Bush 'set on' handover in Iraq

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3264737.stm

America's administrator in Iraq has said he is returning from Washington with a message from President Bush that he is set on transferring power.
Paul Bremer was speaking after urgent talks on speeding up the coalition's handing over of authority in Iraq.

He said that Iraqis were already playing a greater role in the day-to-day running of their country.

Mr Bremer admitted the situation in Iraq was "tough" hours after a bomb devastated an Italian base there.


A lorry bomb which hit the base in the southern town of Nasiriya killed at least 23 people, including 15 Italians
<snip>

Wait a minute. Two days ago, weren't they talking of dumping the Iraqi "Congress?"

Remember? Right before we killed the Baghdad Mayor we installed?

This must be one amazingly intricate and complex plan because I don't comprehend the least bit of logic to it.

[DivinBreuvage]

1. Well, that's it, then...

VICTORY IN IRAQ is going to be declared sometime before November 2004! All you naysayers were wrong.

Then it will be on to the next PNAC project.

Françoise

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

2. Why is it that I have this picture of Bremer getting a cup of joe at a

Baghdad bazaar and then asking the shopkeeper> "How would you like to be President of Iraq?"

[janx]

7. Je pense que non...

Victory may be declared, but it will be hollow indeed.

What a mess. Such a mess!

[DivinBreuvage]

9. Of course it will be a sham

but I think they're hoping that some voters will buy it -- "Yay, we won! Don't mess with the US! Whooo Hooooooooooo! September 11 is avenged! These colors don't run! Take that Osama!" -- and that others, while knowing deep down it's a sham, will be glad enough that US troops are getting out of that mess to be able to reconcile it to themselves as an acceptable definition of victory.

I think they're going to have a very hard sell getting troops into the next place on the list, however, phony victory or no.

Françoise

[54anickel]

10. Yep, time to cut 'n run

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A30434-2003Nov12.html

The U.S. occupation staff is concerned that time may be running out, reinforcing the need to focus on "where is the exit," a U.S. official in Baghdad said. Part of that calculation is the belief that Iraqis themselves need to see, as the official put it, "the light at the end of the tunnel."

[jayfish]

16. If This IS True, Then The Next PNAC Project Will Be...

the re-invasion of Iraq (being the crusaders that they are). I'm sure that if he still lives, Saddam will be in charge of Iraq within a month of such a hasty and ill conceived departure.

Jay

[loudnclear]

18. We are spinning how we are going to "bail out"

and call it victory. Osama and Saddam have kicked our butts every which way but loose. We just can't stand face to face combat or gorilla warfare. If we can't bomb the crap out of people from afar, then they are terrorists if they stand up to us on the ground.

[DuctapeFatwa]

3. They were shooting at the "governing council" this morning

It appears that the main thrust of the new strategy will be to kill more Iraqis.

They have began dropping 2000 lb bombs on areas suspected of anti-coalition sentiment, and taping the mouths and arresting those who make anti-coalition statements.

Reducing the population will facilitate securing natural resources such as oil installations.

[Eloriel]

13. Hmmm, political repression

Isn't that, like, what Saddam did?

Eloriel

[librechik]

4. I wonder if and when the American People will tire of being jerked around

by this idiot. He's a ferking selfish baby that cares nothing for consequences, as long as he gets what he wants. And nobody has every straightened him out. What kind of public servant is this? Not ANY kind, that's what!

[Zero Gravitas]

5. Rovian Foreign Policy

They will be able to spin an early handover of power to an interim Government as Total Victory In Iraq. By the time it all disolves into civil war, the election will already be over.

[Fovea]

11. That is what they hope

But I do not see Council as having the same sort of Steely Determination to hang on as the Weimar Government.
</sarcasm>

[soleft]

6. Bush set? He wasn't even at the meeting

[muriel_volestrangler]

12. 'set' has more meanings than any word in English

This is as in "my phaser is set on 'kill'". The phaser is just a tool, wielded by a badly acted, power crazy invader.

[LuminousX]

8. What they need to do

is set up a strong dictatorship, give him armaments to put down any revolutions, prop him up for a few decades, keep him armed with chemical weapons in case Syria or Iran get any ideas, and stand back and watch the fun. Oh, wait, that has NEVER worked in our favor. Oh well, this time it might work.

[mediaman007]

14. only if we get the oil

(added sarcasm)

[The_Casual_Observer]

15. There isn't a solution to this problem

The minute the US turns and runs from that place it's instant civil war followed by strict Islamic rule. The Bushies know it and don't know what to do about it, other than permanent occupation with large numbers of US troops or genocide on a Saddam sized scale.

[DuctapeFatwa]

17. The solution is to stop killing Muslims and get the Crusaders out

out of Iraq, out of Afghanistan, out of Saudi Occupied Arabia, get every single gun and gunrunner and gunman and oilboi and covert operative and special force and commercial soldier out, and stop funding dictators and butchers from Hosni to sharon to Abdullah and write a blank check to every non-US, non-UN affiliated NGO in the world so that they can stop the humanitarian catastrophe that the bush regime has turned the region into and send every one of the PNAC signers, every bush regime henchman and crony and operative to the Hague and call in international monitors to organize and hold free and open elections with UNIVERSAL franchise.

[Gloria]

19. "Warlords"---Editor of the the Turkish Daily News that if we turn over

more security to Iraqi troops, then we can expect a warlord situation erupt, like we have now in Afghanistan........He also said that that, basically, we really screwed up....

This was a couple of days ago.....

WARLORDS, what a way to fill a vacuum....

[leftchick]

20. Someone said here at DU several weeks ago, what is happening in Iraq

is so much more like Afghanistan than Vietnam everyday. I do believe it is....:(

[TomNickell]

21. Islamic rule might be the -good- outcome..

Saddam and the Baath Party had whole networks of informers and secret police--all the apparatus of a Stalinist police state.

Without those, a central authority may not be able to control this place. Kurds, Sunni, Shi'ites, Ba'ath, Iranian agents. And a near infinite supply of guns and explosives. Division into ethnic enclaves seems the likely outcome.