Apology guy: Col. Richard Francey said we were "deeply saddened"--but that's not enough.

Seems that an American colonel (above) calling an authorized military raid to secure stinkin' Iraqi territory against violent attack a "terrible tragedy" isn't sufficient. More grovelling, says Iraq, and now. Reuters reports:

The Iraqi government has asked General Ray Odierno, the U.S. commander in Iraq, for an official apology for a U.S. raid this week that killed two people and kicked off a tide of condemnation, an official said on Tuesday.

"The prime minister sent a letter to the commander of multinational forces in Iraq condemning this act. He asked for an official apology and asked that such acts not be repeated," said Major General Qassim Moussawi, Baghdad security spokesman.

Meanwhile, Bloomberg is reporting that the Iraqi Council of Ministers (whoo, whoo) has called the raid “an unacceptable breach of the withdrawal of forces agreement between the parties.”

As I wrote yesterday, good--or, rather, good riddance! The gall of these people--which goes virtually unnoted in the US as does the obvious question it prompts: What are we doing there? Why are we trying to secure a country for people who want to put our forces on trial for doing so?

This incident marks the first time Iraq's PM has called for putting Americans on trial, but it's a long time coming. Last July, Der Spiegel reported:

He [Maliki] also bemoaned the fact that Baghdad has little control over the US troops in Iraq. "It is a fundamental problem for us that it should not be possible, in my country, to prosecute offences or crimes committed by US soldiers against our population," Maliki said.

Thanks to this SOFA -- another barely noted travesty -- anything's possible.