Posted on 03/28/2015 10:53:48 AM PDT by Rusty0604
Iranian-backed Shiite militias have left the northern Iraq city of Tikrit, a key condition the U.S. demanded before it agreed to begin launching airstrikes Wednesday to support Iraqi forces and try to retake the city from the Islamic State group, the top U.S. general for the Middle East said Thursday.
Austin said he witnessed brutality by Shiite militias during his extensive experience leading U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq.
"I will not -- and I hope we will never -- coordinate or cooperate with Shiite militias," he said, adding a blunt explanation for why the Iranian-led offensive failed: The wrong approach was taken, he said.
Asked if the Iranian forces are nearby, Austin said, "I'm sure they're still in the area."
A spokesman for Iraq's Popular Mobilization Units, which mostly consist of Iranian-backed Shiite militias, offered a different explanation.
Mu'een al-Kadhimy said that a number of Shiite militias, including Asaib Ahl al-Haq, Ketaeb Hizbollah and Muqtada al-Sadr's Peace Brigades, are boycotting the Tikrit operation because of the involvement of U.S. forces.
"Their involvement is potentially harmful to the operation," he told The Associated Press, adding that the powerful Badr Brigade will most likely join the boycott. "We led the fight to liberate al-Dawr, to liberate al-Alam, and we are capable of liberating Tikrit without the help of American forces."
Mohammed Abu Ragheef al-Moussawi, the spokesman for Kataeb Hizbollah, told the AP that he knew "for more than 10 days that the Americans would try to participate and pressure the Iraqi government to abide by its rules. The American pressure was strong enough, and the government accepted whatever they demanded. But we told them from the start that if the Americans enter the fight for Tikrit, we will withdraw. That was our condition."
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
seems upside down, to me.
Isn’t killing each other a good thing ?
The fact that someone would accept the job of being a ‘top general’ for Obama is evidence that such a person cannot be trusted until proven otherwise.
I suspect the general had a long military career before Obama cast he first “present” vote in the Illinois Senate.
I think the most important thing is not to mess up Obama’s nuke plans with Iran. It looks like a show to me.
When The Won gives you the order to you will say "Yes, sir! Please don't take away my pension" won't you?
“Army Gen. Lloyd Austin appeared to stun Senate Armed Services Committee members with that development...”
He stuned their beebers!
Looks that way. He’s pretty close to retirement.
How can you tell the difference , they all carry guns and shout Ally Has a Car ?
obammy replaced many real generals with butt kissers moosie supporters or worse.
At this point I trust nothing involved with the federal gub mint.
Don’t forget they all have to applaud the LGBT crowd.
indeed, isn’t this idiot handing Tikrit over to the militias on a silver platter?
yep,
in todays obammy world, one fag is equal to ten real folks.
I get the impression that there is some misunderstanding here. We are telling the Shiites, supported by Iran to not enter Tikrit because in the past these militias have been nasty to folks in Sunni towns. Tikrit was Saddam Hussein’s home town and Sunni. I doubt that this is going to make Iran happy with Obama.
Meanwhile Turkey has expressed considerable annoyance at Iran for messing around in other ME countries like Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and now Yemen.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/03/26/us-yemen-security-turkey-idUSKBN0MM2N820150326
In addition, Saudi Arabia has accused Putin of hypocrisy after reading out loud a letter sent by Putin to the Arab Summit meeting in Egypt. Putin made reference to solving problems in ME without external interference. Given Putin’s extensive influence in Syria, this outraged the Saudi representative.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/03/29/us-mideast-arabs-summit-putin-idUSKBN0MP0I920150329
Welcome to Middle East.
Friends on one topic are enemies on others, and shift on a relatively frequent basis.
Everyone has to keep a knife sharpened for everyone else.
As a culture, Arabs tend to be quite emotional. When they fight, it tends to get pretty nasty - far beyond Western rules of war. Nowadays, it is getting worse, with the breakdown of Westernized central governments, and the rise of reliogious,ideological movements.
Kind of a cage match free for all developing.
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