Be pro-social
Bulgaria sold weapons to the Kurdish Regional Government in northern Iraq. The government is using the arms to patrol areas outside of the three provinces it legally controls. If this article is to be believed, there are two major problems. First, there may be a civil war between Kurds and Baghdad over oil. Second, the … Read more
The Bush administration refuses to release a copy of the military agreement signed with Iraq even though Iraq has published a copy of the agreement. When President Bush vowed to send democracy to Iraq, I assumed he intended to keep it in the US also. Mission Accomplished: no democracy in the US.
The Iraqi cabinet approved a troop deal with the US today. The deal includes a firm deadline of 2011 for troop withdrawal–whatever the conditions on the ground are. Recall that Bush and the Republicans derided anyone and everyone who called for a withdrawal timeline. No matter how you look at their statements, this deal demonstrates … Read more
When violence happens in Iraq, US officials, local officials, and newspaper reports often provide dramatically different numbers of dead and wounded. Even facts such as “how many killed” are dependent on the source of the fact. The best measure for Iraq may be very simple: is Iraq as safe as Springfield, USA? Context of the … Read more
The US even lacks credibility in Iraq. “The problem for Iraqis, he said, was ‘the feeling with some of the parties that America has no intention of withdrawing within the timetable.’” Mission accomplished.
The top US commander in Iraq talked with Turkey about Kurdish rebels in Northern Iraq. Turkey has been regularly invading Iraq to attack Kurds. Will they soon have explicit permission?
The Associated Press wrote a long screed about how American soldiers who commit crimes in Iraq may have to face Iraqi law. AP does not seem to mind that millions of Iraqis will have to use the same laws.
Iraq and the US have agreed to let Iraq prosecute some crimes committed by Americans in Iraq and a time line for US withdrawal. In other news, McCain’s head explodes when someone says “time line.”
“Turkish officials on Tuesday pressed the president of Iraq’s Kurdish enclave to crack down on the Kurdish separatists launching cross-border attacks from their Iraqi mountain sanctuaries.”