Is the surge working before anyone even arrives?
Al Qaeda terrorists are fleeing Baghdad in advance of President Bush’s 21,500-man troop surge, a senior military intelligence officer told Pajamas Media today. Under orders from the al Qaeda commander in Iraq, Abu Ayyub al-Masri, fighters are streaming toward the Diyala region of Iraq.
This confirms reports posted on Iraq the Model, which cited al-Sabah, a well-known mouthpiece for al Qaeda in Iraq.
In speaking with Pajamas Media the military intelligence officer supplied several new details of the al Qaeda retreat.
The apparent evacuation of Baghdad by al Qaeda forces comes from direct orders issued by al-Masri, the former soldier who took control of the Iraqi wing of al Qaeda following the June 2006 bombing death of Zarqawi.
Initially, the intelligence officer informed Pajamas, the Baghdad-based AQ fighters did not want to leave. Al-Masri had to send unequivocal orders for their retreat, adding that one of the lessons from the Fallujah campaign was that Americans have learned how to prevail in house-to-house fighting. Masri said that remaining in Baghdad was a ‘no-win situation’ for the terrorists.
“In more than ten years of reading al Qaeda intercepts, I’ve never seen language like this,” the intelligence officer said. Usually, al Qaeda communications are full of bravado and false confidence, he added.Al-Masri’s evacuation order – assuming that it is authentic – reveals that al Qaeda in Iraq leader has a good grasp of a tactical situation. “He is far more formidable than Zarqawi was,” the intelligence officer said, because of his training at Soviet special warfare schools.
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