So U.S. Army Major General Rick Lynch tells us here that “about 50 members of an elite Iranian military unit are training Shiite militias south of Baghdad, the first time the U.S. military has alleged that Iranians are aiding insurgents from inside Iraq.”And, as noted here, Dubya recently designated Iran’s Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization to be covered under the 2002 Authorization to Use Military Force.
Given this, is it altogether surprising that Gen. Lynch, among others, has advocated that we “splurge on” forever in that quagmire?
And I would question Lynch for no other reason than that I don’t trust him based on how he handled the “investigation” into the killing of a Reuters journalist by our troops near Baghdad in September 2005. Apparently, the “crime” committed by driver Waleed Khaled that warranted his death was to shift his car quickly into reverse upon nearing a military checkpoint; Lynch said that "that car approached at a high rate of speed and then conducted activity that in itself was suspicious. There were individuals hanging outside with what looked to be a weapon.”
So, was there any follow up to determine what the object was? A camera or a microphone maybe? Wouldn’t those be considered “tools of the trade” for Khaled and his crew?
I’m not unsympathetic to the dangers faced by our people at checkpoints from terrorist insurgent murderers (or whatever Rudy! thinks we should be calling them, as if that would actually make a difference). But I also know a whitewash when I see it, and you’d better believe that that’s how that went down on “the Arab street.”
And all of this gives Lynch even less credibility when he tells us to Shut Up And Clap Louder for “the splurge” (here is some reality on this from seven soldiers who have served in Iraq - behind the Times Select wall, sadly; they wrote a powerful Op-Ed that appeared yesterday).
Update 8/24: Shut your pie hole, General...sir.
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