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Mission Accomplished: “Five years of occupation have destroyed Iraq as a country”
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PATRICK COCKBURN
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
March 19, 2008
“It reminds me of Iraq under Saddam,” a militant opponent of Saddam Hussein said angrily to me last week as he watched red-capped Iraqi soldiers close down part of central Baghdad so the convoy of Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister, might briefly venture into the city.
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Five years after the invasion of Iraq, the U.S. and Iraqi governments claim that the country is becoming a less dangerous place, but the measures taken to protect Maliki told a different story. Gun-waving soldiers first cleared all traffic from the streets. Then four black armored cars, each with three machine-gunners on the roof, raced out of the Green Zone through a heavily fortified exit, followed by sand-colored American Humvees and more armored cars. Finally, in the middle of the speeding convoy, we saw six identical bulletproof vehicles with black windows, one of which must have been carrying Maliki.
The precautions were not excessive, since Baghdad remains the most dangerous city in the world. The Iraqi prime minister was only going to the headquarters of the Dawa party, to which he belongs and which are just half a mile outside the Green Zone, but his hundreds of security guards acted as if they were entering enemy territory.
Five years of occupation have destroyed Iraq as a country. Baghdad is today a collection of hostile Sunni and Shiite ghettoes divided by high concrete walls. Different districts even have different national flags. Sunni areas use the old Iraqi flag with the three stars of the Baath party, and the Shiite wave a newer version, adopted by the Shiite-Kurdish government. The Kurds have their own flag.
The Iraqi government tries to give the impression that normality is returning. Iraqi journalists are told not to mention the continuing violence. When a bomb exploded in Karada district near my hotel, killing 70 people, the police beat and drove away a television cameraman trying to take pictures of the devastation. Civilian casualties have fallen from 65 Iraqis killed daily from November 2006 to August 2007 to 26 daily in February. But the fall in the death rate is partly because ethnic cleansing has already done its grim work and in much of Baghdad there are no mixed areas left.
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March 19th, 2008 at 6:32 am
And Georgie boy thinks that this is something to celebrate. YE-HAW for $105 barrels of oil.
Cooked bastard.
March 19th, 2008 at 7:14 am
so this is why we don’t hear anything about iraq, they make it look like everything is under control, reminder of Rwanda, just because cameras don’t catch the violence on film, doesn’t mean it stopped
March 19th, 2008 at 7:31 am
#1
be careful!
$105 per oil barrel. But, the dollar has lost value with respect to gold. He can earn more dollars, but those dollars are ….. meaningless. If they change to euro, swiss frank, yuan or yen. They will get the same money. Indeed, the price of oil with respect to gold has not changed … too much.
March 19th, 2008 at 7:36 am
What if God is SATAN ? CELEBRATION ?!
March 19th, 2008 at 7:36 am
GOOD AND BAD ? ALL THE SAME ?
March 19th, 2008 at 7:43 am
All About Light spirits and Demonic Spirits. Who do we listen to? Light spirits tell us to love one another, Demonic spirits Tell us to hurt one another. Who do you listen to??
March 19th, 2008 at 7:51 am
Look at the add on this page: AH 64 Heli do you see it? Look Close at it. Now if we go back in time a thousand years or so, How would you describe what you see???? In Revelation, John Described that with amazing detail. He called it a beast, because he did not know what a AH 64 helecopter was. John called a space ship a Dragon. for the same reason. Now that you know that read revelation again. It will make sense to you now, and you will see how accurate he was.
March 19th, 2008 at 7:55 am
Mouth of the Beast= Door on a helicopter.
March 19th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
Hay George why don’t you snort some more Coke, and have some more gay porno boys over to the White House! Does your wife like to watch? You sick Fuck
March 19th, 2008 at 9:03 pm
Hey everyone! I’ve got a new idea! All the peace we’ve been having on this planet for the last God knows how many thousands of years now, is getting really boring! I’m fed up with prosperity, a clean environment etc. Let’s create a network of secret societies that protect esoteric and occult knowledge and a Royal Elite bloodline of hybrid alien(Gods)/Human DNA that rules over the rest of humanity, tightening it’s grip of power, wealth and control by way of keeping the population ignorant about everything from science to it’s own history and have lots of wars to create as much chaos and confusion whilst everyone else starves and we get richer! What? We’re already doing that? Shit, i’ll have to think up another idea!
March 20th, 2008 at 5:34 pm
The neocon dream is that one day we can drive through the streets of Iraq and see the fruits of their labor: Wal-Mart, Dunkin Donuts, McDonalds, Subway….
March 20th, 2008 at 8:22 pm
As an Iraq War veteran, I would say the 5 years of illegally occupying this country is far too long. The time for TOTAL WITHDRAW has passed considering this conflict is based on LIES. But of course the CFR/Skull & Bones/CIA corporate-owned mass media (FOX, CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS,etc) will want to continue to fill Americans with propaganda, mindless “fluff” stories, and sex scandals. Notto mention the media “spin” or the total blackout of critical stories to making informed decisions on important issues (like the slaughter of Iraqi civilians). Back in 2003 when I was serving at Camp Anaconda, near Balad (40 miles north of Baghdad), I was told by some peoplethat this installation will soon become PERMANENT in which the tents we were living in would be replaced with barracks to house large numbers of soliders just as in Germany and South Korea. This of course was the plan of the neo-cons and chickhawks (who CONNED America into war) as outlined in their document “REBUILDING AMERICA’S DEFENSES”published in the year 2000. It called for the U.S. to establish a “permanent presence” in the Persian Gulf, reguardless
if the issue of Saddam Hussein (No-Fly Zones) was resolved. So now the result has been:
1.) The completion of the World’s Largest U.S. Embassy in Baghdad (Green Zone)-104 acres.
2.) The establishment of 14 permanent large U.S. military bases throughtout Iraq.
3.) The rebuilding of a 40-year old oil pipeline (Mosul-Hafia) to Israel.
4.) The establishment of the Mid-East Free Trade Area (M.E.F.T.A.).
5.) The passage of a “Hydrocarbon Law” that gives BIG OIL (Exxonmobil, Shell, BP, and Chevron)
access to trillions of dollars worth of untapped oil reserves and profits.
As for the true cost of this illegal occupation of Iraq these include:
1.) Over 3,000 U.S. troops are dead (by offical count)
2.) Thousands more U.S. troops and veterans suffer from PSTD and severe physical disablities.
3.) Suicides have risen dramatically since the being of the war.
4.) Both recruitment and retention of personnel for the Armed Forces (Active Duty, Reserve, and
National Guard conponents) have experienced a sharp decline.
5.) A.W.O.L. and Desertion rates have gone up due to “stop-loss” policies and contant re- deployments.
6.) Over 1 million Iraqi civilians have been killed.
7.) Many Ancient artifacts (5,000 yrs old) and sites have been either looted or destroyed.
8.) Deleted Uranium (DU) weapsons have serious contaminated the enivornment and people
(including U.S. soldiers) thus causing illnesses and deformed infants.
9.) Massive destruction of Iraq’s structure have left Iraqi’s without sanitation, electrical power,
medical supplies, clean water, fuel, or other utilities.
10.) Iraq’s transformation from a secular government into an Islamic theocracy, has left it’s
women with far less freedom than under Saddam. Before the invasion, Iraq’s women
had the highest level of education and rights in the Arab world. No under the new Iraqi
constitution (which the U.S helped to write) states that no laws passed may not contra-
dict the teachings of Islam. Which means the “Saudization” of Iraqi society.
So after these 5 years, after BILLIONS of taxpayer dollars wasted in this conflict, George W. Bush’s (or rather the Vatican’s) “Crusade” on terrorists (with SMOM’s Blackwater mercs as foot
soldiers) and Inquisition (CIA/MOSSAD/Titan/CACI-Torture programs) threatens to spread to
IRAN and Venezuela!!! AMERICANS must get their heads out of the sand and find alternative
sources for information before the NEW WORLD ORDER takes over their lives FOREVER!!!
March 21st, 2008 at 11:27 am
Mission Accomplished? That’s nice W, tell me another story. Because of this undeclared BOONDOGGLE, the USN ships were being fitted for surge deployments and the crew was not notified when they were going to return. You had many skippers get fired because they could not meet the demand of the CNO and the executive branch. Lots of lies, shortcuts and manipulation by junior officers saying “CAN DO” to attempt to get their 25 year old ships ready for sea because of this GODLESS MISSION, thus the enlisted morale went to hell. I know because our ship was the first one in the Pilot Program; (i.e. guinnee pig) I knew after that I wanted no part in that Mission or anything that followed.
March 21st, 2008 at 11:33 am
Ron Paul will be on Coast-to-CoastAM with George Noory, one of Alex’s biggest media promoters because of being the largest radio show of its type worldwide, this coming Monday, March 24th. The show starts at 10pm CT. This is in response to demands from tens of thousands of listeners. Do your part…..LISTEN ALSO. Tnx.
On the Ron Paul website, it says Tuesday, the 25th. I hope it is true since it is not listed on the http://www.CoasttoCoastAM.com website at all. If it is the 24th, then that just shows all the more that there is a “mole” within the campaign. If not, then I heard wrong, although I still believe that there is a “mole” in the campaign no matter what.
Rhonda
PS: This is comment number 16