Anbar? Here’s your salvation. This frankly terrifies me; didn’t anyone think to restrain the commander guy? This was about the only counterinsurgency success they’ve had, and it’s been pissed away for the sake of a good TV picture-with-the-sound-off. Seriously. Once Bush shook hands with him on live television, he was as dead as if he’d just had the Mafia kiss of death.
I think Scorsese would probably have cut that as too obvious; among so many other things, these people can’t even be evil with style. Marc Lynch reckons it wasn’t Al-Qa’ida, but instead the NOIA; I have no reason to disagree.