UN news service: Jihadis welcome Baker Commission findings

Of course they do.

But until the pullout actually begins, they’ll just have to keep carbombing schoolchildren.

Insurgents and militias in Iraq on Thursday welcomed the recommendations made in a report by the Iraq Study Group that indicated that US policy in Iraq was not working and that its troops should be pulled out earlier than current projections suggest.

“The withdrawal of US troops from Iraq has been one of our foremost demands since 2004. The presence of foreign troops in our country is the reason why we continue to fight, resulting in the killing of thousands of Iraqis,” said Abu Baker, a member of Sunni insurgent group Jeyshi Muhammad (Muhammad’s Army) who declined to give his full name…

“No Muslim country should close their eyes over this occupation that is destroying the country. The occupation is not popular with us Iraqis and that is why you can see an increase in the numbers of Iraqis who have turned into fighters against the US occupation,” said Abu Ahmed, who claimed to be a member of al-Qa’eda in Iraq and declined to give his full name.

He warned that the departure of US troops is not enough and said members of the Iraqi government and parliament who are pro-US should quit their positions “to clean the government of US ideology”.

“Abu Baker.” Perfect.

World Net Daily interviewed a bunch of Palestinian jihadis for reaction — they’re thrilled too — but I’d proceed with caution. The only one who actually mentions the report is “Abu Ayman” of Islamic Jihad, and a quick Google search reveals that he seems to do most of his talking to WND, which isn’t renowned for its credibility in the first place.

Meanwhile, military experts tell the Times the Commission’s plan (which is also Nuri al-Maliki’s plan) to have the Iraqi army take over this year or by early 2008 is not only hopelessly unrealistic but potentially dangerous to the diminished force of U.S. military “advisors” left behind, all of whom will be wearing bullseyes if civil war breaks out:

In essence, the study group is projecting that a rapid infusion of American military trainers will so improve the Iraqi security forces that virtually all of the American combat brigades may be withdrawn by the early part of 2008…

Jack Keane, the retired acting Army chief of staff who served on the group’s panel of military advisers, described that goal as entirely impractical. “Based on where we are now we can’t get there,” General Keane said in an interview, adding that the report’s conclusions say more about “the absence of political will in Washington than the harsh realities in Iraq.”

Barry McCaffrey calls it “a recipe for national humiliation.”

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