Iraq PM: We Can Manage Without U.S.
What should we do now that the Prime Minster does not think he needs the troops and blames America for being the problem? Do you think Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki wants us out so he can dominate the Sunni and not split the oil revenue?
AP-AJC
— Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki shrugged off U.S. doubts of his government’s military and political progress on Saturday, saying Iraqi forces are capable and American troops can leave “any time they want.”
….”We say in full confidence that we are able, God willing, to take the responsibility completely in running the security file if the international forces withdraw at any time they want,” he said
One of al-Maliki’s close advisers, Shiite lawmaker Hassan al-Suneid, bristled over the American pressure, telling The Associated Press that “the situation looks as if it is an experiment in an American laboratory (judging) whether we succeed or fail.”
He sharply criticized the U.S. military, saying it was committing human rights violations and embarrassing the Iraqi government through such tactics as building a wall around Baghdad’s Sunni neighborhood of Azamiyah and launching repeated raids on suspected Shiite militiamen in the capital’s slum of Sadr City.
He also criticized U.S. overtures to Sunni groups in Anbar and Diyala provinces, encouraging former insurgents to join the fight against al-Qaida in Iraq. “These are gangs of killers,” he said.
In addition, he said that al-Maliki has problems with the top U.S. commander, Gen. David Petraeus, who he said works along a “purely American vision.”
“There are disagreements that the strategy that Petraeus is following might succeed in confronting al-Qaida in the early period but it will leave Iraq an armed nation, an armed society and militias,” al-Suneid said.
The sooner, the better.
I don’t think we should just ignore the Kurdish threat.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Awtgc2RMtV8&NR=1
http://youtube.com/watch?v=pWV2X7II7IU
Bill,
I say pull out all the stops, total WAR!
Send in MacDonalds and Burger King!
MD
SUPERSIZE THOSE STINKBAGS!!!
FYI
As Loved Ones Fight On, War Doubts Arise
FORT EUSTIS, Va., July 11 — Cpl. April Ponce De Leon describes herself and her husband as “gung-ho marines,” and in two weeks she deploys to Iraq, where her husband has been fighting since March.
But she says she stopped believing in the war last month after a telephone conversation with him.
“He started telling me that he doesn’t want me to go and do the things he has been doing,” said Corporal Ponce De Leon, 22, speaking by telephone as she boxed up her belongings in their apartment near Camp Lejeune, N.C.
“He said that ‘we have all decided that it’s time for us to go home.’ I said, ‘You mean go home and rest?’ And he said, ‘I mean go home and not go back.’
“This is from someone who has been training for the past nine years to go to combat and who has spent his whole life wanting to be a marine,” she continued. “That’s when I realized I couldn’t support the war anymore, even though I will follow my orders.”
In voicing her shifting view on the war in Iraq, Corporal Ponce De Leon is not alone. In the past few weeks, President Bush has faced defections within his own party over his handling of the war by Republicans who have cited a growing weariness among military families as having played a central role in changing their opinions. At a news conference last week, Senator Pete V. Domenici, Republican of New Mexico, who had been a staunch supporter of the president’s handling of the war, said he had sensed a shift among some military families. He recounted how a father he spoke to recently said his son was proud to serve.
“But then this man said, ‘I’m asking you if you couldn’t do a little extra to get our troops back,’ ” Mr. Domenici said, recalling the conversation. “I heard nothing like that a couple years ago.”
Experts cite three causes of eroding morale among military families: longer and multiple deployments, the continued chaos in Baghdad, and the growing death toll — April, May and June were the deadliest three months for American troops since the invasion of Iraq in March 2003.
Among military members and their immediate families who responded to a national New York Times/CBS News poll in May, two-thirds said things were going badly, compared with just over half, about 53 percent, a year ago. Fewer than half of the families and military members said the United States did the right thing in invading Iraq. A year ago more than half held that view, according to the a similar poll taken last July. The May poll had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 7 percentage points.
Recruiting efforts are also suffering. Despite granting more waivers for recruits with criminal backgrounds, offering larger cash bonuses, loosening age and weight restrictions, and accepting more high school dropouts, the Army said it had missed its recruiting targets in May and June. Pentagon officials say resistance from families is a major recruiting obstacle. Membership is also increasing among antiwar groups that represent the active military and veterans. Military Families Speak Out, one such group, which was started in the fall of 2002, now has about 3,500 member families. About 500 of them have joined since January.
Nancy Lessin, a founder of the group, said it was noteworthy that about a hundred military wives living on bases had joined in the last three months. Wives living on bases, she said, are more reluctant than parents of soldiers to speak out.
For Beth Pyritz, 27, who recently joined the group, the turning point came last month when her husband, an Army specialist, left for Iraq for his third deployment.
“I voted for Bush twice,” said Ms. Pyritz, seated with her five children in their home at Fort Eustis near Virginia Beach. “I backed this war from the beginning, but I don’t think I can look my kids in the eyes anymore, if my husband comes home in a wooden box, and tell them he died for a good reason.”
She said her views began changing late last year as the administration seemed slow to release information about the chaos unfolding in Baghdad and crystallized when military deployments were extended to 15 months from 12 months.
Paul Jones, 51, a social worker who for three years has been counseling members of the National Guard and Army Reserve, said he had seen a growing number of troops who were angry and on edge, which is fueling dissent within military families.
“The soldiers have come home from a war zone with a whole different perception of how things are,” said Mr. Jones, 51, who did not want to divulge the base where he works to protect the soldiers’ confidentiality.
MD,
When I was patrolling the streets of Baghdad, one of my friends made a very astute observation that is very much in-line with your thinking: put a Starbucks and a McD’s on every other street corner and our work would be done.