THE US, THE UN AND IRAQ, TENTH THREAD.

In the comparisons between Vietnam and Iraq one thing is obvious, we may have lost in Vietnam but the Vietnamese have prospered since we left and they didn't descend into civil war. Furthermore, it is mere unreasoned supposition to suggest that if we stayed in Vietnam we have eventually won. It is more likely we would have only continued to loose more of our military troops and killed more innocent Vietnamese women and Children without a victory; just like we are doing now in Iraq. When people are fighting on their home ground there is more of an incentive to hold their own so at the end of the day their country will still be their own.

It is apparent that Bush by making this statement has learned nothing. Were he president at the time of the Viet Nam war we would still be fighting and dying in it's jungles.

Another Turning Point in Iraq: Pull Out or Final Push?
Another Turning Point in Iraq: Pull Out or Final Push?
By Greg Mitchell
E & P
November 17, 2006

Editorial writers and pundits, often critical of the conduct of the war, have long opposed a U.S. pullout from Iraq. Now, with death and violence already at a peak, there is talk of a sending more troops for a "final push." Now what will the opinion shapers say?

It has been one year since Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) issued his sudden and startling call for the start of a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq. Since then, troop levels have remained steady, death and violence have increased, and few editorials and pundits have echoed Murtha's call.

One more thing: Since that day, 790 Americans have been killed in Iraq and more than 6000 seriously wounded.

Ironically, Rep. Murtha is in the news right now because of his failed attempt to gain the #2 position in the House leadership. But the step he took last Nov. 17, as it turned out, played a critical role in making that Democratic takeover possible.

One year later, we are again at a critical moment in the war. Despite the election results, reports surfaced this week that the White House wants to make another "final push" for victory in Iraq -- and the long-awaited recommendations from Jim Baker's Iraq Study Group may very well endorse the notion of a "temporary" troop buildup. The Washington Post remains hawkish through it all, and even the dovish New York Times suggested last Sunday "one last push to stabilize Baghdad. That would require at least a temporary increase in American and Iraqi troops on Baghdad streets."

Sound like a good idea to you? Opinion writers are once again squarely on the spot. If they oppose the idea they won't hear much protest from readers. Every major survey shows that about 60% back a U.S. withdrawal -- immediately or within a year.

Last Nov. 17, I was in the middle of writing yet another of my tireless, perhaps tiresome, columns suggesting that perhaps it was time for at least a few major newspapers to carry editorials calling for the start of a phased pullout from Iraq after more than two years of murder and incompetence. None of my previous efforts had produced much of a positive response, beyond the Seattle Times and Minneapolis Star Tribune and a few others, so my hopes were not exactly high.

Then came word that Rep. Murtha had suddenly called for a rapid "redeployment" of U.S. forces from Iraq, and even introduced a bill to this effect. Murtha? Wasn't he that crusty old hawk and Pentagon water-carrier? Amazingly, it was true, and the media went wild -- not endorsing his views, God forbid, but at least giving them serious play. Within hours, I had penned a column hinting that perhaps this would be this war's "Cronkite moment" -- when a wholly establishment figure says, enough! That voice sure wasn't going to come from, say, The Washington Post.

"Our military has done everything that has been asked of them, the U.S. can not accomplish anything further in Iraq militarily," Murtha said then. "It is time to bring them home." He pointed out that more than half of Americans in polls wanted us out, and uttered these highly prescient words: "The public is way ahead of us."

In response, White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan said, "it is baffling that he is endorsing the policy positions of Michael Moore."

But hat's off to Rod Dreher, the conservative newspaper columnist, who quickly posted this at NRO Online, the National Review site: "If tough, non-effete guys like Murtha are willing to go this far, and can make the case in ways that Red America can relate to -- and listening to him talk was like listening to my dad, who's about the same age, and his hunting buddies -- then the president is in big trouble. I'm sure there's going to be an anti-Murtha pile-on in the conservative blogosphere, but from where I sit, conservatives would be fools not to take this man seriously."

I closed my initial column by urging editorial and opinion writers to rise to the "Cronkite" challenge. So what happened after that? Most of them praised Murtha for showing some courage, but then came out against withdrawal or suggested that the U.S. give the Iraqis a few more months to get their act together. Of course, 12 months have passed since then -- and some of the same editorial writers now ask for another six months.

One year ago, USA Today, which had been critical of the conduct of the war, opined: "Murtha's call for withdrawal is as understandable as it is misguided." The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, also no fan of the war, weighed in that Murtha's call "plays better as a heartfelt expression of frustration than as sound practical advice." The Washington Post ripped those who call for "an early pullout," adding "what we've mainly seen during the past two weeks is a shameful exercise in demagoguery and name-calling. ... If there is to be any chance of that war being won, the United States will have to commit its own forces to the fight for years, though perhaps not at current levels. The alternative is to risk a defeat that would be devastating to U.S. security."

The San Antonio Express-News added: "A precipitous departure from Iraq is likely to create more problems than it will solve." Many other papers expressed the belief, or at least hope, that the upcoming elections in Iraq would turns things around. The Plain Dealer in Cleveland repeated its demand for the resignation of Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld -- while opining that a "precipitous withdrawal risks the tragic waste of the blood investment we have in Iraq." The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel said Murtha is "surely on the right track," but "leaving Iraq now would be a mistake."

So here we are, 12 months and thousands of U.S. casualties later, with renewed calls for an American buildup, not a draw-down, in Iraq. So, editorial writers, what do you have to say?

We disagree!

In December 2001, 3 months after 9/11 and 2 months after the USA invaded Afghanistan, it was true that "all Iraq had was a small al-Qaeda camp in NE Iraq." However, by March 2003, 15 months later when the USA invaded Iraq, that small al-Qaeda camp had grown as rapidly as did the small al-Qaeda camp in Afghanistan in the 15 months from May 1996 (when bin Laden moved to Afghanistan) until August 1997.

A year later in August 1998, President Clinton ordered the USA Navy to fire cruise missiles at the al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan. Though most of those missiles hit their intended target, neither bin Laden nor any other terrorist leader was killed. The strikes had killed 20 to 30 people but missed bin Laden by a few hours. By the time the USA invaded Afghanistan 37 months later in October 2001, al-Qaeda had trained more than 10,000 fighters.

While Saddam's regime invaded the Kurdish area in 1996 to remove regime enemies, it did not invade al-Qaeda in NE Iraq after al-Qaeda was established there in December 2001. Unfortunately, when the USA in March 2003 invaded the al-Qaeda camps in NE Iraq, many of the al-Qaeda there escaped into Iran. Because of both of these facts, there is little reason to think that a USA invasion limited to NE Iraq, would prevent al-Qaeda returning to Iraq soon after the USA left there.

On the other hand, the tactics the USA has employed since its invasion of Iraq to subdue terrorists after the removal of the Saddam regime, has not kept al-Qaeda out of Iraq, either. But that is not a valid argument for not invading Iraq. That is a valid argument for changing the USA's tactics in Iraq.

ican, you really need to keep your nose up.

Anniversary of Haditha massacre

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6162442.stm

Embittered Insiders Turn Against Bush
Right to be mad but for the wrong reason.---BBB

Embittered Insiders Turn Against Bush
By Peter Baker
The Washington Post
Sunday 19 November 2006

The weekend after the statue of Saddam Hussein fell, Kenneth Adelman and a couple of other promoters of the Iraq war gathered at Vice President Cheney's residence to celebrate. The invasion had been the "cakewalk" Adelman predicted. Cheney and his guests raised their glasses, toasting President Bush and victory. "It was a euphoric moment," Adelman recalled.

Forty-three months later, the cakewalk looks more like a death march, and Adelman has broken with the Bush team. He had an angry falling- out with Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld this fall. He and Cheney are no longer on speaking terms. And he believes that "the president is ultimately responsible" for what Adelman now calls "the debacle that was Iraq."

Adelman, a former Reagan administration official and onetime member of the Iraq war brain trust, is only the latest voice from inside the Bush circle to speak out against the president or his policies. Heading into the final chapter of his presidency, fresh from the sting of a midterm election defeat, Bush finds himself with fewer and fewer friends. Some of the strongest supporters of the war have grown disenchanted, former insiders are registering public dissent and Republicans on Capitol Hill blame him for losing Congress.

A certain weary crankiness sets in with any administration after six years. By this point in Bill Clinton's tenure, bitter Democrats were competing to denounce his behavior with an intern even as they were trying to fight off his impeachment. Ronald Reagan was deep in the throes of the Iran-contra scandal. But Bush's strained relations with erstwhile friends and allies take on an extra edge of bitterness amid the dashed hopes of the Iraq venture.

"There are a lot of lives that are lost," Adelman said in an interview last week. "A country's at stake. A region's at stake. This is a gigantic situation... . This didn't have to be managed this bad. It's just awful."

The sense of Bush abandonment accelerated during the final weeks of the campaign with the publication of a former aide's book accusing the White House of moral hypocrisy and with Vanity Fair quoting Adelman, Richard N. Perle and other neoconservatives assailing White House leadership of the war.

Since the Nov. 7 elections, Republicans have pinned their woes on the president.

"People expect a level of performance they are not getting," former House speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) said in a speech. Many were livid that Bush waited until after the elections to oust Rumsfeld.

"If Rumsfeld had been out, you bet it would have made a difference," Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) said on television. "I'd still be chairman of the Judiciary Committee."

And so, in what some saw as a rebuke, Senate Republicans restored Trent Lott (Miss.) to their leadership four years after the White House helped orchestrate his ouster, with some saying they could no longer place their faith entirely in Bush.

Some insiders said the White House invited the backlash. "Anytime anyone holds themselves up as holy, they're judged by a different standard," said David Kuo, a former deputy director of the Bush White House's faith-based initiatives who wrote "Tempting Faith," a book that accused the White House of pandering to Christian conservatives. "And at the end of the day, this was a White House that held itself up as holy."

Richard N. Haass, a former top Bush State Department official and now president of the Council on Foreign Relations, said a radically different approach to world affairs naturally generates criticism. "The emphasis on promotion of democracy, the emphasis on regime change, the war of choice in Iraq - all of these are departures from the traditional approach," he said, "so it's not surprising to me that it generates more reaction."

The willingness to break with Bush also underscores the fact that the president spent little time courting many natural allies in Washington, according to some Republicans. GOP leaders in Congress often bristled at what they perceived to be a do-what-we-say approach by the White House. Some of those who did have more personal relationships with Bush, Cheney or Rumsfeld came to feel the sense of disappointment more acutely because they believed so strongly in the goals the president laid out for his administration.

The arc of Bush's second term has shown that the most powerful criticism originates from the inside. The pragmatist crowd around Colin L. Powell began speaking out nearly two years ago after he was eased out as secretary of state. Powell lieutenants such as Haass, Richard L. Armitage, Carl W. Ford Jr. and Lawrence B. Wilkerson took public the policy debates they lost on the inside. Many who worked in Iraq returned deeply upset and wrote books such as "Squandered Victory" (Larry Diamond) and "Losing Iraq" (David L. Phillips). Military and CIA officials unloaded after leaving government, culminating in the "generals' revolt" last spring when retired flag officers called for Rumsfeld's dismissal.

On the domestic side, Bush allies in Congress, interest groups and the conservative media broke their solidarity with the White House out of irritation over a number of issues, including federal spending, illegal immigration, the Supreme Court nomination of Harriet Miers, the response to Hurricane Katrina and the Dubai Ports World deal.

Most striking lately, though, has been the criticism from neoconservatives who provided the intellectual framework for Bush's presidency. Perle, Adelman and others advocated a robust use of U.S. power to advance the ideals of democracy and freedom, targeting Hussein's Iraq as a threat that could be turned into an opportunity.

In an interview last week, Perle said the administration's big mistake was occupying the country rather than creating an interim Iraqi government led by a coalition of exile groups to take over after Hussein was toppled. "If I had known that the U.S. was going to essentially establish an occupation, then I'd say, 'Let's not do it,' " and instead find another way to target Hussein, Perle said. "It was a foolish thing to do."

Perle, head of the Pentagon's Defense Policy Board at the time of the 2003 invasion, said he still believes the invasion was justified. But he resents being called "the architect of the Iraq war," because "my view was different from the administration's view from the very beginning" about how to conduct it. "I am not critical now of anything about which I was not critical before," he said. "I've said it more publicly."

White House officials tend to brush off each criticism by claiming it was over-interpreted or misguided. "I just fundamentally disagree," Cheney said of the comments by Perle, Adelman and other neoconservatives before the midterm elections. Others close to the White House said the neoconservatives are dealing with their own sense of guilt over how events have turned out and are eager to blame Bush to avoid their own culpability.

Joshua Muravchik, a neoconservative at the American Enterprise Institute, said he is distressed "to see neocons turning on Bush" but said he believes they should admit mistakes and openly discuss what went wrong. "All of us who supported the war have to share some of the blame for that," he said. "There's a question to be sorted out: whether the war was a sound idea but very badly executed. And if that's the case, it appears to me the person most responsible for the bad execution was Rumsfeld, and it means neocons should not get too angry at Bush about that."

It may also be, he said, that the mistake was the idea itself - that Iraq could serve as a democratic beacon for the Middle East. "That part of our plan is down the drain," Muravchik said, "and we have to think about what we can do about keeping alive the idea of democracy."

Few of the original promoters of the war have grown as disenchanted as Adelman. The chief of Reagan's arms control agency, Adelman has been close to Cheney and Rumsfeld for decades and even worked for Rumsfeld at one point. As a member of the Defense Policy Board, he wrote in The Washington Post before the Iraq war that it would be "a cakewalk."

But in interviews with Vanity Fair, the New Yorker and The Post, Adelman said he became unhappy about the conduct of the war soon after his ebullient night at Cheney's residence in 2003. The failure to find weapons of mass destruction disturbed him. He said he was disgusted by the failure to stop the looting that followed Hussein's fall and by Rumsfeld's casual dismissal of it with the phrase "stuff happens." The breaking point, he said, was Bush's decision to award Medals of Freedom to occupation chief L. Paul Bremer, Gen. Tommy R. Franks and then-CIA Director George J. Tenet.

"The three individuals who got the highest civilian medals the president can give were responsible for a lot of the debacle that was Iraq," Adelman said. All told, he said, the Bush national security team has proved to be "the most incompetent" of the past half- century. But, he added, "Obviously, the president is ultimately responsible."

Adelman said he remained silent for so long out of loyalty. "I didn't want to bad-mouth the administration," he said. In private, though, he spoke out, resulting in a furious confrontation with Rumsfeld, who summoned him to the Pentagon in September and demanded his resignation from the defense board.

"It seemed like nobody was getting it," Adelman said. "It seemed like everything was locked in. It seemed like everything was stuck." He agrees he bears blame as well. "I think that's fair. When you advocate a policy that turns bad, you do have some responsibility."

Most troubling, he said, are his shattered ideals: "The whole philosophy of using American strength for good in the world, for a foreign policy that is really value-based instead of balanced-power-based, I don't think is disproven by Iraq. But it's certainly discredited."

BBB, Good article; thanks for sharing it.

from bbb's post :
"...In an interview last week, Perle said the administration's big mistake was occupying the country rather than creating an interim Iraqi government led by a coalition of exile groups to take over after Hussein was toppled. "If I had known that the U.S. was going to essentially establish an occupation, then I'd say, 'Let's not do it,' " and instead find another way to target Hussein, Perle said. "It was a foolish thing to do."
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should one really believe that richard perle did not know that the U.S. would be occupying iraq ?
if all of this was a surprise to him , one would be entitiled to ask him :
"did you ever ask any questions or were you just a blind follower ? "

furthermore , ahmad chalabi was one of the iraqi exiles chosen to give the U.S. some insight into iraq . he was able to squeeze a fair amount of money out of the U.S. government .
again , i would ask how much richard perle knew about chalabi and his associates ; was that one of the groups to "lead a new iraq" ?
chalabi and his associates didn't look like a group of people wanting to give service to a new iraq , but instead trying to line their own pockets .


there is an interesting blog by 'interfacedesign' recalling what richard perle said in 2000 ; but i guess he must have forgotten his words .
here is part of the blog :

"I remember very clearly Perles position before war. I glad to be able to quote it from that old article (because I blogged it back then):

Having spent decades in and out of office, feeding journalists and seeing his "genius" promoted in return, Perle has employed his semi-oracular status to promote war with Iraq while consistently underestimating its likely costs. As Perle told US News & World Report: "The Iraqi opposition is kind of like an MRE [meals ready to eat, a freeze-dried Army field ration]. The ingredients are there and you just have to add water, in this case U.S. support." Testifying before Congress in 2000, Perle insisted, "We need not send substantial ground forces into Iraq when patriotic Iraqis are willing to fight to liberate their country." Last year, he conceded that the US troop requirement might go as high as 40,000. "

full text :
...RICHARD PERLE IN 2000...

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
as for mr chalabi's contribution ; it seems that even the U.s. government had had enough of him by 2004 - but he had been able to get a 'fair wage' for his efforts in the meantime

"MSNBC News Services
Updated: 8:09 p.m. ET May 18, 2004
The Pentagon has stopped funding Ahmad Chalabi, the Iraqi exile it once hoped might help lead Iraq but whose intelligence reports and motives were doubted elsewhere in Washington, U.S. officials said Tuesday.

The Pentagon had been giving Chalabi's Iraqi National Congress roughly $340,000 a month. A U.S. defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the Pentagon made its May payment to the INC, and that it was the final one.

full text :
...CHALABI...

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with friends like that .... (you can fill in the rest)

hbg

dys...keep his nose up...? LOL.

Links can be found at the source

I agree with Cole, a phased withdrawal in a short time frame.

Congress and it's ethics.
Democrats in Congress divided on ethics rules

By David D. Kirkpatrick / The New York TimesPublished: November 19, 2006



WASHINGTON: : After railing for months against congressional corruption under Republican rule, Democrats in Congress are divided on how far their proposed ethics overhaul should go.

Democratic leaders in the House and the Senate, mindful that voters in the midterm election cited corruption as a major concern as they handed control of Congress to the Democrats, say they are moving quickly to complete a package of proposed changes. The changes could be ready for consideration as soon as the new Congress convenes in January.

The initial proposals, laid out earlier this year, would prohibit members from accepting meals, gifts or travel from lobbyists, require lobbyists to disclose all contacts with lawmakers, and bar former lawmakers-turned-lobbyists from entering the floor of the chambers or congressional gymnasiums.

None of those measures would overhaul campaign financing or create an independent ethics watchdog to enforce the rules.

Nor would they significantly restrict earmarks, the pet projects lawmakers can insert anonymously into spending bills, which have figured in several recent corruption scandals and attracted criticism from both parties. The proposals would require disclosure of the sponsors of some earmarks, but not all.
But some Democrats say their election is a mandate for more sweeping changes. Many newly elected candidates, citing scandals involving several Republican lawmakers last year, made congressional ethics a major issue during the campaign.

After the Democrats won a majority, Nancy Pelosi, the California representative who will be the new speaker of the House, promised "the most honest, most open and most ethical Congress in history."



http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/19/news/dems.php

The talk the talk. But will they walk the walk? Do you believe that the best congress that money will buy will do the right thing?

Yes, you should have stayed in Vietnam as well - you have ben there, McG, haven't you?

McG's a Fighting 101st Keyboarder. You act as if he isn't doing his patriotic duty sitting in front of his computer, WH.

Cycloptichorn

Where would the world be without the help of those keybord patriots.
*sigh* and *more sighing*

Yay! Another Waltism (tm)!

Nope, I was too young. But, my dad was there.

Would you mind telling us how many Vietnamese were killed in the period of time we were in Vietnam?

...IRAN INVITES IRAQI AND SYRIAN PRESIDENTS FOR TALKS...

so what do we have here ?
is this a new and different "axis of evil" ?
i wonder if henry kissinger is using some of his old connections here ?
he has recently said that only a political solution will have any chance of success .
we should know fairly soon if anything will come of it .
hbg