Five other bodies: MNF-I (Caldwell), “Operational Update,” June 26, 2006.
Zarqawi gurgled blood: Multi-National Force–Iraq (Major General William B. Caldwell IV), “Iraq Operational Update” (briefing), June 12, 2006.
Zarqawi was dead: Time lines emerge from Caldwell’s June 12 and June 15 press briefings.
minutes after 3:30 A.M.: Multi-National Force–Iraq (Major General William B. Caldwell IV), “Iraq Operational Update” (briefing), June 8, 2006.
announcing Zarqawi’s death: John F. Burns, “Leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq Has Been Killed,” New York Times, June 8, 2006.
“Although the designated leader”: “Statement by U.S. Forces in Iraq,” New York Times, June 8, 2006.
parliament dropped their vetoes: “The killing of Mr. Zarqawi brought immediate political results in the form of parliamentary approval, immediately after the news conference, of Mr. Maliki’s nominees” (John Burns, “U.S. Strike Hits Insurgent at Safehouse,” New York Times, June 8, 2006).
relieved to see him go: Lawrence Wright, author of The Looming Tower, wrote in The New Yorker following the strike, “Among those quietly celebrating the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi last week, no doubt, were Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, the leaders of Al Qaeda, who have watched their nominal ally wreck the standing of their organization among Muslims around the world” (“The Terrorist,” New Yorker, June 19, 2006). Some commentators went further. Michael Scheuer, who ran the CIA’s Alec Station during the late 1990s, claimed that killing Zarqawi had been a strategic error—that our enemy was making such grand mistakes we should not have interrupted him. I find this untenable.
“fight the apostate infidels simultaneously”: Nibras Kazimi, “Zarqawi’s Anti-Shi’a Legacy: Original or Borrowed?” Current Trends in Islamist Ideology, August 2, 2006, 53–54.
self-propelling cycle: The Pentagon’s August 2006 report “Measuring Stability and Security in Iraq” gave the following assessment of violence: “Since the last report, the core conflict in Iraq changed into a struggle between Sunni and Shi’a extremists seeking to control key areas in Baghdad, create or protect sectarian enclaves, divert economic resources, and impose their own respective political and religious agendas. Death squads and terrorists are locked in mutually reinforcing cycles of sectarian strife, with Sunni and Shi’a extremists each portraying themselves as the defenders of their respective sectarian groups. However, the Sunni Arab insurgence remains potent and viable, although its visibility has been overshadowed by the increase in sectarian violence.” Department of Defense, “Measuring Stability and Security in Iraq,” August 2006, 26.
previously mixed neighborhoods drained: Between the late February Samarra mosque bombing and August of 2006, 22,977 families, or 137, 862 individuals, had been displaced (ibid.).
3,149 Iraqis died: Michael O’ Hanlon and Ian S. Livingston, “Brookings Iraq Index,” Brookings Institution, December 21, 2006, 10.
1,855 Iraqi corpses: Edward Wong and Damien Cave, “Iraqi Death Toll Rose Above 3,400 in July,” New York Times, August 15, 2006.
90 percent of them executed: DOD, “Measuring Stability,” 34.
CHAPTER 14: NETWORKED
On June 5, 2006: Information about Ramadi and my recollection of this event were aided by interviews with members of the task force who served there and were on this operation.
Only one hundred policemen: These figures, from May 2006, are from page 44 of Neil Smith and Sean MacFarland’s paper recounting their campaign for Ramadi (“Anbar Awakens: The Tipping Point,” Military Review (March–April 2008).