(H/T – CDR Salamander)
You might want to read the latest e-mail from Michael Yon, who has been in the “irretreviably-lost” (if you believe the Dhimm crowd) Anbar province for quite a while, that Glenn Reynolds put up, as well as the follow-on correspondence. First, part of Yon’s e-mail:
Otherwise, 2-7 hardly have fired their weapons. Today, I accompanied LTC Doug Crissman, the commander, to three meetings with Iraqi police and civilian leadership. The meetings were important but thankfully more administrative than combat oriented. Subjects included police recruitment and local politics, and actually seemed more difficult to navigate than “simple combat.” And to think that only in January of this year, this city was a daily battle. Today, there are clear signs of development and the civilian population was out shopping. In addition to basic services being restored, the city of Hit has rebuilt its library. Citizens had stored away the books during the war here. They are preparing to re-stock the library. Glenn, you know that I do not hesitate to deliver bad news. I have no bad news to deliver today. The town of Hit clearly is doing much, much better. “Anbar the impossible” might be possible after all.
Next, a bit of Captain Michael Mulvania’s letter:
I’m actually sitting about 30 feet from Michael Yon as he types his dispatches, here in the town of Hit, Al Anbar province. As one of the soldiers in Task Force 2-7, I have to say it’s really heartening to have a journalist of his caliber out here reporting with us. Hit, along with Anbar generally, has settled down tremendously in the 4 months I’ve been in country this tour. It’s surreal to compare my first two months in downtown Ramadi – incessant gunfire, explosions, and unending violence – to the peacekeeping and institution-building we finally have underway here in Hit. You wouldn’t get that reading the papers, with their constant focus on the (obviously tragic) sectarian violence in Baghdad, but frankly what has happened in Anbar is near-miraculous – it’s a story that deserves to be reported far more heavily than it has so to date.
Isn’t it interesting how we’re not hearing much of anything out of Anbar anymore since we certainly seem to be succeeding there? Gee, could ABCCBSNBCCNNNYTWPMJSDhimmiRATsetal be more interested in defeating President Bush, the Republicans and conservatives than protecting people that want to just live from those that want to kill everybody, whether American or Iraqi, that isn’t 110% in agreement with them? Do note that I did NOT include Time. Even though Joe Klein did manage to sneak in a cheap shot or two, he did notice that we are making some serious progress against Al Qaeda in Anbar.
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