Spoils of War. The war against Iraq highlights the influence of a web of individuals inside and outside the government that operates with minimal scrutiny. By Bob Herbert. [New York Times: Opinion]

Most Americans have never heard of the Defense Policy Group. Its meetings are classified. The members disclose their business interests to the Pentagon, but that information is not available to the public.

The Center for Public Integrity, a private watchdog group in Washington, recently disclosed that of the 30 members of the board, at least 9 are linked to companies that have won more than $76 billion in defense contracts in 2001 and 2002.

...

The war against Iraq has become one of the clearest examples ever of the influence of the military-industrial complex that President Dwight Eisenhower warned against so eloquently in his farewell address in 1961. This iron web of relationships among powerful individuals inside and outside the government operates with very little public scrutiny and is saturated with conflicts of interest.

Their goals may or may not coincide with the best interests of the American people. Think of the divergence of interests, for example, between the grunts who are actually fighting this war, who have been eating sand and spilling their blood in the desert, and the power brokers who fought like crazy to make the war happen and are profiting from it every step of the way.

There aren't a lot of rich kids in that desert. The U.S. military is largely working-class. The power brokers homing in on $100 billion worth of postwar reconstruction contracts are not.

...

Those who dreamt of a flowering of democracy in Iraq are advised to consider the skepticism of Brent Scowcroft, the national security adviser to the first President Bush. He asked: "What's going to happen the first time we hold an election in Iraq and it turns out the radicals win? What do you do? We're surely not going to let them take over."  

7:33:54 PM  #  

Arrogance...

After Weeks of Criticism, Cheney Claims Vindication. Vice President Dick Cheney spoke publicly for the first time since the start of the war, and in his understated way said: I told you so. By Richard W. Stevenson and Eric Schmitt. [New York Times: Politics]

Today, Mr. Cheney weighed in on how he wanted to see postwar Iraq put back together, making clear his disdain for giving the United Nations and through it, France, Germany and Russia, a pivotal role.

"The French and the Germans, in particular, did everything they could to prevent us from going forward and enforcing the U.N. Security Council resolutions," he said.

Mr. Cheney implied that he would like those countries to stew awhile now that oil contracts and other lucrative rebuilding jobs are on the line. "Perhaps time will help in terms of improving their outlook," Mr. Cheney said, adding pointedly that perhaps France, Russia and Germany might start by providing humanitarian aid.

...

He watches coverage of the war on television in his office [~] he is partial to Fox News and Brit Hume

7:04:42 PM  #  

Instability plagues Baghdad. Civil order breaks down in the Iraqi capital with homes and hospitals being ransacked as fighting continues. [BBC News | World | UK Edition]

when the al-Kindi hospital, one of Baghdad's key medical facilities, was attacked by armed looters, US troops failed to intervene, saying they had no orders to do so.

"The coalition forces seem to be completely unable to restrain looters or impose any sort of control on the mobs that now govern the streets," said Veronique Taveau, spokeswoman for the UN Office of the Humanitarian Co-ordinator for Iraq (UNOHCI).

7:00:47 PM  #  

Number of Iraqi Dead May Be Unknowable. The effort to number the dead on the Iraqi side in the war begins with a conundrum: who is a civilian and who is a soldier? By John M. Broder. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]

The bombing campaign that accompanied ground actions to squeeze Iraqi military units into ever-smaller "kill boxes" almost certainly left thousands of soldiers dead, perhaps tens of thousands. But the world will probably never know how many, and no Iraqi authority is left to count them and notify their families.

The question of enemy dead does not come up in daily briefings for senior commanders at Central Command, a senior official here said. They are interested only in the combat effectiveness of the units they face and how that can be further reduced, the official said.

6:55:37 PM  #  

NBC to Make TV Movie About POW Jessica Lynch [AP World News]

No need to comment on this.
6:44:12 PM  #  

I'm afraid that we can expect more of this as Iraq adjusts to the lack of leadership. Competing groups may have no compunction for killing eachother. After all, they have not had any form of loyal opposition in generations, if ever.

Crowd Kills Two Islamic Clerics in Iraq. A crowd rushed two Islamic clerics and hacked them to death in Najaf, witnesses said. By The Associated Press. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]

The bloodshed underscored how difficult it will be to bridge deep emnities and political rivalries in Iraq as the American military and interim administration led by retired U.S. Gen. Jay Garner tries to fill the power vaccuum left by the collapse of Saddam's regime.

Crowd Kills 2 Clerics at Shiite Shrine. A furious crowd hacked two clerics to death in a Shiite Muslim shrine Thursday when a meeting meant to be a model of reconciliation in post-Saddam Iraq erupted into a melee between rivals, witnesses said. [Associated Press war headlines via GoUpstate.com]
6:41:46 PM  #  

Link to disturbing war photos, including American dead.

How can the hawks justify this?
9:46:26 AM  #