Centerfield

Prime guess: The raid was the result of inf0rmation obtained from the raids that captured top IRANIAN officials in Baghdad.

The headline's bad in another way as well. "Close Adviser to Sadr Dies in U.S.-Iraqi Raid." They make it sound like he died of fright, or had a stroke.

Better: "Close Adviser to Sadr KILLED in Iraqi-U.S. Raid"

But "dies" takes less space than "killed" -- which can often be a controlling factor when composing a headline. Some really obscure words became common simply because headline writers needed a shorter word to say the same thing (or at least something arguably similar).

Accuracy is rarely controlling when headlines are done.

Jon,

The headline, of course, was mostly wrong: it was Iraqi troops taking the initiative on this, the US troops were merely advisors;

Indeed, this is usually the case, but I'm wondering where you got the inf*rmation to support this assessment. Admittedly, I have no oversight and little knowledge of the details about this particular operation (although one of the SF team leaders was my classmate at West Point). However, the perception among the Iraqis in Najaf and Karbala is that this operation was almost exclusively US-led, with little or no Iraqi buy-in.

This is significant because just a week ago, Najaf went PIC (Provincial Iraqi Control- basically, responsibility for securing the battlespace transfers from US to Iraqi officials, and it brings some limitations on what the US can do without prior coordination with Iraqi security forces). Prior to PIC, the Coalition controls and directs security in a province and tells the Iraqi security forces what to do; after PIC, the Iraqis control and direct security in their province, and Americans have to work through their leadership if we want to do something.

At least according to officials in Najaf, the US did not coordinate this operation through their offices, and simply swept in with their own hand-picked Iraqi security force in support. While it was tactically brilliant, one can imagine the strategic tension it has caused on the part of Iraqi provincial officials across the country who are wondering what's the point of working to PIC, if the US is simply going to ignore the very rules that we ourselves set up?

My guess is that this operation had been in the works for weeks, and when PIC got pushed up to December, the SF decided to go ahead with it, because the value-added in neutralizing Sahib al-Amiri (by all accounts, a bad guy) was worth the negative effect of souring relations with the locals (also, the SF don't interface with the provincial officials, so it's not their problem to deal with). And, indeed, it hasn't detrimentally affected my relationship with Karbala officials (although they were keen to tell me that when they go PIC, they don't want a similar situation occurring).

But, as always, there are no free lunches, every action has an opposite reaction, and be wary of those who would promise otherwise.

But "dies" takes less space than "killed"

True.

Accuracy is rarely controlling when headlines are done.

Also true--but I'd extend that to the articles as well. Accuracy has not been recent hallmark of journalism.

Yeah, that line of causation sounds likely to me.