Reports CNN: "Baghdad, Iraq (CNN) -- At least 112 people were killed in central Baghdad and more than 400 were wounded early Tuesday when suicide bombers exploded their cars in a series of five terrorist attacks, Iraqi authorities said."
No reports on who is responsible or their motivations yet. I would love to know whether this was carried out by a terrorist group like Al-Qaeda, or was an act of Baathist insurgents. There are apparently still questions over who perpetrated the Iraq car bomb attacks of just two months ago:
"Iraqi officials blamed the October attacks on loyalists to Saddam Hussein's banned Baathist Party – even bringing out three suspects on national television who gave what officials termed confessions.
But there are questions whether leaders are trying to shift attention away from a possible resurgence of Sunni insurgents led by al-Qaida in Iraq. A rise in insurgent power could be a serious blow to the government's credibility before national elections, which were set Tuesday for March 6 – a more than seven-week delay from the original mid-January date because of political bickering on the voting rules."
In either event, it seems clear to me that the attacks were motivated by the currents and context of local and regional politics, not global politics. Why are we still in Iraq? Why should our troops remain in an area that is still suffering through the violent pangs of civil war and why should they have to fight that civil war for someone else? What American national defense interest does that serve?
President Barack Obama promised a withdrawal from Iraq during the election, but after becoming president sent more troops to Iraq, proposed a total farce of a withdrawal, and has sent even more troops to Iraq as recently as this October. When will it end?
The libertarian-leaning candidate for the Republican nomination in 2008, Ron Paul, famously said during the GOP debates that we should "Just come home. We just marched in... we ought to just come home!" Had he been inaugurated this January, our troops would be out of Iraq by now and out of harm's way.
And that's what I call supporting the troops.
