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This case is unusual as it is rare for an Admiral to even face criminal proceedings Source: http://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local/San-Diego-Navy-Admiral-Guilty-Plea-Navy-Bribery-Scheme-382400401.html#ixzz4B8MhpHYZ Follow us: @nbcsandiego on Twitter | NBCSanDiego on Facebook A rear admiral in the U.S. Navy plead guilty to one felony charge in connection with a multi-million dollar bribery scheme that has led to the arrest or imprisonment of more than a dozen U.S. Navy officers and Pentagon employees. Rear Admiral Robert J. Gilbeau appeared in court Thursday in the downtown San Diego federal courthouse. Gilbeau entered a change of plea to one count of providing false statements to federal investigators and...

Shiite Militia groups taking up arms against IS Militants News / World Iraqi Prime Minister Disbands Seven Shiite Militia Groups 14.09.2014 Nuwar Faqie BasNews, Baghdad   Iraqi Prime Minister Haidar Abadi has reversed key decisions of former PM of Iraq Nouri al-Maliki by halting the activities of several Shiite militia groups.   Abadi has pledged to stop the activities of seven Shiite militia groups in Baghdad while at the same time indicated that he cannot impose his authority on two Shiite militia groups, which report to Maliki.   He revealed that some internal decisions that were made by the...

Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki said Thursday night that he had agreed to relinquish power, state television reported, potentially ending a crisis in which his deployment of extra security forces around the capital had raised worries of a military coup.

America was tired of him, Iran was tired of him, the Sunnis were really tired of him, even the country’s Shiite-in-chief thought it was time for him to move along. There’s no doubt he would have dug in on last weekend’s attempted coup if he thought the military would protect him, but they were prepared to cut him loose as well.And so an ignominious reign ends with a whimper. Maliki: I withdraw my candidacy for PM in favour of Abadi to safeguard unity & stability of Iraq, political process pic.twitter.com/iSIAWI3oai— Sajad Jiyad سجاد (@SajadJiyad) August 14, 2014 It was...

07.06.14 Why the White House Ignored All Those Warnings About ISIS Team Obama was told, over and over, that the Iraqi army couldn’t stop a terror group that was ready to pounce. But Washington was a prisoner to its paradox of an Iraq policy. On November 1, 2013, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki visited the White House, and made a rather stunning request. Maliki, who celebrated when the last U.S. troops left his country in 2011, asked Obama to quietly send the military back into Iraq and help his beleagured Air Force develop targets for air strikes; that’s how serious...

This was popped up in the headlines, and details are still sketchy, but something potentially big is afoot in Iraq. (And for once, we’re not talking about their being under attack by ISIS.) We were first tipped off on Twitter as well as a quick draw compilation of tweets from inside Iraq provided at Pundit Press. Here are a few, along with Pundit Press’s summary, keeping in mind that this isn’t confirmed yet: Iraq’s parliament just chose a new President who refused to rename Prime Minister Nouri Kamal al-Maliki to a third term. Maliki declared the move unconstitutional and his...

Iraqi Al Qaeda's entry into Syria's civil war caused "a political disaster" for Islamist militants there, the movement's global leader Ayman al-Zawahri said in a video message, urging the faction to redouble its efforts in Iraq instead. Zawahri has repeatedly tried to end infighting between the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and another Al Qaeda-aligned group, the Nusra Front. He said on May 2 in a message translated by SITE Monitoring that if ISIL had accepted his decision not to get involved in Syria and had instead worked to "busy itself with Iraq, which needs double its...

BAGHDAD — Iraq’s embattled Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, in a surprise speech late Sunday, resisted calls for his resignation and accused the country’s new president of violating the constitution, plunging the government into a political crisis at a time it is battling advances by Islamic State militants. On Sunday night, in a nationally televised speech, al-Maliki declared he will file a legal complaint against the new president, Fouad Massoum, for committing “a clear constitutional violation". “This attitude represents a coup on the constitution and the political process in a country that is governed by a democratic and federal system,” al-Maliki...

UNCONFIRMED reports suggest troops have sealed off Baghdad’s “Green Zone” in an apparent coup. Controversial Iraqi PM Maliki won a fresh round of elections, but does not hold a clear majority in parliament. He technically remains prime minister until parliament sits and votes. But Mr Maliki has this morning lashed out against his opponents, calling them “ministers for ISIS”. “Today I will file a formal complaint to the federal court against the president,” he said, in a surprise address at midnight Iraq time. Controversial Iraqi PM Maliki won a fresh round of elections, but does not hold a clear majority...

Iraq’s parliament just chose a new President who refused to rename Prime Minister Nouri Kamal al-Maliki to a third term. Maliki declared the move unconstitutional and his own State of Law Party pulled support from him. Now his forces are seizing government buildings in Iraq, have closed the airport, and are surrounding the Green Zone.

Iraqi forces have withdrawn from the militant-held city of Tikrit after their new offensive met heavy resistance, in a blow to the government effort to push back Sunni insurgents controlling large parts of the country. The failure highlights the difficulties of Baghdad's struggle to recapture territory from the insurgents who seized Mosul, Tikrit and other cities last month in a rapid offensive which threatens to fragment Iraq on ethnic and sectarian lines. The setback came as Iraqi politicians named a moderate Sunni Islamist as speaker of parliament on Tuesday. That was a long-delayed first step towards a power-sharing government urgently...

A classified military assessment of Iraq’s security forces concludes that many units are so deeply infiltrated by either Sunni extremist informants or Shiite personnel backed by Iran that any Americans assigned to advise Baghdad’s forces could face risks to their safety, according to United States officials. The report concludes that only about half of Iraq’s operational units are capable enough for American commandos to advise them if the White House decides to help roll back the advances made by Sunni militants in northern and western Iraq over the past month. Adding to the administration’s dilemma is the assessment’s conclusion that...

Sunni insurgents battling forces loyal to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki broke into a military base in Diyala province northeast of Baghdad on Thursday, a security source and a local official said. They said militants fought their way into the base on the edge of Muqdadiya town, 80 km (50 miles) northeast of the capital. The northern side of the town was already under their control before Thursday's clashes. The area around Muqdadiya has seen sustained fighting in recent weeks since fighters led by the hardline Islamic State, an offshoot of al Qaeda, seized the northern city of Mosul and...

<p>"The crisis now gripping Iraq and the Middle East was not only predictable but predicted — and preventable. By looking the other way and unconditionally supporting and arming Maliki, President Obama has only lengthened and expanded the conflict that President Bush unwisely initiated. Iraq is now a failed state, and as countries across the Middle East fracture along ethno-sectarian lines, America is likely to emerge as one of the biggest losers of the new Sunni-Shiite holy war, with allies collapsing and radicals plotting another 9/11."</p>

To understand why Iraq is imploding, you must understand Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki — and why the United States has supported him since 2006. I have known Maliki, or Abu Isra, as he is known to people close to him, for more than a decade. I have traveled across three continents with him. I know his family and his inner circle. When Maliki was an obscure member of parliament, I was among the very few Americans in Baghdad who took his phone calls. In 2006, I helped introduce him to the U.S. ambassador, recommending him as a promising option for...

The Obama administration is hoping that 4,000 Hellfire missiles might turn the tide in Iraq as the Middle Eastern nation takes on the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). Officials were told by the State Department last week that the Obama administration is trying to complete the sale with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s Shiite-led government. Members of the Senate and House foreign relations committees will conduct a review of the planned sale. The process can take up to 40 days....

Sunnis and Kurds walked out of the first session of Iraq's new parliament on Tuesday after Shi'ites failed to name a prime minister to replace Nuri al-Maliki, dimming any prospect of an early national unity government to save Iraq from collapse. The United States, United Nations, Iran and Iraq's own Shi'ite clergy have pushed hard for politicians to come up with an inclusive government to hold the fragmenting country together as Sunni insurgents bear down on Baghdad. The leader of the al Qaeda offshoot spearheading the insurgency, the Islamic State, has declared a "caliphate" in the lands it has seized...

Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has told the BBC that he hopes jets from Russia and Belarus will turn the tide against rebels in the coming days. "God willing within one week this force will be effective and will destroy the terrorists' dens," he said. He said that the process of buying US jets had been "long-winded" and that the militants' advance could have been avoided if air cover had been in place. Isis and its Sunni Muslim allies seized large parts of Iraq this month. Mr Maliki was speaking to the BBC's Arabic service in his first interview for...

Three things have happened in the past weeks that are making it obvious that the nation that has been Iraq since 1919 will soon cease to exist. First, the Turks have spoken in an approving way of the idea of an independent Kurdistan inside of what is now Iraq and has moved to address the issues that have fueled a long running Kurdish insurgency in Turkey. Second, Iraqi Prime Minister Nour al-Maliki has cast his lot firmly and unambiguously with Iran. In his weekly televised address, Mr Maliki called on “all political forces to reconcile” in the face of a...

It’s not some shadowy anonymous source from the peshmerga’s middle management who’s claiming this, do note. It’s Nechirvan Barzani, the Kurds’ prime minister. That’s the second time in four days that a major foreign official has accused Obama’s America of being a fickle, disengaged ally. Thoughtfully considering the Kurds’ offer and declining so as not to get sucked back into Iraq would be one thing, but that’s not what happened according to Barzani. Apparently, we simply didn’t respond. The Kurds became especially alarmed at signs that ISIS had already formed a shadow government in Mosul, weeks before initiating the carefully...