Aim A Top O' Zem

[Volodya987]

By Tariq Ali.
Occupied Iraq will never know peace.
The recolonisation of Iraq is not proceeding smoothly. The resistance in the country (and in Palestine) is not, as Israel and Western propogandists like to argue, a case of Islam gone mad. It is, in both cases, a direct consequence of the occupation.
Before the recent war, some of us argued that the Iraqi people, however much they despised Saddam Hussein, would not take kindly to being occupied by the United States and its British adjutant.
Contrary to the cocooned Iraqis who had been on the US payroll for far too long and who told George Bush that US troops would be garlanded with flowers and given sweets, we warned that the occupation would lead to the harrying and killing of Western soldiers every day and would soon lead to a low intensity guerilla war.
The fact that events have vindicated this analysis is no reason to celebrate. The entire country is now in a mess and the situation is much worse than it was before the conflict.
The only explanation provided by Westenn news managers for the resistance is that these are dissatisfied remnants of the old regime.
This week Washington contradicted its propoganda by deciding to recruit the real remnants of the old state apparatus - the secret police - to try to track down the resistance organisations, which number more than fourty groups. The demonstrations in Basra and the deaths of more British soldiers are a clear indication these former bastions of anti-Sadam sentiment are now prepaired to join the struggle.
The bombing of the UN headquaters in Baghdad shocked the West, but as Jamie Tarabay of the Associated Press reported in dispach from the Iraqi capital last week, there is a deep ambivalence towards the UN among ordinary Iraquis. This is an understatement.
In fact, the UN is seen as one of Washington's more ruthless enforcers. It supervised the sanctions that, according to UNICEF figures, were directly responsible for the deaths of half a million Iraqi children and a horrific rise in the mortality rate. Two senior UN officials, Denis Halliday and Hans van Sponeck, resigned in protest at these policies, explaining that the UN had failed in its duties to the people of Iraq.
Simultaneously the US and Britain, with UN approval, rained hundreds of tonnes of bombs and thousands of missiles from 1992 onwards and, in 1999, US officials calmly informed The Wall Street Journal that they had run out of targets.
By 2001, the bombarderment of Iraq had lasted longer than the US invasion of Vietnam.
That's why the UN is not viewed sympathetically by many Iraqis. The recent Security Council decision to retrospectively sanction the occupation, a direct breach of the UN charter, has only added to the anger.
All this poses the question of whether the UN today is anything more than a cleaning-up operation for the American Empire.
The effects of the Iraqi resistance are now beginning to be felt in both the occupying countries. The latest 'Newsweek' poll reveals that President Bush's approval ratings are down 18 points to 53 per cent and, for the first time since September 11, more registered voters (49 per cent) say they would not like to see him re-elected. This can only get worse (or better depending on one's point of view) as US casualties in Iraq continue to rise.
In Britain more than two-thirds of the population now believe that Tony Blair lied to them on Iraq. This view is shared by senior figures in the establishment. There was open disquiet within the armed forces before the war. Some generals were not too pleased by the sight of their Prime Minister, snarling at the leash like a petty mastiff, as he prepared to dispach a third of the British army to help occupy one of the countries largest former colonies in the Middle East.
After the capture of Baghdad, Sir Rodric Braithwaite, the former head of teh joint intelligence committee and a former national security adviser to Blair, wrote an astonishing letter to the 'Financial Times" in which he accused Blair of having deliberately engineered a war hysteria to frighten a deeply sceptical population into backing a war. Fishmongers sell fish, warmongers sell war, wrote Braithwaite, arguing that Blair had oversold his wares.
This anger within the establishment came to a head with the alleged suicide of ih Ministry of Defence's leading scientist, Dr David Kelly, and forced a judicial enquiry, a form of therapy much favoured by the English ruling class.
This week Blair will be interrogated befor Lord Hutton, but already the inquiry has uncovered a mould of wriggling worms.
There is talk now that New Labour will offer the Defence Secretary, a talentless mediocrity by the name Geoff Hoon, as a blood sacrifice to calm the public. But what if Hoon refuses to go alone? After all, he knows where the bodies are buried.
And Australia? Here the Prime Minister - a perenniel parrot on the imperial shoulder - managed to pull his troops out before the resistance began. They were badly needed in the Solomon Islands. Like Blair, John Howard parroted untruths to justify the war and, like Blair, he's lucky that the official Opposition is lead by a weak-kneed and ineffective politician scared of his own shadow.
And one day, when the children of dead Iraqis and Americans ask why their parents died, the answer will come: because the politicians lied.
Meanwhile, there will be no peace as long as Palestine and Iraq continue to be occupied - and no amount of apologetics will conceal this fact.
(Author of "Bush in Babylon: The Recolonisation of Iraq" to be publishe by Verso in October)

[Volodya987]

AimATopO'Zem sends Uncle Tom's nephew to U.N. to beg for assistance in stealing oil from meZ'OpoTAmiA.

[Freedom1]

Evhen, the yanqui apologist - FRONT AND CENTER !

Yes Ma'am! Sergeant X reports!

Quote from a quote:

"a case of Islam gone mad".

Who said that!? Is that why the U.S. is targeting another 50-60 BILLION dollars? Why the Bush administration was very careful, early on, to make citizens aware it was the aftermath of war that would be most difficult ( and this point was re-emphasized ad nauseaum while the ground victory was a precipitious certainty.

No my dear Volodya, your journalist is throwing out meaningless cliches that do not reflect common opinion, or the, IMHO, the view of the U.S. Government. Maybe the 'kvas nationalist/isolationist' "thoughts" of " Joe had-too-many-six-packs ". But not any educated citizens.


Another quote from a quote: ( which unwittingly details the endgame, again IMHO and I SURE DO HOPE, of the U.S. Middle East Policy )

"there will be no peace as long as Palestine and Iraq continue to be occupied ."

Yup, uh huh. Only the most jaded observer of Middle Eastern affaris would argue differently ( jaded or unextricably biased - and there are plentiful unextricably biased players on both sides of the fray - the Israeli-Arab fray specifically).

Whether or not the U.S. was simply "floating a ballon" when they annouced they had shelved a Middle-East Peace initiative just at the time leading to the action against Iraq, let's assume they know this. And they certainly don't intend, or plan, on occupying Iraq for decades. ( one decade might be enough to get that country on its own two feet- after we screw the French and Russians on the arms debt and use oil revenues to build a social services system).

But, Iraq's occupation is new. It really boils down to item #1, the Palestinians/Israelis. "Zionized" into multi-generational guerilla war. While no one really stepped up for them in a big way back in the day, they currently fuel the ethos of Pan Arabism, and particualrly, the bipolar view of Islamists.

Anyway, as a guy whose ancesters were screwed with by other ethnicities, I can relate. You know what I mean Volodya?

The U.S. influence on Israel clearly has its limits - particularly when it comes to issues that Israelis believe are central to their survival as a state.

But do you think if we could approach the Israelis and say look, we just secured a major nation state which will act as a security buffer for you, we REQUIRE you to do the following. Give back some land. Let the U.N. "sit" on Palestine for a while while the new nation state develops.

We protect their southern-eastern side, Egypt, a loose ally, at their southwestern. We get them to stop effing with the Palestinians. We need major land concessions to have that happen. Concessions that will put politicians out of office. Concessions that will help put the terrorists out of business.

At the same time that the new infrastructure is up and running in Iraq, and the U.S. can do what they know how to do best, help build an economy, a middle class economy ( assumed as a key component of democracy ).

It's a ten year plan. Which is what I can't figure. Why would a two term, at best, administration go for the long ball? It IS the right answer, but all too often, American foreign policy is cyclical due to changes of administration. The current policy is a pretty clear vision of implementing " what it takes" to effect peace.

And how does one know its the right thing to do? It's pretty simple in policitcs, NO ONE LIKES IT. It universally unpopular. I give Bush credit for having the character to NOT be a politician and do the right thing.

I'll give you some more "contra opinion" in my next post there, mr. Aim ATop, which, incidentally, I hope only applies at distances of 300m or more.

Please don't reply, just giving you some food for thought, a little 'contra-intuitive' view.

[Volodya987]

Your sectarian and fascist view:
"what's good for the business interests of clones of the Queen of England, and their 'so(re)ba(c)ke', is good for the world",
explains exactly why sectarian and fascist organisations like 'al-Qaeda' exist.

[lorepoetess]

Volodya, I think you haunt dreams..and so does sobachka...
And you are not a "sect" either are you? Could have fooled me..

[Volodya987]

In the beginning there was the word
and this word was truth/pravda.
Now there is proPaganda.
With TV reporters as its thralls
atomic bombs as its walls
Black Hawks as its squalls
this pagan tries to reign supreme.

[Volodya987]

#1 of 999, makes a speech at the United Nations requesting others to come to Hell with him.
A 9, currently living in PaRis, refuses.
A 9, living in BeRin, hedges his bets.