Category: War

Will Contractors Lose Iraq Immunity? – TIME

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Well, it appears that the US and Iraq are in the process of renegociating their security agreements, and the Iraqis consider the removal of immunity for contractors to be non-negotiable.

I think that this is the first time that the representatives of the Iraqi government are behaving in a way that is both beneficial to, and supported by its citizens regardless of ethnicity.

Good for them. As for the mercenaries, the rules in a foreign country are that if you do the crime, you do the time, in that country’s jails.

The US Has No Permanent Military Bases Anywhere

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Remember when I claimed that Bush’s statement of “No Permanent Bases in Iraq” was a lie?

Well, now we get the parsing, because Bush and His Evil Minions™ are now saying that the US has no permanent bases anywhere in the world.

We don’t have them in Japan, or Korea, or Germany, because at some point, the host government could ask us to leave, or, in a few billion years, the sun could go nova.

I knew that his “no permanent bases” statement was a lie, but now he’s parsing it on the basis of what the word “is” is.

News Flash: Europeans Conflate Efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Support Neither

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Robert Gates is surprised and alarmed by this attitude. I say, “Well, Duh!!!”

It’s painfully clear that Afghanistan was shortchanged for the invasion of Iraq, and that the US is unable to support both efforts fully, so this means that European aid with operations in Iraq actually does free up US resources for operations in Afghanistan.

The European public has realized this for some time, as have the governments.

However, those in power realize that saying, “You’re on your own, Jack,” will shatter an alliance that they see as valuable.

The support of the European public American military operations anywhere is a rapidly wasting asset, and the stupid, disasterous war in Iraq is at its core.

The US Is Intent on Pursuing a Child on War Crimes Prosecutions

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He was 15 years old when arrested, and the US government, and the US military is determined to prosecute Omar Khadr, who was 15 when he was apprehended by US forces.

Khadr is charged in the Guantanamo war court with murder, attempted murder, conspiring with al Qaeda, providing material support for terrorism and spying by conducting surveillance of U.S. military convoys in Afghanistan. He faces life in prison if convicted.

Kuebler argued that U.S. and international law assume that children involved in an armed conflict are not there voluntarily, because they lack the experience and judgment to understand the risk of joining armed forces. Defense attorneys contend that any charges against Khadr should be pursued in a civilian court in a juvenile system where the goal is rehabilitation rather than punishment.

This is repugnant beyond belief. It refutes the principles upon which the republic was supposed to be founded, and it makes us less safe, because this war crime, and it is a war crime, inspires other people to become Jihadi.

Delays in 30,000 lb Massive Ordinance Penetrator

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It appears that there are significant delays with thebomb rack for the Massive Ordinance Penetrator (MOP).

Cost has increased 33%, and the delay is expected to be at least 10 months.

Considering the controversy over the weapon, Congress blocked funding to integrate it into the B-2, because of concerns that the Bush administration would use it on a surprise sneak attack against Iran, one wonders if the military might be dragging its heels until the crazies have left the White House.

Iraq Forever

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Remember Bush’s comments about troop cuts in Iraq?

He’s “recondidering troop cuts“.

To Bush and His Evil Minions™, winning is staying in, whatever the consequences, because it makes them feel like they did not dodge the draft in the 1960s.

Four months after announcing troop reductions in Iraq, President Bush is now sending signals that the cuts may not continue past this summer, a development likely to infuriate Democrats and renew concerns among military planners about strains on the force.

Mr. Bush has made no decisions on troop reductions to follow those he announced last September. But White House officials said Mr. Bush had been taking the opportunity, as he did in Monday’s State of the Union address, to prepare Americans for the possibility that, when he leaves office a year from now, the military presence in Iraq will be just as large as it was a year ago, or even slightly larger.

The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Mr. Bush wanted to tamp down criticism that a large, sustained presence in Iraq would harm the overall health of the military — a view held not only by Democrats, but by some members of his own Joint Chiefs of Staff.

You Don’t Destroy the Army You Want, You Destroy the Army You Have

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The US Army has missed its recruiting benchmarks by an alarming margin:

  • For the third consecutive year, the Army missed DoD benchmarks set for educational attainment and scores on the Armed Forces Qualification Test. (Important, because non HS grads drop out of service in their first term at a much higher rate)
  • Scores on the Armed Forces Qualification Test (AFQT) continue to fall. 60.8% of the recuits scored average or higher, well below the Army’s now abandoned goal of 67%.
  • Overall recruit quality, a figure derived largely from the above two factors, has fallen, with high quality recruits plummeting to 44.6%, down from 56.2% in 2007.
  • Bonuses for reenlistments have skyrocketed in amount, and scope.

Heck of a job there, Rummie.

And in the Department of the Amazingly Obvious,

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Bush and His Evil Minions™ are lying sacks of sh$@!

Lying about the Iraq, here, and here.

NINE HUNDRED AND THIRTY FIVE LIES

Bush comes in number two on the lie parade, but number two is a bit of a surprise:

The study says Bush made 232 false statements about Iraq and former leader Saddam Hussein’s possessing weapons of mass destruction, and 28 false statements about Iraq’s links to al Qaeda.

…

The study, released Tuesday, says Powell had the second-highest number of false statements, with 244 about weapons and 10 about Iraq and al Qaeda.

Yep, the most overrated man in America lied to us more than anyone except for Bush himself.

Can we please stop calling “respected”.

Bush Administration Lied on Iraqi Reconstruction Spending

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The GAOhas the details on Iraqi reconstruction spending, but the nickel tour is that Bush and His Evil Minions™ lied when they said that, “By July 2007, the administration said, Iraq had spent some 24 percent of $10 billion set aside for reconstruction that year”, as was stated in documents given by Crocker and Petraeus to Congress.

But in its report on Tuesday, the accountability office said official Iraqi Finance Ministry records showed that Iraq had spent only 4.4 percent of the reconstruction budget by August 2007. It also said that the rate of spending had substantially slowed from the previous year.

The reason for the difference, said Joseph A. Christoff, the G.A.O.’s director of international affairs and trade, was that few official Iraqi figures for 2007 were available when General Petraeus and Mr. Crocker went to Congress.

So the administration, with the help of the Finance Ministry in Baghdad, appears to have relied on a combination of indicators, including real expenditures, ministries’ suggestions of projects they intended to carry out, and contracts that were still under negotiation, Mr. Christoff said. But actual spending does not seem to have lived up to those estimates for spending on reconstruction, a budget item sometimes called capital or investment expenditures, he added.

“So it looked like an improvement, but it wasn’t an improvement,” he said.

Meaning that there was no data, and that they did not look for ways to get that data, because they were under orders to sell Bush’s endless war™.

This was not bad data, this was Crocker and Petraeus telling the Iraqis the numbers they wanted, and then getting those numbers.

BTW, the 2007 number on Iraqi spending is LESS than the 2006 number. It’s getting worse, not better.