Mere kritik af amerikansk irak-politik fra en britisk øversbefalende

Den britiske Generalmajor Tim Cross, kommer i forlængelse af general Sir Mike Jackson, med en bidende kritik af den amerikanske irak-politik. Generalmajoren påstår at han indtil flere gange har luftet seriøse bekymringer for den måde den amerikanske administration håndterede Irak efter krigens officielle afslutning.

"Right from the very beginning we were all very concerned about the lack of detail that had gone into the post-war plan and there is no doubt that Rumsfeld was at the heart of that process," he said.

"I had lunch with Rumsfeld in February in Washington - before the invasion in March 2003 - and raised concerns about the need to internationalise the reconstruction of Iraq and work closely with the United Nations."

Maj Gen Cross, 59, who was deputy head of the coalition's Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance, said he also raised concerns over the number of troops available to maintain security in Iraq.

"He didn't want to hear that message," he said. "The US had already convinced themselves that following the invasion Iraq would emerge reasonably quickly as a stable democracy."
He added: "There is no doubt that with hindsight the US post-war plan was fatally flawed and many of us sensed that at the time."

kilde: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6974611.stm

P1's Orientering om potentiel Iran-krig

Programmet der sendtes den 31. August kan høres her:

http://www.dr.dk/P1/orientering/indslag/2007/08/31/183714.htm

Hvis du missede den: Den Foruroligende Oxfam rapport

Iflg. Oxfam rapporten:

- Four million Iraqis – 15% - regularly cannot buy enough to eat.
- 70% are without adequate water supplies, compared to 50% in 2003.
- 28% of children are malnourished, compared to 19% before the 2003 invasion.
- 92% of Iraqi children suffer learning problems, mostly due to the climate of fear.
- More than two million people – mostly women and children - have been displaced inside Iraq. - A further two million Iraqis have become refugees, mainly in Syria and Jordan.

læs den her:

http://www.oxfam.org/en/policy/briefingpapers/bp105_humanitarian_challenge_in_iraq_0707

UK's General Sir Mike Jackson angriber USA vedr. Irak

Highlights:

"Sir Mike, who took command of the British Army one month before US-led forces invaded Iraq, said Mr Rumsfeld was "one of those most responsible for the current situation in Iraq".


Crucially, the general writes, he refused to deploy enough troops to maintain law and order after the collapse of Saddam's regime, and discarded detailed plans for the post-conflict administration of Iraq that had been drawn up by the US State Department.
In the book, Sir Mike says he believes the entire US approach to tackling global terrorism is "inadequate" because it relies too heavily on military power at the expense of nation-building and diplomacy."

"Sir Mike says the failure of the US-led coalition to suppress the Iraqi insurgency four years after Saddam's overthrow was down to the Pentagon's refusal to deploy enough troops. A combined force of 400,000 would be needed to control a country the size of Iraq, but even with the extra troops recently deployed for the US military's "surge" the coalition has struggled to reach half that figure.

Sir Mike is particularly critical of President Bush's decision to hand control of the post-invasion running of Iraq to the Pentagon, when all the post-war planning had been done by the State Department.

"All the planning carried out by the State Department went to waste," he writes. For Mr Rumsfeld and his neo-conservative supporters "it was an ideological article of faith that the coalition forces would be accepted as a liberating army.

"Once you had decapitated Saddam Hussein's regime, a model democratic society would inevitably emerge."

Læs resten:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=UUI4XW1GEXIN3QFIQMFSFF4AVCBQ0IV0?xml=/news/2007/09/01/wirq101.xml

Sir Mike Jackson's kritik af den amerikanske administrations håndtering af Irak, bakkes op af flere. Generalmajor Patrick Cordingley, som ledte de såkaldte Desert Rats under Golfkrigen i 1991, kalder således Sir Mike Jackson's analyse for "absolutely spot on".

Sir Malcolm Rifkind siger endvidere: "I think one of the most fundamental criticisms is not just that Rumsfeld was incompetent - which he was - but it was actually his boss, George Bush, who actually made the extraordinary decision to put the Pentagon and Rumsfeld in control of political nation-building after the actual war ended."´

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uklatest/story/0,,-6890347,00.html

Pentagons Blitzkriegsplan for Iran

I The Sunday Times kunne man igår læse om Pentagon's nyeste paln for et angreb på Iran. Pentagon vil iflg. The Times ikke foretage såkaldte nålestiksangreb mod Iran, men har planlagt at destruere størstedelen af Irans militære kapacitet, gennem luftbombardementer af 1200 mål.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article2369001.ece

TIME Magazine om Rudolph Giuliani

TIME har et spændende portræt af Rudolph Giuliani med titlen "Behind Giuliani's Tough Talk" hvori hans postulerede viden om udenrigspolitik betvivles. Et par highlights fra artiklen.

Vedrørende Giulianis påståede "30 års studier af terrorisme":

"Giuliani and his aides have said he has been 'studying Islamic terrorism' for 30 years. This is an exaggeration. As a prosecutor and Justice Department official in the 1970s and '80s, Giuliani had many successes—against white collar criminals and the Mafia. He did not direct major terrorism prosecutions that led to convictions."

Vedrørende Giulianis udenrigpolitiske erfaring:

"Giuliani has also claimed he knows more about foreign policy than other candidates, but that's exceedingly unlikely. John McCain spent 22 years as a Navy pilot and five as a prisoner of war and is now the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee in the Senate, where he has served for 20 years. He has been to Iraq six times; Giuliani has never been there. (Of the major candidates, only Giuliani, Fred Thompson and John Edwards have never visited Iraq.)"

Vedrørende Giulianis udtalelser under valgkampen:

"On the campaign trail, Giuliani's foreign policy comments have sometimes come off more confident than competent. In New Hampshire this spring, according to the New York Times, Giuliani said it was unclear whether Iran or North Korea was further along on building a nuclear bomb. (North Korea tested a nuclear device in October 2006. Iran has not done so.) Then, in his speech at the Maryland synagogue in July, Giuliani mocked Democratic candidate Barack Obama for claiming that North Korea was the nation's No. 1 enemy. "North Korea is an enemy. North Korea is dangerous. I mean, I grant that. And boy, we have to be really careful about North Korea," Giuliani said, his voice iced with sarcasm. "But I don't remember North Koreans coming to America and killing us."

North Korea is known to sell advanced weaponry to other states that sponsor terrorists. The State Department has listed North Korea as a sponsor of terrorism. The reason North Korea keeps U.S. terrorism experts up at night is not that North Korean operatives will come here and attack us; it's that they might sell a nuclear bomb to people who will."

Artiklen ender med at konkludere følgende:

"In addition to extraordinary grace under fire, Giuliani developed an intimate knowledge of emergency management and an affinity for quantifiable results. On 9/11, he earned the trust of most Americans. ...
The evidence also shows great, gaping weaknesses. Giuliani's penchant for secrecy, his tendency to value loyalty over merit and his hyperbolic rhetoric are exactly the kinds of instincts that counterterrorism experts say the U.S. can least afford right now."

læs resten: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1655262-1,00.html

P1's Irak Hvad nu?

P1 har en programrække bestående af fem radioprogrammer der vedrører Irak-krigen. Jeg vil her specielt anbefale læseren, at lytte til programmet med Henrik Nedergaard som har været i Irak for at arbejde for Røde Kors og Verdensbanken.

http://www.dr.dk/Tema/exitirak/irakhvadnu/samtale4_1.htm