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Exit?

7 comments on Exit?

Exit?
: The Telegraph goes out on a limb interpretting Paul Bremer’s visit to Washington, saying in a headline that “Bush speeds up the exit strategy“:

President George W Bush ordered his senior envoy in Iraq last night to speed up the handover of power to local politicians, following warnings from the CIA of impending disaster and a suicide bombing that killed 18 Italian paramilitary police….

The atmosphere of crisis in Washington was palpable.

Paul Bremer, the US administrator in Iraq, was rushed back from Baghdad to plot a new course for American officials who have been forced to use the word “war” for what had been described as mopping-up operations….

British officials believe Mr Bremer’s seven-point plan is too slow and cumbersome. They want to demonstrate to the Iraqis that the occupation is quickly coming to an end, partly in the hope that this would reduce support for gunmen who stage daily attacks.

Before leaving for Washington, Mr Straw told BBC Radio 4’s Today: “We want to hand over power to the Iraqi people as quickly as possible and it could well be that we hand over more quickly than planned.

“However, the occupying powers have clear responsibilities for security in Iraq and we have to meet those responsibilities.”

Sounds like the Brit spin on the story.

Compare and contrast with the NY Times:

L. Paul Bremer III, the American administrator in Iraq, asserted today that the pacification of Iraq was going well despite inevitable problems. But Secretary of State Colin L. Powell later acknowledged that there had been discussions at the White House about the state of security in Iraq.

And the Washington Post:

After two days of urgent talks in Washington with the Bush administration’s foreign policy team, the top U.S. administrator in Iraq said today he plans to return to Baghdad to consult with the U.S.-appointed Governing Council there about how best to accelerate the hand-over of power to a new Iraqi government.

And you can guess the Guardian’s view:

The White House yesterday drew up emergency plans to accelerate the transfer of power in Iraq after being shown a devastating CIA report warning that the guerrilla war was in danger of escalating out of US control.

Whom to believe? Who the hell knows.

I do know that we cannot abandon the Iraqi people and with it hope for democracy in the Middle East. As we used to say after 9/11: “The terrorists will have won if….”

7 responses to “Exit?”

  1. Mike Avatar
    Mike

    This post war administration was lost in the inital fighting of the war. The war needed to be extended and really fought without buying off many units instead of fighting them. This was due to the French and Russians trying to delay the war to prevent us from fighting it altogether. Thus, we tried to end it as quickly as possible, which then made our post war administration even more difficult.
    The released prisoners, jihadis infiltrating, former Baathists still roaming around etc… are going to make sure that post war administration goes bad and are pros at fooling the stupid Iraqis in general who don’t even realize what they’re getting themselves into by not warmly accepting us, though many do.
    Then you throw in the European and Arabic Press doing everything possible to incite against us, and wey’re fighting insurmountable odds already with those thrown on top of them. They are actually conspiring to fuck the Iraqis.
    We also are running out of cash now.

  2. hugh macleod Avatar
    hugh macleod

    The more the European establishment (political, media etc) can paint the USA as failing, the more easily they can deflect attention away from their own failings.
    I’m not Euro-bashing. They’ve just got some serious long-term issues about the general unsustainability of their current sociopolitical arrangement.

  3. button Avatar
    button

    Whom to believe? Funny you should ask because I don’t pick any of the choices on the menu you provided.
    My take on Bremer’s trip was that it was being used as a diversionary red herring to draw people’s attention away from something Gen Abizaid and Gen Sanchez et al were up to.
    It seems they have inaugurated some new operation call Iron Hammer. Maybe they were doing stuff connected to that. Or maybe stuff connected to their new TV station.

  4. Jeremy Avatar
    Jeremy

    Bear in mind, the British press tends to be, well, hysterical. That’s really the only word for it.

  5. hugh macleod Avatar
    hugh macleod

    Good point, Jeremy. And also more overtly partisan than the US equivs.

  6. Dave F Avatar
    Dave F

    How could they be leaving? That would mean the UN would have to take over the gig, since it would destabilise in weeks. That would mean, in turn, France, Germany and all the other spoilers having to ante up, something they have no intention of doing. So guess who would be asked by the UN to take care of it?
    Yeah, it’s circular logic, but that what all the critics are caught up in. They’re loopy, in other words.

  7. Roger Karraker Avatar
    Roger Karraker

    It’s always fun to compare ledes of different papers working from the same general set of facts. With the British press one always has to triangulate a bit, taking into account the papers’ acknowledged political viewpoints (in these examples, Telegraph=Tory, Guardian=left).
    It’s more difficult with U.S. papers because they espouse “objectivity”. Sorry, there’s no such critter.
    In this critter, I thought it interesting that the Guardian, Telegraph and WashPost all used the term “accelerate” or “speed up” a transfer of power to Iraqis. Only the Times left that interpretation out of its report.
    So what’s the “truth”? Who knows? But I’d find it hard to believe that there isn’t a sense of urgency at the White House.