It's rerun season already!
Overnight Saddam and his pals were once again targeted with a bunker buster strike as they had a soiree near a Baghdad restaurant. No word on finger bowls. Meanwhile there is still speculation on whether Chemical Ali is toast:

Until they do a DNA, I'm not going to speculate," said an exasperated Col. Larry Brown, operations chief for the Marines in Iraq. "The guy has been like Freddy Krueger -- we've killed him five times already."

and the AP leads with its chin in Purported bin Laden Tape Urges Attacks:

The tape was obtained by The Associated Press from an Algerian national, identified only as Aadil, who said he had slipped across the border from Afghanistan, where the bin Laden tape was apparently recorded.

My accent isn't so good, but maybe I could start selling tapes on eBay.

Good question
Colin Brazier of Sky News in Golden luxury amid the poverty:

As of last night, the airport is once again receiving flights but it remains a risky business to fly here. The first incoming flight, organised by the CIA, was welcomed with desultory bursts of anti-aircraft fire. Half-a-dozen Iraqi artillery shells have hit over the past 24 hours.

But things are changing and, as the days pass, minds are changing too.

A captured Iraqi colonel being held in one of the hangars listened in astonishment as his information minister praised Republican Guard soldiers for recapturing the airport.

He looked at his captors and, as he realised that what he had heard was palpably untrue, his eye filled with tears. Turning to a translator, he asked: "How long have they been lying like this?"

They're back!
Actually, they never left, but I've been giving the Euroweenies a rest lately. However Ananova provides a fish in a barrel - Scientists urge people to stop using English terms:

German scientists are telling the public to stop using words derived from English and use French terms instead.

Armin Burkhardt, who heads the working group on language in politics, calls the project a way of "peaceful linguistic protest".

He is a professor at the German department at Magdeburg University.

In an appeal published by the committee, Burkhardt suggests Germans should buy billets not tickets, go on a rendezvous instead of a date and agree by saying d'accord rather than okay.

He is also calling for "formidable" to replace "cool" and "bonvivant" to replace "playboy".

French expressions have long been part of German, whereas most English expressions only entered the language after World War II.

The group lists about 30 French replacements for English expressions.

Yet, Burkhardt insists the project isn't directed against English-speaking countries.

"But it is meant to show that the political line of the French president and the German chancellor on Iraq have the support of the majority of the public."

D'accord, Armin. That's formidable! But what's the French for "Bite me"?

Who knew?
Iraqi Ambassador to the Arab League, Mohsen Khalil, gives us an update:

"Iraq has now already achieved victory - apart from some technicalities."

Here's a tip, Mohsen. Down at the unemployment office, don't look for a gig in rocket science.

More roaches
AFP reports US marines discover "PLF faction's bomb-making facility" in Iraq:

NEAR BAGHDAD, April 7 (AFP) - US Marines in Iraq have discovered bomb-making facilities at a facility described as a training camp operated by the a faction of the Palestine Liberation Front (PLF), a military spokesman said Monday.

Bomb-making facilities, chemicals, mortars, gas masks and AK-47s were found inside the 20-building complex to the east of Baghdad, said Public Affairs Officer Corporal John Hoellwarth.

The complex, which was the size of a battalion headquarters, featured pictures of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, PLF faction leader Abu Abbas and the PLF's flag, Hoellwarth added.

Other photos included pictures of Abu Abbas posing with a brigadier general from Saddam's Republican Guard inside the camp.

In case you don't remember - PLF "1st Lieutenant" Ahmed Walid Raguib al-Baz was killed in Baghdad, "while confronting the treacherous US air bombardment on Iraq". Translation: he got caught in the rubble from the first strike on Saddam's bunker

Followers of Abu Abbas carried the deadly attack in 1985 on the cruise ship Achille Lauro, but renounced terrorism after the 1993 Oslo peace accords between Israel and Palestinians.

Oh yeah, I believe that. Sounds like they were just simple goat botherers.

Look who's checked in at the roach motel
Jane Perlez at the NY Times in U.S. Commanders Say 3 Battalions Will Stay in Iraqi Capital:

At one of the palaces, half a dozen Syrian soldiers were found, one of them hiding in a refrigerator, military officials said. The Republican Guards responsible for the security of the palace had fled.

And Caroline Glick in the Jerusalem Post - Palestinian, Jordanian gunmen fighting in Baghdad:

The US Army's 3rd infantry division, 2-7 Mechanized Infantry Brigade, is involved in a fierce battle with Palestinian and Jordanian gunmen in the industrial area of southern Baghdad.
...
Military sources are saying that they know from prisoners of war that the Palestinian and Jordanian fighters are attempting to reorganize Iraqi resistance in Baghdad.

Going downtown
Well it was a hot time in the old town last night as Bruce Plante illustrates:



Inveterate Bagcam watchers, waiting for "Bazookas" Lara Logan to provide the latest Saddam Spin, got to see A-10's flying over Baghdad and a impromptu Disinformation Minister press conference on the roof of the Palestine hotel complete with a gargage truck pep rally in the traffic circle outside. Embedded reporter Greg Kelly of Fox News once again had stunning video of the operation.

Down south the British took Basra after playing the damn bagpipes and confirmed that Chemical Ali is now a grease spot on the highway of life. Couldn't have happened to a nicer thug.

It's the lads again
Nicholas Horrock of UPI has an article - Feature: Odyssey of a human shield - that's filled with predictable blather from a "human shield" doing the Baghdad bugout to Jordan with some of his like-minded chums. But I liked one paragraph:

They were roaring down the highway to Amman when they were stopped by a group long-haired, armed men in desert uniforms. They all sat frightened in the bus until one shield, a woman from Australia, jumped up and ran out to talk to the soldiers. He could hear her say "G'day." She had seen the patches. They were Australian special operations soldiers.

Reuters reporter Nadim Ladki also hit the road to Jordan and provides a travelogue. It has the usual Reuters slant, but I found the following of interest:

About 50 miles farther on, things changed. There was an Iraqi military position at the side of the road but it was now manned by coalition special forces. From that point on, anything that looked like it was Iraqi military, wasn't.

There were two checkpoints, at the town of Rutba, with some 20 vehicles and heavy machine guns set up.

My car was stopped by two Arabs who said they were Iraqi forces. But their accent wasn't Iraqi. They asked me to drive ahead 130 feet where there were coalition forces.

One man was wearing a cap with a British flag on it. He asked me in Arabic if he could look into the car. I asked them where they were from. They didn't say, but I'm almost sure they were American, British or Australian.

I asked them what was happening in Rutba. They said there were remnants of Iraqi forces, but they were chasing them out. We chatted. They seemed very relaxed.

Sounds like the plot for a romance novel!
Olga Craig in the Telegraph - Who the **** are you, asked the man from special forces:

As a greeting, it was neither conventional nor civilised - but then neither were the circumstances. I was in retreat, he was advancing.

It was 4pm one afternoon last week on the bridge into Basra, and Saddam Hussein's elite militia were sending a rain of mortar shells and rocket-propelled grenades from the city.

In the smoke and the confusion and the deafening noise, I ran straight into him, my left arm colliding with his assault rifle. "Who the f*** are you?" he asked incredulously, surprised to see a British woman. "Who are you?" was my instinctive response.

Dressed in civvies - cargo trousers and a T-shirt - he didn't look like a soldier. On the other hand, he was obviously British, and he did have an impressive telescopic sight atop his rifle. "You don't need to know," he said ominously. Realisation dawned: he was a member of the special forces.
...
His message communicated, he stopped talking. His departure was as unconventional as his greeting. He simply stalked off.

A few days later, back temporarily in Kuwait City, I watched the bombing of the bridge continue on a television in the lobby of the hotel where I was staying.

Suddenly, without my being aware of his approach, a man appeared at my shoulder. "The last time we met was on that bridge," he said, pointing up at the TV screen. I took my eyes off him for a moment and he did it again. He just disappeared.

The party is just getting started
Marie Colvin in the (UK) Times - Iraqi exiles fly in to incite anti-Saddam uprisings:

Among their ranks were an Iraqi American who had abandoned his grocery store in Missouri and a former nightclub bouncer from London.

Hundreds of Iraqi exiles, assembled under the banner of the Free Iraqi Force, opened a new front in the battle to oust Saddam Hussein yesterday after flying to the south of the country on a perilous mission to incite rebellion in its cities.

Guided by Colonel Ted Seel, a grizzled American Vietnam veteran and expert in psychological warfare, the force will use tribal contacts and guerrilla attacks to trigger uprisings in southern cities such as Basra.

A pretty good article except for a line about "paid a generous £25 a week". £25 is hardly generous and it seems most of them have other reasons:

For these men it is an intimate war. Everyone I met spoke of a brother or sister imprisoned, threatened, tortured or humiliated.