The US presence in Iraq, how long?

Tartarin
Since you don't know how it happened or the conditions how can you ask that question? Oh! I know we must have been at fault.

Craven

You and the un-American police here aren't quick to condemn are you?
Are you implying that I am un-American.

[...]Americans said some of the tactical weapons had been stored there by Saddam's regime, which had stashed such items in schools, homes and other populated areas.
The U.S. military had put some of the ordnance there itself, however, collecting abandoned Iraqi caches from around the city for later disposal, King said.
The cache included Russian-made Frog-7s and Iraq's own Al Samoud 2 - 80 missiles in all, said Col. John Peabody, commanding officer of the U.S. Army's 11th Engineering Brigade, which had been helping at the site.
The flares hit an ammunition pit, setting fire to wooden ammo crates, King said. In a flash, deadly remnants of Saddam's regime were pounding homes without warning. Booms rattled windows across the city.
About a mile away, a missile plowed into a dirt lane between two rows of crude two-story homes. Walls crumbled and roofs blew off, demolishing four houses. Inside one, the impact killed a 50-year-old worker, his four teenage children and his 23-year-old daughter-in-law, a new mother.
``Our house collapsed. That's all I remember,'' Mohammed Khazaal, 15, said from a hospital bed, his head wrapped in bandages and gashes across his body. A brother of the dead young woman, he had been sleeping when the missile hit.
Nearby, medical workers treated deep cuts in the legs of Zeineb Thamer, the year-old daughter of the woman who died. Blood matted Zeineb's light-brown hair. In English, the message on her T-shirt declared, ``Welcome, Little Friend.''
Peabody said 10 or more Iraqis were wounded. Two of them were said to be near death.
U.S. forces initially came under small-arms fire when they went to the scene, Peabody said. They returned fire. There was no word on further casualties.
Peabody wouldn't speculate on exactly who fired the flares. ``Somebody who does not want us to be here,'' he said.
Ultimately, Peabody said, the fallen Iraqi regime was responsible. ``We are very sorry that the practice of Saddam Hussein putting his missiles ... throughout Baghdad has resulted in this.''
In Zafaraniyah, residents described days of what appeared to be U.S.-controlled blasts at the missile dump, apparently to destroy leftover Iraqi weaponry.
Mohammed Hussein said he and some neighbors had personally visited U.S. military officers to stress that the depot was near crowded neighborhoods. American forces stopped night explosions after that, and ended the daytime ones three or four days ago, Hussein and others said.
Many Iraqis in the area, though, contended that an intentional American blast had triggered the disaster. ``Why?'' one distraught man demanded when three American GIs went to look for missile parts in the shattered home. Responded one American: ``It's not our fault.''
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-2609111,00.html

You and the un-American police here aren't quick to condemn are you?
Are you implying that I am un-American.

It is a question, Tartarin. I fault the US for not having accommodated the inevitable constabulary needs attendant upon the removal of a pre-existing civil authority. The resources to topple a regime are inadequate to the task of policing a nation. That was overlooked, I'm afraid, and I'm not convinced it is being remedied in suitable, timely fashion.

It's important to recognize that every action we take and everything we fail to do will weigh against us among a fragmented population in flux -- a population which believes we are invaders and should get out of there. The longer we stay, the less "gratitude" we will experience. One can hardly blame the Iraqis.

I think you've put your finger on the problem, Timber.

]Timber, could you admit it if it ends up that the US just f-ed things up worse than they already were?

And I realize the reverse of that is that I would have to be willing to concede a resounding diplomatic, military and PR victory for Bush and his bunch, should time prove that to be the case?

Dossier reveals France briefed Iraq on US plans
The Sunday Times | April 27, 2003 | Matthew Campbell


FRANCE gave Saddam Hussein's regime regular reports on its dealings with American officials, documents unearthed in the wreckage of the Iraqi foreign ministry have revealed.

The first Iraqi files to emerge documenting French help for the regime show that Paris shared with Baghdad the contents of private transatlantic meetings and diplomatic traffic from Washington.

The information, said in the files to have come partly from "friends of Iraq" at the French foreign ministry, kept Saddam abreast of every development in American planning and may have helped him to prepare for war. One report warned of an American "attempt to involve Iraq with terrorism" as "cover for an attack on Iraq".

Another, dated September 25, 2001 from Naji Sabri, the Iraqi foreign minister, to Saddam's palace, was based on a briefing from the French ambassador in Baghdad and covered talks between presidents Jacques Chirac and George W Bush.

Chirac was said to have been told that America was "100% certain Osama Bin Laden was behind the September 11 attacks and that the answer of the United States would be decisive".

The report also gave a detailed account of American attitudes towards Saddam amid anxiety in Iraq that the country might soon become a target of American reprisals.

"Information available to the French embassy in Washington suggests that there is no intention on the part of the Americans to attack Iraq, but that matters might change quickly," said the document from folders marked France 2001 found by The Sunday Times.

"According to French information, a discussion about Iraq is going on in Washington between [secretary of state] Colin Powell and the Zionist [Paul] Wolfowitz [the deputy defence secretary]. Powell was against a military attack on Iraq whereas Wolfowitz was in favour of a strong military operation against Iraq."

The report noted that "the Israelis have informed the French ambassador in Washington that they have no evidence of Iraqi involvement in the attacks".

An account of a meeting between Hubert Vedrine, the former Socialist foreign minister of France, and Powell after September 11 also made its way into the Baghdad archives. Powell was said to have disclosed that he would raise with Russia the subject of its "co-operation" with Iraq.

Powell, the report said, "is going to ask the Russian foreign minister how Russia could co-operate with a country that had expressed satisfaction at America being subjected to such attacks. He is going to ask for a new draft resolution from the United Nations security council on Iraq".

Bernard Jenkin, shadow defence secretary, said the briefings went beyond diplomatic courtesies and pointed to French "duplicitousness".

A report last night claimed documents found in the headquarters of the Mukhabarat, the Iraqi security service, showed that a representative of Osama Bin Laden's Al-Qaeda network had visited Baghdad in 1998. However, a western intelligence source said: "There have been contacts between Bin Laden's people and Iraq's people in the past, but fleeting contacts and we have never seen that as a strong institutional link. Even if there was a visit it does not amount to an ongoing institutional relationship."

At least 12 Iraqis died yesterday when unknown attackers threw an incendiary device into a Baghdad arms dump.

timber, That is 'some' revelation! I'm not sure where I stand on our diplomatic relations with France. It's one thing for France to be against any preemptive attack on Iraq, but quite another to share confidence with a tyrant like Saddam. What do you think? c.i.