Rice vs. Powell: UN Role in Iraq
From BBC News:Two senior advisers to US President George W Bush have made contrasting statements about the relative role of the coalition partners and the United Nations in providing a new administration for Iraq after the war...
National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice said a UN role was not currently under discussion, but Secretary of State Colin Powell said a dialogue on the UN role had already begun. ["Bush advisers split on UN role
", BBC, 5 April 2003]
Related Coverage: America Should Withdraw From The United Nations and Let It Collapse, Powell's Paper Tiger Show, and U.S. War on Iraq is Morally Legitimate.
Respecting the “Security” of a Dictatorship
The standoff between the United States and North Korea over the Asian nation's nuclear ambitions could escalate into war, a U.N. envoy warned Thursday. [Maurice] Strong, a special adviser to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, said he believed North Korea was "prepared to go to war if they believe the security and the integrity of their nation is really threatened, and they do." [Associated Press, 4/4/03]Note the typical neutrality of the UN with respect to dictatorships: "security" is not a proper way to refer to the maintenance of a bloodthirsty tyrannical regime.
War is Not the Answer
"War is not the answer, or so they say. But what is the answer? I went to the peace protest to find out." Evan Coyne Maloney went to the antiwar demonstrations in New York and San Francisco with some basic questions for the protesters. What he found plays like "Battle of the Jaywalk All Stars."I Hope He’s Not Telling the Truth
Apparently, Colin Powell has learned nothing:Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer ... who met Tuesday with Secretary of State Colin Powell and other senior US officials, said those within the administration of President George W. Bush who opposed any UN role in Iraq had lost the argument. Key US officials remain angered... and had fought to prevent the world body gaining a role in Iraq's reconstruction, he said. "But I think that view, if it hasn't changed, that argument has been won by those who believe there should be a role for the UN," Downer told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation radio. "I think the idea of a United Nations special representative or special coordinator is one they feel comfortable with as well," he said, acknowledging though that the United States would "inevitably" control Iraq for an interim period after the war before handing authority back to Iraqis. [Agence France Presse, 4/2/03]It's possible that this is more of Powell's "street fighting," attempting to make it appear as if he's won the argument when things are really still up in the air. At any rate, this is outrageous and deserves voluminous complaint. Would that GWB would just fire the man.
An Iraqi Hero
The Iraqi man who tipped U.S. Marines to the location of American POW Jessica Lynch said Thursday he did so after he saw her Iraqi captor slap her twice as she lay wounded in a hospital....After he saw Lynch slapped, the lawyer slipped into her room at the Saddam Hospital in Nasiriyah and told her, "Don't worry." ..."I love America. I like America. Why, I don't know," Mohammed said...Mohammed said he told his wife to take their daughter to his father's house for safety, and then set off on foot to find the American troops he had heard were occupying the edges of Nasiriyah. "This was very dangerous for me because American soldiers shoot," he said...They asked him to return to the six-story, 234-bed hospital to gather information on its layout, its hallways, stairways and doors, its basement and whether a helicopter could land on its roof...."I drew them a map. I drew them five maps," he said, plainly relishing his cloak-and-dagger missions into the heart of Saddam's terror network. Fedayeen raided his house the next day, he said, taking away all his possessions and even his car, a Russian-made Muscovitch Brazilia 680. He said a neighbor was shot and her body dragged through the streets just for waving at a U.S. helicopter... Mohammed and his family are now officially "temporary refugees." ... "I am very happy," he said, adding that his wife wants to work in a hospital helping Americans and that he is eager to help the Marines any way he can until he can return home to Nasiriyah and resume his normal life...."Believe me, not only I, all the people of Iraq, not the people in the government, like Americans," Mohammed said. "They want to help the Americans, but they are all afraid." [Kansas City Star, 4/3/03]
What America Means to Him
In the giddy spirit of the day, nothing could quite top the wish list bellowed out by one man in the throng of people greeting American troops from the 101st Airborne Division who marched into town today. What, the man was asked, did he hope to see now that the Baath Party had been driven from power in his town? What would the Americans bring? "Democracy," the man said, his voice rising to lift each word to greater prominence. "Whiskey. And sexy!" Around him, the crowd roared its approval. [New York Times, 4/3/03]But there's so much more to us than that…