This Day In Iraqi History - Feb 4

 

1917 British defeated Ottoman forces at Hai River

1925 League of Nations Mosul commission final report said Mosul should go to British Iraq Mandate

with Kurds getting concessions Said British Mandate in Iraq should continue to ensure stability

(Musings On Iraq How The Ottoman Province Of Mosul Became Part Of Iraq)

(Musings On Iraq review The Creation of Iraq 1914-1921)

(Musings On Iraq review Supremacy And Oil, Iraq, Turkey, and the Anglo-American World Order, 1918-1930)

(Musings On Iraq review Kurds of Iraq, Tragedy and Hope)

(Musings On Iraq review The Kurdish Revolt 1961-1970)

(Musings On Iraq review Iraq & the Kurdish Question, 1958-70)

1963 Qasim arrested 1 opponent as Communists warned of an impending coup

(Musings On Iraq interview with Western Kentucky’s Prof Romero on the Qasim govt)

1963 Qasim removed 48 officers from army connected to Baath Party

1969 Bakr govt claimed it had implemented 12 point program for Kurds Hadn’t

(Musings On Iraq review of The Kurds, A Modern History)

(Musings On Iraq review Kurds of Iraq, Tragedy and Hope)

(Musings On Iraq review The Kurdish Revolt 1961-1970)

(Musings On Iraq review Iraq Since 1958, From Revolution To Dictatorship)

1979 Ayatollah Baqir al-Sadr began Islam Guides to Life series that outlined his ideas on an Islamic

political system

1981 Iraq received around 100 tanks from Eastern Europe

(Musings On Iraq interview with author Anthony Tucker-Jones on Iran-Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq interview with author Tom Cooper on Iran-Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq review The Iran-Iraq War 1980-1988)

(Musings On Iraq review Iran-Iraq War, The Lion of Babylon, 1980-1988)

(Musings On Iraq review The Iran-Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq review The Longest War, The Iran-Iraq Military Conflict)

1996 UK intel team arrived in Wash DC to get CIA equipment to tap into Iraqi communications to help

UN inspectors

(Musings On Iraq review Iraq In The Eye of the Storm)

(Musings On Iraq review Neighbors, Not Friends, Iraq And Iran After The Gulf Wars)

1998 UK intel report said UN inspectors had destroyed majority of Iraq’s WMD programs

(Musings On Iraq UN Inspectors Were Right Iraq Was Not A Threat)

(Musings On Iraq Iraq’s Rejection of UN Inspectors Led To Mistrust Over WMD and 2003 Invasion)

1998 Blair govt talked about how dangerous Saddam was due to his WMD capabilities

(Musings On Iraq Review The Report of the Iraq Inquiry, Executive Summary)

(Musings On Iraq Chilcot Report Sec 1.1 UK Iraq Strategy 1990 To 2000)

2002 Work on State Dept’s Future of Iraq Project began 17 working groups on Iraq’s postwar needs

Worked mostly with Iraqi exiles

(Musings On Iraq review Hard Lessons, The Iraq Reconstruction Experience)

(Musings On Iraq review Blood Money, Wasted Billions, Lost Lives, and Corporate Greed in Iraq)

2003 US gave documents on alleged Iraq-Niger uranium deal to IAEA Story fake

(Musings On Iraq How US Intelligence Failed The Iraq-Niger Uranium Story)

(Musings On Iraq Review Hubris, The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, And The Selling Of The Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq review The WMD Mirage, Iraq’s Decade of Deception and America’s False Premise for War)

2003 UN inspectors looked at two alleged mobile WMD labs and found nothing

(Musings On Iraq How Iraqi Defector CURVEBALL Became Basis For US Claims That Iraq Had WMD)

(Musings On Iraq Look Who The LA Times Dug Up – CURVEBALL)

(Musings On Iraq The Story Of CURVEBALL And Iraq’s Mobile Biological Weapons Labs)

2003 CIA analyst emailed Dep Chief Iraq Task Force against using Curveball story that Iraq had mobile

WMD labs Dept Chief told analyst war coming so didn’t matter if there were questions about Curveball and his mobile WMD labs story Didn’t exist

2003 CIA Dir Tenet warned by European chief Drumheller that there were problems with Curveball’s

story that Iraq had mobile WMD labs Tenet said don’t worry Didn’t exist

2003 PM Blair said plan was to get UN to show Iraq not cooperating on WMD and then have Arab

countries make Saddam step down

2003 Sec State Powell and Turkey’s Foreign Min Yakis met to talk about US aid in return for using

Turkey in Iraq invasion

(Musings On Iraq review Losing Iraq, Inside The Post War Reconstruction Fiasco)

2004 Def Sec Rumsfeld told Congress that ex-Iraq Study Group chief David Kay’s conclusion that

everyone was wrong about Iraq’s WMD was just a hypothesis and Iraq’s weapons might be found

(Musings On Iraq Iraq One Of The Worst Intelligence Failures In US History)

(Musings On Iraq How The Administration Reversed Itself On Finding Iraq’s WMD)

(Musings On Iraq review Hoodwinked, The Documents That Reveal How Bush Sold Us a War)

(Musings On Iraq review What Happened, Inside the Bush White House and Washington’s Culture of Deception)

2004 UK intel officer said intel heads ignored warnings that Iraqi WMD could not be confirmed before

invasion

(Musings On Iraq Review The Report of the Iraq Inquiry, Executive Summary)

2004 Future IS leader Abu Omar al-Baghdadi arrested by Americans and sent to Camp Bucca

(Musings On Iraq interview with Naval War College’s Prof Whiteside on ISI leader Abu Omar al-Baghdadi)

2005 Early election results had United Iraqi Alliance 44% Kurds 18% Iraqiya 12% of vote

(Musings On Iraq review The U.S. Army In The Iraq War: Volume 1, Invasion, Insurgency, Civil

War, 2003-2006)

2007 Report was debate within Bush admin over whether to back PM Maliki or replace him with VP

Adel Abdul Mahdi Decided to support Maliki

2007 Govt’s Article 140 comm said anyone expelled form Kirkuk had right to return and compensation

payment Arabs moved into province during Arabization who wanted to leave would be compensated All Baath laws giving land to Arab settlers were annulled Led to protests by Arabs in Kirkuk PM Maliki did not sign decision

All Baath laws giving land to Arab settlers were annulled

2008 Sadr renewed Mahdi Army ceasefire after 6 months

2009 Gen Austin said Iran still supporting Special Groups and found munitions from Iran in 2009

(Musings On Iraq interview with Galen Wright of Arkenstone blog on Iranian arms shipments to Iraqi militias) 

(Musings On Iraq Iran’s Policy Towards Iraq)

(Musings On Iraq Overview of Iran’s Influence In Iraq)

2009 Burnham that led Lancet study that said 650k Iraqi civilians died Was questioned by Amer Assoc for

Public Opinion Research Burnham only gave partial responses Was censured by group for non-cooperation Study was widely refuted by experts

(Musings On Iraq Major Flaws With The Lancet Reports On Iraqi Deaths Part I)

(Musings On Iraq Major Flaws With The Lancet Reports On Iraqi Deaths Part II)

(Musings On Iraq New Survey On Estimated Deaths In Iraq Refutes Lancet Reports)

(Musings On Iraq interview with Prof Mark Van Der Laan on Lancet Reports)

(Musings On Iraq interview with Prof Michael Spagat on Lancet reports)

2010 PM Maliki called for parliament to meet to discuss unbanning 511 candidates for Baathist ties

Claimed Election Comm didn’t have to follow unbanning Maliki told US Amb Hill to stop interfering in Iraqi politics

(Musings On Iraq Timeline of Iraq’s De-Baathification Campaign)

(Musings On Iraq Iraq’s Shiite Parties Turn To Blaming America Before The March Elections)

(Musings On Iraq Appeals Court To Go Through Banning Cases Before Iraq’s March Election)

2010 US Embassy cable PM Maliki tried to fire 36 from military intelligence Almost all were Sunnis Maliki

tried to replace them with Dawa members Maliki would fire 376 intel officers total in early 2010

View the Iraq History Timelines 

Review The Origins Of ISIS

Mabon, Simon and Royle, Stephen, The Origins Of ISIS, London, New York: I.B. Tauris, 2017

 

The Origins of ISIS attempts to take a holistic view of Iraqi history to explain the rise of the Islamic State. The main argument is that Iraq has lacked sovereignty since its creation by the British after World War I. That only got worse after the 2003 American invasion. Vacuums were created which were filled by tribes, sectarianism, militias and the insurgency. While this was an ambitious attempt trying to understand Iraqi history and politics just to write a book proved to be too much for the two authors Simon Mabon and Stephen Royle. They end up skipping from topic to topic, get some points wrong, and most importantly claim that Al Qaeda in Iraq was different from the Islamic State showing that the writers could have spent more time studying the background of the group.

This Day In Iraqi History - Feb 3

 

1917 British attacked Hai River salient 3^rd time outside Kut Ottomans withdrew afterward

Since start of campaign to retake Kut in Dec 1916 British lost 8,524 casualties Ottomans 10,000 casualties and prisoners

1932 US diplomat said King Faisal would walk streets of Baghdad and locals didn’t pay attention nor

acknowledge him

1941 Regent asked Gen Taha al-Hashemi to become premier Hoped he could control pan-Arab Golden

Square officers 

(Musings On Iraq review Persian Gulf Command, A History of the Second World War In Iran and Iraq)

(Musings On Iraq review Rashid Ali al-Gailani, The National Movement in Iraq 1939-1941)

(Musings On Iraq review The Role of the Military In Politics, A case study of Iraq to 1941)

(Musings On Iraq review The Chatham House Version and other Middle-Eastern Studies)

(Musings On Iraq review Iraq Between the Two World Wars, The Militarist Origins of Tyranny)

1970 Iraq asked Turkey for help with dispute with Iran Shah put troops on border after coup he backed

vs Pres Bakr failed

1970 Shah suggested Iran and Iraq withdraw forces from border as neither wanted war ending crisis

1987 Report US analysts said that Iraq would not be able to reverse recent Iranian gains in southern Iraq

(Musings On Iraq interview with author Anthony Tucker-Jones on Iran-Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq interview with author Tom Cooper on Iran-Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq review The Iran-Iraq War 1980-1988)

(Musings On Iraq review Iran-Iraq War, The Lion of Babylon, 1980-1988)

(Musings On Iraq review The Iran-Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq review The Longest War, The Iran-Iraq Military Conflict)

1998 Report Al Qaeda’s Zawahiri met Iraq’s Vice President in Baghdad to talk about setting up camps   Another story said Iraq gave Zawahiri $300,000 False stories

1999 Qatar Oman UAE told US that outside interference in Iraq wouldn’t help anyone

2003 UK issued paper on Iraqi deception campaign to hide its WMD Later turned out 60% was

plagiarized from a journal article

2003 Sec State Powell OpEd in Wall St Journal said Iraq hiding its WMD

(Musings On Iraq Iraq One Of The Worst Intelligence Failures In US History)

(Musings On Iraq review The WMD Mirage, Iraq’s Decade of Deception and America’s False Premise for War)

2003 CIA asked Italian intel for more info on Iraq-Niger deal but it had none Story fake

(Musings On Iraq How US Intelligence Failed The Iraq-Niger Uranium Story)

(Musings On Iraq Review Hubris, The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, And The Selling Of The Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq review The WMD Mirage, Iraq’s Decade of Deception and America’s False Premise for War)

2003 Dep PM Ramadan and Foreign Min Sabri went to Turkey for last minute talks to halt war Nothing

came of it

2004 Bush complained he felt like he was the only one standing up for his decision to go to war with

Iraq

2004 Natl Sec Adv Rice told Sec State Powell he betrayed Bush and had to tell press he stood by

decision to invade Iraq after article said Powell wouldn’t have backed Iraq war if knew truth about is WMD

2004 Sec State Powell said Bush made right decision to invade Iraq under pressure from White House

2004 PM Blair agreed to inquiry about pre-war intel on Iraq’s WMD

(Musings On Iraq Review The Report of the Iraq Inquiry, Executive Summary)

2005 UK intel report on insurgency Said it threatened new Iraq Military campaign not containing

insurgency Politics could bring in some insurgents but not most Foreign jihadists were a small minority of insurgency but carried out some of the biggest attacks Insurgents were not unified Sunni hearts and minds were being lost due to lack of law and order slow reconstruction few jobs poor quality of life

(Musings On Iraq review Insurgency and Counter-Insurgency In Iraq)

2007 Truck bomb in Baghdad market killed 137 wounded 305

(Musings On Iraq review Voices From Iraq, A People’s History, 2003-2009)

2008 US military said more attacks in Jan 08 by Iran-backed Special Groups then in last year

2009 Report Displaced in Diyala were not allowed to vote Turnout was only 50% Kurds said 16,000

families in Khanaqin couldn’t vote 700 families protested in Baquba on election day because couldn’t vote

2009 Report European election monitor said registration for displaced was flawed Many were

registered in home provinces not where they were displaced Christians in Ninewa said they were pressured to vote for Kurds Security guards told they would lose jobs if didn’t vote for Kurds Displaced said they were handed out money in return for votes

2010 Cassation Panel unbanned 511 candidates PM Maliki spokesman Accountability and Justice

Comm and Sadr condemned decision Maliki said Panel working for US

(Musings On Iraq Accountability And Justice Commission Attempts To Interfere In 2010 Elections)

(Musings On Iraq Timeline of Iraq’s De-Baathification Campaign)

(Musings On Iraq Appeals Court To Go Through Banning Cases Before Iraq’s March Election)

(Musings On Iraq Candidates Unbanned From Running In March 2010 Election)

2011 Wasit Governor Tarfa dismissed on corruption charges

2014 Al Qaeda’s Zawahiri renounced ties to ISIS after it killed Jabhat al-Nusra emir in Raqqa, Syria 

(Musings On Iraq review The Caliphate At War, Operational Realities and Innovations of the Islamic State)

2019 Trump said US spent so much money on a base in Iraq that it owned it Said US would be staying

in Iraq to watch Iran Angered ant-US parties

2020 Sadrists shot at protesters in Najaf killing 11 Shot and stabbed demonstrators in Babil killing one

(Musings On Iraq Sadr Tries To Impose His Will On Iraq’s Protests)

(Musings On Iraq UN Report On Violence Against Iraqi Protesters)

View the Iraq History Timelines 

Coordination Framework Goes Back To Court To Delay Forming New Iraqi Govt

(Iraqi News Agency)

The Coordination Framework which is made up of the major Shiite parties besides Moqtada al-Sadr’s has gone back to the courts to try to drag out the government formation process. That’s because it is desperately trying to convince Sadr to include the entire list in the new regime.

This Day In Iraqi History - Feb 2

 

1920 General Haldane made commander in Iraq Told to draw down troops to save money for

London

1920 UK India Office official Sirt Hirtzel wrote head political officer in Iraq Wilson that an Arab

administration under British control should be established in Iraq 

(Musings On Iraq review When God Made Hell, The British Invasion of Mesopotamia and the Creation of Iraq, 1914-1921)

1948 New Sadr govt said it would not ratify the Anglo-Iraq Treaty 1930 Anglo-Iraq Treaty still in effect

1970 Iraq went to UN over Shah placing troops on border after coup he backed vs Pres Bakr failed

1987 Iran Op Karbala 5 withdrew from bridgehead on Iraqi Fish Lake defensive line in Basra

(Musings On Iraq interview with author Anthony Tucker-Jones on Iran-Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq interview with author Tom Cooper on Iran-Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq review Iran-Iraq War Volume 3: Iraq’s Triumph)

(Musings On Iraq review The Iran-Iraq War 1980-1988)

(Musings On Iraq review Iran-Iraq War, The Lion of Babylon, 1980-1988)

(Musings On Iraq review The Iran-Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq review The Longest War, The Iran-Iraq Military Conflict)

2002 William Kristol told Senate invading Iraq would transform Middle East

(Musings On Iraq review The Road to Iraq, The Making of a Neoconservative War)

(Musings On Iraq review America at the Crossroads, Democracy, Power, and the Neoconservative Legacy)

(Musings On Iraq review Wanting War: Why the Bush Administration Invaded Iraq)

(Musings On Iraq review Losing Iraq, Inside The Post War Reconstruction Fiasco)

(Musings On Iraq review The Assassins’ Gate, America In Iraq)

2003 Sec State Powell and his deputy Armitage went to CIA to go through Iraq intel to use in his UN

speech Powell decided to use 3 intercepts of Iraqi officers perhaps talking about hiding WMD and intel on Zarqawi in Kurdistan CIA Dir Tenet told Powell no intel Saddam directly involved with Zarqawi Powell decided to claim Iraq giving sanctuary to Zarqawi

(Musings On Iraq review Insurgent Iraq, Al Zarqawi and the New Generation)

(Musings On Iraq review The WMD Mirage, Iraq’s Decade of Deception and America’s False Premise for War)

2004 Sec State Powell told WashPost if he knew Iraq had no WMD his decision on Iraq invasion would

have been different

2004 Sec Def Rumsfeld claimed Iraq Study Group head Kay’s Senate testimony Iraq had no WMD

stocks proved White House case

(Musings On Iraq Iraq One Of The Worst Intelligence Failures In US History)

(Musings On Iraq How The Administration Reversed Itself On Finding Iraq’s WMD)

(Musings On Iraq review Hoodwinked, The Documents That Reveal How Bush Sold Us a War)

(Musings On Iraq review What Happened, Inside the Bush White House and Washington’s Culture of Deception)

2004 Bremer and UK Rep Greenstock met with Barzani and Talabani to convince them of federalism

included in Transitional Admin Law Kurds objected to federalism by provinces but by region so KRG maintained

(Musings On Iraq review Iraq After America, Strongmen, Sectarians, Resistance)

2005 Assyrians in Ninewa Plains accused Kurds of stopping them from voting in Jan 30 election

2005 Bush said US in Iraq to create a democracy that could defend itself and was not a threat to its

neighbors

(Musings On Iraq Did the US Ever Have A Strategy To Win In Iraq Before the Surge?)

(Musings On Iraq review Iraq’s Future The aftermath of regime change)

(Musings On Iraq review Iraq’s Dysfunctional Democracy)

(Musings On Iraq review The War Within, A Secret White House History 2006-2008)

(Musings On Iraq review What Happened, Inside the Bush White House and Washington’s Culture of Deception)

2007 US Natl Intel Estimate ISF lacked training equipment skills to replace US forces If US withdrew in

12-18 months violence would increase in Iraq

(Musings On Iraq review The U.S. Army In The Iraq War: Volume 1, Invasion, Insurgency, Civil

War, 2003-2006)

2007 Def Sec Gates and Joint Chief head Gen Pace said Iraqis behind schedule in sending troops to

Baghdad for Surge Said only 55-65% of promised troops were in Baghdad

2008 Bombing 2 markets in Baghdad killed 99 wounded 145

(Musings On Iraq review Voices From Iraq, A People’s History, 2003-2009)

2008 Accountability and Justice law passed to replace deBaathification legislation

(Musings On Iraq New DeBaathification Law)

2008 Interior Min Bolani said large drop in Saudi foreign fighters coming to Iraq

(Musings On Iraq The Saudi Role In The Iraqi Insurgency)

2009 Sheikh Hamid al-Hayes said he would burn Ramadi if Islamic Party won election in Anbar

Said he would start a tribal war against the party

2014 Al Qaeda publicly renounced ties with ISIS

(Musings On Iraq review The Caliphate At War, Operational Realities and Innovations of the Islamic State)

2018 Pentagon Inspector General reported 9 Abrams tanks sold to Iraqi army ended up with Pro-Iran

Hashd groups Some captured from IS others not

(Musings On Iraq Pentagon Finally Realized Tanks It Sold To Iraq Ended Up With Pro-Iran Hashd Groups)

2019 Pro-Iran Hashd fired rockets at US advisers at Al-Asad air base in Anbar

2020 Sadr issued statement saying protesters blocking roads should be arrested and Education Min should

punish students and teachers on strike

(Musings On Iraq Sadr Tries To Impose His Will On Iraq’s Protests)

2020 Sadr spokesman said movement would impose peace upon protests and work with ISF Said that

saboteurs had to be expelled from demonstrations

2020 Sadrists tried to clear a bridge in Baghdad occupied by protesters but failed Attacked demonstrators

in Basra and Nasiriya who were against Allawi’s nomination as PM Tried to take over protest square in Karbala

(Musings On Iraq UN Report On Violence Against Iraqi Protesters)

View the Iraq History Timelines 

Iraq’s Continued Improvement On Corruption Index But Still At Bottom

(Reuters)

Iraq remains towards the bottom of Transparency Internationals Corruption Perceptions Index. The organization released its new report at the end of January. Iraq had a score of 23 out of 100 giving it a rank of 157 out of 180 or the 23^rd most corrupt country on the Index. It had improved by two points since the last survey however.

This Day In Iraqi History - Feb 1

 

1917 British attacked Hai River salient 2^nd time outside Kut Failed again

1922 UK intel report said cabinet told Def Min to count time in Arab Revolt in WWI double for

pensions vs officers that joined afterward to privilege ex-Ottoman officers that originally joined King Faisal Favored Iraqi leaders like Jaafar al-Askari and Nuri al-Said

1928 UK sent note to Iraqi govt saying opposed conscription and if govt ran into problems over it

UK wouldn’t help

(Musings On Iraq review Iraq Between the Two World Wars, The Militarist Origins of Tyranny)

1958 Egypt and Syria created United Arab Republic PM Said afraid pan-Arabists would overthrow

his govt so Iraq could join UAR Syria suggested union with Egypt out of fear that Iraq was trying to forge coup or overthrow govt and take over country

(Musings On Iraq review Ropes Of Sand that includes Iraq plots against Syria)

(Musings On Iraq review Killing Hope, U.S. Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II)

1981 Iraq received 1^st of 4 shipments of Mirage jets from France despite Paris claiming neutrality in

Iran-Iraq War

(Musings On Iraq review Iraqi Mirages, The Dassault Mirage Family In Service With The Iraqi Air Force, 1981-1988)

1984 Iraq said it was going to hit 11 Iranian cities near border Iran threatened to shell Iraqi cities in

response

1984 US Middle East envoy Rumsfeld had second meeting with Saddam to improve US-Iraq ties

(Musings On Iraq review The Saddam Tapes)

1985 Iranian counterattack pushed Iraqi forces out of mountains overlooking Sumer around Qasr e-

Shirin central Iran across from Diyala

(Musings On Iraq review Iran-Iraq War Volume 4: The Forgotten Fronts)

1987 Iran Op Karbala 5 broke through Iraq’s Jassim Canal defenses 7 miles away from Basra city

(Musings On Iraq interview with author Anthony Tucker-Jones on Iran-Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq interview with author Tom Cooper on Iran-Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq review Iran-Iraq War Volume 3: Iraq’s Triumph)

(Musings On Iraq review The Iran-Iraq War 1980-1988)

(Musings On Iraq review Iran-Iraq War, The Lion of Babylon, 1980-1988)

(Musings On Iraq review The Iran-Iraq War)

(Musings On Iraq review The Longest War, The Iran-Iraq Military Conflict)

1998 UN Secretary Gen Annan sent report to Security Council recommending doubling the Oil for Food

program Said humanitarian mission should be separate from Iraq’s non-cooperation with weapons inspectors

1999 NY Post claimed Saddam was making contacts with bin Laden and Abu Nidal to strike US

False story

2001 2^nd Bush NSC meeting again dealt with Iraq State Dept said US policy should be to stop

Iraq from threatening Middle East Sec State Powell talked again about smart sanctions Sec Def Rumsfeld said removing Saddam and putting in pro-US govt could change Middle East and show world what US policy about Pentagon talked about rebuilding Gulf War coalition against Iraq CIA Dir Tenet talked about coup vs Saddam End of meeting Rumsfeld said US objective was not getting rid of Saddam but his WMD

(Musings On Iraq Chilcot Report Section 1.2 UK Iraq strategy September 2000 To September 2001)

(Musings On Iraq review The Price of Loyalty)

2002 Gen Franks briefed Sec Def Rumsfeld on war plans with start time April 2002

(Musings On Iraq review Shaping the Plan for Operation Iraqi Freedom, The Role of Military Intelligence Assessment)

(Musings On Iraq review Leap of Faith, Hubris Negligence, and America’s Greatest Foreign Policy

Tragedy)

2002 Turkey wrote Saddam Asked him to allow UN weapons inspectors back into Iraq to stop US invasion

Saddam rejected idea

2003 US Army War College study said ehtnosectarian differences could lead to civil war or fractured

state after fall of Saddam Said longer US presence in Iraq the more resistance it would face Said ethnosectarian parties would probably emerge in Iraq and increase divisions Warned that there would be terrorism providing services would be difficult oil could not pay for reconstruction Suggested 135 tasks US had to take care of to ensure stability of postwar Iraq Said US would have to occupy Iraq for a long time and building democracy a huge challenge Warned US could win the Iraq war and lose the peace

(Musings On Iraq review Iraq’s Future The aftermath of regime change)

(Musings On Iraq Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction’s “Hard Lessons” – Part I: Planning for Postwar Iraq September 2001 to May 2003)

2003 Chief UN inspector Blix refused US claims that Iraq was sending WMD and scientists outside

country to hide them

(Musings On Iraq UN Inspectors Were Right Iraq Was Not A Threat)

(Musings On Iraq Iraq’s Rejection of UN Inspectors Led To Mistrust Over WMD and 2003 Invasion)

(Musings On Iraq review The WMD Mirage, Iraq’s Decade of Deception and America’s False Premise for War)

2003 Sec State Powell went to CIA HQ to go over Iraq-Al Qaeda intel for UN speech Decided to focus

upon Zarqawi

(Musings On Iraq review Insurgent Iraq, Al Zarqawi and the New Generation)

2003 Cheney Chief of Staff Libby and DepNatSecADv Hadley wanted Sec State Powell to use 9/11

hijacker Atta meeting with Iraqi intel in 2001 Powell said no Story false

2003 US-Turkey worked out rules of engagement for proposed Turkish security zone in Kurdistan during

invasion

2004 US Iraq cmdr Gen Sanchez complained to Dep Def Sec Wolfowitz about no military strategy in Iraq

Wolfowitz said goal was to win war Writing strategy waste of time

(Musings On Iraq Did the US Ever Have A Strategy To Win In Iraq Before the Surge?)

(Musings On Iraq US Army History Of Iraq War Vol 1- Chapter 11 The Gathering Storm)

2004 2 suicide bombers hit KDP and PUK offices in Irbil killed 117 injured 133

(Musings On Iraq review Suicide Bombers In Iraq, The Strategy and Ideology of Martyrdom)

2005 Report US analysts believed Jan 05 elections could erode support for insurgency

(Musings On Iraq Did the US Ever Have A Strategy To Win In Iraq Before the Surge?)

(Musings On Iraq review The Endgame, The Inside Story of the Struggle for Iraq, from

George W. Bush to Barack Obama)

(Musings On Iraq review The U.S. Army In The Iraq War: Volume 1, Invasion, Insurgency, Civil

War, 2003-2006)

2006 Saddam refused to appear in court claiming new judge was biased against him

2007 Report Shiite officials were trying to blame Soldiers of Heaven uprising in Najaf on Sunnis

Claimed that its leader was a Sunni Wahabi from Basra Some claimed he was backed by ISI even though group was Shiite Soldiers of Heaven wanted to kill Shiite clergy in Najaf claiming it would lead to return of missing Mahdi

2007 Report Mahdi Army leaders going to Iran and Syria to avoid Surge Militiamen told to lie low to

avoid confrontations with US forces

2007 Experts said Foreign Affairs and Water Mins were stable and well run Oil and Finance Mins had

been purged and suffered from political infighting Some ministries run by parties that used them to further their political and sectarian goals more than govern like Health Min run by Sadrists

2008 Female suicide bomber hit pet market in Baghdad 45 killed 82 wounded Followed by another

woman bomber hitting another market 27 dead 67 wounded

(Musings On Iraq The Rise of Female Suicide Bombers0

(Musings On Iraq Motivations Behind Female Suicide Bombers)

(Musings On Iraq review Voices From Iraq, A People’s History, 2003-2009)

(Musings On Iraq review Suicide Bombers In Iraq, The Strategy and Ideology of Martyrdom)

2010 Ninewa Gov Nujafi visited Wana Was met by Kurdish protest Nujafi’s convoy shot at Mayor of Qosh

who visited Nujafi harassed by Asayesh Nujafi’s bodyguards arrested people charging them with shooting at convoy Kurds responded by taking hostages Gen Odierno sent Emma Sky to negotiate end to confrontation

2010 Accountability and Justice Comm banned another 57 candidates on top of 511 already due to

Baathist ties Part of push by Shiite parties to make Baathists main issue of 2010 vote

(Musings On Iraq Timeline of Iraq’s De-Baathification Campaign)

2020 Former Communications Minister Mohammed Allawi was named interim premier

2020 Protest movement across Iraq rejected Allawi’s appointment

(Musings On Iraq Conflicts Between Protesters And Sadrists Over Their Return And New Interim Premier)

2020 Sadrists attacked protesters in Baghdad’s Tahrir Square who were against nomination of Allawi as

new premier Then took over Turkish Restaurant

(Musings On Iraq Sadr Tries To Impose His Will On Iraq’s Protests)

View the Iraq History Timelines