Telegraph: (Allawi) Call for martial law as 70 are killed in Iraq

[Eugene]

Call for martial law as 70 are killed in Iraq

By Damien McElroy and Richard Holt
Last Updated: 9:45am GMT 13/12/2006

Iraq's former prime minister Ayad Allawi has called for the imposition of martial
law in a last-ditch attempt to halt the country's worsening security situation.

Dr Allawi is the first major Iraqi politician to suggest that democratic freedoms
can no longer be sustained in the face of mounting violence.

-snip-

The worsening attacks have added to the sense of a city in chaos. Mr Allawi's
prescription is a drastic option but one that many Iraqis would welcome as a
last chance to secure order.

"I think martial law is required," Mr Allawi told America's NBC television news.

-snip-

Mr Allawi's comments will be interpreted in some quarters as an attempt to
place himself as the strongman who could save Iraq.

-snip-

Full article: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/12/13/wirq13.xml

[Warren Stupidity]

1. "one that many Iraqis would welcome"

And of course this is simply editorializing by the telegraph. Did they poll the Iraqis to determine that many would welcome martial law? I think not. I think they just made shit up.


But more to the point: it what sense is the current situation in Iraq not martial law, and exactly which army would be martialling the law once it is declared? The Iraqi Army that by all accounts is nothing more than a source of weapons and other equipment for the militias? The US occupation army?

Allawi is calling for a coup, for the overthrow of the blue finger wagging freemon'n'moxy gummint Dumbass so proudly crowed about, and by martial law he means to officially put the shiite militias in charge of the nominal government. At that point any pretense that this is not a civil war can be put aside.