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Norwegian soldiers serving with NATO peacekeeping forces in Kosovo were among those injured in one of the bloodiest days of unrest since the end of the Kosovo war in 1999. Twenty Norwegians were hurt in rioting and violence that left at least 10 dead and hundreds injured. Fighting broke out in every major city in the province between Serbs and Albanians. Ethnic Albanians blamed Serbs for the drownings of two children, and set Serb homes, churches and cars on fire. Norwegian soldiers took part in the fighting Wednesday night. Officer Nils Hanheide told Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK) that one local man...

Running the Planet: Not just a job, but an (endless) adventure Many potential new wars are in play among the neoimperialist foreign policy glitterati, still flying high after the Iraq invasion. It wasn't an obvious and immediate national or international tragedy—after all, the world didn't end, did it? No WMDs were unleashed on our troops or American cities. Because, well, there weren't any, even though the danger (but not, mind you, the "imminent" danger!) they posed was the major excuse for the war in the first place. But, hey, look what it did to Qaddafi, the essential post hoc justification...

BAGHDAD - The creation of a new Iraqi military that will defend, not oppress, Iraqi citizens is under way. Many young men are coming forward to train and become part of what will be a 27 battalion, nine brigade, three division Iraqi Army of 45,000 soldiers, said Lt. Col. Damian Heaney, who was deployed from Fort Huachuca last year. Women eventually will be recruited, too. There also will be a small Iraqi Air Corps of about 1,000 people and a six-boat Navy being called the Iraqi Coastal Force, which will have about 1,000 sailors. The developing Iraqi Army will be...

<p>Here we go again. The Marines should sign an annual contract with United Air Lines to ferry troops to Port-au-Prince and collect the frequent-flier miles.</p> <p>It's difficult to argue with the proposition that the United States has a humanitarian responsibility to stop the killing and man's inhumanity to man, which was long ago raised to an art form in Haiti, but we should be under no illusion that the latest Marine expedition to the miserable island of Hispaniola will accomplish lasting good.</p>

Why Haiti's Such a Mess (And Why Bill Clinton Was So Wrong to Prop Up Aristide) By Michael Radu Mr. Radu is Senior Fellow and Co-Chair, Center on Terrorism and Counterterrorism, at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia. Ten years ago, in September 1994, U.S. troops invaded Haiti under the auspices of restoring democracy, human rights and the rule of law. At the time, the Clinton-conceived operation was hailed by leftists as a model of liberal interventionism, as former Catholic priest Jean-Bertrand Aristide was restored to power and an oppressive military regime was ousted. There was only one problem...

In rehabilitating a crucial powerplant, Iraqi engineers are enhancing their skills and broadening their experience under the supervision of a U.S.-based contractor while strengthening their country’s generation base. But the Bechtel-led restoration project at Baghdad’s 640-Mw Daura Powerplant also highlights the difficulties Iraqi contractors face on restoration contracts and the dangers they confront in cooperating with the U.S. occupation. In November 2003, San Francisco-based Bechtel awarded Iraq’s United Co. the $1-million subcontract to provide labor to revamp two steam turbines at the four-unit Daura power station on the outskirts of Baghdad. Fawzi Elia, United’s project manager, explains that the company...

BAGHDAD – Capt. Roger Maynulet didn't know that liberating Iraq would involve so many photo ops. Yet here he is in a baroque Arab wedding hall in Baghdad for the Hay Somer neighborhood council Christmas party, and he's just upstaged "Papa Noel." Sitting in the bower where newlyweds usually receive their guests, the burly Maynulet is besieged by excited kids clambering over him while laughing parents snap pictures. In between shots, council members and residents whisper in his ear, pressing ideas for neighborhood improvements but also eager to be seen with the American soldier. This is the occupation the US...

Is the Bush administration having second thoughts about its plan to transfer power to an interim Iraqi government by the end of June? The question is raised by recent remarks made by officials in Washington and Baghdad about possible delays in implementing the plan. The reason cited is a statement last Sunday by Grand Ayatollah Ali Mohammed Sistani, the most prominent religious leader of Iraqi Shiites. His statement came in response to a question put to him by a group of un-named "believers" who wished to know what he thought of the plan to set up an interim government. The...

For Chalmers Johnson, it's only a matter of time before we reap 'The Sorrows of Empire' Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Republic by Chalmers Johnson Holt, 389 pages, $25 Being right isn't much fun. Chalmers Johnson's previous book, published during the last year of Bill Clinton's presidency, predicted that America's foreign policy poultry was about to boomerang back to the homeland. Johnson opened his influential "Blowback: The Costs and Consequences of American Empire" by describing an incident about which you're probably a few seconds from thinking, "Oh yeah – I remember when that happened": the deaths of 20...

Kosovo's terrorists continue to wage war In the midst of conflicts in Southwest Asia and the Mid dle East, I cannot help but wonder: Whatever happened to the Balkans? We Americans spent more than a decade listening to and watching CNN and BBC clips of the war-torn region and the countless war crimes that had taken place at the hands of various ethnic groups. What about Kosovo? A 78-day bombing campaign was undertaken to "liberate Kosovo's ethnic Albanian population" from the hands of "terror-invoking Serbs." Why was there no media follow- up of the accomplishments of peace-loving and newly liberated...

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Dec. 8 — They were a father and son shopping for a car for the young man, a family ritual as common as any in the United States. It was unfolding on a recent evening here, though, to the cadence of distant gunfire and explosions. Aadel Kadhem, 43, and his 23-year-old son, Mohammed, walked around a pair of black BMW's, opening the doors, staring through the windows. Aadel Kadhem paints automobiles for a living, and his income has risen tenfold since the fall of Saddam Hussein's government, he said, allowing him to squirrel away $3,000 for a car...

Has Bush changed his mind? Or was there no mind to change? By Michael Kinsley November 21, 2003 To be "pro-Bush" now means the opposite of what it did five minutes ago. America's proper role in promoting democracy and freedom in the world was a big issue in the 2000 presidential election. One of the candidates was a Wilsonian idealist, arguing that the prestige and even the military strength of the United States should be used to remake other governments in America's image. The other candidate was contemptuous of this woolly-minded notion, saying US blood and treasure should be spent...

The candidacy of Wesley Clark can be summarized somewhat simply. He may have domestic policy proposals, but no one can seriously argue that they motivated either his entry into the presidential race or his support among Democratic primary voters. His appeal is his military prowess, his successful prosecution of the war in Kosovo, and his furious opposition to the war to topple Saddam, a war he once celebrated and called worthy of victory parades and now describes as a mistake of historic proportions. But the profile of Clark in the current New Yorker takes all this a little further. Let's...

Amazon Review of The Kimchi Matters A Timeless Classic for the Ages, October 22, 2003 Reviewer: Justin Palmer (see more about me) from Chicago, USA Lefkovitz and his co-authors present an extensive but precise discussion of basic truths behind the "globalization hype." The authors use kimchi-the pungent fermented cabbage leaves that are a staple of the Korean diet-as their chief metaphor because it is a local, particular and, to many Americans, peculiar item in a society that is of vital regional and international importance. To turn up one's nose at the local, as in disdaining kimchi or failing to appreciate...

<p>When I left Haiti a few weeks ago, news came of the anonymous but unusually precise execution of a thug named Amiet Metayer, leader of the pro- President Aristide gang called the Cannibal Army. One bullet to the heart, one in each eye.</p>

Belgrade flag flap reveals identity crisis By Matthew Price BBC correspondent in Belgrade C300 has come to the rescue of Serbia and Montenegro's politicians. At last a scientific answer to the political problems countries in the Balkans have faced for years. C300 is a specific shade of blue which apparently keeps both Serbs and Montenegrins happy in the "flag battle" which followed the collapse of Yugoslavia. The colour is a classic compromise - halfway between the Serbian dark blue, and the light blue of Montenegro. The wrangling began when Yugoslavia was abolished in March this year, and changed its name...

A week into his presidential bid, Wesley Clark looks less like the Democrats' solution than another symptom of their basic problem. That problem is that much of the Democratic base still doesn't take national security seriously. Sure, Democrats know that most Americans don't trust the party to keep them safe. But they deny that this distrust has anything to do with prevailing Democratic ideology. The party, they reassure themselves, merely needs a tougher image. And so Democrats keep trying to find new, ever more Rambo-like personas to proclaim essentially the same message. First, there was John Kerry, whose Vietnam heroism...

When it comes to nation building, President Bush is a hypocrite, at least according to most liberals, mainstream journalists and all professional Democrats. The argument goes something like this: Bush opposed "national building" during the presidential campaign. He now supports nation building in Iraq and Afghanistan. Ergo: The "W" in George W. Bush stands for Whypocrite (the "W" is silent, of course).Now, by my lights, Bush needn't be a hypocrite. First of all, the nation building he opposed during the campaign was the sort of stuff Charles Krauthammer has called foreign policy as social work - propping up countries...

Two weeks into Operation Iraqi Freedom, a number of newspapers and many airwaves were filled with prognosticators declaring the war plan a failure. The United States, they said, did not do enough to build international support, did not properly anticipate the level of resistance by Iraqis, and failed to send enough forces to do the job. Then coalition forces took Baghdad in 21 days. Today Gen. Tom Franks's innovative and flexible war plan, which so many dismissed as a failure, is being studied by military historians and taught in war colleges.

Post-World Wars I & II and Iraq: A Fascinating Historical Perspective Two tragic bombings in Baghdad and Najaf last month and the continuing attacks on American soldiers in some parts of Iraq have led many to call for more troops in Iraq or for Americans to withdraw. Cries are heard that we are in a Vietnam-like quagmire. Those inclined to make straight-line extrapolations from the events of a few news cycles should read some history. Margaret Mac- Millan's Paris 1919 shows how the Allied leaders who gathered at the peace conference in Paris were largely clueless about how to reconstruct...