On Scene: How Operation Swarmer Fizzled (TIME)

[kpete]

On Scene: How Operation Swarmer Fizzled.

Not a shot was fired, or a leader nabbed, in a major offensive that failed to live up to its advance billing

By BRIAN BENNETT/AL JALLAM



Scene: Michael Ware on What's Changed

Posted Friday, Mar. 17, 2006
Four Black Hawk helicopters landed in a wheat field and dropped off a television crew, three photographers, three print reporters and three Iraqi government officials right into the middle of Operation Swarmer. Iraqi soldiers in newly painted humvees, green and red Iraqi flags stenciled on the tailgates, had just finished searching the farm populated by a half-dozen skinny cows and a woman kneading freshly risen dough and slapping it to the walls of a mud oven.

The press, flown in from Baghdad to this agricultural gridiron northeast of Samarra, huddled around the Iraqi officials and U.S. Army commanders who explained that the "largest air assault since 2003" in Iraq using over 50 helicopters to put 1500 Iraqi and U.S. troops on the ground had netted 48 suspected insurgents, 17 of which had already been cleared and released. The area, explained the officials, has long been suspected of being used as a base for insurgents operating in and around Samarra, the city north of Baghdad where the bombing of a sacred shrine recently sparked a wave of sectarian violence.

..................................

The operation, which doubled the population of the flat farmland in one single airlift, was initiated by intelligence from Iraq security forces, says Lt Col Skip Johnson commander of the 187 Battallion, 3rd Combat Brigade of the 101st Airborne. "They have the lead," he said to reporters at the second stop of the tour. But by Friday afternoon, the major targets seemed to have slipped through their fingers. Iraqi Army General Abdul Jabar says that Samarra-based insurgent leader Hamad el Taki of Mohammad’s Army was thought to be in the area, and Iraqi intelligence officers were still working to compare known voice recordings and photographs with the prisoners in custody.

..........................

Before loading up into the helicopters for a return trip to Baghdad, Iraqi and American soldiers and some reporters helped themselves to the woman’s freshly baked bread, tearing bits off and chewing it as they wandered among the cows. For most of them, it was the only thing worthwhile they’d found all day.

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1174448,00.html

[TechBear_Seattle]

1. "Helped themselves to the woman's freshly baked bread"?

Is it significant that the article makes no mention of the Iraqi and American soldiers and some reporters being given any of that bread, do you suppose?

[madame defarge]

2. On BBC News Hour this morning...

Their analysis:

- in the grand scheme of the war, this is a fairly insignificant event

- in the eyes of US middle America, this will seem very significant, but in reality, it's only a media event...

Of course, you won't hear that from our MSM...

[BurtWorm]

3. Brilliant move, Bushists.

Call more attention to what wastes of space you are as military strategists and propagandists.

Can anyone who thinks the Bushists are "competent" explain this one?

[kpete]

4. More from Ware:

"I've spent the last three years immersed in this conflict, but after only two months away I'm amazed at how quickly this war has mutated into something even worse than it was before. We're now seeing a sectarian element nothing like we've previously seen. Even ordinary families, people who are in no way combatants are suddenly talking about fellow Iraqis in terms of "us" and "them."

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1173647,00.html

[Disturbed]

5. Another PR show for the world.

Only the most brainwashed will not scoff at this blatant BS Prop-Up-Ganda.

[Neil Lisst]

6. "helped themselves" doesn't sound like an invitation by her

Surely they didn't take this poor woman's bread without paying her.

I hope not.

[GreatCaesarsGhost]

7. and bush didn't know anything about it - per scot mcclellan

so he couldn't be held responsible for it when it was exposed as a fraud.

[gatorboy]

8. Do these clowns know how long it takes to make bread?

Family members probably went hungry while the calvary "helped themselves". :puke:

[jsamuel]

9. War? What War? There is nothing wrong in Iraq! Here, have some bread...

:sarcasm:
:eyes:

Propaganda... the whole thing...

[Drum]

10. Operation Potemkin....nt

[wryter2000]

11. I heard they captured Al Qaeda's #2 man in this raid. n/t

n/t