Saturday, January 13, 2007
This is curious
From the LA Times:
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has filled the top military job in Baghdad with a virtually unknown officer chosen over the objections of U.S. and Iraqi military commanders, officials from both governments said.So Maliki has his own man in the top job and nobody knows much about him. That shouldn't bother Our Dear Leader but it might be a concern to those with a stake in what happens in Iraq.
Iraqi political figures said Friday that Maliki also had failed to consult the leaders of other political factions before announcing the appointment of Lt. Gen. Abud Qanbar....
...."It's a delicate situation," said Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish lawmaker who questioned the choice of Qanbar. "It's very dangerous if it turns out that he has affiliations," he said, naming Maliki's political party and the anti-American Shiite Muslim cleric Muqtada Sadr.
Qanbar, a commander in the navy during Saddam Hussein's reign, has not worked with American military officials, who say they know little about him other than that he hails from Amarah, a city in Iraq's Shiite-dominated south, and that he was taken prisoner by American forces near Kuwait during the 1991 Persian Gulf War....Yup, that should work, don't see any problems here.
....The appointment of Qanbar comes as the U.S. military is debating whether to attack Sadr City. As the Iraqi commander, Qanbar could have advance knowledge of U.S. operations. He would command 18 brigades of Iraqi forces that are supposed to be deployed to work with the Americans.
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