Azzaman, Iraq

Iraq's Car Bombers - Who are They?

"We have yet to hear of the authorities identifying the owner of a single vehicle used in a car bombing or even where it came from."

By Akram Abdulrazzaq

February 7, 2007

Iraq – Azzaman – Original Article (English)

In the nearly four years since the American invasion, a cheap and insane form of death has roamed freely through Iraqi cities and towns. Every day there are car bombs and explosions, which have killed in the hundreds of thousands.

It is estimated that some 5,000 car bombs have gone of so far, which amounts to setting off of hundreds of tons of explosives.

And all this is going on as we are in the custody of the world's mightiest military power, which has been forced to boost its troop levels to pacify a capital city it occupied four years ago.

Whether the result of explosives, car bombs, insurgents, criminals, ongoing American military operations or murderous militias, the violence is taking place right under the noses of U.S. and Iraqi security forces.

The bombings - whether they target U.S. troops or innocent Iraqis - are so advanced that they have to have an army of experts and technicians behind them.

These attacks are devouring Iraqi children, women and elderly. It is innocent Iraqis that are the main fodder of this cruel and vicious circle of violence.

American authorities and the Iraqi government have failed dramatically to check the violence. All they seem to do is condemn these acts and blame them on al-Qaeda linked terrorists and Saddam Hussein loyalists.

But Iraqis are not persuaded by these naive excuses. They need the Americans and the Iraqi authorities they support to tell them where in the world all these car bombs are coming from. How is it that they manage to sneak through so many American and Iraqi checkpoints and road blocks, especially in Baghdad?

Don't these cars have registrations and serial numbers? We have yet to hear of the authorities identifying the owner of a single vehicle used in a car bombing or even where it came from.

Before Baghdad fell to U.S. troops, the country had a sophisticated car registration system, and the authorities were able to identify the owner of any wrecked vehicle in a matter of minutes.

Iraqis have a right to ask whether the U.S. has any military, intelligence or scientific capacity left in Iraq. What is the government doing? Does it have any plan at all?

The U.S. and Iraqi governments are discussing a new security plan. But if they can't even say who owns what car in Baghdad, how in the world will they manage to widen their control over a sprawling city of six million people?

The new Baghdad security plan is merely an attempt to contain Iraqi fury over U.S. and government failure. It will certainly end in a fiasco, just like the plans that came before it.

Instead of it being "a decisive attack on terror in the capital," as they claim, the plan will only add more fuel to the raging fire of violence, intensifying tensions and increasing the number of violent incidents.