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2006 Iraq News:

20061225

US - Iraq - Christmas - "In Baghdad, a Christmas patrol." ... "The sun was just beginning to rise, bringing a dim glow on a cold and clear Christmas morning in Baghdad, but the U.S. Army mission was late." ... "The Stryker armored vehicles were supposed to have rolled from Forward Operating Base Loyalty 11 minutes ago, at 6:30 a.m., yet soldiers were still milling about outside the green machines, shivering in bulletproof jackets and Kevlar helmets." ... "Christmas was another working day for many in the battalion, heading out to cordon off a dangerous section of eastern Baghdad and go house to house searching for insurgents, weapons and bomb-making materials." ... "But the holiday - and thoughts of friends and family back home - never left their minds." -By Will Weissert -AP via -SeattlePI.NWsource
US - Iran - Iraq - Military - "U.S. arrest of Iranians reportedly upsets Iraqi president." ... "Iraqi and Iranian authorities slammed the United States on Monday for having arrested several Iranians who were visiting Iraq." ... "A U.S. official said the Iranians were suspected of involvement in attacks against Iraqi security forces." ... "A spokesman for Iraqi President Jalal Talabani said Talabani had invited the Iranians to the country, and the president was "unhappy" about the arrests." ... "The U.S. National Security Council confirmed that the American military arrested at least four Iranians in raids during the past week in Iraq, including two diplomats." ... "NSC spokesman Gordon Johndroe said the two diplomats were questioned, turned over to the Iraqi government and released." ... "At least two others, who are members of the Iranian military, remain in U.S. military custody while an investigation is conducted on whether they were involved in attacks on security forces in Iraq, Johndroe said." -Contributions by Shirzad Bozorgmehr, Sam Dagher, Jomana Karadsheh and Suzanne Malveaux -CNN

20061224

US - Iraq - People - Police - Military - Politics - "12,000 Iraqi policemen killed since '03; 6 U.S. soldiers killed." ... "Some 12,000 Iraqi policemen have been killed since the ouster of Saddam Hussein, the country's interior minister said Sunday, as clashes, a suicide bomber and weekend explosions killed more than a dozen Iraqi officers and six American soldiers." ... "Police and police recruits have been frequent targets of insurgent attacks. In one of the worst single attacks, a suicide car bomber detonated his explosives near a line of national guard and police recruits waiting to take physicals in February 2005. The blast in Hillah, about 60 miles south of Baghdad, killed 125." ... "Police have also been blamed for violence. Gunmen in Iraqi army and police uniforms have been responsible for recent bank robberies in Baghdad and the kidnapping of more than 40 workers and volunteers at the Iraqi Red Crescent." ... "The Iraqi Ministry of Health estimated in November that 150,000 Iraqi civilians been killed in the war that began in 2003. Other estimates put the figure as low as 51,000 or as high as 600,000." -AP via -USATODAY

20061211

US - Iraq - Military - Police - Terrorism - Religion - Intelligence - Politics - Analysis - "Intensified Combat on Streets Likely." ... "President Bush's plan to send tens of thousands of U.S. and Iraqi reinforcements to Baghdad to jointly confront Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias is likely to touch off a more dangerous phase of the war, featuring months of fighting in the streets of the Iraqi capital, current and former military officials warned." ... "The prospect of a more intense battle in the Iraqi capital could put U.S. military commanders in exactly the sort of tough urban fight that war planners strove to avoid during the spring 2003 invasion of the country. The plan to partner U.S. and Iraqi units may compel American soldiers to rely on questionable Iraqi army and police forces as never before. And while the president insisted there is no timetable associated with the troop increase, military officials said sustaining it for more than a few months would place a major new strain on U.S. forces that already are feeling burdened by an unexpectedly long and difficult war." ... "Most of all, the White House's insistence on confronting all insurgents and militias, both Sunni and Shiite, may mean that the U.S. military will wind up fighting the Mahdi Army of radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. That militia is estimated by some U.S. intelligence officials to have grown over the past year to about 60,000 fighters, and some in the Pentagon consider it more militarily effective than the Iraqi army." -By Thomas E. Ricks and Ann Scott Tyson -WashingtonPost

20061205

US- Iraq - Afghanistan - Government - Military - Technology - Money - Politics - People - Flying - Vehicles - Alabama - "U.S. Army Battling To Save Equipment: Gear Piles Up at Depots, Awaiting Repair." ... "Field upon field of more than 1,000 battered M1 tanks, howitzers and other armored vehicles sit amid weeds here at the 15,000-acre Anniston Army Depot [Alabama] -- the idle, hulking formations symbolic of an Army that is wearing out faster than it is being rebuilt." ... "The Army and Marine Corps have sunk more than 40 percent of their ground combat equipment into the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to government data. An estimated $17 billion-plus worth of military equipment is destroyed or worn out each year, blasted by bombs, ground down by desert sand and used up to nine times the rate in times of peace. The gear is piling up at depots such as Anniston, waiting to be repaired." ... "The depletion of major equipment such as tanks, Bradley Fighting Vehicles, and especially helicopters and armored Humvees has left many military units in the United States without adequate training gear, officials say. Partly as a result of the shortages, many U.S. units are rated "unready" to deploy, officials say, raising alarm in Congress and concern among military leaders at a time when Iraq strategy is under review by the White House and the bipartisan Iraq Study Group." ... "Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker, the Army's chief of staff, is lobbying hard for more money to repair what he calls the "holes" in his force, saying current war funding is inadequate to make the Army "well." Asked in a congressional hearing this past summer whether he was comfortable with the readiness levels of non-deployed Army units, Schoomaker replied: "No."" ... "Despite the work piling up, the Army's depots have been operating at about half their capacity because of a lack of funding for repairs." -By Ann Scott Tyson -WashingtonPost

20061110

US - Government - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Privacy - Environment - Health - Seniors - Drugs - Oil - Industry - Legal - History - Missouri - "Democrats are set to subpoena: The new majority is expected to hold hearings on military spending and the Iraq war -- just for starters." ... "[Missouri Democrat] Rep. Ike Skelton knows what he will do in one of his first acts as chairman of the Armed Services Committee in the Democratic-led House: resurrect the subcommittee on oversight and investigations." ... "The panel was disbanded by the Republicans after they won control of Congress in 1994. Now, Skelton (D-Mo.) intends to use it as a forum to probe Pentagon spending and the Bush administration's conduct of the Iraq war." ... "With control of every committee in Congress starting in January, the new majority will inherit broad powers to subpoena and investigate. And that is expected to translate into wide-ranging and contentious hearings." ... "The agenda is likely to be dominated by the Iraq war, but could include probes into the Bush administration's warrantless surveillance, environmental policies and new prescription-drug program for seniors. Industries, such as oil companies, could also come under closer scrutiny." ... ""This could be remembered as a historically unique period in which an administration got immunity from Congress to engage in errors with impunity," said Charles Tiefer, a University of Baltimore law professor and a former House counsel." ... "Democrats are expected to bore into the Iraq war, including review of no-bid contracts for reconstruction, intelligence failures and decisions to ignore the advice of military commanders about troop levels." (1, 2) -By Richard B. Schmitt and Richard Simon -LAtimes

20061108

Noteworthy - Secret - US - Iraq- Iran - Religious - Terrorism - Military - Intelligence - History - "Gates’ CIA Past Could Haunt Him in Confirmation Hearings." ... "President Bush’s pick to replace Donald H. Rumsfeld with former CIA Director Robert Gates is an odd one, considering it’s almost certain to revive festering questions about the Bush administration’s handling of pre-war intelligence on Iraq." ... "In early 1987, his role in the so-called Iran-Contra affair, a secret White House operation to sell weapons to radical Islamic Iran in exchange for the release of U.S. hostages — and cash for CIA-backed rebels in Nicaragua — came under scrutiny." ... "Then, in during his 1991 nomination hearings to run the CIA, Gates ran into a buzz saw of testimony from a former agency analyst who said that during the 1980s Gates had skewered intelligence to fit the convictions of senior Reagan administration officials that Soviet agents had concocted a plot to assassinate the pope and were arming and encouraging Marxist revolutionary groups to carry out terrorist attacks." ... "Both theories turned out to be wrong, according Carolyn McGiffert Ekedahl, who headed a team of CIA analysts assigned the task of investigating the theory." ... "Senior former CIA analyst Mel Goodman charged Gates with a number of improprieties, including “the imposition of intelligence judgments, often over the protests of the consensus in the Directorate of Intelligence, to slant intelligence . . . suppression of intelligence that didn’t support the Casey agenda . . . (and) use of the Directorate of Operations to slant intelligence of the Directorate of Intelligence.”" -By Jeff Stein -CQ.com
Election 2006 - US - Iraq - Military - Missouri - Montana - Virginia - Pennsylvania - Santorum - Rhode Island - Ohio - Indiana- Kentucky - "Democrats win House control in midterm elections; Senate still in doubt." ... "Democrats took over the House in Tuesday's midterm elections but Senate control might take weeks to decide, in an election shaped by voter discontent with President Bush and the direction of the Iraq war." ... "Democrat Claire McCaskill's victory over incumbent [Republican] Sen. Jim Talent in Missouri has put Senate control within her party's grasp. Two Senate races remained undecided early Wednesday -- Montana, where a Democratic challenger led, and Virginia, where another Democratic challenger was ahead by the slimmest of margins. Democrats must win both to seize Senate control." ... "Four incumbent Republicans lost in the Senate. Pennsylvanians voted out conservative stalwart Rick Santorum [Republican] — the No. 3 GOP leader in the Senate — in favor of Democrat Bob Casey; Rhode Island voters picked Democratic challenger Sheldon Whitehouse over incumbent Republican Sen. Lincoln Chafee; Ohio voters chose Democratic Rep. Sherrod Brown over Republican incumbent Mike Dewine; and McCaskill beat Talent." ... "Democrats also won major House races in Indiana, Pennsylvania and Kentucky and the closely contested governor's race in Ohio, the AP projected. And Democrats seized a majority of the nation's governorships for the first time in 12 years."-USATODAY

20061107

US - 2006 Election - Opinion - Government - Iraq - Military - "Corruption named as key issue by voters in exit polls." ... "By a wide margin, Americans who voted Tuesday in the midterm election say they disapprove of the war in Iraq." ... "But when asked which issue was extremely important to their vote, more voters said corruption and ethics in government than any other issue, including the war, according to national exit polls." ... "And defying the traditional political maxim that "all politics is local," 62 percent of voters said national issues mattered more than local issues when deciding which House candidate to pick." -CNN
US - Iraq - Military - People - TV - Money - Oil - Politics - Japan - New York - "Rupert Murdoch -- who once predicted Iraq war could lead to $20/barrel oil --described war casualties as "minute"." ... "On November 6, News Corp. chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch reportedly said at a conference in Tokyo [Japan] that U.S. casualties in Iraq, "by the terms of any previous war are quite minute," as the weblog Democratic Underground noted. He further stated: "I believe it was right to go in there. I believe that certainly the execution that has followed that has included many mistakes. But that's easy to say after the event." Murdoch, whose conservative media empire includes Fox News Channel, the New York Post, and The Weekly Standard, vocally supported the war in 2003, citing potential economic benefits. As of November 3, according to CNN, a total of 2,836 U.S. soldiers have been killed since the invasion of Iraq in March 2003." -MediaMatters.org

20061103

Secret - US - Iraq- Nuclear - Government - Military - Intelligence - Internet - Archive - History - Hoekstra- Michigan - Roberts - Kansas - Legislation - Politics - "U.S. Web Archive Is Said to Reveal a Nuclear Primer." ... "Last March, the federal government set up a Web site to make public a vast archive of Iraqi documents captured during the war. The Bush administration did so under pressure from Congressional Republicans who had said they hoped to “leverage the Internet” to find new evidence of the prewar dangers posed by Saddam Hussein." ... "But in recent weeks, the site has posted some documents that weapons experts say are a danger themselves: detailed accounts of Iraq’s secret nuclear research before the 1991 Persian Gulf war. The documents, the experts say, constitute a basic guide to building an atom bomb." ... "Last night, the government shut down the Web site after The New York Times asked about complaints from weapons experts and arms-control officials. A spokesman for the director of national intelligence said access to the site had been suspended “pending a review to ensure its content is appropriate for public viewing.”" ... "Officials of the International Atomic Energy Agency, fearing that the information could help states like Iran develop nuclear arms, had privately protested last week to the American ambassador to the agency, according to European diplomats who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the issue’s sensitivity. One diplomat said the agency’s technical experts “were shocked” at the public disclosures." ... "The documents, roughly a dozen in number, contain charts, diagrams, equations and lengthy narratives about bomb building that nuclear experts who have viewed them say go beyond what is available elsewhere on the Internet and in other public forums. For instance, the papers give detailed information on how to build nuclear firing circuits and triggering explosives, as well as the radioactive cores of atom bombs." ... "The director of national intelligence, John D. Negroponte, had resisted setting up the Web site, which some intelligence officials felt implicitly raised questions about the competence and judgment of government analysts. But President Bush approved the site’s creation after Congressional Republicans proposed legislation to force the documents’ release." ... "The campaign for the Web site was led by the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Representative Peter Hoekstra [Republican] of Michigan. Last November, he and his Senate counterpart, Pat Roberts [Republican] of Kansas, wrote to Mr. Negroponte, asking him to post the Iraqi material." (1, 2, 3) -By William J. Broad with contributions by Scott Shane -NYTimes

20061102

Noteworthy- US - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Politics - History - "Bush owes troops an apology, not Kerry: Olbermann: Bush 'appearing to be stupid' about Kerry's joke." ... "A brief reminder, Mr. Bush: You are not the United States of America." ... "You are merely a politician whose entire legacy will have been a willingness to make anything political; to have, in this case, refused to acknowledge that the insult wasn't about the troops, and that the insult was not even truly about you either, that the insult, in fact, is you." ... "So now John Kerry has apologized to the troops; apologized for the Republicans' deliberate distortions." ... "Thus, the president will now begin the apologies he owes our troops, right?" ... "This president must apologize to the troops for having suggested, six weeks ago, that the chaos in Iraq, the death and the carnage, the slaughtered Iraqi civilians and the dead American service personnel, will, to history, "look like just a comma."" ... "This president must apologize to the troops because the intelligence he claims led us into Iraq proved to be undeniably and irredeemably wrong." ... "This president must apologize to the troops for having laughed about the failure of that intelligence at a banquet while our troops were in harm's way." ... "This president must apologize to the troops because the streets of Iraq were not strewn with flowers and its residents did not greet them as liberators." ... "This president must apologize to the troops because his administration ran out of "plan" after barely two months." ... "This president must apologize to the troops for getting 2,815 of them killed." (1, 2, 3, 4) -By Keith Olbermann -MSNBC

20061101

Secret - US - Iraq - Religious - Police - Politics - Intelligence - "Military Charts Movement of Conflict in Iraq Toward Chaos." ... "A classified briefing prepared two weeks ago by the United States Central Command portrays Iraq as edging toward chaos, in a chart that the military is using as a barometer of civil conflict." ... "A one-page slide shown at the Oct. 18 briefing provides a rare glimpse into how the military command that oversees the war is trying to track its trajectory, particularly in terms of sectarian fighting." ... "The slide includes a color-coded bar chart that is used to illustrate an “Index of Civil Conflict.” It shows a sharp escalation in sectarian violence since the bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra in February, and tracks a further worsening this month despite a concerted American push to tamp down the violence in Baghdad." ... "In fashioning the index, the military is weighing factors like the ineffectual Iraqi police and the dwindling influence of moderate religious and political figures, rather than more traditional military measures such as the enemy’s fighting strength and the control of territory." ... "The conclusions the Central Command has drawn from these trends are not encouraging, according to a copy of the slide that was obtained by The New York Times. The slide shows Iraq as moving sharply away from “peace,” an ideal on the far left side of the chart, to a point much closer to the right side of the spectrum, a red zone marked “chaos.” As depicted in the command’s chart, the needle has been moving steadily toward the far right of the chart." ... "An intelligence summary at the bottom of the slide reads “urban areas experiencing ‘ethnic cleansing’ campaigns to consolidate control” and “violence at all-time high, spreading geographically.” According to a Central Command official, the index on civil strife has been a staple of internal command briefings for most of this year. The analysis was prepared by the command’s intelligence directorate, which is overseen by Brig. Gen. John M. Custer." -By Michael R. Gordon -NYTimes

20061031

US - Iraq - Afghanistan - Military - Government - Media - Terrorism - Politics - "Statement of John Kerry Responding to Republican Distortions, Pathetic Tony Snow Diversions and Distractions." ... "Senator John Kerry issued the following statement in response to White House Press Secretary Tony Snow, assorted right wing nut-jobs, and right wing talk show hosts desperately distorting Kerry’s comments about President Bush to divert attention from their disastrous record:" ... "“If anyone thinks a veteran would criticize the more than 140,000 heroes serving in Iraq and not the president who got us stuck there, they're crazy. This is the classic G.O.P. playbook. I’m sick and tired of these despicable Republican attacks that always seem to come from those who never can be found to serve in war, but love to attack those who did." ... "I’m not going to be lectured by a stuffed suit White House mouthpiece standing behind a podium, or doughy Rush Limbaugh, who no doubt today will take a break from belittling Michael J. Fox’s Parkinson’s disease to start lying about me just as they have lied about Iraq. It disgusts me that these Republican hacks, who have never worn the uniform of our country lie and distort so blatantly and carelessly about those who have." ... "The people who owe our troops an apology are George W. Bush and Dick Cheney who misled America into war and have given us a Katrina foreign policy that has betrayed our ideals, killed and maimed our soldiers, and widened the terrorist threat instead of defeating it. These Republicans are afraid to debate veterans who live and breathe the concerns of our troops, not the empty slogans of an Administration that sent our brave troops to war without body armor." ... "Bottom line, these Republicans want to debate straw men because they’re afraid to debate real men. And this time it won’t work because we’re going to stay in their face with the truth and deny them even a sliver of light for their distortions. No Democrat will be bullied by an administration that has a cut and run policy in Afghanistan and a stand still and lose strategy in Iraq.”" -JohnKerry.com
US - Iraq - Afghanistan - Military - Families - "Army: 7 Families Misled On War Deaths: Review Finds Soldiers' Families Given Incorrect Information On Their Deaths." ... "The families of seven soldiers who died in Iraq or Afghanistan were given incorrect or misleading information about the deaths, the Army has concluded after a review of war casualty reports." ... "The best-known was Cpl. Patrick Tillman, the former star player in the National Football League whose family initially was told he had died a hero's death, killed by enemy forces in Afghanistan. After Tillman's memorial service the family was told the truth: He was killed unintentionally by gunfire from his fellow soldiers." ... "More than 1,800 Army soldiers have died in Iraq since the war began in March 2003; about 240 have died in Afghanistan. Overall, more than 2,800 U.S. military members have died since the start of the Iraq war." -AP via -CBSNews

20061023

US - Iraq - Police - "15 Police Recruits Killed in Iraq; U.S. Death Toll for October Hits 86." ... "At least 15 Iraqi police recruits were killed Sunday when two buses taking them to Baghdad were ambushed by insurgents north of the capital, a local police official said. Twenty-five recruits were injured in the attack, and 20 others were kidnapped, he said." ... "On Sunday and Monday, the U.S. military announced the deaths of seven soldiers and a Marine, bringing the number of U.S. troops killed in Iraq this month to 86 -- the fifth-highest total in any single month since the war began. The only higher monthly tolls were 137 in November 2004, 135 in April 2004, 106 in January 2005, and 96 in October, 2005. Attacks against U.S. and Iraqi forces in Baghdad have increased more than 40 percent since midsummer, U.S. military officials say." -By John Ward Anderson and Debbi Wilgoren -WashingtonPost

20061018

US - Iraq - People - "10 troops slain, brings American October death toll to 69." ... "The U.S. military reported Wednesday that 10 American troops had been killed the day, raising the death toll so far this month to 69 and putting October on track to be the deadliest month for coalition forces since January 2005." ... "According to an Associated Press count, October also is on the way to being the deadliest month for Iraqis since the AP began tracking deaths in April 2005. In October, 767 Iraqis have been killed in war-related violence, an average of 45 every day." ... "The actual number is likely higher, as many killings go unreported." ... "For the U.S. military, October's death toll is on a pace that, if continued, would make the month the deadliest for coalition forces since January 2005, when 107 U.S. troops died. The war's deadliest month for U.S. forces was November 2004, when 137 troops died. At least 2,785 members of the U.S. military have died since the Iraq war started in March 2003, according to an AP count."-AP via -USATODAY

20061017

US - Government - Money - Politics - Legislators - Election 2006 - TV - Radio - Ads - Washington - Virginia - Indiana - Connecticut - Iraq - Afghanistan - Military - "Dems using hourly wage issue against GOP rivals." ... "Democratic challengers in more than two-dozen House and Senate races are attacking Republicans in Congress for taking pay raises while voting against a minimum wage increase." ... "The attacks are contained in television and radio ads running from Washington state to Virginia. In some races, such as House contests in Indiana and Connecticut, Democrats also link pay raises to Republican votes against combat bonuses for U.S. troops fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan." ... "Most members of Congress currently earn $165,200 a year; top leaders earn more. That's $31,600 more than in 1997, when the federal minimum wage was raised to the current $5.15 an hour. Unless legislators act during a lame-duck session after [2006] Election Day, lawmakers who will be part of the Congress that convenes in January will get an automatic 2% raise to $168,504." -By Andrea Stone -USATODAY

20061013

UK- Iraq - Politics - "General seeks UK Iraq withdrawal: The presence of UK armed forces in Iraq "exacerbates the security problems" and they should "get out some time soon", the head of the British Army has said." ... "Chief of the General Staff Sir Richard Dannatt told the Daily Mail that the military campaign fought in 2003 had "effectively kicked the door in"." ... "He also said that initial planning for the post-war period had been poor." ... "There are currently more than 7,000 British soldiers in Iraq, based largely in Basra in the south of the country." ... "BBC political editor Nick Robinson described Sir Richard's remarks as "quite extraordinary"." ... "He said the new head of the British army's comments "directly contradicted so much of what the government had said"." ... "Sir Richard, who took on his role in August, also said planning for what happened after the initial successful war military offensive was "poor, probably based more on optimism than sound planning"." ... "Major General Patrick Cordingly said: "I think it is a very brave thing for him to say. I do agree. I think there comes a time when you have got to let Iraq get on and look after its own security."" -BBC /News

20061012

UK - Iraq - Religious - Politics - "Sir Richard Dannatt : A very honest General." ... "[Head of the UK's Army] Sir Richard's lead in shining a light on the Armed Forces extends to the mission in Iraq. He says with great clarity and honesty that "our presence exacerbates the security problems". "I think history will show that the planning for what happened after the initial successful war-fighting phase was poor, probably based more on optimism than sound planning." ... ""History will show that a vacuum was created and into the vacuum malign elements moved. The hope that we might have been able to get out of Iraq in 12, 18, 24 months after the initial start in 2003 has proved fallacious. Now hostile elements have got a hold it has made our life much more difficult in Baghdad and in Basra." ... ""The original intention was that we put in place a liberal democracy that was an exemplar for the region, was pro-West and might have a beneficial effect on the balance within the Middle East." ... ""That was the hope. Whether that was a sensible or naïve hope, history will judge. I don't think we are going to do that. I think we should aim for a lower ambition."" ... "Sir Richard adds, strongly, that we should "get ourselves out sometime soon because our presence exacerbates the security problems". "We are in a Muslim country and Muslims' views of foreigners in their country are quite clear. "As a foreigner, you can be welcomed by being invited into a country, but we weren't invited, certainly by those in Iraq at the time. Let's face it, the military campaign we fought in 2003 effectively kicked the door in." ... ""That is a fact. I don't say that the difficulties we are experiencing around the world are caused by our presence in Iraq, but undoubtedly our presence in Iraq exacerbates them."" ... "He contrasts this with the situation in Afghanistan, where we remain at the invitation of President Hamid Karzai's government." ... ""There is a clear distinction between our status and position in Iraq and in Afghanistan, which is why I have much more optimism that we can get it right in Afghanistan."" -By Sarah Sands -DailyMail.co.uk

20060929

Noteworthy - US - Iraq - Political - Intelligence - History - Book - "Book Says Bush Ignored Urgent Warning on Iraq." ... "The White House ignored an urgent warning in September 2003 from a top Iraq adviser who said that thousands of additional American troops were desperately needed to quell the insurgency there, according to a new book by Bob Woodward, the Washington Post reporter and author. The book describes a White House riven by dysfunction and division over the war." ... "The warning is described in “State of Denial,” scheduled for publication on Monday by Simon & Schuster. The book says President Bush’s top advisers were often at odds among themselves, and sometimes were barely on speaking terms, but shared a tendency to dismiss as too pessimistic assessments from American commanders and others about the situation in Iraq." ... "As late as November 2003, Mr. Bush is quoted as saying of the situation in Iraq: “I don’t want anyone in the cabinet to say it is an insurgency. I don’t think we are there yet.”" ... "Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld is described as disengaged from the nuts-and-bolts of occupying and reconstructing Iraq — a task that was initially supposed to be under the direction of the Pentagon — and so hostile toward Condoleezza Rice, then the national security adviser, that President Bush had to tell him to return her phone calls. The American commander for the Middle East, Gen. John P. Abizaid, is reported to have told visitors to his headquarters in Qatar in the fall of 2005 that “Rumsfeld doesn’t have any credibility anymore” to make a public case for the American strategy for victory in Iraq." ... "Robert D. Blackwill, then the top Iraq adviser on the National Security Council, is said to have issued his warning about the need for more troops in a lengthy memorandum sent to Ms. Rice. The book says Mr. Blackwill’s memorandum concluded that more ground troops, perhaps as many as 40,000, were desperately needed." ... "It says that Mr. Blackwill and L. Paul Bremer III, then the top American official in Iraq, later briefed Ms. Rice and Stephen J. Hadley, her deputy, about the pressing need for more troops during a secure teleconference from Iraq. It says the White House did nothing in response." (1, 2) -By David E. Sanger with contributions by Mark Mazzetti, David Johnston, and Julie Bosman -NYTimes

20060928

US- Iraq - Afghanistan - Military - Terrorism - Money - Politics - "Cost of Iraq war nearly $2b a week." ... "A new congressional analysis shows the Iraq war is now costing taxpayers almost $2 billion a week -- nearly twice as much as in the first year of the conflict three years ago and 20 percent more than last year -- as the Pentagon spends more on establishing regional bases to support the extended deployment and scrambles to fix or replace equipment damaged in combat." ... "The upsurge occurs as the total cost of military operations at home and abroad since 2001, including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, will top half a trillion dollars, according to an internal assessment by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service completed last week." ... "The spike in operating costs -- including a 20 percent increase over last year in Afghanistan, where the mission now costs about $370 million a week -- comes even though troop levels in both countries have remained stable. The reports attribute the rising costs in part to a higher pace of fighting in both countries, where insurgents and terrorists have increased their attacks on US and coalition troops and civilians." ... "Another major factor, however, is ``the building of more extensive infrastructure to support troops and equipment in and around Iraq and Afghanistan," according to the report." -By Bryan Bender -BostonGlobe

20060926

US - Iraq - Politics - "General: Appeals for More Troops Were Denied: Three retired soldiers slam Rumsfeld's policies at a Democratic hearing in which the -party tries to take the offensive on the war in Iraq." ... "Adding to criticism of the Bush administration's prosecution of the war in Iraq, a retired senior general who commanded an infantry division in the conflict said Monday that requests by commanders for more soldiers were repeatedly turned down." ... ""Many of us routinely asked for more troops," retired Maj. Gen. John R.S. Batiste said, contradicting statements by President Bush and his senior aides that the administration had given the military all the resources it had asked for." ... ""There simply aren't enough troops there to accomplish the task," said Batiste, who has previously called for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld to resign. "It's a shell game we're playing in Iraq, and we've been doing it since day one. And we're still doing it today."" ... "Batiste, in his testimony, renewed his April call for Rumsfeld to resign. Joining him were retired Army Maj. Gen. Paul D. Eaton and retired Marine Col. Thomas X. Hammes." ... "All three of them Iraq veterans, they lambasted what they called the Defense secretary's reluctance to commit more troops and other resources to the war." ... ""The whole thing is absolutely disingenuous," Batiste said of the administration's position that the number of soldiers deployed was sufficient to secure Iraq. "We started with a strategy and a plan that was under-resourced in soldiers and Marines and airmen and sailors by a factor of three."" (1, 2) -By Noam N. Levey -LAtimes

20060925

US - Afghanistan - Iraq - Pakistan - Osama bin Laden - Religious - Terrorism - Money - Politics - Military - Intelligence - "Afghanistan, 5 years later: U.S. confront Taliban's return." ... "Afghanistan has become Iraq on a slow burn. Five years after they were ousted, the Taliban are back in force, their ranks renewed by a new generation of diehards. Violence, opium trafficking, ethnic tensions, official corruption and political anarchy are all worse than they've been at any time since the U.S.-led intervention in 2001." ... "By failing to stop Taliban leaders and Osama bin Laden from escaping into Pakistan, then diverting troops and resources to Iraq before finishing the job in Afghanistan, the Bush administration left the door open to a Taliban comeback. Compounding the problem, reconstruction efforts have been slow and limited, and the U.S. and NATO didn't anticipate the extent and ferocity of the Taliban resurgence or the alliances the insurgents have formed with other Islamic extremists and with the world's leading opium traffickers." ... "There are only 42,000 U.S. and NATO-led troops to secure a country that's half again the size of Iraq, where 150,000 U.S.-led coalition troops are deployed. Suicide bombings have soared from two in all of 2002 to about one every five days. Civilian casualties are mounting." ... "James Dobbins, who was President Bush's special envoy to Afghanistan, said that the administration dismissed European offers of a major peacekeeping force after the U.S. intervention and almost immediately began shifting military assets to invade Iraq." ... "The White House "resisted the whole concept of peacekeeping," said Dobbins. "They wanted to demonstrate a different approach, one that would be much lower cost. So the decision to skimp on manpower and deploy one-fiftieth the troops as were deployed in Bosnia was accompanied by a decision to underplay economic assistance." ... ""We invaded Afghanistan in October 2001. We conquered the country in December, and Congress was not asked to provide any (reconstruction) money until the following October," he continued. "Much of the money didn't show up for years. And not only were the actual sums relatively small, but with the failure to establish even a modicum of security in the countryside, there was no way to spend it."" ... "There are 22,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan. But there are only 5,000 U.S. combat soldiers in eastern Afghanistan bordering Taliban refuges in Pakistan, a 27,000-square-mile area of vast deserts and mountains nearly the size of South Carolina." ... "ISAF [International Security Assistance Force led by NATO], with 20,000 troops from 36 nations, has only 8,000 troops for 77,000 square miles - slightly smaller than Minnesota - in the south." ... "The insurgents and their leaders operate from Pakistan, aided by Pakistani officials, radical Islamic parties and al Qaida. They're flush with recruits from Islamist seminaries on both sides of the border that offer religious instruction and combat training." ... "Taliban extremists also have been to Iraq for training in combat and bomb-making, and Iraqi insurgents have traveled to Pakistan to forge closer ties with Afghan and Pakistani extremists, according to U.S. intelligence officials." ... "The Afghan army has about 30,000 troops who participate in operations with U.S. and ISAF forces. But they lack basic equipment - helmets, radios and armored vehicles - and rely on U.S. and other foreign funds for their salaries." -By Jonathan S. Landay -McClatchy-RealCities

20060924

US - Government - Intelligence - Iraq - Global - Religious - Military - Terrorism - Politics - "Spy Agencies Say Iraq War Worsens Terror Threat." ... "A stark assessment of terrorism trends by American intelligence agencies has found that the American invasion and occupation of Iraq has helped spawn a new generation of Islamic radicalism and that the overall terrorist threat has grown since the Sept. 11 attacks." ... "The classified National Intelligence Estimate attributes a more direct role to the Iraq war in fueling radicalism than that presented either in recent White House documents or in a report released Wednesday by the House Intelligence Committee, according to several officials in Washington involved in preparing the assessment or who have read the final document." ... "The intelligence estimate, completed in April, is the first formal appraisal of global terrorism by United States intelligence agencies since the Iraq war began, and represents a consensus view of the 16 disparate spy services inside government. Titled “Trends in Global Terrorism: Implications for the United States,’’ it asserts that Islamic radicalism, rather than being in retreat, has metastasized and spread across the globe." ... "An opening section of the report, “Indicators of the Spread of the Global Jihadist Movement,” cites the Iraq war as a reason for the diffusion of jihad ideology." ... "The report “says that the Iraq war has made the overall terrorism problem worse,” said one American intelligence official." ... "The estimate’s judgments confirm some predictions of a National Intelligence Council report completed in January 2003, two months before the Iraq invasion. That report stated that the approaching war had the potential to increase support for political Islam worldwide and could increase support for some terrorist objectives." ... "The [new] estimate concludes that the radical Islamic movement has expanded from a core of Qaeda operatives and affiliated groups to include a new class of “self-generating” cells inspired by Al Qaeda’s leadership but without any direct connection to Osama bin Laden or his top lieutenants." ... "In early 2005, the National Intelligence Council released a study concluding that Iraq had become the primary training ground for the next generation of terrorists, and that veterans of the Iraq war might ultimately overtake Al Qaeda’s current leadership in the constellation of the global jihad leadership." (1, 2) -By Mark Mazzetti -NYTimes
US - Iraq - Global - Military - Religious - Terrorism - Politics - "Spy Agencies Say Iraq War Hurting U.S. Terror Fight." ... "The war in Iraq has become a primary recruitment vehicle for violent Islamic extremists, motivating a new generation of potential terrorists around the world whose numbers may be increasing faster than the United States and its allies can reduce the threat, U.S. intelligence analysts have concluded." ... "A 30-page National Intelligence Estimate completed in April cites the "centrality" of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, and the insurgency that has followed, as the leading inspiration for new Islamic extremist networks and cells that are united by little more than an anti-Western agenda. It concludes that, rather than contributing to eventual victory in the global counterterrorism struggle, the situation in Iraq has worsened the U.S. position, according to officials familiar with the classified document." ... ""It's a very candid assessment," one intelligence official said yesterday of the estimate, the first formal examination of global terrorist trends written by the National Intelligence Council since the March 2003 invasion. "It's stating the obvious."" ... "The NIE, whose contents were first reported by the New York Times, coincides with public statements by senior intelligence officials describing a different kind of conflict than the one outlined by President Bush in a series of recent speeches marking the fifth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks." ... "The latest terrorism assessment paints a portrait of a global war in which Iraq is less the central front of actual combat than a unifying battle cry for disparate extremist groups and even individuals. "It is just those kinetic actions that lead to the radicalization of others," a senior counterterrorism official said earlier this summer. "Surgical strikes? Nothing is surgical about military operations. They tend to have impacts, affects."" ... "But "a really big hole" in the U.S. strategy, a second counterterrorism official said, "is that we focus on the terrorists and very little on how they are created. If you looked at all the resources of the U.S. government, we spent 85, 90 percent on current terrorists, not on how people are radicalized."" (1, 2) -By Karen DeYoung with contributions by Dafna Linzer and Thomas E. Ricks, and Magda Jean-Louis -WashingtonPost

20060921

US - Iraq - Military - Prison - Torture - Human Rights - Politics - "Iraq torture 'worse after Saddam'." ... "Torture may be worse now in Iraq than under former leader Saddam Hussein, the UN's chief anti-torture expert says." ... "Manfred Nowak said the situation in Iraq was "out of control", with abuses being committed by security forces, militia groups and anti-US insurgents." ... "Bodies found in the Baghdad morgue "often bear signs of severe torture", said the human rights office of the UN Assistance Mission in Iraq in a report." ... "The UN report says detainees' bodies often show signs of beating using electrical cables, wounds in heads and genitals, broken legs and hands, electric and cigarette burns." ... "Bodies found at the Baghdad mortuary "often bear signs of severe torture including acid-induced injuries and burns caused by chemical substances"." ... "Many bodies have missing skin, broken bones, back, hands and legs, missing eyes, missing teeth and wounds caused by power drills or nails, the UN report says." ... "Victims come from prisons run by US-led multinational forces as well as by the ministries of interior and defence and private militias, the report said." ... "It concludes that torture threatens "the very fabric of the country" as victims exact their own revenge and fuel further violence." -BBC /News

20060920

Virginia- 2006 Election - 2008 Election -US - Iraq - Military - Terrorism - "Gaffes Make Allen Vulnerable to Hard-Charging Webb in Va.." ... "Less than a year ago, there was little indication that Virginia Republican George Allen would face much of a race in his bid for a second Senate term. With Democrats then struggling to find a credible challenger, Allen was widely expected to be able to spend a good part of this year in other states to prospect a possible bid for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination." ... "But the emergence of a tough-minded Democratic nominee in author and former Navy Secretary Jim Webb, and some self-inflicted damage on Allen’s part, have combined to keep Allen close to home — and thrust him into a contest that looks increasingly competitive. As a result, CQPolitics.com has changed its rating on the race to Leans Republican from Republican Favored." ... "Webb, a decorated Marine Corps veteran of the Vietnam War, served as Navy secretary under President Ronald Reagan and is the author of several best-selling non-fiction books and novels, many with military themes. He maintained his Republican Party allegiances right through 2000, when he favored George W. Bush for president — and Allen in his successful bid to unseat Democratic Sen. Charles S. Robb." ... "But Webb turned sharply because of his strong opposition to Bush’s decision as president to launch the war in Iraq, a conflict that Webb viewed as unnecessary to defend U.S. national security and a diversion of personnel and resources away from the pursuit of the terrorists who actually staged the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States." -By Greg Giroux -CQPolitics.com

20060919

US - Iraq - Religious - Military - Intelligence - Politics - "Young children fight U.S. troops in Iraq." ... "Shiite militias are encouraging children — some as young as 6 or 7 — to hurl stones and gasoline bombs at U.S. convoys, hoping to lure American troops into ambushes or provoke them into shooting back, U.S. soldiers say." ... "Gangs of up to 100 children assemble in Sadr City, stronghold of radical anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army militia, and in nearby neighborhoods, U.S. officers said in interviews this week." ... "Militants have used children before. Marines in the volatile city of Ramadi say Sunni Arab insurgents often send children to check out U.S. defenses or warn of approaching patrols. And Israeli troops have long faced stone-throwing Palestinian kids." ... "The incidents have seemed to increase since U.S. soldiers moved their security crackdown into Shiite neighborhoods surrounding eastern Baghdad's Sadr City. The U.S. crackdown in the capital is aimed at curbing the power of the Mahdi Army and other sectarian militias." ... "Army intelligence officers say they predicted before the offensive began this summer that militants in Baghdad would make use of children." -By Antonio Castaneda -AP via -Yahoo

20060917

US - Iraq - Government - Military - Money - Politics - "Ties to GOP Trumped Know-How Among Staff Sent to Rebuild Iraq." ... "After the fall of Saddam Hussein's government in April 2003, the opportunity to participate in the U.S.-led effort to reconstruct Iraq attracted all manner of Americans -- restless professionals, Arabic-speaking academics, development specialists and war-zone adventurers. But before they could go to Baghdad, they had to get past Jim O'Beirne's office in the Pentagon." ... "To pass muster with O'Beirne, a political appointee who screens prospective political appointees for Defense Department posts, applicants didn't need to be experts in the Middle East or in post-conflict reconstruction. What seemed most important was loyalty to the Bush administration." ... "O'Beirne's staff posed blunt questions to some candidates about domestic politics: Did you vote for George W. Bush in 2000? Do you support the way the president is fighting the war on terror? Two people who sought jobs with the U.S. occupation authority said they were even asked their views on Roe v. Wade." ... "Many of those chosen by O'Beirne's office to work for the Coalition Provisional Authority, which ran Iraq's government from April 2003 to June 2004, lacked vital skills and experience. A 24-year-old who had never worked in finance --but had applied for a White House job -- was sent to reopen Baghdad's stock exchange. The daughter of a prominent neoconservative commentator and a recent graduate from an evangelical university for home-schooled children were tapped to manage Iraq's $13 billion budget, even though they didn't have a background in accounting." ... "The decision to send the loyal and the willing instead of the best and the brightest is now regarded by many people involved in the 3 1/2 -year effort to stabilize and rebuild Iraq as one of the Bush administration's gravest errors. Many of those selected because of their political fidelity spent their time trying to impose a conservative agenda on the postwar occupation, which sidetracked more important reconstruction efforts and squandered goodwill among the Iraqi people, according to many people who participated in the reconstruction effort." (1, 2, 3, 4, 5) -By Rajiv Chandrasekaran -WashingtonPost

20060914

US - Iran - Iraq - Military - Nuclear - Intelligence - Politics- Peter Hoekstra - Mich - "U.N. Inspectors Dispute Iran Report By House Panel: Paper on Nuclear Aims Called Dishonest." ... "U.N. inspectors investigating Iran's nuclear program angrily complained to the Bush administration and to a Republican congressman yesterday about a recent House committee report on Iran's capabilities, calling parts of the document "outrageous and dishonest" and offering evidence to refute its central claims." ... "Officials of the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency said in a letter that the report contained some "erroneous, misleading and unsubstantiated statements." The letter, signed by a senior director at the agency, was addressed to Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.), chairman of the House intelligence committee, which issued the report. A copy was hand-delivered to Gregory L. Schulte, the U.S. ambassador to the IAEA in Vienna." ... "The IAEA openly clashed with the Bush administration on pre-war assessments of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Relations all but collapsed when the agency revealed that the White House had based some allegations about an Iraqi nuclear program on forged documents." ... "After no such weapons were found in Iraq, the IAEA came under additional criticism for taking a cautious approach on Iran, which the White House says is trying to build nuclear weapons in secret. At one point, the administration orchestrated a campaign to remove the IAEA's director general, Mohamed ElBaradei. It failed, and he won the Nobel Peace Prize last year." -By Dafna Linzer -WashingtonPost

20060908

Noteworthy - US - Iraq - Secret - Censored - Intelligence - Transportation- Government - Politics - Virginia- "[US Army Fort] Eustis chief: Iraq post-war plan muzzled: Army Brig. Gen. Mark Scheid, an early planner of the war, tells about challenges of invasion and rebuilding." ... "Months before the United States invaded Iraq in 2003, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld forbade military strategists from developing plans for securing post-war Iraq, the retiring commander of the Army Transportation Corps said Thursday." ... "In fact, said Brig. Gen. Mark Scheid, Rumsfeld said "he would fire the next person" who talked about the need for a post-war plan." ... "Rumsfeld did replace Gen. Eric Shinseki, the Army chief of staff in 2003, after Shinseki told Congress that hundreds of thousands of troops would be needed to secure post-war Iraq." ... "Scheid, who is also the commander of Fort Eustis in Newport News [Virginia], made his comments in an interview with the Daily Press. He retires in about three weeks." ... "Scheid said the planners continued to try "to write what was called Phase 4," or the piece of the plan that included post-invasion operations like occupation." ... "Even if the troops didn't stay, "at least we have to plan for it," Scheid said." ... ""I remember the secretary of defense saying that he would fire the next person that said that," Scheid said. "We would not do planning for Phase 4 operations, which would require all those additional troops that people talk about today." ... ""He said we will not do that because the American public will not back us if they think we are going over there for a long war."" -By Stephanie Heinatz with contributions by Tracy Sorensen -DailyPress.com
Noteworthy - US - Iraq - Military - Terrorism - Religion - Osama bin Laden - Dick Cheney - Politics - "Intelligence Didn't Back Bush Iraq Claims, Senate Reports Say." ... "Bush administration claims justifying the war against Iraq were based on fragmented, conflicting, and at times unreliable intelligence, according to two reports released today by the Senate Intelligence Committee." ... "Administration statements that Saddam Hussein was allied with Osama bin Laden and was helping al-Qaeda obtain chemical and biological weapons proved wrong and misleading and weren't based on solid intelligence in its possession, the declassified Senate reports said." ... "Contrary to assertions by Vice President Dick Cheney and other senior Bush administration officials, Hussein didn't have links to al-Qaeda and the Sept. 11 terrorist plot, the reports said." ... "``Saddam Hussein was distrustful of al-Qaeda and viewed Islamic extremists as a threat to his regime,'' one of the reports said. Hussein refused all requests from al-Qaeda to provide material or operational support, said the reports." ... "Allegations that Hussein provided chemical and biological weapons training to al-Qaeda operatives also turned out to be false, the reports said. The Defense Intelligence Agency said in 2002 that it was unlikely Iraq gave Bin Laden any useful weapons assistance." ... "While Bin Laden's al-Qaeda lieutenant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was in Iraq in 2002, he was traveling under cover and eluded efforts by Hussein to capture him, the reports said." -By William Roberts and James Rowley -Bloomberg

20060902

Iraq - US - Iran - Syria- Religious - Terrorism - Politics - "Pentagon: Sectarian violence is now spreading beyond Baghdad." ... "Sectarian violence is spreading in Iraq and the security problems have become more complex than at any time since the U.S. invasion in 2003, a Pentagon report said Friday." ... "In a notably gloomy report to Congress, the Pentagon reported that illegal militias have become more entrenched, especially in Baghdad neighborhoods where they are seen as providers of both security and basic social services." ... "The report described a rising tide of sectarian violence, fed in part by interference from neighboring Iran and Syria and driven by a "vocal minority" of religious extremists who oppose the idea of a democratic Iraq." ... "Death squads targeting mainly Iraqi civilians are a growing problem, heightening the risk of civil war, the report said." ... ""Death squads and terrorists are locked in mutually reinforcing cycles of sectarian strife," the report said, adding that the Sunni-led insurgency "remains potent and viable" even as it is overshadowed by the sect-on-sect killing." -AP via -USATODAY
Iraq - US - Execution - Terrorism - Politics - "Pentagon Cites Spike In Violence in Iraq: Averting Civil War Called Main Goal." ... "Rising sectarian bloodshed has pushed violence in Iraq to its highest level in more than two years, and preventing civil war is now the most urgent mission of the growing contingent of 140,000 U.S. troops in the country, according to a new Pentagon report released yesterday." ... "Executions, kidnappings and other sectarian attacks targeting Iraqi civilians have soared over the past three months, contributing to a 51 percent rise in casualties among the population and Iraqi security forces, the report said. More than 3,000 Iraqis are killed or wounded each month, and by July, 2,000 of the casualties were the result of sectarian incidents, it showed." ... "The Pentagon report, though consistent with what news media have reported for months, is significant because it represents an official acknowledgment of trends that are widely believed to be driving the country toward full-scale civil war." ... ""It's a pretty sober report this time," said Peter Rodman, assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs. "The last quarter . . . it's been rough, and the levels of violence are up and the sectarian quality of the violence is particularly acute and disturbing," he said at a news briefing." ... ""This is reality catching up with Rumsfeld and the Pentagon," said Michael O'Hanlon, a military analyst at the Brookings Institution." -By Ann Scott Tyson -WashingtonPost

20060901

Iraq - US - Politics - "Pentagon Releases Grim Report on Iraq." ... "The Pentagon report on “Measuring Security and Stability in Iraq” is mandated by Congress and issued quarterly. It covers a broad range of subjects, ranging from the economy to public attitudes to the training of Iraqi security forces." ... "This time, the study has been the focus of special interest because of increasing fears that Iraq is sliding into civil war. And its grimmer notes, echoing recent Congressional testimony by military commanders, come at a time when President Bush and members of his cabinet have been trying to present a strong case in support of the war, in the face of vehement criticism from Democrats." ... "Addressing that scenario, the report notes: “Conditions that could lead to civil war exist in Iraq, especially in and around Baghdad, and concern about civil war within the Iraqi population has increased in recent months.”" -By Michael R. Gordon -NYTimes
- US - Iraq - Government - Military - Terrorism - Intelligence - Politics - Noteworthy - Religion - Human Rights - Law - History - Salt Lake City - Utah - Ross C. Anderson

"Challenging the Culture of Obedience." ... [August 30, 2006 speech by Salt Lake City, Utah mayor Ross C. "Rocky" Anderson, watch the video via KUTV.com]

Ross C. Anderson, Mayor of Salt Lake City, Utah
Challenging the Culture of Obedience.

"A patriot is a person who loves his or her country. Who among you loves your country so much that you have come here today to raise your voice out of deep concern for our nation--and for our world?

And who among you loves your country so much that you insist that our nation's leaders tell us the truth?

Let's hear it: "Give us the truth! Give us the truth! Give us the truth!"

Let no one deny we are patriots. We love our country, we hold dear the values upon which our nation was founded, and we are distressed at what our President, his Administration, and our Congress are doing to, and in the name of, our great nation.

Blind faith in bad leaders is not patriotism.

A patriot does not tell people who are intensely concerned about their country to just sit down and be quiet; to refrain from speaking out in the name of politeness or for the sake of being a good host; to show slavish, blind obedience and deference to a dishonest, war-mongering, human-rights-violating President.

That is not a patriot. Rather, that person is a sycophant. That person is a member of a frightening culture of obedience--a culture where falling in line with authority is more important than choosing what is right, even if it is not easy, safe, or popular. And, I suspect, that person is afraid--afraid we are right, afraid of the truth (even to the point of denying it), afraid he or she has put in with an oppressive, inhumane regime that does not respect the laws and traditions of our country, and that history will rank as the worst presidency our nation has ever had to endure.

In response to those who believe we should blindly support this disastrous President, his Administration, and the complacent, complicit Congress, listen to the words of Theodore Roosevelt, a great President and a Republican, who said: The President is merely the most important among a large number of public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the Nation as a whole.

Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right. Any other attitude in an American citizen is both base and servile. To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. Nothing but the truth should be spoken about him or any one else. But it is even more important to tell the truth, pleasant or unpleasant, about him than about any one else."

" -By Ross C. "Rocky" Anderson, mayor of Salt Lake City, Utah speech, Challenging the Culture of Obedience. - Ross C. Anderson

20060830

US - Iraq - Government - Military - Politics - "Feeling morally, intellectually confused?" ... "The man who sees absolutes, where all other men see nuances and shades of meaning, is either a prophet, or a quack." ... "Donald H. Rumsfeld is not a prophet." ... "Mr. Rumsfeld’s remarkable speech to the American Legion yesterday demands the deep analysis—and the sober contemplation—of every American." ... "For it did not merely serve to impugn the morality or intelligence -- indeed, the loyalty -- of the majority of Americans who oppose the transient occupants of the highest offices in the land. Worse, still, it credits those same transient occupants -- our employees -- with a total omniscience; a total omniscience which neither common sense, nor this administration’s track record at home or abroad, suggests they deserve." ... "Dissent and disagreement with government is the life’s blood of human freedom; and not merely because it is the first roadblock against the kind of tyranny the men Mr. Rumsfeld likes to think of as “his” troops still fight, this very evening, in Iraq." ... "It is also essential. Because just every once in awhile it is right and the power to which it speaks, is wrong." -By Keith Olbermann -MSNBC

-Video via CrooksandLiars.com

US - Iraq - Government - Military - People - Money - Politics - "Soldiers die, CEOs prosper." ... "More than 2,600 US soldiers have died in Iraq. July's toll for Iraqi civilians was 3,500, the deadliest month of the US occupation. Iraq's civil war is on pace to kill 25,000 to 30,000 civilians by year's end. If you add in the tens of thousands of deaths from the 2003 invasion (we do not know the exact number because the Pentagon won't comment), researchers will inevitably say that the body count has crossed 100,000." ... "As [American] soldiers have died in displaying personal patriotism, the pay gap between soldiers and defense CEOs has exploded. Before 9/11, the gap between CEOs of publicly traded companies and army privates was already a galling 190 to 1. Today, it is 308 to 1. The average army private makes $25,000 a year. The average defense CEO makes $7.7 million." ... "The top profiteers after 9/11 were the CEOs of United Technologies ($200 million), General Dynamics ($65 million), Lockheed Martin ($50 million), and Halliburton ($49 million)." ... "While Army privates died overseas earning $25,000 a year, David Brooks, the disgraced former CEO of body-armor maker DHB, made $192 million in stock sales in 2004. He staged a reported $10 million bat mitzvah for his daughter. The 2005 pay package for Halliburton CEO David Lesar, head of the firm that most symbolizes the occupation's waste, overcharges, and ghost charges on no-bid contracts, was $26 million, according to the report's analysis of federal Securities and Exchange Commission filings." ... "``Those examples take the cake, especially because it's all related to their government contracts, which is money straight out of the taxpayer's pocket," Leondar-Wright said." -By Derrick Z. Jackson -Boston/Globe
Iraq - Religious - Political - Military - Health - "Iraqi Hospitals Are War's New 'Killing Fields': Medical Sites Targeted By Shiite Militiamen." ... "In growing numbers, sick and wounded Sunnis have been abducted from public hospitals operated by Iraq's Shiite-run Health Ministry and later killed, according to patients, families of victims, doctors and government officials." ... "As a result, more and more Iraqis are avoiding hospitals, making it even harder to preserve life in a city where death is seemingly everywhere. Gunshot victims are now being treated by nurses in makeshift emergency rooms set up in homes. Women giving birth are smuggled out of Baghdad and into clinics in safer provinces." ... "In most cases, family members and hospital workers said, the motive for the abductions appeared to be nothing more than religious affiliation. Because public hospitals here are controlled by Shiites, the killings have raised questions about whether hospital staff have allowed Shiite death squads into their facilities to slaughter Sunni Arabs." ... "According to patients and families of victims, the primary group kidnapping Sunnis from hospitals is the Mahdi Army, a militia controlled by anti-American Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr that has infiltrated the Iraqi security forces and several government ministries. The minister of health, Ali al-Shimari, is a member of Sadr's political movement." (1, 2, 3) -By Amit R. Paley with contributions by Saad Sarhan -WashingtonPost

20060829

US - Iraq- Afghanistan - Government - Military - Brain- Science - Health - Money - "Brain injury budget faces cut: Military research, treatment at risk." ... "Brain injuries are so common among U.S. troops that they're called the signature injury of the Iraq war, but Congress is poised to cut military spending on researching and treating them." ... "House and Senate versions of the defense appropriation bill would chop funding for the Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center from $14 million to $7 million. The center runs 10 facilities across the country, including one at Fort Bragg [North Carolina] that has performed research and treated soldiers' injuries since 1998." ... ""It's just ridiculous," said Sgt. Maj. Colin Rich, a Fort Bragg soldier who has been legally blind since he was shot in the head while serving in Afghanistan in 2002. "Whoever is cutting the budget must have a head injury themselves."" ... "As of March 31, the Pentagon reported about 1,200 traumatic brain injuries as a result of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Experts say the real total is much higher because closed-head injuries in particular -- those where there is no obvious wound -- often go undiagnosed." -By Jay Price -NewsObserver.com

20060820

US - Iraq - Military - Connecticut - Cheney - 2006 Election - "Kerry Calls Lieberman the New Cheney: Senator Labels Bush Iraq Policy 'Disaster,' Lieberman Bid 'Huge Mistake'." ... "Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., blasted a fellow Democrat, Sen. Joe Lieberman, for continuing his bid in the Connecticut Senate race despite a narrow loss to newcomer Ned Lamont in the Democratic primary earlier this month." ... ""I'm concerned that [Lieberman] is making a Republican case," Kerry told ABC News' "This Week with George Stephanopoulos" in an exclusive appearance." ... "Kerry accused the 2000 Democratic vice presidential candidate of "adopting the rhetoric of Dick Cheney," on the issue of Iraq." ... ""Joe Lieberman is out of step with the people of Connecticut," Kerry added, insisting Lieberman's stance on Iraq, "shows you just why he got in trouble with the Democrats there."" ... "Kerry called Lieberman's independent bid a "huge mistake" and applauded businessman-turned-politician Lamont as "courageous" for challenging Lieberman on the war." ... "Of his own views on Iraq, Kerry stated forthrightly, "The course of this country in Iraq is making the world more dangerous."" (1, 2) -By Ed O'Keefe -ABCNEWS.com

20060819

US - Iraq - Military - Virginia - Election 2008 - Language- "Allen Flap May Give A Boost To Webb: Reenergized Va. Democrats Gain Support." ... "The nationwide fallout from controversial remarks [Virginia Republican Senator] Sen. George Allen (R-Va.) made last week has given Democrats new hope in a race many thought would be difficult to win in the historically conservative state." ... "Before Allen insulted a native Fairfax County man of Indian descent, many Democratic officials were privately doubtful that [Virginia Democrat] James Webb could mount an aggressive challenge to the former governor and possible 2008 presidential candidate." ... "But Allen's remarks to S.R. Sidarth, 20 -- which included saying "welcome to America" -- are generating new support for the Webb campaign and energizing Democratic activists." ... "Webb, an Iraq war opponent who is a former Marine and was secretary of the Navy during the Reagan administration, still faces a relentless campaigner who last month had 10 times as much to spend on his reelection bid." ... "Last Friday, while speaking at a GOP rally in southwestern Virginia, [Republican George] Allen singled out Sidarth, a Webb volunteer, and called him "Macaca."" ... "The term "macaca" refers to a genus of monkey and is considered an ethnic slur in some cultures." (1, 2, 3) -By Tim Craig and Michael D. Shear -WashingtonPost

20060817

Iraq - Weather - "Iraq doubles funding for oil imports." ... "Iraq has doubled the money allocated for importing oil products in August and September to tackle the country's worst fuel shortage since Saddam Hussein's 2003 ouster, a senior Iraqi official said Thursday." ... "Iraq has been plagued by periodic fuel shortages since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion. The current crisis comes amid higher demand for fuel to power generators and cool homes and offices as summer temperatures reach 120 degrees." -AP via -HoustonChronicle.com
US - British - Iraq - Police- Religion - Politics - "Rival Shiite Militias Clash in Southern Iraq." ... "Clashes between rival Shiite Muslim militias erupted Wednesday in Basra, Iraq's second-largest city, when scores of gunmen stormed the governor's office after accusing his supporters of assassinating their tribal leader. Meanwhile, car bombs in Baghdad killed 25 people." ... "The gunmen in Basra, a predominantly Shiite city, laid siege to the office for two hours, lobbing mortar shells and barricading nearby bridges, before British troops and Iraqi police pushed them back. The fighting left at least four policemen dead, police said. Authorities imposed a curfew on the city. As U.S. and Iraqi forces focus their efforts on taming sectarian violence in Baghdad, Wednesday's bloodshed served as a reminder of the tenuous security conditions across Iraq, and how precariously the country teeters on the edge of civil war." ... "Tensions also are rising between U.S. and Iraqi forces and the powerful anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, who is emerging as the main Shiite obstacle to U.S. efforts to establish order and security in Baghdad as well as in the south." ... "Many of the militias are affiliated with radicalized clerics or political parties in Iraq's fragile coalition government. Some leaders, such as Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, head of the influential Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, have called for neighborhood militias to provide security, a move that would strengthen their power bases." (1, 2) -By Sudarsan Raghavan with contributions by Saad al-Izzi and K.I. Ibrahim -WashingtonPost
US - Iraq - Utah - Terrorism - Election 2006 - "Hatch says Demo win could help terrorists." ... "[Utah Republican] Sen. Orrin Hatch, who continuously decries the bitter partisanship in Washington, implied this week that Democratic success in November's [2006] election could result in terrorist attacks on America." ... "Hatch was quoted in Tuesday's Tooele Transcript Bulletin as saying Middle East terrorists are "waiting for the Democrats here to take control, let things cool off and then strike again."" ... "Democrats are criticizing Hatch for what they see as "ridiculous" partisan hyperbole." ... "Hatch's challenger Democrat Pete Ashdown said the senator continuously goes too far." ... "The comment "is a further example of the demonization and the divisiveness Senator Hatch uses to win campaigns."" ... "[Vermont Democrat Senator Patrick] Leahy's spokesman, David Carle, combated the perception that Republicans have kept America safe through their actions in Iraq." ... ""The gross mismanagement of the war in Iraq has handed the terrorists the biggest recruiting and training ground they have ever had, making us less secure than before," he said." -By Matt Canham -SLTrib.com
US - Iraq - Terrorism - Intelligence - Politics - "Bombs Aimed at G.I.’s in Iraq Are Increasing." ... "The number of roadside bombs planted in Iraq rose in July to the highest monthly total of the war, offering more evidence that the anti-American insurgency has continued to strengthen despite the killing of the terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi." ... "Along with a sharp increase in sectarian attacks, the number of daily strikes against American and Iraqi security forces has doubled since January. The deadliest means of attack, roadside bombs, made up much of that increase. In July, of 2,625 explosive devices, 1,666 exploded and 959 were discovered before they went off. In January, 1,454 bombs exploded or were found." ... "The bomb statistics — compiled by American military authorities in Baghdad and made available at the request of The New York Times — are part of a growing body of data and intelligence analysis about the violence in Iraq that has produced somber public assessments from military commanders, administration officials and lawmakers on Capitol Hill." ... "“The insurgency has gotten worse by almost all measures, with insurgent attacks at historically high levels,” said a senior Defense Department official who agreed to discuss the issue only on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak for attribution. “The insurgency has more public support and is demonstrably more capable in numbers of people active and in its ability to direct violence than at any point in time.”" ... "A separate, classified report by the Defense Intelligence Agency, dated Aug. 3, details worsening security conditions inside the country and describes how Iraq risks sliding toward civil war, according to several officials who have read the document or who have received a briefing on its contents." (1, 2) -By Michael R. Gordon, Mark Mazzetti, and Thom Shanker -NYTimes

20060816

US - Iraq - Military - Connecticut - New-Jersey - Hawaii - "Kerry bats for anti-war candidates Lamont, Menendez and Akaka." ... "Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry is revving up his online political machine to raise campaign cash for Democratic Senate nominee Ned Lamont, the anti-war candidate who upset three-term Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman in last week's primary." ... "Kerry tapped his 3 million-person e-mail list on Wednesday to deliver a fundraising appeal for Lamont." ... ""Ned Lamont has caused a national stir by successfully challenging the Bush position on Iraq that ignores the utter failure of the President's policy," Kerry's message said." ... "The Kerry e-mail also touted two Democratic Senate incumbents facing tough fights this fall, Robert Menendez of New Jersey and Daniel Akaka of Hawaii. Both oppose the war." ... ""Ned, Dan and Bob have been attacked mercilessly for acting with such conviction and are locked in close must-win races," Kerry said. "It's time to reward their courage."" -By Andrew Miga -AP via -Newsday.com
US - Iraq - Afghanistan- Intelligence - Politics - "Pentagon studying its war errors: Analysts assess tactics in Iraq, Afghanistan." ... "The US military establishment has quietly undertaken a wholesale reassessment of its war strategy with a goal of identifying the mistakes made in Iraq and Afghanistan -- and remedying them before the next conflict." ... "This summer, high-level Pentagon officials ordered a pair of secret studies to pinpoint the military's failures in the two conflicts, and, according to one of the authors, ``the results won't be pretty" when the findings are produced this fall. Last week, the Defense Department invited about 50 of the nation's top counter insurgency specialists to a closed-door meeting outside Washington to critique recent operations and chart a way forward." ... "The studies, according to several Pentagon officials involved, have found serious deficiencies across the board. For example, US troops in Iraq have often used too much force when conducting operations in civilian areas, unnecessarily alienating local populations. They cite US commanders as being too slow to establish working relationships with local allies, and note that providing security and safety for the Iraqi people wasn't an early priority." ... "The military's continuing shortcomings in gathering accurate intelligence about insurgents has particularly hampered its missions: ``We know relatively little about insurgent motivation and morale, leadership, and recruitment," according to an unpublished study produced in June by the government-funded RAND Corporation." -By Bryan Bender -Boston/Globe

20060815

US - Iraq - Military - Religious - Election 2006 - 2004 Election - Free Speech - Law - Colorado - Maryland - Montana - Tennessee - Michigan - Ohio- Pennsylvania - New Jersey - Minnesota - California - "Conservatives Put Faith in Church Voter Drives: Evangelicals seek to sign up a new flock of GOP supporters in states with crucial November races." ... "As discontent with the Republican Party threatens to dampen the turnout of conservative voters in November, evangelical leaders are launching a massive registration drive that could help counter the malaise and mobilize new religious voters in battleground states." ... "The program, coordinated by the Colorado-based group Focus on the Family and its influential founder, James C. Dobson, would use a variety of methods — including information inserted in church publications and booths placed outside worship services — to recruit millions of new voters in 2006 and beyond." ... "The effort builds on the aggressive courtship of evangelical voters in 2004 by President Bush's reelection campaign, even as the Internal Revenue Service has announced renewed scrutiny of nonprofit organizations, including churches, that engage in political activities." ... "The program, announced in an e-mail to activists last week, is seeking county and church coordinators in the targeted states of Maryland, Montana, Tennessee, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Minnesota." ... "Registering voters in churches is not a new tactic for either party, but Republicans have proved far more effective in recent years at combining religion and politics for electoral gain." ... "Critics say the practice is potentially illegal, citing tax laws that prohibit churches from engaging in partisan activities." ... "The IRS has launched a program to crack down on violators, with investigations pending against dozens of churches." ... "The IRS probe with the highest profile is that of All Saints Church in Pasadena, one of Southern California's largest and most liberal congregations." ... "After a priest delivered a sermon critical of the Iraq war two days before the 2004 presidential election, the IRS began reviewing the Episcopal church's tax-exempt status. No decision has been announced." -By Peter Wallsten -LAtimes

20060813

Britain - Iraq - Afghanistan - Military - Intelligence- Historical - Terrorism - Religion - Mental Health - Enforcement - "These ludicrous lies about the West and Islam." ... "There is indeed a plausible argument that military action in recent years has made Britain less, not more, secure. In particular, the conduct of the war in Iraq, regardless of the virtues of removing Saddam Hussein from office, has been riddled with error. The absence of weapons of mass destruction, removal of which was the premise for war, has undermined trust in the Prime Minister. Meanwhile, engagement in Iraq has made it harder to secure victory in Afghanistan, where the anti-terror justification for war was rock solid." ... "But even within the bleakest possible analysis of Mr Blair's foreign policy, it is still simply not true that the West is waging war on Islam. Just as it is not true that the CIA was really behind the 11 September attacks or any other arrant conspiratorial nonsense that enjoys widespread credence in the Middle East and beyond. It is also a logical and moral absurdity to imply, as some critics of British policy have done, that mass murder is somehow less atrocious when it is motivated by an elaborate narrative of political grievance." ... "If young British Muslims are alienated, that is sad and their anger should be addressed. But anyone whose alienation leads them to want to kill indiscriminately has crossed a line into psychopathic criminality. Policy cannot be dictated by the need to placate such people." ... "British Muslim leaders are entitled, along with everybody else, to raise questions about the conduct and consequences of Mr Blair's foreign policy. But they have a more immediate responsibility to promote the truth: that Britain is not the aggressor in a war against Islam; that no such war exists; that there is no glory in murder dressed as martyrdom and that terrorism is never excused by bogus accounts of historical victimisation." -Observer.co.uk via -Guardian.co.uk
US - Connecticut - Cheney - Terrorism - Iraq - Military - "Lamont: Lieberman Sounded Like Cheney." ... "Democratic Senate nominee Ned Lamont, the anti-war candidate who toppled Sen. Joe Lieberman in the Connecticut primary, says he was surprised by Lieberman and Vice President Dick Cheney's claims that his victory could embolden terrorists." ... ""My God, here we have a terrorist threat against hearth and home and the very first thing that comes out of their mind is how can we turn this to partisan advantage. I find that offensive," Lamont said in an interview Sunday with The Associated Press." ... "After British officials disclosed they had thwarted a terrorist airline bombing plot on Thursday, Lieberman warned that Lamont's call for a phased withdrawal of troops from Iraq would be "taken as a tremendous victory" by terrorists." ... "Cheney suggested Wednesday that Lamont's victory might encourage "the al-Qaida types" who want to "break the will of the American people in terms of our ability to stay in the fight and complete the task."" ... "Lamont said Lieberman's swipe at his candidacy "sounded an awful lot" like Cheney." (1, 2) -By Andrew Miga -AP via -WashingtonPost
US- Iraq - Military - Enforcement - Politics - "5 Bombs Kill at Least 57 in Baghdad." ... "As American forces conducted a new security sweep in western Baghdad [Iraq's capital] on Sunday, five apparently coordinated bombings in a predominantly Shiite neighborhood on the city’s south side killed at least 57 people and wounded 148, an Iraqi government official said." ... "The death toll could rise, the official said, as emergency workers searched for victims in the rubble of an apartment building that collapsed as a result of the bombings." ... "The attacks, which killed civilians in a largely residential neighborhood, were the deadliest in the capital since the American military dispatched new forces here more than a week ago to quell a surge in killings and kidnappings by sectarian militias and criminal gangs." ... "The new American-led security operation here is intended “to reduce the level of murders, kidnappings, assassinations, terrorism and sectarian violence in northwest Baghdad and to reinforce the Iraqi government’s control in Iraq’s capital city,” according to a statement released by the United States military on Sunday evening." -By Paul von Zielbauer with contributions by Qais Mizher, Ali Adeeb, and Khalid W. Hassan -NYTimes

20060812

US - British - Iraq - Global - Military - Intelligence - Airline - Terrorism - Religion - Politics - Election 2006 - John Boehner - Ohio - "Can Democrats make case Iraq diverted war on terror?" ... "The immediate domestic political impact of the latest airliner-bombing plot is to bolster Republican fortunes in the campaign leading to midterm elections on Nov. 7." ... "Terrorism has been the issue that has kept the Bush administration afloat since Sept. 11, 2001. The White House and its Republican allies should benefit at least momentarily from the traditional rallying effect that helps the party in power in the face of a national threat." ... "How long that moment lasts will be the supreme test for Democratic candidates in the coming days. For if Democrats now, with the revelation of the British-based plot, cannot make the case that the Bush administration has mishandled the fight against terrorism, they deserve whatever may befall them 12 weeks from Tuesday." ... "This will not be easy, given Republican possession of the White House and its bully pulpit and Republican willingness to demagogue the issue." ... "The British suspects were barely in handcuffs before House Majority Leader John Boehner was complaining about "Defeatocrats." Funny, but I don't recall it was Democrats who stood in the way of full implementation of the recommendations of the Sept. 11 commission." ... "This isn't about whether you can pack hand cream in your carry-on bag. This is about how President Bush has squandered manpower and materiel in the war in Iraq, a conflict that has emboldened radical Islamists and made their cause more acceptable and recruiting much easier." ... "In his first public response to the arrest of suspects in Britain, Bush said that uncovering the plot was "a stark reminder that this nation is still at war with Islamic fascists."" ... "What Bush did not say was that the continuing war in Iraq has been a diversion from U.S. leadership in the global war on terrorism." -By Cragg Hines -HoustonChronicle.com

20060811

US - Guantanamo - Cuba - Afghanistan - Iraq - Political - Law - Enforcement - War Crimes Act - Human Rights - Military - Terrorism - Detainee - History - "Criminal, Immunize Thyself: The Bush administration's get out of jail card for torturers." ... "If the Bush administration is still good at anything, it's this: distracting its opponents and seizing little victories from what might have been big defeats." ... "Take the administration's recent efforts to respond to the Supreme Court's decision in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld. Hamdan arose from a challenge to the president's authority to create novel military commissions to try Guantanamo [Cuba] detainees. In June, the court found these commissions were unlawful: Among other problems, their procedures were inconsistent with existing statutes and fell short of "fair trial" guarantees in the 1949 Geneva Conventions. (Defendants could, for instance, be convicted based on evidence they would never see.)" ... "The decision was, of course, a major defeat for the Bush administration. Not surprisingly, administration officials went back to Congress this month with legislation that would authorize military commissions to pass Supreme Court muster." ... "But now, as recently reported by the Washington Post, the administration is also trying to use Hamdan to pass legislation that would immunize government personnel for abuses against detainees at Guantanamo, in Afghanistan, and in Iraq, including those abuses it authorized. In other words, in the middle of what should be a post-Hamdan debate about how to provide fair trials for those accused of terrorist activities, the administration is simultaneously trying to decriminalize its own past crimes." -By John Sifton -Slate

20060809

US - Iraq - International - Military - Intelligence - Prisons - Human Rights - War Crimes Act - Enforcement - Politics - "War Crimes Act Changes Would Reduce Threat Of Prosecution." ... "The Bush administration has drafted amendments to a war crimes law that would eliminate the risk of prosecution for political appointees, CIA officers and former military personnel for humiliating or degrading war prisoners, according to U.S. officials and a copy of the amendments." ... "Officials say the amendments would alter a U.S. law passed in the mid-1990s that criminalized violations of the Geneva Conventions, a set of international treaties governing military conduct in wartime. The conventions generally bar the cruel, humiliating and degrading treatment of wartime prisoners without spelling out what all those terms mean." ... "The draft U.S. amendments to the War Crimes Act would narrow the scope of potential criminal prosecutions to 10 specific categories of illegal acts against detainees during a war, including torture, murder, rape and hostage-taking." ... "Left off the list would be what the Geneva Conventions refer to as "outrages upon [the] personal dignity" of a prisoner and deliberately humiliating acts -- such as the forced nakedness, use of dog leashes and wearing of women's underwear seen at the U.S.-run Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq -- that fall short of torture." (1, 2) -By R. Jeffrey Smith -WashingtonPost
US - Iraq - Military - Politics - "Poll: 60 percent of Americans oppose Iraq war." ... "Sixty percent of Americans oppose the U.S. war in Iraq, the highest number since polling on the subject began with the commencement of the war in March 2003, according to poll results and trends released Wednesday." ... "In the most recent poll, 36 percent said they were in favor of the war -- half of the peak of 72 percent who said they were in favor of the war as it began." ... "Sixty-one percent, however, said they believed at least some U.S. troops should be withdrawn from Iraq by the end of the year." -CNN

20060808

US - Government - Military - Brain- Science - Money -Terrorism - Iraq - "Center for war-related brain injuries faces budget cut." ... "Congress appears ready to slash funding for the research and treatment of brain injuries caused by bomb blasts, an injury that military scientists describe as a signature wound of the Iraq war." ... "House and Senate versions of the 2007 Defense appropriation bill contain $7 million for the Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center — half of what the center received last fiscal year." ... "Proponents of increased funding say they are shocked to see cuts in the treatment of bomb blast injuries in the midst of a war." ... "George Zitnay, co-founder of the center, testified before a Senate subcommittee in May that body armor saves troops caught in blasts but leaves many with brain damage. "Traumatic brain injury is the signature injury of the war on terrorism," he testified." -By Gregg Zoroya -USATODAY

20060802

US - Iraq - Military - Human Rights - "Source: Haditha evidence implicates Marines: Investigators reportedly finish initial review in deaths of 24 civilians." ... "Evidence collected on the deaths of 24 Iraqis in Haditha supports accusations that U.S. Marines deliberately shot the civilians, including unarmed women and children, a Pentagon official said Wednesday." ... "Agents of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service have completed their initial work on the incident last November, but may be asked to probe further as Marine Corps and Navy prosecutors review the evidence and determine whether to recommend criminal charges, according to two Pentagon officials who discussed the matter on condition of anonymity." ... "The Marines initially reported after the Nov. 19, 2005 killings that 15 Iraqi civilians at Haditha had been killed by a makeshift roadside bomb and in crossfire between Marines and insurgent attackers. Based on accounts from survivors and human rights groups, Time magazine first reported in March that the killings were deliberate acts by the Marines." -AP via -MSNBC
US - Iraq - Military - "Peers vowed to kill him if he talked, soldier says: Commander gave orders to kill all male insurgents, he adds at hearing." ... "A U.S. soldier testified Wednesday that four of his colleagues accused of murdering three Iraqis during a raid threatened to kill him if he told anyone about the shooting deaths." ... "Pfc. Bradley Mason, speaking at a hearing to determine whether the four must stand trial, also said that their brigade commander, a veteran of the 1993 "Black Hawk Down" battle in Somalia, told troops hunting insurgents to "kill all of them." Mason is not one of the accused." ... "The alleged killings May 9 near Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad, have dealt another blow to the reputation of U.S. soldiers over their conduct in Iraq and fueled anger against their presence." ... "Another hearing is scheduled later this month over allegations that five U.S. soldiers raped and killed a 14-year-old girl." -AP via -MSNBC

20060801

Iraq- US - Government - "Rebuilding Iraq an unfinished job: U.S. lacks coherent plan to transfer effort to Iraqis, report concludes." ... "A flailing Iraq reconstruction effort that has been dominated for more than three years by U.S. dollars and companies is being transferred to Iraqis, leaving them the challenge of completing a long list of projects left unfinished by the Americans." ... "While the handover is occurring gradually, it comes as U.S. money dwindles and American officials face a Sept. 30 deadline for choosing which projects to fund with the remaining $2 billion of the $21 billion rebuilding program. More than 500 planned projects have not been started, and the United States lacks a coherent plan for transferring authority to Iraqi control, a report released Tuesday concludes." ... "Some of the biggest U.S. companies have come under intense scrutiny, too, for their performance in Iraq. Halliburton Co. subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root, Bechtel Corp. and Parsons have each received in excess of $1 billion worth of reconstruction work, but have been criticized for not finishing key jobs. Now, all three are wrapping up their reconstruction work and heading home." (1, 2) -By Andy Mosher and Griff Witte -WashingtonPost via -MSNBC
US - Iraq - Israel - Military - Terrorism - Political - Intelligence - Media - "Competing realities." ... "Meaningful political debates require agreement at least as to the basic facts comprising reality. For a substantial portion of the American population, that agreement is lacking, due to a desire to believe only those facts which comport with one's beliefs and the powerful, self-contained ideology-based media bubble which enables that desire. Those who live in the world where Iraq helped Al Qaeda plan terrorist attacks, Saddam had WMDs, things are going well in Iraq, and Hezbollah rather than Israel collapsed the apartment building in Qana, don't merely have different political views but really live in a different reality." -By Glenn Greenwald

20060731

US - Iraq - Terrorism - Politics - "U.S. Troops Back on the Point: Stunning Reversal of Military Strategy in Iraq." ... "The U.S. strategy of putting Iraqis in charge of their own security suffered a stunning reversal last week when President Bush announced that more U.S. troops would be sent back to Baghdad." ... ""Obviously, the violence in Baghdad is still terrible," Bush said during a visit to Washington by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki." ... "For months, U.S. military spokesmen had released evermore upbeat assessments of the "Iraqification" of the security forces, which was meant to both reduce U.S. casualties and emphasize that Iraqi forces were being trained to take over securing their own country." ... "In Baghdad today, apart from the heavily U.S.-patrolled airport road, it is rare to see American units on the city's streets. But in their absence has come increasing violence and mayhem." ... "It took the commander in chief to finally admit what was becoming increasingly clear on the ground: The strategy of Iraqification has backfired in Baghdad because the largely Shiite security forces are widely seen to have been infiltrated by death squads and militia members who have been targeting Sunnis, making the sectarian conflict worse, not better." (1, 2) -By Terry McCarthy -ABCNEWS.com

20060730

US - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Law - 2006 Election - Nev. - Pat Roberts - Kan. - "Report on Prewar Intelligence Lagging: Information Democrats Want Most Might Not Come Out Until After Election." ... "When angry Democrats briefly shut down the Senate last year to protest the slow pace of a congressional investigation into prewar intelligence on Iraq, Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) claimed a rare victory." ... "Republicans called it a stunt but promised to quickly wrap up the inquiry. Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, which is overseeing the investigation, said his report was near completion and there was no need for the fuss." ... "That was nine months ago." ... "The Republican-led committee, which agreed in February 2004 to write the report, has yet to complete its work. Just two of five planned sections of the committee's findings are fully drafted and ready to be voted on by members, according to Democratic and Republican staffers. Committee sources involved with the report, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said they are working hard to complete it. But disputing Roberts, they said they had started almost from scratch in November after Democrats staged their protest." -By Dafna Linzer -WashingtonPost

20060728

Noteworthy - International - US - Afghanistan - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Terrorism - Detainee - Death Penalty - Human Rights - Politics - History - "Detainee Abuse Charges Feared: Shield Sought From '96 War Crimes Act." ... "An obscure law approved by a Republican-controlled Congress a decade ago has made the Bush administration nervous that officials and troops involved in handling detainee matters might be accused of committing war crimes, and prosecuted at some point in U.S. courts." ... "Senior officials have responded by drafting legislation that would grant U.S. personnel involved in the terrorism fight new protections against prosecution for past violations of the War Crimes Act of 1996. That law criminalizes violations of the Geneva Conventions governing conduct in war and threatens the death penalty if U.S.-held detainees die in custody from abusive treatment." ... "In light of a recent Supreme Court ruling that the international Conventions apply to the treatment of detainees in the terrorism fight, Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales has spoken privately with Republican lawmakers about the need for such "protections," according to someone who heard his remarks last week." ... "Gonzales told the lawmakers that a shield is needed for actions taken by U.S. personnel under a 2002 presidential order, which the Supreme Court declared illegal, and under Justice Department legal opinions that have been withdrawn under fire, the source said." ... "Since the U.S. invasions of Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003, hundreds of service members deployed to Iraq have been accused by the Army of mistreating detainees, and at least 35 detainees have died in military or CIA custody, according to a tally kept by Human Rights First. The military has asserted these were all aberrant acts by troops ignoring their orders." ... "Defense attorneys for many of those accused of involvement have alleged that their clients were pursuing policies of rough treatment set by officials in Washington. That claim is amplified in a 53-page Human Rights Watch report this week that quoted interrogators at three bases in Iraq as saying that abuse was part of regular, authorized procedures. But this argument has yet to gain traction in a military court, where U.S. policy requires that active-duty service members be tried for any maltreatment." (1, 2) -By R. Jeffrey Smith with contributions by Julie Tate and Madonna Lebling -WashingtonPost

20060727

US- Iraq- Terrorism - Police - Religion - Politics - "Shortage of troops in Iraq a `grim warning'." ... "The Bush administration's decision to move thousands of U.S. soldiers into Baghdad to quell sectarian warfare before it explodes into outright civil war underscores a problem that's hindered the American effort to rebuild Iraq from the beginning: There aren't enough troops to do the job." ... "Many U.S. officials in Baghdad and in Washington privately concede the point. They say they've been forced to shuffle American units from one part of the country to another for at least two years because there haven't been enough soldiers and Marines to deal simultaneously with Sunni Muslim insurgents and Shiite militias; train Iraqi forces; and secure roads, power lines, border crossings and ammunition dumps." ... "Although military planners are still finalizing the details, as many as 4,000 additional U.S. soldiers are being sent to Baghdad, including two battalions of the Army's 172nd Stryker Brigade, four or five military police companies from northern Iraq and a field artillery battalion that's standing in reserve in Kuwait." ... "But when U.S. forces have cracked down in one place, Iraqi insurgents and foreign terrorists have popped up in another. Some towns have been pacified multiple times, only to return to chaos as soon as the Americans reduced troop numbers. In cities such as Baghdad, Kirkuk, Samarra and Ramadi, bloodshed ebbs and flows, but security is never a given." ... "The frustration of returning to quell violence in the same places multiple times has taken a toll on American morale, undermined Iraqi confidence in the U.S. and cast doubt on the Bush administration's hopes of beginning significant withdrawals of soldiers and Marines by the end of this election year. There are 130,000 U.S. service members in Iraq, down from 160,000 last December." -By Tom Lasseter -McClatchy-RealCities
US - Iraq - "'Waiting to Get Blown Up': Some Troops in Baghdad Express Frustration With the War and Their Mission." ... "Army Staff Sgt. Jose Sixtos considered the simple question about morale for more than an hour. But not until his convoy of armored Humvees had finally rumbled back into the Baghdad military base, and the soldiers emptied the ammunition from their machine guns, and passed off the bomb-detecting robot to another patrol, did he turn around in his seat and give his answer." ... ""Think of what you hate most about your job. Then think of doing what you hate most for five straight hours, every single day, sometimes twice a day, in 120-degree heat," he said. "Then ask how morale is."" ... "As President Bush plans to deploy more troops in Baghdad, U.S. soldiers who have been patrolling the capital for months describe a deadly and infuriating mission in which the enemy is elusive and success hard to find. Each day, convoys of Humvees and Bradley Fighting Vehicles leave Forward Operating Base Falcon in southern Baghdad with the goal of stopping violence between warring Iraqi religious sects, training the Iraqi army and police to take over the duty, and reporting back on the availability of basic services for Iraqi civilians." ... "But some soldiers in the 2nd Battalion, 6th Infantry Regiment, 1st Armored Division -- interviewed over four days on base and on patrols -- say they have grown increasingly disillusioned about their ability to quell the violence and their reason for fighting. The battalion of more than 750 people arrived in Baghdad from Kuwait in March, and since then, six soldiers have been killed and 21 wounded." (1, 2, 3) -By Joshua Partlow -WashingtonPost

20060726

US - Iraq - Politics - "Bush to Add Troops in Baghdad, Citing 'Terrible' Sectarian Strife." ... "President Bush said yesterday that he will send more U.S. forces and equipment to Baghdad as part of a fresh strategy to put down rising sectarian violence, abandoning a six-week-old operation that failed to pacify the strife-torn Iraqi capital and opening what aides called an unexpected new phase of the war." ... "Playing host to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki at the White House for the first time, Bush sounded unusually dour and acknowledged that the situation in Iraq in many ways has worsened lately. But he vowed to adjust tactics to deal with evolving threats and to keep U.S. forces in Iraq as long as necessary to fortify Maliki's government until it can defend itself." ... "The additional U.S. forces for Baghdad, which could total in the thousands, would come from elsewhere in Iraq, but the deteriorating security situation seemed to all but doom the prospect for significant troop withdrawals before the November congressional elections. The Pentagon had drawn up scenarios that envisioned pulling out as many as 30,000 troops this year, but military officials said yesterday that those now appear implausible and that U.S. forces will probably remain at the current level of 127,000 for several months at least." (1, 2) -By Peter Baker and Josh White with contributions by Joshua Partlow and Hassan Shammari -WashingtonPost

20060712

US - Iraq- Guantanamo Bay - Cuba - Military - Prison - Politics - "GOP Senator Criticizes Appeals Court Nominee." ... "A key Senate Republican clashed yesterday with President Bush's pick for a federal appeals court, taking aim at the nominee's past support for harsh interrogation methods at the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba." ... "At a Judiciary Committee hearing, Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (S.C. [Republican]) said that Pentagon General Counsel William J. Haynes II had pushed for the tactics over the objections of top uniformed military lawyers who considered the policy process a "sham."" ... "The result, Graham told reporters after the hearing, was "legal confusion" that contributed to the scandal at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison -- and the attendant courts-martial and other career damage for those held responsible." ... "Noting that the U.S. commander in Iraq during Abu Ghraib, Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, has seen his career stall, Graham said, "The question is whether enough things went wrong on [Haynes's] watch that he needs to be held accountable."" -By Charles Lane -WashingtonPost
US- Iraq - Terrorism - Politics - "General Sees Need for More U.S. Forces in Baghdad." ... "Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the senior American commander in Iraq, said today that “terrorists and death squads” were responsible for the surge in sectarian killings here in recent weeks, and that more American forces may need to move into the capital to prevent the deadly cycle from escalating even further." ... "General Casey said Sunni Arab terrorist groups affiliated with Al Qaeda were killing Shiite civilians in Baghdad to show their continued power in the aftermath of an American missile strike last month that killed the leader of Al Qaeda insurgents in Iraq, Abu Musab al- Zarqawi." ... "In response to the killings by Sunni Arabs, the general said, Shiite “death squads” in Baghdad had begun indiscriminately killing Sunni residents, including dozens who were seemingly randomly pulled from their cars and homes on Sunday and executed on the street." ... "“So you have both sides now attacking civilians and that has caused the recent spike” in violence in Baghdad, General Casey said." ... "More than 130 people have been killed in or around Baghdad over the past four days, underscoring both the senselessness and persistence of violence that has convinced many Iraqis that the country is already in the throes of a low-level civil war." -By Paul von Zielbauer and David S. Cloud with contributions by Mona Mahmoud, Khalid al-Ansary and Khalid W. Hassan -NYTimes

20060707

US - Iraq - Terrorism - Politics - Intelligence - "Hate Groups Are Infiltrating the Military, Group Asserts." ... "A decade after the Pentagon declared a zero-tolerance policy for racist hate groups, recruiting shortfalls caused by the war in Iraq have allowed "large numbers of neo-Nazis and skinhead extremists" to infiltrate the military, according to a watchdog organization." ... "The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks racist and right-wing militia groups, estimated that the numbers could run into the thousands, citing interviews with Defense Department investigators and reports and postings on racist Web sites and magazines." ... ""We've got Aryan Nations graffiti in Baghdad," the group quoted a Defense Department investigator as saying in a report to be posted today on its Web site, www.splcenter.org. "That's a problem."" -By John Kifner -NYTimes

20060705

US - Iraq - Military - Prison - Law - "House Wants Abu Ghraib Whistleblower Info: House Seeks Pentagon Information on GI Who Says He Was Hassled for Blowing Whistle on Abu Ghraib." ... "Lawmakers have issued a subpoena seeking Pentagon information on a soldier who says he suffered retaliation for reporting abuses at Abu Ghraib prison." ... "The subpoena from the House Government Reform Committee seeks all communications relating to information provided by Army Spc. Samuel Provance about the Iraq prison, where U.S. mistreatment of detainees caused an international uproar." -By Pauline Jelinek -AP via -ABCNEWS.com
US - Iraq - Military - Connecticut - "AP Interview: Lamont won't rule out more spending in Senate run." ... "Greenwich [Connecticut] businessman Ned Lamont said Wednesday he's prepared to dump more money, possibly $1 million more, into his Democratic primary battle against U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman." ... "Lieberman, who is running for a fourth-term, is facing a primary battle for the first time in his Senate career. Just six years after being his party's nominee for the vice presidency, Lieberman has fallen into disfavor by some Democrats for supporting the Iraq war and his perceived closeness to President Bush." ... "Lamont, a former Greenwich selectman and newcomer to state politics, has gained in statewide polls by accusing Lieberman of being a Republican lapdog who has strayed from his Democratic roots." -By Susan Haigh -AP via -BostonGlobe

20060626

US - Iraq - Military- Calif - Mich - "Democrats Cite Report On Troop Cuts in Iraq: Pentagon Plan Like Theirs, Senators Say." ... "Senate Democrats reacted angrily yesterday to a report that the U.S. commander in Iraq had privately presented a plan for significant troop reductions in the same week they came under attack by Republicans for trying to set a timetable for withdrawal." ... "Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) said that the plan attributed to Gen. George W. Casey resembles the thinking of many Democrats who voted for a nonbinding resolution to begin a troop drawdown in December. That resolution was defeated Thursday on a largely party-line vote in the Senate." ... ""That means the only people who have fought us and fought us against the timetable, the only ones still saying there shouldn't be a timetable really are the Republicans in the United States Senate and in the Congress," Boxer said on CBS's "Face the Nation." "Now it turns out we're in sync with General Casey."" ... "Sen. Carl M. Levin (Mich.), one of the two sponsors of the nonbinding resolution, which offered no pace or completion date for a withdrawal, said the report is another sign of what he termed one of the "worst-kept secrets in town" -- that the administration intends to pull out troops before the midterm elections in November." -By Michael Abramowitz and Thomas E. Ricks -WashingtonPost

20060623

US - Iraq - Military - Politics - "Report sparks debate over Iraq arsenal." ... "A partially declassified intelligence report provides no new evidence that Saddam Hussein had stockpiled weapons of mass destruction on the eve of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, U.S. intelligence officials said Thursday." ... "The report, publicized by two Republican legislators in the midst of a Senate debate on the Iraq war, says that about 500 weapons containing degraded mustard gas and sarin nerve agent have been found in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion." ... "President Bush, in making the case for war, alleged that Iraq continued to develop and stockpile weapons of mass destruction. But the intelligence officials said the munitions found since the invasion dated from before the 1991 Persian Gulf War and for the most part were badly deteriorated. "They are not in a condition where they could be used as designed," one intelligence official said." -KnightRidder -WashingtonPost via -SeattleTimes.NWsource

20060622

US - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Rick Santorum - Pennsylvania - Pete Hoekstra - Michigan - "Lawmakers Say WMDs Were Found In Iraq ... Kind Of: Report reveals discovery of degraded chemical weapons likely buried in 1980s." ... "You'd think that after the numerous revelations of faulty prewar intelligence and the failure to find the dangerous weapons cache allegedly stockpiled by former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, the Bush administration would be shouting from the rooftops about finding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq." ... "Instead, in a hastily called news conference on Wednesday, a pair of Republican lawmakers told reporters that it turns out we did find those WMDs after all, even though the White House and the intelligence community have admitted that no such weapons caches had been discovered." ... "According to The Washington Post, Representative Peter Hoekstra [Michigan Republican], chairman of the House intelligence committee, and Senator Rick Santorum [Pennsylvania Republican] made the announcement, based on an unclassified summary from a report by the National Ground Intelligence Center regarding 500 chemical munitions shells that had been buried near the Iranian border." ... "Of course, most of those weapons were buried by Iraqi troops during their eight-year war with Iran — which ended in 1988 — and were long forgotten." -By Gil Kaufman -MTV.com/News

20060621

US - Iraq - People - "Army takes older recruits." ... "The U.S. Army, aiming to make its recruiting goals amid the Iraq war, raised its maximum enlistment age by another two years on Wednesday, while the Army Reserve predicted it will miss its recruiting target for a second straight year." ... "People can now volunteer to serve in the active-duty Army or the part-time Army Reserve and National Guard up to their 42nd birthday after the move aimed at increasing the number of people eligible to sign up, officials said." ... "It marked the second time this year the Army has boosted the maximum age for new volunteers, raising the ceiling from age 35 to 40 in January before now adding two more years." (1, 2) -By Will Dunham -Reuters

20060614

US - Iraq - Military - Opinion- Massachusetts- "Kerry demands US troop pullout: Regrets his vote for war resolution." ... "Senator John F. Kerry [Massachusetts Democrat] is placing himself at the center of congressional action over the war in Iraq this week with a crisply worded resolution to require President Bush to withdraw almost all US troops by the end of this year." ... "The measure has exposed Kerry to attacks from Republicans and some Democrats, as critics rushed to tag the plan as a ``cut-and-run" strategy. But it also has made him a rallying point for antiwar activists." ... "``My friends, war is no excuse for its own perpetuation," Kerry said before a group of cheering liberal activists who had gathered in Washington yesterday for a ``Take Back America" conference. ``It is essential to acknowledge that the war itself was a mistake -- to say the simple words that contain more truth than pride. . . . It was wrong and I was wrong to vote for that Iraqi war resolution."" ... "``It was right to dissent from a war in 1971 that was wrong and could not be won," Kerry said in his speech. ``And now, in 2006, it is both a right and an obligation for Americans to stand up to a president who is wrong today, [and] dissent from policies that are wrong today, and end a war in Iraq that weakens the nation each and every day we are in it."" -By Rick Klein -BostonGlobe

20060613

US - Iraq - Terrorism - Religion - Internet - Military - Politics - "Agencies: Homegrown Radicals Inside U.S.." ... "U.S. counterterrorism officials say they are uncovering homegrown Islamic radicals inside the United States who lack formal ties to al-Qaida and operate independently." ... "Those independent qualities - combined with the radicals' ability to organize and plot on the Internet - make them particularly difficult to disrupt, retired Vice Adm. John Scott Redd, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Tuesday." ... "The hearing came less than a week after the U.S. military and intelligence agencies killed one of the world's top terror leaders in an airstrike, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the former leader of al-Qaida in Iraq." ... "Redd said the merger between al-Zarqawi's group and al-Qaida's central organization gives terror leaders a more diverse pool of "battle-hardened" operatives from which to draw. Intelligence officials, he said, are also seeing signs that al-Zarqawi's group was hatching plots outside Iraq. But he did not elaborate." -By Katherine Shrader -AP via -Forbes

20060608

US - Iraq - Jordan- Terrorism - Religion - "Zarqawi killed in Iraq air raid: Militant leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has been killed, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has announced." ... ""Today we have eliminated Zarqawi," Mr Maliki said, sparking sustained applause. The US said he was killed in an air raid near Baquba." ... "The Jordanian-born leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq was considered the figurehead of the Sunni insurgency." ... "Al-Qaeda in Iraq has been blamed for scores of bombings that have killed hundreds of Shias and US forces." ... "His death does not mean either the Islamist al-Qaeda elements or nationalist fighters will give up, says the BBC News website's world affairs correspondent, Paul Reynolds." ... "Indeed his removal might well bring about an explosion of revenge by his followers, he adds." -BBC /News
Iraq - US - Military - Money- "Condolence payments to Iraqis soar: Military gave nearly $20m to families of civilians." ... "The amount of cash the US military has paid to families of Iraqi civilians killed or maimed in operations involving American troops skyrocketed from just under $5 million in 2004 to almost $20 million last year, according to Pentagon financial data." ... "The dramatic spike in what's known as condolence payments -- distributed to Iraqi families whose loved ones were caught in US crossfire or victimized during US ground and air assaults -- suggests that American commanders made on-the-spot restitution far more frequently, according to congressional aides and officials familiar with a special fund at the disposal of military officers in Iraq." ... "Defense Department officials maintain that the payments -- which officials said range from a few hundred dollars for injuries such as a severed limb to $2,500 for the death of a relative -- mirror a local custom commonly known as ``solatia," in which families receive financial compensation for damages or human losses. They stressed that the payments shouldn't be seen as an admission of guilt or responsibility." ... "But amid reports that US Marines paid $2,500 per victim after dozens of civilians were killed on Nov. 19 in the town of Haditha -- killings now engulfed by allegations of a massacre -- the fourfold increase in condolence payments raises new questions about the extent to which Iraqi civilians have been the victims of US firepower." -By Bryan Bender -BostonGlobe

20060605

US - Iraq - International - Prisoner - Human Rights - Intelligence - Politics - "Army Manual to Skip Geneva Detainee Rule: The Pentagon's move to omit a ban on prisoner humiliation from the basic guide to soldier conduct faces strong State Dept. opposition." ... "The Pentagon has decided to omit from new detainee policies a key tenet of the Geneva Convention that explicitly bans "humiliating and degrading treatment," according to knowledgeable military officials, a step that would mark a further, potentially permanent, shift away from strict adherence to international human rights standards." ... "The decision could culminate a lengthy debate within the Defense Department but will not become final until the Pentagon makes new guidelines public, a step that has been delayed. However, the State Department fiercely opposes the military's decision to exclude Geneva Convention protections and has been pushing for the Pentagon and White House to reconsider, the Defense Department officials acknowledged." ... "For more than a year, the Pentagon has been redrawing its policies on detainees, and intends to issue a new Army Field Manual on interrogation, which, along with accompanying directives, represents core instructions to U.S. soldiers worldwide." ... "President Bush's critics and supporters have debated whether it is possible to prove a direct link between administration declarations that it will not be bound by Geneva and events such as the abuses at Abu Ghraib or the killings of Iraqi civilians last year in Haditha, allegedly by Marines." ... "But the exclusion of the Geneva provisions may make it more difficult for the administration to portray such incidents as aberrations. And it undercuts contentions that U.S. forces follow the strictest, most broadly accepted standards when fighting wars." (1, 2) -By Julian E. Barnes -LAtimes

20060604

Illinois - US - Iraq - Military - 2006 Election - "Out of the War, Into a Fierce Battle for Congress: Tammy Duckworth's injuries led her to seek office. She knows the race won't be easy." ... "Sitting on a couch inside her cramped campaign headquarters, the Army major seems equally comfortable talking about how she piloted a Black Hawk helicopter in Iraq as she does her candidacy in one of the country's most talked-about political races." ... "The life of this 38-year-old political novice was radically changed in November 2004 when her helicopter was shot down over Baghdad, leaving her with catastrophic wounds." ... "As the Democratic candidate running in the Republican stronghold of DuPage County [Illinois], the loss of her legs and the severe injuries to her right arm have done more than distinguish her from rivals. The wounds, which inspired her to enter the public spotlight, underscore some of her campaign messages — including a desire to hold the White House more accountable for the nation's military presence in Iraq." ... ""We had steak and lobster dinners every Sunday, and not enough armor," Duckworth said. "I didn't go to war expecting lobster. I would have happily exchanged it for better armor."" ... "Duckworth is among nearly a dozen veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan who are vying for congressional seats this election cycle. Many are running as Democrats, and political analysts say they could help the party obtain a majority in the midterm elections and gain traction on issues such as national security." (1, 2) -By P.J. Huffstutter -LAtimes

20060531

US - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Phone - Privacy - Law - "Gore: Bush is 'renegade rightwing extremist'." ... "Al Gore has made his sharpest attack yet on the George Bush presidency, describing the current US administration as "a renegade band of rightwing extremists"." ... "Denying that his politics have shifted to the left since he lost the court battle for the 2000 election, Mr Gore says: "If you have a renegade band of rightwing extremists who get hold of power, the whole thing goes to the right."" ... "In the years since, he has been a steady critic of specific Bush administration policies. He opposed the war on Iraq at a time when most prominent Democrats were supporting it, and more recently spoke out against what he called "a gross and excessive power grab" by the administration over phone tapping." -Oliver Burkeman and Jonathan Freedland -Guardian.co.uk

20060525

Australia - East Timor - US - British - Iraq - Afghanistan - Terrorism - Politics - "Australia rushes to troubled East Timor: East Timor's call for help Wednesday opened a new mission for an already stretched military." ... "Australian and other foreign troops were preparing to head for East Timor Wednesday after the former Portuguese colony issued an urgent appeal for help to quell weeks of unrest." ... "Canberra will shoulder the lion's share of the deployment, and was planning to send a battalion of up to 1,300 troops as well as helicopters and armored vehicles. Three warships already on standby in northern Australian waters will also be deployed." ... "For Australia, this is the latest in a string of recent deployments to neighboring failing nations. While often viewed with suspicion by some of its Asian neighbors, small, troubled states in the South Pacific often welcome military intervention by the country they have come to regard as a mostly benign Big Brother. But Australia's willingness to play this role, as well as its increasing commitments to the war on terror, is straining its military." ... "The pressures on Australia's military -which includes some 52,000 active-duty personnel and 20,000 reserve forces - are growing. The country was among the first to commit troops to the US-led invasion of Iraq and now has about 1,400 military personnel there - miniscule by US or British standards, but politically significant for Canberra. Australia has also sent 550 troops to Afghanistan, including a special forces task force." -By Nick Squires -CSMonitor

20060521

- John Edwards - Cheney- Noteworthy - 2008 Election - "Edwards Bashes Cheney, Bush: 2004 vice presidential contender blasts Bush and readies to run again." -With George Stephanopoulos -ThisWeek-ABCNEWS.com
US - Iraq - Edwards - Cheney - Disaster- Energy - Health - Government - Intelligence - Law - History - 2008 Election - NC - "Edwards: Bush Worse than Nixon." ... "Former Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., says George W. Bush is the "worst president of our lifetime," and "absolutely" worse than Watergate-tainted President Richard M. Nixon." ... "In an exclusive appearance on "This Week with George Stephanopoulos," the former presidential and vice presidential contender said of Bush, "He's done a variety of things -- things which are going to take us forever to recover from." ... ""You have to give Bush and Cheney and gang credit for being good at politics -- you know, good at political campaigns," Edwards added. "They're very good at dividing the country and taking advantage of it. What they're not good at is governing, and it shows every single day in this administration. And the country is paying a huge price for that."" ... ""It is not an accident that he's [Vice President Cheney] unbelievably poorly thought of," Edwards said. "He is one of -- if not the --principal architects of this disaster in Iraq. He put us on an energy path that the American people are paying an enormous price for right now. He paid little to no attention to making sure the government was prepared to respond to the kind of disaster that hit our Gulf Coast. We've got a health care crisis going on, he's had no proposal of any kind that I know of. And people don't trust him anymore, which is understandable. I wouldn't trust him."" ... "Edwards made the pitch for a Democratic president in 2008, claiming the Bush has "intentionally ignored" the law and constitution in the NSA wiretapping controversy." (1, 2, 3, 4) -By Ed O'Keefe-ABCNEWS.com

20060518

US - Memorial Day - Military- Homeless - Poverty - Health - Government - Money - Politics - Iraq - Calif. - "Number of Homeless Vets Called a 'Disgrace': A Third of Homeless Men in the U.S. Have Served in the Military." ... "One of every three homeless males in the United States is a veteran, and each night as many as 200,000 men and women veterans go to sleep with no place to call home, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs." ... "With Memorial Day approaching, Democratic members of the House Veterans Affairs Committee held a forum on homeless veterans." ... "Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., who chaired the forum, was blunt. "It's a disgrace that we let any of our vets get in this position. If we spend a billion dollars every 2½ days in Iraq, we can spend a lot more for those who have served us but will be out on the streets tonight."" ... "According to recent statistics, the VA provided health care services to more than 100,000 homeless veterans in 2004, and the agency spent more than $1 billion to assist tens of thousands of homeless and at-risk veterans." (1, 2) -By Dean Norland -ABCNEWS.com

20060514

US - Iraq - Mother's-Day - Politics - "Anti-war mothers say best gift would be peace." ... "An exhibit of empty combat boots and a silent march against the war in Iraq are bringing mothers and anti-war protesters together on the National Mall this Mother's Day weekend." ... "Sarah Fuhro, a peace activist whose son is stationed in Iraq, says the best Mother's Day gift would be to hear the war is won and the troops are coming home." -AP via -WOI-TV

20060512

US - Iraq - Australia - UN- Military - Intelligence - Book - "Ex-WMD inspector: Politics quashed facts." ... "A year after Bush administration claims about Iraqi "bioweapons trailers" were discredited by American experts, U.S. officials were still suppressing the findings, says a senior member of the CIA-led Iraq inspection team." ... "At one point, former U.N. arms inspector Rod Barton says, a CIA officer told him it was "politically not possible" to report that the White House claims were untrue. In the end, Barton says, he felt "complicit in deceit."" ... "Barton, an Australian biological weapons specialist, discusses the 2004 events in "The Weapons Detective," a memoir of his years as an arms inspector, being published Monday in Australia by Black Inc. Agenda." ... "Barton's memoir says that well into 2004, pressure from Washington kept the U.S. public uninformed about the true nature of these alleged WMD systems." -Charles J. Hanley -AP via -Kentucky.com

20060511

US - Government - Military- Mental Health - Afghanistan - Iraq - "Study shows combat stress aid falls short." ... "Less than one-quarter of the U.S. military's Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans who show signs of post-traumatic stress are referred for additional mental health treatment or evaluation, a government study finds." ... "The report released Thursday said about 5 percent of the veterans interviewed after they returned from combat tours appeared at risk for post-traumatic stress disorder. Of those, about 22 percent are referred for more health care." ... "The Government Accountability Office said the Defense Department cannot guarantee that those who need referrals get them, and there appear to be inconsistencies in how health care workers from the different military services determine who needs a referral." -By Lolita C. Baldor -AP via -SeattlePI.NWsource

20060507

US - Iraq - Afghanistan - "Sailors, airmen land new role." ... "The Navy and Air Force are training their sailors and airmen for war duty far from the seas or skies: jobs typically performed by a strained Army in Iraq and Afghanistan." ... "Navy and Air Force personnel are replacing Army soldiers to carry out such duties as guarding convoys, patrolling bases and watching for homemade bombs, the top killer of U.S. troops in Iraq." ... "The Navy also is running a prison in Iraq, patrolling rivers and helping to clear and search buildings." ... "About 8,000 sailors are on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to Rear Adm. David Gove, head of the Navy Personnel Command. By the end of the year, that number is expected to grow to as many as 12,000, he says." -By Tom Vanden Brook -USATODAY

20060506

US - Iraq - Foreign - Military - Terrorism - Intelligence - Politics - Porter Goss - "The Fix-It Man Leaves, but The Agency's Cracks Remain." ... "Porter J. Goss was brought into the CIA to quell what the White House viewed as a partisan insurgency against the administration and to re-energize a spy service that failed to prevent the Sept. 11 attacks or accurately assess Iraq's weapons capability." ... "But as he walked out the glass doors of Langley headquarters yesterday, Goss left behind an agency that current and former intelligence officials say is weaker operationally, with a workforce demoralized by an exodus of senior officers and by uncertainty over its role in fighting terrorism and other intelligence priorities, said current and former intelligence officials." ... "As a result of all these factors, said these sources and outside experts who work with the CIA, the number of case officers has skyrocketed, but there has been no dramatic improvement in how spies collect intelligence about terrorist targets." ... "As important, Goss -- who did not like to travel overseas or to wine and dine foreign intelligence chiefs who visited Washington -- allowed the atrophy of relations with the foreign intelligence services that helped the CIA kill or catch nearly all the terrorists taken off the streets since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, in the view of these officials and several foreign intelligence officials." (1, 2) -By Dana Priest with contributions by Thomas E. Ricks and Julie Tate -WashingtonPost

20060425

US - Iraq - Noteworthy - Government - Military - Intelligence - Secrets - Law - Pat Roberts- Kansas - "Is There A Double Standard On Leak Probes?" ... "When the CIA announced on Friday that it had fired an employee who the agency claims "knowingly and willfully shared classified intelligence" with a newspaper reporter, Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts, R-Kansas, immediately praised the agency's action, saying that "unauthorized disclosures of classified information can significantly harm our ability to protect the American people."" ... "Roberts, one of the staunchest defenders of the Bush administration's effort to stop the flow of sensitive information to the press, said in a statement that "[t]hose who leak classified information not only risk the disclosure of intelligence sources and methods, but also expose the brave men and women of the intelligence community to greater danger. Clearly, those guilty of improperly disclosing classified information should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law."" ... "But three years ago on the eve of the invasion of Iraq, Roberts himself was involved in disclosing sensitive intelligence information that, according to four former senior intelligence officers, impaired efforts to capture Saddam Hussein and potentially threatened the lives of Iraqis who were spying for the United States." ... "On March 20, 2003, at the onset of military hostilities between U.S. and Iraqi forces, Roberts said in a speech to the National Newspaper Association that he had "been in touch with our intelligence community" and that the CIA had informed President Bush and the National Security Council "of intelligence information from what we call human intelligence that indicated the location of Saddam Hussein and his leadership in a bunker in the suburbs of Baghdad."" ... "The former intelligence officials said in interviews that Roberts was never held accountable for his comments, which bore directly on the issue of intelligence-gathering sources and methods, and revealed that Iraqis close to Hussein were probably talking to the United States." ... "After opening his speech with the information about human intelligence and Saddam Hussein's location in a Baghdad bunker, the senator said that President Bush had conferred with his top military advisers and had "authorized a pre-emptive surgical strike with 40 Tomahawk Missiles launched by ship and submarines and so called bunker bombs by F-117 stealth aircraft. I do not have a damage assessment. The Iraqi's report 14 killed and one wounded and are reporting damage in residential areas."" ... "At the time, it was one of the most sensitive secrets in government that the CIA had recruited Iraqi nationals who claimed to have infiltrated Hussein's inner circle to be able to follow his movements at the onset of war. But after the bombs and missiles hit an Iraqi governmental complex known as Dora Park, located on the Tigris River south of Baghdad, Hussein either was not there, or escaped unharmed." ... "Whether or not Roberts' comments were inadvertent, former intelligence officials said, they almost certainly tipped off the Iraqi dictator that there were spies close to him. "He [Roberts] had given up that we had a penetration of [Saddam's] inner circle," says a former senior intelligence official. "It was the worst thing you could ever do."" -By Murray Waas with contributions by Brian Beutler -NationalJournal
US - Iraq - Government - Military - Intelligence - Pat Roberts - Kans. - Law - "Sen. Roberts seeks delay of Intel probe." ... "Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), who chairs the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, said he wants to divide his panel’s inquiry into the Bush administration’s handling of Iraq-related intelligence into two parts, a move that would push off its most politically controversial elements to a later time." ... "The inquiry has dragged on for more than two years, a slow pace that prompted Democrats to force the Senate into an extraordinary closed-door session in November. Republicans then promised to speed up the probe." ... "Left unfinished would be a report on whether public statements and testimony about Iraq by senior U.S. government officials were substantiated by available intelligence information. Roberts also would leave unfinished another report on what Democrats have called possibly illegal activity in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, formerly headed by Douglas Feith, who is believed to have played an important role in persuading the president to invade Iraq." -By Alexander Bolton -TheHill.com

20060424

Iraq - Military - Police - Politics - "Seven Car Bombs Rock Baghdad." ... "Seven car bombs exploded across the capital Monday, killing at least six people and wounding dozens, as politicians met to try to finalize a new Cabinet. Police discovered bodies of 20 Iraqis, apparent victims of sectarian killings the U.S. hopes the new government can end." ... "Elsewhere, in Baghdad and other areas, three roadside bombs, five drive-by shootings and a mortar round killed a total of 12 Iraqis, police said." ... "The violence underlines the challenges prime minister-designate Jawad al-Maliki faces as he begins the tough task of assembling a Cabinet out of Iraq's Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish parties." (1, 2) -AP -CBSNews

20060423

US - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - "A Spy Speaks Out." ... "When no weapons of mass destruction surfaced in Iraq, President Bush insisted that all those WMD claims before the war were the result of faulty intelligence. But a former top CIA official, Tyler Drumheller — a 26-year veteran of the agency — has decided to do something CIA officials at his level almost never do: Speak out." ... "He tells correspondent Ed Bradley the real failure was not in the intelligence community but in the White House. He says he saw how the Bush administration, time and again, welcomed intelligence that fit the president's determination to go to war and turned a blind eye to intelligence that did not." ... ""It just sticks in my craw every time I hear them say it’s an intelligence failure. It’s an intelligence failure. This was a policy failure," Drumheller tells Bradley." ... "Drumheller was the CIA's top man in Europe, the head of covert operations there, until he retired a year ago. He says he saw firsthand how the White House promoted intelligence it liked and ignored intelligence it didn’t:" ... ""The idea of going after Iraq was U.S. policy. It was going to happen one way or the other," says Drumheller." (1, 2, 3) -Produced by David Gelber and Joel Bach -60 Minutes -CBSNews

20060420

US - Iraq- Government - Money - Politics - "The One Certainty About Iraq: Spiralling Costs for Americans: Poor Planning, Need for New Equipment Could Push War Costs to $1 Trillion." ... "ABC analyst Tony Cordesman, who also holds the Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy for the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says the exorbitant costs come down to poor planning." ... ""When the administration submitted its original budget for the Iraq war, it didn't provide money for continuing the war this year or any other. We could end up spending up to $1 trillion in supplemental budgets for this war."" ... "According to the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, the United States spent $48 billion for Iraq in 2003, $59 billion in 2004, and $81 billion in 2005. The center predicts the figure will balloon to $94 billion for 2006." ... "Analysts say the increases can be blamed on the rising cost of maintaining military equipment and developing new equipment. As the cost of military equipment escalates, the cost of the war escalates." (1, 2) -By Keith Garvin -ABCNEWS.com

20060413

US - Iraq - Opinion - Politics - "Rumsfeld Rebuked By Retired Generals: Ex-Iraq Commander Calls for Resignation." ... "The retired commander of key forces in Iraq called yesterday for Donald H. Rumsfeld to step down, joining several other former top military commanders who have harshly criticized the defense secretary's authoritarian style for making the military's job more difficult." ... ""I think we need a fresh start" at the top of the Pentagon, retired Army Maj. Gen. John Batiste, who commanded the 1st Infantry Division in Iraq in 2004-2005, said in an interview. "We need leadership up there that respects the military as they expect the military to respect them. And that leadership needs to understand teamwork."" ... "Batiste's comments resonate especially within the Army: It is widely known there that he was offered a promotion to three-star rank to return to Iraq and be the No. 2 U.S. military officer there but he declined because he no longer wished to serve under Rumsfeld. Also, before going to Iraq, he worked at the highest level of the Pentagon, serving as the senior military assistant to Paul D. Wolfowitz, then the deputy secretary of defense." ... "Batiste said he believes that the administration's handling of the Iraq war has violated fundamental military principles, such as unity of command and unity of effort. In other interviews, Batiste has said he thinks the violation of another military principle -- ensuring there are enough forces -- helped create the Abu Ghraib abuse scandal by putting too much responsibility on incompetent officers and undertrained troops." (1, 2) -By Thomas E. Ricks -WashingtonPost
US - Iraq - Military - Politics - "Analysis: Criticism Mounts Vs. Rumsfeld." ... "A growing number of commanders who served under him [Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld under Republican President George Bush] say he has botched the Iraq operation, ignored the advice of his generals and should be replaced." ... "Two more retired generals called for Rumsfeld's resignation on Thursday, bringing the number this month to six." ... "Retired Army Major Gen. John Riggs told National Public Radio that Rumsfeld fostered an "atmosphere of arrogance." Retired Gen. Charles Swannack told CNN that Rumsfeld micromanaged the war. "We need a new secretary of defense," he said." ... "Joining the criticism earlier this week was retired Army Maj. Gen. John Batiste, who served as an infantry division commander in Iraq until last November. He called for a "fresh start at the Pentagon," accusing Rumsfeld of ignoring sound military decision-making and seeking to intimidate those in uniform." ... "Earlier calls for Rumsfeld's replacement came from retired Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni, retired Marine Lt. Gen. Gregory Newbold and retired Army Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton." (1, 2,3) -By Tom Raum -AP via -ABCNEWS.com

20060412

US- Iraq- Noteworthy - Secret - Military - Technology - Intelligence - "Lacking Biolabs, Trailers Carried Case for War: Administration Pushed Notion of Banned Iraqi Weapons Despite Evidence to Contrary." ... "On May 29, 2003, 50 days after the fall of Baghdad, President Bush proclaimed a fresh victory for his administration in Iraq: Two small trailers captured by U.S. and Kurdish troops had turned out to be long-sought mobile "biological laboratories." He declared, "We have found the weapons of mass destruction."" ... "The claim, repeated by top administration officials for months afterward, was hailed at the time as a vindication of the decision to go to war. But even as Bush spoke, U.S. intelligence officials possessed powerful evidence that it was not true." ... "A secret fact-finding mission to Iraq -- not made public until now -- had already concluded that the trailers had nothing to do with biological weapons. Leaders of the Pentagon-sponsored mission transmitted their unanimous findings to Washington in a field report on May 27, 2003, two days before the president's statement." ... "The three-page field report and a 122-page final report three weeks later were stamped "secret" and shelved. Meanwhile, for nearly a year, administration and intelligence officials continued to publicly assert that the trailers were weapons factories." ... "The contents of the final report, "Final Technical Engineering Exploitation Report on Iraqi Suspected Biological Weapons-Associated Trailers," remain classified. But interviews reveal that the technical team was unequivocal in its conclusion that the trailers were not intended to manufacture biological weapons." (1, 2, 3, 4) -By Joby Warrick with contributions by Alice Crites -WashingtonPost

20060409

US - Iraq - Military - Politics - "Why Iraq Was a Mistake A military insider sounds off against the war and the "zealots" who pushed it By Lieut." ... "Two senior military officers are known to have challenged Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on the planning of the Iraq war. Army General Eric Shinseki publicly dissented and found himself marginalized. Marine Lieut. General Greg Newbold, the Pentagon's top operations officer, voiced his objections internally and then retired, in part out of opposition to the war. Here, for the first time, Newbold goes public with a full-throated critique:" ... "In 1971, the rock group The Who released the antiwar anthem Won't Get Fooled Again. To most in my generation, the song conveyed a sense of betrayal by the nation's leaders, who had led our country into a costly and unnecessary war in Vietnam. To those of us who were truly counterculture--who became career members of the military during those rough times--the song conveyed a very different message. To us, its lyrics evoked a feeling that we must never again stand by quietly while those ignorant of and casual about war lead us into another one and then mismanage the conduct of it. Never again, we thought, would our military's senior leaders remain silent as American troops were marched off to an ill-considered engagement. It's 35 years later, and the judgment is in: the Who had it wrong. We have been fooled again." ... "From 2000 until October 2002, I was a Marine Corps lieutenant general and director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff. After 9/11, I was a witness and therefore a party to the actions that led us to the invasion of Iraq--an unnecessary war. Inside the military family, I made no secret of my view that the zealots' rationale for war made no sense. And I think I was outspoken enough to make those senior to me uncomfortable. But I now regret that I did not more openly challenge those who were determined to invade a country whose actions were peripheral to the real threat--al-Qaeda. I retired from the military four months before the invasion, in part because of my opposition to those who had used 9/11's tragedy to hijack our security policy. Until now, I have resisted speaking out in public. I've been silent long enough." (1, 2, 3) -By General Greg Newbold (Ret.)-TIME.com
US - Iraq - Dick Cheney - Lewis Libby - Government - Nuclear - Military - Intelligence - Media - Politics - "Iraq Findings Leaked by Cheney's Aide Were Disputed." ... "President Bush's apparent order authorizing a senior White House official to reveal to a reporter previously classified intelligence about Saddam Hussein's efforts to obtain uranium came as the information was already being discredited by several other officials in the administration, interviews and documents from the time show." ... "The filing [in court by Central Intelligence Agency leak prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald] revealed for the first time testimony by Mr. Libby saying that Mr. Bush, through Mr. Cheney, had authorized Mr. Libby to tell reporters that "a key judgment of the N.I.E. [National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq] held that Iraq was 'vigorously trying to procure' uranium."" ... "In fact, that was not one of the "key judgments" of the document." ... "In fact, the estimate's key judgments, which were officially declassified 10 days after Mr. Libby's meeting with [NYTimes journalist] Ms. Miller, say nothing about the uranium allegations. The key judgments on Iraq's nuclear program — namely, that Iraq was again trying to build a bomb — were based instead on other intelligence, like the assertion that Iraq was seeking high-strength aluminum tubes for nuclear centrifuges." ... "In an interview with The Times in 2004, a senior intelligence official involved in drafting the estimate said the uranium allegations were excluded from the key judgments because the drafters knew there were serious doubts about their accuracy." (1, 2) -By David E. Sanger and David Barstow -NYTimes
US - Iraq - Niger - Dick Cheney - Lewis Libby - Government - Nuclear - Military - Intelligence - Politics - "A 'Concerted Effort' to Discredit Bush Critic: Prosecutor Describes Cheney, Libby as Key Voices Pitching Iraq-Niger Story." ... "As he drew back the curtain this week on the evidence against Vice President Cheney's former top aide, Special Counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald for the first time described a "concerted action" by "multiple people in the White House" -- using classified information -- to "discredit, punish or seek revenge against" a critic of President Bush's war in Iraq." ... "Bluntly and repeatedly, Fitzgerald placed Cheney at the center of that campaign. Citing grand jury testimony from the vice president's former chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Fitzgerald fingered Cheney as the first to voice a line of attack that at least three White House officials would soon deploy against former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV." ... "Cheney, in a conversation with Libby in early July 2003, was said to describe Wilson's CIA-sponsored trip to Niger the previous year -- in which the envoy found no support for charges that Iraq tried to buy uranium there -- as "a junket set up by Mr. Wilson's wife," CIA case officer Valerie Plame." (1, 2) -By Barton Gellman and Dafna Linzer with contributions by Julie Tate -WashingtonPost

20060408

US - Iraq - Religious - Political- Police - "Threat of Shiite Militias Now Seen As Iraq's Most Critical Challenge." ... "Shiite Muslim militias pose the greatest threat to security in many parts of Iraq, having killed more people in recent months than the Sunni Arab-led insurgency, and will likely present the most daunting and critical challenge for Iraq's new government, U.S. military and diplomatic officials say." ... "Assassinations, many carried out by Shiite gunmen against Sunni Arabs in Baghdad and elsewhere, accounted for more than four times as many deaths in March as bombings and other mass-casualty attacks, according to military data. And most officials agree that only a small percentage of shooting deaths are ever reported." ... "While acknowledging the instability caused by Shiite armed groups, the largest of which are linked to the country's dominant political parties and operate among Iraq's police and army, U.S. and Iraqi officials here have yet to implement, or even publicly articulate, a strategy for addressing the problem." ... "Militias last emerged as a top U.S. concern in 2004, when the American and Iraqi armies spent months putting down violent uprisings by the Mahdi Army, a militia loyal to the firebrand cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, in Baghdad, Najaf and other cities. But the problem is far thornier now, U.S. officials say, because the militias have added thousands of foot soldiers and gained new political stature." (1, 2, 3) -By Jonathan Finer with contributions by John Ward Anderson and Ellen Knickmeyer -WashingtonPost

20060407

US- Iraq - Government - Political - Secrets - Lewis Libby - Dick Cheney - Telecom- Privacy - Military - Prisons - UN - Media - "Libby testimony shows a White House pattern of intelligence leaks." ... "The revelation that President Bush authorized former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby to divulge classified information about Iraq fits a pattern of selective leaks of secret intelligence to further the administration's political agenda." ... "Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and other top officials have reacted angrily at unauthorized leaks, such as the exposure of a domestic wiretapping program and a network of secret CIA prisons, both of which are now the subject of far-reaching investigations." ... "But secret information that supports their policies, particularly about the Iraq war, has surfaced everywhere from the U.N. Security Council to major newspapers and magazines. Much of the information that the administration leaked or declassified, however, has proved to be incomplete, exaggerated, incorrect or fabricated." -By Warren P. Strobel and Ron Hutcheson with contributions by James Kuhnhenn -KnightRidder via -MercuryNews
Iraq - Religious - Military - Politics - "Three blasts kill 74 at Baghdad mosque: Shiite leader urges restraint; notes reprisals 'are a real danger'." ... "Three suicide bombers -- two of whom were disguised as Shiite women -- struck a Baghdad [Iraq] mosque affiliated with a major Shiite political party Friday, killing at least 74 people, according to the Iraqi Health Ministry." ... "Another 140 people were wounded, authorities said." ... "The attack occurred a day after a bomb killed 10 people and wounded more than three dozen others near the Imam Ali shrine in Najaf, the holy Shiite city in south-central Iraq. (Full story)" ... "The attacks in Najaf and Baghdad have heightened fears that Iraq's Shiite militias, which have been blamed for a number of reprisal attacks on Sunnis, could retaliate. The militias have said that if Iraqi security forces can't protect them, they will protect themselves." -Contributed to by Cal Perry, Aneesh Raman, Auday Sadik and Mohammed Tawfeeq -CNN
US - Iraq - Niger - Military - Nuclear - Intelligence - Secrets - Politics - Dick Cheney - Lewis Libby - Kansas - "Playing Hardball With Secrets." ... "For more than two years, Senate Republicans have dragged out an investigation into how the Bush administration came to use bogus intelligence on Iraq to justify a war. A year ago, [Kansas Republican] Pat Roberts, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, called it "a monumental waste of time" to consider whether the White House manipulated intelligence to exaggerate the threat posed by Saddam Hussein." ... "Meanwhile, the evidence has steadily mounted that President Bush and his team not only did that before the war, but kept right on doing it after the invasion. The most recent additions to this pile came yesterday, in reports by The New York Sun, The National Journal and other news organizations on documents from the case against Lewis Libby, the former chief of staff to Vice President Cheney who is charged with lying about the unmasking of Valerie Wilson, a covert C.I.A. agent." ... "According to these papers, Mr. Libby testified that President Bush authorized him to tell reporters about classified intelligence on Iraq as part of an effort to discredit Mrs. Wilson's husband, Joseph Wilson, a retired diplomat who had cast doubt on the claim that Iraq tried to acquire uranium for nuclear bombs from Niger. The National Journal reported that Mr. Libby has also said that Mr. Cheney authorized him to leak classified information before the invasion to make the case for war." -NYTimes
US- Iraq - Niger - Government - Military - Nuclear - Intelligence - Secrets - Dick Cheney - Lewis Libby - Media - "Bush Authorized Secrets' Release, Libby Testified: Prosecutor Says Disclosures on Iraq Were Aimed at War Critic." ... "President Bush authorized White House official I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby to disclose highly sensitive intelligence information to the news media in an attempt to discredit a CIA adviser whose views undermined the rationale for the invasion of Iraq, according to a federal prosecutor's account of Libby's testimony to a grand jury." ... "The court filing by Special Counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald for the first time places Bush and Vice President Cheney at the heart of what Libby testified was an exceptional and deliberate leak of material designed to buttress the administration's claim that Iraq was trying to obtain nuclear weapons. The information was contained in the National Intelligence Estimate, one of the most closely held CIA analyses of whether Iraq had weapons of mass destruction before the war." ... "Fitzgerald said Libby's disclosure took place as the result of "a strong desire by many, including multiple people in the White House, to repudiate" claims made in a July 2003 newspaper article by former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, who was hired by the CIA to evaluate whether Iraq sought nuclear material in Niger. Wilson wrote that "some of the intelligence related to Iraq's nuclear weapons program was twisted to exaggerate the Iraqi threat."" ... "Bush has been a major critic of leaks of classified information, and his aides have repeatedly said they want to "get to the bottom" of who leaked the name of Wilson's wife, covert CIA operative Valerie Plame, to the media, which touched off Fitzgerald's investigation . But in the past 33 months the White House has never disclosed Bush's apparent involvement in the deliberate disclosure of information meant to undermine Wilson." (1, 2, 3) -By R. Jeffrey Smith with contributions by Dafna Linzer, Walter Pincus and Jim VandeHei and Lucy Shackelford -WashingtonPost

20060406

US - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Dick Cheney - Lewis Libby - Politics - "Libby Says Bush Authorized Leaks." ... "Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff has testified that President Bush authorized him to disclose the contents of a highly classified intelligence assessment to the media to defend the Bush administration's decision to go to war with Iraq, according to papers filed in federal court on Wednesday by Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor in the CIA leak case." ... "I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby testified to a federal grand jury that he had received "approval from the President through the Vice President" to divulge portions of a National Intelligence Estimate regarding Saddam Hussein's purported efforts to develop nuclear weapons, according to the court papers. Libby was said to have testified that such presidential authorization to disclose classified information was "unique in his recollection," the court papers further said." -By Murray Waas with contributions by Brian Beutler -NationalJournal
US - Iraq - Government- Nuclear - Military - Intelligence - Law - Lewis Libby - Dick Cheney - Karl Rove - Politics - "Bush Authorized Leak to Times, Libby Told Grand Jury." ... "A former White House aide under indictment for obstructing a leak probe, I. Lewis Libby, testified to a grand jury that he gave information from a closely-guarded "National Intelligence Estimate" on Iraq to a New York Times reporter in 2003 with the specific permission of President Bush, according to a new court filing from the special prosecutor in the case." ... "The court papers from the prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, do not suggest that Mr. Bush violated any law or rule. However, the new disclosure could be awkward for the president because it places him, for the first time, directly in a chain of events that led to a meeting where prosecutors contend the identity of a CIA employee, Valerie Plame, was provided to a reporter." ... "Mr. Fitzgerald's inquiry initially focused on the alleged leak, which occurred after a former ambassador who is Ms. Plame's husband, Joseph Wilson, wrote an op-ed piece in the New York Times questioning the accuracy of statements Mr. Bush made about Iraq's nuclear procurement efforts in Africa." ... "While prosecutors initially said Mr. Libby was the first government official to disclose Ms. Plame's identity, it subsequently emerged that a Washington Post reporter, Bob Woodward, learned earlier about her CIA employment from another government official. Neither Mr. Woodward nor Ms. Miller wrote about Ms. Plame at the time. Another journalist, Robert Novak, first disclosed the employment of Mr. Wilson's wife in a syndicated column released on July 14, 2003. The columnist based his story on interviews with Mr. Bush's top political adviser, Karl Rove, and another official who has not been officially identified." ... "Prosecutors argued that Mr. Libby covered up his role in the disclosures because "he knew the White House had publicly staked its credibility on there being no White House involvement in the leaking of information about Ms. Wilson." They also noted that Mr. Bush publicly declared he would fire anyone found to have leaked classified information." -By Josh Gerstein -http://NYSun.com

20060402

US - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Politics - "Meet the Press: Transcript for April 2." ... "MR. RUSSERT: I want to bring you back to a book you co-wrote with Tom Clancy called "Battle Ready." And you wrote this: "In the lead-up to the Iraq war and its later conduct, I saw, at a minimum, true dereliction, negligence, and irresponsibility; at worst, lying, incompetence, and corruption." That's very serious." ... "[General Tony Zinni (Ret.)] GEN. ZINNI: Yes." ... "MR. RUSSERT: Where did you see that? At what level?" ... "GEN. ZINNI: Well, I-first of all, I saw it in the way the intelligence was being portrayed. I knew the intelligence; I saw it right up to the day of the war. I was asked at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing a month before the war if I thought the threat was imminent. I didn't. Many of the people I know that were involved in the intelligence side of this, or, or in the military felt the same way. I saw the-what this town is known for: spin, cherry-picking facts, using metaphors to evoke certain emotional responses, or, or shading the, the context. We, we know the mushroom clouds and, and the other things that were all described that the media's covered well. I saw on the ground, though, a sort of walking away from 10 years worth of planning." ... "You know, ever since the end of the first Gulf War, there have been-there's been planning by serious officers and planners and others, and policies put in place. Ten years worth of planning, you know, were thrown away; troop levels dismissed out of hand; General Shinseki basically insulted for speaking the truth and giving a, an honest opinion; the lack of cohesive approach to how we deal with the aftermath; the political, economic, social reconstruction of a nation, which is no small task; a belief in these exiles that anyone in the region, anyone that had any knowledge would tell you were not credible on the ground; and on and on and on. Decisions to disband the army that were not in the initial plans. I mean there's a series of disastrous mistakes. We just heard the secretary of state say these were tactical mistakes. These were not tactical mistakes. These were strategic mistakes, mistakes of policy made back here. Don't blame the troops. They're the ones that perform the tactics on the ground. They've been magnificent. If anything saves this, it will be them." ... "MR. RUSSERT: Should someone resign?" ... "GEN. ZINNI: Absolutely." ... "MR. RUSSERT: Who?" ... "GEN. ZINNI: Secretary of defense, to begin with." (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7,8) -MeetThePress -MSNBC

20060330

US - Iraq - Turkey - California - 2006 Election - Terrorism - Web - Photo- Media - "Candidate admits 'stupid' Web error: Conservative [Republican Howard Kaloogian] uses photo of Turkey, calls it Baghdad." ... "A leading conservative California congressional candidate who has made support for the war in Iraq a central issue acknowledged Wednesday that a campaign Web site photo -- billed as a peaceful street scene taken during his recent trip to Baghdad [Iraq] -- was actually photographed in Turkey." ... "The campaign posted the photo from Kaloogian's July trip to Iraq, a mission dubbed the "Truth Tour" and organized to "tell the American people about the accomplishments (troops) are making in Operation Iraqi Freedom and the fight against terrorism,'' according to the tax-exempt group Move America Forward, a conservative grassroots organization Kaloogian helped found." ... "The caption read that "we took this photo of downtown Baghdad while we were in Iraq'' which is "much more calm and stable than what many people believe it to be. But, each day the news media finds any violence occurring in the country and screams and shouts about it -- in part because many journalists are opposed to the U.S. effort to fight terrorism.''" ... "But bloggers on the popular liberal Daily Kos Web site revealed the photo depicted a street scene in Turkey." -By Carla Marinucci-SFGate.com

DailyKos.com

US - Iraq - Turkey- California - 2006 Election - Web - Photo - Media - "Photo by candidate not taken in Baghdad." ... "For weeks, [California Republican Howard] Kaloogian's campaign Web site featured a photo of a peaceful city block to help make his case that things are going well in Iraq." ... "“We took this photo of Baghdad while we were in Iraq,” the caption accompanying the photo read. “Iraq (including Baghdad) is much more calm and stable than what many people believe it to be.”" ... "There was one problem with the photo. It wasn't Baghdad. It was a suburb of Istanbul, Turkey. " ... "Kaloogian's explanation that it was an innocent mix-up isn't being bought by bloggers across the nation who uncovered the bogus photo." ... "Some of them believe he's guilty of what he's accused the mainstream media of doing: slanting the news to fit his own beliefs." -By Bill Ainsworth -SignOnSanDiego.com
US - Iraq - Karl Rove - Secret - Government - Nuclear - Military - Intelligence - 2004 Election - "Insulating Bush." ... "Karl Rove, President Bush's chief political adviser, cautioned other White House aides in the summer of 2003 that Bush's 2004 re-election prospects would be severely damaged if it was publicly disclosed that he had been personally warned that a key rationale for going to war had been challenged within the administration. Rove expressed his concerns shortly after an informal review of classified government records by then-Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen J. Hadley determined that Bush had been specifically advised that claims he later made in his 2003 State of the Union address -- that Iraq was procuring high-strength aluminum tubes to build a nuclear weapon -- might not be true, according to government records and interviews." ... "Hadley was particularly concerned that the public might learn of a classified one-page summary of a National Intelligence Estimate, specifically written for Bush in October 2002. The summary said that although "most agencies judge" that the aluminum tubes were "related to a uranium enrichment effort," the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research and the Energy Department's intelligence branch "believe that the tubes more likely are intended for conventional weapons."" ... "Three months after receiving that assessment, the president stated without qualification in his January 28, 2003, State of the Union address: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa. Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production."" -By Murray Waas with contributions by Brian Beutler -NationalJournal

20060329

US - Iraq - Religious - Military - Terrorism - "True or not, report of 'massacre' angers Iraqis." ... "The public perceptions swirling around a "massacre" - as some Iraqi officials have charged - are the latest incident to stall the creation of Iraq's new government." ... "Did US forces attack a mosque in a Shiite district of Baghdad Sunday night, killing 17 unarmed worshippers, an act that Iraq's Shiite interior minister called a "horrible violation" that has dominated Iraqi TV and sparked a political outcry?" ... "Or, did Iraqi special forces, backed up by US advisers, take on a "terrorist cell" at an office complex, kill 16 "insurgents," and free an Iraqi hostage - only to have Iraqi provocateurs, as top US commanders allege, "set the scene up" to look like an atrocity?" ... "The truth may be the latest war casualty as perceptions shape Iraq's political reality, and the prevailing view of a bloody US raid is undermining US-backed efforts to form a coalition government, while boosting the influence of anti-US cleric Moqtada al-Sadr." -By Scott Peterson with contributions by Awadh al-Taee -CSMonitor

20060328

US - Iraq - Osama bin Laden - Military - Terrorism - Intelligence - 2006 Election - "Democrats Pledge to 'Eliminate' Osama." ... "Congressional Democrats promise to "eliminate" Osama bin Laden and ensure a "responsible redeployment of U.S. forces" from Iraq in 2006 in an election-year national security policy statement." ... "In the position paper to be announced Wednesday, Democrats say they will double the number of special forces and add more spies, which they suggest will increase the chances of finding al-Qaida's elusive leader. They do not set a deadline for when all of the 132,000 American troops now in Iraq should be withdrawn." ... "Overall, the Democratic position paper attempts to make the case that the Bush administration's "inadequate planning and incompetent policies have failed to make Americas as safe as we should be."" -By Liz Sidoti -AP via -Forbes

20060327

US - Britain - Iraq - Military - UN - "Bush Was Set on Path to War, Memo by British Adviser Says." ... "In the weeks before the United States-led invasion of Iraq, as the United States and Britain pressed for a second United Nations resolution condemning Iraq, President Bush's public ultimatum to Saddam Hussein was blunt: Disarm or face war." ... "But behind closed doors, the president was certain that war was inevitable. During a private two-hour meeting in the Oval Office on Jan. 31, 2003, he made clear to Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain that he was determined to invade Iraq without the second resolution, or even if international arms inspectors failed to find unconventional weapons, said a confidential memo about the meeting written by Mr. Blair's top foreign policy adviser and reviewed by The New York Times." ... "The memo also shows that the president and the prime minister acknowledged that no unconventional weapons had been found inside Iraq. Faced with the possibility of not finding any before the planned invasion, Mr. Bush talked about several ways to provoke a confrontation, including a proposal to paint a United States surveillance plane in the colors of the United Nations in hopes of drawing fire, or assassinating Mr. Hussein." ... "Those proposals were first reported last month in the British press, but the memo does not make clear whether they reflected Mr. Bush's extemporaneous suggestions, or were elements of the government's plan." -By Don Van Natta Jr. -NYTimes

20060323

Iraq - Police - Religious - Military - "At Least 56 Iraqis Dead in New Violence: In a Brutal New Wave of Violence, 56 Iraqis Are Killed, Including Car Bombing at a Police Lockup." ... "A suicide car bomber detonated his explosives at the entrance to the Interior Ministry Major Crimes unit in Baghdad's central Karradah district, killing 10 civilians and 15 policemen employed there, authorities said." ... "The Interior Ministry is a predominantly Shiite organization and heavily infiltrated by members of various Shiite militias. The unit targeted Thursday investigates large-scale crimes and has about 20 suspected insurgents in custody, police Lt. Col. Falah al-Mohammadawi said." ... "He ruled out that the assault was aimed at releasing the prisoners, which was the goal of previous days' attacks on other police facilities." ... "Insurgents engineered a successful jailbreak that released more than 30 prisoners north of Baghdad on Tuesday. On Wednesday, the militants laid siege to a prison south of the capital, but U.S. troops and a special Iraqi unit thwarted the pre-dawn attack, capturing 50 of the gunmen, police said." ... "Police have discovered hundreds of corpses in the past four weeks, victims of religious militants on a rampage of revenge killing." -AP via -ABCNEWS.com
US - Iraq - Military - Economy - Oil - Nevada - "Reid: Bush 'Dangerously Incompetent'." ... "Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid [Nevada] called President Bush "dangerously incompetent" on Wednesday and said the administration ought to be doing more to prevent increasing sectarian violence in Iraq." ... ""Where is (Secretary of State) Condoleezza Rice? Why isn't she over in the Middle East, as the chief diplomat of this country should be, trying to get the political forces to form a government over there?" Reid told The Associated Press." ... "Reid said the United States was "failing three different ways in Iraq." Military efforts have lagged, the economy is crippled by decreased oil production and frequent power outages, and attempts to form a national unity government are behind schedule, he said." -AP via -CBSNews

20060322

US - Iraq - Political - Terrorism - Military - History - "Reporters in Iraq under fire there, and from critics." ... "As they begin a fourth year covering the war in Iraq, journalists there face increasing threats to their safety and increasing criticism of their work." ... "Newspapers and other media have cut the number of reporters in the war zone. The reporters who remain in Iraq find leaving their hotels or rental houses difficult for fear of being killed or kidnapped." ... "On Monday, the multinational group Reporters Without Borders said 86 journalists and news assistants have been killed in Iraq since U.S. forces crossed the border from Kuwait three years ago. By contrast, the group said, 63 journalists were killed in Vietnam during the 22-year period of the war there." ... "Thirty-eight journalists have been kidnapped, Reporters Without Borders said. Five of those kidnapped were killed." ... "Journalists know they may be the next targets of insurgents, terrorists or kidnappers looking to draw attention, make a political statement or obtain a lucrative ransom. Long gone are the days, such as in mid-2003, when reporters could walk the streets, visit shops and engage Iraqis in conversation over dinner at restaurants." -By Mark Memmott -USATODAY
Illinois - US - Iraq - Military - "Iraq War Vet Wins in Illinois Race." ... "Tammy Duckworth, the decorated Iraq war veteran who lost both legs in a grenade attack, won a close race Wednesday in her bid for the Democratic primary nomination to succeed retiring Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R) in Illinois's 6th Congressional District." ... "In the Republican primary, Peter Roskam, a well-financed conservative state lawmaker, ran unopposed to succeed Hyde, the House Judiciary Committee chairman during the impeachment of President Bill Clinton. Hyde is retiring after 16 terms in office." -By Eric Pianin with contributions by Kari Lydersen -WashingtonPost

20060321

US - Iraq - Politics - "Bush: Successor Decides Iraq Pullout." ... "President Bush made it clear Tuesday that there will be American troops in Iraq when he leaves office and it will be his successor's job to bring them home." ... "In response to a question in a White House news conference about if there will come a day that when there will be no American forces in Iraq, Mr. Bush answered, "That, of course, is an objective. And that will be decided by future presidents and future governments of Iraq."" ... "Mr. Bush said there will be "more tough fighting ahead" in Iraq, but denied claims that the nation is in the grips of a civil war three years after the U.S.-led invasion." (1, 2) -AP -CBSNews

20060319

US - Iraq - Military - Politics - Psychology - "A Top-Down Review for the Pentagon." ... "During World War II, American soldiers en route to Britain before D-Day were given a pamphlet on how to behave while awaiting the invasion. The most important quote in it was this: "It is impolite to criticize your host; it is militarily stupid to criticize your allies."" ... "By that rule, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is not competent to lead our armed forces. First, his failure to build coalitions with our allies from what he dismissively called "old Europe" has imposed far greater demands and risks on our soldiers in Iraq than necessary. Second, he alienated his allies in our own military, ignoring the advice of seasoned officers and denying subordinates any chance for input." ... "In sum, he has shown himself incompetent strategically, operationally and tactically, and is far more than anyone else responsible for what has happened to our important mission in Iraq. Mr. Rumsfeld must step down." ... "In the five years Mr. Rumsfeld has presided over the Pentagon, I [Army Major General Paul D. Eaton (Ret.)] have seen a climate of groupthink become dominant and a growing reluctance by experienced military men and civilians to challenge the notions of the senior leadership." (1, 2) -By Army Major General Paul D. Eaton (Ret.) -NYTimes
US - Iraq - Politics- "Iraq in civil war, says former PM: Iraq is in the middle of civil war, the country's former interim prime minister Iyad Allawi has told the BBC." ... "He said Iraq had not got to the point of no return, but if it fell apart sectarianism would spread abroad." ... "The UK and US have repeatedly denied Iraq is facing a civil war, but Mr Allawi suggested there was no other way to describe the sectarian violence." ... "Analysts say Mr Allawi's comments are part of political manoeuvring as talks continue over creation of a government." -BBC /News

20060310

US - Iraq - Government - Military - Money - Politics - "Contractor Bilked U.S. on Iraq Work, Federal Jury Rules: Custer Battles Is Told It Should Pay More Than $10 Million in Damages." ... "In the first civil fraud verdict arising from the war effort, the eight-member panel decided, after two days of deliberation, in favor of two former workers who claimed in a lawsuit that Custer Battles LLC created phony Cayman Island companies to overcharge the Coalition Provisional Authority that ran Iraq after the U.S.-led invasion in 2003." ... ""This is a smashing victory for U.S. taxpayers and these whistle-blowers though the Bush administration did nothing to help," said Alan M. Grayson, the attorney for the plaintiffs, Robert Isakson and William Baldwin. Under the federal False Claims Act, citizens can sue on behalf of the government and the Justice Department can then decide whether to join the suit, which it did not in the Custer Battles case." ... "Grayson said yesterday that there are "dozens" of other fraud cases about contracts in Iraq that remain sealed because the department has not decided whether to join them or not. He called such delay "a dereliction of duty."" -By Charles R. Babcock with contributions by Griff Witte -WashingtonPost

20060307

US - Iraq - Iran - Religious - Politics - "Envoy to Iraq Sees Threat of Wider War: He supports the White House view that an early pullout would backfire, but he is bleak about the Sunni-Shiite conflict and says it could spread." ... "The top U.S. envoy to Iraq said Monday that the 2003 toppling of Saddam Hussein's regime had opened a "Pandora's box" of volatile ethnic and sectarian tensions that could engulf the region in all-out war if America pulled out of the country too soon." ... "In remarks that were among the frankest and bleakest public assessments of the Iraq situation by a high-level American official, U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said the "potential is there" for sectarian violence to become full-blown civil war." ... "In any case, Khalilzad said the U.S. has little choice but to maintain a strong presence in Iraq — or risk a regional conflict in which Arabs side with Sunnis and Iranians back Shiites, in what could be a more encompassing version of the 1980s Iran-Iraq war, which left more than 1 million dead." (1, 2) -By Borzou Daragahi with contributions by Mark Mazzetti and Suhail Ahmad -LAtimes
US - Iraq - Religious - Police - Politics - "U.S. Takes Steps to Reduce Shiite Domination in Iraqi Military." ... "As the threat of full-scale sectarian strife looms, the American military is scrambling to try to weed out ethnic or religious partisans from the Iraqi security forces." ... "The United States faces the possibility that it has been arming one side in a prospective civil war. Early on, Americans ceded operational control of the police to the Iraqi government. Now, the police forces are overseen at the highest levels by religious Shiite parties with militias, and reports of uniformed death squads have risen sharply in the past year." ... "The American military is trying an array of possible solutions, including quotas to increase the number of Sunni Arab recruits in police academies, firing Shiite police commanders who appear to tolerate militias, and sending 200 training teams composed of military police officers or former civilian police officers to Iraqi stations, even in remote and risky locations." (1, 2) -Edward Wong -NYTimes

20060306

US - Iraq - Iran - Military - "EXCLUSIVE: Iraq Weapons -- Made in Iran? Intelligence Officials Say Weapons Responsible for Increasing U.S. Deaths in Iraq." ... "U.S. military and intelligence officials tell ABC News that they have caught shipments of deadly new bombs at the Iran-Iraq border." ... "They are a very nasty piece of business, capable of penetrating U.S. troops' strongest armor." ... "What the United States says links them to Iran are tell-tale manufacturing signatures — certain types of machine-shop welds and material indicating they are built by the same bomb factory." (1, 2) -By Brian Ross, Richard Esposito, and Jill Rackmill -ABCNEWS.com

20060304

US - United Arab Emirates - Iraq - Military - New York - "No Iraq Trip for Legislator Who Opposed Deal on Ports." ... "Representative Peter T. King's prominent opposition to a proposal to allow a [United Arab Emirates] Dubai company to take over some terminal operations at American ports may have earned him some punishment from the Bush administration: He has been grounded." ... "Mr. King, the New York Republican who is chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, confirmed Friday that a few days after he first threatened legislation to hold up the port deal, the Pentagon informed him that it could not provide an aircraft for his planned March Congressional delegation to Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East." -Carl Hulse -NYTimes

20060302

US - Iraq - Dick Cheney - Secret - Government - Military - Nuclear - Technology - "What Bush Was Told About Iraq." ... "Two highly classified intelligence reports delivered directly to President Bush before the Iraq war cast doubt on key public assertions made by the president, Vice President Cheney, and other administration officials as justifications for invading Iraq and toppling Saddam Hussein, according to records and knowledgeable sources." ... "The first report, delivered to Bush in early October 2002, was a one-page summary of a National Intelligence Estimate that discussed whether Saddam's procurement of high-strength aluminum tubes was for the purpose of developing a nuclear weapon." ... "Among other things, the report stated that the Energy Department and the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research believed that the tubes were "intended for conventional weapons," a view disagreeing with that of other intelligence agencies, including the CIA, which believed that the tubes were intended for a nuclear bomb." ... "The disclosure that Bush was informed of the DOE and State dissents is the first evidence that the president himself knew of the sharp debate within the government over the aluminum tubes during the time that he, Cheney, and other members of the Cabinet were citing the tubes as clear evidence of an Iraqi nuclear program. Neither the president nor the vice president told the public about the disagreement among the agencies." -By Murray Waas -NationalJournal
United Arab Emirates - US- Iran - Iraq - Kuwait - Israel - Global- Politics - History - "Emirate Wakes Up Famous. Thank You, America." ... "In the 1980's it [Dubai] built strong relations with Iran by serving as a waypoint to the rest of the world and offering a lifeline during the Iran-Iraq war. In 1991, it became a haven for Kuwaitis who escaped Saddam Hussein's invading armies, then in 2003 it became a haven for Iraqis escaping the second gulf war. And in the years since, Dubai has gradually fashioned itself into a refuge for Iranians, Arabs and others who have eschewed the call to America or the West in exchange for a lifestyle that comes close, but is in keeping with Middle Eastern values." ... "With 85 percent of the population made up of foreigners, many of them second and third generation, the city faces a simmering demographic and identity crisis." ... "Dubai is likely to confront numerous other questions as a 45-day investigation of its [United States] port management program gets under way, possibly illuminating the emirate's struggles with money laundering and other illicit activities. A spotty human rights record regarding foreign workers could also be a sticking point, along with its participation in a continuing Arab boycott of trade with Israel." -By Hassan M. Fattah with contributions by Mohammed Fadel Fahmy -NYTimes

20060301

Iraq - "Iraq Political Leaders Agree to Seek PM: Key Iraqi Political Leaders Agree to Seek New PM in Bid to Jump-Start Stalled Talks on Government." ... "Key political groups agreed Wednesday to mount a campaign to deny Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari another term in a bid to jump-start stalled talks on a new national unity government, as at least 47 people died in bombings and shootings across the country." ... "The move against al-Jaafari, which has been building for weeks, is spearheaded by three major political blocs that have been in U.S.-backed talks with the Shiite alliance on forming a new government." -By Alexandra Zavis and Qassim Abdul-Zahra with contributions by Bassem Mroue, Sameer N. Yacoub and Steven R. Hurst -AP via -ABCNEWS.com

20060228

Iraq - Religion - Military - US - "Toll in Iraq's Deadly Surge: 1,300: Morgue Count Eclipses Other Tallies Since Shrine Attack." ... "Grisly attacks and other sectarian violence unleashed by last week's bombing of a Shiite Muslim shrine have killed more than 1,300 Iraqis, making the past few days the deadliest of the war outside of major U.S. offensives, according to Baghdad's main morgue. The toll was more than three times higher than the figure previously reported by the U.S. military and the news media." ... "Hundreds of unclaimed dead lay at the morgue at midday Monday -- blood-caked men who had been shot, knifed, garroted or apparently suffocated by the plastic bags still over their heads. Many of the bodies were sprawled with their hands still bound -- and many of them had wound up at the morgue after what their families said was their abduction by the Mahdi Army, the Shiite militia of cleric Moqtada al-Sadr." -By Ellen Knickmeyer and Bassam Sebti-WashingtonPost