9.20.2004

Three Iraqi Hostages Beheaded

Man. From AP:

Militants sawed off the heads of three hostages believed to be Iraqi Kurds in a grisly videotape that surfaced Sunday, hours after Iraq's prime minister said January elections would be held on schedule and asserted that American and Iraqi troops were winning the fight against an increasingly bold insurgency.

In another sign of continuing instability 17 months into the U.S.-led occupation of Iraq, a suicide car bomb killed three people in Samarra — a northern city that U.S. and Iraqi commanders have portrayed as a success story in their attempts to put down the insurgency.

Over the past week, about 300 people have been killed in escalating violence, including bombings, street fighting and U.S. air strikes. Last week, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan warned there could not be "credible elections if the security conditions continue as they are now."
This is so, so bad, and Mr. Bush, never one to admit error, says things are going well.

I'm afraid the January elections will be a sham, too, every bit as much as the "American handover of power".