Huge explosions in Baghdad
Breaking News from Omar at Pajamas Media.
Massive explosions in Baghdad: “Over the past 90 minutes or so, massive explosions could be heard in Baghdad and actually I’m hearing more of them while I’m typing. … I went up to the roof to see if anything could be seen from there and I was able to see several flashes coming from the south, south-west side of the city. Using the simple method of measuring the lag between seeing the flash and hearing the sound I figured out the explosions are taking place somewhere in the area between Karrada and Dora, yet the explosions are very loud that they can be heard in the northern parts of Baghdad! … Reuters says the explosions were caused by a fire that broke out at “an ammunition dump at a U.S. base in southern Baghdad” apparently in the Dora district of Baghdad.” (Iraq the Model)
Update: I am hearing from Omar the explosions were "just huge". Could be an ammo dump, as Reuters suggests. Confirmed by FNC to be FOB Falcon. Base being evacuated. Omar reports explosions ongoing every 5 to 10 seconds. 14:52 PDT
Omar reports explosions declining in intensity and frequency. (15:12 PDT)
"It's almost over now...explosions are much less frequent now that the last one was about 10 minutes ago" (16:24 PDT)
posted by wretchardthecat at 10/10/2006 02:51:00 PM
19 Comments:
I've witnessed the explosion of such an ammo dump and hope that both a) that's all it is and b) nobody was inside.
What Omar describes is similar to what I've seen.
I wonder how much loose unexploded ammo has been thrown out and over what radius?
Maybe Hadjii got lucky and one of his mortar rounds hit the jackpot...
wretchard said...
reocon,
Iraq's constitution calls for a federal state. It doesn't call in any shape way or form for a multicultural state where people all live happily on a hilltop singing "I'd like to buy the world a Coke". That's why the Iraqi constitution calls for powerful regional armed forces. The Peshmerga, for example, are not an illicit institution.
First off Article 9 (b) of the Iraqi constitution states: "Forming military militias outside of the framework of the armed forces is banned." The Pesh Merga are not intergated into the Defense or Interior Departments, they are answerable only to their regional political parties: Barzani's and Talabani's. Second the Pesh Merga are not merely a regional force but can be found throughout Bagdhad as private security and militia for Kurds. Third, Article 129 calls for the regional establishment of "police, security and regional guards" but those mandates are of a far, far lighter variety than "powerful regional armed forces". What article in the Iraqi constitution were you referring to?
Fourth, federalism will not solve the problem of Iraqi's multi-ethnic cities, whether Baghdad or Kirkuk. If you don't belive in the success of multi-culturalism then what is the Battle for Baghdad all about?
Recent polls held there showed a fairly high degree of support for such a federal state whose requirement is driven by the circumstance that some means of sharing the oil resource and access to the waterways must be found for any enduring peace to be established. When you think about it, this is really the model of nations, which cooperate with other nations for the common good yet retain their own identity within which they can be, well, neighborly.
Federalism is moribund. Hakim can not pass it through the Parliament because of the Sunni-Sadr legislative alliance. The Sunni have no faith that federalism will give them their fair share of oil and Sadr doesn't want to be trapped in a region with SCIRI and Dawa. This killing off of federalism happened last month and you can read about it here:
Federalism Plan Dead, Says Iraqi Speaker:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/12/AR2006091201549.html
Saddam's regime was a multiethnic society, full of hatreds it's true; but one held together with an efficient secret police. Now which was it that we wanted?
Which serve(d) our interests better? A check on Iran's power or a failed state tilted towards Iran just as Iran develops a nuclear bomb? Is it in our interests do be trapped between our enemies (Shi'a and Sunni) in a civil war?
Re: Federalism. Oops, pardon, this was supposed to be in the last post: Some of the chatter I've heard claims that the recent uptic in violence followed the early September demise of Hakim's Federalism bill in parliament. All sides figured that without an equitable agreement in parliament, they'd just have to take the matter outside . . .
Reocon,
So Saddam's Iraq became the ultimate poison pill. Bush I sweated the same thing in Gulf War I. Oust the bastard, kill people and break things. Malfeasance with the threat of more if you perturb is a suckers game. The only mistake was trying to make a democracy out of a bunch religious extremist goat herders. Screw em all.
Anyone who has ever seen an arsenal knew exactly what was happening here - a fire started near a bunker, and everyone ran for the hills. If a lucky mortar round hit an open bunker door or an outbound truck to start the fire, well, humans are not perfect.
I am so sorry this has happened, it's going to "look bad" and probably make a lot of weak-minded people feel it is an epochal event proving we are losing this war.
reocon,
From Wikipedia
In late 2004, when Arab Iraqi Police and ING (Iraqi National Guard) units in the city of Mosul collapsed in the face of an insurgent uprising, Kurdish Peshmerga battalions, who'd recently been converted into ING forces, led the counter-attack alongside US military units. To this day, there are a number of Kurdish battalions of former Peshmerga in the Iraqi Army serving in Northern Iraq.
And further down:
Unlike the other militias, the Peshmerga were not prohibited by the transitional government. They are usually armed with AK-47s and AK-74s, RPKs (light Soviet machine guns) and DShKs (heavy Soviet machine guns). During the American-led invasion the Peshmerga captured the rest of the arms of the Iraqi forces, consisting of more than 2000 armored vehicles (some hundred of them PT-76s and a smaller number of T-55s) and an unknown number of artillery guns. Peshmerga forces do make use of female fighters, making Kurdistan one of only three entities in the Middle East that actively uses female soldiers (others being Israel and Iran).
Reocon,
If you read the Washington Post link you supplied (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/12/AR2006091201549.html) you'll see that Federalism is dead according to the opinion of the Sunni Speaker of the House, but the Post article says this, and I quote:
The constitution that Iraq adopted last fall allows for a form of federalism. Sunni parties supported the charter only reluctantly and joined the current government on condition of a resumption of federalism discussions, in which they hoped to kill the concept.
So as you see, the Iraqi constitution does in fact call for federalism. The Sunnis opposed it, for reasons best discussed elsewhere and the Sunni speaker is simply reiterating a view held prior to the adoption of that country's constitution. But it is a fact that the Iraqi Constitution as adopted aims for Federalism. Whether it will or will not be achieved is yet to be seen. But to pretend that Federalism was never in the cards but only latterly adopted in the face of increasing difficulties is really counterfactual. It was in the Iraqi Constitution from the get-go.
I am so sorry this has happened, it's going to "look bad" and probably make a lot of weak-minded people feel it is an epochal event proving we are losing this war.
No, this chart proves we are losing this war.
wretchard said...
From Wikipedia
In late 2004 . . .
Unlike the other militias, the Peshmerga were not prohibited by the transitional government.
Wretchard, your Wikipedia entry is from 2004 and deals very specifically with the transitional government. The current consitution was drafted in 2005 and passed by referendum in Oct 15, 2005. The current government is not the "transitional government" that was constituted under Transitional Authoritative Law (TAL). TAL was voided by the adoption of the constitution. (See Article 152).
Again, if you think the present constitution can substantiate your claim, then please supply the specific Article.
So as you see, the Iraqi constitution does in fact call for federalism. The Sunnis opposed it, for reasons best discussed elsewhere and the Sunni speaker is simply reiterating a view held prior to the adoption of that country's constitution. But it is a fact that the Iraqi Constitution as adopted aims for Federalism. Whether it will or will not be achieved is yet to be seen. But to pretend that Federalism was never in the cards but only latterly adopted in the face of increasing difficulties is really counterfactual. It was in the Iraqi Constitution from the get-go.
No, the Iraqi constitution allows for the federalist creation of autonomos provinces if the appropriate bill is passed in Parliament. That bill was raised by SCIRI (Hakim) and Dawa and killed by a coalition of Sunnis and Sadrites. The provision was put into the constitution because no one could agree about federalism at the time. They still can't. The Sunnis know it will be the economic strangulation of them, and Sadr know it will be a Shiite civil war. The constitution as presently written does not call for federalism.. Check out Articles 114, 116, 132, 133 and 143 of the Iraqi constitution.
The Federalism measure has been held up since September, the Parliamentary gov't is deadlocked, and Maliki is ineffective.
For more on the paralysis regarding Federalism:
http://www.heraldextra.com/content/view/194233/3/
I wonder if we gave them a fortune cookie, if Teresita and Reocon would go off someplace else and start their own blog where they can babble at each other and not bother anyone else.
YO, you two doofuses! This thread is supposed to be about exploding ammo dumps. See if you can keep your liberal loser-itis in check for the moments it takes to go back to somewhere that your rants aren't QUITE so off-topic!
Sheesh - sometimes I think freedom of speech is highly over-rated and we need a Constitutional amendment restricting it to adults who can focus.
Evidently there was incoming mortar fire for twenty minutes and everyone was evacuated safely.
NahnCee said...
See if you can keep your liberal loser-itis in check for the moments it takes to go back to somewhere that your rants aren't QUITE so off-topic!
Nahncee, liberalism is what got us into this unwinnable War -- the discredited liberalism of Woodrow Wilson, revived by the political scientist Jospeh Nye and sold to Bill Clinton. It is the same democratic gloablist ideology put forward by the stealth liberals known as "neocons", and swallowed by our unschooled President and other psuedo-conservatives. They believe that insitutions imposed out of humanitarian imperialism will be able to transform foreign cultures through the promulgatin of virtue. Read William Bennett's 2000 essay, "Morality, Character and American Foreign Policy" in Present Dangers edited by WIlliam Kristol and Robert Kagan.
It is not "loser-itis" to oppose this war on solid conservative principles and then see your predictions come to awful term. I would rather that I was wrong and have the world be a better place, but there's no denying the present. (Well, there is: alot of people seem a bit behind the curve. Some people don't realize that the Jaafari gov't collapsed!). This thread is more than simply ammo dump explosions; that is a symptom, the disease is our great liberal effort in Iraq, and as such, the collapse of federalism is a worthy topic. Don't you agree?
Mechanics for establishing federal states passes Iraqi parliament
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/11/AR2006101100529.html
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dave h:
Agreed.
With every news report coming in from the ME, South Asia, Korea, N Africa, S. America we seem to be sliding ever faster into an abyss that looks more unavoidable for humankind.
Dave H said...
Saddam was a dangerous loose cannon with a whole lot of UN enabled money, who has demonstrated a willingness to *pull the trigger* a number of times.
Dave H, what *trigger* was Saddam prepared to *pull* in early 2003? Can you please be specific and tell us what weapon he possesed that could harm our interests?
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