Good News from Anbar Province, full text here.
Sometimes ... sometimes it feels pretty damned good to be an American.
Subject: Election Day in Iraq
All Hands:
Major General John Kelly sends this Iraq election notice
Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
I don't suppose this will get much coverage in the States as the news is so good. No, the news is unbelievable.
Something didn't happen in Al Anbar Province, Iraq, today. Once the most violent and most dangerous places on earth, no suicide vest bomber detonated killing dozens of voters. No suicide truck bomber drove into a polling place collapsing the building and killing and injuring over 100. No Marine was in a firefight engaging an Al Qaida terrorist trying to disrupt democracy.
What did happen was Anbar Sunnis came out in their tens of thousands to vote in the first free election of their lives.
(snip)
One of the things I've always said was that we came here to "give" them democracy. Even in the dark days my only consolation was that it was about freedom and democracy. After what I saw today, and having forgotten our own history and revolution, this was arrogance. People are not given freedom and democracy - they take it for themselves. The Anbaris deserve this credit.
Today I step down as the dictator, albeit benevolent, of Anbar Province. Today the Anbaris took it from me. I am ecstatic. It was a privilege to be part of it, to have somehow in a small way to have helped make it happen.
Semper Fi.
Kelly
Sometimes ... sometimes it feels pretty damned good to be an American.
