April 09, 2008
Snakes on a Plane: The Iraq Counter-Insurgency Plan
If for no other reason, Wretchard gets a link for naming his post Snakes on a Plane. The post analyzes some of the supplemental materials linked by Austin Bay and presented yesterday in General Petraeus' testimony before Congress. Read it all.
I was especially interested in this one. What surprised me was that al Qaeda's former allies in Ansar al-Sunnah get special mention, while the groups which make up The Reform and Jihad Front are just called "other".
I'm not sure if the number of jihadi videos is directly related to the number of attacks against US forces. If there is, then the good news is that al Qaeda in Iraq is nearly defeated. The bad news is that videos from "other" groups have risen significantly.
It took CENTCOM & MNF several years before they institutionalized the notion that al Qaeda propagandists were a large part of the problem. Let's hope it doesn't take them that long to begin to give priority to groups such as Jaish al Rashadeen and Hamas in Iraq. If propaganda videos are a measure of insurgent activity, then groups such as these are becoming the top threat.
Thanks to Larwyn.
