Continuing disaster in Iraq - 9th anniversary bombings

As the US and UK governments gear up for their next Middle Eastern war - most favoured venue, Iran – a reminder of the continuing bloody disaster we unleashed on Iraq.   On the 9^th anniversary of the invasion, at least 30 people have been killed in a series of bombings in the country.

Two car bombs in the mainly Shia city of Karbala are said to have killed at least 13 people, while another in the northern city of Kirkuk caused the deaths of at least seven.   A pregnant woman died in Fallujah.

Bombings are now part of the daily pattern of life in Iraq.    In January, a suicide bomber killed 53 people in an attack on Shi’ite pilgrims in Basra in the south.   Then a few days later another suicide bomber killed 31 mourners at a Shi’ite funeral in Baghdad.

Nearly 5,000 soldiers in the invading armies were killed, but we have no real idea of the number of Iraqi civilians who have paid with their lives.    Few now contest that it is well over 100,000, but we will probably never know the true number because, as Nikita Khrushchev said of the authorities’ indifference to those who died in the great Soviet famine of 1932-3: ‘no one was counting.’

Iraq chaos continues Part 94

The carnage unleashed by Messrs Blair and Bush when they plotted their invasion of Iraq nearly 8 years ago still continues. The death toll from a suicide bomb yesterday aimed at Shi’ite pilgrims near the city of Samarra has risen to 48. Another 80 people have been injured.

The bomber detonated his explosives at a bus depot as Shi’ites were gathering to commemorate the death of one of their most revered imams. Some are blaming al-Qaeda.

Hardly a day goes by in Iraq without a bombing or some other terrorist attack. Last month, dozens of Shi’ite pilgrims were killed in attacks near the holy city of Kerbala, while last Wednesday, at least seven died in the northern city of Kirkuk.

* I was going to keep this under my hat a little longer, but the all-seeing internet has revealed that I’m writing a new book - Britain’s Worst Military Disasters: from the Roman Conquest to the fall of Singapore. Here are a couple of links:-

https://www.waterstones.com/waterstonesweb/products/john+withington/britain27s+worst+military+disasters/8396464/

http://www.whsmith.co.uk/CatalogAndSearch/ProductDetails.aspx?ProductID=9780752461977

Carry on covering up + a great fire of London

As Labour continues to try to hide the truth about Iraq (see my blog of June 16), in that unhappy country itself, the bombs go on exploding. The death toll from the latest – a huge truck bomb in Kirkuk – has now risen to at least 72. It went off as worshippers were leaving a Shia mosque, and there is speculation that it could be the work of al-Qaeda.

Meanwhile it’s been revealed that Tony Blair has been lobbying Gordon Brown to keep the Iraq inquiry secret. Apparently, he wasn’t very keen on being questioned in public and under oath about the decision to bomb, invade and occupy. I’ll bet he wasn’t. Not sure how much persuading was required, though. Do you think Mr Brown himself, not to mention Messrs Straw and Hoon would have been queuing up to tell us all?

On this day….148 years ago, what was then London’s worst fire since the Great Fire of 1666 broke out in the great line of warehouses that stretched between Tooley Street and the south bank of the Thames. The buildings were packed with inflammable goods – cotton, sugar, oil, tallow – and once they had got going, the flames spread mercilessly. The river itself caught fire as burning rum floated on its surface.

The Tooley Street inferno claimed the life of London’s first ever fire chief, James Braidwood – killed when a wall collapsed on him. The flames raged out of control for two days, and it was a whole month before they were put out completely. For more details, see The Disastrous History of London.