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Cost of the War in Iraq
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Saturday, March 29, 2003
Thousands of Protesting
Jordanians Vent
Anger Over War
by Mohammed Alkhereiji
Numerous demonstrations took place across Amman yesterday with thousands of protesting Jordanians calling for the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq.
For the second week in a row, the Al-Qaluti Mosque, near the Israeli Embassy, was the site of a demonstration against the so-called “Operation Iraqi Freedom”.
Close to 400 people called out for an end to the war and the occupation of the Palestinian West Bank.
The rowdy crowd also praised Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden, as well as demonizing Arab nations they believed were helping the “evil empire”.
Although the crowds were larger and more vocal this week, few if any were arrested. Police were there in droves in case things turned violent, and they completely blocked roads leading up to the Israeli Embassy.
The protesters took to the streets of the city center carrying Iraqi flags and portraits of Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden, one resident told Arab News.
“They torched US, British and Israeli flags as well as an effigy representing US President George W. Bush, calling for his death and describing him as a dog,” the resident added.
The protesters warned British Prime Minister Tony Blair: “Iraq will destroy you completely”.
And in an unprecedented gesture they paid tribute to Syrian President Bashar Assad for his steadfast rejection of the war on Iraq, urging him “to enter the battle” against the US and British armies.
Some 10,000 residents also took part in a protest in the city of Maan after clerics across the town called on Muslims “to launch a jihad against Americans wherever they are” in their weekly sermons.
Preachers also urged the Jordanian authorities to expel US troops deployed in Jordan, where the government has acknowledged the presence of “hundreds” of soldiers manning Patriot anti-missile batteries.
more @ Arab News.
post by vasco on 3:58 AM
Iraq Resistence Forces
U.S. Commanders Stop
Advancement for Baghdad
U.S. commanders have ordered a pause of between four to six days in a northwards push towards Baghdad because of supply shortages and stiff Iraqi resistance, U.S. military officers said on Saturday.
They said the "operational pause", ordered on Friday, meant that advances would be put on hold while the military sorted out logistics problems with long supply lines from Kuwait.
The invasion force would continue to attack Iraqi forces ahead of them with heavy air strikes during the pause, softening them up ahead of any eventual attack on Baghdad, said the officers.
Use of gas-guzzling armoured vehicles has been restricted to save fuel and food is also in short supply. In one frontline infantry unit, for instance, soldiers have had their rations cut to one meal packet a day from three.
Resistance from Iraqi forces fighting in towns along the advance lines has hampered the stretched supply convoys.
more @ Al Bawaba.
post by vasco on 3:32 AM
Soldiers Interviews After
Attacks Are Strangely
Reminiscent of NFL Players
Welcome to SurREALITY TV
by Linda Sharp
Our new American Idols are the military men and women and the Fear Factor they are facing head on is beyond anything network television could ever dream up. Eating horse rectum certainly pales next to direct combat, live fire and the threat of chemical weapons.
To quote Donald Rumsfeld, we are experiencing an "unprecedented event" in the real time coverage being broadcast of this war. Not only do we get to see the fighters taking off from the aircraft carriers, we watch them blast their targets, and then land back on their ships, heading to debriefing only after making a detour to the CNN correspondent. Their interviews are strangely reminiscent of football players being questioned on the sidelines during time outs in the NFL.
And that is where some of the "shock and awe" come into it for the viewing audience. Considering the subject matter and images we are seeing, there is a feeling that is almost voyeuristic. We know that when we see those bombs exploding, there are most certainly lives exploding along with them. For months leading up to this assault, we have seen the faces of the innocent citizens of Baghdad, the same faces who now cower under their kitchen tables, shielding their children with their own bodies. How great must their Fear Factor be?
more @ Al Bawaba.
post by vasco on 2:59 AM
Carnage in Baghdad:
Cruise missile kills
dozens of civilians
Arabic-language television stations said Friday that more than 50 Iraqis have been killed in what they described as an air raid on a marketplace in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad.
Al-Jazeera's correspondent said 51 Iraqis had been killed and 49 injured in the market in the Shula neighbourhood of Baghdad. "An Iraqi official told us that the search is still going on for those trapped under the rubble," he said and showed pictures of bodies, including those of two children.
Dubai-based Al-Arabiya television reported 52 dead and showed pictures of injured at a hospital. Witnesses spoke of a missile landing on the al-Nasser market in the west of the Iraqi capital.
Iraqi officials claimed the carnage was caused by a stray cruise missile. An Iraqi doctor, Ismail Marzooki, said a missile hit a residential area just 300 meters from his hospital.
He told television stations: "In a few minutes a massive number of people started to come into the hospital." Dr Marzooki described the scene as being like a "massacre".
He claimed there were no potential military targets in the residential area.
more @ Al Bawaba.
post by vasco on 2:43 AM
Accumulation of Sources Lies
Have Left the Public Feeling
They Are not Well Informed
BBC admits false reporting on Iraq war
A senior BBC News executive Friday admitted that the reporting of allied military claims in Iraq that later prove false, such as heralding the fall of Umm Qasr at least nine times, had "left the public feeling less well-informed than it should be".
Mark Damazer, the deputy director of BBC News, also admitted the BBC had been making mistakes "on a daily basis" during the first week of the Iraq conflict, but denied there was any deliberate bias towards either the pro or anti-war camps.
"I don't deny for a moment that the accumulation of things that have happened in the first week, such as the false claims about the fall of Umm Qasr and the surrender of the Iraqi 51st division, have left the public feeling they are not as well informed as they should be," Damazer said.
"But it's perfectly proper for us to say 'a British defence source has said there's an uprising in Basra' and not report it as gospel truth. We attribute wherever possible to a source. The secret is attribution, qualification and scepticism," he added.
more @ Al Bawaba.
post by vasco on 2:37 AM
A-10 Tankbuster US Plane
Open "Friendly Fire"
Against UK Soldiers
A UK soldier is reported to have been killed and others injured in a "friendly fire" incident in southern Iraq.
The soldier would be the fifth member of the UK forces killed by coalition colleagues since the start of the war in Iraq.
Reports say he died after an American A-10 tankbuster plane targeted two armoured vehicles near Basra on Friday.
Two other soldiers were reported as badly injured with three more described as "walking wounded".
A Ministry of Defence spokeswoman said: "We can confirm we are investigating an incident involving possible friendly fire as a matter of urgency."
< my comment > If I had any doubt about the American missille attack on civilians it's gonne away. Rumsfeld's boys are bombing UK soldiers. It's the fifth coalition colleagues killed. The video game mood and the hurry for back home are doing the mess grows.< /comment >
more @ BBC News.
post by vasco on 2:22 AM
Nasiriyah's US Marines
Are Frustrated and
"Just Want to Go Home"
Conflict sapping forces' morale
by Andrew North
Here on the frontline this conflict is taking its toll on morale.
I can see the signs in the US marines I am with outside Nasiriyah.
Quite a few of the troops have said to me that this isn't what they were expecting.
They have had a tiring week of guerrilla-style fighting and it continues.
They are frustrated that their political masters gave the American public the impression that it would be easier than it's turned out to be.
But, also that they should have given them more expectation about Iraqi resistance like this.
They don't want to admit they can't deal with it, but I think there is definitely a sense that it is not the kind of fighting that they were really trained for.
One Marine told me: "I've had enough of being fired at from all directions, I just want to go home".
I thought it quite a surprising thing to say.
more @ BBC News.
post by vasco on 2:14 AM
Global Crossing's "Prince of
Darkness" Resigns of a Top
Pentagon Policy Group
Veteran US Government hawk Richard Perle has resigned as chairman of a top Pentagon policy group.
Mr Perle's move comes amid controversy over his dealings with the bankrupt telecommunications group, Global Crossing.
The controversy centres on Mr Perle's deal with Global Crossing to win US Government approval of its proposed partial sale to Asian investors, from which Mr Perle stood to make hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The Pentagon had objected to the sale because it would have meant that Global Crossing's invaluable optic fibre technology would be owned by a company with strong links to China.
US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said in a statement he had accepted Mr Perle's resignation as chairman from the Defence Policy Board, which advises him on defence issues, but had asked him to remain a board member.
"As I cannot quickly or easily quell criticism of me based on errors of fact concerning my activities, the least I can do under these circumstances is to ask you to accept my resignation," Mr Perle said in a letter to Mr Rumsfeld.
Mr Perle, a leading advocate of the war on Iraq, said he had decided to resign because he feared that accusations of conflict of interest regarding Global Crossing could distract from Mr Rumsfeld's handling of the Iraqi conflict.
A former assistant secretary of defence under Ronald Reagan, Mr Perle was nicknamed the "Prince of Darkness" for his opposition to arms control.
more @ BBC NEWS.
post by vasco on 1:58 AM
Syria Accuses U.S. of
trying to distract attention
from action against civilians
Military supplies are being smuggled across the border from Syria into Iraq, according to US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
"These deliveries pose a direct threat to the lives of coalition forces," he said.
Warning that the US would hold Syria accountable for "hostile acts", he also cautioned Iran from getting involved in the conflict.
Syria dismissed Mr Rumsfeld's allegations as "unfounded and irresponsible".
The US defence secretary refused to say if he believed the trafficking of supplies was state-sponsored but insisted the Syrian authorities had control of their borders.
He said the shipments included night-vision goggles and "vastly complicated" the military operation in Iraq.
The Syrian Government dismisses allegations by US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld that it is supplying military equipment to Iraq and accuses the US, in a statement from the Syrian foreign ministry, of trying to distract attention from action its forces had been taking against civilians in Iraq.
more @ BBC News.
post by vasco on 1:16 AM
Friday, March 28, 2003
Anti-War Called for Civil
Disobedience and "Die in"
Put 215 People in Jail
About 215 protesters were arrested Thursday after they lay down on Manhattan's Fifth Avenue, blocking traffic in the latest of a series of demonstrations against the war.
The "die-in" temporarily closed the avenue between 49th and 50th streets, near St. Patrick's Cathedral and the Saks Fifth Avenue store and across the street from Rockefeller Center. Most of those arrested face charges of disorderly conduct and obstructing governmental administration, police said.
Anti-war groups had called for civil disobedience, hoping to draw more attention than the largely lawful protests held daily in the city since hostilities began in Iraq.
"Nothing else gets attention," Fordham University student Johannah Westmacott said as she jotted down officers' badge numbers.
The protest drew hundreds of demonstrators, filling a block of Fifth Avenue in the midtown business district. As helicopters hovered overhead, the protesters - some beating drums - chanted "Hey-hey, ho-ho, Bush's war has to go" and "Peace now!"
Officers arrested those who refused to rise. They cuffed many with plastic restraints before half-carrying them into waiting police trucks.
The "die-in" was intended to symbolize Iraqi war victims, said organizers of M27, the ad-hoc coalition behind the event.
It was one of a number of scattered demonstrations Thursday in New York as part of a "no business as usual" protest theme. A dozen people demonstrated outside Tiffany, and five were arrested after a scuffle with police near CNN's offices.
more @ Associated Press.
post by vasco on 3:01 AM
Syria Will Open
its Borders to Syrians
Who Wish to Fight
A report that Syria will open its borders to Syrians who wish to fight alongside Iraqi forces comes on the same day that Syria's highest religious authority, Sheikh Ahmad Kuftaro, called on Muslims to conduct suicide missions against Western forces in the region.
The Syrian government to this point had tried to dissuade volunteers from carrying out attacks and had closed the border with Iraq, though there were reports that some people were sneaking across or bribing border guards. This latest report indicates the government has made the decision to open the border.
more @ The Agonist. War blog The Agonist: thoughtful, global, timely. Minute news from the war front.
post by vasco on 2:45 AM
High Risk Strategy Try
to Quickly Localize and
Defeat the Republican Guard
Hundreds of Iraqis killed in biggest battle so far
American forces fought what was believed to be the largest ground battle of the war to date yesterday, inflicting huge casualties as they progressed towards Baghdad.
Between 150 and 500 Iraqi footsoldiers were killed in a fierce firefight with armoured units of the US 7th Cavalry amid a sandstorm, just to the east of Najaf, a Shi'ite holy city some 90 miles south of Baghdad. Reports of the number of Iraqi dead varied because the regiment had been fighting around Najaf for two days.
The battle came as RAF Tornados and American warplanes were bombing Republican Guard targets south of Baghdad as part of an aerial offensive to weaken the defenders of Saddam Hussein's stronghold.
Pentagon officials said the 7th Cavalry, an armoured scouting unit of the 3rd Infantry Division, encountered a large force of Iraqi troops.
Coalition planners have identified the Republican Guard, the best-trained and equipped component of Saddam's armed forces, as Iraq's 'centre of gravity' and are seeking to defeat it as quickly possible. The 'main effort' in coalition operational plans focused on defeating the Republican Guard rests largely with the US Army's 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanised). Once the RGFC is defeated coalition planners believe that less well-motivated army units will collapse, meaning that costly battles to clear Basra and smaller centres of resistance can be avoided.
The first phase of the US battle plan has gone relatively well, with the armoured columns of the 3rd Infantry Division advancing rapidly across 300km of desert from Kuwait. This advance has been relatively unopposed.
A major effort has been underway in recent days to 'prepare the battlefield' ahead of the advancing US armoured columns in what military doctrine describes as the 'deep battle'. The Apaches of the 11th Aviation Brigade have been in action, trying to find and destroy Republican Guard tanks in the towns and villages south of Baghdad.
Once these efforts to 'find' the main Republican Guard positions have been successful, reconnaissance forces, including attack helicopters, will be sent into action to 'fix' them in their positions while the 3rd Infantry Division's three armoured brigades position themselves to strike.
The 'find and fix' phase of the battle is the most crucial for US commanders because they have a numerically inferior force to the Iraqis and have very exposed flanks and supply lines. If US reconnaissance forces and surveillance assets fail to find the Iraqis or misidentify the main Iraqi defensive positions then the US armoured brigades could be committed in the wrong place, exposing them to counter-attack while refuelling or re-arming.
The strategy of Gen Tommy Franks, Commander US Central Command, is clearly daring and carries high risks. Every kilometre coalition forces advance into Iraq extends the depth of the 'rear battle area' and the distance that must be covered by combat service support units to replenish combat units with vital fuel, water, ammunition and rations. The rear battle area extends from behind the advancing combat forces to the ports and airfields in Kuwait through which reinforcements and every manner of supplies enter the theatre of operations.
more @ News Telegraph and Jane's Defence Weekly.
post by vasco on 1:26 AM
Battles Near Iraqi
Cities Prompting a
Wave of Refugees
By Thomas Fuller
American and British troops battled Iraqi forces outside at least three key cities in south-central Iraq today, and thousands of Iraqi civilians were reported to be fleeing their homes, raising concerns of a burgeoning refugee crisis.
The violent sandstorm that blinded American troops for two days began to lift and British and American warplanes flew more than 600 bombing missions.
In Baghdad, live television broadcasts showed more than a dozen explosions rocking the Iraqi capital shortly before midnight local time. A Reuters correspondent in the city reported that most of the barrage appeared to focus on the west bank of the Tigris, near key government buildings that included the Information Ministry, Planning Ministry and Foreign Ministry. There was no information on casualties.
In northern Iraq, 1,000 American paratroopers who were dropped into Kurdish-controlled territory late Wednesday secured an airfield, officials said.
South of Baghdad, fighting continued outside Nasiriyah, Najaf and Basra in what appeared to be a reflection of a new American strategy of securing the southern parts of the country before moving on to the capital.
Iraqi officials struck a defiant posture today, with the defense minister predicting a fight to the death for Baghdad.
"We will not be surprised if the enemy surrounds Baghdad in 5 or 10 days, but he will have to take the city," the defense minister, Sultan Hasim Ahmad, said. But he added, "Baghdad cannot be taken as long as the citizens in it are still alive."
Iraq said its forces had brought down an American Apache helicopter, and the government showed television images of a helicopter with United States military markings surrounded by Iraqis waving rifles.
Iraqi state television said forces of the Saddam Fedayeen militia had shot down the Apache and a pilotless drone in the mid-Euphrates region of Iraq. There were no details on the fate of the crew.
American military officials at the United States Central Command base in Qatar told reporters there that they had no reports of a missing helicopter but that a drone apparently had been lost. They suggested that the pictures of the downed Apache were of one downed earlier in the conflict.
Television images today also showed men, women and children fleeing Basra and Nasiriyah. Hundreds of refugees were reported to have poured out of Basra after food, drinking water and medical supplies ran low.
British troops distributed packets of food and water outside Az Zubair, a city not far from the Kuwaiti border. Hundreds of men thronged the trucks filled with aid in a disorderly mass outside the town.
But there were also more signs that ran counter to early expectations of military planners, who had been banking on Iraqis greeting the invading troops as liberators.
One young man, as he pushed forward to collect his food, told a British television reporter, in English, "Go back, America and Britain! Go back! Go!" He swatted the air as if bothered by an insect.
more @ New York Times.
founded @ Outside the Beltway.
post by vasco on 12:01 AM
Thursday, March 27, 2003
U.S. Diplomat Resigns
in Protest Over the
"War of Bush Agression."
U.S. Mongolian Diplomat Resigns Over Iraq
By Michael Kohn
A senior diplomat at the U.S. Embassy in Mongolia has resigned in protest over Washington's decision to wage war in Iraq and U.S. policy toward the Middle East and North Korea.
Ann Wright, who as deputy chief of mission was the embassy's second-in-command, also criticized the "unnecessary curtailment of civil rights" in the United States since Sept. 11.
"I believe the administration's policies are making the world a more dangerous, not a safer, place," she said in a resignation letter addressed to Secretary of State Colin Powell.
Wright said Thursday she sent the letter March 19, the day before the U.S.- and British-led attack on Iraq began. She planned to leave Mongolia in early April.
An embassy spokesman in Ulan Bator declined comment.
Wright, 56, is at least the second American diplomat to resign in protest over policy toward Iraq. John Brady Kiesling, a political counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Athens, stepped down March 7.
In her letter, Wright said that by taking military action without U.N. Security Council backing, the United States could trigger a backlash in the Arab world.
"This pre-emptive attack policy will ... provide justification for individuals and groups to `pre-emptively attack' America and American citizens," the letter says.
more @ Associated Press and Yahoo News.
Founded @ The Agonist via Hesiod. War blog The Agonist: thoughtful, global, timely. Minute news from the war front.
post by vasco on 2:50 PM
Syrian President
Call Arab States
to Defend Iraq
And Syrian Cleric Calls For Suicide Attacks Against US, British Troops
by Julie Stahl
Syrian President Bashar Assad is calling on Arab states to defend Iraq while Syria's top religious authority has called for suicide attacks against U.S. and British troops fighting to topple the regime of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
Assad, an outspoken opponent of the allied war against Iraq, said he hopes the Americans will fail, according to an interview published in the Lebanese newspaper As-Safir on Thursday.
Assad called on the Arab states to invoke the joint Arab defense treaty, which calls on them to defend any Arab country that is being invaded, according to a translation provided by the Middle East Media Research Institute.
When asked if he thought the U.S. had Syria on a list of countries it intended to deal with, Assad replied that whether Syria is on a list or not, there is a chance it could be targeted. He also said he expected the war in Iraq to broaden to include other countries.
Syrian expert Dr. Yossi Olmert, who was involved in Israeli-Syrian negotiations during the 1990s, said the interview was "full of very aggressive remarks." But he did not want to guess at what the Syrian leader's intentions are.
more @ Cross Walk.
founded @ The Agonist. War blog The Agonist: thoughtful, global, timely. Minute news from the war front.
post by vasco on 2:18 PM
Anti-War Resistance:
"No Business as Usual"
in New York, March 27th
Wednesday Spokescouncil Location Change: A pre-action meeting is planned for Weds evening, 6pm, March 26, Washington Square United Methodist Church, 135 West 4th Street, (just east of 6th Ave., Village, NYC).
Following in the footsteps of activists in San Francisco and across the country, New Yorkers have vowed that there will be "no business as usual" in the city on Thursday, March 27th.
A mass die-in is planned at Rockefeller Center at 8am on the 27th.
And for more militant activists, "decentralized autonomous direct action throughout the city will stop rush hour traffic. Classrooms will sit empty and employees will NOT be at their desks. Roving street blockades and civil disobedience will fill the intersections." The call to action follows below:
Direct Action
Thursday March 27th -- Let's shut this city down! No more business as usual!
Every day now the lives of Iraqis are ending, and our everyday lives must end as well.
WE MUST REVOLT AGAINST THIS WAR OF A PRESIDENT WE NEVER ELECTED.
The time for symbolic acts has ended. The war is on and we must take our resistance to another level.
Get your affinity groups together and plan for autonomous direct actions against the war in the streets of NYC at 7 am on Thursday, March 27th. We will be on the streets all day!
Disrupting the city is as simple as 123:
1) Pick your target -- any busy street or intersection will do.
2) Your affinity group takes the intersection until the cops come and then runs away to a new street or intersection.
3) Rinse. Repeat.
* This is just one idea. If your affinity group has a good idea, go and do it!
* Keep the details of your action confidential.
* Coordinate clusters of affinity groups to hit a target over and over throughout the day.
* Be creative, stay out of jail and on the move.
* We will support each other by having lots of groups doing lots of actions all day.
This day of action is not being called by any one organization. Get into small groups and organize actions!
more @ NY Independent Media Center
call to action @ No Business as Usual
post by vasco on 3:57 AM
Fierce Clashes Slow
U.S./U.K. Forces’
Advance on the Capital
by Naseer Al-Nahr
Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal warned yesterday that Saudi Arabia’s long-standing alliance with the United States may be damaged if the war against Iraq drags on or turns into a blood bath for Iraqi civilians.
“I believe the basics are healthy in that relationship,” the Saudi chief diplomat told foreign reporters in Riyadh.
“Definitely the war will not contribute to that relationship. Definitely if the war continues it may damage that relationship. That is why we are interested in bringing this war to an end,” the prince said.
Duststorms and intense clashes in southern and central Iraq hindered the US/UK invaders’ drive toward Baghdad for a second straight day, as President George Bush warned troops in Florida that the military offensive was “far from over”.
Russia, which has long voiced its opposition to the war, called for an immediate end to the war after yesterday’s missile attacks on civilians in Baghdad neighborhoods.
Explosions rocked this city at dawn yesterday, after overnight raids that sent thick black smoke billowing from the state television building, targeted by Washington in a bid to silence the Iraqi media.
Fresh airstrikes took place at 7:15 p.m. on the seventh day of fighting since US/UK forces launched a campaign aimed at disarming Iraq and removing Saddam’s government.
The airstrikes on Baghdad came as the invading forces in southern and central Iraq battled sandstorms and stiff resistance from Iraqi fighters that hindered their march toward Saddam’s seat of power.
A sea of blinding dust kept the 101st Airborne Division’s fleet of more than 270 attack helicopters out of Baghdad for the second day, officers said.
The US Third Infantry Division was closest to Baghdad, positioned near Karbala, about 100 kilometers from the capital, field reports said, with the 101st crawling up from the southwest and at least two divisions of Marines approaching from the southeast.
US troops reported their most one-sided victory of the war thus far, saying they had killed 650 Iraqi militiamen in the outskirts of Najaf, south of the capital.
In addition, 250 were killed in two separate incidents on the east bank of the Euphrates River, and another 100 on a bridge spanning the river, said Major General Buford Blount, commander of the Third Infantry Division.
At least 20 US servicemen and 20 British soldiers have been killed since war erupted early Thursday. A handful of others are believed to have been captured.
Qatar-based Al-Jazeera television broadcast photos of two dead British troops and two others reportedly taken prisoner.
Nevertheless, Bush hailed the military’s “good progress” in Iraq, and said: “We cannot predict the final day of the Iraqi regime, but I can assure you there will be a day of reckoning for the Iraqi regime, and that day is drawing near,” he added.
“Protecting innocent civilians is a central commitment of our war plan,” Bush said.
But witnesses saw about two dozen corpses among wrecked vehicles on the road north of the town of Shatra, where the American convoy had come under small-arms fire.
A US military official said some of the 12 soldiers whose supply convoy was ambushed near Nassiriyah in southern Iraq on Sunday may have been killed by their captors although they had tried to surrender. US/UK forces killed at least 100 Iraqis in Nassiriyah, a key crossing point over the Euphrates river. Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed Al-Sahaf said more than 500 Iraqi civilians had been wounded and 200 homes destroyed in Nassiriyah as a result of US and British bombing.
US Marines confiscated more than 3,000 chemical suits and masks from a hospital in Nassiriyah used by Iraqi paramilitaries, US military officials at allied command headquarters in Qatar said. But British Defense Secretary Geoff Hoon told Parliament: “To date we have no evidence of Iraqi use of weapons of mass destruction during this campaign.”
Al-Sahaf denied reports that the country’s sole deep-water port of Umm Qasr in the south had fallen under US/UK control. Baghdad also rejected reports that an anti-Saddam revolt was ongoing in the country’s second city of Basra.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair told lawmakers that “some limited form of uprising” had taken place in Iraq’s main port. But Iraqi officials denied the report and a correspondent in Basra for Al-Jazeera said there was no sign of a revolt.
As British forces entered the outskirts of Basra, the International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) said clean drinking water had been restored to about half of the city’s 1.2 million inhabitants.
A column of Iraqi tanks broke out of Basra late yesterday and was heading toward British positions under bombardment by coalition aircraft, a British spokesman said. Squadron Leader Simon Scott said he could not confirm the number of tanks in the armored thrust, but press reports indicated as many as 100 may be involved.
The UN Security Council met yesterday behind closed doors to discuss the war in Iraq and the possible restart of the oil-for-food program. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan expressed concern over the number of casualties in Iraq, urging both sides to respect international law and take all necessary steps to protect civilians.
founded @ Arab News.
post by vasco on 2:55 AM
New Al Jazeera Web
Site Runs Under DoS
Attacks and Failures
The english Web site of Arab satellite television network Al-Jazeera was attacked with a bombardment of data packets, known as a denial-of-service attack, rendering it intermittently unavailable.
Ayman Arrashid, Internet system administrator at the Horizons Media and Information Services, the site's Web host, said the attack began Tuesday morning. Staff were unable to update the English site for about four hours said it managing editor Joanne Tucker.
The Web host is based in the Persian Gulf state of Qatar. The servers that host the Al-Jazeera site are in France and the United States. Only the U.S. servers were under attack, said Arrashid, so the attackers were likely in the United States.
The Qatar-based network, already controversial in the West for airing messages from Osama bin Laden, has faced a storm of criticism in the United States for broadcasting Iraqi footage of five U.S. prisoners of war and at least eight corpses.
Al Jazeera's information technology manager Salah Al Seddiqui said the company was also told by its Qatar-based vendor that U.S.-based DataPipe could no longer host its site from the end of the month. Al Seddiqui said the company was moving its servers to Europe.
Tucker said war sensitivities may have been behind the decision, but DataPipe said in a statement it was ending its relationship with a company that manages Al Jazeera's site on March 31. It said it had no direct ties with Al Jazeera.
Al-Jazeera is an unusually independent and powerful voice in the Arab world.
tipped by JA in the tagboard and news comment of the blog.
read also @ Associated Press,Reuters and Washington Post.
post by vasco on 2:13 AM
Government Pushs
Private Firms to Censor
Small Web News Sites
by Bernhard Warner
A Florida-based Web hosting company knocked a small news site off-line after it posted controversial photos of captured American soldiers, stoking accusations that private firms are censoring free speech.
For several hours on Tuesday, Yellow Times was dark, carrying the message "Account for domain YellowTimes.org has been suspended." Later in the day there was sporadic access.
The move is stoking fears that as more grisly images and accounts of war surface, independent news sites trying to establish a name for themselves will have to tone down their coverage so as not to alienate readers and the companies that keep their sites alive.
Erich Marquadt, editor of YellowTimes, told Reuters that Orlando, Fla-based Web hosting company Vortech Inc. had first grounded the site on Sunday night after he posted six photos of American POWs plucked from news footage first aired by Qatar-based Al Jazeera television.
U.S. television networks had been abiding by a U.S. Pentagon request not to show the footage. "I think we were the first Web site to show the images," he said. "But the site was down a few hours later, without any warning."
Marquadt said Vortech, which did not return Reuters phone calls, cited viewer complaints and argued the images constituted a breach of the firm's usage agreements. "They said we violated the adult content clause," he added.
"No TV station in the U.S. is allowing any dead U.S. soldiers or POWs to be displayed and we will not either. We understand free press and all but we don't want someone's family member to see them on some site. It is disrespectful, tacky and disgusting," read the email explanation sent to Marquadt and seen by Reuters.
New Cops on the Beat
Small web-only news purveyors that promise a distinct brand of unsanitized news reporting are encountering more and more publishing constraints as their readership swells.
Last year, the FBI asked operators of Web site Ogrish.com and its Virginia-based hosting company, Pro Hosters, to remove an unedited, four-minute video of the murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl.
Pro Hosters complied with the demand at first, but later reinstated the video, which remains archived on its site.
And last week, Israeli army censors said they were working with Web site publishers and the country's ISPs to ensure that sensitive, war-related information, including the whereabouts of potential missile landings, is not published online.
< my comment > We can't forget CNN's scandalous shut down of Kevin Sites' warblog posted in Christopher's blog. Kevin is a CNN cameraman who was blogging from Iraq until the employer "ask" him to suspend it. < /comment >
more @ Reuters.
post by vasco on 1:33 AM
Dubya's Partner Use
Clear Channel to Promote
Pro-War's Movement
By Paul Krugman
By and large, recent pro-war rallies haven't drawn nearly as many people as antiwar rallies, but they have certainly been vehement. One of the most striking took place after Natalie Maines, lead singer for the Dixie Chicks, criticized President Bush: a crowd gathered in Louisiana to watch a 33,000-pound tractor smash a collection of Dixie Chicks CD's, tapes and other paraphernalia. To those familiar with 20th-century European history it seemed eerily reminiscent of. . . . But as Sinclair Lewis said, it can't happen here.
Who has been organizing those pro-war rallies? The answer, it turns out, is that they are being promoted by key players in the radio industry — with close links to the Bush administration.
The CD-smashing rally was organized by KRMD, part of Cumulus Media, a radio chain that has banned the Dixie Chicks from its playlists. Most of the pro-war demonstrations around the country have, however, been organized by stations owned by Clear Channel Communications, a behemoth based in San Antonio that controls more than 1,200 stations and increasingly dominates the airwaves.
The company claims that the demonstrations, which go under the name Rally for America, reflect the initiative of individual stations. But this is unlikely: according to Eric Boehlert, who has written revelatory articles about Clear Channel in Salon, the company is notorious — and widely hated — for its iron-fisted centralized control.
Until now, complaints about Clear Channel have focused on its business practices. Critics say it uses its power to squeeze recording companies and artists and contributes to the growing blandness of broadcast music. But now the company appears to be using its clout to help one side in a political dispute that deeply divides the nation.
Why would a media company insert itself into politics this way? It could, of course, simply be a matter of personal conviction on the part of management. But there are also good reasons for Clear Channel — which became a giant only in the last few years, after the Telecommunications Act of 1996 removed many restrictions on media ownership — to curry favor with the ruling party. On one side, Clear Channel is feeling some heat: it is being sued over allegations that it threatens to curtail the airplay of artists who don't tour with its concert division, and there are even some politicians who want to roll back the deregulation that made the company's growth possible. On the other side, the Federal Communications Commission is considering further deregulation that would allow Clear Channel to expand even further, particularly into television.
Or perhaps the quid pro quo is more narrowly focused. Experienced Bushologists let out a collective "Aha!" when Clear Channel was revealed to be behind the pro-war rallies, because the company's top management has a history with George W. Bush. The vice chairman of Clear Channel is Tom Hicks, whose name may be familiar to readers of this column. When Mr. Bush was governor of Texas, Mr. Hicks was chairman of the University of Texas Investment Management Company, called Utimco, and Clear Channel's chairman, Lowry Mays, was on its board. Under Mr. Hicks, Utimco placed much of the university's endowment under the management of companies with strong Republican Party or Bush family ties. In 1998 Mr. Hicks purchased the Texas Rangers in a deal that made Mr. Bush a multimillionaire.
There's something happening here. What it is ain't exactly clear, but a good guess is that we're now seeing the next stage in the evolution of a new American oligarchy. As Jonathan Chait has written in The New Republic, in the Bush administration "government and business have melded into one big `us.' " On almost every aspect of domestic policy, business interests rule: "Scores of midlevel appointees . . . now oversee industries for which they once worked." We should have realized that this is a two-way street: if politicians are busy doing favors for businesses that support them, why shouldn't we expect businesses to reciprocate by doing favors for those politicians — by, for example, organizing "grass roots" rallies on their behalf?
What makes it all possible, of course, is the absence of effective watchdogs. In the Clinton years the merest hint of impropriety quickly blew up into a huge scandal; these days, the scandalmongers are more likely to go after journalists who raise questions. Anyway, don't you know there's a war on?
< back to Iraq 2.0 comment > It should also be noted that Clear Channel is a major donor to the Republican party. Since 1997, the chairman and CEO, Lowry Mays, according to FEC records, has personally given $11,250, almost all to Republican candidates. (The exception is Rep. Charles Gonzales of the 20th District.)
Krugman’s point is partially that Clear Channel is doing a favor for George W. Bush, but his main point is that major corporations — including media companies — are merging with the government “into one big ‘us.’” The danger of this should be obvious.
Anyway, there’s so much going on now. It’s impossible to know the whole story of this war. But that’s OK, I‘ve come to realize. It’s more important to tell a few stories of the war rather than the story of the war. That will have to be written later. And when the narrative is told, the media will have major role — mainstream, freelance and independent alike. And perhaps someone will look back and say, “The blogosphere stepped up to the plate. With commentary and analysis, its members provided a tonic for much of the mainstream media’s excesses. Others provided a meta-analysis, providing their readers with as much of a bird’s eye view of the coverage as possible. And for the first time, they sent one of their own to war.” < /comment >
more @ New York Times.
founded @ Back to Iraq 2.0.
post by vasco on 12:09 AM
Wednesday, March 26, 2003
Al Jazeera Launches
Iraq Site in English
Providing Arab News
by Ian Fried
Arab news agency Al Jazeera launched an English-language Web site on Monday, providing a starkly different view on the war with Iraq than that offered by many Western media outlets. Featuring headlines such as "US 'precision' bomb destroys civilian bus", "Misinformation Basra" and "Hunger turns Iraqi civilians against US 'saviours'", the site billed itself as "objective and balanced global news coverage and analysis". The site, which is devoted to news on the conflict in Iraq, joins a chorus of voices emanating from the war zone, including individual Web logs as well as the many TV broadcasts, radio reports, newspaper dispatches and other media reports. However, the Al Jazeera site was accessible only intermittently on Monday. Although much of the difference between Al Jazeera's reports and those of other news outlets had to do with the tone and choice of stories, in some cases the site offered facts at odds with those reported by Western media outlets. For example, it was widely reported in the Western press that coalition bombs appeared to have hit a bus carrying Syrian civilians in Iraq near the Syrian border. However, in one article, Al Jazeera says: "A missile is said to have strayed and hit a bus in Syria, killing five innocent passengers." Al Jazeera, which is based in Qatar, has been billed as the CNN of the Middle East, but has also come under criticism, first for broadcasting unedited speeches of Osama Bin Laden and more recently for broadcasting video of US soldiers said to be held prisoner by Iraq. US military leaders have criticised Iraq for showing videotapes of US prisoners and some have extended that criticism to Al Jazeera. "Needless to say, television networks that carry such pictures are, I would say, doing something that's unfortunate," Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on Monday in an interview on CNN's Late Edition. A Pentagon spokesman declined to comment on the site. Although some are likely to value a contrasting voice, the site is sure to be controversial, with features including "Coalition of the willing has become a joke" and "Has Israeli lobby influenced this war?" Among its dispatches on Monday was what it described as an eyewitness account of the assault on Baghdad. "Baghdad witnessed intense bombardment last night," begins the unbylined report, attributed simply to Al Jazeera. "Glass panes on windows and doors of the Al Jazeera Satellite TV office were shattered as shock waves ripped through the city. We still can smell gunpowder and smoke here." The report goes on to give details on an attack on the Al Salam palace, which Al Jazeera said is used for hosting heads of state. "We visited this palace along with the Iraqi Minister of Information and saw the damage," the report said. "It was completely empty and devoid of the alleged weapons of mass destruction." The site also features a section devoted to "global reaction", which focuses entirely on opposition to the war, including various protests as well as antiwar sentiments expressed during Sunday's Academy Awards.
more @ ZDNet News.
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post by vasco on 12:57 PM
Web Logs Offer
Eye Witness
Accounts of War
In addition to 500 "embedded" journalists and three cable networks beaming 24-hour coverage of the Iraq War, there's a new communications channel providing a novel perspective: unfiltered eyewitness accounts posted to individual soldiers' Web logs. "Not only reporters, but people on the battle front can communicate with the world," says Jeff Jarvis, president of Advance Publications' Internet operations. Many of the authors are anonymous, making it difficult to verify the information they supply, but Maj. C.J. Wallington, team leader for the Army's secure intranet system, Army Knowledge Online, says because of the volume the military "can't spend a lot of time" checking up on what soldiers are saying electronically. "We put a lot of faith in soldiers to do the right thing" and apply the same discretion to their Internet communications that they would in their personal conversations. Curiously, unlike the military, traditional media outlets have been trying to suppress their personnel's blogging efforts. Kevin Sites, a CNN correspondent who'd been posting photos, short accounts and audio reports on his own Web site, was asked to desist. "Covering a war for CNN… is a full-time job and we asked Kevin to concentrate only on that for the time being," says a CNN spokeswoman.
more @ Wall Street Journal. (sub req'd)
Received from NewScan Daily newslist. NewsScan Daily (FREE), a lively summary of information technology news writed by John Gehl and Suzanne Douglas. To subscribe, send email to Newscan. Copyright 2003. NewsScan Daily (R) is a publication of NewsScan Inc.
post by vasco on 12:31 PM
Tuesday, March 25, 2003
Russian Industry Sold
Missilles, Jamming and
Night-Vision to Iraq
Bush, Putin Trade Barbs Over Iraq War
By Ron Fournier
Russia is putting U.S. troops at risk in Iraq by selling antitank guided missiles, jamming devices and night-vision goggles to Baghdad, the Bush administration said Monday in a growing rift with Moscow.
President Bush raised the issue in a tense telephone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who in turn charged that the United States was creating "a humanitarian catastrophe" in Iraq.
It was the latest flare-up in a recently bumpy relationship between Washington and Moscow over issues ranging from missile-defense plans to NATO expansion. Russia sided with France and Germany to block a Bush-backed U.N. resolution sanctioning military conflict to disarm Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.
After months of monitoring sales to Iraq, the United States received information in the past 48 hours about "the kind of equipment that will put our men and women in harm's way," Secretary of State Colin Powell said Monday on Fox News Channel.
Later, he told Britain's Sky News that he hoped to convey fresh information to Moscow. Asked if he is certain the equipment was in Iraq, Powell replied: "Yes."
White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said there was "ongoing cooperation and support to Iraqi military forces being provided by a Russian company that produces GPS jamming equipment." The technology blocks satellite signals that guide bombs, missiles and even troop movements.
Asked if the items were being used against U.S. troops, Fleischer said, "They were not provided for the purpose of sitting on shelves."
In particular, U.S. officials alleged Russian technicians were in Iraq during the last few weeks to provide technical support for the GPS jammers. The technicians were from a Russian private company, not the government.
more @ Associated Press.
post by vasco on 4:40 AM
Arab League Declare
the War on Iraq a
Threat to World Peace
Arab states line up behind Iraq
A summit of Arab foreign ministers has demanded the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of US and British forces from Iraq.
The Arab League ministers meeting in Cairo passed a resolution declaring the war on Iraq a "violation of the United Nations Charter" and a "threat to world peace".
The resolution was adopted unanimously by the 22-member League except for key US ally Kuwait amid heated rhetoric, with Libya hailing "Iraqi heroism".
Syria, which represents Arab states on the current UN Security Council, said it would call for an emergency meeting of the body.
The BBC's Mark Doyle, who was at the summit, says Iraq is likely to be pleased with the outcome, but it is not clear what it means in practical terms.
The League does not have executive powers to implement its resolutions, so there is no mechanism for stopping those Arab states which have US forces on their land - such as Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain - from continuing to help them.
In New York, the Syrian ambassador to the UN, Mikhail Wehbe, said he would be calling for an emergency meeting of the Security Council to "stop the aggression against Iraq and the Iraqi people and to withdraw the foreign troops".
more @ BBC News.
post by vasco on 4:19 AM
"Netcentric War"
Assembled With
Off-The-Shelf Components
The Defense Department's "netcentric war" that seamlessly links sensors, communications devices, and weapons in a digital network is built substantially with off-the-shelf technology. Military analyst John Pike says, "There was a fundamental change in their philosophy from build to buy," and Steve Zaloga of The Teal Group explains: "Computer processing used to be expensive and delicate, and now it's battlefield hardened and cheap." For example, the cost of the electronic gear of one airplane system was reduced from $19.5 million a plane to only $4.5 million. Military analyst Loren Thompson of the Lexington Institute says: "There is no time in human history when warriors have had so clear an idea of where their friends were, where their enemies were and what they needed to do to exploit the situation."
more @ USA Today.
Received from NewScan Daily newslist. NewsScan Daily (FREE), a lively summary of information technology news writed by John Gehl and Suzanne Douglas. To subscribe, send email to Newscan. Copyright 2003. NewsScan Daily (R) is a publication of NewsScan Inc.
post by vasco on 4:05 AM
Monday, March 24, 2003
Hail of Gunfire
and Rockets Forces
Apaches to Pull Back
by Jim Dwyer
With a hail of small arms fire and rocket-propelled grenades, Iraqi forces downed two Apache helicopters today and forced 30 other helicopters in their brigade back to their base.
One two-member crew was unaccounted for; the other was rescued. Iraqi state television broadcast images of one downed helicopter, which appeared largely intact, and jubilant men dancing around it.
All 32 helicopters sustained some damage, occasionally slight, Army officials said, in what was a significant setback for the allies.
Fighting continued today in Nasiriya, meanwhile, after the death of 10 marines there on Sunday in the deadliest battle of the war so far.
The attack on the helicopters today surprised American Army leaders and may cause them to adjust their military strategy, which was relying on the Apaches to destroy the Iraqi armored forces that ring Baghdad.
< warblogging comment > Meanwhile, the neoconservatives who assured us that Iraq would be a cakewalk continue to insist that we'll reach Baghdad by Tuesday, as Reuters reports. I was told the same thing by a neoconservative friend yesterday. "No worries, we'll be in Baghdad by Tuesday," he told me. Reuters was hearing the same thing. "We're looking toward Monday night, Tuesday for the ground offensive on Baghdad," an anonymous source said.
Even so, Reuters' source did acknowledge "You are dealing with a different enemy. The Republican Guard are going to put up a proper fight."
How long did that take? I thought the Republican Guard were going to turn tail and run, and that our Apaches would chase them all the way? Apparently not. Apparently the Republican Guard is standing and fighting and the Apaches are the ones who are turning tail. Oh boy. This wasn't what we signed up for.
Don't get me wrong. I want the war in Iraq to be over tomorrow. Since we're committed we can't back out now. We just can't do it. We must push this one to the end, we must capture and occupy Baghdad. I hope that we do it with a minimal loss of life and I hope that we don't lose any more helicopters. I hope that American forces in Iraq streamroll over the Republican Guard.
It doesn't look like that's what happening, though. It looks like we're getting a run for our money. Who woulda thunk it? All the neocons were telling us that the Iraqis would be so happy to see us that they'd greet us with thrown rice, cheers and music. They'd greet us as liberators, just as we were once greeted by the French and the Belgians.
I hope that, in the end, that will be the case. But consider this. If you were under the thumb of a repressive American government and fighting it tooth and nail for every one of your civil liberties, would you greet an Iraqi army with open arms? How about if they say they're here to "liberate" you? Would you throw rice at your liberators or take pot shots at the dirty Arabs who can't even pronounce "Brooklyn" yet point to it on a map and say "We'll take Brooklyn by tomorrow"? I know that I'd reach for a gun and fight a guerilla war. Would you? < /comment >
more @ New York Times
founded @ Warblogging.
post by vasco on 6:26 PM
U.S. Propaganda Machine
Is Too Discredited
to Be of Much Use
Propaganda
The US is really starting to lose the propaganda war, as everything it says turns out to be lies.
Witness:
* Saddam is dead! Ok, no he's not.
* Iraq fired a Scud at Kuwait! Ok, no it wasn't.
* Umm Qasr is taken! Ok, no it's not.
* The Iraqi 51st Division surrendered en masse! Ok, not it hasn't.
* Republican Guard commanders will surrender! Ok, no they won't.
* Basra is taken! Ok, no it's not.
* We found a chemical weapons factory! Ok, maybe it isn't.
Sigh. The fact that these efforts to weaken Saddam's regime can be attributed to several reasons -- perhaps the regime wasn't as despised as claimed. Perhaps command and control is fully intact (they could've laid an underground fiberoptic lines impervious to US jamming or easy location and destruction).
more @ Daily Kos. Daily Kos: political analysis and other daily rants on the state of the nation.
post by vasco on 4:39 PM