“Zarqawi” relentlessly attacked the Arab civilian population. Guerrillas who attack the people they come from are effectively committing suicide. This is self evident, though you seem to be unaware of it. Successful guerrillas like al Qaeda in Afghanistan, Hezbollah, and the American revolutionaries didn’t do this. I even graciously explained to you that governments fighting guerrillas do attack the local civilians – the O.A.S., the Phoenix Program, and the Salvador Option. You’ve never acknowledged this and obviously can’t refute it.

His communiqué was patently absurd. The occupation wasn’t about to leave Iraq in 2004. Iraq has never had a civil war. There has never been a ‘Sunni/Shia civil war’ anywhere. Muslims don’t hate mosques. The explanation is that “Zarqawi” was created to serve the interests of the occupation. It is difficult to determine how much has been spent on the Zarqawi campaign, which began two years ago and is believed to be ongoing. U.S. propaganda efforts in Iraq in 2004 cost $24 million, but that included extensive building of offices and residences for troops involved, as well as radio broadcasts and distribution of thousands of leaflets with Zarqawi’s face on them, said the officer speaking on background.

One internal briefing, produced by the U.S. military headquarters in Iraq, said that Kimmitt had concluded that, “The Zarqawi PSYOP program is the most successful information campaign to date.”

“I’ll also point out that you’ve never provided any examples of guerrillas running around desperately attacking the civilians that support them,”

Uh, I never said they were attacking the people who support them. You, like a neoconservative, must spin, oversimplify, distort, reduce and otherwise butcher your opponent’s argument before you challenge it. Ridiculous. And I’m done.

I’ll also point out that you’ve never provided any examples of guerrillas running around desperately attacking the civilians that support them, though I’ve provided several examples of colonial powers doing that (OAS, Phoenix Program, Salvador Option). Surely you’ve realized that Hezbollah, al Qaeda, the Minutemen, et cetera, didn’t spend all their time blowing up their own mosques and churches in an attempt to start a ‘civil war’, yet you persist in insisting that this is happening in Iraq.

And for old times sake, how likely is it that an Arab Islamist group is running around America effortlessly stealing cars to use for massacring Arabs and destroying mosques on the other side of the world? The FBI’s counterterrorism unit has launched a broad investigation of US-based theft rings after discovering that some of the vehicles used in deadly car bombings in Iraq, including attacks that killed US troops and Iraqi civilians, were probably stolen in the United States, according to senior government officials.

The Sadrists were blamed for the ‘sectarian violence’ shortly after they started blaming the occupation for the bombings in 2004. However, as of 2007 there were still Sunnis living in Sadr City: Hussein and Hasan confirm that the Americans usually “come at night, sometimes by day, always protected by helicopters”. They “sometimes bomb houses, sometimes arrest people, sometimes throw missiles”. Three months ago “they surrounded Sadr City. They keep doing it sometimes, for a few hours.” Hussein is adamant: “This is not a dangerous place. You can walk around anywhere. Even Sunnis live here. Our director of finance, he lives in Adhamiyah, he comes to work here. Many women officials too. The other way around, it would not be possible.” If he wanted to create a homogeneous religious state he would’ve started in his own neighborhood in 2003. Since the death squads had already been active for years by that point it isn’t difficult to see who wanted to partition Iraq.

Also, the death squads kill anyone opposed to the occupation, not just “Sunnis”. The death squads have killed tribal leaders who don’t support Iran In another significant event last August, Sheikh Faissal al-Khayoon, chief of the major Shi’ite Arab tribe Beni Assad, was killed by death squads with suspected Iranian backing. The killers are believed by men from the tribe to have been working for the Iraqi Ministry of Interior in Basra.

“It was another lie that some of us believed,” a senior Beni Assad leader told IPS on condition of anonymity. “The Sheikh was killed by Iranian collaborators and we made a promise to his soul that his precious life will be avenged.”

Your comments on Afghanistan are still bizarre. Afghanistan had a government – the Taliban. They sheltered al qaeda even though they could’ve made themselves quite rich by getting rid of them. If they had been running around blowing up mosques and markets they would’ve been hunted down and killed.

“Zarqawi” didn’t attack the occupation. He attacked the Arab civilian population. The reason for that is because if the locals hate the guerrillas, then the guerrillas will lose. The guerrilla war against the occupation was already underway and still hasn’t stopped, so I have no idea why you think they were sitting around not being attacked when he was created. There’s also the matter of his press releases trumpeting about destroying markets and mosques that were somehow only used by one sect (which is utter nonsense) or how he was getting cars from America.

Since the Iraqis don’t have fuel to put in their cars or jobs to drive them to there are no shortage of useless Iraqi cars around to use for bombs. The gangs and guerrillas would have no problem buying or stealing them and have no plausible way to get cars from America. The occupation gets attacked relentlessly in Iraq and would find it much easier to get cars sent in from elsewhere.

Of course some of the bombs were in local cars but they have an interesting explanation for that. Here’s an excerpt from an interview with an Iraqi guerrilla. The IR [Iraqi Resistance] has condemned and condemns attacks on civilians, we do not blow up markets filled with innocent lives. This is a propaganda tactic by the occupier to discredit us. Suicide bombings against Iraqi civilians, beheadings, car bombs and the rest are all the work of the Occupation, the mercenaries, the Mossad, the Iranian militias and its sectarian squads. On many occasions, cars have been stopped at checkpoints only to find out that during their search they (US forces and militias) have planted bombs in them without the car owner’s knowledge.

The IR does not do such things. We need the Iraqi people, all of the Iraqi people, it is from them that we draw force and support, how can we target them ? We are a Resistance movement against the Occupation (both American and Iranian) not against the Iraqi people. We need our people. How can we kill our own people ?

If you’re going to pretend the Iraqis are doing it to themselves, can you provide a history of all the mosque bombings that took place in Iraq prior to the invasion in 2003?

The Baathists were mostly Shia – Yeah, but not the officers. Not the party bosses. The vast majority of those were Sunni.

Sistani demanded direct elections and ordered every Shia to vote for the United Iraqi Alliance. Not because America wanted him to. They wanted to set up caucuses and select wide and varied folks from all over to write up the constitution and the rest. He screwed them royally.

If Americans wanted to bomb Arabs to frame other Arabs, wouldn’t they steal a car from Iraq, not America too?

Strangely, the concept that Arabs would use bombs to kill Arabs seems to drive you insane.

So, you found a Shia cleric who doesn’t like Sistani. Great. So what? Sistani is apparently a much greater influence on people’s behavior than him.

Funny how he can only blame Americans for the removal of the Sunni from Baghdad. Was it Americans putting drills in people’s heads? Was it Americans leaving dozens of corpses lined up on the side of the roads in the first half of last year and the year before? No. It was the Badr Corps and the Mahdi Army. Iraqis. Arabs. Was Moqtada doing this because Petreaus told him to? (He certainly wasn’t targeted for it, no doubt about that.)

Just because evil Americans have their plans doesn’t mean they run everything and are particularly responsible for every thing that happens. Obviously they’re responsible in the larger sense, but I’m referring to your “But why would an Arab ever bomb an Arab? It must be the pentagon,” theory of yours.

You keep telling me they aren’t fighting about religion and I keep telling you, Yeah, no shit, Cous Cous. Everyone in the whole fucking world knows they aren’t fighting about religion. But virtually every organized group outside of the green zone is run by religious authorities. There are not a bunch of Sunnis in the Mahdi Army. And when the Mahdi Army is killing Sunnis, I NEVER SAID it was because they don’t approve of their religious beliefs. It’s politics. Power. People on Earth fighting for what they want. So stop goddamn telling me to stop saying they hate each others’ religions because I never did the first time. For the last time.

Now this is just stupid: “Al Qaeda didn’t run around Afghanistan blowing up mosques (hint: Muslims don’t hate mosques) and markets in a desperate attempt to start a civil war to get the Soviets to stay. They obviously weren’t ruined when the Soviets left and are still sheltered by the locals today.”

What, can’t you learn boy? I never said that the mujahedeen was desperate to keep the Russians in Afghanistan. What I said was that they saw what happened later as the USSR fell, and naturally took the credit.

They decided to try to replicate this effect by provoking the US to invade. I told you before, bin Laden explained the whole thing in his Oct 04, please reelect Bush speech. And if there were a new state in Iraq, al Qaeda in Iraq would be doomed. There never was a state in Afghanistan. That’s what a state is, a monopoly on acting like al Qaeda within a given geographic setting, see?

I never claimed that “al Qaeda in Iraq” is the “real al Qaeda,” all I ever said was that they were what they were. Zarqawi had rejected bin Laden before heading to Kurdistan. Not till Dec, 04, did he announce that he was loyal to bin Laden. Nothing but a publicity stunt really. Any militia can call itself anything. Zawahiri was concerned enough that he went on TV in Pakistan and told Zarqawi to cool it because he was causing them to much blowback by killing so many people. I guess he fell for it too.

And I never said that Zarqawi was blowing things up or else America would leave. I said that he wanted to keep the war going so that America would bleed to death there AND THEN LEAVE THE ENTIRE MIDDLE EAST FOREVER (Can you read that? Can you comprehend it?), rather than sitting in air conditioned bases babysitting a new puppet government “indefinitely.”

Christ, you got anything else I never said you want to take exception to?

Now go get your own – better – show. I’m not arguing with you anymore.

by the way, I loved the interview… keep up the good work, you sure kept me up tonight.