Encouraging News from the Front

• From Bill Roggio's Iraq Report: Attacking Mahdi, al Qaeda prison camp in Diyala May 27, 2007:

  This morning, U.S. and Iraq forces struck yet again against the Mahdi Army in Sadr City. The joint force captured yet another member of a network "known for facilitating the transport of weapons and explosively formed penetrators, or EFPs, from Iran to Iraq, as well as bringing militants from Iraq to Iran for terrorist training." This is the third such raid in Sadr City in 48 hours. Seventeen members of this network have been killed and 32 captured during numerous raids over the past three weeks. . . .

  In Diyala province, where al Qaeda has established a stronghold, Iraqi and U.S. security forces have broke up an al Qaeda "prison camp" and captured 7 al Qaeda during two separate raids. Today, a joint U.S. and Iraqi Army raid rescued 41 Iraqi civilians "showing signs of having been tortured or mistreated" from an al Qaeda run prison camp just south of the city of Baqubah. "Many of them showing signs of mistreatment ranging from broken bones and bruises to heat injuries caused by being held with insufficient water," AFP noted.

• Memorial Day Message from Michael Yon, milblogger and combat photographer Michael Yon has good news from Mosul:

  Long-time readers know that I deliver bad news with the good. I was first to write that parts of Iraq were in civil war back in February 2005, well over a year before mainstream outlets started reporting the same. I was also the first to report, back in 2005, that Mosul was making a turn for the better. Mainstream outlets hardly picked up on that story, however, although the turn was easy to see for anyone who was there. When I returned from Afghanistan in the spring of 2006, after writing about the growing threat of a resurgent Taliban, bankrolled with profits from the heroin trade, I wrote that parts of our own military were censoring media in Iraq. The recent skirmishing over blogging from Iraq supports that contention. These reminders are for new readers who do not believe that a province that most media outlets had put at the top of the “hopelessly lost” column is actually turning a corner for the better. . . .

  Although there is sharp fighting in Diyala Province, and Baghdad remains a battleground, and the enemy is trying to undermine security in areas they’d lost interest in, the fact is that the security plan, or so-called “surge,” is showing clear signs of progress.

  Note If I had to recommend two blogs for daily reporting on Iraq and the WOT, it would be Michael Yon and Bill Roggio.