Saturday, October 18, 2003
What’s happening, Iraq:
It’s becoming more difficult for the Administration to blame remnants of Saddam’s government for all the difficulties in Iraq. First Sunni Muslims and an unknown number of Islamic fundamentalists who may have crossed into Iraq were seen as the additional enemies at hand. But now the Shiite Muslim community is becoming the focal point of resistance. Yesterday’s gun battle with followers of the cleric Moktada al-Sadr left 3 Americans dead.
These developments provide an increasingly bizarre contrast with the reassuring, confident statements coming from the Administration.
UN Postscript
The Bush Administration put on its happy face, celebrating the UN’s acceding to a US-authored resolution on Iraq.
The resolution allows the United Nations to form a multinational force under a single US command to assist American troops, and calls for financial pledges from UN member states to help rebuild Iraq -- a key request before a donor conference scheduled for next week. The measure also calls for the US-appointed Iraqi Governing Council to provide a timetable by Dec. 15 for drafting a constitution and holding elections.
Yet, it is evident that this was largely for show: With the exception of Japan, no other country is even considering sending money or troops. Some countries quickly noted that they did not like the agreed-to text, and one UN diplomat called it a "prime UN Security Council product: a text on which everyone agrees, but no one agrees what it means."
What’s happening, Iran: The French speak
Not everyone is quietly tolerating the Administration’s threatening talk about the lesser “threats”. The Guardian (Simon Tisdall, Ewen MacAskill) report on the French foreign minister’s denouncing the US pre-emptive regime change notions. Dominique de Villepin noted that military action against Iran over its alleged nuclear weapons would be “absolutely ridiculous.” The official then threw some cold water on the apparent thaw over Iraq by noting that "the conditions for real progress on the reconstruction of Iraq are not complied with today. Reconstruction has to have a partner, you have to have real sovereignty in Iraq if you want to have the Iraqi people working with you.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4777463-110633,00.html
Disturbing Report on Care for wounded
One wants to not believe the UPI report (Mark Benjamin) that describe sick and wounded U.S. troops ...including many who served in the Iraq war are languishing in hot cement barracks here while they wait -- sometimes for months -- to see doctors.
The National Guard and Army Reserve soldiers' living conditions are so substandard, and the medical care so poor, that many of them believe the Army is trying push them out with reduced benefits for their ailments. One document shown to UPI states that no more doctor appointments are available from Oct. 14 through Nov. 11 -- Veterans Day.
One month after President Bush greeted soldiers at Fort Stewart -- home of the famed Third Infantry Division -- as heroes on their return from Iraq, approximately 600 sick or injured members of the Army Reserves and National Guard are warehoused in rows of spare, steamy and dark cement barracks in a sandy field, waiting for doctors to treat their wounds or illnesses.
The Reserve and National Guard soldiers are on what the Army calls "medical hold," while the Army decides how sick or disabled they are and what benefits -- if any -- they should get as a result.
Some of the soldiers said they have waited six hours a day for an appointment without seeing a doctor. Others described waiting weeks or months without getting a diagnosis or proper treatment.
The soldiers said professional active duty personnel are getting better treatment while troops who serve in the National Guard or Army Reserve are left to wallow in medical hold.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4997.htm
Bolivia: Protests, Resignation
Good to know what’s going on in this hemisphere, other than the latest targeting of Cuba. Yesterday Bolivia’s president, Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, resigned following a month of bloody street protests which have claimed approximately 80 lives. The notable popular uprising was fuelled by a triad of complaints- “widespread fury over austerity plans sponsored by the International Monetary Fund [IMF], a US-backed crackdown on coca production and government plans to sell off natural gas”. More from the Guardian at http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4777411-103681,00.html
-R
It’s becoming more difficult for the Administration to blame remnants of Saddam’s government for all the difficulties in Iraq. First Sunni Muslims and an unknown number of Islamic fundamentalists who may have crossed into Iraq were seen as the additional enemies at hand. But now the Shiite Muslim community is becoming the focal point of resistance. Yesterday’s gun battle with followers of the cleric Moktada al-Sadr left 3 Americans dead.
These developments provide an increasingly bizarre contrast with the reassuring, confident statements coming from the Administration.
UN Postscript
The Bush Administration put on its happy face, celebrating the UN’s acceding to a US-authored resolution on Iraq.
The resolution allows the United Nations to form a multinational force under a single US command to assist American troops, and calls for financial pledges from UN member states to help rebuild Iraq -- a key request before a donor conference scheduled for next week. The measure also calls for the US-appointed Iraqi Governing Council to provide a timetable by Dec. 15 for drafting a constitution and holding elections.
Yet, it is evident that this was largely for show: With the exception of Japan, no other country is even considering sending money or troops. Some countries quickly noted that they did not like the agreed-to text, and one UN diplomat called it a "prime UN Security Council product: a text on which everyone agrees, but no one agrees what it means."
What’s happening, Iran: The French speak
Not everyone is quietly tolerating the Administration’s threatening talk about the lesser “threats”. The Guardian (Simon Tisdall, Ewen MacAskill) report on the French foreign minister’s denouncing the US pre-emptive regime change notions. Dominique de Villepin noted that military action against Iran over its alleged nuclear weapons would be “absolutely ridiculous.” The official then threw some cold water on the apparent thaw over Iraq by noting that "the conditions for real progress on the reconstruction of Iraq are not complied with today. Reconstruction has to have a partner, you have to have real sovereignty in Iraq if you want to have the Iraqi people working with you.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4777463-110633,00.html
Disturbing Report on Care for wounded
One wants to not believe the UPI report (Mark Benjamin) that describe sick and wounded U.S. troops ...including many who served in the Iraq war are languishing in hot cement barracks here while they wait -- sometimes for months -- to see doctors.
The National Guard and Army Reserve soldiers' living conditions are so substandard, and the medical care so poor, that many of them believe the Army is trying push them out with reduced benefits for their ailments. One document shown to UPI states that no more doctor appointments are available from Oct. 14 through Nov. 11 -- Veterans Day.
One month after President Bush greeted soldiers at Fort Stewart -- home of the famed Third Infantry Division -- as heroes on their return from Iraq, approximately 600 sick or injured members of the Army Reserves and National Guard are warehoused in rows of spare, steamy and dark cement barracks in a sandy field, waiting for doctors to treat their wounds or illnesses.
The Reserve and National Guard soldiers are on what the Army calls "medical hold," while the Army decides how sick or disabled they are and what benefits -- if any -- they should get as a result.
Some of the soldiers said they have waited six hours a day for an appointment without seeing a doctor. Others described waiting weeks or months without getting a diagnosis or proper treatment.
The soldiers said professional active duty personnel are getting better treatment while troops who serve in the National Guard or Army Reserve are left to wallow in medical hold.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4997.htm
Bolivia: Protests, Resignation
Good to know what’s going on in this hemisphere, other than the latest targeting of Cuba. Yesterday Bolivia’s president, Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, resigned following a month of bloody street protests which have claimed approximately 80 lives. The notable popular uprising was fuelled by a triad of complaints- “widespread fury over austerity plans sponsored by the International Monetary Fund [IMF], a US-backed crackdown on coca production and government plans to sell off natural gas”. More from the Guardian at http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4777411-103681,00.html
-R
