The Iraqi military said three rockets were fired

[reno]

Baghdad (CNN)The commander of Iran's Quds Force and a senior official in Iraq's paramilitary forces have been killed by "shelling" targeting their vehicle at Baghdad International Airport, Iraqi state television reported.

Qassem Suleimani, commander of Iran's Revolutionary Guards Quds Force unit, and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the deputy head of the Iran-backed Iraqi Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), were among those killed in the attack early Friday, al-Iraqiya TV reported.
Rockets hit two vehicles belonging to the PMF, a PMF source and an Iraqi security source told CNN. The head of protocol of the PMF was also killed, a source at the PMF told Iraqiya TV.
Trump threatens Iran after protesters attack US embassy in Baghdad
Trump threatens Iran after protesters attack US embassy in Baghdad
The PMF is a Shia paramilitary force made up of former militias with close ties to Iran whose supporters and members attempted to storm the US embassy this week.
Formed in 2014 to fight ISIS, the PMF was recognized under a 2016 Iraqi law as an independent military force that answers directly to the prime minister.
The Iraqi military said three rockets were fired at the airport on Friday, with the total number of people killed unclear. No one has claimed responsibility for the attack.
CNN's Arwa Damon and Kareem Khadder reported from Baghdad. CNN's
https://www.cnn.com/2020/01/02/middleea ... index.html

[Executioner]

I wish we would have never invaded Iraq. Let Iran and Iraq kill each other. Invading it left a big hole in the region.

[FlyingPenguin]

I wish we would have never invaded Iraq. Let Iran and Iraq kill each other. Invading it left a big hole in the region.

HW Bush took a lot of heat for NOT invading Iraq after chasing the Iraqi's out of Kuwait during Gulf War 1, but he knew that would destabilize the region. For decades our strategy has been to keep Iraq and Iran at equal military strength in order to keep them in check. HW Bush understood the complex balancing act that was necessary.

Then GW Bush (or more accurately, Dick Cheney and his Neocon buddies) used weak excuses to invade Iraq, and destabilized the region riding on a wave of post 9-11 patriotic outrage.

When many of us opposed invading Iraq back then, and accused GW Bush of destabilizing the Middle East, we were all called liberal idiots, cowards and unpatriotic.

Yet here we are.

[FlyingPenguin]

Not going to critique Trump on this move until it all plays out. It does feel like an overkill response. Then again, these guys were bad dudes and I'm not shedding a tear for them.

My concern is that the administration might have no plan, and is just reacting. If there's a plan, okay, but if he had these guys taken out just so he could look tough and brag, and there's no strategy, we could be looking at Gulf War 3.

[Err]

I think we all agree that we should've never gotten involved in the middle east. One of my biggest beefs with our Foreign Policy is Saudi Arabia. These ****ers are responsible for 911 and the bonesaw killing of Khashoggi. If we were going to invade and seize control of any country in the Middle East, it should be them. One of the major problems in the Middle East is our support of Israel because we have too many people believing that we we hasten the Rapture. Seriously, that is the only reason Christians support Israel. Otherwise, they believe Jews are going to Hell because they rejected Jesus. The thought of another war is sickening. While I wish the US would simply leave the region, we're in the muck and are going to have to do something.

I've read the Democrats response and they are simply wrong on this airstrike. The President can order such strikes and doesn't have to consult congress to do so. I disagree with that policy no matter if it's a Democrat or Republican. However, I can see the necessity of it. If we had to have a meeting every time we wanted to take someone out, that person would probably get away. It can be abused and we'll have to wait and see if that was the case this time. I just wish instead of hostility, we would simply pull back.

This all sucks.

[Pugsley]

Ive said it before and ill say it again... Worlds largest glass parking lot.

[FlyingPenguin]

Mark Mellman
@MarkMellman

Whatever one thinks re Soleimani assassination, there’s some contradiction between
@SecPompeo
saying “Americans in the region are much safer today after the demise of Soleimani."

And

@StateDept
saying “depart Iraq immediately. U.S. citizens...should not approach the Embassy.”

[reno]

i think Iran's been pushing for a confrontation with the US ,Great Britain ,and some arabic as well as other Countries for quite some time . we just decided it was time to return the favor to them .they made a miscalculation this time and it was not what they expected. now there crying about it. yes its sad lives were loss .but they asked for this and lucky this was all that was done . im sure we have information as to more hard targets in Iran. we didn't take out places like there shipping ports and oil fields. like they have been behind in other places around the region. also there heads of state not just a commander of Iran's Quds Force and a senior official in Iraq's paramilitary. its not been said but my guess is these were A submarine-launched missile's used.

[Losbot]

From what I have seen and understand, there's a Congressional committee that is informed of crap like this and they were given a head's up before the attack as well as provided with whatever evidence before proceeding. After the attack, not even the Democratic members of that group are saying once thing against the attack (unlike the others who were not privy to that info). It must have been some pretty damning intel they had.

I do hope they come forward with information on why it was carried out because I'm tired of all the idiots on Twitter/FB, etc who are all screaming that Trump decided to just "start a war w/o Congressional approval". If what I was told is accurate, then I'm fine with what he did. The guy was supposedly planning an attack soon.

[FlyingPenguin]

That's why I'm reserving opinion. As sick as I am of Trump's BS, I'm also sick of the automatic assumption on the part of people who dislike Trump that everything this administration does is wrong.

More than likely this was a hit that's been in the works for a while. I bet the military has been watching these two guys, and probably come to Trump with an option to take one or the other out before, but Trump isn't really an aggressor, and he's been trying to play the 'stick and carrot' game with Iran to bring them to the negotiating table.

I suspect this great opportunity to take out two major players just fell in their lap, and the remaining Neocons around him convinced him to use this as a response to all of Iran's previous aggressions. Add to that, Trump probably liked the idea of a little payback for the embassy attack, and he likes to make snap decisions based 'on his gut'.

My concern is that there aren't many people left advising him who would think through all the political ramifications, and the rest are just yes men: Will this scare Iran into backing off, or will this strengthen the hand of the hardliners? Will this increase the chances of sympathetic terrorist attacks around the world? Will it ruin our standing with other countries? The local Iranian commander was a fair target - he was essentially leading a terrorist group, and by all international law he was a legal military target. Suleimani, however, was a member of the Iranian government. Legally it was an assassination, and could certainly be considered an act of war. WWI was the result of an assassination.

I just don't know if there's anyone left that thinks about these ramifications in any great detail, and there's still a lot of neocons in the administration pushing for aggression against Iran.

My other problem is Pompeo has been caught flat out lying in the past, and I would sure like to hear more,about this 'imminent' attack we prevented. If our intelligence on attacks is so good, how come we didn't see the attack on the embassy coming?

[FlyingPenguin]

Another thought that occurred to me today, as regards the claim that killing Suleimani averted some kind of imminent attack, and I'm not sure anyone else has brought this up yet. This guy was a General in the Iranian army, in charge of their version of their special forces. He has a staff, and a deputy (his deputy, BTW, replaced him). They obviously would know the details of any imminent operation that was being planned, and would certainly be able to carry it out without him. If you killed our Army Chief of Staff, it wouldn't prevent any planned operations he was working on from being implemented.

It's only in movies that there's one mastermind who controls everything in the enemy government, and taking him out averts whatever attack is coming.

Pompeo is going to be on Fox News Sunday tomorrow morning. It's going to be interesting to see if Chris Wallace poses any interesting questions along those lines.