THE US, THE UN AND THE IRAQIS THEMSELVES, V. 7.0

This is the same guy who thought Iraqis were gonna meet our troops as liberators...strewing flowers in their path.





This is the same guy who thought Iraqis were gonna meet our troops as liberators...strewing flowers in their path.






Yes there have...and he is one of them.

This is the same guy who fired top military officials for suggesting that large numbers of troops were going to be needed in Iraq for a long time in order to secure some semblance of peace after the fighting.


etc, etc, etc.

merry christmas frank et al

Calls Effort in Iraq 'Mediocre'

By Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, December 25, 2004; Page A01



The U.S. military invaded Iraq without a formal plan for occupying and stabilizing the country and this high-level failure continues to undercut what has been a "mediocre" Army effort there, an Army historian and strategist has concluded.

"There was no Phase IV plan" for occupying Iraq after the combat phase, writes Maj. Isaiah Wilson III, who served as an official historian of the campaign and later as a war planner in Iraq. While a variety of government offices had considered the possible situations that would follow a U.S. victory, Wilson writes, no one produced an actual document laying out a strategy to consolidate the victory after major combat operations ended.

Looking at the chaos that followed the defeat of the Saddam Hussein regime, a military officer's study says, "The United States, its Army and its coalition of the willing have been playing catch-up ever since." (Michael Robinson-chavez -- The Washington Post)


"While there may have been 'plans' at the national level, and even within various agencies within the war zone, none of these 'plans' operationalized the problem beyond regime collapse" -- that is, laid out how U.S. forces would be moved and structured, Wilson writes in an essay that has been delivered at several academic conferences but not published. "There was no adequate operational plan for stability operations and support operations."

Similar criticisms have been made before, but until now they have not been stated so authoritatively and publicly by a military insider positioned to be familiar with top-secret planning. During the period in question, from April to June 2003, Wilson was a researcher for the Army's Operation Iraqi Freedom Study Group. Then, from July 2003 to March 2004, he was the chief war planner for the 101st Airborne Division, which was stationed in northern Iraq.

A copy of Wilson's study as presented at Cornell University in October was obtained by The Washington Post.

As a result of the failure to produce a plan, Wilson asserts, the U.S. military lost the dominant position in Iraq in the summer of 2003 and has been scrambling to recover ever since. "In the two to three months of ambiguous transition, U.S. forces slowly lost the momentum and the initiative . . . gained over an off-balanced enemy," he writes. "The United States, its Army and its coalition of the willing have been playing catch-up ever since."

It was only in November 2003, seven months after the fall of Baghdad, that U.S. occupation authorities produced a formal "Phase IV" plan for stability operations, Wilson reports. Phase I covers preparation for combat, followed by initial operations, Phase II, and combat, Phase III. Post-combat operations are called Phase IV.

Many in the Army have blamed Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and other top Pentagon civilians for the unexpectedly difficult occupation of Iraq, but Wilson reserves his toughest criticism for Army commanders who, he concludes, failed to grasp the strategic situation in Iraq and so not did not plan properly for victory. He concludes that those who planned the war suffered from "stunted learning and a reluctance to adapt."

Army commanders still misunderstand the strategic problem they face and therefore are still pursuing a flawed approach, writes Wilson, who is scheduled to teach at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point next year. "Plainly stated, the 'western coalition' failed, and continues to fail, to see Operation Iraqi Freedom in its fullness," he asserts.

"Reluctance in even defining the situation . . . is perhaps the most telling indicator of a collective cognitive dissidence on part of the U.S. Army to recognize a war of rebellion, a people's war, even when they were fighting it," he comments.

Because of this failure, Wilson concludes, the U.S. military remains "perhaps in peril of losing the 'war,' even after supposedly winning it."

Overall, he grades the U.S. military performance in Iraq as "mediocre."

Wilson's essay amounts to an indictment of the education and performance of senior U.S. officials involved in the war. "U.S. war planners, practitioners and the civilian leadership conceived of the war far too narrowly" and tended to think of operations after the invasion "as someone else's mission," he says. In fact, Wilson says, those later operations were critical because they were needed to win the war rather than just decapitate Saddam Hussein's government.

Air Force Capt. Chris Karns, a spokesman for the U.S. Central Command, which as the U.S. military headquarters for the Middle East oversaw planning for the war in Iraq, said, "A formal Phase IV plan did exist." He said he could not explain how Wilson came to a different conclusion.

Army Gen. Tommy R. Franks, who as chief of the Central Command led the war planning in 2002 and 2003, states in his recent memoir, "American Soldier," that throughout the planning for the invasion of Iraq, Phase IV stability operations were discussed. Occupation problems "commanded hours and days of discussion and debate among CENTCOM planners and Washington officials," he adds. At another point, he states, "I was confident in the Phase IV plan."

Asked about other officers' reaction to his essay, Wilson said in an e-mail Monday, "What active-duty feedback I have received (from military officers attending the conferences) has been relatively positive," with "general agreement with the premises I offer in the work."

He said he has no plans to publish the essay, in part because he would expect difficulty in getting the Army's approval, but said he did not object to having it written about. "I think this is something that has to get out, so it can be considered," he said in a telephone interview. "There actually is something we can fix here, in terms of operational planning."

In his analysis of U.S. military operations in 2003 in northern Iraq, Wilson also touches on another continuing criticism of the Bush administration's handling of Iraq -- the number of troops there. "The scarcity of available 'combat power' . . . greatly complicated the situation," he states.

Wilson contends that a lack of sufficient troops was a consequence of the earlier, larger problem of failing to understand that prevailing in Iraq involved more than just removing Hussein. "This overly simplistic conception of the 'war' led to a cascading undercutting of the war effort: too few troops, too little coordination with civilian and governmental/non-governmental agencies . . . and too little allotted time to achieve 'success,' " he writes.

Yeah, I was trying to be as purty as you were when you were molting.

Quote, "What Rumsfeld neglected to say was how long and at what cost to people and treasury.. " That's also been my contention from the very beginning. They skirt around this issue - the primary one in my books - every time they open their mouth. It's sad that the right people are not asking the right questions. They always try to give it a positive spin, but it's only because none of them have personally sacrificed anything.

Kara, ..... you ... also ................... molt ....?!?!?!?

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1515&e=3&u=/afp/20041225/wl_mideast_afp/iraquschristmas_041225180609

Birth of Christ reminds US soldiers of their mission in Iraq

BAGHDAD (AFP) - US soldiers in Iraq (news - web sites) celebrated the birth of Jesus while eating Christmas dinner in full body armour, with many explaining how the nativity story continues to motivate their mission in the war-torn country.


Here, soldiers enjoying their traditional Christmas meal put on full head and body armour to eat, a requirement since this week's devastating bombing of another US base in Iraq.


The suicide bombing at a US mess hall in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul on Tuesday killed 22, including 14 US military personnel. That triggered a re-assessment of base security throughout the country and added further tension to the festive season.


Elsewhere on the base, a few dozen soldiers filed into the austere chapel on Camp Cuervo, a base on the northeastern side of Baghdad, where three long rows of bleached pews face a big wooden cross.


On the chapel's stage, five chaplains and soldiers begin playing guitars, an organ and singing in a gospel choir gathered for the start of a special Christmas Day service.


"The shepherds out there were much like we are, doing their job to make sure their flock is safe ... spreading the good news of Jesus," says Chaplain Tim Maracle.


According to Christian belief, an angel appeared to shepherds in fields near Bethlehem to tell them about the birth of Jesus. The shepherds were at first terrified by the glow of the angel, but then went to see the baby for themselves and began spreading the word of Christ's birth.


"Lord, protect every one of us here from the enemies of this dark world throughout the next year, help us to successfully accomplish the mission that our nation has sent us here to do," says Chaplain Steve Prost.


"Ultimately, we do this in service to you as we attempt to shine your light in a dark world until you come again."


Prost tells soldiers they are much like the shepherds "responding to the light and spreading the light in a powerful way."


A seven-member gospel choir of soldiers dressed in green and red festive T-shirts and clapping their hands in the air launch into a passionate rendition of "Go Tell it on the Mountain."


Soldiers get up and sing along as the words are projected on a wall.


"Our overall mission is to bring peace and safety to Iraq and the world," says Sergeant Paul Jarett, 26, from Rochester, Minnesota.


Another soldier says he normally does not go to church but that "something told me to come today."


"We have helped them (Iraqis) go from where they had sewerage on the street to cleaning their own messes and helping them to get back on their feet," says Specialist Ronald Lindsey, 21, from Georgia.


Away from religious services, many soldiers take advantage of the rest time on Christmas to catch up on sleep, write e-mails, watch movies or open gifts from home.


Soldiers at Camp Cuervo's mail room are busy loading up packages sent by families into a truck for distribution.


About 5,000 boxes arrived on Saturday alone, according to Sergeant James McMahon, who has been putting in 16-hour days recently in order to cope with the deluge of mail.

Most of the merriment and parties on Camp Cuervo took place before Christmas Day because of the "threat level", says Lieutenant Casey Swakon.

There were raffles for gifts, as well as talent shows and sport games.

Some soldiers spoke about missing their loved ones or special Christmas meals.

"When I get movies of my child it makes you kind of sad," says Jack Maroney, a reservist from Buffalo, New York, who left for Iraq 10 months ago the same day his daughter was born.

[just offer this as just something to look at and wonder why the soldiers are equating Christianity with the war in Iraq. I don't mean to put down soldiers missing their loved ones or celabrating christmas, but I was simply disturbed by their dragging Jesus into the Iraq equation.]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A23297-2004Dec23?language=printer

Iraqis' Dismay Surges as Lights Flicker and Gas Lines Grow
Leaders Criticized for Energy Shortages
By Karl Vick
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, December 24, 2004; Page A01

BAGHDAD -- The car needed gas, so the Matrood family made a day of it.
Dawn was still hours away when mom and dad bundled the children into their dirty blue Daewoo sedan and set off for the filling station. Dusk was falling when they finally reached the pump, which was flanked by National Guardsmen in ski masks, intelligence officers in jackets and rows of concrete barricades -- all necessary to protect a product as precious as a few gallons of gasoline in Iraq these days.

"There were days when we spent the night here," said Abdul Razzaq Matrood of his family. He counted himself lucky after spending a mere 12 hours in a gas line two miles long. "We brought our blankets to sleep in the car."

Energy shortages of every stripe bedevil this country, which sits atop the world's second-largest petroleum reserves. Electricity shuts off for whole days. Prices of scarce cooking fuel have risen nine-fold. And gas lines this month reached new lengths, creating yet another venue for violence. At least two men have been killed in Baghdad over places in line or allegations of watering down the goods.

"The whole situation is unbearable," said Elham Abbas, whose family bought a small generator to use when the power went out, only to find themselves struggling to find enough gasoline to make it run. "As if all these explosions, assassinations and the daily suffering aren't enough!"
The shortages are exasperating Baghdad's residents -- already demoralized by chronic insecurity -- just as Iraq's interim government is trying hard to get ordinary citizens enthused about the Jan. 30 parliamentary election.

Voter registration concluded last week, candidates and coalitions are finalizing their platforms, and satellite television is awash with inspirational public service montages celebrating the "the Iraqi heroes" of everyday life.

"Of course this will affect the elections," said Ahmed Abdul Kadhim, who burned his last gallon of gas waiting in line and was pushing a battered sedan the last 100 yards to the pump. "Because they came and promised us they'd achieve many things, but they did not do anything."

By all accounts, the shortages have been worsened by insurgent attacks. Rebel strikes recently disabled a power station in the restive northern city of Baiji, in the heart of the Sunni Triangle. The damage last week not only plunged all of Baghdad into chilly darkness, it also shut down the overtaxed refinery on the capital's southern edge.

That kind of chain reaction is a legacy of Iraq's former Baathist government, founded on socialist principles that linked electrical power and state petroleum operations: Without one, the other cannot function.
It has also proved difficult to guard fuel supplies against insurgent attacks. The tanker trucks that ferry fuel across the country are a preferred target. Matrood's family said attacks on tankers in their home region, Babil province, had made gasoline all but impossible to come by.
Guerrillas also ambush trucks bringing in fuel from neighboring Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. Ayad Allawi, the interim prime minister, last week beseeched the prime minister of Kuwait and Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah to send more refined petroleum products and extra guards for the tankers carrying it.

And this week, the Oil Ministry announced that it had bought 60 brand-new gas stations to help alleviate lines. But all 60 remain in Syria because the continuous violence makes it too dangerous to haul them over the border and across the desert

Corruption has aggravated the shortages, Iraqi officials acknowledge. The government "needs to do better," said Barham Salih, the deputy prime minister. "There is fundamental mismanagement."
Even if there were no sabotage, officials say, Iraq's fuel supply is clearly being diverted by the people who control it. The official system builds in numerous incentives for distributors to siphon gasoline before it reaches service stations. For one thing, the government sets an artificially low price for fuel -- so low that the government spends $5 billion to $7 billion a year subsidizing it.


"It's bigger than the cost of the food ration," said Adnan Janabai, a government minister of state, referring to the massive subsidy for staple foods that, along with the fuel subsidy, eats up half of Iraq's budget, according to officials. "What's doing the damage is the smuggling."
For anyone entrusted with distributing gasoline, the temptation is obvious. At the pump, the price of a gallon of gas is officially set at 80 dinars, the equivalent of one American nickel.

Ten days ago, customers unwilling to wait in line were handing over $2.70 for the same gallon. On Saturday, the black market rate had dropped to perhaps half that, but the 2,500 percent markup remained a powerful enticement to sell the stuff on the side.

"Yes, the people blame us, but what can we do?" said Atiyaf Abdul Sattar, an Oil Ministry employee, who was driving a Toyota van so new it had no license plates. Because she works for the ministry, she had to wait in line only an hour at a Baghdad filling station. "The main problem is the security situation."

"The main problem is with us," countered Natiq Dawood, 39, a taxi driver in a two-mile line on Thursday. "Some people even praise the government, even though under the previous regime . . . there were no long lines."

Shortages do appear to have worsened since Iraq took responsibility for its fuel supplies. The U.S. Defense Logistics Agency, which for more than a year imported gasoline, cooking fuel and kerosene, turned over control of imports to the Iraqi interim government in mid-September.

The fuel crisis followed weeks later.
"Instead of showering every day, we do it once a week now," said Muayad Abbas, 34, sitting in his chilly Baghdad house with his hands tucked into his armpits for warmth. Then he and his mother, bundled in winter clothes, inspected the walls for cracks and shoved newspapers into them. Kerosene, which cost the equivalent of $1 for 11 gallons a month ago, now costs $9.

At night, the temperature approaches freezing, especially inside homes built to retain the cold during Baghdad's long, sweltering summers.
"We put our jackets and socks on when we go to bed," said Um Muhammed Wal, a neighbor in the Tobchi neighborhood. "I sleep under the blanket like a child in the mother's womb."

As elections approach, the political implications of the shortages loom ever larger. In Baghdad's largest slum, operatives of the radical Shiite Muslim cleric Moqtada Sadr organized distribution of kerosene and gas at seven stations until U.S. forces intervened.

On Saturday, news that the interim government had begun court proceedings against Gen. Ali Hassan Majeed, the notorious lieutenant of ousted president Saddam Hussein known as "Chemical Ali," only irritated some Baghdad residents more concerned with daily travails.

"He was bad, but we didn't have to fight for a cooking gas cylinder," said Saad Noaman, 41, a taxi driver arguing with a clerk over the price of propane.

Noting that Majeed's court appearance was being shown on television, he added sourly, "Have them fix the electricity first so that people will be able to watch."

Some Baghdad residents say they will simply not vote, rather than be seen as rewarding an interim government that has urged them to cast ballots. Government officials prefer to frame the issue as an incentive to better governance.

"It's democracy," said Salih, the deputy prime minister "There's incentive for the government to get things right so people will vote for it."

At the same time, Salih added with a grim smile, not all the news has been bad. Last week Iraqi police captured a Syrian man walking on a freeway bridge spanning the Tigris River in the capital's south end. The vehicle he had abandoned turned out to be rigged with explosives.

"A car bomb ran out of fuel," Salih said. "There's always a silver lining."

Staff writer Jackie Spinner, correspondent Anthony Shadid and special correspondents Omar Fekeiki, Khalid Saffar and Naseer Nouri contributed to this story.

(I guess the press does print positive news-referring to the last quote in italics)

Tanker bomb rocks Baghdad quarter

Part of the tanker landed in the Libyan embassy compound
A suspected suicide attack using a bomb-laden fuel tanker has left nine dead and 13 injured in a diplomatic quarter of the Iraqi capital Baghdad.
Witnesses said the driver drove at high speed without lights before the bomb went off on Friday night, close to the Jordanian embassy.

The victims' bodies, including seven members of the same family, were dug from the rubble of houses.

The attack followed a surprise visit to Iraq by the US defence secretary.

Witnesses described a fireball shooting into the sky when the butane tanker, wired with explosives, blew up. The vehicle's tank landed close to the Libyan embassy.

The intended target is not clear but witnesses said the tanker was heading for a villa temporarily housing Jordan's embassy, which was destroyed by a car bomb last year.

Three houses were wrecked in the blast in an area where many high-ranking Iraqi government officials also live.

"I'm the only one left," a young woman said after arriving at the ruins of the house in which seven family members perished, including two children.

The confirmed death toll includes the driver, whose body was not recovered, police said.

Survivors were taken to a nearby hospital for treatment, some suffering from third-degree burns.

American style democracy in Iraq.
****************************
U.S. Is Suggesting Prominent Posts for Iraq's Sunnis
By STEVEN R. WEISMAN

Published: December 26, 2004


WASHINGTON, Dec. 25 - The Bush administration is talking to Iraqi leaders about guaranteeing Sunni Arabs a certain number of ministries or high-level jobs in the future Iraqi government if, as is widely predicted, Sunni candidates fail to do well in Iraq's elections.

An even more radical step, one that a Western diplomat said was raised already with an aide to Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq's most revered Shiite cleric, is the possibility of adding some of the top vote-getters among the Sunni candidates to the 275-member legislature, even if they lose to non-Sunni candidates.

The diplomat said even some Shiite politicians who are followers of Ayatollah Sistani are concerned that a Pyrrhic victory by Shiites, effectively shutting Sunni Arabs out of power, could alienate Sunnis and lead to more internal strife. Shiites make up about 60 percent of Iraqis and were generally denied power under Saddam Hussein.

The idea of adding Sunnis to the legislature after the election was acknowledged by officials as likely to be difficult to carry out, but they said it might be necessary to avoid Sunni estrangement. Sunnis Arabs make up about 20 percent of the population and formed the core of Saddam Hussein's power structure. Much of the violent insurgency is taking place in Sunni-dominated areas in the central part of the country, and some Sunni leaders have called for a boycott of the election. This has led to fears that large numbers of Sunnis will obey the call or be afraid to vote.

"There's some flexibility in approaching this problem," said an administration official. "There's a willingness to play with the end result - not changing the numbers, but maybe guaranteeing that a certain number of seats go to Sunni areas even if their candidates did not receive a certain percentage of the vote."

The idea of altering election results is so sensitive that administration officials who spoke about it did not want their names revealed. Some experts on Iraq say such talk could undercut efforts to drum up support for voting in Sunni areas.

Guaranteeing a certain number of positions in government for certain ethnic groups is not without precedent, though. Lebanon, for example, has a power-sharing arrangement among its main sectarian groups. The Parliament in Iran has seats reserved for religious minorities.

It was not known whether Ayad Allawi, the Iraqi prime minister, has been consulted about the possibility of taking such action.

Any suggestion of delaying the elections because Sunnis are reluctant to vote has been knocked down by President Bush and other administration officials. An administration official said, for example, that when King Abdullah II of Jordan visited Mr. Bush earlier this month, the president began the meeting by telling the king to not even raise the issue of postponing the elections because it was beyond consideration. Instead, Mr. Bush has pressed King Abdullah and the leaders of Saudi Arabia, Egypt and other countries to spread the word to Sunnis in Iraq to support their candidates and to vote.

Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and other top officials have said in the past week that they were generally pleased with indications that an overwhelming majority of Iraqis wanted to vote and that many well-known Sunni leaders were running for office, despite the calls for a boycott by other prominent Sunnis.

But there are also American-made factors hobbling full participation in the election.

Administration officials say, for example, that one reason why some Sunnis are not running is that they have refused to sign documents renouncing their former affiliation with the Baath Party of Mr. Hussein, as demanded by Iraqi authorities.

"I've talked to a number of people in the Baath Party, and they bitterly resent having to sign such a document," said a Western diplomat in Baghdad. The diplomat acknowledged that the requirement had been an obstacle to a fully inclusive range of candidates, including figures associated with Mr. Hussein who are believed by Western diplomats to be ready to take part in the political process if they do not have to renounce their past ties.

Robin Williams with American soldiers in Afghanistan during a U.S.O. tour there earlier this month.


By THOM SHANKER

Published: December 26, 2004





Emilio Morenatti/Associated Press
The Hall of Fame football player John Elway passes to eager troops during a U.S.O. visit to Afghanistan.


BALAD AIR BASE, Iraq - On stages in war zones like this one, Bob Hope used to wag a golf club, affecting nonchalance as he poked fun at pompous military brass and making light of the dangers around him.

This holiday season, playing the Hope role on the U.S.O.'s marquee barnstorming tour of the front lines, Robin Williams seemed to pay distant tribute to his predecessor by ending each show with a monologue on the demented Scots who he said invented the game. You whack and whack at a tiny ball, he said, until you have a seizure - which is why each swing is called a stroke.

The audience was overwhelmingly, even stunningly, appreciative.

For this year's big U.S.O. holiday shows, the comedy was certainly racier than in Hope's day. The audiences wore desert khaki, not jungle camouflage or olive drab. But as the tour dashed for six days and 19,700 miles across Afghanistan, the Persian Gulf and the Horn of Africa, ending in Northern Europe, the formula was timeless: a comedian or two, a sports star, a pretty girl, a dose of sentiment and crowds of grateful soldiers savoring the respite and the reminder of home.

More than 26,000 Americans in uniform were expected to see the tour's 13 performances [the last was in Ramstein, Germany, on Dec. 17], including two at bases where missions are so secret that the entertainers and a journalist who accompanied the troupe swore not to reveal the locations.

John Elway, who led the Denver Broncos to two Super Bowl victories in the late 1990's, stepped into the sneakers once filled on Hope's Vietnam tours by Rosey Grier and Johnny Bench. The cheesecake quotient was filled by Leeann Tweeden, a Fox network sports commentator. The troops in Iraq and Afghanistan who sought her autograph handed her not box scores to sign, but the cover of the year-end issue of the laddie magazine FHM, which features Ms. Tweeden in lingerie.

The United Service Organizations Inc. is a private, nonprofit group that carries a Congressional charter to deliver morale-building, welfare and recreation programs to Americans in uniform. With individual, corporate and philanthropic support, the U.S.O. operates more than 120 hospitality centers around the world and organized 40 concerts and tours in the United States and overseas this year. Mostly vanished from public consciousness since Hope's televised holiday shows from Vietnam, the U.S.O. is again highly visible, dispatching talent to track the military's footprints in deserts where more troops face extended deployments than at any time since the divisive war in Southeast Asia.

Back then, Bob Hope took flak in a deeply divided country for his steadfast support of the troops. And Edward A. Powell Jr., president of the U.S.O., acknowledged that the personal politics of many stars had forced the programmers to be deft in navigating culture wars at home.

"But we have not seen it impact dramatically on the entertainers we would like to take overseas," he said aboard a military jet shuttling between shows. "The entertainers we've brought are all over the map in terms of politics back home, whether it's Al Franken or Toby Keith or Darryl Worley or Joan Jett or Sheryl Crow." Other recent U.S.O. headliners included James Gandolfini and Tony Sirico of "The Sopranos," David Letterman and the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders.

Mr. Williams, who openly mocked President Bush during the election campaign, has visited the war zone three times and said he had taken no criticism for his decisions.

"Politics has no place on this tour," Mr. Williams said in an interview before his monologue in a clamshell-shaped tent jammed with troops at Bagram Air Field, the main military hub in Afghanistan. "You want to debate? That's for home. Here, we concentrate on the soldiers. It's all for them."

Politics may have had no place on the tour, but appropriateness, if not political correctness, was required.

The tour opened with two performances in Kuwait - which, like New Haven in bygone days of theater, offered the performers a chance to work out the kinks before heading to Iraq and Afghanistan.

The US' concern for the plight of Iraqis under Saddam was an afterthought, ican. Our pretexts for our invasion was WMD in Iraq that threatened us, and a "nexus" between Saddam and al Qaeda. Without those pretexts, do you think we would have invaded Iraq for the sake of Iraqis?

The Iraqis will "vote" to keep the coalition forces there.

Just as we are between a rock and a hard place, so too are the Iraqi's. I would venture a guess that they realize despite the chaos danger and quality of life issues. Conditions would be far worse off were the US to pull out at this juncture. Up to and including civil strife between the Shia, Sunni's and Kurds.

Here's a precursor of what will happen in Iraq, but with more insurgency problems. c.i.
******************************************

Top Karzai rival plans new party

Mr Qanuni formerly ran the education ministry for Mr Karzai Afghan President Hamid Karzai's strongest rival in October's election, Yunus Qanuni, has announced he is forming a new political party. Mr Qanuni said his party will go under the name of New Afghanistan and will contest April's parliamentary polls.

The ethnic Tajik politician said he had turned down a job as defence minister in President Karzai's new cabinet in order to form the opposition grouping.

Correspondents say militia leaders have been sidelined in the new cabinet.

Among those excluded is Gen Mohammed Fahim, a leader of the powerful, largely-Tajik Panjshiri faction, who was formerly Mr Karzai's defence minister.

I was offered the defence ministry post but I turned it down because I am not a military man

President Karzai has said he will support Mr Qanuni's new venture as long as it defines itself as a national, rather than an ethnic or regional party.

"We need political parties because in [their] absence... politics will become ethnic or linguistic," he said.

At a news conference at his Kabul residence on Saturday, Mr Qanuni thanked the president for his support.

He said his party would back positive efforts by the government to redevelop the country but "if they do something wrong, we will raise our voice and struggle against that".


Hamid Karzai was sworn in as Afghanistan's first directly-elected president on 7 December.

He has led the country since the Taleban regime was ousted in 2001.

Mr Karzai's cabinet will need to be approved by the new parliament. Elections are set for April, but the complexity of the process and continuing security fears may delay polling.

The cabinet's mix of technocrats and educated exiles - at the expense of some mujahideen and militia bosses - is likely to be welcomed by foreign donors but, correspondents say, could spark resentment among many Afghans.

Nukes for sale.
**************

THE BOMB MERCHANT
Chasing Dr. Khan's Netwo





As Nuclear Secrets Emerge, More Are Suspected
By WILLIAM J. BROAD and DAVID E. SANGER

Published: December 26, 2004


When experts from the United States and the International Atomic Energy Agency came upon blueprints for a 10-kiloton atomic bomb in the files of the Libyan weapons program earlier this year, they found themselves caught between gravity and pettiness.

The discovery gave the experts a new appreciation of the audacity of the rogue nuclear network led by A. Q. Khan, a chief architect of Pakistan's bomb. Intelligence officials had watched Dr. Khan for years and suspected that he was trafficking in machinery for enriching uranium to make fuel for warheads. But the detailed design represented a new level of danger, particularly since the Libyans said he had thrown it in as a deal-sweetener when he sold them $100 million in nuclear gear.

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"This was the first time we had ever seen a loose copy of a bomb design that clearly worked," said one American expert, "and the question was: Who else had it? The Iranians? The Syrians? Al Qaeda?"

But that threat was quickly overshadowed by smaller questions.

The experts from the United States and the I.A.E.A., the United Nations nuclear watchdog - in a reverberation of their differences over Iraq's unconventional weapons - began quarreling over control of the blueprints. The friction was palpable at Libya's Ministry of Scientific Research, said one participant, when the Americans accused international inspectors of having examined the design before they arrived. After hours of tense negotiation, agreement was reached to keep it in a vault at the Energy Department in Washington, but under I.A.E.A. seal.

It was a sign of things to come.

Nearly a year after Dr. Khan's arrest, secrets of his nuclear black market continue to uncoil, revealing a vast global enterprise. But the inquiry has been hampered by discord between the Bush administration and the nuclear watchdog, and by Washington's concern that if it pushes too hard for access to Dr. Khan, a national hero in Pakistan, it could destabilize an ally. As a result, much of the urgency has been sapped from the investigation, helping keep hidden the full dimensions of the activities of Dr. Khan and his associates.

There is no shortage of tantalizing leads. American intelligence officials and the I.A.E.A., working separately, are still untangling Dr. Khan's travels in the years before his arrest. Investigators said he visited 18 countries, including Syria, Saudi Arabia and Egypt, on what they believed were business trips, either to buy materials like uranium ore or sell atomic goods.

In Dubai, they have scoured one of the network's front companies, finding traces of radioactive material as well as phone records showing contact with Saudi Arabia. Having tracked the network operations to Malaysia, Europe and the Middle East, investigators recently uncovered an outpost in South Africa, where they seized 11 crates of equipment for enriching uranium.

The breadth of the operation was particularly surprising to some American intelligence officials because they had had Dr. Khan under surveillance for nearly three decades, since he began assembling components for Pakistan's bomb, but apparently missed crucial transactions with countries like Iran and North Korea.

In fact, officials were so confident they had accurately taken his measure, that twice - once in the late 1970's and again in the 1980's - the Central Intelligence Agency persuaded Dutch intelligence agents not to arrest Dr. Khan because they wanted to follow his trail, according to a senior European diplomat and a former Congressional official who had access to intelligence information. The C.I.A. declined to comment.

"We knew a lot," said a nuclear intelligence official, "but we didn't realize the size of his universe."

President Bush boasts that the Khan network has been dismantled. But there is evidence that parts of it live on, as do investigations in Washington and Vienna, where the I.A.E.A. is based.

Cooperation between the United Nations atomic agency and the United States has trickled to a near halt, particularly as the Bush administration tries to unseat the I.A.E.A. director general, Mohamed ElBaradei, who did not support the White House's prewar intelligence assessments on Iraq.

To them, the numbers are immaterial- a price in other people's lives they are ready and willing to pay- and the cost will be immaterial once they get their hands on the oil reserves.

People say that but I don't see how it can get that much worse. I mean people are dying and they are afraid to even go to get out on the streets. There is already civil war to some extent and if our being there is what is keeping it from being all out civil war then at what point would that change? We keep saying vague things like train the Iraqi's, but I don't see how that works when most of the Iraqi's are split up in divided groups and beliefs and refuse to work with another. Or if a good deal of Iraqi's feel that to support the government is to support the occupation and they refuse to do that.

Even if all that were not case and it is the case is it not? But even if it were not, the whole reason that I want the US to get out is because I don't trust this administration not manipulate Iraq according to their own agendas no matter whose name is rubber stamped as the leader of Iraq of which we have already seen proof of with their wanting to install people regardless if they are actually elected or not.

The longer we are there able to manipulate everything the more power that the administration will be able to have behind the scenes to influence things in their favor. The whole reason that they wanted to go to Iraq in the first place in my opinion based on things I have read had to do with that "Plan For a Better America" that they tried to peddle back when Clinton was in charge. Which has to do changing the middle east to suit westernize interest rather than any kind of "do gooding" for the Iraqi people. Which is wrong in my opinion. We have no right to arrange the world to suit ourselves as though everyone else but Americans are merely props in a play or something.

The whole reason I was against the war from the beginning was because I simply mistrusted the Bush administration motives and everything since has only told me I was right not to trust them. In my opinion they can't be trusted not to be corrupt in Iraq and so I see no reason to keep giving them free reign to further than their 'Plans for a better America.'

If we leave, maybe other nations will be more willing to help, but even if they are not and a big civil war happens that people keep talking about, it is still better for them to work it out themselves however it turns out than to be manipulated by the Bush administration.

c.i., that was an interesting piece about the possibility of adding some Sunnis to the legislature. I read the whole article this morning, and there was a thought to the effect that a Sunni candidate who lost to a non-Sunni might be included anyway. This would be an excellent idea, I think, even thought it might take some fancy footwork in "election results." Since we are running the show anyway, why not manage it with an eye to the day after, not just the day of, the election.

revel
I disagree as bad as things may be in Iraq at present. Were, the US to cut and run the conditions now would seem to be a walk in the park compared to what they would become. Whether we should or should not have invaded Iraq is irrelevant now. The US now has an obligation to repair the damage Bush's war has caused.

So in your opinion, a straight massacre of several million Iraqis, that would serve only to enslave the remaining Iraqis in radical Islamic extremism is still better than to be manipulated by the Bush administration into some form of self-determination. And this after feigning concern that people are dying in the streets?