Lie by Lie: The Mother Jones Iraq War Timeline

Een zeer nuttige tijdlijn voor wat betreft de Irak-oorlog, bijgehouden door Mother Jones.

General in Iraq: Deal letting U.S. troops stay may break down

SAMARRA, Iraq | In a blunt assessment, the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, Army Gen. Raymond Odierno, said Thursday that there is a 20 percent to 30 percent chance that the United States and Iraq won't reach a deal to allow U.S. troops to operate in Iraq past Dec. 31.

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DU covers Iraq

Depleted uranium, munitie met verarmd uranium vergiftigt Irak en iedereen ter plekke.

Link

U.S. official issues a blunt warning on security pact

The chairman, Admiral Mike Mullen, also pointedly accused Iran of working to undermine efforts to negotiate and approve a status of forces deal.

Speaking to reporters in Riga, Latvia, Mullen said he respected the need for Iraqis to engage in "a healthy debate" over important issues of sovereignty, such as the Dec. 31 expiration date of the UN Security Council Resolution authorizing the American-led military effort.

"But we are clearly running out of time" he warned. He said he was "increasingly concerned" about the sharp public criticisms within Iraq of the proposed text.

Indeed, his remarks came amid reports that the Iraqi cabinet had decided Tuesday to ask the United States for unspecified changes in the draft security pact that would allow U.S. troops to remain in Iraq for another three years.

Lees verder op IHT

RTL daagt Balkenende om informatie over Irak

RTL Nieuws, dat de Amsterdamse rechtbank donderdag vraagt het ministerie te dwingen de stukken vrij te geven, beroept zich op de Wet openbaarheid bestuur. Het nieuwsprogramma is bezig een reconstructie te maken van de Nederlandse besluitvorming rond de politieke steun aan de invasie in 2003.

Lees verder op Nieuws.nl

Ik sta hier voorlopig wel positief tegenover. RTL Nieuws gebruikt de middelen die ter beschikking staan, om de waarheid boven tafel te krijgen. Actie en politiek hebben tot nu toe bar weinig resultaat gehad, (shame on ourselves!) maar hier doet een deel van de media gewoon haar werk.

Mutant Seeds for Mesopotamia

by Andrew Bosworth, Ph.D.

October 15, 2008

One would think that Iraqi farmers, now prospering under "freedom" and "democracy," would be able to plant the seeds of their choosing, but that choice, under little-known Order 81, would be illegal.

But first, it is important to set the context. Most people have never heard of the infamous "100 Orders," but they help explain why the majority of Iraqis remain opposed to foreign occupation. The 100 Orders allow multinational corporations to basically privatize an entire nation, and this degree of foreign and private control has not been witnessed since the days of the British East India Company and its extraterritoriality treaties.

Lees verder op Uruknet

Terugblik: Israel seeks pipeline for Iraqi oil

Plans to build a pipeline to siphon oil from newly conquered Iraq to Israel are being discussed between Washington, Tel Aviv and potential future government figures in Baghdad.

The plan envisages the reconstruction of an old pipeline, inactive since the end of the British mandate in Palestine in 1948, when the flow from Iraq's northern oilfields to Palestine was re-directed to Syria.

The Guardian, 20 april 2003

Iraq's Nouri Maliki breaking free of U.S.

BAGHDAD -- Once dependent on American support to keep his job, Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has consolidated power and is asserting his independence, sharply reducing Washington's influence over the future of Iraq.

Iraq's police and army now operate virtually on their own, and with Washington's mandate from the United Nations to provide security here expiring in less than four months, Maliki is insisting on imposing severe limits on the long-term U.S. military role, including the withdrawal of American forces from all cities by June.

Lees verder op LA Times

MP calls for new Kelly death probe

Since the Hutton report was published it has also been revealed that there were no fingerprints on the knife Dr Kelly is supposed to have used.

Also, he suffered from a disorder that made it hard for him to swallow pills – and when a heat-seeking search aircraft flew over the spot where his corpse was found shortly after his supposed time of death it did not pick up any sign of a body.

Lees meer op Daily Mail

PR Push for Iraq War Preceded Intelligence Findings

"White Paper" Drafted before NIE even Requested

National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 254

Posted - August 22, 2008 For more information contact: John Prados - (202) 994-7000 Washington D.C., August 22, 2008 - The U.S. intelligence community buckled sooner in 2002 than previously reported to Bush administration pressure for data justifying an invasion of Iraq, according to a documents posting on the Web today by National Security Archive senior fellow John Prados. The documents suggest that the public relations push for war came before the intelligence analysis, which then conformed to public positions taken by Pentagon and White House officials. For example, a July 2002 draft of the "White Paper" ultimately issued by the CIA in October 2002 actually pre-dated the National Intelligence Estimate that the paper purportedly summarized, but which Congress did not insist on until September 2002. A similar comparison between a declassified draft and the final version of the British government's "White Paper" on Iraq weapons of mass destruction adds to evidence that the two nations colluded in the effort to build public support for the invasion of Iraq. Dr. Prados concludes that the new evidence tends to support charges raised by former White House press secretary Scott McClellan and by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence in its long-delayed June 2008 "Phase II" report on politicization of intelligence. Read more at URUKNET

Who killed Nick Berg?

Possum believes "the available evidence surrounding the case suggests that it was a 'black operation' by US psychological warfare specialists ... to provide the media with a moral relativity argument to counter the adverse publicity over torture at Abu Ghraib". The use of FBI footage in the opening sequence, if confirmed, suggests the involvement of high-level US Government operatives.

I do not know who killed Nick Berg, or how he died. But there's something fishy about this video.

In the end, the question is: who killed Nick Berg, and why?

Sydney Morning Herald

Kucinich seeks to bar US oil firms from Iraq

August 1, 2008

Rep. Dennis Kucinich has introduced a measure that would bar US oil companies from receiving contracts in Iraq.

The Ohio Democrat, who believes exploiting Iraq’s massive oil reserves was the primary reason we invaded, introduced a measure he says aims to keep Iraq’s oil wealth within the country.

“Iraq needs oil revenue now more than ever as they try to rebuild their country,” Kucinich said Thursday, unveiling the Oil for Iraq Liberation Act. Bron

Met dank aan Abdul Haq

Obama outlines policy of endless war

Any misconception that Barack Obama is running in the 2008 election as an “antiwar” candidate should have been cleared up Tuesday in what was billed by the Democratic presidential campaign as a “major speech” on national security and the US war in Iraq.

Global Research

Big Oil's 'secret' out of Iraq's closet

NEW YORK - It is not about the "war on terror". It is not about weapons of mass destruction. It is not about "freedom and democracy to the Iraqi people", or to the "Afghan people". It is not about "Islamofascism". It is not about a Pentagon-coined "arc of instability" from the Middle East to Central Asia. New evidence shows once again both George W Bush administration wars - in Afghanistan and Iraq - above all are about oil and gas.

A must-read by Pepe Escobar, Asia Times

Zie voor een Nederlandse bewerking: Zapruder.nl

At Last, Some Truth About Iraq and Afghanistan

PARIS – After a sea of lies and a tsunami of propaganda, the ugly truth behind the Iraq and Afghanistan wars finally emerged into full view this week.

Four major western oil companies, Exxon, Mobil, Shell, BP and Total, are about to sign US-brokered no-bid contracts with the US-installed Baghdad regime to begin exploiting Iraq’s oil fields. Saddam Hussein had kicked these firms out three decades ago when he nationalized Iraq’s foreign-owned oil industry for the benefit of Iraq’s national development. The Baghdad regime is turning back the clock.

Meanwhile, according to Pakistani and Indian sources, Afghanistan just signed a major deal to launch a long-planned, 1680 km long pipeline project expected to cost $ 8 billion. If completed, the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India pipeline (TAPI) will export gas and, later, oil from the Caspian Basin to Pakistan’s coast where tankers will transport it to the west.

More at LewRockwell

No blood for ... er ... um ...

More than five years after the invasion of Iraq - just in case you were still waiting - the oil giants finally hit the front page ...

ATimes

Turkish newspaper reveals Maliki’s wait-game

Turkish newspaper Cumhuriyat [via alriyadh] revealed why Maliki is playing a time game and why the Kurds want to sign the agreement as soon as possible:

Iraqi government asked both Turkey and Iran to provide written guarantees on security cooperation with Iraq, in exchange for abandoning the security agreement the U.S.

The newspaper uncovered, that Baghdad is waiting for answers from Tehran and Ankara, and will cancel the whole idea of the agreement in case Iran and Turkey provide such guarantees.

Uruknet

This actually means that US military presence would no longer be necessary. If it ever was. It also means that a US/Israeli attack on Iran would become virtually impossible, without upsetting Nato-partner Turkey, and without sparking a major new wave of violence and political instability in Iraq.

Let's just hope no 'incident' will happen in the near future, to prevent this deal from happening.

Iraq says no hard evidence of Iran support for militia

Iraq said on Sunday it has no evidence that Iran was supplying militias engaged in fierce street fighting with security forces in Baghdad.

URUKNET

Iran should be "Set Up for an Attack"

When Gen. David Petraeus along with U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker gave their testimony to the Senate on April 9, they did nothing more than to confirm in spades what had been being mooted and duly leaked by the Washington-based press: that the Bush-Cheney Administration had officially endorsed the line that Iran should be set up for attack, on grounds that it--and not any indigenous resistance--were responsible for the mounting death toll among American troops in Iraq.

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Opposing views on America’s Likudnik war with Iran

Lind suspects the bush mafia will attack iran and that, as a consequence, the american military could lose its army in iraq. "Adm. Fallon's (forced?) resignation was the last warning we are likely to get of an attack on Iran. It does not mean an attack is certain, but the U.S. could not attack Iran so long as he was the Centcom commander. That obstacle is now gone. Vice President Cheney's Middle East tour is another indicator. According to a report in The American Conservative, on his previous trip Cheney told our allies, including the Saudis, that Bush would attack Iran before the end of his term. If that report was correct, then his current tour might have the purpose of telling them when it is coming. The purpose of this column is not to warn of an imminent assault on Iran, though personally I think it is coming, and soon. Rather, it is to warn of a possible consequence of such an attack.

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