Key benchmark in Iraq achieved today!

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If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
Irvine511 said:
and ask yourself this: would the American public have supported a full scale invasion of Iraq if the Bush administration would have been as honest as you are and said that they are going into Iraq in order to secure the oil?

They were honest though, you just have to read between the lines. Defending freedom, defending "the American Way of Life(c)" - those things run on oil buddy. To their credit, groups like PNAC/Heritage etc have always been pretty open an honest about seeing no issue with fighting wars for resources in the 21st Century, or the understanding that it would be a very tough sell.
 
Strongbow said:


Bush and company went to the UN to get a resolution (1441) which was actually unnecessary because prior resolutions had already given authorization for subsequent military action needed to enforce the resolutions. Colin Powell was the one who pushed going back to the United Nations for another resolution authorizing military action and he succeeded in getting it. The United Nations then authorized the occupation starting in the summer of 2003 with resolution 1483 and the United Nations has continue to approve of the occupation every summer since then despite the calls by many to essentially abandon the Iraq.



it is up to the UN Security Council to enforce it's resolutions, it is not up to the United States to enforce Security Council resolutions. it was the US government, not the UN, that announced that "diplomacy has failed" and then started a war. for a resolution to pass, one needs 9 out of 15 votes. and many refer to 1441 as the "second" resolution, not the 18th, and Kofi Annan stated on 9/16/04 stated that the occupation was illegal. it was retroactively legalized, but that does not in any way mean that it was legal at the time.

what else was the UN to do in 2003 post occupation but deal with the reality and retroactively legalize the illegal occupation?

you bring up a good point about the interdependence of the global economy. after all, it was only because of economic ties with and pressure applied by the US that won the "support" of countries like Costa Rica and mighty Poland. your coalition is more accurately called the "coalition of the coerced" as most were won over by coercion, bullying, and bribery.

so, ask yourself this: if it is so thuddingly obvious and such a moral imperative to overthrow Saddam and secure the oil, why then did the US have to resort to such underhanded tactics, including secre surveillance done by the NSA, to secure any support at all?
 
Irvine511 said:
:shrug:

i mean, really, what's the point?

:shrug:

There really isn't a point. It is not like we are going to change the minds of these people. I say, those who still support the war and still support going in are not stupid, they definitely know whats going on, they are just stubborn, arrogant, radical American fundamentalists.
 
Earnie Shavers said:


You mean Colin Powell, the British, the Australians and the Spanish. It's easier to limit it to "those who didn't give a f*ck about the UN and felt they didn't need their approval" ie Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz etc.... than try and isolate those who did as some tiny minority. It was the other way around. Tony Blair had his people working on a resignation speech and a timing and working for a smooth handover in the weeks leading into the war. The Spanish govt were pretty sure they wouldn't make it through either. Those governments certainly felt 1441 was VERY necessary. The belief that they were standing on very shady legal ground otherwise, the belief that their plan of containment and influence over the US would look to have completely failed otherwise, and that public 'support' for the war was running at easily 90%+ against in all three major ally countries meant that they didn't think they could get away with it without a very, very clear resolution behind them, rather than some washy 'consequences' resolution.

If you look at the resolution (678) which authorized the 1991 Gulf War, it is not any more specific about the use of "military force" than resolution 1441 in 2002. In fact, in 1990 the United States had the words "military force" in the resolution and the Soviet Union demanded that the words be taken out before they would vote for it so the United States had those words taken out. So there is no reason to be jumping up and down because 1441 is just as clear about he use of military force as 678 was about the use of military force in 1990. If you think that 1441 did not authorize military force, then you can't be saying that 678 in 1990 did either.

The alleged domestic fears of various governments and countries and that governments would fall is not to much different from 1990 when Democrats were predicting that more than half of the governments in the middle east would fall do to revolution by the populations which were said to be heavily against the US led war to retake Kuwait.
 
Irvine511 said:




:shrug:

you obviously think a few hundred thousand deaths and the establishment of a permanent American presence in the middle of the most volatile region of the world for the next 50-100 years is clearly preferable to the diversification of our oil portfolio and to the development of alternative forms of energy.

it's funny to call oil a "vital natural resource." i suppose it is if you want it to be, and if you're beholden to Exxon and Mobil.

just come out and say it: it's about oil, stupid.

don't dress it up. don't fabricate dangers. don't pretend like you actually care about iraqis. you just care about securing the oil and you think it's perfectly fine to go to war and slaughter thousands in order to secure natural resources as they did in the 19th century.

all i'm asking for is honesty (something you still can't provide when talking about either 1441 or pretty much everything else).

and ask yourself this: would the American public have supported a full scale invasion of Iraq if the Bush administration would have been as honest as you are and said that they are going into Iraq in order to secure the oil?

if you had been honest, would you have had the political capital to marshall support for an invasion? or do you agree with Bush -- a dictatorship would be a heckuva lot easier?


First, a few hundred thousand people have NOT died in Iraq from the US invasion, although well over a few hundred thousand people did die during Saddam's rule of Iraq.

Once again, protecting the energy reserves, in the Persian Gulf(oil and natural gas) is not something the United States does in lieu of diversifying its oil portfolio and the development of alternative forms of energy. Its a basic fact that the planet is currently dependent upon the Persian Gulf for this energy. The economy depends on it. The global economy has to continue to properly function in order for countries around the world to be able to have the funds to invest in finding alternative forms of energy that would be cheaper and more efficient than oil. Its also vital to foreign aid budgets of countries around the world that would quickly dry up if the global economy was thrown into a depression through the siezure or sabotage of Persian Gulf oil supply.

If you value finding an alternative form of energy, stopping aids in Africa, aiding poor nations, supporting your family, then you should be in support of maintaining the current global economic environment which at the current time is dependent on Persian Gulf oil. You can't abandon the resources that currently sustain you while you look for an alternative. That would be foolish and actually puts at risk your chances of finding an alternative. This is not the 19th century when the global economy was not interdependent and energy was not a requirement for economic survival, at least not in the way that it is today.

The American public supported the 1991 Gulf War because they understood the threat to US and global energy supply from Saddam. They supported the continued US presence in the Persian Gulf after 1991 as well as the invasion and overthrow of Saddam in 2003 essentially because of these facts. Most people understood why it was important to insure that Saddam was disarmed of all WMD and why it was important to defend the Persian Gulf from Saddam given recent history.

American jobs, America's standard of living, America's society is dependent on relatively stable energy prices. A global economic depression, worse than the 1930s, caused by the sudden loss of Persian Gulf oil would essentially destroy the country as we know it. Every President since World War II has understood how vital Persian Gulf oil is to the economy. Jimmy Carter stated he was ready to use Nuclear Weapons to defend the Persian Gulf and that was 30 years ago when the United States and the world were not as dependent on Persian Gulf oil as they are today. Defending Persian Gulf Oil supply has been a central part of US military strategy for nearly 60 years now. Anyone who has been in the White House has understood this. The Clintons both supported operation Iraqi Freedom despite occasional revisionism that we see from time to time by both of them.
 
Irvine511 said:




it is up to the UN Security Council to enforce it's resolutions, it is not up to the United States to enforce Security Council resolutions. it was the US government, not the UN, that announced that "diplomacy has failed" and then started a war. for a resolution to pass, one needs 9 out of 15 votes. and many refer to 1441 as the "second" resolution, not the 18th, and Kofi Annan stated on 9/16/04 stated that the occupation was illegal. it was retroactively legalized, but that does not in any way mean that it was legal at the time.

what else was the UN to do in 2003 post occupation but deal with the reality and retroactively legalize the illegal occupation?

you bring up a good point about the interdependence of the global economy. after all, it was only because of economic ties with and pressure applied by the US that won the "support" of countries like Costa Rica and mighty Poland. your coalition is more accurately called the "coalition of the coerced" as most were won over by coercion, bullying, and bribery.

so, ask yourself this: if it is so thuddingly obvious and such a moral imperative to overthrow Saddam and secure the oil, why then did the US have to resort to such underhanded tactics, including secre surveillance done by the NSA, to secure any support at all?

The UN security council did authorize the war through the passing of resolution 1441 which I might add was passed 15-0. The vote on resolution 678 for the 1991 Gulf War passed but did have some opposition. What Kofi Annan thinks is his opinion and essentially irrelevent since he does not have a vote in the security council. From a legal standpoint, the United Nations would never authorize an occupation brought about through illegal means. When the United Nations sees an operation that it finds illegal, it passes a resolution stating that fact, or at least makes an attempt at one. The United Nations NEVER did this in regards to the invasion of Iraq. Instead it approved of the occupation which makes sense because it just months earlier approved and invasion that would lead to such an occupation.

The whole idea of a "coalition of the coerced" was brought up in 1990-1991 along with terms like "blood for oil" and other attempts to discredit the coalition and the UN authorization to go to war, nearly all of which came from the US Democratic party which overwhelmingly opposed the US and coalition military action to remove Saddam's military from Kuwait. In 1990, the United States forgave nearly 10 Billion dollars of debt that Egypt owed it, and passed around plenty of favors in order to secure the support of many nations back in 1990. If your going to attack the necessity and legitamacy of the war with this line of thinking, your going to have to do it to nearly every coalition the US has built and nearly every war it has been involved in.
 
1991 ≠ 2003. Using the first Gulf War and people's opposition to it as some sort of justification or rebuttal to their opposition to the current Gulf War does not work.

And this line?

If your going to attack the necessity and legitamacy of the war with this line of thinking, your going to have to do it to nearly every coalition the US has built and nearly every war it has been involved in.

Would you mind expanding on that logic, please?
 
Diemen said:
1991 ≠ 2003. Using the first Gulf War and people's opposition to it as some sort of justification or rebuttal to their opposition to the current Gulf War does not work.

And this line?



Would you mind expanding on that logic, please?

Simply pointing out the same lines, phrases, and reasoning that went into the opposition to the first Gulf War and has been seen again in the second Gulf War is informative and does shed some light on the general ideas and thoughts of the opposition who in many cases are the same crowd as the one in 1991.

The line you question was in reference to the idea that somehow the US effort could be regarded as illegitimate because certain countries were "bribed" or "coerced" into siding with the United States, when in fact these things are typical of coalition building for any war that the United States has fought in. The United States did what ever it could to bring countries into the coalition it formed in 1990-1991, just as it did in 2003.
 
Iraq's largest province and the prior base of the Sunni insurgency with the towns of Fallujah and Ramadi has been pacified to such a degree that the Iraqi military will take over security for it this spring. When it does, it will bring the number of Iraqi provinces where all the security is provided by the Iraqi military and security services to 10 out of the 18. This hand over is very significant given it was the one time base of the Sunni insurgency and where Al Quada had its deepest inroads into Iraq. Another coalition victory for liberals and Democrats to either attempt to explain away or ignore all together.



US sets timetable to hand over Iraq's largest province

by Ben Sheppard
Tue Jan 15, 5:40 AM ET



RAMADI, Iraq (AFP) - The US military will hand over to Iraqi control the huge province of Anbar within three months, a senior officer said, reflecting a sharp turnaround for a region once a hotbed of insurgency.

Colonel John Charlton, the top US officer in the provincial capital Ramadi, about 100 kilometres (60 miles) west of Baghdad, told AFP that Anbar would be officially returned to Iraqi authorities in March or April.

The plan would mean local rule for both Ramadi and Fallujah, Anbar's major cities which were reduced to ruins in battles between US forces and an alliance of tribes, nationalists, Saddam Hussein loyalists and Al-Qaeda fighters.

Security has been transformed in the western province over the past year after Sunni tribal leaders turned against Al-Qaeda and switched loyalty to the US military, their former enemy.

The tribal "Awakening" groups also backed the rapidly-expanding Iraqi police, which now monitors movement into and within the province through a dense web of checkpoints.

Ramadi alone now has 5,100 Iraqi soldiers, 8,100 district police and 1,700 other official security personnel, according to the US military.

"There is going to be a big level of handover," Charlton said at the US base west of the city on Sunday.

"Provincial Iraqi control means just that: Iraqis will be in charge of all aspects of the province from security to governance, and our role becomes purely advisory at that point," he said.

"We are not going to do the handover all at once. This has been a process that has started months ago and each day we take a step closer towards that, and then it becomes official in March or April."

Charlton said Iraqi soldiers and police were already in charge of most of the province's security, and US-led coalition troops now made virtually no arrests.

Coalition troops would be ready to step in at any time should Iraqi commanders ask for assistance.

"The only time we would not agree to something is if it puts coalition lives at risk. Otherwise it is up to them, and they are already making the decisions to a large degree," he said.

Charlton said he expected a grand handover ceremony similar to the one held when Iraq formally took security control of the southern oil province of Basra from British forces in December.

If the Anbar handover takes place in March, it would coincide with the fifth anniversary of the US-led invasion of Iraq.

Sunni-dominated Anbar province was the centre of the fierce resistance against the presence of US forces in Iraq after the 2003 invasion.

In 2004, Fallujah was the scene of battle between US troops and insurgents during which residents fled and two-thirds of the city was destroyed.

Under Saddam Hussein's regime, Anbar had provided many of the officers in the Iraqi army and Al-Qaeda in 2006 declared Ramadi the capital of its so-called "Islamic State of Iraq."

But, over the past year, attacks in Ramadi have dropped from 25-30 every day to less than one a week.

The number of roadside bombs has declined by 90 percent, according to latest US military figures, with the efforts of the Anbar Awakening being mainly credited for the turnaround.

"This will be a huge step forward," said Charlton. "Anbar being the largest province will make the handover pretty noteworthy -- especially given it was one of the worst areas in Iraq, and was an Al-Qaeda stronghold for years."

If Anbar is handed over on schedule, it will be the 10th of Iraq's 18 provinces to be returned to local control by the coalition.

Sheikh Ahmed Abu Reesha, leader of the "Anbar Awakening", warned at the weekend that a rapid US withdrawal from Iraq would spark a return of savage sectarian violence because the Iraqi army was not capable of ensuring peace.
 
Strongbow said:


Simply pointing out the same lines, phrases, and reasoning that went into the opposition to the first Gulf War and has been seen again in the second Gulf War is informative and does shed some light on the general ideas and thoughts of the opposition who in many cases are the same crowd as the one in 1991.

Exactly what light does it shed? Please, enlighten us, Sting.

As I see it, it sheds little to no light. Some of the same people who opposed the 1991 War oppose this war. That is true. If the '91 war and the current one were very much the same kind of war, then you might have something. But they are very much not the same kind of war (other than trying to protect our oil). They were not entered into under similar circumstances, they did not have the same level of support, their missions were not the same, they were not sold the same way, etc, etc.

The line you question was in reference to the idea that somehow the US effort could be regarded as illegitimate because certain countries were "bribed" or "coerced" into siding with the United States, when in fact these things are typical of coalition building for any war that the United States has fought in. The United States did what ever it could to bring countries into the coalition it formed in 1990-1991, just as it did in 2003.

So we're just continuing in the fine line of bribing and coercing then? Well then everything must be fine!

Except you'll notice that this time around we had a much harder time gaining the same size and strength of a coalition as we did in previous engagements.
 
Diemen said:


Exactly what light does it shed? Please, enlighten us, Sting.

As I see it, it sheds little to no light. Some of the same people who opposed the 1991 War oppose this war. That is true. If the '91 war and the current one were very much the same kind of war, then you might have something. But they are very much not the same kind of war (other than trying to protect our oil). They were not entered into under similar circumstances, they did not have the same level of support, their missions were not the same, they were not sold the same way, etc, etc.



So we're just continuing in the fine line of bribing and coercing then? Well then everything must be fine!

Except you'll notice that this time around we had a much harder time gaining the same size and strength of a coalition as we did in previous engagements.

It shows that much of the opposition is blindly opposing both conflicts without actually studying the reasons behind them as well as attempting to understand the reasons behind decades old US military strategy supported by both Democratic and Republican Presidents. In fact, the opposition in the United States in 1990 to the first Gulf War was much higher than it was for the 2nd Gulf War, epecially when you look at how Congress voted. The congressional resolution authorizing the first Gulf War passed by a couple of votes while the one authorizing the 2003 war passed in a landslide.

Both wars were entered into under the authorization of the United Nations in order to enforce UN Security Council resolutions vital to the security of the region especially countries like Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. In fact, you could argue that the wars are in fact the same war since Saddam never fully fullfilled the demands of the 1991 Gulf War Ceacefire agreement and was often in violation of the agreement. The level of support in terms of non-US troops on the ground as a percentage of the effort was very similar. The United States made up 75% of the force in 1991 and 85% of the force in 2003. The missions were very similar as well since the resolutions and requirements against Saddam passed prior to the 1991 war were also involved in the need for military action in 2003. Resolutions like 678 passed before the first Gulf War and the resolution that authorized the first Gulf War were affirmed in the body of resolution 1441 and had language that authorized the use of subsequent military action if Saddam violated any of the resolutions passed then or later as long as they were passed under Chapter VII rules. George Bush Sr. did bring up Iraq's WMD arsonal and the threat that Saddam could develop a nuclear weapon in the "selling" of the first Gulf War.

Notice I put the words bribing and coercing in quotation marks because I do not regard it as that.
 
Strongbow said:


It shows that much of the opposition is blindly opposing both conflicts without actually studying the reasons behind them as well as attempting to understand the reasons behind decades old US military strategy supported by both Democratic and Republican Presidents.



yes, all opposition to the war is blind. is that what you've taken from here? that everybody but you is blind? and you wonder why people get frustrated with you. its quite obvious who the willfully blind person is in this room, and i'll give you a hint -- it isn't Diemen. you'd get so much further if you wouldn't paint your opposition (ie, everyone) in such broad strokes without any nuance. but, i suppose that's to be expected -- the world you describe has no nuance, has no complexity, and most importantly, has no doubt. you're the ONLY one who gets it. it's true. it must be so lonely.

everyone in here knows the emperor has no clothes, but continue to admire the fine embroidery and french cuffs that ties together your silk shirt so fetchingly.
 
Irvine511 said:




yes, all opposition to the war is blind. is that what you've taken from here? that everybody but you is blind? and you wonder why people get frustrated with you. its quite obvious who the willfully blind person is in this room, and i'll give you a hint -- it isn't Diemen. you'd get so much further if you wouldn't paint your opposition (ie, everyone) in such broad strokes without any nuance. but, i suppose that's to be expected -- the world you describe has no nuance, has no complexity, and most importantly, has no doubt. you're the ONLY one who gets it. it's true. it must be so lonely.

everyone in here knows the emperor has no clothes, but continue to admire the fine embroidery and french cuffs that ties together your silk shirt so fetchingly.


I never said that all opposition to the war is blind. Again, I suggest that you stick to the ISSUES being discussed rather than these bizarre attempts to analyze posters in FYM.
 
Strongbow said:



I never said that all opposition to the war is blind. Again, I suggest that you stick to the ISSUES being discussed rather than these bizarre attempts to analyze posters in FYM.



:shrug:

when i discuss the issues, i hit a brick wall. when i analyze the issues, i hit the same brick wall. when we shift and talk about new developments, it's that same brick wall again. the same one that's been there since 2004. the one that doesn't change, the one that doesn't respond to questions and objections but merely blares back into the bullhorn the same sentences that prompted the initial questions and objections. the manner in which something is presented is as relevant as that which is presented, form matters, especially in a *debate* forum, and respect for other posters -- which comes in many forms -- matters as well.

your dismissive, condescending manner -- noted by *many* here -- hasn't won you a single voice of support, it drags down a thread, and most don't even bother to respond to you. perhaps i should do the same.
 
Irvine511 said:




:shrug:

when i discuss the issues, i hit a brick wall. when i analyze the issues, i hit the same brick wall. when we shift and talk about new developments, it's that same brick wall again. the same one that's been there since 2004. the one that doesn't change, the one that doesn't respond to questions and objections but merely blares back into the bullhorn the same sentences that prompted the initial questions and objections. the manner in which something is presented is as relevant as that which is presented, form matters, especially in a *debate* forum, and respect for other posters -- which comes in many forms -- matters as well.

your dismissive, condescending manner -- noted by *many* here -- hasn't won you a single voice of support, it drags down a thread, and most don't even bother to respond to you. perhaps i should do the same.

What really drags down a thread is this type of crap. Does this have anything remotely to do with Iraq? nope Find a topic or an issue your interested in, post your opinion, and move on. Its what the vast majority of people here are able to do.
 
i'll take your word for it, chief, because if there's anyone people love to discuss an issue with -- especially Iraq! -- it's you! :up:
 
Strongbow said:
What really drags down a thread is this type of crap. Does this have anything remotely to do with Iraq? nope Find a topic or an issue your interested in, post your opinion, and move on. Its what the vast majority of people here are able to do.

But is anything Irvine said there incorrect? I've only seen you posting for a small amount of time, but your absolute refusal to recognize any portion of anyone's argument aside from your own has been quite alienating.

It's perfectly fine to have a reasonable argument for reasons why Iraq wasn't illegal or is successful, but in your posts you brush away any other viewpoints as people "not understanding" or "Democrats hellbent on spinning it into a failure." That "crap" is what drives threads straight into your brick wall more than anything. Instead of replying with your original post worded differently, maybe you should address the points made by the replying poster.

I don't think what Irvine is saying is unreasonable.
 
phillyfan26 said:


But is anything Irvine said there incorrect? I've only seen you posting for a small amount of time, but your absolute refusal to recognize any portion of anyone's argument aside from your own has been quite alienating.

It's perfectly fine to have a reasonable argument for reasons why Iraq wasn't illegal or is successful, but in your posts you brush away any other viewpoints as people "not understanding" or "Democrats hellbent on spinning it into a failure." That "crap" is what drives threads straight into your brick wall more than anything. Instead of replying with your original post worded differently, maybe you should address the points made by the replying poster.

I don't think what Irvine is saying is unreasonable.

Look at the topic of the thread and look at what your discussing. If there is really a problem that needs to be addressed, a moderator will take care of it.
 
That's a cop-out and you know it. And you'll most certainly reply with some quote from the rules or something, but you know you're dancing around Irvine's point.

Strongbow said:
It shows that much of the opposition is blindly opposing both conflicts without actually studying the reasons behind them as well as attempting to understand the reasons behind decades old US military strategy supported by both Democratic and Republican Presidents.
Strongbow said:
I never said that all opposition to the war is blind.
Diemen said:
Do you think there are any legimate positions of opposition to this war, Sting?

I would, however, ask you to answer Diemen's question here, which I think is legitimate. I would be interested to hear your response.
 
erm, yeah, is this what's known as "the catch"?



[q]Iraq's New Law on Ex-Baathists Could Bring Another Purge

By Amit R. Paley and Joshua Partlow
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, January 23, 2008; A01

BAGHDAD -- Maj. Gen. Hussein al-Awadi, a former official in Saddam Hussein's Baath Party, became the commander of the Iraqi National Police despite a 2003 law barring the party from government.

But now, under new legislation promoted as way to return former Baathists to public life, the 56-year-old and thousands like him could be forced out of jobs they have been allowed to hold, according to Iraqi lawmakers and the government agency that oversees ex-Baathists.

"This new law is very confusing," Awadi said. "I don't really know what it means for me."

He is not alone. More than a dozen Iraqi lawmakers, U.S. officials and former Baathists here and in exile expressed concern in interviews that the law could set off a new purge of ex-Baathists, the opposite of U.S. hopes for the legislation.

Approved by parliament this month under pressure from U.S. officials, the law was heralded by President Bush and Iraqi leaders as a way to soothe the deep anger of many ex-Baathists -- primarily Sunnis but also many Shiites such as Awadi -- toward the Shiite-led government.

Yet U.S. officials and even legislators who voted for the measure, which still requires approval by Iraq's presidency council, acknowledge that its impact is hard to assess from its text and will depend on how it is implemented. Some say the law's primary aim is not to return ex-Baathists to work, but to recognize and compensate those harmed by the party. Of the law's eight stated justifications, none mentions reinstating ex-Baathists to their jobs.

"The law is about as clear as mud," said one U.S. senior diplomat.

The confusion has been compounded because the information on former party members comes from the de-Baathification commission headed by Ahmed Chalabi, the former deputy prime minister who as an Iraqi exile sought to convince U.S. officials that Hussein's government had weapons of mass destruction. In light of the absence of such weapons, many Iraqi and U.S. officials are suspicious of his commission's statistics.

In an interview at his lavish home in the Mansour district, Chalabi said the new legislation would drive out some of the former Baathists his commission had allowed to return to government. The new measure, he said, is much harsher than the existing policy and a draft of the law that the United States had encouraged parliament to pass.

"Put this under the category of: Be careful what you wish for," Chalabi said.
'This Law Is Bait'

The new law was supposed to ease the homeward passage of former Baathists such as Muhammed Kareem.

After 35 years as a civil servant in the Oil Ministry, Kareem fled his home in Basra after the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003. Four fellow Baathists from the ministry in Basra had turned up dead. Searching for him, militiamen had ransacked Kareem's house.

Kareem, 53, and his family moved to Amman, Jordan, where they live in a sparsely furnished basement apartment. He has one abiding wish: to return to Iraq. But sitting at his kitchen table last week, flipping through a draft of the law, he was despondent.

"This is a bomb on the road of reconciliation," said Kareem, a former director general in the ministry. "This law does not bring anything new. This does not serve national reconciliation that all Iraqis are hoping for. On the contrary, it envisions hostility, hatred, discrimination and sectarian strife."

Kareem, along with other Baathists who were purged from their jobs after the invasion, argues that the law typifies the animosity that Iraq's Shiite-led government has for the bureaucrats of Hussein's regime. They say the climate is nowhere near safe enough for them to identify themselves to the government as former Baathists.

Kareem, who was a senior Baath Party member, said the new law does grant him the right to a pension, which would greatly benefit his family. He has not had a steady salary in five years, and has been living off the charity of friends and relatives, but said he would not attempt to claim the pension.

"This law is bait," he said. "I have to go back to Basra and apply for the pension through several measures. If I get killed, nobody will know who did it."

Kareem and other former Baathists advocate nullifying the law and the concept of de-Baathification in general. They say it discriminates against their political party at a time when other parties have also been associated with militias, death squads and major crimes. Trying to abolish an ideology and outlaw a political party seems to him both impossible and undemocratic.

"Aren't I the son of an Iraqi? Aren't I an Iraqi myself? Don't I have the right to live in Iraq?" he added. "This law is a punishment not only to the Baathists but to his sons and grandsons. So where is the justice in it?"[/q]
 
THE SURGE IS WORKING !!!!!!! :dance: :dance: :dance:




34866138.jpg

The new flag, top, replaces the three green stars of the old flag,
bottom, representing the "Unity, Freedom, Socialism" motto of Hussein's Baath Party.

:yawn:


of course a five year old with a box of crayons
could have done that in 15 minutes





:sick: well it is kind of working

Bush supporters please do not read the following :no:
The temporary flag, a one-year stopgap until a more permanent design is selected, will no longer bear the three green stars representing the "unity, freedom, socialism" motto of Hussein's Baath Party. The former leader's handwritten "Allahu akbar" (God is great) will be replaced with an old-style Arabic font
 
deep said:
THE SURGE IS WORKING !!!!!!! :dance: :dance: :dance:




yeah, remember that single positive political result of the Surge? you know, the actual goal of the surge (political progress)?

it's not happening.



[q] Iraq VP says won't ratify key Baathists law

By Waleed Ibrahim 2 hours, 46 minutes ago

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq's Presidency Council is unlikely to ratify a new law that would give thousands of former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath party their old jobs back, Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi said on Thursday.
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The step would be a blow to Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and the United States, which praised the law's approval on January 12 and called it a key step to advancing national reconciliation.

Hashemi, a Sunni Arab, said the bill passed by parliament was flawed because it meant many people given jobs after the U.S.-led invasion to topple Saddam in 2003 would be forced out so ex-Baathists could return.

"We cannot regard this law as a step in the national reconciliation process. The spirit of revenge is so clear in many articles of the law," Hashemi said in an interview.

"It is not only me who objects to signing it, but the whole Presidency Council."

The council consists of President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, Shi'ite Vice President Adel Abdul-Mahdi, and Hashemi. It must ratify all laws passed by parliament, otherwise they are sent back to the legislature.

The Accountability and Justice Law is one of several being sought by Iraq's minority Sunni Arab community, which was dominant under Saddam.

But many ex-Baathists have already rejoined the military and the civil service in the absence of the law and there have been suggestions they could be purged a second time.

Washington introduced "de-Baathification" under U.S. administrators after the 2003 invasion to rid the military and public service of senior Baath party members. It later acknowledged the measures went too far.

Hashemi said the Presidency Council was coming under pressure from both former Baathists who want their old jobs back and from those currently in the positions.

"The council will call for amendments for a new law," he said. "It is very necessary. Talks are going on."

[/q]
 
You're not giving it enough time, Irvine. :tsk: This could take 100 years.

And by his silence I can only assume that Sting doesn't believe there are any legitimate positions of opposition to the war.

It must be hard when you're the only one right and everyone else is wrong...
 
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