I am getting ready to close out my ‘Iraq’ category since I started it to deal with the war in Iraq and start a new one “The New Iraq” to follow the progress of our ally. I am waiting to see the new government formed and the celebrations that will ensue to mark the occasion.

Too many on the left have succumbed to delusional denial. I have to laugh when I see Democrat statements ‘Get Out Of Iraq” because they just as easily can be saying “Get Out Of Nazi Germany”! Two stories to illustrate the point.

The first is the continuing ‘civil war’ (if you can even call it that) between the foreign Al Qaeda fighters and there one time allies the Sunni insurgents. The Sunni insurgents know now there is no path to power and prestige through murder and mayhem. In fact, it is a clear path to jail or death. Iraqi’s want to enjoy and experience and test out their new freedoms. They have been under the jack-boot of Hussein for twenty years – it’s time to live.

In that line we see Al Qaeda being turned in or killed (probably after a fair warning to leave by the locals):

Iraqi forces killed a local al-Qaida in Iraq leader and two other insurgents in a raid north of Baghdad on Friday, and roadside bombs killed an American soldier and an Iraqi policeman, officials said.

…

Iraqi commando forces, acting on a tip, raided a house where Hamid al-Takhi, the local al-Qaida in Iraq leader, and the two other insurgents were hiding just outside Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad, said police Capt. Laith Mohammed.

Al-Takhi, known as the “emir” of Samarra, was gunned down while fleeing the house, and the other two militants while trying to defend it with grenades, the U.S. military said. After they were killed, the Iraqi troops found a car parked nearby containing a grenade launcher, rockets, AK-47s, grenades, and a shotgun, the U.S. military said.

Mohammed said al-Takhi had been responsible for many insurgent attacks against coalition forces and civilians in the area.

Someone turned this animal in. They did not want him in their neighborhood or city. And why would the people of Iraq turn this monster in?

Around the same time, police found the corpses of two middle-aged Iraqi men in a mostly Sunni Arab neighborhood of western Baghdad, Hussein said. The men, handcuffed, blindfolded and bullet-ridden, appeared to be the latest victims of a wave of kidnappings and killings by Sunni and Shiite death squads that target civilians.

Zarqawi and his brutish thugs paintt an alternative future for Iraq which would simply be more of the same brutality that Hussein rained down on the people. Of course they are going to turn these murderers in, it is their only way to gain protection. Watch for more news stories like this one.

But note who we are not fighting. We are not fighting the Iraq military or the Iraq government. In fact we are training the military and protecting the government as it stands up. If that is how some fight a war then I guess we are at war with Europe, Japan, South Korea, Isreal too.

The second is the agreement to disband the Shiite militias and get their members under control. This is coming from the new PM Maliki and the leading Shiite religious leader, Sistani. With that kind of support it will happen. I guess it takes some folks a little longer to catch on to what is happening in the world.