Huge (And Excellent) War Updates!

Several major, major pieces of news to pass along to you about the War on Terror.

First, Right Truth posts some links to a story from WorldNetDaily that indicate Iraq shipped WMDs to Syria before the U.S.-led invasion back in 2003:

A former American overseer of Iraqi prisons says several dozen inmates who were members of Saddam Hussein's military and intelligence forces boasted of helping transport weapons of mass destruction to Syria and Lebanon in the three months prior to Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Don Bordenkircher – who served two years as national director of prison and jail operations in Iraq– told WND that about 40 prisoners he spoke with "boasted of being involved in the transport of WMD warheads to Syria."

A smaller number of prisoners, he said, claimed "they knew the locations of the missile hulls buried in Iraq."

Some of the inmates, Bordenkircher said, "wanted to trade their information for a release from prison and were amenable to showing the locations."

The prisoners were members of the Iraqi military or civilians assigned to the Iraqi military, often stationed at munitions facilities, according to Bordenkircher. He said he was told the WMDs were shipped by truck into Syria, and some ended up in Lebanon's Bekaa Valley.

This is not the first time we've seen this information (I blogged about it here over a year ago), but it does serve as yet another confirmation from independent sources.  With repeated confirmations, wouldn't it be logical to conclude that the story is accurate?  And yet, we still hear the mantra of how Bush lied about WMDs from the Left.  It's pitiful, really.  This report also busts another Lefty myth, confirming the presence of Al Qaeda in Iraq before the war and active assistance in training and support from Saddam Hussein's regime.  Darn those pesky facts!

Next, Little Green Footballs reports on a Washington Post story that indicates the leader of 'Al Qaeda in Iraq' needs to get new business cards printed up:

The leader of the Sunni insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq and several of his top lieutenants have recently left Iraq for Afghanistan, according to group leaders and Iraqi intelligence officials, a possible further sign of what Iraqi and U.S. officials call growing disarray and weakness in the organization.

Excellent work, men and women of the U.S. Armed Forces!

Next we have a report that Al Qaeda's #2 man, Ayman al-Zawahiri may have been killed in a recent U.S. missile strike in Waziristan.  Zawahiri's death has been reported a couple times before, so we'll have to wait for the confirmation before celebrating too much, but if they actually got him this time, it would be a monster blow to what's left of Al Qaeda.  I'll let you know when the confirmation comes in.

Finally, UPI.com posts a story that U.S. combat-related deaths are at an all-time low since the Iraq war began:

Iraq combat in July claimed five U.S. military lives, by far the lowest monthly U.S. death toll of the 5-year-old war, U.S. government reports say.

The report represents a dramatic drop from a year ago, when more than 100 troops a month were killed for several consecutive months.

U.S. President George Bush suggested the decreasing violence in Iraq would allow him to withdraw additional troops before leaving office in January, the Post said.

Bush has also now gone on the record:

"[T]here now appears to be a degree of durability to the gains that we have made.  We are now in our third consecutive month with reduced violence levels holding steady.  We have now brought home all five of the combat brigades and the three Marine units that were sent to Iraq as part of the surge. The last of these surge brigades returned home this month."

Troop withdrawals because of victory - that's what Americans wanted!  Not surrender, not premature withdrawal, but an orderly drawdown as the result of victory.

So there you have it.  The war is all good news.  That's why you're not hearing much -- if anything -- about it in the MSM.

There's my two cents.