Tag: iraq

From Iraq to Iran: What the latest war revealed about US airpower

During nearly six weeks of the war on Iran, the US has suffered heavy military aircraft losses, now exceeding those recorded during the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Iran’s recent downing of an American F-35 jet marks the first time in 23 years that a US fighter jet has been shot down in combat; the previous instance was in Iraq in 2003, when an A‑10 was lost. 

Over the seven years of the Iraq campaign from 2003 to 2009, total US aviation losses amounted to 129 helicopters and 24 fixed‑wing aircraft, with only 46 attributed to hostile fire. The remaining cases were due to malfunctions, fuel exhaustion, and pilot error.

Since the start of the Iran war, the US has lost at least 44 aircraft, including the first incident of the US fifth-generation stealth F-35 Lightning II being hit. The list includes four F-15E Strike Eagle (the Wall Street Journal cited a fact sheet stating that the original model costs at least $31 million, while the cost of newer models is close to $100 million), two A-10 Thunderbolt IIs, two Lockheed C-130 Hercules, two Boeing E-3 Sentries, eight Boeing KC-135 Stratotankers, one Boeing CH-47 Chinook, one Sikorsky HH-60 Pave Hawk (damaged), two Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawks (damaged), four MH-6 Little Bird helicopters, and 17 General Atomics MQ-9 Reapers (at about $30 million each, totalling close to $500 million).

High-value AWACS and multiple KC-135 tankers were damaged by Iranian strikes on regional airbases.  In the first four days of the war, Iran hit almost all US military bases (or locations hosting US aircraft) in the Gulf. It struck key US ground radars linked to the THAAD air‑defense system, other early‑warning radars, and multiple radar and communication nodes.

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Did Democrat Senator Mark Kelly Just Admit to Committing War Crimes During Desert Storm?

Commentator Wiz Buckley criticized current claims of potential war crimes tied to U.S. military strategy involving Iran, pointing to past military operations and raising questions about consistency in how such actions are evaluated.

Speaking during an interview, Buckley framed his remarks by emphasizing the broader perspective of military personnel.

“Well, good afternoon, Emily. Thank you for having me,” he began.

“I want to lead with this. There is not a young man or woman out on the tip of the spear that wants any of this war is the ultimate failure of the human condition.”

Buckley said that members of the U.S. military operate under the direction of civilian leadership.

“So just know that the United States military wants to avoid all of this,” he said, adding, “but we follow the orders of the Commander in Chief.”

He then turned to what he described as a reaction from critics who have raised concerns about possible war crimes.

“And Emily, I got to be honest with you,” Buckley said.

“Let me lead with this. The people frothing at the mouth today, clutching their pearls about alleged war crimes.”

Buckley specifically referenced Senator Mark Kelly, a former naval aviator, in his remarks. “If the president decides to target infrastructure, and I’m going to target a fellow naval aviator, the guy is just making my skin crawl right now is Captain Mark Kelly,” Buckley said.

He pointed to U.S. military operations during the Gulf War as a comparison. “Captain Kelly flew A-6s in Desert Storm,” Buckley said.

He referenced the opening phase of the conflict, describing it as “shock and awe in the first 24 to 48 to 72 hours of Desert Storm,” and stated that “all we targeted was infrastructure, power plants, TVs, bridges, roads.”

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Downed U.S. Drone Appears On TikTok Live As Iraqi Children Try To Sell It

As the U.S.-Iran conflict enters its second month, America’s Low-Cost Unmanned Combat Attack System, or LUCAS, is becoming increasingly visible across the Middle East theater, a sign that the Department of War has learned one critical lesson from both the Iranian drone playbook and the Ukraine-Russia war: cheap drones are the future of warfare.

The latest news on LUCAS comes from an unverifiable TikTok video, amplified on X, which appears to show a downed drone seized by Iraqi children who are reportedly trying to sell it.

If authentic, the footage is another reminder that low-cost drones are proliferating so widely across the region that they will likely spread to other parts of the world.

In a separate video reposted on X, Iranian forces appear to have recovered a LUCAS drone in the Persian Gulf area.

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Two Different Wars, Two Different Presidents, But the Same Lies

I’m writing this piece well into President Donald Trump’s new war with Iran, which, with the help of Israel, has already killed more than 2,000 civilians, including 175 schoolgirls and staff; displaced some 3.2 million people; and is costing the American taxpayer at least one billion dollars a day. All of which is tragically reminiscent of the last time a Republican president led the U.S. into a war on a river of lies and greed. I’m thinking, of course, about George W. Bush and the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Weapons that don’t exist. Threats to this country that aren’t real. Liberation for a people that the U.S. will never win over. Freedom for women about whom nobody in power cares a jot. A war that will bring total victory in only a few days or weeks. All this we heard in 2003, and all this we are hearing again now.

I spent many years writing about the Iraq War, even though it took me some time to figure out how to begin. I was sickened by the Muslim-baiting that had been going on since the 2001 attacks on New York City and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and disgusted with the Hollywood movies and legacy press articles glorifying our vengeful wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, while deifying our soldiers. I wanted to tell a different story. I just didn’t know how.

Then, in 2004, I came across the blog Baghdad Burning by a 24-year-old Iraqi woman who called herself Riverbend. She was the first Iraqi I had ever read on the war, and she taught me that those in an occupied country tell a very different story than do the occupiers.

Back then, if Iraqi men showed up in American books, movies, or journalism at all, it was usually as an enemy or a clown. Meanwhile, Iraqi women were depicted as little more than incomprehensible black-clad figures hovering in the background or wailing over the dead. But Riverbend was none of those. She was a computer technician in a sophisticated city who sounded like an American college student. I was hooked.

Over the next few months, I read her blog religiously. Riverbend’s language and thoughts sounded no different than those of my own daughter, except that she was describing what it was like to live, hour-by-hour, through the overwhelming, heart-freezing violence of a U.S. bombing campaign and the occupation of her country.

Today, we can get the same sense of immediacy by reading or listening to brave civilians and journalists in Gaza, but during our post-9/11 wars on Afghanistan and Iraq, hearing any voice from the “other side” was rare. So, Riverbend’s blog was not only eye-opening, but it made readers like me feel as though we were experiencing the war right beside her. She wove the mundane moments of her days — jokes, lighthearted observations, conversations with her family — in with her terror at the falling bombs and her feelings about the United States as she watched us tear apart her country. Her blog was eventually collected into a book and published by The Feminist Press in 2005.

Soon, I began reading other Iraqi blogs, too, along with every translation I could find of Iraqi poetry and fiction. I also followed videos by Iraqis that were appearing online, telling stories remarkably different from those I was hearing here in the United States. Some of those Iraqi civilians did indeed want democracy, although they didn’t believe it could be forced on anyone by a foreign power or bombs. Some had been satisfied living under Saddam Hussein’s autocratic rule. Many were too focused on their daily struggles to find food and avoid bombs to think about politics at all. But all of them, whatever their thoughts and opinions, were suffering horribly, not only from our bombs, but from wounds, illnesses, malnutrition, starvation, and threats of all kinds, as well as from bullying, kidnappings, rape, and murder at the hands of the gangs and militias our war had unleashed.

One of the most eye-opening of those Iraqi videos was made by an anonymous woman early in the war, who put on a burqa, hid her handheld camera under it, and drove around the countryside interviewing women about their struggles and poverty. As she explained, what she was doing was so dangerous that she had no doubt her video would only remain up on YouTube for a day or so. Sure enough, it quickly disappeared. I only hope that she didn’t disappear with it.

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DoW Identifies Air Force Casualties

The Department of War announced the death of six Air Force Airmen who were supporting Operation Epic Fury.

Maj. John A. Klinner, 33, of Auburn, Ala.; Capt. Ariana G. Savino, 31, of Covington, Wash.; and Tech. Sgt. Ashley B. Pruitt, 34, of Bardstown, Ky., were assigned to the 6th Air Refueling Wing, MacDill Air Force Base, Fla. and Capt. Seth R. Koval, 38, of Mooresville, Ind.; Capt. Curtis J. Angst, 30, of Wilmington, Ohio; and Tech. Sgt. Tyler H. Simmons, 28, of Columbus, Ohio were assigned to the 121st Air Refueling Wing at Rickenbacker Air National Guard Base, Columbus, Ohio.

The six Airmen died on March 12, 2026, in the crash of a KC-135 in western Iraq. The incident is under investigation.

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Iraq and Cuba hit by blackouts amid US pressure and attacks on Iran

Both Iraq and Cuba have been plunged into nationwide blackouts, with the Middle Eastern country’s grid collapsing after a sudden drop in gas supplies to a major power plant in Basra, while the Caribbean island’s outage is being blamed on chronic fuel shortages worsened by the US blockade on Venezuelan oil.

The day before the Iraqi blackout, an Electricity Ministry spokesperson was quoted as saying that “incomplete supplies” of gas from neighboring Iran were already affecting power plant operations. Iran has been facing a massive US-Israeli air campaign since Saturday.

A separate power facility also experienced a shutdown in central Salah al-Din province, with local police explicitly denying reports that the station was targeted by an attack, according to the state-run INA news agency.

Iraq relies on Iranian gas for 30-40% of its power generation. The dependence is a direct consequence of decades of foreign intervention in the country. Before the 1991 Gulf War, the grid, though strained by sanctions, largely met demand. The war destroyed 75% of its generating capacity, and the 2003 US-led invasion caused a catastrophic collapse to less than 10% of prior output.

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They Are Still Lying About Iraq

The lack of shame exhibited by the US government as it lies about Iraqi improvised explosive device (IED) attacks that killed thousands of American service members to justify its new war on Iran is breathtaking. President Trump led off his press conference today, the first since the attacks began Saturday morning, with this lie. Trump’s proxies on cable news, in the newspapers and online have been repeating it non-stop.

The lie is essentially that American soldiers were killed and wounded in Iraq at the orders of the Iranians. That the people responsible for blowing up American vehicles and sending home US soldiers in caskets or without body parts were Iranians, not Iraqis. The reality, of course, is that responsibility for those deaths and mutilations belongs to George W. Bush and every politician, general, government official, journalist, pundit and citizen who supported that war. I put myself into that disgraceful camp as someone who twice went voluntarily to that war.

This lie gets recycled whenever the prospect of war with Iran is present. For example, in 2019, the allegation appeared as the US imposed severe sanctions on Iran and labeled the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps a terrorist organization (the first time the US government designated a government or a military as a terrorist organization). These actions, following the unilateral abrogation of the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran by the US, led to year-long tensions that culminated in the US assassination of Iranian general Qasem Soleimani, who the American government and press labeled as having “American blood on his hands”, and retaliatory Iranian missile attacks on US forces in Iraq.

To begin with, the majority of US service members killed and wounded in the occupation of Iraq were killed by Sunni resistance groups, NOT Shia resistance groups. Sunni groups accounted for more than 80% of American deaths. These Sunni groups did not receive any support from Iran. These Sunni groups, like the Taliban in Afghanistan, did get a great deal of support from persons and institutions throughout Sunni countries in the Middle East, especially from the Gulf monarchies, Saudi Arabia chief among them. Yet, in Washington, DC’s calculus, these states don’t have the blood on their hands that Iran does, even as 4 out of 5 Americans were killed by Iraqi Sunni groups.

Sunni groups did fight against Shia groups that may have had a relationship with Iran. The Shia groups also fought against each other. Some Shia groups fought against the Americans. The Americans killed and wounded by Shia groups using IEDs were killed and wounded by Iraqis, not Iranians. Yes, there was a small Iranian presence in Iraq, acting as advisors to the Shia groups. However, the Iranian role was dwarfed by organic Iraqi resistance to occupation and sectarian commitments to one side or the other in intra-Iraqi fighting.

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US Again Demands Iraq End Maliki Nomination, Or Else

Iraq’s Coordination Framework is still putting forward Nouri al-Maliki as its candidate for prime minister, despite President Trump loudly and repeatedly demand he be withdrawn. The US had reportedly set a deadline of Friday, February 27, to end the candidacy or face unspecified repercussions. What happens next, after the US has attacked Tehran, is anyone’s guess.

If that sounds familiar, it’s because the US had similarly set a “final deadline” for Maliki’s withdrawal last weekend, though that deadline passed with little visible consequence and just more US complaining about Maliki.

With just 24 hours left, the latest deadline doesn’t seem like it’s going to change anything either, with the Framework saying they don’t intend to allow the US to decide who gets to be Iraq’s prime minister.

Furthermore, the indication is that they don’t even intend to hold another meeting on the premiership until next week, well after this deadline will have already passed.

There does not appear to be any other serious candidate being put forward by any part of the Framework, which is the largest bloc in Iraq’s deeply divided parliament.

Maliki served as Prime Minister of Iraq from 2006 through 2014. President Trump has insisted he has “insane policies and ideologies” and cannot be allowed to return to office, though again there are no other serious candidates within the Framework who have come forward to replace him with.

Maliki has sought to return to office for years and though his State of Law Party only won about 6% of the seats in last year’s election, he has the support of Kurdish factions, and the largest party within the Framework, that of current Prime Minister Mohammed al-Sudani, has appeared to accept Maliki’s candidacy after Sudani said he doesn’t intend to serve another term.

It’s a recurring theme in Iraq that after their elections forming a coalition government takes quite some time and a lot of negotiation.

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4,700-Year-Old Discovery Reveals Clues to Cult of Ishtar’s Spread Throughout the Ancient World

Hidden beneath an ancient temple in Assur, Iraq, archaeologists have made a discovery that holds potentially crucial evidence for the cult of Ishtar’s origins in the area.

The researchers behind the discovery date the temple’s foundation to between 2896 BCE and 2702 BCE, saying that it provides crucial evidence for the spread of Mesopotamian ritual practice to northern Iraq and urban life at Assur over 4,700 years ago, revealing the growth of cult worship.

The findings were published in The Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports.

Assur’s Ishtar Temple

Assyria was a major Mesopotamian civilization that began as Assur—initially a meager city-state—and eventually expanded into a much larger empire.

The city itself is located on the western bank of the Tigris River, and during the first millennium BCE, the Neo-Assyrian empire became well established, leaving a rich corpus of well-preserved records about these later periods. Yet, earlier records are murkier or nonexistent, leaving Assur’s beginnings shrouded in mystery.

German archaeologist Walter Andrae first excavated the Ishtar Empire between 1903 and 1914.  However, the deepest layers remained covered until the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich’s Assur Excavation Project in 2024. Modern coring technology has enabled archaeologists to access the temple cella.

“The excavators of the Ishtar temple simply didn’t report it, so we assume they didn’t see it,” lead author Mark Altaweel told The Debrief in an email. “The sand is below the last floor level of the temple, so it is possible they just didn’t dig far enough or reach the bedrock. We basically cored until we hit the bedrock.”

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Dick Cheney’s Legacy Is One of Brutal Carnage

On March 15, 2006, the United States was nearly three years into its second Iraq war. After over a decade of brutal sanctions and continuous bombing, in spring 2003, the US had launched a full-scale invasion of the oil-rich Middle Eastern nation. The invasion was a flagrant violation of international law. After toppling Iraq’s Ba’athist government, a former on-again, off-again ally of Washington, the United States and its allies began a protracted military occupation of Iraq. The neocolonial affair was particularly brutal. Such is the nature of seeking to impose your presence by military force on a people who do not wish it and are willing to use force to oppose it.

That day, March 15, soldiers approached the home of Faiz Harrat Al-Majma’ee, an Iraqi farmer . Allegedly they were looking for an individual believed to be responsible for the deaths of two US soldiers and a facilitator for al-Qaeda recruitment in Iraq. In the version told by US troops, someone from the house fired on the approaching soldiers, prompting a twenty-five-minute confrontation. Eventually the soldiers entered the house, killing all of the residents.

This included not just Al-Majma’ee, but his wife; his three children, Hawra’a, Aisha, and Husam, who were between the ages of five months and five years old; his seventy-four-year-old mother, Turkiya Majeed Ali; and two nieces, Asma’a Yousif Ma’arouf and Usama Yousif Ma’arouf, who were five and three years old. An autopsy performed on the deceased “revealed that all corpses were shot in the head and handcuffed.” After slaughtering the family execution style, US soldiers called in an air strike, destroying the house. The presumed reason for the bombardment was to cover up evidence of the extrajudicial killings.

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