Friends, The below items are all from mainstream channels in the US or UK during the past week. The URLs are given for the full articles, along with the first few paragraphs giving the main conclusions. The neocons must feel like Noah when the flood began, except that they may be doubting the seaworthiness of their ark. Chalabi serves as perfect scapegoat to excuse those who now object to Bush's policies and who formerly supported them. But since he is Rumsfeld and Cheney's protogé, the neocons can't get by with that excuse themselves. For them, he is an anchor dragging them down. Either they knew he was lying or they look like fools. The New York Times apology article is in some sense the most interesting. Here in Ireland it's difficult to judge American public opinion. Has anyone noticed any shifts among ardent Bush supporters? cheers, rkm _________________________________________________ http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/052304C.shtml The Other Prisoners By Luke Harding The Guardian U.K. Thursday 20 May 2004 Most of the coverage of abuse at Abu Ghraib has focused on male detainees. But what of the five women held in the jail, and the scores elsewhere in Iraq? The scandal at Abu Ghraib prison was first exposed not by a digital photograph but by a letter. In December 2003, a woman prisoner inside the jail west of Baghdad managed to smuggle out a note. Its contents were so shocking that, at first, Amal Kadham Swadi and the other Iraqi women lawyers who had been trying to gain access to the US jail found them hard to believe. The note claimed that US guards had been raping women detainees, who were, and are, in a small minority at Abu Ghraib. Several of the women were now pregnant, it added. The women had been forced to strip naked in front of men, it said. The note urged the Iraqi resistance to bomb the jail to spare the women further shame. _________________________________________________ http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/052304B.shtml List of Detainee Death Inquiries Expanded to 37 By John Hendren The Los Angeles Times Saturday 22 May 2004 The Pentagon's higher figure for Iraq and Afghanistan includes at least eight unresolved homicide cases that may have involved assaults. WASHINGTON - Pentagon officials on Friday increased to 37 the number of detainee deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan that have prompted investigations, including at least eight unresolved homicides that may have involved assaults before or during interrogation. _________________________________________________ http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/052404A.shtml Gen. Zinni: 'They've Screwed Up' CBS News Friday 21 May 2004 Accusing top Pentagon officials of "dereliction of duty," retired Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni says staying the course in Iraq isn't a reasonable option. "The course is headed over Niagara Falls. I think it's time to change course a little bit or at least hold somebody responsible for putting you on this course," he tells CBS News Correspondent Steve Kroft in an interview to be broadcast on 60 Minutes, Sunday, May 23, at 7 p.m. ET/PT. _________________________________________________ http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/052404B.shtml Prison Visits By General Reported In Hearing By Scott Higham, Joe Stephens and Josh White The Washington Post Sunday 23 May 2004 Alleged Presence of Sanchez Cited by Lawyer. A military lawyer for a soldier charged in the Abu Ghraib abuse case stated that a captain at the prison said the highest-ranking U.S. military officer in Iraq was present during some "interrogations and/or allegations of the prisoner abuse," according to a recording of a military hearing obtained by The Washington Post. _________________________________________________ http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/052404C.shtml Iraq Setbacks Change Mood in Washington By Doyle McManus The Los Angeles Times Sunday 23 May 2004 Lawmakers in both parties as well as some military leaders fear the occupation is heading for failure. Bush stands firm, but U.S. goals may be scaled back. WASHINGTON - President Bush is hearing increasingly bleak warnings that the U.S. occupation of Iraq is heading for failure - from Republican and Democratic members of Congress, current and former officials and even some military officers still on active duty. _________________________________________________ http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/052404E.shtml Failure Now May be an Option By Timothy M. Phelps Newsday Sunday 23 May 2004 WASHINGTON -- Since the invasion of Iraq 14 months ago, a favorite mantra in political Washington has been that "failure is not an option." But after the repeated disasters of recent weeks, warnings of the possibility -- if not the inevitability -- of "failure" or "defeat" are beginning to echo through the marble halls of Congress and the ornate conference rooms of Washington think tanks. "We need a fast turnaround and we need it right away," retired Gen. Joseph Hoar, a former commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last week. "We're about on the brink of failure." _________________________________________________ http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/052504B.shtml Behind the Walls of Abu Ghraib By T. Trent Gegax Newsweek Saturday 22 May 2004 "Could you stand there while he's in the shower?" Army Reserve Spc. Diane Liang recalls the plain-clothed American official asking her. "He'll feel more humiliated if there's a female present." As a member of the 372nd Military PoliceCompany, Liang was assisting with interrogations last January in Tier 1A of Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison. When she walked over, she saw a nude man in a stall with cold water streaming over his head. For 30 minutes, Liang watched the shivering prisoner get "softened up" by the "OGA" [Other Government Agency official, often code for CIA] and two Military Police [MPs]. _________________________________________________ http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/052604A.shtml The Iranian Spy in the House of Bush By William Rivers Pitt t r u t h o u t | Perspective Wednesday 26 May 2004 George W. Bush is running for a second term on the basis of his performance in the defense of our national security. Vice President Cheney has flatly stated that if Bush loses in 2004, the terrorists win. In truth, however, the national security of the United States of America has been raped by these people. 'Rape' is a strong word, but in truth, is not strong enough to describe what has taken place. This disaster can be summed up in one name: Ahmad Chalabi. Chalabi was the head of the Iraqi National Congress, a dissident group organized for the purpose of overthrowing the regime of Saddam Hussein. Chalabi was a beloved ally of Don Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney before they came to power with this administration; Chalabi and his group were the impetus behind the passage of the Iraqi Liberation Act in 1998, legislation advocated loudly by Rumsfeld, Cheney and the neo-conservatives who now occupy this government. Rumsfeld personally groomed Chalabi to take control of Iraq once Hussein was removed. This, despite the fact that Chalabi was convicted of 32 counts of bank fraud in Jordan and sentenced in absentia to 22 years in prison, despite the fact that Chalabi had not set foot in Iraq since he was a teenager, despite the fact that he had no power base and no credibility in the Middle East. Because the neo-cons loved him, however, Chalabi saw his opening. More than anything, he lusted after the oil revenues available from an Iraq he controlled. _________________________________________________ http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/052704C.shtml The Times and Iraq From The Editors New York Times Wednesday 26 May 2004 Over the last year this newspaper has shone the bright light of hindsight on decisions that led the United States into Iraq. We have examined the failings of American and allied intelligence, especially on the issue of Iraq's weapons and possible Iraqi connections to international terrorists. We have studied the allegations of official gullibility and hype. It is past time we turned the same light on ourselves. In doing so - reviewing hundreds of articles written during the prelude to war and into the early stages of the occupation - we found an enormous amount of journalism that we are proud of. In most cases, what we reported was an accurate reflection of the state of our knowledge at the time, much of it painstakingly extracted from intelligence agencies that were themselves dependent on sketchy information. And where those articles included incomplete information or pointed in a wrong direction, they were later overtaken by more and stronger information. That is how news coverage normally unfolds. But we have found a number of instances of coverage that was not as rigorous as it should have been. In some cases, information that was controversial then, and seems questionable now, was insufficiently qualified or allowed to stand unchallenged. Looking back, we wish we had been more aggressive in re-examining the claims as new evidence emerged - or failed to emerge. _________________________________________________ http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/052704D.shtml Abuse of Captives More Widespread, Says Army Survey By Douglas Jehl, Steven Lee Myers and Eric Schmitt New York Times Wednesday 26 May 2004 Washington - An Army summary of deaths and mistreatment involving prisoners in American custody in Iraq and Afghanistan shows a widespread pattern of abuse involving more military units than previously known. The cases from Iraq date back to April 15, 2003, a few days after Saddam Hussein's statue was toppled in a Baghdad square, and they extend up to last month, when a prisoner detained by Navy commandos died in a suspected case of homicide blamed on "blunt force trauma to the torso and positional asphyxia." _________________________________________________ -- ============================================================ If you find this material useful, you might want to check out our website (http://cyberjournal.org) or try out our low-traffic, moderated email list by sending a message to: •••@••.••• You are encouraged to forward any material from the lists or the website, provided it is for non-commercial use and you include the source and this disclaimer. Richard Moore (rkm) Wexford, Ireland _____________________________ "...the Patriot Act followed 9-11 as smoothly as the suspension of the Weimar constitution followed the Reichstag fire." - Srdja Trifkovic There is not a problem with the system. The system is the problem. Faith in ourselves - not gods, ideologies, leaders, or programs. _____________________________ "Zen of Global Transformation" home page: http://www.QuayLargo.com/Transformation/ QuayLargo discussion forum: http://www.QuayLargo.com/Transformation/ShowChat/?ScreenName=ShowThreads cj list archives: http://cyberjournal.org/cj/show_archives/?lists=cj newslog list archives: http://cyberjournal.org/cj/show_archives/?lists=newslog _____________________________ Informative links: http://www.globalresearch.ca/ http://www.MiddleEast.org http://www.rachel.org http://www.truthout.org http://www.zmag.org http://www.co-intelligence.org ============================================================
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