Just In Case You Didn't Notice;Just In Case You Care

Most US papers aren't printing it, but at least WaPo put it in section A, albeit on page 13.

700 More Troops to Be Sent To Iraq
Aim Is to Bolster Prison Operations

By Bradley Graham
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, August 18, 2005; Page A13

Responding to an appeal for more forces in Iraq to help manage a rising number of detainees, the Pentagon is dispatching an additional 700 troops from the 82nd Airborne Division, defense officials said yesterday.

The previously unscheduled deployment is intended specifically to bolster prison operations, the officials said. It is not part of a temporary increase in U.S. troop levels in Iraq that commanders have said is likely to enhance security for a planned constitutional referendum in October and governmental elections in December.

I don't know, maybe this isn't really important.  But maybe, just maybe, our citizens do care that we are increasing troop deployment.  Maybe they do care that we are running into a problem handling the fact that the number of prisoners in Iraq has doubled in the past seven months.  We are in the process of building a fourth prison there.  The article points out:

Military officials have attributed the influx of detainees to intensified counterinsurgency operations by Iraqi as well as U.S. forces. But the burgeoning prison population also appears to reflect the persistence of the insurgency itself.

The good news is that the insurgents are being captured.  The bad news, which is not reflected in the article, is that it doesn't seem to be making any difference how many are captured.  The attacks continue to increase, and our troops continue to get killed.

categories: politics, war
tags: Iraq