Who Does Kerry Want to Lead Iraq?

Townhall ^ | 24-Sep-2004 | Jay Bryant

[HawaiianGecko]

 

Who Does Kerry Want to Lead Iraq?
Jay Bryant (archive)
September 25, 2004 | Print | Send

Saddam Hussein, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, Ayad Allawi.

These are your choices.

Who do you want to be the leader of Iraq?

The slick-mustachioed dictator with his mass graves? The cunning terrorist bent on holding the Guinness record for beheadings? Or the rumpled, avuncular Prime Minister courageously facing day-by-day danger to bring democracy to his country?

These are your choices.

And John Kerry's choices, too. Among many other things, John Kerry has said the Iraq war was the "wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time." There is no possible way to interpret that statement than the way President Bush has: if John Kerry had been President these past two years, Saddam Hussein would still be in power.

And Allawi, therefore, would not. But thanks to President Bush and the sacrifices of American troops and taxpayers, Saddam is out and Allawi is in. The evil Zarqawi has vowed to change that, to deliver Iraq and its 25 million people to the merciless governance of al-Qaeda, and make it the capital of world terrorism so it can behead Western Civilization en masse, as it does to innocent people in Iraq and, with striking and appalling visual similarity, as it did to the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.

Only the success of Allawi and his plan for democracy can prevent this outcome. For an American to do anything that diminishes Allawi's chances for success is despicable.

Allawi knows how greatly his chances depend on America and its allies. So he has come here, to offer us his thanks and his encouragement. There should be an outpouring of support for him as he visits our shores. We should give the man a ticker- tape parade. Schoolchildren should be encouraged to draw pictures illustrating our support for his efforts. The flag of free Iraq should greet him from store windows and lampposts wherever he goes.

He came to thank us, to encourage us. We need to thank him, and encourage him. This man, a 59-year old neurologist, has reported for duty when his country, and ours, needed him.

John Kerry does not see it that way. John Kerry is so cynical that he will distort Allawi's words and attack him verbally, even as he is our guest. "I think the prime minister is obviously contradicting his own statement of a few days ago, where he said the terrorists are pouring into the country," Kerry sneered in reaction to Allawi's encouraging words before a joint session of Congress. Shameful, shameful. The comments from which Kerry cynically clipped his reference was this: "Foreign terrorists are still pouring in, and they're trying to inflict damage on Iraq to undermine Iraq and to undermine the process, democratic process in Iraq, and, indeed, this is their last stand. So they are putting a very severe fight on Iraq. We are winning. We will continue to win. We are going to prevail."

I've tried, and I can't think of a more unethical use of an out of context quote, not even the one Kerry and his cronies tried to pull on Cheney a couple of weeks ago, when keening in their girly-man fashion, they accused Cheney of saying that a Kerry election would increase the likelihood of a terrorist attack on the U.S.

That's not what Cheney said, but I'll tell you something: by his inexcusable dissing of Allawi, Kerry has decreased the likelihood of Allawi's success, and that would most assuredly increase the likelihood of a terrorist attack on the U.S.

Imagine if Wendell Willkie had said those things about Churchill in 1940.

The old bromide that politics stops at the water's edge has never really been true. Robust discussions of foreign policy are not forbidden by our political code of ethics, nor should they be.   But the contumelious slander of a heroic and valued ally like Allawi is unprecedented for a candidate in wartime. Kerry would have us believe this brave man is a vacuous puppet and a flip- flopper. By his slander, he has insulted the people of Iraq, not to mention the troops of the international coalition who are putting their lives on the line for the Allawi government's plan for elections in January.

Such talk was not justified with regard to Nguyen Van Thieu in 1971, but at least then Kerry had the excuse of being young and inexperienced. In all likelihood, he was even sincere. He probably actually believed Vietnam would be better off under the rule of the communists.

By his disgraceful attack on the great hope of Baghdad, Kerry begs a parallel question, 33 years later: You've got three choices: who do you want to be the leader of Iraq?

 

 

I personally think Kerry is a disgraceful man! 

[kesg]

Didn't Kerry already answer "Saddam" the other day?

[JasonC]

It is even worse than the article makes it out to be. Kerry wants to be president. He wants to be in charge of our Iraq policy. If he were elected, this man would be the prime minister of Iraq that he would need to deal with to impliment any policy of his own, whatever it is. He is burning bridges with the man before he even takes office. As Burke once put it, being a poor craftsman, he sells his tools. Why? Because he doesn't believe he is going to win anyway, and at this point is focused just on hatred of his opponent and everything he does or stands for.

[Socratic]

...whom do you want to be the leader of Iraq? Ah, that's better.

[christie]

.
To understand John Kerry is to understand his dad. Richard Kerry published his only book, The Star-Spangled Mirror, in 1990. He writes:

"Americans are inclined to see the world and foreign affairs in black and white. They celebrate their own form of government and denigrate all others, making them guilty of what he calls 'ethnocentric accommodation' -- everyone ought to be like us. As a result, America has committed the 'fatal error' of 'propagating democracy' and fallen prey to 'the siren's song of promoting human rights,' falsely assuming that our values and institutions are a good fit in the Third World. And, just as Americans exaggerate their own goodness, they exaggerate their enemies' badness. The Soviet Union wasn't nearly as imperialistic as American politicians warned. Seeing the Soviet Union as the aggressor in every instance, and the U.S. as only reacting defensively, relieves an American observer from the need to see any parallel between our use of military power in distant parts of the world, and the Soviet use of military power outside the Soviet Union. . . . Third world Marxist movements were autonomous national movements -- outside Moscow's orbit."

More on the John F. Kerry Timeline.
.

[Kirkwood]

Yes, I really think he wants Saddam back in power. Of course, he would be controlled by UN occupying forces until Saddam proves he can behave (about 3 months).

[FormerACLUmember]

CBS has cast its vote: Dan Rather flew to Bagdad and gave a buttocks licking "interview" of Saddam Hussein.

I suspect their preferred leader would actually be Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. CBS would love to give a repectful loving interview of aforementioned al Queda mass murderer, were it not for the fact that Free Iraqi and US hunter-killer strike forces would send a HellFire missle down his throat at the first cellphone location fix.

Ayad Allawi flies to NY and Washington and is snubbed by CBS, giving more evidence as to the liberals' preference.

[Kirkwood]

This sounds like the BS that I had to put up with from sociology professors in college. I have an employee from Russia who would vehemently disagree with the notion that the Soviets weren't so bad and not so controlling. Meanwhile, many tens of millions who died at the hands of Soviet communists remain silent on the issue.

[Wil H]

Kerry negotiated with the enemy to defeat America in Vietnam..

Kerry negotiated with the enemy to defeat America in Nicaragua..

Kerry wants to negotiate in Iraq....

see a pattern here?

[Tacis]

Actually, "Viet Cong" Kerry has promised the job of leader of Irag (if Kerry wins) to Nguyen Minh, a young man with whom he had, shall we say, carnal knowledge when he was in Cam Ranh Bay in 1969. Minh has held positions of some reponsiblity in the UN organization and, of course, speaks French.

[kesg]

Kerry negotiated with the enemy to defeat America in Vietnam..

Kerry negotiated with the enemy to defeat America in Nicaragua..

Kerry wants to negotiate in Iraq....

see a pattern here?

He also supported the nuclear freeze movement and was otherwise on the wrong side of virtually every important national security issue of the last two decades. Yes, I see a pattern: out of the mess of inconsistencies, contradictions, non sequiturs, and other mush, there emerges a clear, continuous, consistent, unrelenting pattern of anti-Americanism.

[Rome2000]

This is what Kerry and his treacherous band of com-symp SOB's really think of the courageous President of Iraq.







Weekend Edition
June 26 / 27, 2004
"We Will Crush Fallujah's Insurgents"
Iyad Allawi, the CIA's New Stooge in Iraq

By PATRICK COCKBURN

The US military angrily lashed out yesterday with an air strike on an alleged "safehouse" of insurgents in Fallujah believed to be behind co-ordinated attacks across Iraq.

As the insurgents attacked in cities across central Iraq this week, killing more than 100 people, Iyad Allawi, the interim prime minister, vowed that "we are going to defeat them. We are going to crush them."

It will not be easy to do. By making co-ordinated assaults on police stations and government buildings, the guerrillas have shown that they are far better organised and more numerous than they were six months ago.

The attacks also had the obvious intention of spoiling the so-called handover of power by the US-led Coalition Provisional Authority to the Iraqi interim government led by Mr Allawi on 30 June.

In fact the transfer of power will be limited. Mr Allawi has grandiose plans for a beefed-up Iraqi security force, but at the moment he has little armed strength. He must depend on the 138,000 US troops in the country for the foreseeable future. The elaborate security measures protecting Mr Allawi as he speaks defiantly to his enemies make clear his reliance on the US. Anybody attending his press conferences must enter the Green Zone, the American civil headquarters in Iraq, and pass through four checkpoints manned by US soldiers. No Iraqi officials are visible.

But there is no doubt about the American desire to give an Iraqi face to the occupation and to see Iraqi security forces do much of the fighting.

The US military and civil leaders were profoundly shaken when half of the Iraqi army, paramilitary units and police deserted or went home during the uprisings in April.

Mr Allawi will now play a vital role in US plans. He is a surprising choice. "We really chose him because he had the least enemies," said a member of the notoriously divided Iraqi Governing Council, which selected him last month. He was a notably unsuccessful opposition leader against Saddam Hussein in the 1990s, played little role in the war last year, and his movement, the Iraqi National Accord, had made little impact since entering Baghdad.

But Mr Allawi, 59, has certain advantages. He was born into a well-known Shia family in a country where the Shias make up 60 per cent of the population. He was also a member of the Baath party in Iraq and in the UK until he broke with Saddam in the 1970s. This is reassuring for former members of the Baath, numbering some 750,000 members last year, which Paul Bremer, the US viceroy last year, disastrously persecuted. Mr Allawi has publicly said that disbanding the Iraqi army was a mistake.

Again his appointment will be welcomed by hundreds of thousands of former Iraqi soldiers and security men.

But other aspects of Mr Allawi's past are less than reassuring for Iraqis, who expect him to end the occupation and bring peace (and there is an overwhelming desire for peace among Iraqis). Trained as a neurologist in Baghdad, he was awarded a scholarship to Britain, where he worked for Iraqi intelligence as head of the Iraqi Student Union of Europe. He made money in business. Soon he was dealing with British as well as Iraqi intelligence officers.

It is in this shadowy world that Mr Allawi is happiest. He defended himself this month against charges that he was being financed by the CIA by saying that over the years he had taken money from 15 different intelligence organisations but had always been true to his aim of getting rid of Saddam Hussein. In 1978, Saddam, angered by Mr Allawi's change in loyalties, sent assassins to his home in London. They burst into his bedroom armed with knives and axes but he survived, though seriously wounded.

Mr Allawi founded the Iraqi National Accord (al-Wifaq), which sought to attract defecting Baathists and army officers. In 1996 it opened an office in Jordan and tried to launch a coup against Saddam in Baghdad. It failed bloodily. Iraqi security men had penetrated its organisation. But the CIA appeared never to lose faith in him as their chosen agent.

Curiously Mr Allawi's subterranean existence since the fall of Saddam has stood him in good stead. Much of the time he was out of the country. His rival Ahmed Chalabi, close to the Pentagon and the neo-conservatives but hated by the CIA and the US State Department, has fallen from grace as a result of bureaucratic wars in Washington.

The problem for Mr Allawi is that he must now try to ride two very different horses at the same time. Iraqis want him to restore order and get rid of the US occupation. But he has no real base and must therefore do what the US wants at the end of the day. He is thus in danger of having responsibility but little power and being seen by Iraqis as an American stooge.

[patriciamary]

I think when Kerry criticized the prime minister of Iraq Bush should have said not only we support Iraq's people,personally I could care less about Iraq's people,he should how said he is an ally against terror which we fight in Iraq in order to keep America safe. He has to hammer that message home.The average American does not care about the Iraqi people. We are much more worried about our safety,and in these debates if Bush doesn't keep tieing Iraq to the USA'S protection he's in trouble!

[Kirkwood]

I care about Iraqi people and so do many people I know. Why? Because a peaceful and democratic Iraq can only help to weaken islamic fundamentalists. We need to use every weapon in the war on terror, not just our military. Social "weapons" may be just as useful as our troops. If we can help the good people of Iraq and gain their trust and respect at the same time, so much the better.

[patriciamary]

I agree,but Kerry will say as he has said time and time again,Iraq is not part of the war on terror and the American public needs to be reminded time and time again that Iraq is part of the war on terror and in helping keeping our homeland safe ,and we are fighting the enemy,our enemy,and name names and their connection to bin laden and who we have successfully caught or killed, in Iraq ,otherwise Kerry message will ring true to the public true or not and Bush WILL definitely lose this election because of IRAQ!