Update: Reuters has more details on the stunning changes in Iraq. They hillariously claim the 65-82% drop in violence in the areas now purged of al-Qaeda by The Surge is “Gradual Progress” – demonstrating the depth of their denial and bias. And they note that those locations al-Qaeda was chased to had – surprise! – an increase in violence. Just more evidence al-Qaeda is the source of Muslim blood in Iraq and not Iraqis. Whereever al-Qaeda goes the blood runs thick in the streets, where they are purged become peaceful. Doesn’t take a rocket scientist to connect those dots. – end update

I had to read this news a couple of times to make sure I was not seeing things. We know the media exaggerates like hell to make it seem as if al-Qaeda us indestructible. So I am not sure how to take this commentary from Newsweek, but it seems (as many of us have been saying) that the build up of al-Qaeda in Pakistan is obvious for many clear (and surprising reasons). It seems that Iraq and Afghanistan are so harsh for al-Qaeda it is no surprise they are moving to safe havens in Pakistan.Here is how a regional newspaper relayed the conclusions of a ‘media report’ (a.k.a., a biased treatise on the media’s political objectives):

Pakistan, which recently witnessed a series of suicide attacks by pro-Taliban and Al-Qaida militants, is the most dangerous country in the world, and has become a safe haven for terrorists, a media report says.

“Unlike countries such as Afghanistan and Iraq, Pakistan has everything Al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden could ask for: political instability, a trusted network of radical Islamists, an abundance of angry anti-Western recruits, secluded training areas and security services that don’t always do what they’re supposed to do,” says Newsweek in an investigative report being published in its upcoming issue.

Emphasis mine. One needs to step back a moment and let this sink in to realize what Newsweek is claiming in their report. First off it is noting the differences between Iraq and Afghanistan – the two countries the US focused their war on terrorism on after 9-11 – to Pakistan. The list I cited is a set of conditions which only exist in Pakistan (supposedly) and not in Iraq or Afghanistan. They define the differences the authors of this media report see between the areas we are focused and where the terrorists seem to be headed.

According to Newsweek, Pakistan has “a trusted network of radical Islamists”. What this implies, and the evidence bears out in Iraq, is the radical Islamists in Iraq are not trustworthy. At least in the sense they cannot be trusted to succeed. The Islamo Fascists in Iraq have only succeeded, through their endless and brutal atrocities on the Iraqi Muslims, to alienate the entire country against al-Qaeda. Now Iraq is hunting down and killing trusted radical Islamists. There are few trusted Islamists and a lot of pissed off and angry Muslims chasing al-Qaeda down.

It is clear there are many al-Qaeda leaders who would agree with Newsweek on thbis and prefer to be someplace else other than Iraq:

The last days on Earth of Abu Osama al-Tunisi apparently were filled with anxiety: “We are desperate for your help,” he said in a letter to al Qaeda chieftains.

A copy of the letter was found by U.S. troops sifting through the rubble of the building in Musayb, about 40 miles south of Baghdad, where on Sept. 25 al-Tunisi had been meeting with two local al Qaeda operatives when an F-16 cut their discussion short.

Al-Tunisi was a key member of the rapidly dwindling inner circle of Abu Ayoub al Masri, the al Qaeda chieftain in Iraq. Another key member, Abou Yaakoub al Masri, an intimate of Osama bin Laden’s deputy, Ayman al Zawahiri, was killed Aug. 31 near the northern Baghdad suburb of Tarmiyah.

Given the environment in Iraq, with the locals now actively on the hunt for them, is it any surprise al-Qaeda is massing in Pakistan around their leader? Did not the Nazis mass around Hitler in Berlin during the last days of WW II?

Newsweek also notes Iraq does not have “an abundance of angry anti-Western recruits”. That is because it has an abundance of angry anti al-Qaeda recruits! Seems to make sense there.

Newsweek also claims Iraq does not have “secluded training areas”. It is hard to set up a training camp when US intelligence assets are blanketing the countryside. Not to mention those pesky locals out trying to find al-Qaeda where ever they may be hiding.

Finally, Newsweek admits something that is the harbinger of final success in Iraq. It seems Iraq has a security forces that are not like those in Pakistan, which apparently “don’t always do what they’re supposed to do”. Which therefore means Iraqi forces usually do what they are supposed to do. And if they do what they are supposed to do, then it is only a matter of time before they build up to a point where they can secure Iraq and we declare success in Iraq. It seems these are the conclusions of the Newsweek “media report”.

Here is the essence of it all. The Surge is working and working very, very well. Iraq is experiencing such a dramatic change in fortunes the anti-war left is in complete denial that their hopes of US failure will now never come true. To underline this we can see by the statistics on death and violence in Iraq how much thing have changed. Here is the view of Iraq and Baghdad by the United Nations as violence drops off to levels unthought-of of a few months ago:

Iraqis are breathing a sigh of relief as violence in their war-torn country is ebbing and the number of violence-related victims has dropped sharply since the beginning of this year, according to statistics compiled by the country’s interior, defence and health ministries.

“Violence-related deaths in September dropped remarkably to levels not seen in more than a year as the number [of violence-related deaths] stood at 290 while in September 2006 the number was about 1,400,” Adel Muhsin, the health ministry’s inspector-general, told IRIN in a phone interview.

According to the ministry’s statistics, between January and the end of September 2007, the number of violent deaths involving civilian, police and military in all of Iraq was about 7,100, against 27,000 in the same period of 2006.

According to Muhsin, the average number of dead bodies sent to Baghdad’s main morgue just over a year ago was between 100 and 150 a day. Now, it is no more than 10 bodies a day, and about 50 percent of them are dying in normal circumstances.

These are truly stunning numbers, especially when you look at the percentage change they represent. When death due to war torn violence goes from 145 a day to 5 a day (assuming 5 a day is the number due to “normal circumstances”) that is a drop off of more than 95% (~97%). I hopefully don’t have to prove the point that going from 95 to 5 is close to a 95% drop as well.

Anything that drops by 95% is nearly 100% gone! These numbers, by the UN no less, show a death rate due to war related violence that is basically gone. No wonder there are some in the military who see victory is at hand and not simply weeks away.

In fact, the reporting on the most violent attacks of the day is a story about in-fighting between al-Qaeda and other Iraqi Islamic extremist groups. Even the supposed allies of al-Qaeda are out to destroy them.

It seems both Newsweek and the UN agree: Iraq is no place for al-Qaeda to be right now, and since they have been routed in Iraq the violence and death they bring has disappeared with them. Now the prime concern is the Mahdi Militias and their violent nature. But it is clear they do not have the same capacity for atrocities as al-Qaeda did. Which is probably the only reason they still exist to any degree in Iraq. Otherwise they too would have felt the force of a people rising up to destroy them.

Addendum: Micheal Yon writes today about the stubborness of the news media to report objectively (and admit how wrong they have been on the war in Iraq). He says resistence is futile and the news media now controls our TV sets (and newspapers, etc) and therefore the true story will never come out:

I was at home in the United States just one day before the magnitude hit me like vertigo: America seems to be under a glass dome which allows few hard facts from the field to filter in unless they are attached to a string of false assumptions. Considering that my trip home coincided with General Petraeus’ testimony before the US Congress, when media interest in the war was (I’m told) unusually concentrated, it’s a wonder my eardrums didn’t burst on the trip back to Iraq. In places like Singapore, Indonesia, and Britain people hardly seemed to notice that success is being achieved in Iraq, while in the United States, Britney was competing for airtime with O.J. in one of the saddest sideshows on Earth.

I am sure everytime bias and propaganda tried to override reality there was a time those in the midst of the effort to cover up the truth felt it would not see the light of day. But this is a different world with the electronic pamphleteers (bloggers) and independent reporters (Yon, Roggio and Totten). I need to remind Yon that the Borg in Star Trek (from which Yon takes his post’s title) never actually were able to conquer the Federation – the good guys. Resistance is futile, for the SurrenderMedia. They cannot change reality by pretending in print it does not exist. There are 25 million witnesses to history in Iraq right now! Also check out Michael Barone’s article today which notes the deep denial of the Surrendercrats in Congress – and how Iraq is not working out for them either.