INSURGENCY TO LAST 7-12 YEARS

"The insurgency in Iraq is not likely to be put down in a year or even two since history shows such uprisings can last a decade or more, the United States' top military commander said on Friday. Air Force Gen. Richard Myers said that in the past century, insurgencies around the world have lasted anywhere from seven to 12 years, making a quick fix to the problem in Iraq unlikely..."
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=7746184

SYRIA A PHASE AFTER IRAQ?

"Assad (said) Washington's rhetoric against Damascus is reminiscent of the saber-rattling that preceded the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq. "The language of the White House leads one to predict a campaign like that that preceded the conflict against Saddam. Will we be the next target of Israel and the White House? All of this has been written for a long time. Iraq was the first phase, then it will be Iran's and Syria's turn. But it's not a given that things will go that way."
http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=12835

UKRAINE AND OTHERS TO WITHDRAW FROM IRAQ

"Ukraine plans to pull all of its 1,650 troops out of Iraq by the end of the year, the country’s new defense minister said Thursday... around 700 Ukrainian troops among the 1,650-strong contingent serving in a Polish-led multinational division would probably leave Iraq by the end of April... The Ukraine contingent is the sixth-largest in the U.S.-led coalition..."
http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?F=682430&C=europe

Other withdrawals:
"Poland's decision to pull out a third of its 2,400 troops this month and the announcement that it will withdraw the rest this year due to strong domestic rejection to the deployment. Portugal quietly pulled out its 150 soldiers this month. Next month, the Netherlands will begin withdrawing its 1,700 troops, one of the largest contingents. Australia has also withdrawn a big part of its forces..."
Raed in the Middle, Friday, February 25, 2005
http://raedinthemiddle.blogspot.com/

PROJECTED COST OF WAR

"... According to a report on the cost of the war in Iraq released last week by the Democratic staff of the House Budget Committee, the war and ongoing insurgency could cost the United States between US$461 billion and $646 billion by 2015... (over) half a trillion dollars... The lower figure is based on a US withdrawal of forces within four years..."
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/GB25Ak01.html

THE SEIGE OF BAGHDAD

" Insurgent attacks to disrupt Baghdad's supplies of crude oil, gasoline, heating oil, water and electricity have reached a degree of coordination and sophistication not seen before... the insurgents have a deep understanding of the complex network of pipelines, power cables and reservoirs feeding Baghdad... the choice of targets and the timing of sabotage attacks has... become what amounts to a siege of the capital... The overall pattern of the sabotage and its technical savvy suggests the guidance of the very officials who tended to the nation's infrastructure during Saddam Hussein's long reign..."
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/21/international/middleeast/21sabotage.html?hp&ex=1109048400&en=42d988dc64929643&ei=5094&partner=homepage

KURDS WANT THEIR OWN AUTONOMOUS AREA

"Kurdish Demands Slow Iraq Search for New Govt... The Kurds came second in the Jan. 30 election... that makes them kingmakers... Kurds are insisting on control of oil-rich Kirkuk and other disputed northern areas as their price for agreeing to a deal on the formation of a new national government... a tough negotiating position which... could greatly complicate the process of forging a unified government..."
http://www.metronews.ca/reuters_international.asp?id=57984

NO TOWN HALL QUESTIONS FROM GERMANS ABOUT IRAQ

"During his trip to Germany on Wednesday, the main highlight of George W. Bush's trip was meant to be a "town hall"-style meeting with average Germans... Bush's strategists felt an uncontrolled encounter with the German public would be too unpredictable... Rice's staff insisted on screening and approving any questions to be asked by students... Was Bush afraid the event might focus on prickly questions about Iraq and Iran... (So) with the German government unwilling to permit a scripted event with questions approved in advance, the White House has quietly put the event on ice... "
http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/0,1518,343281,00.html

FRESH DOUBTS OVER LEGALITY OF IRAQ CONFLICT

"Fresh doubts are raised over the legality of Iraq conflict... The controversy was reopened by claims that Lord Goldsmith's crucial statement endorsing military action was drafted by Downing Street rather than himself... "
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=614141

U.S. TALKING TO REBELS ON WITHDRAWAL

"Americans and rebels begin talks on timetable for withdrawal from Iraq... talks have taken place for the first time in the heavily fortified Green Zone in Baghdad.... US military commanders are now dubious about the chances of winning an outright military victory over the Sunni rebels... The talks so far are tentative but they indicate a recognition on the part of the US that it will need a political solution... (but) The new Iraqi government about to take office after the election on 30 January will be ambivalent about talks between the US and the resistance. It will therefore be impossible for the US to withdraw as the resistance demands."
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=613492

WOMEN NO BETTER OFF AFTER INVASION

"... In a report entitled "Iraq -- Decades of Suffering"... Amnesty International said... two years after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, women there are no better off than under the rule of ousted dictator Saddam Hussein... "The lawlessness and increased killings, abductions and rapes that followed the overthrow of the government of Saddam Hussein have restricted women's freedom of movement and their ability to go to school or to work. Women have been subjected to sexual threats by members of the U.S.-led forces and some women detained by U.S. forces have been sexually abused, possibly raped"...
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=7693173

ISLAMICIST PRIME MINISTER

"... Ibrahim Jaafari (is the) candidate for prime minister of the majority United Iraqi Alliance (UIA)... Jaafari, a leader of the Da'wa (Islamic Call) Party... (which) insists that Iraq's constitution... be based primarily if not exclusively on Islamic law... has also said that no laws should be passed "that contradict Islam".
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/GB24Ak04.html

HOPE FOR SECULAR IRAQ FADING

"... It’s not about a Sunni government or a Shia government- it’s about the possibility of an Iranian-modeled Iraq... There’s talk of Shari’a, or Islamic law, having a very primary role in the new constitution..."

"... Women feel it the most. There’s an almost constant pressure in Baghdad from these parties for women to cover up what little they have showing... There are the threats, and the printed and verbal warnings, and sometimes we hear of attacks or insults. You feel it all around you. It begins slowly and almost insidiously. You stop wearing slacks or jeans or skirts that show any leg because you don’t want to be stopped in the street and lectured by someone who doesn’t approve. You stop wearing short sleeves and start preferring wider shirts with a collar that will cover up some of you neck. You stop letting your hair flow because you don’t want to attract attention to it...

"It’s interesting to watch American politicians talk about how American troops are the one thing standing between Sunnis and Shia killing each other in the streets... Right now, during all these assassinations and abductions, the troops are just standing aside and letting Iraqis get at each other... There was hope of a secular Iraq, even after the occupation. That hope is fading fast."

Baghdad Burning, blog by a teacher, Friday, February 18, 2005
http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com/

MAKING SURE WE DON'T GET ASKED TO LEAVE

"... If we are going to have any chance of getting out of the mess in Iraq, we will have to permit an Iraqi government elected next January to have the right to invite the U.S. military to leave forthwith. It is Negroponte's job to make sure that does not happen, and we all know that, don't we?"
Memo on the Margin, February 19, 2005
http://www.wanniski.com/

43% OF RECONSTRUCTION FUNDS USED FOR SECURITY

"When Congress initially approved $18.4 billion in November 2003 to help rebuild Iraq, the majority of the money was intended to improve electrical and water systems... (now) an estimated $8 billion — or 43% — of the reconstruction money will wind up paying to improve security... So far, about $3 billion of the $18.4 billion has been spent, most of it on the equipment for the Iraqi security forces... The Bush administration's recent proposal for additional funding for Iraq included no money for infrastructure, but an additional $5.7 billion to purchase more equipment for the security forces..."
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/la-fg-cuts21feb21,0,3116082.story?coll=la-home-headlines

U.S. HAS GIVEN UP ON WINNING

"... the Bush administration has all but given up any expectation of defeating the enemy with whom we are engaged... today the Bush administration's aim is not to win but to relieve itself of responsibility for waging a war that it began but cannot finish. Debate in national security circles focuses... on how we can extricate ourselves before our overstretched forces suffer irreparable damage... U.S. troops today are no longer fighting to win, but simply to buy time: This has become the Bush administration's substitute for victory... we are spending several billion dollars per month and losing, on average, two soldiers per day — not to prevail but simply to prolong the stalemate. Moreover... we can expect that expenditure of blood and treasure to continue for many months, until there emerges an Iraqi government able to fend for itself or Iraq descends into chaos..."
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/sunday/commentary/la-oe-bacevich20feb20,0,5357059.story?coll=la-sunday-commentary

REMARKS OF OCCUPATION SOLDIERS

"There are things I have to do out here that I can't explain to my chain of command, and that the American people would never understand."

"The one thing you learn over here is that there are no innocent civilians, except the kids. And even them - the ones that are all, `Hey mister, mister, chocolate?' - I'll be killing them someday."

"Every time we kill one of them, we breed more that want to fight us... We end up turning neutral people against us. It's not really our fault, though, because I have to defend myself."

http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/10937079.htm

THE U.N. RESOLUTION THAT THE U.S. CAN ENFORCE

"There is... a mandated end to the US occupation, stipulated in UN Security Council Resolution 1546. That resolution says the US presence will conclude at the end of 2005, or earlier if the Iraqi government demands it... (but) the venerable, pro-US Adnan Pachachi has despaired of America's unwillingness to reaffirm this vow. "What we wanted from the Americans was a clear statement to the effect that they would abide by this resolution," he has commented. "But they refused to do so, so it seemed the suspicions of the [Iraqi] people have some basis in fact."
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/GB19Ak03.html

UN Resolution 1546:
http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2004/sc8117.doc.htm

ROBOT SOLDIERS FOR IRAQ

"... The military plans to invest tens of billions of dollars in (robots)... The median lifetime cost of a soldier is about $4 million today and growing, according to a Pentagon study. Robot soldiers could cost a tenth of that... several hundred robots are digging up roadside bombs in Iraq, scouring caves in Afghanistan and serving as armed sentries at weapons depots. By April, an armed version of the bomb-disposal robot will be in Baghdad, capable of firing 1,000 rounds a minute.."
http://nytimes.com/2005/02/16/technology/16robots.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5094&en=527b7e950d00d351&hp&ex=1108616400&adxnnl=0&partner=homepage&adxnnlx=1108556030-UMDFw7kCAUsmtAa7coQQcw

CPA WASTED MILLIONS

"... Millions of dollars were wasted by the US-led Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) that ran Iraq... Huge cash payments were made to Iraqi contractors out of the back of pick-up trucks, in scenes reminiscent of the "Wild West"... The allegations were made... (by) former CPA official Franklin Willis... at a Senate hearing into the authority's practices... The allegations follow a report by the inspector general which said the CPA had transferred nearly $9 billion to the interim Iraqi government without any controls."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4266231.stm

SOLDIERS' PHOTOS

The homepage says "many of the images on this site are quite graphic". Those photos and captions would be on pages 52 through 56.
http://www.undermars.com/

IRAQ ELECTS PRO-IRANIAN GOVERNMENT

"Iraq Winners Allied With Iran Are the Opposite of U.S. Vision... Iraqis instead went to the polls and elected a government with a strong religious base -- and very close ties to the Islamic republic next door. It is the last thing the administration expected from its costly Iraq policy -- $300 billion and counting...

"Thousands of members of the United Iraqi Alliance, a Shiite-dominated slate that won almost half of the 8.5 million votes and will name the prime minister, spent decades in exile in Iran..."

"And the winning Kurdish alliance, whose co-leader Jalal Talabani is the top nominee for president, has roots in a province abutting Iran, which long served as its economic and political lifeline..."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A21679-2005Feb13.html

TRAINING OF SECURITY FORCES

"Training of Iraq's security forces... is going so badly that the Pentagon has stopped giving figures for the number of combat-ready indigenous troops... Instead, only figures for troops "on hand" are issued... an overall total of Iraqis in uniform, which includes raw recruits and police who have gone on duty after as little as three weeks' training... there may be as few as 5,000 troops who could be considered combat ready..."
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=610574

U.S. PAYS HALIBURTON $2 BILLION FOR UNVERIFIED WORK

"The U.S. Army agreed to pay Halliburton’s KBR subsidiary nearly $2 billion for work that nobody can prove ever took place... KBR is responsible for military logistics, which includes feeding the troops, transporting military supplies, constructing military housing and offices, and maintaining laundry facilities... 43 percent of the $4.5 billion requested by Halliburton... could not be verified... the Army decided to withhold 15 percent of future reimbursements until KBR verifies when, how and to whom the suspicious expenses were paid. However, a few hours later the decision was abruptly reversed... the Army claimed it did not want to harm the troops in the field by withholding payments to KBR."
http://www.guerrillanews.com/A01130

OFF PROGRAM VS CPA

"Forget the UN. The US occupation regime helped itself to $8.8 bn of mostly Iraqi money in just 14 months... the US inspector general for Iraq reconstruction published a report about the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA)... In just 14 months, $8.8bn went absent without leave... a British adviser to the Iraqi Governing Council told the BBC's File on Four programme that officials in the CPA were demanding bribes of up to $300,000 in return for awarding contracts. Iraqi money seized by US forces simply disappeared. Some $800m was handed out to US commanders without being counted or even weighed. A further $1.4bn was flown from Baghdad to the Kurdish regional government in the town of Irbil, and has not been seen since..."

"... more than half the money the CPA was giving away did not belong to the US government but to the people of Iraq. Most of it was generated by the coalition's sales of oil. If you think the UN's oil-for-food programme was leaky, take a look at the CPA's oil-for-reconstruction scheme..."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1407964,00.html

INTERIM VOLCKER REPORT ON OIL FOR FOOD PROGRAM

"... the investigators of... oil-for-food program in Iraq acknowledge that they have so far failed to find a smoking gun. However, in an interim report... they accused the world body of failing to abide by the rules to assure fairness, transparency and accountability... Paul Volker, chairman of the Independent Inquiry Committee (said)... the UN administration of the program appeared to be "free of systematic or widespread abuse".
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/GB05Ak01.html

"... Volcker said in the interim report... the most serious violations of the U.N. sanctions involved illegal oil sales outside oil-for-food. "And there is no question that those sales were known by the U.N. Security Council," which included the United States..."
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=7538861&pageNumber=1

"... Both the report and Mr. Volcker emphasized that the major source of Mr. Hussein's illicit money was not kickbacks from the oil-for-food program but the estimated $8 billion in illegal oil sales to Jordan, Turkey and Syria that occurred even before the program was created. Mr. Volcker said that those sales were known to Security Council members, including the United States, and that Washington had specifically waived American laws barring such sales."
http://nytimes.com/2005/02/04/international/04food.html?hp&ex=1107579600&en=ebf0c386611be17d&ei=5094&partner=homepage


"... The government of the US, in other words, though it had been informed about a smuggling operation which brought Saddam Hussein's regime some $4.6bn, decided to let it continue. It did so because it deemed the smuggling to be in its national interest, as it helped friendly countries (Turkey and Jordan) evade the sanctions on Iraq. The biggest source of illegal funds to Saddam Hussein was approved not by officials of the UN but by officials in the US..."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1407964,00.html

PARLIAMENTARIANS TARGETED FOR ASSASSINATION

"... Guerrillas attacked the head of the Nation Party... This incident... points to a looming danger for elected parliamentarians. They can't remain anonymous while serving in parliament, and the guerrillas will target all 275 for assassination..."
Informed Comment, Wednesday, February 09, 2005
http://www.juancole.com/

A SIMILAR PREVIOUS ELECTION

"United States officials were surprised and heartened today at the size of turnout in South Vietnam's presidential election despite a Vietcong terrorist campaign to disrupt the voting. According to reports from Saigon, 83 percent of the 5.85 million registered voters cast their ballots yesterday. Many of them risked reprisals threatened by the Vietcong. A successful election has long been seen as the keystone in President Johnson's policy of encouraging the growth of constitutional processes in South Vietnam."
- Peter Grose, in a page 2 New York Times article titled, 'U.S. Encouraged by Vietnam Vote,' September 4, 1967.
http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/nytimes/82602711.html?did=82602711&FMT=ABS&FMTS=AI&date=Sep+4%2C+1967&author=By+PETER+GROSE+Special+to+The+New+York+Times&desc=U.S.+ENCOURAGED+BY+VIETNAM+VOTE

VACATION
On vacation 23 Jan to 14 Feb.