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Two of the three small clinics in the city have been bombed, and in one case, medical staff and patients killed, he said. A U.S. tank was positioned beside the third clinic.
“People are afraid of even looking out the window because of snipers,” he said, asking that he not be named for his own safety. “The Americans are shooting anything that moves.”
The number of civilian casualties in the city is not known. Most of the city’s 200,000-300,000 residents are thought to have fled before the offensive. Those remaining have endured days without electricity, frequent barrages and dwindling food supplies.
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Richard Myers, called the offensive “very, very successful.”
Speaking on NBC’s “Today” show, he acknowledged that guerrillas will move their fight. “If anybody thinks that Fallujah is going to be the end of the insurgency in Iraq, that was never the objective.”
I don't know what to do about Iraq. I do know that no matter how bad the baddies of Fallujah are they weren't a threat to the US or US interests before the war. I don't know what retaking Fallujah will accomplish, or what "retaking it" means, other than increasing our troops presence there. I imagine very little good, and a lot that is possibly bad. And, no this isn't a criticism of the troops, it's a a criticism of their civilian overlords including Allawi who is credited with giving the orders these days.
I do know that the people involved in getting us into this war and who failed to do a single thing right once Statue-Toppling-Day occurred should have been held responsible. But, sadly, the voters didn't do that on Nov. 2 and now it seems that most of the key people will be promoted, not fired.
And, yes, Americablog is right - the most insightful commentary about the state of affairs before the election did indeed come from Ed Helms of the Daily Show, who raised the rather obvious but overlooked point of how does one run any kind of election campaign during a period of martial law.