There’s a lot of debate about how the terrorists will react to the new plan as it is implemented. Will they keep their heads down, bug out and attack somewhere else, or stand and fight a really messy fight? Unfortunately, they know the basic details of our plan, the approximate numbers of troops involved, and the short timeline we’re working with. I’d say the advantage is theirs.
There was no official timeline for the launch of the new security plan, but U.S. Colonel Douglass Heckman, the senior adviser to the 9th Iraqi Army Division, said it was expected to begin shortly after a transition of military control in the city.
“Officially the Baghdad Operational Command takes over tomorrow, so the expectation is that the plan will be implemented soon thereafter, very soon thereafter,” he said, according to The Associated Press.
Two Iraqi newspapers have reported the operation, the third attempt since May 2006 to pacify the capital, would begin Monday.
Heckman said thousands of U.S. and Iraqi reinforcements already were in place for the neighborhood-by-neighborhood sweep to clamp off the violence by Sunni insurgents and Shiite militia, AP said.
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