, I see them as showing the positive developments. God knows there’s enough coverage of the horrible things that happen in Iraq. That is why I’ve never felt the need to highlight the negative things.
I don’t instantly distrust negative reports, when all they are doing is reporting the facts. What I distrust is when they are editorializing a conclusion based on those facts. Because our conclusions are based entirely on our point of view.
And you’re right in that, things could change for any number of reasons, for the worse, or for the better. But that is the nature of everything in life. Nothing is certain, except that we are born, grow old, suffer, and die. I don’t claim to have any special knowledge to say that, yes, with these developments everything is going to be peachy.
I was browsing for another article and came across this blog with my quote. Regarding the “rosy pictures” and contrasting views of the war, I would quote a reply I provided to my niece’s question for a school report.
What is your opinion of how the media portrays this war?
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Good question and I don’t think it has an easy answer. I’ll add more to this, but the quick response in my opinion is: the reports are accurate; the overall portrayal is incomplete; and the analysis is based on a preconceived opinion rather than actual trends. Rather than complaining about the media, part of our job as Soldiers is to get accurate information out to Americans to let them know what is happening.
We get Stars and Stripes daily and we can usually pull news stories off the internet. Reports tend to lump a lot of events together. If there is good news in our area, the article may start off with the good and then say, “but in other areas, violence continues with 2 violent attacks in …” It doesn’t matter if the violence is on the other end of the country. The overall article makes it sound like shootings, bombs and attacks are continuous.
If one bomb explodes and kills or wounds 2 American Soldiers, that is news. When Sons of Iraq (SOIs – Iraqis paid to man checkpoints) turn in the locations of 20 unexploded bombs and 5 caches of weapons and explosives it one week, it doesn’t get reported. We had so many SOIs turning in locations of IEDs and weapons caches that it wouldn’t even make the news. It sounded like a normal event because it happened every day. We had to hold all of the individual reports and give a grand total for the week to be able to make it “newsworthy”.
We have a lot of civilian contractors over here. There was one woman that provides software database training. She has been here about 3 weeks. She will be returning to the US in about 2 more months to go back to law school. She was very interested in the training because she was working with the Intelligence Soldiers that collect information on the people we are after and the ones we have to work with. I asked her if this was better than she expected. She agreed and said it really isn’t bad. If she wasn’t going back to school, she would try and bring her husband out here to work.
We had various reporters coming through our area. There were fewer because the violence was so low there was nothing ‘newsworthy’ to report.
Keith, keep up the good work.