Saturday, April 10, 2004

Posted here Saturday, April 10, 2004 at 4:20:02 PM     The key issue on the ground in Iraq, from www.billmon.org see fubar april 10 But, if it is true that Centcom has temporarily backed away from the fight, and is preparing to hunker down in fortified bases in hopes the intifada will eventually start to cool down, then this really would start to resemble the first Vietnam War -- in which the French Army, knowing it was too weak to pacify the entire country, tried to rely on a system of block houses and other strong points to maintain some semblance of control. ********

Posted here Saturday, April 10, 2004 at 10:49:25 AM     Restless. Do we see the emergence of teachins, marches?  For a view from the leading edge of concern http://tompaine.com/feature2.cfm/ID/10216 So this is a full-blown crisis, and our leader will not, or cannot, resolve it. It’s time to put partisan politics aside. John Kerry the statesman has to replace Kerry the politician. Sane Republicans like Brent Scowcroft, James Baker and Senator Dick Lugar have to join with leading Democratic statesman in an ultimate showdown with the White House. President Bush has to be forced to admit that his entire Iraq policy was wrong-headed, and if he won’t decline to seek re-election, than he has to fire Don Rumsfeld and ease Dick Cheney off the ticket and seek a consensus for a new Iraq policy. Byrd has to convince other Democrats, such as clear-headed colleagues like Ted Kennedy, to resist the urge to see Iraq as an electoral tool against Bush. What is happening in Iraq is far more important than a partisan electoral issue. And anti-neocon Republicans have to ignore the temptation to rally behind the the bungling Bush administration, for the good of the country and for the salvation of Iraq. Perhaps they can convince President Bush 41 to step in, too. Whatever it takes. There is still a slim chance that a U.S. decision to withdraw all its troops by year’s end, combined with a United Nations takeover and the involvement of Iraq’s Arab neighbors, can stop Iraq from its nightmarish plunge into chaos. ********

Posted here Saturday, April 10, 2004 at 10:02:01 AM     Juan Cole and the Israel connection saturday http://www.juancole.com/ Part of what caused this incipient collapse of the US-appointed Iraqi government is that the US military decided to besiege the entire city of Fallujah to get at insurgents who killed 4 US Blackwater mercenaries last week, even though reports indicated that the guerrillas left the city after the killings. Those guerrillas, supported by civilian demonstrations and desecration of the mercenaries' bodies, announced that they were taking revenge for the Israeli murder of Hamas clerical leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. Just as the Israelis and their American amen corner helped drag the US into the Iraq war, so they also have inflamed Iraqi sentiment against the US by spectacular uses of state terror against Palestinians. Both the Sunni and the Shiite uprisings in Iraq in the past week in a very real sense were set off by Sharon's whacking of Yassin, a paraplegic who could easily have been arrested. (Only once Muqtada al-Sadr announced his support for Hamas was he targeted by the Neocon-dominated Coalition Provisional Authority for arrest, convincing him that he had nothing to lose and had better launch an insurgency).   ********

Posted here Saturday, April 10, 2004 at 9:58:34 AM     From England http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=510195 After their White House talks next Friday, Mr Blair and President George Bush will tell the world that they are not wavering. Their common script is already being honed. The 30 June deadline for handing over power to the Iraqi interim government will not be moved. A "small minority of insurgents" must not derail the moves to democracy. Those who look for a sign of weakness must be met with a show of unwavering strength and determination. ********