ADM Mark Fox, Chief flack for MNF-I, said on Monday that violence is down in Iraq, and things are improving. [emph added throughout]

BAGHDAD — Attacks and violent incidents in Iraq are down, but Iraqi and Coalition forces still have a lot of work ahead, a top Coalition spokesman in Iraq said today.

“In a whole sense there is no question about the fact that, in our minds, the trend is going in the right direction,” said Navy Rear Adm. Mark I. Fox, communications division chief for Multi National Force-Iraq. “Our efforts to continue the reduction in violence will allow Iraqi society to begin to mend. There is a lot of hard work to do.”

Hard work means stopping extremists before they strike, Fox said in a news briefing. To that end, he said, Iraqis are reporting insurgent activity in their neighborhoods.

Well, that is certainly good news, although not really unexpected from the new guy in the job. Is it likely that he’s going to start broadcasting bad news right away? “Things are trending on the right direction” is very promising. A pessimist might wonder whether Iraqis reporting insurgent activity means they’re ratting out the bastards or just calling for help because there are so many.

A boost to local neighborhoods this week is the addition of some 744 new Iraqi Policemen who graduated Sept. 20 from the Baghdad Police Academy. Thousands more new Iraqi Security Force members are expected in the coming months.

“Another class of 800 will graduate Tuesday,” Fox added. “Over the next six months, some 12,000 new Iraqi Security Force members will be trained -- a clear indication of local Iraqis taking ownership of their own security.”

Excellent news! Let’s see… September 20th was last Thursday, and we’re graduating 800 on Tuesday (two days ago now) so that means we’re graduating two battalions per week? Or did these 1500 Iraqi police recruits just join up in their own little surge?

Maintaining security in Iraq means keeping al Qaeda off balance and eliminating safe havens terrorists once enjoyed, Fox said. “Al Qaeda is off balance; they’re on their back foot. They’re responding and we own the initiative,” Fox said.

I like this ADM Fox! Al Qaeda is on their back foot in the Tikriti Tango of Death.

The admiral said he is confident the trend toward reducing violence in Iraq will continue as Coalition forces continue to pressure extremists.

In other news…..

BAGHDAD (AFP) - Iraq was on Wednesday rocked by powerful car and suicide bombings that killed 28 people, bringing the toll in a three-day surge of bloodletting across the country to about 70, officials said.

"There was an increase in violence in the past few days," US military spokesman Major General Kevin Bergner told reporters in Baghdad. "We had been expecting it."

But….but… ADM Fox just said on Monday that things were getting better! And on Wednesday, MG Bergner is saying things have gotten worse? Do these two guys talk to each other? Are they from competing propaganda offices?

In one of Wednesday's attacks, a suicide bomber smashed his car into the house of a tribal sheikh who had been supporting police in the fight against Al-Qaeda and detonated his explosives, killing eight people and wounding 10, an official said. The sheikh was among those wounded.

The attack in the town of Sinjar, west of the main northern city of Mosul, targeted the home of Sheikh Kanan al-Juhaimur, a Sunni tribal leader, according to the mayor of the town, Dakheel Qasim Hassu.
…
The attack comes almost two weeks after the killing in a car bomb attack in Anbar province of top Sunni Sheikh Abdul Sattar Abu Reesha, who had spearheaded a fight against Al-Qaeda through his Anbar Awakening Conference coalition of tribal leaders in the vast desert province.

It’s beginning to look like it’s open season on tribal sheiks in the north and west. I suppose those 1500 new trained police are going to be busy.

The Iraqi authorities and US military have been trying to duplicate the Anbar Awakening process in other parts of the country but on Monday another initiative, at Shifta near the restive city of Baquba north of Baghdad, was targeted by a suicide bomber who struck during a reconciliation meeting.

Police said 28 people were killed and 34 wounded in the attack, which took place in a mosque during a meeting of local leaders of the Shiite Mahdi Army militia and the rival Sunni insurgent group, the Brigades of the 1920 Revolution.

Synchronised car bombs, meanwhile, ripped through a crowded marketplace in the town of Shargat, 300 kilometres (185 miles) north of Baghdad, on Wednesday killing at least seven people, police said.

A cynical man might begin to wonder whether all these attempts at duplicating the “Anbar Awakening” are doomed to failure. Bad karma? Has anyone checked the soles of Mr Bu$h’s shoes? Has he been walking too close to Barney?

The truth of the matter is that Sheik Sittar, who started this “Anbar Awakening” thing just saw a golden opportunity to score. All of the western tribes were resentful of a-Q’s push into their area, because they brought their fundamentalist ideology with them. That meant no more cigarettes, no whiskey, and no sexy. No more girlfriends or tent dancers, which must have been annoying. It was a lucky break for them that COL Sean MacFarland bumped into Sheik Sittar by accident.

MacFarland understood immediately the sway Sheik Abdul Sittar holds in Ramadi when he met the tribal leader for the first time in August. "The walls were just lined with guys in the sheik robes," MacFarland says, describing the scene at Sittar's compound when he arrived for a formal meeting with the sheik shortly after assuming command in the area. Among Sittar's guests that day were local police officials who often fail to turn up for meetings called by the governor of Anbar Province, Maamoun Sami Rashid al-Awani. And there were other prominent local leaders sometimes difficult to corral. "I go down and see to the governor about once a week, and it's just me and the governor," says MacFarland, who views Sittar's ability to fill a room as a measure of the respect and authority he commands. "I go into sheik Sittar's house, and the place is packed."

As we have learned, Sheik Sittar was a brigand, a convoy robber, and suddenly a US Marine colonel arrives with dufflebags full of money. It was a lucky match. Attempts to copy that in other provinces have been less than successful.

Much like the coordination between ADM Fox’s and MG Bergner’s dueling propaganda offices.