Sunday, April 11, 2004
Iraq: Maybe they want their country back? But there is a plan, and that's not part of it
From a nice piece by Naomi Klein in the ever essential Nation. Forgive the long quote, but in fact there is a plan, and Iraqi sovreignty isn't part of it. Here it is:
Lots of privatization.
Assuming that Sistani, who has Bush by the balls (back), and regards himself as a source of law in his own right, accepts this "prohibition," of course.
Which is too bad for the Iraqis, since the mobile network our pigs at the trough are forcing on them won't work.
Well, we'll have to start over again with the Police. It looks like a lot of them have vanished into the militias, carrying the weapons we thoughtfully gave them.
This paragraph is the money, I think. The bases, and a Status of Forces Agreement with some Iraqi government, any Iraqi government. For "at least two years," read "indefinitely." Saudi Arabia must be a lot more unstable than we're being told... And right astride the oil and the pipelines. Any doubts now as to why the Iraq war was fought?
Eesh. The Iraqis get to handle the injured, the dying, and the dead, and everything else is for us. Anyhow, that's the plan. Where to begin?
The June 30th date is clearly meaningless except as a photo op for domestic political consumption. The Iraqis really don't have any sovreignty before or after that date, since the entire country is being run by the CPA.
The whole exercise is probably the biggest exercise of the spoils system in the history of the world. The RNC is running the CPA (back), and through the CPA is running the reconstruction effort, and funnelling billions of taxpayer dollars to Republican-connected firms, all without any significant budgetary oversight. And the RNC is running the mercenaries (ibid), also Republican-connected, who have formed the world's largest private army, without any oversight either. This doesn't look a lot like democracy to me, but then maybe the Republicans genuinely believe it does. Who knows?
And given that the entire exercise depends heavily on foreign contractors to build the bases, build the embassies, build the wireless networks, train the policemen, redesign the courts, et cetera, et cetera, it looks like the insurgents are doing the strategically savvy thing by targetting them, and the tactically smart thing too, since the contractors don't tend to travel in tanks or wear body armor.
So expect the hostage-taking, the kidnapping, and the shootings to keep getting worse. (Sorry, contractors, but as it turns out that's why the pay was so good. Some of you may be genuinely in it for good, but Bush has made sure you won't be seen that way.) All this will play very badly on domestic TV (as opposed to Al Jazeera). So look for the CPA, when more of those images show up on our enabling SCLM, to defend its operatives by further embroiling the regular military in its, well, quagmire. Fallujah is, then, a prototype not only for the insurgents, but for us. "Bring it on...."
Bottom line for me is that the whole CPA is a cancer not only on Iraq but on the American body politic, given that it's a self-sucking ice cream cone infested with Republican operatives. If and when Kerry gets elected, one of his jobs will be to cut this cancer out, if it's not too late.
UPDATE Alert reader smiley (George Smiley?) points out that permament bases in the Mideast have always been part of the PNAC blueprint. So obvious I forgot to point it out....
As the June 30 "handover" approaches, Paul Bremer has unveiled a slew of new tricks to hold on to power long after "sovereignty" has been declared.
Lots of privatization.
Some recent highlights: At the end of March, building on his Order 39 of last September, Bremer passed yet another law further opening up Iraq's economy to foreign ownership, a law that Iraq's next government is prohibited from changing under the terms of the interim constitution.
Assuming that Sistani, who has Bush by the balls (back), and regards himself as a source of law in his own right, accepts this "prohibition," of course.
Bremer also announced the establishment of several independent regulators, which will drastically reduce the power of Iraqi government ministries. For instance, the Financial Times reports that "officials of the Coalition Provisional Authority said the regulator would prevent communications minister Haider al-Abadi, a thorn in the side of the coalition, from carrying out his threat to cancel licenses the coalition awarded to foreign-managed consortia to operate three mobile networks and the national broadcaster."
Which is too bad for the Iraqis, since the mobile network our pigs at the trough are forcing on them won't work.
The CPA has also confirmed that after June 30, the $18.4 billion the US government is spending on reconstruction will be administered by the US Embassy in Iraq. The money will be spent over five years and will fundamentally redesign Iraq's most basic infrastructure, including its electricity, water, oil and communications sectors, as well as its courts and police. Iraq's future governments will have no say in the construction of these core sectors of Iraqi society.
Well, we'll have to start over again with the Police. It looks like a lot of them have vanished into the militias, carrying the weapons we thoughtfully gave them.
Retired Rear Adm. David Nash, who heads the Project Management Office, which administers the funds, describes the $18.4 billion as "a gift from the American people to the people of Iraq." He appears to have forgotten the part about gifts being something you actually give up. And in the same eventful week, US engineers began construction on fourteen "enduring bases" in Iraq, capable of housing the 110,000 soldiers who will be posted here for at least two more years. Even though the bases are being built with no mandate from an Iraqi government, Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, deputy chief of operations in Iraq, called them "a blueprint for how we could operate in the Middle East."
This paragraph is the money, I think. The bases, and a Status of Forces Agreement with some Iraqi government, any Iraqi government. For "at least two years," read "indefinitely." Saudi Arabia must be a lot more unstable than we're being told... And right astride the oil and the pipelines. Any doubts now as to why the Iraq war was fought?
The US occupation authority has also found a sneaky way to maintain control over Iraq's armed forces. Bremer has issued an executive order stating that even after the interim Iraqi government has been established, the Iraqi army will answer to US commander Lieut. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez. In order to pull this off, Washington is relying on a legalistic reading of a clause in UN Security Council Resolution 1511, which puts US forces in charge of Iraq's security until "the completion of the political process" in Iraq. Since the "political process" in Iraq is never-ending, so, it seems, is US military control.
In the same flurry of activity, the CPA announced that it would put further constraints on the Iraqi military by appointing a national security adviser for Iraq. This US appointee would have powers equivalent to those held by Condoleezza Rice and will stay in office for a five-year term, long after Iraq is scheduled to have made the transition to a democratically elected government.
There is one piece of this country, though, that the US government is happy to cede to the people of Iraq: the hospitals. On March 27 Bremer announced that he had withdrawn the senior US advisers from Iraq's Health Ministry, making it the first sector to achieve "full authority" in the US occupation.
(via The Nation)
Eesh. The Iraqis get to handle the injured, the dying, and the dead, and everything else is for us. Anyhow, that's the plan. Where to begin?
The June 30th date is clearly meaningless except as a photo op for domestic political consumption. The Iraqis really don't have any sovreignty before or after that date, since the entire country is being run by the CPA.
The whole exercise is probably the biggest exercise of the spoils system in the history of the world. The RNC is running the CPA (back), and through the CPA is running the reconstruction effort, and funnelling billions of taxpayer dollars to Republican-connected firms, all without any significant budgetary oversight. And the RNC is running the mercenaries (ibid), also Republican-connected, who have formed the world's largest private army, without any oversight either. This doesn't look a lot like democracy to me, but then maybe the Republicans genuinely believe it does. Who knows?
And given that the entire exercise depends heavily on foreign contractors to build the bases, build the embassies, build the wireless networks, train the policemen, redesign the courts, et cetera, et cetera, it looks like the insurgents are doing the strategically savvy thing by targetting them, and the tactically smart thing too, since the contractors don't tend to travel in tanks or wear body armor.
So expect the hostage-taking, the kidnapping, and the shootings to keep getting worse. (Sorry, contractors, but as it turns out that's why the pay was so good. Some of you may be genuinely in it for good, but Bush has made sure you won't be seen that way.) All this will play very badly on domestic TV (as opposed to Al Jazeera). So look for the CPA, when more of those images show up on our enabling SCLM, to defend its operatives by further embroiling the regular military in its, well, quagmire. Fallujah is, then, a prototype not only for the insurgents, but for us. "Bring it on...."
Bottom line for me is that the whole CPA is a cancer not only on Iraq but on the American body politic, given that it's a self-sucking ice cream cone infested with Republican operatives. If and when Kerry gets elected, one of his jobs will be to cut this cancer out, if it's not too late.
UPDATE Alert reader smiley (George Smiley?) points out that permament bases in the Mideast have always been part of the PNAC blueprint. So obvious I forgot to point it out....
