iraq

More muscular than the Terminator...
As liberal as Joe McCarthy...
Smarter than the average bear...
Further right than Genghis Khan [is this ok?]...

We present, in association with the Project for Nepotistic American Corruption [please check spelling - Ed.]:

THE HOUSTON MANIFESTO

Item 1
We are committed to democratic norms, procedures and structures. We're also committed to finding out what they are at some point. [Aaronovitch think he knows, but none of us think he knows. I don't even know if he thinks].

Item 2
We just don't understand how the world works. No, really, hear us out. We're proud of it. Trying to understand how the world works is more dangerous than mainlining crack while BASE jumping with a parachute full of moths. There are Bad People. There are Good People. Understand? You can safely leave working out who's who to smart folk like Donald Rumsfeld.

Item 3
People killed by democrats are less dead than people killed by tyrants. You get a better class of distributed entrails too, and the mass graves smell sweeter. Oh, and we hate double standards.

Item 4
Equality should be striven for, and enforced by Edward Woodward in a Jaguar, because he looks cool.

Item 5
Globalisation is good. Arbeit Macht Frei [look, this really won't do - please ring Alistair Campbell for a better line - you'll find him at Number Ten working on the Iran Dossier]

Item 6
We support a one-state solution to the Middle East's problems. That state's historical borders are delineated by Mexico on one side and Canada on the other.

Item 7
We support a two state solution to the Israel-Palestine problem. [Note: this is deprecated by Item 6]

Items 7b-7z
Solutions to the problems of Zimbabwe, Chechnya, Kashmir, Uzbekistan, Belgium etc. [cut for reasons of indifference]

Item 8
Racism is appalling, especially when practiced by people with brown skins, beards and Qu'rans. Now that's the really bad sort of racism, but what do you expect from their sort? Send 'em back now, I always say, guv. Some of them are anti-semitic homophobes who vote for George Galloway and the Trots, you know. Vile medieval-minded Islamist scum. I had that Yusuf Islam in the back of the cab once. Lovely fella. Kept wanting to play The Clash, so I locked the doors and took him straight down to Paddington Green nick.

Item 9
Terrorists, arn'tchasickof'em? Ban all celebrations of Irish independence, US independence [oops, better not, see Item 6], the French Resistance (and throw that old dear who just got her parachute wings into Belmarsh). Better throw in anyone protesting near Parliament, nuclear sites or airbases while you're at it. Oh, and arrest Iyad Allawi for murdering Ba'athists. Cast the net as broad as Charles Clarke's trouser seat and string 'em up, it's the only language I understand.

Item 10
What's mine is yours, what's yours is mine. The precise weight given to each clause in this item will depend on how many tanks we each command.

Item 11
I'll say this for Maggie, she sorted out those lefties and put the Great back into Great Britain.

Item 12
History is highly volatile stuff, which is why it should carefully be written by historians you agree with, otherwise you could be exposed to lethal levels of understanding (see Item 2). Best to leave it to the professionals at Fox News.

Item 13
Nothing should interfere with a man's right to shout 'FIRE' in a crowded theatre, and the Pope smells of wee, and as for the Prophet Mahomed, he...

Lieutenant-General John Vines, who stepped down as commander of ground forces in Iraq at the beginning of this year, said it was essential to reduce the numbers.

“There is an incredible amount of stress and I’m worried about it,” said Vines. He added that soldiers were on their third or fourth tours of duty in Iraq: “The war has been going on nearly as long as the second world war and we’re asking a lot of the forces.”

Vines’s replacement as commander of ground forces is Lieutenant-General Peter Chiarelli, who pioneered the use of force with Sweat to subdue Sadr city, a working-class Shi’ite district of Baghdad, in 2004. On the eve of his return to Iraq this year he described how the tactics had worked and vowed to repeat them.

“It was not uncommon for the 1st Calvary Division to be engaged in intense urban combat in one part of the city, while just a few blocks away we had units replacing damaged infrastructure, helping to foster business growth or facilitating the development of local government,” Chiarelli said.

Residents have taken to carrying two ID cards and ostentatiously religious CDs because of fears of sectarian violence. “If you are stopped at a Shi’ite checkpoint, you have to show you have a Shi’ite name, and if it is a Sunni insurgent checkpoint, it is good to show that your name is Omar,” said a Baghdad resident who had recently obtained a new ID.

Dahr Jamail and Jeremy Scahill LIVE from Sacramento

Dahr Jamail and Jeremy Scahill in a gripping lecture that they gave together in Sacramento, CA on March 14, 2006. Some of the highlights include Dahr Jamail's concise and damning account of US war crimes in Iraq, and Jeremy's ferocious and precise detailing of the deadly war that the US is waging today on journalism in Iraq.

This is by far the best lecture video yet hosted on the DahrJamailIraq website.

The mission of MNF-I is, in partnership with the Iraqi Government, to conduct operations against former regime extremists and foreign terrorists, and to organise, train, and equip Iraqi security forces

the use of any method or technique for doing anything else that is capable of being done for the purposes of terrorism, in connection with the commission or preparation of an act of terrorism or Convention offence or in connection with assisting the commission or preparation by another of such an act or offence.

...There is a horrifying Shakespearean symmetry about how it all began.

Two spoiled directionless sons of oil millionaires, Bush and Bin Laden, both motivated by religious fundementalism and a longing for power. Two idealogies, both of which sees human lives as disposable collateral damage to be sacrificed in the 'war' to win. Two 'shock and awe' spectaculars - 9/11 and Iraq. Two sides of the same coin, feeding the fire.

It does not have to be this way. Our leaders are suppposed to be accountable to us. Unless we hand over all our power and allow them to bully and frighten us, tag us and watch us and scare us into submission. But until that day, when our leaders are running mad, when they are in denial or lying, it is our responsibility to challenge them and bring them to account.

I don't see what else to do. Too many lives are at risk and this policy, this stupid 'War on Terror' is not working. It is making things worse. Much worse.

Please, do what you can. Engage. Debate. Protest. Care. We condemn ourselves to a bloody and unstable future if we do not make them reconsider now, and change their behaviour, admit their mistakes. The first step is official recognition of the links between the invasion of Iraq, and attacks on the U.K , including July 7th. Wilful refusal to accept this clear connection is not acceptable. Lying is not acceptable. Excuses are not acceptable. This disconnect between what we know and what the Government has denied until now, must end. Every day in Iraq is July 7th now. And July 7th will happen here, again, and again, and again, until this madness ends...

Straw: I think we both recognize and people around the world recognize that without the remarkable spiritual guidance shown by His Eminence, the Grand Ayatollah Sistani, this country, for all the problems that it now faces, would not have in its hands the potential of a very much better future. And we salute the guidance and the restraint that Grand Ayatollah Sistani has been able to bring to his people, the majority community.

Rice: And let me very much underline what Secretary Straw has said. The leadership of the Grand Ayatollah Sistani in this regard, someone who, as I said the other day, we all admire for his wisdom and his courage and his leadership, has been an anchor for that community but also for all Iraqis who want to have a peaceful, and democratic, and unified future.

QUESTION (Via interpreter): Don't you think that this an interference in the Iraqi affair in determining its fate, then especially that Iraq is supposed to be sovereign and this is against the principles of democracy?

RICE: Okay. The question was whether or not this is interference in Iraqi affairs. Iraq is sovereign. And is it also -- is it democratic to do this, I guess, is the way to put it.

First of all, we've been very clear that Iraq is indeed sovereign. That is indeed what we fought and which -- for what our people died. So let's be very clear that there are Americans and Brits and others who gave their lives so that Iraq could be liberated from a tyrant and Iraq could be sovereign. The transfer of sovereignty took place almost two years ago now and we have done nothing as an international community and as a coalition force but support the process by which the will of the Iraqi people will be made evident...

... Again, it is not our job to determine who will do that. But as the Secretary said yesterday, we should not say and will not say who the prime minister of Iraq should be, who the president of Iraq should be, who the speaker should be. But that there must be -- and soon -- responsible leaders in those positions is something that I think the international community has a right to expect.

STRAW: And could I just underline, look, we've made it clear from the very start, which is our duty towards a sovereign state, that we will recognize anybody who emerges democratically as the prime minister and vice president, president, and other leaders, whether it's Mr. A, Mr. B, Mr. C. But please, the Americans have lost over 2,000 people. We've lost over 100. There are 140,000 overseas troops here, helping to keep the peace in Iraq and billions -- billions -- of United States dollars, hundreds of millions of British pound sterlings have come into this country. We do have, I think, a right to say that we've got to be able to deal with Mr. A or Mr. B or Mr. C. We can't deal with Mr. Nobody. And that's a problem, okay.

Condoleezza Rice came to Liverpool

It was an honour to see a part of the Great Game come to my neighbourhood close enough to get out in the street and shout at. We had two weeks notice of this return visit by the Secretary of State after she had shown our foreign secretary, Jack Straw, around her home town of Birmingham, Alabama last year.

Liverpool and the Northwest of Britain is not Jack's home. He grew up in Essex and has his real home down in the South of England. He only holds a Parliamentary seat near here, in Blackburn. It is the rule, not an exception, in this dysfunctional state that the elected representatives in most regions to come from the same tight clique of the great and the good.

I got to the protest outside the town council meeting on 15th of March. Becka and Martin held a poster which said: "Condi Rice not welcome here. (Try the Hague)", in reference to the place where war criminals are supposed to held for trial.

We were there for about an hour as all the councillors went in, including the leader of the minority labour block, Joe Anderson. He stopped to have a word with us. He said he was against the Iraq war, but not against welcoming Condi Rice's visit, because -- like the Liberal Democratic leader Charles Kennedy on Bush's triumphant visit to London in November 2003 when 400,000 people took to the streets to block his victory parade -- he believes that dialog is more important than a public message that such people have no business walking free in a civilized society. Apparently, protocol requires that you do not to bring up politics when you meet an an international statesman if you are a mere local representative. Your body is required just for the photographs...

Jack Straw - I believe what I said at the time...

"I have been very impressed by the professionalism and restraint shown by the Iraqi security forces in their handling of recent terrorist activities.

"The improving operational effectiveness of the Iraqi security forces will help to give Iraq what the vast majority of the Iraqi people want - a stable and secure future for their country."

Our Prime Minister, Tony Blair, has refused to meet the families of those killed in Iraq. He has not visited the many hundreds of soldiers wounded in his war nor attended any of the funerals of those killed.
Most professional service men and women accept that death and injury are risks of their job. That means they put their trust in the hands of their Government to act with integrity and to be honest regarding the facts as to why they must go.
It is now clear that Tony Blair lied to the British people and its parliament. Together with George Bush he decided on war with Iraq when it was plain there were no weapons of mass destruction in that country. This was an illegal war based on lies.

We are demanding a meeting with Tony Blair because we need an accounting for the reasons we were taken to war and the reasons why we have suffered so much. Iraq posed us no military threat. We are calling for the troops to be withdrawn.

On Wednesday April 26 we are organising a lobby of MPs in parliament. Following the lobby we will be laying a wreath at the cenotaph and delivering a petition to Downing Street. We are calling on other families and servicemen and women to join us to make it clear to Tony Blair that he cannot continue to ignore us.
Please circulate this call as widely as possible.

Peter Brierley
Rose Gentle
Pauline Hickey
Reg Keys
Susan Smith
Download this letter [Adobe Acrobat PDF 352KB]

Bombing them into submission? When was the last US bomb dropped in Iraq, I forget, was it 2003?

BAGHDAD, Iraq - American forces have dramatically increased airstrikes in Iraq during the past five months, a change of tactics that may foreshadow how the United States plans to battle a still-strong insurgency while reducing the number of U.S. ground troops serving here.

A review of military data shows that daily bombing runs and jet-missile launches have increased by more than 50 percent in the past five months, compared with the same period last year. Knight Ridder's statistical findings were reviewed and confirmed by American Air Force officials in the region.

The numbers also show that U.S. forces dropped bombs on more cities during the last five months than they did during the same period a year ago. Air strikes a year ago struck at least nine cities, but were mostly concentrated in and around the western city of Fallujah. This year, U.S. warplanes have struck at least 18 cities.

When were you last in Baghdad?

In a speech in which Mr Reid sought to “set out in specific terms” his views on when UK forces could leave, the defence secretary said Iraq was likely to be still rife with violence and suffering from widespread shortages even when British troops departed.

“The point at which Iraqis are fully in control of their nation again will not be the point when attacks cease, when infrastructure is without fault, when there is nothing left to do,”

... there had to be a “manageable level of threat” from insurgents, rather than their complete elimination. He added that Iraqi forces needed to be “more able” to deal with the threat themselves, but fell short of saying how much more able. “Our key task is not, as some claim, to defeat the insurgency ranged against Iraq,” Mr Reid said. “It is to ensure that Iraqis have the ability to do that.”