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$3.99
By Gordon M. Goldstein
$16.50
$35
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U.S. Marine Corps / Chief Warrant Officer 3 Philippe E. Chasse
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Hamid Karzai and NATO would like Afghan forces to take over the country’s security by 2014, a goal Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell calls “aspirational,” as in “There may very well be the need for forces to remain in-country ... ” (more jibber-jabber after the jump)
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U.S. Air Force / Tech. Sgt. Francisco V. Govea II
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By Eugene Robinson — The tens of thousands of classified military documents posted on the Internet Sunday confirm what critics of the war in Afghanistan already knew or suspected: We are wading deeper into a long-running, morally ambiguous conflict that has virtually no chance of ending well.
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White House / Pete Souza
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By William Pfaff — Washington once again finds itself dangerously entangled with the hostile policies, nationalistic interests and supporters, and personal ambitions of a foreign figure whom it counted on to serve American interests.
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By Amy Goodman — President Barack Obama met recently with the prime ministers of Canada and Britain, two NATO allies looking for a way out of Afghanistan even as the U.S. is talking escalation.
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POTUS Executive Office
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The former vice president tells Politico that there is a “high probability” of a terrorist attack involving “a nuclear weapon or a biological agent of some kind” and that the current administration is “more concerned about reading the rights to an Al Qaeda terrorist than they are with protecting the United States. ...”
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One of JFK’s “best and brightest” died wondering how the Vietnam War could have gone so wrong. Now, in an important new book, we have some answers.
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Collage: AP photo / Chip Somodevilla, pool / Wikimedia Commons
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James G. Blight and janet M. Lang —
The leading issue in the current face-off between Barack Obama and John McCain is the economy. Once elected and inaugurated, however, a U.S. president’s politics become global literally overnight.
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By William Pfaff — Barack Obama is right to want to get out of Iraq, but his eagerness to do battle in the tribal hinterlands of Afghanistan and Pakistan will only lead to a quagmire of his own.
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By Eugene Robinson — How on earth is the Republican Party going to sell John McCain? Once the Democrats stop doing the job, I mean.
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Flickr / Kevindooley
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By James Harris — Harvard scholar Linda Bilmes speaks about the book on the Iraq war’s costs that she wrote with Joseph Stiglitz. The two former Truthdiggers of the Week have been working hard to uncover even more hidden expenses for the war, which they estimate will cost the taxpayers and their children trillions of dollars.
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By Marie Cocco — In the beginning—back when most Americans believed Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11, when Rumsfeld was known for his quick verbal jabs and not the quagmire in Iraq, and when Bush still could hope to be revered as a great wartime president—the women of Code Pink would stand quietly in front of the White House and hope someone would take their fliers.
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AP photo / Junji Kurokawa
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By Robert Scheer — Not to stoke any of the inane conspiracy theories running wild on the Internet, but if Osama bin Laden wasn’t on the payroll of Lockheed-Martin or some other large defense contractor, he deserves to have been. What a boondoggle 9/11 has been for the merchants of war, who this week announced yet another quarter of whopping profits made possible by George Bush’s pretending to fight terrorism by throwing money at outdated Cold War-style weapons systems.
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By Chalmers Johnson — The best-selling author of “The Sorrows of Empire” takes a look at David Halberstam’s critical history of the Korean War.
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By Marie Cocco — Gen. Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker, to no one’s surprise, think the “surge” is working. So what if a majority of Iraqis disagree with them?
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AP Photo / Hasan Sarbakhshian
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By Chris Hedges — By all indications, the United States is about to attack Iran. Expect a regional catastrophe to follow, propelled by impotent diplomacy and inane media.
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Not too long ago, Dick Cheney actually made sense. The subject was the occupation of Iraq and why he thought it was a bad idea, or a “quagmire,” as he put it at the time.
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AP Photo / Hameed Rasheed
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By Chris Hedges — The Pulitzer Prize-winning Mideast observer warns that the situation in Iraq is about to get much, much worse, whether we stay or leave.
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By Eugene Robinson — Last week, George W. Bush invited nine conservative pundits to the White House for what amounted to a pep talk, with the president providing all the pep. Many of the columnists have described his demeanor as incongruously sunny, but some of the accounts are downright scary. Could the whole world be out of touch, or is it just him?
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Fox comedy show MadTV, in a skit built on the common American mispronunciation of a certain occupied country’s name, effectively skewers the Bush administration’s faulty foreign policy—and especially its intransigence in the face of popular opposition to it—via this phony Steve Jobs presentation of the new “iRack.”
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Dr. Dahlia Wasfi joins Robert Scheer and James Harris to discuss the past, present and future of the Iraq war. Wasfi (pictured), who has twice visited Iraq during the occupation, says it is only a matter of time and casualties before the U.S. leaves: “It’s really simple: You bring the troops home, they stop dying there.” Update: Full transcript now available.
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radaronline.com
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Radar Online checks in with Mongolia, Bulgaria and the other member nations of the “coalition of the willing” still fighting in Iraq. Albania, true to its love of George W. Bush, promises to see the war through to the end, with its 120 troops. Reminder: Of the roughly 162,000 troops fighting in Iraq, 150,000 are American, 7,100 are British and the rest, a hodgepodge of nations from Armenia to the Ukraine—and that’s not counting the mercenaries.
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Dr. Dahlia Wasfi joins Robert Scheer and James Harris to discuss the past, present and future of the Iraq war. Wasfi, who has twice visited Iraq during the occupation, says it is only a matter of time and casualties before the U.S. leaves: “It’s really simple: You bring the troops home, they stop dying there.”
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dailymail.co.uk
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Tony Blair is getting one last glimpse of the mess he helped make before stepping down. The outgoing prime minister’s staff says the purpose of Blair’s Baghdad visit is to highlight the connection between security and political stability, but we can’t help but notice an emerging trend. Remember Donald Rumsfeld’s farewell tour of Iraq?
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A military wife whose husband is deployed in Iraq corners conservative pundit William Kristol over his support for the war.
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Seventy-five percent of projects surveyed in the latest report by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction were no longer functioning properly. Investigators said facilities began breaking down after only six months and that roughly $5 billion is lost every year to fraud.
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A new report from the Red Cross says living conditions in Iraq, from healthcare to general safety, continue to worsen. One woman interviewed by the ICRC said it would be helpful if someone removed the bodies piling up in front of her house so her children wouldn’t have to look at them on the way to school.
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Iraq’s former trade, defense and finance minister has written a scathing assessment of the war. A book by Ali A. Allawi, a prominent member of the post-Saddam regime, offers a surprisingly frank appraisal of what he calls the “monumental ignorance” and “rank amateurism and swaggering arrogance” of the occupation of his country.
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washingtonpost.com
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John McCain will attempt to resurrect his struggling presidential campaign by launching a coordinated effort to reaffirm his support for the Iraq war. While his rosy take on “progress” in Baghdad just blew up in his face, the candidate has effectively painted himself into a corner.
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Last week the Iraq war entered its fifth year. We mark the occasion by revisiting striking moments from March 19, 2003, onward. It would be impossible for one slide show to capture every iconic frame or ghastly scene. Still, these images remind us that little has changed in the years since George Bush stood before a banner reading “Mission Accomplished.”
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By Joe Conason — Every dismal anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq has come to resemble the last, at least for anyone still listening to George W. Bush. So redundant were the president’s remarks that they scarcely registered on the front pages.
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AP Photo / Jerome Delay
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By Robert Scheer — The man who once famously took a sledgehammer to Saddam Hussein’s statue now says “the Americans are worse than the dictatorship.” That’s a growing sentiment in George W. Bush’s Iraq, where a majority of people view attacks on coalition forces as acceptable.
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These are stories from Iraq, told by people who live there. It’s easy to forget that amid the carnage and chaos we read about, regular people are simply trying to live out their lives in peace.
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thinkprogress.org
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It has now been four years since the United States invaded Iraq and, according to the latest CNN poll, only 30 percent of Americans are “proud” of the war—half the number recorded in 2003. Still—with thousands of Americans and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis killed; hundreds of billions of dollars spent, stolen and wasted; millions of refugees created; terrorist recruitment thriving and a civil war that threatens to engulf the region—we just have to ask: What could anyone possibly be proud of?
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rollingstone.com
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Rolling Stone gathered notables ranging from Zbigniew Brzezinski to Juan Cole to learn their takes on the future of Iraq. They agreed on one thing: The war is lost. Gen. Tony McPeak (ret.), formerly of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, put it this way: “Even if we had a million men to go in, it’s too late now.”
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vanityfair.com
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Vanity Fair has an interesting profile of six retired generals—all of whom voted for George W. Bush—who famously and courageously condemned the administration’s conduct of the Iraq war. Find out why they went against years of military tradition to speak out, and how they feel about the current state of affairs.
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ABC’s News’ Bob Woodruff, who narrowly escaped death while reporting from the Iraq war, visits with a young Marine who also sustained a major brain injury. Although rehabilitation is vital to the Marine’s recovery, the VA has refused treatment for half of the critical first year.
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Sgt. Paul Cortez has been sentenced to 100 years in prison for his role in the rape of a 14-year-old Iraqi girl and the murder of her and her family. Cortez testified that he and two other soldiers chose the family because it was an “easy target.” The gang rape, murder and mutilation of the girl (the soldiers burned her corpse) outraged Iraqis.
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news.bbc.co.uk
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Vice President Dick Cheney celebrated the Australian government’s commitment to the Iraq war (1,450 troops) on Thursday, saying “the whole world respects you for it.” But Australians certainly don’t: More than two-thirds of the nation’s population want a withdrawal.
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aljazeera.net
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After a Sunni mother of 11 told al-Jazeera she had been raped by Iraqi soldiers, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki accused her of fabricating the story to stir sectarian tensions. But four men, including an officer who allegedly recorded the crime on his mobile phone, were arrested and confessed to the crime. Update: An alleged victim in a similar rape case has come forward.
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Before the invasion of Iraq, Gen. Tommy Franks gathered with his top advisers to review their plans. The recently released slides from that meeting offer an insight into the startling optimism of the men who designed the war. Four years post-invasion, the commanders expected Iraq to have a fully representative government, a functioning army and as few as 5,000 U.S. troops. Whoops!
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AP Photo / Evan Vucci
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By Robert Scheer — The lies of Douglas Feith, exposed by the Pentagon’s inspector general, are the key to understanding the greatest intelligence fiasco in American history.
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news.bbc.co.uk
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Despite an influx of thousands of U.S. troops, Baghdad continues to experience devastating violence. Four explosions Monday killed at least 76 people.
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