"The enemy's ability to stage near-simultaneous attacks of such magnitude is a bad sign, but Wretchard notes the real news of the day: "when dying and bleeding, beset by the flower of terrorism, with pistol to set against automatic rifle and grenade, the Iraqi police did not ask for help from 82nd Airborne. They asked for ammunition."

You and Glenn and everyone portray this as good news.

Uh, sorry, I would prefer they picked up their phones and asked for help. Dead policemen everywhere -- great recruiting campaign. This speaks to great spirit, but bad training, and premature turn over of responsibility.

This was a freakin tragedy and it takes a callous and perverse individual to portray it as good news.

Actually, it takes someone with near-zero understanding of either military or police background NOT to see the point Wretchard and others are making.

First of all, ya gotta read. If they asked for ammo, they didn't do it telepathically. They WERE asking for help. And someone has to deliver that ammo to them in the middle of said firefight - gee, wonder who?

If you think about it, the 82nd has to come either way.

Which brings us to point #2: they didn't quit, and they didn't want to. Badly trained and unmotivated troops fold under those circumstances. These guys didn't. That motivation matters quite a bit. So does the taking of responsibility, a very good sign indeed.

Wretchard is likely wrong about the police there having only pistols, by the way - AKs are much more likely. These guys are more paramilitaries than police as you might understand them.

Finally, is this a tragedy? No. It's war. That's what happens in war. The question is, do the good guys have what it takes to keep going and refuse to lose it?

The only way you find that out is to see them in bad situations. Which, in any war, are certain to come eventually.

The Iraqi police were tested yesterday, sorely. I hope the U.S. Army and CPA are rethinking rapid-response plans in light of this incident, and making changes if it is possible to be more effective in future. But Wretchard is right on with his bottom line... the Iraqi police passed the test.

That IS good news, even as we mourn the dead. There will be more, bet on it. But as long as Iraqis keep stepping up, sooner or later Al-Awda will be stepping down.

To a certain extent this is also a confirmation of the sentiments in the now infamous Zarqawi memo (Whether or not it is authentic). If the extent of the tribal ties of the new police force is not exaggerated it doesn't take much of a logic leap to conclude that 100 bodies blown up in the past couple of weeks contributed substantively to Iraqi police's resolve. It also might farther explain their reluctance to ask for overt American support in what they consider a blood feud.

It looks increasingly likely to me that the Zarqawi memo was penned by a Coalition operative - the wording is just too pat.

But it's also been chillingly accurate. Best guess - the Coalition had info, probably from diverse and/or unrevealable sources, as to what was coming.

What to do, when you know but you can't say how? Well, you might as well let everyone know what's coming, and make sure they see it for what it is, its motivations and its goals. The memo was their vehicle for this.

jal17: you might want to adjust the tinfoil on your head. The government's mind control rays are getting through.

jal17:

As far as the wording goes, one possibility is that our translators got a clue™ and decided to convey more than just the basic gist of Zarqawi's message. Hence rationale as to why Western terms like "pretext" appear amidst the general rant that we've all come to know and love by now. I'm sure it sounds much more primitive and drawn-out in the original Arabic.

The best chance radical Islam has of taking over the world rests in either ASTEROIDS impacting the earth and destroying much or all of the Western world, including the USA; OR a de facto UN takeover of the hyperpower USA itself, with EUrope and Japan cowering like sheep afterwards, this latter I suspect being the REAL OBJECTIVE of the Communist Clintons and domestic/global ANTI-AMERICANISM! As long as the Clintons are around to influence the Democrats and American politics, 2004 and 2008, etal. is in reality to be about US SOCIALISM versus US CAPITALISM as the agenda for the now UNIPOLAR WORLD! Be that a sit may,THE USA IS NOT GOING TO PULL OUT OF IRAG, AFGHANISTAN, OR ANYWHERE ELSE IN THE MIDDLE EAST - THE REPUBLICANS WON'T GO FOR IT BECAUSE OF 9-11 AND CONSEQUENTIAL RIGHTEOUS INDIGNATION, AND NATIONAL AND GLOBAL SECURITY, WHEREAS DEMOCRATS -GLOBALISTS WON'T GO FOR IT BECAUSE AS FAILED LEFTISTS-SOCIALISTS-SUBSIDISTS,THEY NEED TO THE VALIDATE THE UNO AS A [SOCIALIST] GLOBAL-ORIENTED MODEL OF WORLD GOVERNANCE, PLUS THEY NEED THE SUCCESSFUL REPUBLICANS-RIGHTWING TO QUIETLY, DECEPTIVELY, AND ALTERIORILY CREATE A GOP-LED, GOP-CREATED, ERGO ONLY GOP-BLAMED, GLOBAL WELFARE-POLICE STATE FOR THEM WHICH THEY WILL LATER PC USURP AND TAKE OVER - ONLY THE THE FAILED LEFT HAS EVERYTHING TO GAIN, AND EVERYTHING TO LOSE, AGAIN, BY PULLING OUT OF IRAQ AND THE MIDDLE EAST!
Bush already knows the predom Leftmedias are NOT for him, the GOP-RIGHT, or America NO MATTER WHAT HE DOES, and that current DEMOCRAT MOVES TO ACT LIKE REPUBLICANS, QUASI-REPUBLICANS, CONSERVATIVES, OR RIGHTISTS IS ESSENTIALLY MOTIVATED TOWARD DECEPTIVELY INDUCING THE GOP AND RUGHTIST AMERICA TO ATTACK SOVEREIGN BUT PRO-TERROR OR ANTI-USA ISLAMIC-ROGUE NATIONS, IE WAGE GLOBAL [CONVENTIONAL; LIMITED NUCLEAR] LIMITED WARS, ESPECIALLY AGAINST REGIONAL ROGUE STATES LIKE NORTH KOREA AND IRAN OF SIGNIFICANT GEOPOLITICAL-MILITARY INTEREST TO ALREADY WELL-NUCLEARIZED, COMMUNIST-CONTROLLED FASCIST RUSSIA AND STILL-COMMUNIST CHINA. The GOP and American RIght's response to the currrent anti-American effort is NOT to turn isolationist and pull back from everywhere, for the Failed and Angry Left will as usual interprete such a move as a major negative point against the GOP and use for justifying 1990's Clintonism - Bush and the GOP must instead use America's global might to confront and defeat the Left! IOW, OVERWHELMING AMERICAN UNILATERALISM AND OVERWHELMING MILITARY FIREPOWER IS PRECISELY WHAT IS NEEDED AND WHAT BUSH NEEDS TO DO, IRREGARDLESS OF THE LEFT OR THE COMMUNIST CLINTONS ALTERIOR, MALICIOUS MOTIVES IN DISGUISED FOR GLOBAL- AND COMMUNIST SOCIALISM!