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

The zealots will buy this woman's 'story' for about a week, making a lot of noise about it, to no avail. It will go the way the story of the tank that supposedly 'deliberately' targeted the hotel full of journalists during the taking of Baghdad <eyeroll>.

The bottom line is if we'd wanted to kill her, she'd be dead. She isn't.

This was either an accident or a set-up.

In order to believe the woman's story, you also have to believe that the soldiers to a man (or woman--not sure who all was there) all agreed with murdering unarmed civilians and all concocted and are sticking with the same manufactured story. You also have to assume they knew this woman was coming, had advance information on her ETA and the vehicle they should expect, and they hated her sufficiently to open fire. And you have to further assume that they did not hate more those who have opened fire on and killed, wounded, maimed their fellow solders as much as they have not presumed to kill them when unarmed and defenselsss.

Until there is reason not to do so, I will believe the solders were acting prudently and properly in their presumed self defense just as I'm going to give the cop the benefit of the doubt in similar circumstances every time.

8. Public Support for Iraq War Collapsing Majority of...
Public Support for Iraq War Collapsing
Majority of Americans want to Bring Some Troops Home

Zogby international found that in late February the percentage of Americans who felt that the Iraq War was worth the cost plummeted by 20 percent. Is this because of the further $83 billion Bush requested for Iraq? If so, the support is likely to fall a good deal further, since this thing is not getting any cheaper.

Question: Do you think the war in Iraq is worth its costs?

Feb. 25-27

Worth it 39%

Not worth it 54%


Feb. 14-17

Worth it 52%

Not worth it 46%

Moreover, a majority of Americans now believes that the US should begin withdrawing troops from Iraq, according to a Marist College Institute poll of last week. This poll confirms the Zogby finding that a majority now says that the war was not worth it. A majority of Americans now also questions whether Iraq will be a "stable democracy" any time soon.

This poll also shows that Americans know very well that neither Iran nor Syria constitutes a threat to the US. Interestingly, more Americans think Iraq still poses a threat to the US than think Iran does (10 percent versus 8 percent). Interestingly, the perception of a threat from Syria has fallen to almost nothing from 12 percent two years ago. You have to wonder if the revelations about Iraq's lack of WMD and of the ramshackle state of its government and military have taught us all a lesson about seeing threats realistically. (David Wurmser will be upset at this attitude toward Syria, since he's been trying to get up a US war against Damascus).

On February 25, The Marist College Institute for Public Opinion poll reports:


Bring them home: A majority of Americans think the U.S. should withdraw at least some troops from Iraq.

Question Wording: What do you think the United States should do about its number of troops in Iraq: send more, keep the same number, withdraw some, or withdraw all troops from Iraq?

Americans
February 2005

Send More 12%

Keep Same Number 24%

Withdraw Some 23%

Withdraw All Troops 33%

Unsure 8%


Second thoughts? A majority of Americans think the war in Iraq is not worth it.

Question Wording: All in all, do you think the war in Iraq is worth it or not?

Americans
February 2005

Worth It 43%

Not worth It 53%

Unsure 4%


A long road to democracy ahead: Americans are not optimistic about the realization of a stable democracy in Iraq in the near future. Only about one in three Americans believe a stable democracy in Iraq will emerge in the next two years.

Question Wording: Two years from now, do you think it is very likely, likely, not very likely, or not likely at all that Iraq will be a stable democracy?


Americans
February 2005


Very Likely 6%

Likely 28%

Not Very Likely 39%

Not Likely at All 22%

Unsure 5%


Americans see other imminent threats in the world: Many Americans see North Korea as the biggest foreign threat facing the United States.

Question Wording: Which one of the following do you see as the biggest foreign threat facing the United States today?

Americans


February 2005

North Korea 43%

Al Qaeda 24%

Iraq 10%

Iran 8%

Syria 2%


November 2004

North Korea 22%

Al Qaeda 43%

Iraq 11%

Iran 9%

Syria 1%


May 2003

North Korea 38%

Al Qaeda 22%

Iraq 9%

Iran n.a.

Syria 12%
Sun, Mar 6, 2005 0:06

Roadblocks to Nowhere
Plus--kf vs. Not-on-Time-Warner
By Mickey Kaus
Updated Monday, March 7, 2005, at 2:24 AM PT

Have U.S. generals ever been through a U.S. roadblock? Drudge briefly linked to this excellent CSM piece which asks that question after describing how easy it is for innocent, law-abiding Iraqi drivers and their passengers to get killed by U.S. fire. There's also a horrifying account in Evan Wright's Generation Kill. ("[A U.S. Marine] asks the father, sitting by the side of the road, why he didn't heed the warning shots and stop. The father simply repeats, 'I'm sorry,' then meekly asks permission to pick up his daughter's body.") ... Can average drivers detect so-called warning shots? Wright writes:

In the dark, warning shots are simply a series of loud bangs or flashes. It's not like this is the international code for "Stop your vehicle and turn around." As it turns out, many Iraqis react to warning shots by speeding up. Maybe they just panic. Consequently, a lot of Iraqis die at roadblocks.

Surely our roadblock practices have done much more to alienate Iraqis than the Abu Ghraib abuses. Roadblocks wind up killing innocent families, not humiliating suspected insurgents. ... Wright does describe some efforts by Marines to improvise a better policy, with spotty results. ... Update: WaPo, NYT. ... 1:12 A.M.

Today's stories
03/07/2005
What Iraq's checkpoints are like
A speeding sedan and a close call for one marine unit
more stories...

Specials > Iraq in Transition
from the March 07, 2005 edition

What Iraq's checkpoints are like
By Annia Ciezadlo | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor
Editor's note: On Friday, an Italian intelligence officer was killed and Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena was wounded as their car approached a US military checkpoint in Baghdad. The US says the car was speeding, despite hand signals, flashing white lights, and warning shots from US forces. Ms. Sgrena says her car was not speeding and they did see any signals. This personal account, filed prior to the shooting, explains how confusing and risky checkpoints can be - from both sides.

It's a common occurrence in Iraq: A car speeds toward an American checkpoint or foot patrol. They fire warning shots; the car keeps coming. Soldiers then shoot at the car. Sometimes the on-comer is a foiled suicide attacker (see story), but other times, it's an unarmed family.
(Photograph)
BACK HOME: Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena arrived in Rome Saturday, injured after US troops fired on her car.
ALESSANDRA TARANTINO/AP



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As an American journalist here, I have been through many checkpoints and have come close to being shot at several times myself. I look vaguely Middle Eastern, which perhaps makes my checkpoint experience a little closer to that of the typical Iraqi. Here's what it's like.

You're driving along and you see a couple of soldiers standing by the side of the road - but that's a pretty ubiquitous sight in Baghdad, so you don't think anything of it. Next thing you know, soldiers are screaming at you, pointing their rifles and swiveling tank guns in your direction, and you didn't even know it was a checkpoint.

If it's confusing for me - and I'm an American - what is it like for Iraqis who don't speak English?

In situations like this, I've often had Iraqi drivers who step on the gas. It's a natural reaction: Angry soldiers are screaming at you in a language you don't understand, and you think they're saying "get out of here," and you're terrified to boot, so you try to drive your way out.

'Stop or you will be shot'

Another problem is that the US troops tend to have two-stage checkpoints. First there's a knot of Iraqi security forces standing by a sign that says, in Arabic and English, "Stop or you will be shot." Most of the time, the Iraqis will casually wave you through.

Your driver, who slowed down for the checkpoint, will accelerate to resume his normal speed. What he doesn't realize is that there's another, American checkpoint several hundred yards past the Iraqi checkpoint, and he's speeding toward it. Sometimes, he may even think that being waved through the first checkpoint means he's exempt from the second one (especially if he's not familiar with American checkpoint routines).

I remember one terrifying day when my Iraqi driver did just that. We got to a checkpoint manned by Iraqi troops. Chatting and smoking, they waved us through without a glance.

Relieved, he stomped down on the gas pedal, and we zoomed up to about 50 miles per hour before I saw the second checkpoint up ahead. I screamed at him to stop, my translator screamed, and the American soldiers up ahead looked as if they were getting ready to start shooting.

After I got my driver to slow down and we cleared the second checkpoint, I made him stop the car. My voice shaking with fear, I explained to him that once he sees a checkpoint, whether it's behind him or ahead of him, he should drive as slowly as possible for at least five minutes.

He turned to me, his face twisted with the anguish of making me understand: "But Mrs. Annia," he said, "if you go slow, they notice you!"

Under Saddam, idling was risky

This feeling is a holdover from the days of Saddam, when driving slowly past a government building or installation was considered suspicious behavior. Get caught idling past the wrong palaces or ministry, and you might never be seen again.

I remember parking outside a ministry with an Iraqi driver, waiting to pick up a friend. After sitting and staring at the building for about half an hour, waiting for our friend to emerge, the driver shook his head.

"If you even looked at this building before, you'd get arrested," he said, his voice full of disbelief. Before, he would speed past this building, gripping the wheel, staring straight ahead, careful not to even turn his head. After 35 years of this, Iraqis still speed up when they're driving past government buildings - which, since the Americans took over a lot of them, tend be to exactly where the checkpoints are.

Fear of insurgents and kidnappers are another reason for accelerating, and in that scenario, speeding up and getting away could save your life. Many Iraqis know somebody who's been shot at on the road, and a lot of people survived only because they stepped on the gas.

This fear comes into play at checkpoints because US troops are often accompanied by a cordon of Iraqi security forces - and a lot of the assassinations and kidnappings have been carried out by Iraqi security forces or people dressed in their uniforms. Often the Iraqi security forces are the first troops visible at checkpoints. If they are angry-looking and you hear shots being fired, it becomes easier to misread the situation and put the pedal to the metal.

A couple of times soldiers have told me at checkpoints that they had just shot somebody. They're not supposed to talk about it, but they do. I think the soldiers really needed to talk about it. They were traumatized by the experience.

Traumatic for soldiers, too

This is not what they wanted - really not what they wanted - and the whole checkpoint experience is confusing and terrifying for them as well as for the Iraqis. Many of them have probably seen people get killed or injured, including friends of theirs. You can imagine what it's like for them, wondering whether each car that approaches is a normal Iraqi family or a suicide bomber.

The essential problem with checkpoints is that the Americans don't know if the Iraqis are "friendlies" or not, and the Iraqis don't know what the Americans want them to do.

I always wished that the American commanders who set up these checkpoints could drive through themselves, in a civilian car, so they could see what the experience was like for civilians. But it wouldn't be the same: They already know what an American checkpoint is, and how to act at one - which many Iraqis don't.

Is there a way to do checkpoints right? Perhaps, perhaps not. But it seems that the checkpoint experience perfectly encapsulates the contradictions and miseries and misunderstandings of everyone's common experience - both Iraqis and Americans - in Iraq.

Interesting article and it probably explains what happened unless more news come up, thanks Gelisgesti.

It's also interesting that already before you posted it you probably know the responses you are going to get from both sides. Somehow the mystique has gone out of threads. However, I learn more here in a2k than I have in years about everything from just better words to world history and current events.

I have been trying to find more places to find more up to date news on Iraq and other world news, do you have any suggestions?

August 5, 2004
The PKK Factor
Another criical enemy front in the war on terror.
...
— Michael Rubin is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and editor of the Middle East Quarterly.

Instead, as with much in the global war on terrorism, the problem is in implementation. President Bush may enunciate a no-nonsense approach to policy, but the National Security Council neither coordinates effectively nor enforces policy discipline. Some NSC staff members have gone so far as to question the war on terror. Bush recently promoted a career diplomat who spoke of "Bush's stupidity" among not only American, but also foreign colleagues. A recent NSC appointee has argued that the U.S. should take a more forgiving attitude toward terrorism, whereby "lesser penalties would apply to lesser levels of state sponsorship." Such nuance flies in the face of Bush strategy, since it implies some terror to be permissible.

There remains, however, a major problem with clientitis, both at the lower levels of the State Department and at the upper levels of the military. The State Department dominated the Coalition Provisional Authority's governance wing. Many U.S. diplomats serving in Baghdad spent their careers in the Arab world. Reading translated Arabic newspapers and drinking tea with government elites in Beirut, Damascus, and Riyadh takes its toll: Many had adopted the biases of the societies in which they served.

Ironically, proactive deployment might obviate the need for a confrontation. Despite the proximity to the unguarded Iranian frontier, many of the areas occupied by the PKK have no U.S. military, Iraqi military, or peshmurga presence. Villagers, Kurdish officials, and peshmurga all say that small garrisons of Coalition forces in valleys and along the Iranian frontier would fill a vacuum, and force the PKK back across the border into Iran which, continues to provide aid and comfort to the group.

One thing should be clear, though. Terrorists exploit a vacuum. Nearly 3,000 Americans would be alive today had the Clinton administration not left unaddressed a vacuum in Afghanistan. Our impotence toward the PKK threatens to undermine our credibility not only in Turkey, but also in our fight against terrorists and states like Lebanon which provide them safe haven. With regard to the PKK, the stakes are higher. Not only is the president's credibility on the line, but so too is a 50-year partnership with one of our most valuable allies.

"... Bush assured Berlusconi that "the incident will be fully investigated," McClellan said, adding that the two spoke for about five minutes."

Expressing "regret" in a five minute telephone conversation hardly makes ammends for a catastrophic and tragic accident. So its becoming clearer from what Giuliana Sgrena has said, and by the American reaction that it wasn't an accident.

And if it wasn't an accident it was an act of war against Italy. Now if Berlusconi sends more troops to Iraq, can the Americans be sure they are friendly and not hostile forces?

Another ally Bush has lost. The ignorance arrogance and brutality which characterises the American handling of Iraq knows no bounds.

White House Rejects Italy Hostage's Claims

Monday March 7, 2005 3:31 PM


WASHINGTON (AP) - The White House on Monday said it was ``absurd'' for a former hostage in Iraq to charge that U.S. military forces may have deliberately targeted her car as she was being rushed to freedom.

White House press secretary Scott McClellan said the car carrying Giuliana Sgrena was traveling on one of the most dangerous roads in Iraq when it was fired upon. An Italian intelligence officer in the car was shot and killed.

Responding to Sgrena's statement that the car may have been deliberately targeted, McClellan said. ``It's absurd to make any such suggestion, that our men and women in uniform would target individual citizens.

Bush should insist that Italy pull all its' soldiers and citizens, including reporters, out of Iraq to prevent the terrorists from going back to the ATM.