Today in Iraq

War News for July 2 and 3, 2004 Bring ‘em on: One US Marine dies of wounds in al-Anbar province. Bring ‘em on: One US Marine killed in action near Fallujah. Bring ‘em on: Two insurgents killed in fighting near Beiji. Bring ‘em on: Three central Baghdad hotels rocketed. Bring ‘em on: Car bomb factory discovered in Baghdad. Bring ‘em on: One US soldier killed, two wounded by roadside bomb near Mosul. Bring ‘em on: Three Iraqis killed by roadside bomb near Baghdad airport. Bring ‘em on: Rocket attacks reported on Indonesian embassy and Islamic Party offices in Baghdad. Bring ‘em on: Finance ministry official assassinated in Baghdad. Bring ‘em on: Oil pipeline sabotaged near Basra. Bring ‘em on: Five ICDC members killed, five wounded in insurgent attack near Mahmudiyah. Hawaii National Guard infantry brigade mobilized for duty in Iraq. Rumsfeld approved torture. “Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, who was the head of detention operations at Abu Ghraib, told the Santa Clarita Signal that there are memos showing Rumsfeld approved tactics at the prison that were similar to those used at Guantanamo Bay -- including the use of military dogs, stripping and sensory deprivation. ‘I did not see it personally (at the time), but since all of this has come out, I have not only seen, but I've been asked about some of those documents, that he signed and agreed to,’ Karpinski told the newspaper, which published the article Friday. The Pentagon has denied Karpinski's assertions. Last week, officials released documents that showed Rumsfeld had approved the use of such techniques in interrogations at Guantanamo Bay, where the administration has said the Geneva Conventions on treatment of prisoners do not apply. US military families evacuated from Bahrain due to increased terrorist threat. Individual Ready Reserve mobilization begins Tuesday. This summer's IRR mobilization is not a one-time event, the Army officials said - the mobilizations will continue as the Army continues to rotate troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. ‘We expect to call some more’ not only for OIF4 and OEF7, but also some call-ups in addition to the 5,600 for OIF3, Smiley said. Pressed on how many additional IRR mobilizations the future might hold, Smiley said, ‘We simply don't know.’ When asked if numbers could be in the thousands, he replied, ‘Yes.’” Yemen will send troops to Iraq only after US forces leave. Army releases initial after-action review of Iraqi ground campaign. “But the report does say that the military's ‘running start’ — the strategy of launching the invasion before all support units had arrived — made it difficult for commanders to quickly adjust from major combat to postwar challenges. Because combat units outraced supply and support units, combat commanders were caught unprepared when Hussein's regime collapsed after three weeks.” “Running start” was Rummy’s hare-brained idea, not Army doctrine. The uniforms were very pissed off about crossing the line of departure without adequate logistical support and rear-area security units in place. Psyops. “As the Iraqi regime was collapsing on April 9, 2003, Marines converged on Firdos Square in central Baghdad, site of an enormous statue of Saddam Hussein. It was a Marine colonel — not joyous Iraqi civilians, as was widely assumed from the TV images — who decided to topple the statue, the Army report said. And it was a quick-thinking Army psychological operations team that made it appear to be a spontaneous Iraqi undertaking.” Support the troops. “The Defense Department has not yet implemented a special pay allowance for military service members who are frequently deployed for short periods of time, according to a new General Accounting Office report. The allowance, approved in the fiscal 2004 defense authorization law (P.L. 108-136), is designed to cover service members who do not receive a family separation allowance when they are deployed because they are gone for less than 30 days at a time. However, Defense has not yet identified frequent short-term deployments as an issue that might require a special allowance, the report states… Defense officials agreed with the need to set a timeline and establish criteria. But they said they have not implemented the allowance because they believe it to be a peacetime authority. In wartime, they said, it is more difficult to control deployments and therefore officials have elected to use other methods to provide pay allowances. Defense, the officials said, will reassess the use of the high deployment allowance ‘at some point in the future.’” Army Times has a reader poll on this issue. The troops ain’t happy. Commentary Editorial: “The Bush administration's response to charges that it has tolerated, if not approved, torture to extract information from prisoners captured in combat was to make public a 258-page stack of documents that portray President Bush as rejecting the use of harsh tactics against prisoners captured in Afghanistan. But that's not nearly enough.” Opinion: “All day, television showed Steinberg's arrival on Riverside Drive. So many people were watching with anger that precedes a person settling into celebrity. The anger was misdirected. Steinberg killed one person, 17 years ago. And we have a president who has people getting killed almost every day, young people who went into a war we should never have started and there are, what? almost 1,000 dead, and the blood is on George Bush's hands. Bush is the worst president the country has had. He has the most limited mind of anybody we've had. Compare his stuttering to Bill Clinton's 953-page book. It is a book by a man with an endless curiosity, with no subject out of his reach. Bush has the imagination of a stuffed chair. If you put all the things in which he has an interest into a book, it would be as thin as a slice of white bread.” Casualty Reports Local story: Illinois soldier killed in Iraq. Local story: Maryland Marine killed in Iraq. Local story: Florida Marine killed in Iraq. Local story: Louisiana soldier dies in Iraq. Local story: New Jersey Marine killed in Iraq. Local story: Tennessee Marine killed in Iraq. Local story: Pennsylvania Marine killed in Iraq. Local story: Wisconsin soldier dies of wounds received in Iraq. Local story: New Jersey Marine wounded in Iraq. Local story: Pennsylvania Marine wounded in Iraq. Local story: Mississippi soldier wounded in Iraq. Local story: Colorado soldier injured in Iraq. Local story: Washington State Guardsman wounded in Iraq. Off Topic: A Joke I Heard Today. The pope was coming to visit an American monastery. The abbot wanted to make a good impression. He summoned one of the monks. “Brother John, go down to the lake in town and catch some fish,” he told the monk. “Our cook, Brother Andrew, is highly skilled at preparing a fish dinner.” The monk rented a boat and rowed out on the lake where he caught an enormous fish. When the monk returned to the dock, a local fisherman saw the fish in the boat. “That’s a big sum’bitch you got there, Brother.” “Please, sir,” said the monk. “Your language.” “Oh, no,” said the fisherman, embarrassed. “That’s the kind of fish you have there. That’s the fish’s name.” The monk returned to the abbey and carried the fish into the kitchen. “Look at this big sum’bitch I caught, Brother Andrew!” “Brother John!” said the cook. Your language!” “Oh, no,” said Brother John. “That’s the fish’s name.” A group of novices came to the kitchen to help Brother Andrew prepare the fish for cooking. “Help me clean this big sum’bitch,” said Brother Andrew. “Brother Andrew!” said the shocked novices. “Your language!” “Oh, no,” said Brother Andrew. “That’s the fish’s name.” Later one of the other monks walked into the kitchen while Brother Andrew cooked the fish. “Something smells good,” he said. “What is it?” “It’s that big sum’bitch Brother John caught in the lake.” “Brother Andrew!” said the monk. “Your language!” “Oh, no,” said Brother Andrew. “That’s the fish’s name.” When the Pope arrived, the monks assembled in the abbey dining hall. They sat at a long table, with the abbot and the Pope seated together at the head of the table. “This fish is delicious,” said the Pope after he tasted the fish. The monks immediately began chattering. “Sum’bitch is tasty!” said one. “It was a big sum’bitch, too!” said another. “Brother John caught the sum’bitch!” announced a third. The abbot was mortified. The pope leaned over, nudged the abbot and whispered in his ear. “You motherfuckers are all right!” 86-43-04. Pass it on.