How goes YOUR WAR today,
MR. BUSH?
The government which was designed for the people, has got into the hands of their bosses and their employers, the special interests. An invisible empire has been set up above the forms of democracy.
– Woodrow Wilson
Sightings from The Catbird Seat
~ o ~
April 10, 2009
Breaking news: Indictment of Bush
Officials May Come in Days
Newsweek Breaks Shocking New Revelations
About Disappeared Persons
From Pinochet to Bush, the Path to Prosecution
* The imminent indictment in Spanish courts of former officials of the Bush Administration is being applauded by civil and human rights organizations and legal scholars. The popular wave of support for indictment of Bush officials will inevitably lead to Bush himself.
* Newsweek Magazine blew open more shocking news about Bush' system of kidnapping, secret prisons and torture. A secret Red Cross report indicates that many kidnapped and tortured people were turned into "disappeared persons" by the CIA under instructions from Bush and Cheney. A former Bush administration official told Newsweek's Michael Isikoff that the information had been hidden from the Red Cross. "The majority of the people in the CIA program are unaccounted for. We don't know what happened to them," a human rights investigator told Isikoff.
* Like Bush, former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, thought his power would shield him from criminal prosecution when his regime kidnapped and tortured and assassinated individuals who became known as the "disappeared." It was when Spanish courts brought indictments against Pinochet that everything changed. As Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights said, "the importance of this investigation [in Spain] can not be understated. Contrary to statements by some, the Spanish investigations are not 'symbolic.' Just ask Augusto Pinochet, who was stranded under house arrest in England and who ultimately faced criminal charges in Chile because of the pressure of the Spanish courts. If and when arrest warrants are issued, 24 countries in Europe are obligated to enforce them. The world is getting smaller for the torture conspirators.”
Ramsey Clark, former U.S. Attorney General has called for the prosecution of Bush and other high officials in the United States, stating, "The greatest danger arising from impunity for President Bush and his cohorts would be that all subsequent officials will feel secure in committing the same crimes and the people, having failed to compel impeachment for such open, notorious and egregious crimes, will feel even more helpless to prevent them. Ultimately the power and the responsibility to prevent criminal acts by government is with the people."
Now is the time for massive outreach and publicity. This requires newspaper ads, organizing national call-in days to pressure Congressional representatives, intensive media work, teach-ins and educational forums, and providing literature for people of conscience to distribute in cities and towns across the country....
--All of us at http://www.IndictBushNow.org
“Blinded by the lies,” by Carl Klang
"Can't you see? Are you blinded by the lies?"
- Jesus Christ of Nazareth
January 25, 2009
Afghan president: US forces
killed 16 civilians
By JASON STRAZIUSO and RAHIM FAIEZ, Associated Press
KABUL, Afghanistan – President Hamid Karzai condemned a U.S. operation he said killed 16 Afghan civilians, while hundreds of villagers denounced the American military during an angry demonstration Sunday.
Karzai said the killing of innocent Afghans during U.S. military operations "is strengthening the terrorists."
He also announced that his Ministry of Defense sent Washington a draft technical agreement that seeks to give Afghanistan more oversight over U.S. military operations. The same letter has also been sent to NATO headquarters.
Karzai in recent weeks has increasingly lashed out at his Western backers over the issue of civilian casualties, even as U.S. politicians and a top NATO official have publicly criticized Karzai for the slow pace of progress here.
The back-and-forth comes as the new administration of President Barack Obama must decide whether to support Karzai as he seeks re-election later this year as part of the United States' overall Afghan strategy.
Karzai's latest criticism follows a Saturday raid in Laghman province that the U.S. says killed 15 armed militants, including a woman with an RPG, but that Afghan officials say killed civilians.
Two women and three children were among the 16 dead civilians, Karzai said in a statement.
In Laghman's capital, hundreds of angry demonstrators denounced the U.S. military Sunday and demanded an end to overnight raids. U.S. military leaders, victims' relatives and Afghan officials — including two top Karzai advisers — met at the governor's compound to discuss the issue, Gov. Latifullah Mashal said.
"The U.S. military said 'We are sorry for this incident and after this we are going to coordinate our operations with Afghan forces,'" Mashal said.
Civilian deaths during U.S. operations have been a huge point of friction between the Afghan government and U.S. and NATO militaries. Many of the deaths happen on overnight raids by U.S. Special Forces who launch operations against specific insurgent leaders....
Karzai last week told parliament that the U.S. and NATO have not heeded his calls to stop airstrikes in civilian areas....
Civilian deaths are an extremely complicated issue in Afghanistan. Afghan villagers have been known to exaggerate civilian death claims in order to receive more compensation from the U.S. military, and officials have said that insurgents sometimes force villagers to make false death claims.
But the U.S. military has also been known to not fully acknowledge when it killed civilians.
After a battle in August in the village of Azizabad, the U.S. military at first said no civilians were killed. A day later it said about five died, and eventually a more thorough U.S. investigation found 33 civilians were killed. The Afghan government and the U.N. said 90 civilians were killed.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090125/ap_on_re_as/as_afghanistan
September 9, 2008
US re-examines Afghan attack
that killed civilians
By JASON STRAZIUSO, Associated Press
The U.S. military said Sunday it has "new information" about an American attack that Afghanistan says killed 90 civilians and it is sending a senior military officer to the country to review its initial investigation that concluded no more than seven civilians died.
The military did not say what new information had emerged. But Afghan and Western officials say Afghanistan's intelligence agency and the U.N. both have video of the aftermath of the airstrikes on Azizabad village showing dozens of dead women and children.
An Afghan government commission has said 90 civilians, including 60 children and 15 women, died in the Aug. 22 bombings, a finding that the U.N. backed in its own initial report.
But a U.S. investigation released Tuesday said only up to seven civilians and 35 militants were killed in the operation in the western province of Herat.
A U.N. official who has seen one video of Azizabad told The Associated Press it shows maimed children. The official became highly emotional describing rows of bodies.
A second Western official has said one video shows bodies of "tens of children" lined up and he called the video "gruesome." The two officials spoke on condition they not be identified because the videos had not been publicly released.
Although the U.S. said Tuesday its investigation of the attack was complete, the military at that time appeared to leave open the possibility that photographs or video from the scene could emerge. American officials said privately last week that they were aware photographic evidence apparently existed, but that they did not have access to it.
"No other evidence that may have been collected by other organizations was provided to the U.S. investigating officer and therefore could not be considered in the findings," the initial U.S. report said.
On Sunday, Gen. David McKiernan — the senior U.S. officer in Afghanistan and the commander of the 40-nation NATO-led mission — had requested that an American general travel from U.S. Central Command in Florida to Afghanistan to review the U.S. investigation.
That announcement followed by one day a statement attributed to McKiernan on Azizabad that said:
"We realize there is a large discrepancy between the number of civilians casualties reported" and McKiernan would continue to "try to account for this disparity."
The New York Times reported on its Web site Sunday that one of its reporters had seen cell phone video in Azizabad of at least 11 dead children among some 30 to 40 bodies laid out in the village mosque. The Times also said Azizabad had 42 freshly dug graves, including 13 so small they could hold only children.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai has for years now warned the U.S. and NATO that it must stop killing civilians in its bombing runs, saying such deaths undermine his government and the international mission. But the Azizabad incident could finally push Karzai to take action.
Shortly after the Azizabad attack, he ordered a review of whether the U.S. and NATO should be allowed to use airstrikes or carry out raids in villages. He also called for an updated "status of force" agreement between the Afghan government and foreign militaries. That review has not yet been completed.
Nek Mohammad Ishaq, a provincial council member in Herat and a member of the Afghan investigating commission, has said photographs and video taken of the victims are with Afghanistan's secretive intelligence service.
Ahmad Nader Nadery, spokesman for Afghanistan's Independent Human Rights Commission, has said a villager named Reza, whose compound bore the brunt of the attack, had a private security company that worked for the U.S. military at nearby Shindand airport.
Villagers and officials have said the operation was based on faulty information provided by a rival of Reza. Aziz Ahmad Nadem, a member of parliament from Herat, has told the AP that the rival is now being protected by the U.S. military.
Afghan officials say U.S. special forces and Afghan commandos raided the village while hundreds of people were gathered in a large compound for a memorial service honoring a tribal leader, Timor Shah, who was killed eight months ago by a rival, Nader Tawakal. Reza, who was killed in the Aug. 22 operation, is Shah's brother.
The U.S. investigative report released Tuesday said American and Afghan forces took fire from militants while approaching Azizabad and that "justified use of well-aimed small-arms fire and close air support to defend the combined force."
The report said investigators discovered evidence that the militants planned to attack a nearby coalition base. Evidence collected included weapons, explosives, intelligence materials and an access badge to the base, as well as photographs from inside and outside the base.
July 27, 2008
U.S. acknowledges Baghdad victims were law-abiding, not insurgents
By Leila Fadel, McClatchy Newspapers
BAGHDAD -- The U.S. military said Sunday that the three people killed last month after U.S. soldiers shot at their car in one of the most secured areas of Iraq were civilians, not criminals as the military initially reported.
The correction came more than a month after a bank manager at a branch inside the airport, Hafeth Aboud Mahdi , and two female bank employees were shot at by U.S. soldiers as they sped to work on a road within the secured airport compound. The road is used only by people with high-level security clearance badges. The car veered off the road, hit a concrete blast wall and burst into flames.
The original statement said that Mahdi and the two women were "criminals" and that an American convoy on the side of the secured road came under small-arms fire from the vehicle. Soldiers said they shot back. A weapon was found in the debris and two U.S. military vehicles were struck by bullets from the attack, the statement on June 25 said.
"When we are attacked, we will defend ourselves and will use deadly force if necessary," said Maj. Joey Sullinger , a spokesman for 4th Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division, said at the time. "Such attacks endanger not only U.S. soldiers but also innocent civilians, including women and children, traveling the roadways of Baghdad ."
On Sunday the story changed and the tone was apologetic. A military statement said that neither the civilians who were killed nor the soldiers were at fault for the deaths. An investigation found that "the driver and passengers were law-abiding citizens of Iraq ."
Soldiers had pulled off the road because one of the vehicles in the convoy was having maintenance problems. As they worked on the vehicle they saw Mahdi's car and thought it was moving too quickly toward them, the statement said. Believing they might be in danger, the soldiers warned the car. When the driver ignored the signals they shot at the vehicle, the statement said.
The alleged attack and the weapon that was said to have been recovered from the burned vehicle were misunderstandings, the statement said.
"This was an extremely unfortunate and tragic incident," said Col. Allen Batschelet , chief of staff, MND-B and 4th Infantry Division, in a statement. "Our deepest regrets of sympathy and condolences go out to the family. We are taking several corrective measures to amend and eliminate the possibility of such situations happening in the future."
Mahdi's son, Mohammed Hafeth, said the statement was insufficient.
He said the image of his father's burning vehicle haunts him. He'd waited in his father's office that morning surprised that he wasn't there yet. They'd left at nearly the same time that morning.
Hafeth drives bank employees to work. That morning his father offered to take one of Hafeth's passengers and picked up another female bank employee who lived nearby their central Baghdad home.
As he sat in the office a colleague walked in and told Hafeth his father's car was broken down on the airport road. Hafeth reached for his car keys.
"I'll drive," he recalled his colleague saying.
As they approached his father's car he saw the flames. He jumped from the car and started to run toward the burning vehicle, but U.S. soldiers blocked his way.
"Go," he recalled them ordering. But he said he couldn't move. He dropped to the ground and wept as his father burned inside the vehicle.
"Why did they kill him like this?" Mohammed Hafeth said Sunday in a phone interview. "We demand that they send those soldiers to an Iraqi and American court."
Mahdi was the father of six, including Hafeth. Hafeth said he now shoulders the financial responsibility for his family on his approximately $100 -a-month salary.
"I was shocked that my father was killed by the Americans," he said. "Supposedly we move in a secured area ... we used to wave at them and they waved at us."
Hafeth said he didn't accept the compensation offered by the U.S. military. They offered $10,000 , he said, and that wasn't enough for his father's car let alone his father's life.
"My father was a peaceful man," he said. "He never did anything wrong. Everybody knew his good reputation and everybody liked him."
July 20, 2008
As wars lengthen, toll on
military families mounts
By DAVID CRARY, AP National Writer
Far from the combat zones, the strains and separations of no-end-in-sight wars are taking an ever-growing toll on military families despite the armed services' earnest efforts to help.
Divorce lawyers see it in the breakup of youthful marriages as long, multiple deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan fuel alienation and mistrust. Domestic violence experts see it in the scuffles that often precede a soldier's departure or sour a briefly joyous homecoming.
Teresa Moss, a counselor at Fort Campbell's Lincoln Elementary School, hears it in the voices of deployed soldiers' children as they meet in groups to share accounts of nightmares, bedwetting and heartache.
"They listen to each other. They hear that they aren't the only ones not able to sleep, having their teachers yell at them," Moss said.
Even for Army spouses with solid marriages, the repeated separations are an ordeal.
"Three deployments in, I still have days when I want to hide under the bed and cry," said Jessica Leonard, who is raising two small children and teaching a "family team building" class to other wives at Fort Campbell. Her husband, Capt. Lance Leonard, is in Iraq.
Those classes are among numerous initiatives to support war-strained families. Yet military officials acknowledge that the vast needs outweigh available resources, and critics complain of persistent shortcomings — a dearth of updated data on domestic violence, short shrift for families of National Guard and Reserve members, inadequate support for spouses and children of wounded and traumatized soldiers.
If the burden sounds heavier than what families bore in the longest wars of the 20th century — World War II and Vietnam — that's because it is, at least in some ways. What makes today's wars distinctive is the deployment pattern — two, three, sometimes four overseas stints of 12 or 15 months. In the past, that kind of schedule was virtually unheard of.
"Its hard to go away, it's hard to come back, and go away and come back again," said Dr. David Benedek, a leading Army psychiatrist. "That is happening on a larger scale than in our previous military endeavors. They're just getting their feet wet with some sort of sense of normalcy, and then they have to go again."
Almost in one breath, military officials praise the resiliency that enables most families to endure and acknowledge candidly that the wars expose them to unprecedented stresses and the risk of long-lasting scars.
"There's nothing that has prepared many of our families for the length of these deployments," said Rene Robichaux, social work programs manager for the U.S. Army Medical Command. "It's hard to communicate to a family member how stressful the environment is, not just the risk of injury or death, but the austere circumstances, the climate, the living conditions."
An array of studies by the Army and outside researchers say that marital strains, risk of child maltreatment and other problems harmful to families worsen as soldiers serve multiple combat tours.
For example, a Pentagon-funded study last year concluded that children in some Army families were markedly more vulnerable to abuse and neglect by their mothers when their fathers were deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan.
In Iraq, the latest survey by Army mental health experts showed that more than 15 percent of married soldiers deployed there were planning a divorce, with the rates for soldiers at the late stages of deployment triple those of recent arrivals.
For the Army, especially, the challenges are staggering as it furnishes the bulk of combat forces. As of last year, more than 55 percent of its soldiers were married, a far higher rate than during the Vietnam war. The nearly 513,000 soldiers on active duty collectively had more than 493,000 children.
Jessica Leonard at Fort Campbell says family support programs there have improved since her husband's first combat tour, helping her feel more self-reliant. Yet she's convinced that domestic violence and divorce are rising at the base, which is home to the 101st Airborne Division.
"Infidelity is huge on both sides — a wife is lonely, she looks for attention and finds it easier to cheat," she said. "It does make even the most sound marriages second-guess."
Among soldiers coming home, whether for two-week breaks that often end with wrenching good-byes or for longer stays, she sees evidence of lower morale and rising depression.
"They come home, and find that problems are still there," she said. "Instead of a refreshing R-and-R, a nice little second honeymoon, it's battle for two weeks."
There have been some horrific incidents shattering families of soldiers back from the wars — a former Army paratrooper from Michigan charged with raping and beating his infant daughter; a sergeant from Hawaii's Army National Guard accused of killing his 14-year-old son as the boy tried to save his pregnant mother from a knife attack by the soldier.
In one of the saddest cases, a recently divorced airman who served with distinction in Iraq chased his ex-wife out of military housing with a pistol in February before killing his two young children and himself at Oklahoma's Tinker Air Force Base. Tech. Sgt. Dustin Thorson's former wife had sought a protection order against him, saying he threatened to kill the children if she filed for divorce.
Officials at Tinker, while confirming that Thorson had been getting mental health care, would not say whether those problems related to his service in Iraq.
His brother, Shane Thorson, a sheriff's deputy from Pasco, Wash., who also served in Iraq, has no doubt Dustin's war experiences contributed to the tragedy.
"He didn't want to go — he was afraid, but he had a job that he'd signed up to do and he went and did it," Shane said. "I do think it led up to everything that happened. ... It opened up a world of death and chaos and uncertainty."
Shane, who is married and has an 8-year-old daughter, is sure the deployments have damaged many marriages.
"My wife and friends, they tell me I'm not the same person before I came back — not as loving," he said. "You really realize how insignificant you are in this world, and life moves on whether you're there or not."...
Advocacy groups also say more must be done for families of wounded and traumatized soldiers who leave the service. At a recent congressional hearing, Barbara Cohoon of the National Military Families Association suggested the Veterans Administration is not meeting these needs, and said the anguish of wounded soldiers' children "is often overlooked and underestimated."
Stacy Bannerman, an anti-war activist whose husband served with the Washington State National Guard in Iraq, says many Guard members and reservists don't get adequate treatment when — like her husband — they are diagnosed with PTSD.
"The families are scattered everywhere, and we don't have the support networks that active duty does," Bannerman said. "There's very little attention paid to reintegration — bammo, you suddenly go back to your civilian life. I haven't spoken to anyone who hasn't experienced some degree of stress on a marriage."
Her own marriage nearly became one of the casualties. She and her husband, Lorin, were separated for more than a year, but now — after finding a counselor outside the military — are working at reconciliation even as Lorin faces a second deployment to Iraq in August.
"It's been a long, arduous process," said Bannerman, who has moved to Oregon to work at an animal sanctuary which is seeking to involve traumatized veterans in its programs.
Many returning soldiers experience some form of depression, lapsing into substance abuse, sleeping fitfully, withdrawing from family activities. Children may feel their father is too distant, or unsettlingly changed....
On the Net:
Army family-support programs: http://www.behavioralhealth.army.mil/
Monday, March 24, 2008
From: "maillist@michaelmoore.com" <maillist@michaelmoore.com>
To: the-catbird
Subject: So? ... A Note from Michael Moore
Friends,
It would have to happen on Easter Sunday, wouldn't it, that the 4,000th American soldier would die in Iraq. Play me that crazy preacher again, will you, about how maybe God, in all his infinite wisdom, may not exactly be blessing America these days. Is anyone surprised?
4,000 dead. Unofficial estimates are that there may be up to 100,000 wounded, injured, or mentally ruined by this war. And there could be up to a million Iraqi dead. We will pay the consequences of this for a long, long time. God will keep blessing America.
And where is Darth Vader in all this? A reporter from ABC News this week told Dick Cheney, in regards to Iraq, "two-thirds of Americans say it's not worth fighting." Cheney cut her off with a one word answer: "So?"
"So?" As in, "So what?" As in, "F*** you. I could care less."
I would like every American to see Cheney flip the virtual bird at the them, the American people. Click here and pass it around. Then ask yourself why we haven't risen up and thrown him and his puppet out of the White House.
The Democrats have had the power to literally pull the plug on this war for the past 15 months -- and they have refused to do so. What are we to do about that? Continue to sink into our despair? Or get creative? Real creative. I know there are many of you reading this who have the chutzpah and ingenuity to confront your local congressperson. Will you? For me?
Cheney spent Wednesday, the 5th anniversary of the war, not mourning the dead he killed, but fishing off the Sultan of Oman's royal yacht. So? Ask your favorite Republican what they think of that.
The Founding Fathers would never have uttered the presumptuous words, "God Bless America." That, to them, sounded like a command instead of a request, and one doesn't command God, even if they are America. In fact, they were worried God would punish America. During the Revolutionary War, George Washington feared that God would react unfavorably against his soldiers for the way they were behaving. John Adams wondered if God might punish America and cause it to lose the war, just to prove His point that America was not worthy. They and the others believed it would be arrogant on their part to assume that God would single out America for a blessing. What a long road we have traveled since then.
I see that Frontline on PBS this week has a documentary called "Bush's War." That's what I've been calling it for a long time. It's not the "Iraq War." Iraq did nothing. Iraq didn't plan 9/11. It didn't have weapons of mass destruction. It DID have movie theaters and bars and women wearing what they wanted and a significant Christian population and one of the few Arab capitals with an open synagogue.
But that's all gone now. Show a movie and you'll be shot in the head. Over a hundred women have been randomly executed for not wearing a scarf. I'm happy, as a blessed American, that I had a hand in all this. I just paid my taxes, so that means I helped to pay for this freedom we've brought to Baghdad. So? Will God bless me?
God bless all of you in this Easter Week as we begin the 6th year of Bush's War.
God help America. Please.
Michael Moore
MMFlint@aol.com
MichaelMoore.com
October 21, 2007
US: Raid of Baghdad's
Sadr City kills 49
By STEVEN R. HURST, Associated Press Writer
The U.S. military said its forces killed an estimated 49 militants during a dawn raid to capture an Iranian-linked militia chief in Baghdad's Sadr City enclave, one of the highest tolls for a single operation since President Bush declared an end to active combat in 2003.
Iraqi police and hospital officials, who often overstate casualties, reported only 15 deaths including three children. Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said all the dead were civilians.
Al-Dabbagh said on CNN that Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite, had met with the U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, to protest the action.
Associated Press photos showed the bodies of two toddlers, one with a gouged face, swaddled in blankets on a morgue floor. Their shirts were pulled up, exposing their abdomens, and a diaper showed above the waistband of one boy's shorts. Relatives said the children were killed when helicopter gunfire hit their house as they slept.
One local resident said some of the casualties were people sleeping on roofs to seek relief from the heat and lack of electricity. The Iraqi officials said 52 were wounded in the raid on the sprawling district.
The U.S. military said it was not aware of any civilian casualties, and the discrepancy in the death tolls and accounts of what happened could not be reconciled. American commanders reported no U.S. casualties.
The raid on the dangerous Shiite slum was aimed at capturing an alleged rogue militia chief, one of thousands of fighters who have broken with Muqtada al-Sadr's mainstream Mahdi Army. The military did not say if the man was captured. He was also not named.
The Shiite cleric has ordered gunmen loyal to him to put down their arms. But thousands of followers dissatisfied with being taken out of the fight have formed a loose confederation armed and trained by Iran.
The U.S. operation was the latest in a series that have produced significant death tolls, including civilians, as American forces increasingly take the fight to Sunni insurgents, al-Qaida militants and Shiite militiamen.
The intensity and frequency of American attacks and raids have grown since the arrival of the last of 30,000 additional soldiers on June 15.
The reinforcements were ordered into Iraq earlier this year by Bush and have inflicted a heavy toll on militants on both sides of Iraq's sectarian divide. American commanders credit the troop buildup for a sharp drop in the number of attacks and deaths of U.S. soldiers and Iraqi civilians, particularly in the past two months.
As U.S. forces pounded Sadr City, the potential grew for a fresh explosion of fighting on a new front, Iraq's northern border with Turkey.
Early Sunday, Kurdish separatist rebels who take shelter in the rugged mountains on the Iraqi side of the frontier ambushed a military unit inside Turkey and killed at least 12 soldiers. Turkish forces responded by lobbing at least 15 artillery shells toward mainly abandoned Kurdish villages inside Iraq, according to Iraqi border guard Col. Hussein Rashid. He said there were no casualties.
In the Sadr City raid, the U.S. military said forces killed "an estimated 49 criminals" in three linked attacks during an intelligence-driven raid to capture the rogue Shiite kidnapper who was partially funded by Iran.
U.S. troops returned fire under attack from automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades from nearby buildings as they began raiding structures in the district, according to a statement. It said 33 militants were killed in the firefight. Ground forces then called in helicopter airstrikes, which killed six more militants.
As American soldiers left the zone, troops were hit by a roadside bomb and continued heavy fire, killing 10 more combatants.
"All total, coalition forces estimate that 49 criminals were killed in three separate engagements during this operation. Ground forces reported they were unaware of any innocent civilians being killed as a result of this operation," the military said.
A local resident who goes by the name Abu Fatmah said his neighbor's 14-year-old son, Saif Alwan, was killed while sleeping on the roof.
"Saif was killed by an airstrike and what is his guilt? Is he from the Mahdi Army? He is a poor student," Abu Fatmah said.
An uncle of 2-year-old Ali Hamid said the boy was killed and his parents seriously wounded when helicopter gunfire pierced the wall and windows of their house as they slept indoors.
Relatives gathered at Sadr City's Imam Ali hospital where the emergency room was overwhelmed with bloodied casualties. The dead were placed in caskets covered by Iraqi flags.
APTN video showed three bloodied boys sitting on hospital tables and an elderly man being treated for a head wound. Mourners tied wooden coffins onto the tops of minivans with a plume of smoke in the background. Other footage showed a U.S. helicopter flying over the area while black smoke rose.
The sweeps into Sadr City have sent a strong message that U.S. forces plan no letup on suspected Shiite militia cells despite objections from the Shiite-led government of al-Maliki, who is working for closer cooperation with Shiite heavyweight Iran.
An Iraqi military spokesman, Brig. Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi, said the government would ask the Americans for an explanation of Sunday's raid and stressed the need to avoid civilian deaths.
The government has issued mixed reactions to the raids and airstrikes, particularly those that have targeted Sunni extremists.
U.S. troops backed by attack aircraft killed 19 suspected insurgents and 15 civilians, including nine children, in an operation Oct. 11 targeting al-Qaida in Iraq leaders northwest of Baghdad.
Al-Maliki's government said those killings were a "sorrowful matter," but emphasized that civilian deaths are unavoidable in the fight against al-Qaida in Iraq.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071022/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq
October 13, 2007
Ex-general:
'No end in sight'
in Iraq
By STEVEN KOMAROW, Associated Press Writer
ARLINGTON, Va. - The U.S. mission in Iraq is a "nightmare with no end in sight" because of political misjudgments after the fall of Saddam Hussein that continue today, a former chief of U.S.-led forces said Friday.
Retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, who commanded coalition troops for a year beginning June 2003, cast a wide net of blame for both political and military shortcomings in Iraq that helped open the way for the insurgency — such as disbanding the Saddam-era military and failing to cement ties with tribal leaders and quickly establish civilian government after Saddam was toppled.
He called current strategies — including the deployment of 30,000 additional forces earlier this year — a "desperate attempt" to make up for years of misguided policies in Iraq.
"There is no question that America is living a nightmare with no end in sight," Sanchez told a group of journalists covering military affairs.
Sanchez avoided singling out at any specific official. But he did criticize the State Department, the National Security Council, Congress and the senior military leadership during what appeared to be a broad indictment of White House policies and a lack of leadership to oppose them.
Such assessments — even by former Pentagon brass — are not new, but they have added resonance as debates over war strategy dominate the presidential campaign.
The Bush administration didn't directly address Sanchez's critical views.
"We appreciate his service to the country," said White House spokesman Trey Bohn. He added that as U.S. commander in Iraq Gen. David Petraeus and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker have said: "There is more work to be done, but progress is being made in Iraq and that's what we're focused on now."
Sanchez retired from the Army last year, two years after he completing a tumultuous year as commander of all U.S. forces in Iraq. As he stepped down, he called his career a casualty of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal.
He was never charged with anything but he was not promoted in the aftermath of the prisoner abuse reports. He was criticized by some for not doing more to avoid mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners.
Sanchez told the gathering that he thought he had made mistakes and said he didn't always fully appreciate the secondary affects of actions the military took.
He did deny reports that he and then-Iraqi administrator L. Paul Bremer were not on speaking terms. He said they spoke every day.
The retired soldier stressed that it became clear during his command that the mission was severely handicapped because the State Department and other agencies were not adequately contributing to a mission that could not be won by military force alone.
When asked when he saw that the mission was going awry, he responded: "About the 15th of June 2003" — the day he took command.
"There is nothing going on today in Washington that would give us hope" that things are going to change, he said.
Sanchez went on to offer a pessimistic view on the current U.S. strategy against extremists will make lasting gains, but said a full-scale withdrawal also was not an option.
"The American military finds itself in an intractable situation ... America has no choice but to continue our efforts in Iraq," said Sanchez, who works as a consultant training U.S. generals.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071013/ap_on_re_mi_ea/sanchez_iraq
September 26, 2007
Bush seeks nearly $50 billion
more for wars
Defense Secretary Gates will make appeal
for $190 billion, a third more
MSNBC, Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary Robert Gates will ask Congress on Wednesday to approve nearly $190 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2008, increasing initial projections by more than a third.
President Bush and Congress are headed toward another showdown on war spending, this time sparring over nearly $190 billion the Pentagon said is needed to keep combat in Iraq afloat for another year.
Sen. Robert Byrd, chairman of the Appropriations Committee, vowed Wednesday not to “rubber stamp” the request and said it was time to put Bush’s policies in check.
“We cannot create a democracy at the point of a gun,” said Byrd, D-W.Va., whose speech during a Senate hearing on the spending request were interrupted several times by cheers of anti-war protesters.
“Sending more guns does not change that reality,” Byrd said.
The tough rhetoric was reminiscent of last spring, when Congress passed and Bush vetoed a bill funding the war through September but ordering troop withdrawals to begin by Oct. 1. Supporters lacked the two-thirds majority needed to override a presidential veto.
If approved, Congress would have appropriated more than $760 billion for the two wars, having already approved of $450 billion for Iraq and $127 billion for Afghanistan....
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20991580/
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National Priorities Project - Cost of War
$ $ $ $ $
September 13, 2007
Sunni Leader Praised
By Bush Is Killed
'Brave Man' Praised
The death of an influential Sunni leader whose followers have been helping U.S. and Iraqi forces fight al-Qaida in Iraq is the result of an assassination, the Iraqi government said Thursday.
A roadside bomb exploded outside the farm of Abdul-Sattar Abu Risha, killing the sheik and two of his aides, chief government spokesman Ali Aldabbagh told reporters in a conference call.
Sattar was a "very brave man" who "took the lead to protect the al Anbar and all the worst areas at a time when everybody was afraid and scared of even talking against al-Qaida," Aldabbagh said.
Sattar led a group known as the Anbar Salvation Council. The Pentagon said his followers were part of the movement in Anbar province to side with coalition forces against al-Qaida.
The sheik was among a group of tribal leaders who met with President George W. Bush on Labor Day at Al Asad Air Base in Anbar province.
Aldabbagh said said the killings will motivate Sunnis in the region to fight even harder against al-Qaida.
"They have to continue in order to protect their region from any such terrorist groups," he said.
The White House, preparing for Bush's Iraq speech to the nation Thursday night, called his death an "unfortunate and outrageous act."
During a visit Sept. 3 to al-Asad Air Base, Bush hailed the courage of Abu Risha and others "who have made a decision to reject violence and murder in return for moderation and peace."
Bush spokeswoman Dana Perino said Abu Risha "was one of the first to come forward to want to work with the United States to repel al-Qaida."
Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. military commander in Iraq, had praised the Anbar uprising in hearings this week before Congress. He called the news of Sattar's death a "tragic loss."
"It's a terrible loss for Anbar province and all of Iraq. It shows how significant his importance was and it shows al-Qaida in Iraq remains a very dangerous and barbaric enemy. He was an organizing force that did help organize alliances and did help keep the various tribes together," Petraeus said in a statement.
http://www.knbc.com/news/14107188/detail.html
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September 1, 2007
More Than 1,800 Iraqis
Killed in August
By DAVID RISING, AP
Filed Under: Iraq News, World News
Civilian deaths rose slightly in August from July's figure as a huge suicide attack in the north two weeks ago offset security gains elsewhere, according to figures compiled Saturday by The Associated Press.
U.S. deaths remained well below figures from last winter when the U.S began dispatching 30,000 additional troops to Iraq.
At least 1,809 civilians were killed last month, compared to 1,760 in July, based on figures compiled by the AP from official Iraqi reports. That brings to 27,564 the number of Iraqi civilians killed since AP began collecting data on April 28, 2005.
The August total included 520 people killed in quadruple suicide bombings on Yazidi communities near the Syrian border. The horrific attacks made Aug. 14 was the single deadliest day since the war began in March 2003.
Eighty-five coalition troops - 81 American and four British - died in August, down from 88 the month before, including 79 Americans. The average rate of 2.74 coalition deaths per day was the second lowest since the surge began, and down from a peak of 4.23 per day in May.
U.S. officials have maintained that violence is declining in Iraq in the run-up to a series of reports to Congress this month that will decide the course of the U.S. military presence here.
The top U.S. commander, Gen. David Petraeus, was quoted Friday as saying the troop increase has sharply reduced sectarian killings in Baghdad. Petraeus is expected to make the same point when he reports to Congress in about two weeks.
"If you look at Baghdad, which is hugely important because it is the center of everything in Iraq, you can see the density plot on ethno-sectarian deaths," the Australian newspaper quoted him as saying during an interview in the Iraqi capital.
"It's a bit macabre but some areas were literally on fire with hundreds of bodies every week and a total of 2,100 in the month of December '06, Iraq-wide. It is still much too high but we think in August in Baghdad it will be as little as one quarter of what it was," the newspaper quoted Petraeus, who gave no specific figures.
American hopes brightened this week when the most powerful Shiite militia leader, Muqtada al-Sadr, ordered a halt to attacks by his Mahdi Army for up to six months to reorganize and purge it of unruly factions that the U.S. maintains are armed and trained by Iran .
"If implemented, Sadr's order holds the prospect of allowing coalition and Iraqi security forces to intensify their focus on al-Qaida-Iraq and on protecting the Iraqi population," the U.S. military said in a statement Saturday.
The statement said an end to Mahdi Army violence "would also be an important step in helping Iraqi authorities focus greater attention on achieving the political and economic solutions necessary for progress and less on dealing with criminal activity, sectarian violence, kidnappings, assassinations, and attacks on Iraqi and coalition forces."
The government-run newspaper Sabah published a front-page editorial Saturday praising al-Sadr's declaration as "a correct decision" and urged other militia leaders to follow suit.
Despite those comments, U.S. and Iraqi forces have not let up on raids against extremists in Shiite areas.
Before daybreak Saturday, Iraqi and American forces raided Sadr City, the Baghdad stronghold of the Mahdi Army, detaining eight people and demolishing several cars with tanks, according to a police officer speaking on condition of anonymity. Associated Press Television News video from the scene showed several crushed cars on the street.
The U.S. military did not respond to a request for information on the raid. American commanders routinely refer to extremists targeted in raids as "rogue elements," implying they may be beyond al-Sadr's control.
Leaflets scattered around Sadr City urged people to report on Shiite militants who are cooperating with the Iranians, providing a cell phone number and an e-mail address.
"The criminal Iraqis who work with the Iranian Revolutionary Guards are toys under Persian control," read one of the leaflets, which pictured a puppet dancing on strings. "Iranian Revolutionary Guards are interfering in Iraq's affairs while Iraqis are dying."
Armed Shiite groups are locked in a struggle for power in Shiite areas of the capital and in the Shiite heartland of the south, which includes major religious shrines and vast oil wealth. Control of the shrines offers not only prestige but access to huge sums of money donated by Shiites from around the world.
As part of that power struggle, gunmen on a motorcycle assassinated Muslim al-Batat, an aide to the country's top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, police said. The attack occurred in Basra, where numerous militias are competing for power.
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August 25, 2007
Iraq body count running
at double pace
By STEVEN R. HURST, Associated Press Writer
BAGHDAD - This year's U.S. troop buildup has succeeded in bringing violence in Baghdad down from peak levels, but the death toll from sectarian attacks around the country is running nearly double the pace from a year ago.
Some of the recent bloodshed appears the result of militant fighters drifting into parts of northern Iraq, where they have fled after U.S.-led offensives. Baghdad, however, still accounts for slightly more than half of all war-related killings — the same percentage as a year ago, according to figures compiled by The Associated Press.
The tallies and trends offer a sobering snapshot after an additional 30,000 U.S. troops began campaigns in February to regain control of the Baghdad area. It also highlights one of the major themes expected in next month's Iraq progress report to Congress: some military headway, but extremist factions are far from broken.
In street-level terms, it means life for average Iraqis appears to be even more perilous and unpredictable.
The AP tracking includes Iraqi civilians, government officials, police and security forces killed in attacks such as gunfights and bombings, which are frequently blamed on Sunni suicide strikes. It also includes execution-style killings — largely the work of Shiite death squads.
The figures are considered a minimum based on AP reporting. The actual numbers are likely higher, as many killings go unreported or uncounted. Insurgent deaths are not a part of the Iraqi count.
The findings include:
• Iraq is suffering about double the number of war-related deaths throughout the country compared with last year — an average daily toll of 33 in 2006, and 62 so far this year.
• Nearly 1,000 more people have been killed in violence across Iraq in the first eight months of this year than in all of 2006. So far this year, about 14,800 people have died in war-related attacks and sectarian murders. AP reporting accounted for 13,811 deaths in 2006. The United Nations and other sources placed the 2006 toll far higher.
• Baghdad has gone from representing 76 percent of all civilian and police war-related deaths in Iraq in January to 52 percent in July, bringing it back to the same spot it was roughly a year ago.
According to the Iraqi Red Crescent Organization, the number of displaced Iraqis has more than doubled since the start of the year, from 447,337 on Jan. 1 to 1.14 million on July 31.
However, Brig. Gen. Richard Sherlock, deputy director for operational planning for the Pentagon's Joint Chiefs of Staff, said violence in Iraq "has continued to decline and is at the lowest level since June 2006."
He offered no statistics to back his claim, but in a briefing with reporters at the Pentagon on Friday he warned insurgents might try intensify attacks in Iraq to coincide with three milestones: the sixth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks in the U.S., the beginning of Ramadan and the report to Congress.
The U.S. military did not get all the additional American forces into Iraq until June 15, so it would be premature to draw a final statistical picture of the effect of the added troops.
But initial calculations validate fears that the Baghdad crackdown would push militants into districts north of the capital, including Diyala province where U.S. force and Iraqi soldiers have conducted major operation to clear its main city, Baqouba, of al-Qaida in Iraq fighters.
In July, the AP figures show 35 percent of all war-related killings occurred in northern provinces. The figure one year ago was 22 percent.
The final death count for August also will likely be further oriented to the north after the savage Aug. 14 attack by suspected al-Qaida truck bombers near the Syrian border in Ninevah province. At least 500 villagers from the Yazidi sect were killed in the deadliest civilian attack of the war.
In the first months of this year, many extremists fled to Baghdad and regions to the north after Sunni tribesmen in Anbar, the sprawling desert province west of the capital, turned on their erstwhile al-Qaida allies.
Anthony Cordesman, an Iraq expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said many militants are trying to hang onto footholds in central Iraq.
"Most of the force shifts are still in the Baghdad ring and Diyala," he said in a recent interview, predicting more spectacular attacks in the days leading to next month's report to Congress by U.S. commander Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker.
"Will it lead to more bloody attacks as they try to exploit the American political debate? Yes."
Nora Bensahel, a military analyst at the Rand Corp., said that northern Iraq had become increasingly destabilized over the past few months.
The insurgents have made a "concerted effort to concentrate attacks in other parts of the country," Bensahel said, in part to escape the increased U.S. troop presence in Baghdad and in part to give the impression that no place in Iraq is safe.
Mostly, she said, the insurgents have shifted their focus to the Baghdad suburbs, but they are particularly keen to undermine the notion that northern Iraq is a "success story" for Washington and its key Iraqi partners — including the Kurds who have maintained a near-autonomous state in the north since the early 1990s.
Staging attacks in the north "has a symbolic effect," she said.
And beyond that, Bensahel said the tactic puts the United States in a difficult situation.
"There isn't an ability to move north in any significant numbers without abandoning Baghdad" — a change in strategy that Washington is not prepared to make, she said.
But a huge problem also looms in the south, the center of Shiite political and spiritual influence and the site of Iraq's main oil fields.
There are daily gunbattles between the Mahdi Army militia — loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr — and the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, the powerhouse Shiite political party that controls most of the bureaucracy and police forces in southern Iraq.
This month, the governors of two southern provinces loyal to the Supreme Islamic Council were killed in roadside bombings.
The clashes are expected to grow more intense as Britain draws downs its forces in southern Iraq over the coming months. The effect of the shrinking British presence is already being felt, said Cordesman in an assessment released Aug. 22.
"The end result was to turn the four provinces in southeastern Iraq over to feuding Shiite factions whose actions were mixed with corruption, extortion and links to criminal activities," he wrote.
And there are increasing signs that whole regions of the south are inclined to seek increased autonomy from the center — moves that many Iraqis fear could lead to partition of the country.
In Najaf — the spiritual heart for Shiites around the world — the provincial spokesman, Ahmed Deibel, told AP early this month that the gas turbine generator there had been removed from the national electricity grid. The unilateral action has contributed to several nationwide power blackouts.
He said the provincial plant produced 50 megawatts, while the province needed at least 200 megawatts.
"What we produce is not enough even for us. We disconnected it from the national grid (Aug. 1) because the people in Baghdad were getting too much, leaving little electricity for Najaf," he said.
The No. 2 U.S. commander, Lt. Gen. Ray Odierno, has also expressed fears of a big insurgent attack in the final days before the report to Congress, but also claimed the offensives have shaken militant fighters in Baghdad and environs.
"Due to the constant pressure and depletion of their leadership, extremists have been pushed out of many population centers and are on the move, seeking other places to operate within the country," Odierno said last week.
"As a result, we are now in pursuit of al-Qaida and other extremist elements, and we'll continue to aggressively target their shrinking areas of influence," he said.
"Over the coming weeks, we plan to conduct quick-strike raids against remaining extremist sanctuaries and staging areas," Odierno said.
August 7, 2007
US missing 190,000
guns in Iraq
The Times
BAGHDAD - The US government cannot account for 190,000 weapons issued to Iraqi security forces in 2004 and 2005, according to an investigation carried out by the Government Accountability Office.
According to the July 31 report, the military "cannot fully account for about 110,000 AK-47 assault rifles, 80,000 pistols, 135,000 items of body armour and 115,000 helmets reported as issued to Iraqi forces."
The weapons disappeared from records between June 2004 and September 2005, as the military struggled to rebuild the disbanded Iraqi forces from scratch amid mounting attacks from Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias.
Since 2004 the military "has not consistently collected supporting records confirming the dates the equipment was received, the quantities of equipment delivered, or the Iraqi units receiving the items," the report said.
"Since 2006 the command has placed greater emphasis on collecting the supporting documents. However, GAO’s review of the January 2007 property books found continuing problems with missing and incomplete records."
US commanders often accuse foreign powers such as Iran of supplying arms to illegal militias fighting in Iraq, but the report shows they cannot fully account for the hundreds thousands of weapons they brought in themselves.
Last month, Turkey raised concerns over reports that separatist Kurdish guerrillas launching cross-border raids from northern Iraq had received US-supplied guns supposedly destined for Iraqi security forces.
The United States has spent 19.2 billion dollars (14 billion euros) on Iraq’s security forces since the 2003 invasion to oust Saddam Hussein, with 2.8 billion dollars devoted to equipping them.
The report comes as US President George W. Bush is under intense pressure from a Democrat-led Congress and critics within his own Republican party to show progress on Iraq, with many in both parties calling for withdrawal.
But the ability of Iraqi forces to stabilise the country in the wake of a US troop drawdown has been called into question, most recently by a mid-July progress report issued by the White House.
Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s government "has made unsatisfactory progress toward increasing the number of Iraqi security forces units capable of operating independently," that report said.
The report also found "no momentum in the government of Iraq toward developing and implementing a comprehensive disarmament program for militia members" from Iraq’s divided communities.
Four years after the 2003 US-led invasion the country remains in the grip of several overlapping conflicts, and Iraqi security forces, particularly the police, are widely believed to be infiltrated by rival militias.
http://www.sundaytimes.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=529602
August 4, 2007
Another record poppy crop in Afghanistan
By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press, Yahoo! News
WASHINGTON - Afghanistan will produce another record poppy harvest this year that cements its status as the world's near-sole supplier of the heroin source, yet a furious debate over how to reverse the trend is stalling proposals to cut the crop, U.S. officials say.
As President Bush prepares for weekend talks with Afghan President Hamid Karzai, divisions within the U.S. administration and among NATO allies have delayed release of a $475 million counternarcotics program for Afghanistan, where intelligence officials see growing links between drugs and the Taliban, the officials said.
U.N. figures to be released in September are expected to show that Afghanistan's poppy production has risen up to 15 percent since 2006 and that the country now accounts for 95 percent of the world's crop, 3 percentage points more than last year, officials familiar with preliminary statistics told The Associated Press.
But counterdrug proposals by some U.S. officials have met fierce resistance, including boosting the amount of forcible poppy field destruction in provinces that grow the most, officials said. The approach also would link millions of dollars in development aid to benchmarks on eradication; arrests and prosecutions of narcotraders, corrupt officials; and on alternative crop production.
Those ideas represent what proponents call an "enhanced carrot-and-stick approach" to supplement existing anti-drug efforts. They are the focus of the new $475 million program outlined in a 995-page report, the release of which has been postponed twice and may be again delayed due to disagreements, officials said.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because parts of the report remain classified.
Counternarcotics agents at the State Department had wanted to release a 123-page summary of the strategy last month and then again last week, but were forced to hold off because of concerns it may not be feasible, the officials said.
Now, even as Bush sees Karzai on Sunday and Monday at the presidential retreat in Camp David, Md., a tentative release date of Aug. 9, timed to follow the meetings, appears in jeopardy. Some in the administration, along with NATO allies Britain and Canada, seek revisions that could delay it until at least Aug. 13, the officials said.
The program represents a 13 percent increase over the $420 million in U.S. counternarcotics aid to Afghanistan last year. It would adopt a bold new approach to "coercive eradication" and set out criteria for local officials to receive development assistance based on their cooperation, the officials said....
"Afghanistan is providing close to 95 percent of the world's heroin," the State Department's top counternarcotics official, Tom Schweich, said at a recent conference. "That makes it almost a sole-source supplier" and presents a situation "unique in world history."
Almost all the heroin from Afghanistan makes its way to Europe; most of the heroin in the U.S. comes from Latin America.
Afghanistan last year accounted for 92 percent of global opium production, compared with 70 percent in 2000 and 52 percent a decade earlier. The higher yields in Afghanistan brought world production to a record high of 7,286 tons in 2006, 43 percent more than in 2005.
A State Department inspector general's report released Friday noted that the counternarcotics assistance is dwarfed by the estimated $38 billion "street value" of Afghanistan's poppy crop, if all is converted to heroin, and said eradication goals were "not realistic."
Schweich, an advocate of the now-stalled plan, has argued for more vigorous eradication efforts, particularly in southern Helmand province, responsible for some 80 percent of Afghanistan's poppy production. It is where, he says, growers must be punished for ignoring good-faith appeals to switch to alternative, but less lucrative, crops.
"They need to be dealt with in a more severe way," he said at the conference sponsored by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "There needs to be a coercive element, that's something we're not going to back away from or shy away from."
But, in fact, many question whether this is the right approach with Afghanistan mired in poverty and in the throes of an insurgency run by the Taliban and residual al-Qaida forces.
Along with Britain, whose troops patrol Helmand, elements in the State Department, U.S. Agency for International Development, the Defense Department and White House Office of National Drug Control Policy have expressed concern, saying that more raids will drive farmers with no other income to join extremists.
There is also skepticism about the incentives in the new strategy from those who believe development assistance should not be denied to local communities because of poppy growth, officials said.
Opponents argue that the benefits of such aid, new roads and other infrastructure, schools and hospitals, will themselves be powerful tools to combat the narcotrade once constructed....
May 29, 2007
Losing the 'other war'
in Afghanistan?
By Karl F. Inderfurth, International Herald-Tribune
WASHINGTON:
Controversy rages over the war in Iraq, but what about the so-called other war in Afghanistan, for which there is strong bipartisan support in the United States and in the international community? Is there a danger of losing in Afghanistan? The answer is yes.
Almost six years after U.S.- led military forces removed the Taliban and its Qaeda support network from power, major challenges are seriously undermining popular support and trust in the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai: A resurgent Taliban and a growing sense of insecurity throughout the country, including Kabul; rampant corruption, ineffective law enforcement and a weak judicial system; a failure to provide social services, lagging reconstruction and high unemployment; a booming drug trade and too many warlords.
Now another challenge is rising to the top of that list - the increasing civilian death toll.
Last year more than a thousand Afghans died. Three quarters were killed in Taliban attacks, many deliberately aimed at civilians. But some 230 innocent Afghans also died as a result of air strikes and ground operations by U.S. military and NATO forces. This year those numbers are on the rise.
Since March there have been at least six incidents in which Western troops, mainly those under American command, have been accused of killing Afghan civilians, with more than 135 deaths reported and many more wounded. According to Red Cross, bombing by U.S. forces in western Afghanistan last month destroyed or badly damaged some 170 houses and left almost 2,000 people in four villages homeless.
Mounting civilian casualties are turning Afghans against the nearly 45,000 U.S. and NATO troops in their country, provoking demonstrations and a motion in the upper house of Parliament to set a date for their withdrawal. These incidents also provide a propaganda windfall and new recruits for the Taliban.
Karzai has told U.S. and NATO commanders that the patience of the Afghan people is wearing thin. He said civilian deaths and aggressive, arbitrary searches of people's houses have reached an unacceptable level, adding "Afghans cannot put up with it any longer."
Several actions are needed to address this problem. First, the United States and NATO should publicly adopt the goal of "zero innocent civilian casualties," as recommended a year ago by retired General Barry McCaffrey after a trip to Afghanistan. To accomplish this, military tactics must change to limit casualties even where this means, in McCaffrey's words, "Taliban units escape destruction by hiding among the people."
Second, more must be done to put "an Afghan face on operations," as called for by the former NATO commander in Afghanistan, General David Richards of Britain. This means closer coordination on military operations with the Afghan Ministry of Defense and the Afghan National Army. Afghan soldiers should also be included in U.S. and NATO military actions to act as a buffer, a longstanding demand of Karzai. It is also imperative to work more closely with the local authorities and do more to respect Afghan sensibilities. U.S. and NATO policies regarding house searches and detentions of residents should be reconsidered.
Third, the United States should conclude a Status of Forces Agreement with Afghanistan. Such an agreement is intended to clarify the legal terms under which a foreign military is allowed to operate in a country, including locations of bases and access to facilities as well as matters affecting the relations between a military force and civilians. Nearly six years into the U.S. military campaign, a formal, binding understanding with the Afghan government is needed, in part to underscore the political message that the U.S. military is there at the invitation of the Afghan people, not as an "occupier" (which some Afghans are beginning to feel that it is).
Finally, NATO should set up a compensation fund for civilian deaths, injuries or property damage resulting from its military operations in Afghanistan. Since 2002 the United States has appropriated more than $12 million to help Afghan civilians harmed by U.S. operations. The funds are used for medical, rehabilitation and reconstruction aid. But NATO, as a whole, does not have an equivalent program.
On May 8, a U.S. Army brigade commander issued a formal apology to families of 19 Afghan civilians who were killed by U.S. marines after they were ambushed by a suicide bomber. "I stand before you today," he said, "deeply, deeply ashamed and terribly sorry that Americans have killed and wounded innocent Afghan people."
But military actions in the coming weeks by U.S. and NATO forces will speak louder than those sincerely expressed words. As the death toll of civilians mounts, Afghan hearts and minds are being lost and, with that, the specter of losing the war looms.
Karl F. Inderfurth, a professor at the Elliott School of International Affairs at George Washington University, served as U.S. assistant secretary of state for South Asian affairs from 1997 to 2001.
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/29/opinion/edinderfurth.php
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