Stories related to: Iraq mess

The key issue in the presidential election won’t be national security or Iraq, as many once believed—it will be how to fix our ailing nation at home, writes Thomas Friedman in the New York Times . “We are a country in debt and in decline—not terminal, not irreversible, but in decline,” Friedman notes. What we need is a president who can restore a broken political system. More »

A car bomb tore through a market area in a mainly Shiite neighborhood in Baghdad today, killing more than 50 people and wounding dozens, officials said. It was the deadliest such attack in more than three months. Nobody claimed responsibility, but it bore the hallmarks of al-Qaeda in Iraq, which is known to use car bombs and suicide attacks. More »

Retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, who led US forces in Iraq for a year after Saddam’s ouster, says George W. Bush “led America into a strategic blunder of historic proportions” in a memoir the Washington Post deems “lost in the media furor” over Scott McClellan's. Sanchez recounts a presidential video-conference pep talk in 2004: “Kick ass! If somebody tries to stop the march to democracy, we will seek them out and kill them! More »

The number of men in Iraq's security forces is estimated to be a healthy 530,000. Trouble is, a "substantial number" of them are injured, dead, or AWOL, a new government audit says. The review casts doubt on Pentagon reports about Iraqi capabilities and questions Baghdad's ability to train its own forces, the Military Times reports. More »

President Bush praised the government of Iraq today for the offensive launched three days ago against militias in Basra, painting it as a sign of progress toward the goals of the US war, the AP reports. Bush also criticized Congress for calling for troop withdrawals so the military’s attention could be turned to anti-terrorism efforts elsewhere, such as Afghanistan. More »

A top Iraq war architect slams the CIA and State Department for flawed handling of the build-up and eventual invasion in a new book, the Washington Post reports. Douglas Feith, former undersecretary of defense, takes shots at Colin Powell, Tommy Franks, and ex-occupation chief Paul Bremer, among others, for brushing off Feith’s and the Bush administration’s plans. More »

American military forces accidentally killed nine Iraqi civilians and injured three during raids south of Baghdad Saturday, US officials revealed today. The incident occurred near Iskandariyah, when a helicopter air strike was ordered on a checkpoint after a convoy of US troops in pursuit of Al Qaeda in Iraq came under attack. Iraqi police said American forces had erroneously fired on Iraqi civilian guardsmen helping the US effort against Al Qaeda. More »