Free Republic

CHALABI CHATTER Like everybody else, I've been trying to get a handle on Ahmed Chalabi, the Iraqi National Congress leader, who some people would like to see as the new President of Iraq, despite some rough edges. Chalabi is also the focus of the latest unfortunately public Pentagon-State tiff. I must admit, it annoys me that he doesn't have a totally clean slate. Seems like it just makes things that much more difficult. The anti-war elites are in desperation mode because their "quagmire" predictions didn't materialize and they brought out the knives for this guy without skipping a beat (none...

The assassination of Abdul Majid al-Khoei, elder son of the late Ayatollah Khoei, opens the way for the Islamic regime to increase its influence in any future equation related to the Iraqi Shi-ites. Al Khoei family is know for rejecting the Islamic republic regime policies and ideology and the funeral ceremony of the late Ayatollah Khoei, organized 2 years ago, turned into a mass protest and demonstration against the Iranian regime as he was opposed to both dictatorships in Iran and in Iraq. The Islamic republic regime supports Ayatollah Hakim and has armed and trained hundreds of its extremist Iraqi...

Ayatollah Abdul Majid al-Khoei, a key U.S. ally in southern Iraq is murdered, and the power struggle intensifies By TONY KARON The power struggle among Iraqis to fill the vacuum left by the collapse of Saddam Hussein's regime may have claimed its first victim Thursday when Ayatollah Abdul Majid al-Khoei was stabbed to death by unknown assailants inside the Imam Ali Mosque, Shiite Islam's holiest shrine, in the city of An Najaf. According to press reports, al-Khoei was killed during a meeting with a rival cleric backed by Saddam's regime over control of the shrine. The reports said al-Khoei had...

<p>UMM QASR, Iraq — The vanguard of an interim government arrived in southern Iraq yesterday, rolling up in dusty sport utility vehicles after driving from Kuwait City, to establish a civil administration for postwar Iraq.</p> <p>About three dozen retired officers, bureaucrats and technical experts set up the first Iraqi field office of the Pentagon's Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance (ORHA), which will fund and guide the initial rehabilitation of Iraq's human services and infrastructure.</p>

Rapidly, decisions are being made about the governance of postwar Iraq. While debate rages in the press and in Congress, George W. Bush has decided that the United States, not the United Nations, and the Defense Department, not the State Department, will be in charge of Iraq once hostilities have been concluded. Last Wednesday, Colin Powell informed the European foreign ministers that the United Nations would not be in charge. Also on Wednesday, the Washington Post reported that Donald Rumsfeld had rejected eight State Department nominees for positions in postwar Iraq. On Thursday U.S. News broke the story that Rumsfeld...

WASHINGTON (AP) - The United States is beginning to build a new Iraqi army even before Saddam Hussein's forces are defeated, deploying some of the nation's exiles and internal dissidents around the country. Several hundred soldiers of the Iraqi National Congress exile group were flown to an area near the city of Nasiriyah, the group said Sunday. "These are Iraqi citizens who want to fight for a free Iraq, who will become basically the core of the new Iraqi army once Iraq is free," said Marine Gen. Peter Pace, vice chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. More will be...

NEW YORK: In the first major step towards establishing a physical Iraqi presence among coalition forces in their final surge towards Baghdad, the US military has begun airlifting Iraqi opposition fighters into southern Iraq. The airlift, which began Friday night, will put about 1,000 Iraqi opposition forces into a base in southern Iraq controlled by coalition forces, ABC television reported on Sunday. The force is under the control of the Iraqi National Congress and its leader Ahmed Chalabi, who will accompany his troops into Iraq. The opposition forces will also attempt to help set up liaison between US-led forces and...

Opposition mobilises free Iraqi force AMONG their ranks were an Iraqi American who had abandoned his grocery store in Missouri and a former nightclub bouncer from London. Hundreds of Iraqi exiles, assembled under the banner of the Free Iraqi Force, opened a new front in the battle to oust Saddam Hussein yesterday after flying to the south of the country on a perilous mission to incite rebellion in its cities. Guided by Colonel Ted Seel, a grizzled American Vietnam veteran and expert in psychological warfare, the force will use tribal contacts and guerrilla attacks to trigger uprisings in southern cities...

Washington is searching for a successor regime to Saddam Hussein. It is an exercise in political science. Can an even passably democratic government be devised to take the place of a dictator who has stripped his people of decency and trust in others? Iraqis of all sorts are putting themselves forward: dissidents and exiles, former army officers who fled from Saddam in fear of their lives, men of substance certainly. But how representative are they? Why should Iraqis have confidence in self-selected and evidently ambitious leaders whose legitimacy is questionable? This is where the Hashemite family comes in. The last...

Pentagon chief charged with the rebuilding of Iraq tells Toby Harnden he wants to hand over to the people even if Saddam is still there What happens after Saddam Hussein is toppled? Critics of the man overseeing post-war plans have already accused him of trying to turn Iraq into an American fiefdom - complete with colonial-style viceroy - and mocked him for imagining that he can transplant "Jeffersonian democracy". Paul Wolfowitz, the deputy head of the Pentagon, shrugs off these contradictory charges. As the first senior government official to advise that "regime change" in Iraq had to be a primary...

New Delhi, April, 4, IRNA - India's Attorney General, Soli Sorabjee   said on Friday that US war on Iraq to rationalize regime change from  outside in the name of democracy is disgusting.                           Sorabjee while chairing the seminar titled 'Iraq War-Legal and    Ethical Implications' at Indian Law Institute here said that the US   war on Iraq is for oil.                                                   In a well packed S. N. Jain Memorial Hall, Sorabjee said, the US  war on Iraq has opened a grave situation where a foreign country (can) invade another country and dictate democracy to liberate its people   (while this) is unjust...

Saddam's Regime is a European ImportBy Bernard LewisNational Post | April 4, 2003 In the Western world, knowledge of history is poor -- and the awareness of history is frequently poorer. For example, people often argue today as if the kind of political order that prevails in Iraq is part of the immemorial Arab and Islamic tradition. This is totally untrue. The kind of regime represented by Saddam Hussein has no roots in either the Arab or Islamic past. Rather, it is an ideological importation from Europe -- the only one that worked and succeeded (at least in the sense...

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use. CAIRO (Reuters) - With U.S. troops rattling at the gates of Baghdad, leading experts believe Washington may end up having to rely on former members of President Saddam Hussein's ruling Baath party to run post-war Iraq. The Bush administration has talked ambitiously of reshaping Iraq into a democracy that would be a beacon to the Middle East after an initial period of military rule. But Arab and Western analysts say that seems unrealistic in a divided country with no democratic tradition that has endured 34 years of totalitarian rule built on...

Leave Iraq to US Neither the French nor the UN should have any part in drawing up a new Iraqi constitution, says Mark Steyn New Hampshire In Punditstan and Armchairiya it may be a quagmire. But in the sands of Mesopotamia this war’s going very well. The late Mr S. Hussein seems to have resigned to spend more time with his ancestors, his army is taking casualties at a rate 100 times greater than the Great Satan’s, and the increasing Anglo-American control of his territory means the French, Germans and Russians are going to have a much harder time getting...

CBS) What is going to happen in Iraq after the war? The Pentagon has an ambitious plan in the works to rebuild the country, and it has brought together an elite group of Iraqi exiles to plan and carry it out. Vicki Mabrey reports. The plan for post-war Iraq is being plotted by one of the architects of the war itself, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz. His task, he says, is to write a blueprint for a free self-governing Iraq, with a functioning government as soon as possible. “And if anyone thinks you can write a blueprint for that, they've...

A key Iraqi dissident group that has backers from every major religious faction in the country is being snubbed by the Central Intelligence Agency in what one newspaper describes as a bid to cover up intelligence mistakes made during the 1990s. The decision to marginalize the Iraqi National Congress, carried forward into the Bush-era under Clinton appointed CIA Director George Tenet, is making the task of liberation more difficult, the Wall Street Journal said Monday, by complicating efforts of U.S. forces to gain the trust of the Iraqi people. The Iraqi National Congress is the only opposition movement that...

<p>Following a quarter-century of staggering misrule and the squandering of nearly unimaginable economic opportunities under Saddam Hussein, the reconstruction tasks awaiting his successors in Iraq will be undeniably substantial. But, unlike the rebuilding effort facing the 27 million people of Afghanistan — who, as White House Budget Director Mitchell Daniels Jr. recently observed, were essentially "starting from scratch" — Iraq's soon-to-be-liberated population of 24 million will be able to draw upon massive resources to help finance the reconstruction of the nation that will soon be returned to them.</p>

This is how Berlin must have been in the worst days of the Cold War. Spies in the shadows, intrigues in the hotel lobbies, discreet meetings in cafes, as the would-be successors to Saddam Hussein jockey and maneuver for position.It is the same in Tehran, in Amman, in Ankara and in Damascus, as all Iraq's neighbors try desperately to work out who will run the place when the dust finally settles.Throughout this region, politicians and generals and media assume that the Americans will pick Iraq's next ruler. This is the Middle East, where nobody believes the American protestations that the...

No U.S. territorial ambitions in Iraq RIYADH, Saudi Arabia, April 2 (UPI) -- U.S. Ambassador in Saudi Arabia Robert Jordan affirmed that his country has no territorial ambitions in Iraq but will stay there as long as its presence is needed. Jordan said, in comments published Wednesday, that the United States was also "working hard to avoid casualties among civilians." Jordan who made the comments Tuesday in front of the Saudi Shura (consultative) Council said the U.S. forces "will remain in Iraq as long as it is necessary to consolidate security and stability and the Iraqis have to decide which...

Dangerous WatersWill the U.S. nurture an Islamist Iraq? A proposed first meeting of the Iraqi opposition on Iraqi soil has been delayed by disputes between Kurds and Turks, the late arrival of the U.S. delegation, and opposition leaders' criticism of American plans to install a temporary postwar military government. Ahmed Chalabi, head of the Iraqi National Congress, fears the U.S. will leave Saddam Hussein's followers in charge. Kanan Makiya, an adviser to the Congress, says the U.S. may shunt aside those "who have invested whole lifetimes, and suffered greatly, fighting Saddam Hussein." However, another aspect of plans for Iraq...

An exiled spiritual leader of Iraq's Shiite Muslims, who make up more than 60 percent of the population, tells CBS News correspondent Bob Simon that he is ready to return to help his people - a factor that could affect the U.S. plans for a post-war democracy in Iraq. The interview with the Ayatollah al-Hakim, who has spent the last 23 years in exile in Iran, will be broadcast on 60 Minutes Sunday, March 30, at 7 p.m. ET/PT. Ready to return to Iraq on a moment’s notice, al-Hakim has enjoyed a long relationship with Iran’s revolutionary Islamic government. "I...

WASHINGTON -- In the largest operation in their storied history, elite special operations forces are waging a shadow war in Iraq whose success could determine whether coalition forces can topple the regime of Saddam Hussein quickly or whether the conflict will drag on for months, say military officials and specialists. The military's ''silent warriors,'' as President Bush called them yesterday, were involved in the first operations of the war and are likely to conduct some of the last, including helping spearhead the birth of new civil institutions in a post-Hussein Iraq. Details of their activities in recent weeks -- from...

DAMASCUS, Syria -- Iraqi opposition groups called Thursday for a popular uprising to liberate the country from Iraqi "dictatorship" and outlined a detailed plan for the future of Iraq. In a statement faxed to The Associated Press, the six-member Iraqi opposition leadership council -- set up this year to formulate policies for a post-Saddam Iraq -- urged the Iraqi armed forces to "sever ties with the Baghdad regime" and join them. "The Iraqi opposition command, out of a sense of responsibility to save the people, army and people of Iraq ... calls on the people of Iraq in northern, central...

Leave After War, Iraqi Opposition Group Tells U.S. Tue March 25, 2003 08:13 AM ET TEHRAN (Reuters) - The leader of Iraq's main Shi'ite opposition group warned Washington on Tuesday that U.S. troops would face armed resistance if they stayed in Iraq once President Saddam Hussein was toppled. "Iraqis are against foreign dominance, and if they (the Americans) don't want to leave Iraq, the nation will resist," said Ayatollah Mohammed Baqir Hakim, head of the Tehran-based Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI). "One of the legitimate ways of resistance against occupiers is force and weapons," he told...

Analyzing the decline and fall of the Roman Empire from the security of a politically liberal and rapidly developing-if hardly very democratic-London in 1776, Edward Gibbon concluded that modern Europe possessed a prophylactic that Rome had lacked. Rome, as every schoolgirl once knew, fell to a combination of barbarians without and a loss of belief within. Thus, the glory that was Rome "insensibly declined with their laws and manners." By contrast, Gibbon considered that the threat posed by barbarism to modernizing 18th-century Europe had "contracted to a narrow span." This was for two reasons. First, in the spirit of liberal...

The United States is preparing to establish immediate sole control of postwar Iraq, initially without recourse to the United Nations, with a civilian administration under the direct command of the military, according to senior administration officials. Even before American troops reach Baghdad, administration officials are assembling a team of civilian officials, largely retired American diplomats, to run Iraq as soon as the fighting is over. The administration has decided that helping the country and its people recover after the war will require a civilian corps in place working with the military as it tries to establish security throughout the country....

In a Fox News interview on Sunday from northern Iraq, Ahmad Chalabi, the leader of the Iraqi National Congress — the umbrella organization of the Iraqi democratic opposition — quietly suggested that it might be easier to induce the surrender of Iraqi soldiers if they were approached by Iraqi opposition leaders rather than by American military officers. He mentioned in passing that his soldiers had been ordered to await the arrival of Allied liaison officers. One must regret that such officers had not been with the INC since the onset of hostilities — no doubt Turkey’s outrageous refusal of cooperation...

It is not too soon to look toward the rebuilding of Iraq after the war. "Once Iraqis stabilize and liberate their own capabilities and infrastructure, they will turn outward. Then the modern standard-bearers of the world's oldest civilization will use their extraordinary talents as entrepreneurs and facilitators to shine light on knowledge and information gaps all over the Middle East and beyond." So says Joseph Braude in his book, The New Iraq: Rebuilding the Country for its People, the Middle East, and the World . A senior analyst for Pyramid Research, a Cambridge, Mass., consulting firm, Braude knows both the...

As the campaign in Iraq evolves, caution and judiciousness begin to outweigh speed as the principal virtues. THERE IS AN IMPORTANT DIFFERENCE between war and battle. War is large, governed by politics. Very few people experience war, even very few people in uniform. Battle can be large or small, but is almost always chaotic. Battle is what most soldiers know; Clausewitz called it "the engagement." Battle is also what most in the media know, whether they are "veteran" war correspondents like Peter Arnett or Peter Jennings or big-hair anchors just promoted from doing the local weather. This has never been...

"SAFWAN, Iraq. Waving white flags and raising their hands to the sky, hundreds of Iraqi soldiers quickly surrendered to coalition forces in southern Iraq -- and some even tried to give themselves up to Western journalists. One Marine traffic control unit manning an intersection in southern Iraq accepted at least 45 soldiers' surrender by sundown Friday" -- MSNBC, March 21. - - - "American forces shot down at least two of the incoming [Iraqi] missiles" -- Patrick E. Tyler, New York Times, March 21. - - - "The militant Islamic groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad urged Iraqis on Friday to...

Tehran, March 24, IRNA -- Iraqi opposition groups on Monday stressed that they would declare an Iraqi transitional government once the two important cities of Basra and Mosul have fallen to US-led troops. The London-based newspaper "Asharq al-Awsat" quoted sources with the Iraqi opposition standing committee as saying that Turkey's failure to authorize US mobilization of troops into northern Iraq through its territory was the main problem to declare the transitional government. The Asharq al-Awsat stressed that Turkey's decision would eventually force US commanders to transfer their troops to Kuwait from Turkish shores, and thereon to Iraq's Kurdistan by plane....

INTERVIEW-Shi'ite cleric sees no Islamic republic in Iraq By Sujata Rao LONDON, March 24 (Reuters) - Post-Saddam Iraq will not emulate neighbouring Iran by creating a Shi'ite Islamic republic, even though Shi'ite Muslims make up a majority of the population, a leading Iraqi opposition cleric said on Monday. Mohammed Bahrul-uloom, a Shi'ite cleric who coordinates several Iraqi opposition groups in exile, dismissed forecasts of a breakup of Iraq if President Saddam Hussein is ousted in the U.S.-led war on Iraq. But he told the United States that it would not be in its interest to "stay on in Iraq. Iraqis...

Iraqi opposition forces clashed with units of Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard last night on the outskirts of Kirkuk in northern Iraq, according to the Iraqi National Congress, a longstanding resistance group. The Iraqi rebel troops have taken up fortified positions in preparation for an offensive against Saddam's forces, said the umbrella group's Washington, D.C., director, Entifadh Quanbar. The resistance troops came under fire from Republican Guard units along the roads leading to Taqtaq and Chamchamal, he said. There were no reports of casualties. The Iraqi forces opposing Saddam are working in coordination with coalition troops. "They can play a huge...

<p>While many European leaders remain deeply fearful of the fallout from a war with Iraq, many Arab leaders in the Middle East began several weeks ago to adjust to what they perceive to be a new reality. They stopped trying to prevent the war and instead began signaling that they wanted neither to be on the wrong side of the conflict nor on the wrong side of the U.S. -- or our broader agenda in the region.</p>

While there is disagreement whether it will be easy or hard for the US to remove Saddam Hussein, scholars and laymen alike confidently assume that the US will not be able to bring stability or decent government to Iraq without a Japanese-style occupation involving large numbers of American troops for many years.  An Iraqi produced democracy is assumed to be out of the question.But these cynics who think that the Iraqi future can be read directly from Iraqi history may not be correct.  Before reaching such conclusions we should look at the dynamics that would exist if the Iraqi...

CHANCES FOR DEMOCRACY IN IRAQ ARE SLIM AND NONE WASHINGTON -- The State Department has now confirmed in a deeply disturbing report what any of us with any experience in the Middle East instinctively and intellectually know -- that Iraq is the least likely country in the world to be "democratized." Not only are economic and social problems there so intense as to undermine basic stability in the region for years, the report says, but even if some form of democratic government took form, the spoils would go to fundamentalist Islamists deeply hostile to the United States. The thrust of...

Our Protesters—and TheirsBy Chris WeinkopfFrontPageMagazine.com | March 19, 2003 SOME 20,000 intrepid, peace-loving activists turned out last week to protest against their government, its unjust policies, its war-mongering president and his utter disregard for international opinion. The protest was held in Kirkuk, Iraq—outside the Baath Party’s main administrative headquarters. The demonstrators were calling for Saddam Hussein’s overthrow. True, this protest didn’t generate as much attention as the “anti-war” rallies staged last weekend in a Portland, San Francisco, Washington, and elsewhere, where the America-hating left compared President Bush to Adolf Hitler and pleaded for Hussein’s prolonged hold on power, but there’s...

In the desolate expanse of desert where Iraq and Jordan meet, the shabby concrete huts of the Trebeil border crossing provide countless opportunities for Saddam Hussein's officials to humiliate hapless travellers. When I found myself making a quick exit from Iraq in the early hours of yesterday, less than 30 minutes before President George W Bush delivered his White House address and all but declared war, this stage of the journey was the one I dreaded most. Portentous notices on Trebeil's grimy walls offer travellers an improbable array of instructions. One sign with a golden frame decrees in garbled English...

Hundreds of guerrillas from an Iranian-backed Iraqi Islamic opposition faction have staged a military parade in northern Iraq, in an area controlled by the Iraqi Kurds, close to the border with Iran. Sciri are drawn from Iraq's Shia Muslim majority The march-past, carried out in a remote hillside but with the international press invited, appeared to carry a significant message from the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (Sciri) and its Iranian supporters. About 1,500 fighters from Sciri's Badr Brigade marched or drove in formation past a dais seating commanders and officials. In addition to light weapons, they...

Concrete Answers Elude Planners, Analysts By Harry Levins, Post-DispatchAny American military conquest of Iraq will bring on an American military occupation of Iraq. And nobody has hard-and-fast answers to three questions about that occupation:*How many soldiers will it tie up?*How long will it last?*How much will it cost?Some people are setting forth definite figures. But those people won't make the decisions. Meanwhile, the decision-makers shy away from definite figures. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld uses terms like "unknowable."Even the definite figures vary wildly. For example, estimates of the size of the force start at 45,000 soldiers and march uphill to 200,000.Part...

By David Ignatius Tuesday, March 18, 2003; Page A29 KUWAIT CITY -- As U.S.-led troops prepare to push north toward Baghdad, people around the world are probably asking the same basic question: What is the justification for America's war against Iraq? I put that question to Abdulatif Hamad, who heads the Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development here. It was his organization that last year bravely co-sponsored the Arab Human Development Report, which presented a devastating indictment of the lack of freedom and economic progress in the Arab world. Hamad gave a simple but eloquent answer: An Iraqi living...

Summary: It would be a mistake, possibly a catastrophic mistake, to involve the United Nations in the transitional administration in Iraq. [CAPITALISM MAGAZINE.COM] We stand on the brink of the liberation of Iraq. This liberation is long overdue, delayed by the Administration’s attempt to secure the unnecessary support of the United Nations. The President has pledged that there will be no new dictator in Iraq, and I applaud him for this commitment. The President spoke of the democracies built under American protection on February 26: After defeating enemies, we did not leave behind occupying armies, we left constitutions and parliaments....

<p>Addressing the world from the Azores yesterday, President Bush made it clear that once Saddam is gone the U.S. "will push as quickly as possible for an Iraqi interim authority to draw upon the talents of Iraq's people to rebuild their nation." He then reiterated his commitment to "the goal of a unified Iraq with democratic institutions" and vowed to "seek new Security Council resolutions to encourage broad participation in the process of helping the Iraqi people to build a free Iraq."</p>

DOHA, Qatar - France won't participate in any unilateral war against Iraq but it will play a role in postwar peace-building in the country, French Defense Minister Michele Alliot-Marie said Sunday. "Peace cannot be made except with the international community, and understandably in such a case, France will assume its role and all its responsibilities," Alliot-Marie said during a stop here on a Gulf tour. "After the war, we will see what are the needs," she said. Alliot-Marie said she was traveling to Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia — which have been supportive of the hard-line U.S....

A JOINT statement promising a better future for all Iraqis has been issued by the US, Britain, Spain and Portugal after an emergency summit on the disarmament crisis. The full text of the statement follows: "Iraq's talented people, rich culture and tremendous potential have been hijacked by Saddam Hussein. His brutal regime has reduced a country with a long and proud history to an international pariah that oppresses its citizens, started two wars of aggression against its neighbours, and still poses a grave threat to the security of its region and the world. "Saddam's defiance of United Nations Security Council...

Click here for an intelligent editorial on bringing democracy to Iraq from a VERY liberal newspaper, the CHARLESTON GAZETTE. We Freepers may actually be getting through to some people!!!!!!! The sooner, the better!!!!!!!

<p>SULAYMANIYAH, Iraq -- Opposition officials here in the Kurdish-controlled zone said yesterday that thousands of Iraqi military and political leaders have signed secret agreements to defect and will surrender the moment a US-led military campaign begins.</p> <p>Leaders of the two biggest opposition parties, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, or PUK, and the Kurdish Democratic Party, or KDP, as well as smaller parties in the semiautonomous area under protection of the US and British no-fly zone in northern Iraq, said they have worked for months through a network of operatives to arrange the defections.</p>

In the long run, democracy may be the only effective defense against the disease that struck us on 9/11. IN EUROPE, the United States, and the Middle East, it has become commonplace to hear doubts, if not derision, expressed about the wisdom of the Bush administration's abetting the creation of a democratic Iraq. Most of the folks who think Iraqi democracy a lame idea are of course also opposed to the war, and would no doubt be against it even if they thought Iraq's various people--Shia and Sunni Arabs, Kurds, Turkomans, and Christians--could form a democratic union. If the Iraqi...

People still don't get it – and not just in France. Many are wondering why Saddam is America's next stop in the War against Terror. Iraq is not the biggest threat to America, they realize. Saddam's army has been in shambles since the Gulf War. Iraq (unlike North Korea in a few months) possesses no missiles capable of reaching American shores. And while Saddam's covert relationship with terrorists has been revealed, other nations – like Syria, Libya and Iran – openly support organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah, and we're not going after them. So what gives? The Bush administration is...