Summary: Here's what I thought you'd like to hear about today: Closing Guantanamo? - Why We Can'tThose Busy Iranians in Iraq - with the Hezbollah ConnectionNew Progress on Reconciliation in Iraq - Calm After the latest Samarra BombingThe Army is not Breaking - Applying Lynch's Rules of War Download Subscribe Add Wizbang Podcast to iTunes Closing Guantanamo? - Why We Can't One of the most persistent rumors in Washington these days is that we are just about to close the detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. It usually starts by someone demanding that we should just shut down the center and try all the prisoners in criminal courts in the U.S. That leads to a question to some high ranking official asking if we are going to close it. For example, the following clip from a press conference June 29 in which Secretary Gates is asked about Gitmo. Play clip. In truth the issue is much more complex than just sensitive intelligence sources. It's also about the methods of capture. Many of the prisoners were seized on the battlefield, where normal criminal police procedures were not on the minds of our soldiers. There was no CSI Miami crew that descended on the crime scene to scrub it for evidence when Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was captured. And what would they be charged with? Is it really a crime for a citizen of Afganistan to wage jihad against an American soldier? Of course not, it's a war. The Pentagon detainee policy was the subject of a blogger's conference call on June 26 that I participated in. Michael Goldfarb of the Weekly Standard has a good writeup of the call. There's another from UPI. I'm going to play a few clips from the call that explain why we are not going to close Guantanamo any time soon. The first clip is me asking about the difference between criminals and combatants. Play clip. Grim from Blackfive asked next about what's next for the detainees. Later, I ask about the rumors of closure that periodically surface. Play clip. I think Liotta captured the reason this rumor keeps coming up: Some people allow their wishes to get ahead of their ears. Those Busy Iranians in Iraq - with the Hezbollah Connection Last February, some officers in Iraq, lead by Major General Caldwell, put on a show of Iranian weapons seized in Iraq. The press conference was highly criticized because of some over the top remarks about how much the Iranian government was involved in the activity. I covered this in my podcast at the time. Since that time there has been tremendous intelligence efforts made to make the case that Iran is highly unhelpful in Iraq. On July 2, Brig. Gen. Kevin J. Bergner took another run at exposing Iranian involvement in Iraq. He was exceptionally well prepared. No offense to Major General Caldwell, but General Bergner blew the doors off this issue. They have documents, interrogation results, and network connections back to Hezbollah in Lebanon that show how deep the Iranian connection goes. I'm going to play several clips from his presentation. Thanks to the Pentagon for the transcript and the audio. At this point he begins talking about the Iranian connection to what are called Special Groups. Play clip. This description of Daqduq is just one of the Iranian directed bad guys seized or killed in Iraq. General Bergner described others in his talk. The Q&A that followed his presentation was good also. Here's Lara Logan of CBS, and Michael Ware of CNN asking some great questions. Play clip. Of course the next question is what to do about Iran. Anybody have any ideas? Senator Lieberman on Face the Nation on June 10 had one: Play clip. New Progress on Reconciliation in Iraq - Calm After the latest Samarra Bombing I was invited to another bloggers conference call set up by the Pentagon on June 21 with Colonel Michael Hoyt, who is the senior chaplain officer in Iraq. He was on to talk about a little noticed religious summit held the previous week that drew top leaders of Sunni, Shi'a, Christian, Yezidi, and the Kurds to a conference on
