Marines hand over control of Fallujah to ex-Saddam general

01 May 2004

US marines handed over control of Fallujah to a former general in Saddam Hussein's army yesterday and began to withdraw troops from positions close to the besieged city.

In a significant climbdown by the US, the former Republican Guard general Jasim Mohammed Saleh arrived in Fallujah to take command of 1,100 soldiers from the disbanded Iraqi army who live in the city. And in an apparent attempt to sabotage the new agreement, a suicide car bomb killed two US Marines close to Fallujah yesterday.

"We have now begun forming a new emergency military force," General Saleh said, adding that the people of Fallujah "rejected" US soldiers.

General Saleh was greeted by cheering crowds waving the old Iraqi flag, abolished by the US-appointed Iraqi Governing Council. He met tribal leaders in a mosque. A US Marine officer said it would not be a problem if those who had been fighting the soldiers joined the new force.

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=517044



Major General Jasim Muhammad
Salih has arrived in Falluja waving
the resistance flag

the resistance even futher.

Nope, we won't negotiate with terrorists.

against putting Saddam's people back in charge?
Iraqis ain't dumb. Fallujah was a Saddam stronghold. The rest of the country doesn't seem to be very happy about the prospects.

so now, the flowers and hugs come out.

Cheny, rummy and wolfie were right after all. We just got the timing wrong.

It represents an incredible loss of control by the Pentagon in Washington over the American military. It is apparent that the American commanders on the ground in Falluja came to the conclusion that whoever was giving the orders in Washington was insane (Dr. Strangelove), and that they were no longer prepared to participate in a massacre that not only would fail in its short-term military goal, but would turn the whole country violently against the Americans (not to mention completely destroying the moral integrity of the American military by forcing soldiers to murder civilians). They negotiated a cease-fire unknown to the Pentagon in Washington and against the express wishes of the civilian neocons in charge of the Pentagon. In fact, Falluja was being micromanaged by the White House itself. No to put too fine a point on it, the cease-fire in Falluja was a mutiny by the American commanders in Falluja (the hero seems to be Marine Lt. Gen. James Conway). This explains why we were simultaneously hearing announcements of a cease-fire in Iraq and vehement denials from the Pentagon in Washington.

more:
http://xymphora.blogspot.com/2004_05_01_xymphora_archive.html#108338736556004732

That was the headline in my hometown paper.