Rebel-held Falluja emptied of women and children

[UpInArms]

http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,3077569a12,00.html

FALLUJA: If US-led forces carry out a threatened full-scale assault on the Iraqi city of Falluja, they will find the rebel stronghold virtually deserted.

Thousands of women and children have long since fled almost daily bombardment of the city by US warplanes.

<snip>

"Three-quarters of the people have fled to other towns to avoid the American air strikes, especially the women and children," said Abdel Aziz Ibrahim, a teacher.

"I stayed but my family is in Baghdad so the kids can go to school. No schools are open in Falluja now because of the security situation."

Bank employee Mohammed al-Alwani said: "Whoever looks around Falluja now can only feel sadness. The damage is so heavy the suburbs look like they were hit by an earthquake."

...more...

[saigon68]

1. We had to destroy the Village to save it D. Rumbdumb (War Criminal)

Tonight in a dark barracks in Iraq sit 3 young americans who are about to be killed in Wolfowitz's PNAC war to control the Arabs.

Their families will be told in a few days "They died for freedom"

Their only real contribution will be they helped the Halliburton stockholder achieve an increased 3rd quarter dividend.

Rest in peace boys, your deaths in this cluster fuck will be recorded by I casualties very soon.

[UpInArms]

4. haven't you heard that Hellaburnin is complaining about

poor profits in Iraq?

Halliburton says profit in Iraq is weak

http://www.iht.com/articles/2004/10/26/business/halli.html

HOUSTON Halliburton, the oil services company once run by Dick Cheney, the U.S. vice president, reported on Tuesday a quarterly loss and only meager pickings from its vast operations in Iraq.

Halliburton had a loss of $44 million, or 9 cents a share, in the three months ending Sept. 30 as costs of an asbestos-related settlement swelled to $230 million. A year earlier, Halliburton had posted a profit of $58 million, or 13 cents a share.

Revenue surged 15.5 percent to $4.79 billion - nearly 30 percent of which came from the operations in Iraq conducted by Halliburton's KBR unit.

Halliburton said it squeezed out just $4 million in operating profit from its Iraq operations, despite taking in $1.4 billion in revenue.

The Iraq operations produced an operating profit a year earlier of $34 million and revenue of $900 million.

KBR said it had an operating loss of $50 million, reversing a year-earlier operating profit of $49 million, because of losses including those at a gas plant in Algeria. KBR revenue for the third quarter rose 15 percent to $2.7 billion.

...more...

:nuke:

[saigon68]

6. Its creative accounting

With the heat that's on them they aren't about to boast.., If the Chimp is elected there will be good news all around.

[UpInArms]

7. just some of that good ole' Arthur Andersen accounting

that FUCheney learned:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/2119981.stm

excerpt:

Our correspondent says that, almost as embarrassing for Mr Cheney is a promotional videotape he made praising the now disgraced accounting firm Andersen.

The video, which fell into the hands of the Wall Street Journal, was made in 1996 when Mr Cheney was at Halliburton and showed his personal relationship with Andersen.

In it, he describes how Andersen gave advice "over and above" what would normally be expected from auditors.

In a short section of the video, Mr Cheney says: "I get good advice, if you will, from their people, based upon how we are doing business and how we are operating, over and above the normal, by-the-books auditing arrangement."

Last month, Andersen was convicted of obstructing justice by shredding documents relating to the failed US energy giant Enron.

...more...

[saigon68]

10. Thanks I did not know this

[July]

12. Who's the source of that ("we had to destroy the village ...")?

I've heard it for years, but I don't know where it came from.

[Wickerman]

2. Why do you hate America?

why are you only posting the bad things about Iraq? You are overlooking the good in this story. The kids get a holiday to Baghdad. Huh? Huh?

[aquart]

3. What holiday? They're in school. Check your facts.

If the women and kids are gone, who's left? And why?

Women and Children Flee From Americans. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus.

[Wickerman]

5. Please relax

its very simple, they may be in school, but they get to be in school in Baghdad. Rummy would spin it that way. :)

Yes, it is horrible, yes, our pResident is failing miserably. There is little need to attack one another here on this board, save your passions for Bush*

[aquart]

8. Oh, dear. You need a smiley to know when someone's kidding.

Sorry.

[Wickerman]

11. No, the apology is mine

In the future I will be certain to use the Irony-o-Meter when trotting out any tired old Bush*ism.

[muriel_volestrangler]

9. This is how to create more 'insurgents'

both in propaganda terms, and in reality.

The tactic, which the Americans used last time in Falluja as well, of allowing women and children to flee, but keeping the men in the city, means that the embarrassing pictures of massacred kids and mothers are decreased. It's then much easier for the Marines to paint any man as a 'terrorist', especially when he's dead. Knowing this, even previously peaceful men (which probably means anyone over the age of 12, with practically no upper age limit), once forced to remain in a city that is about to be blown apart, are going to use any weapons offered to them, for simple self-defence.

Not only do the Marines have to destroy the city to save it, they first have to militarise it.