Al Qaeda in Iraq will lash out

Washington Post:

U.S. military officials on Wednesday said they expected the Sunni insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq to "lash out and stage spectacular attacks" and fuel sectarian violence in response to an ongoing U.S. offensive north of Baghdad.

Calling al-Qaeda in Iraq "the principal threat" to Iraqis, Brig. Gen. Kevin J. Bergner, the chief U.S. military spokesman, said the group was the main focus of the U.S. security campaign. Like other U.S. officials in recent weeks, Bergner stressed that al-Qaeda in Iraq is supported by the organization led by Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, an assertion that intelligence analysts have disputed.

"Al-Qaeda senior leadership does provide direction to al-Qaeda in Iraq," Bergner told reporters. "They do establish and provide resourcing and support the network," he added, noting that Zawahiri recently released a video seeking international recruits for the war in Iraq.

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Bergner defended the focus on al-Qaeda in Iraq. "They are clearly the main accelerant in sectarian violence and the greatest source of these spectacular attacks that are killing innocent Iraqis in such large numbers," Bergner said. "Their numbers are very small, but the effect is very large."

For the past three weeks, U.S. forces have been battling al-Qaeda in Iraq in and around Baqubah, the capital of Diyala province, about 35 miles northeast of Baghdad. Bergner said U.S. forces were also staging operations against the group in Mosul to the north as well as in Ramadi in western Anbar province in an attempt to stop fleeing fighters from regrouping and attacking in other areas.

Bergner said al-Qaeda in Iraq was responsible for 80 to 90 percent of the suicide bombings in Iraq, many of them carried out by foreigners. The U.S. military, he said, had killed or captured 26 high-level leaders of al-Qaeda in Iraq during May and June.

Sixty to 80 foreign fighters enter Iraq each month to join al-Qaeda in Iraq, mainly through Syria, Bergner said. He added that "facilitators" with links to bin Laden's group smuggled in foreign fighters and arms for al-Qaeda in Iraq. Syria has long denied that it is a gateway for foreign combatants.

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Al Qaeda's loss of its Anbar sanctuary should be having an impact on its ability to smuggle in foreign fighters. The loss of its rat lines through Anbar should make it harder to get its human ordinance to Baghdad to explode. By losing its base in Diyala its leadership is further diffused which should impact its command and control. What Bergner and the military are doing is forcing the Democrats to come out of their fantasy land and admit al Qaeda ia in Iraq and it is the central front in their war against us.