"Saddam's spy" is mostly responsible for the "successful" Troop Surge

An enigmatic military intelligence officer from the old Iraqi Army is leading a revolt that has reduced the bloodshed in Baghdad
www.timesonline.co.uk...

Amariyah has experienced a startling rebirth since that western-style shootout. In May its streets were filled with corpses being picked over by stray dogs. American troops ventured in rarely. When they did, they used heavily armoured vehicles, several of which were blown apart by mines.

Now the shops and cafés are open, and schoolchildren and women stroll the streets. Mr al-Obeidi’s men patrol on foot with American troops and Iraqi soldiers.

It has been a precarious journey from al-Qaeda fiefdom to what US commanders see as a possible model for the future of Iraq. The process has not been made clearer by the mystique surrounding the enigmatic man at the centre of the revolt.

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US general says Iran helping stop Iraq bloodshed
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BAGHDAD (AFP) — A US general on Wednesday acknowledged Iran's role in helping quell the bloodshed in Iraq, saying Tehran had contributed to stopping the flow of arms across the border into the country.
Lieutenant General James Dubik, who is in charge of training Iraqi security forces, said Tehran was keeping to its pledge of stopping the smuggling of weapons to Iraqi extremists.


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Troops Find Iraq Torture House; Iran Helping Stem Weapons Flow
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Brig. Gen. James Boozer said forces found execution equipment and chains in the house in the Diyala River Valley, an Al Qaeda stronghold north of Baghdad, as he touted progress in bolstering Iraqi security forces and said Iran seems to be holding to a commitment to thwart the flow of weapons into Iraq.


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Foreign Fighters in Iraq Are Tied to Allies of U.S.

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BAGHDAD — Saudi Arabia and Libya, both considered allies by the United States in its fight against terrorism, were the source of about 60 percent of the foreign fighters who came to Iraq in the past year to serve as suicide bombers or to facilitate other attacks, according to senior American military officials.
The data come largely from a trove of documents and computers discovered in September, when American forces raided a tent camp in the desert near Sinjar, close to the Syrian border. The raid's target was an insurgent cell believed to be responsible for smuggling the vast majority of foreign fighters into Iraq.

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As violence continues to drop and hundreds of Iraqis return home each day, a result of extinguishing the influence of Al Qaeda, many eyes are focusing on the negative impact of Iran's involvement in Iraq.
With Al Qaeda's violence waning, Iran's meddling is increasingly sky-lined against Iraq's reformation.
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