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2002
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"Iraq
Timeline." -CNN/Specials
GlobalSecurity.org
"Confrontation
With Iraq - Background." ... "Under UN Security Council Resolution
(UNSCR) 687 (April 1991), which set out the cease-fire terms for ending
the Gulf War, Iraq is obliged to: (a) accept the destruction, removal,
or rendering harmless of all its - nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons,
and ballistic missiles with a range over 150 kilometers; and - research,
development, and manufacturing facilities associated with the above; and
(b) undertake not to develop such weapons in the future. The United Nations
Special Commission (UNSCOM) oversees these processes. Iraq must give full
cooperation, in particular immediate, unrestricted access to any site UNSCOM
needs to inspect." ... As part of GlobalSecurity.org's
"Target
Iraq," director John Pike provides a succinct summary of relevant
facts regarding Iraq's actions following its invasion of Kuwait and the
subsequent Gulf War, also included is a brief timeline from 1991 - 1998/12/16,
a map
of the "no fly zone", and a list of "US Military Operations in Southwest
Asia." -By John Pike
-GlobalSecurity.org
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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Iraq
Map
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Links to larger photos were
good at the time the picture was posted.
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 Iraq
IRAQ News:
20080814
 Barack
Obama -  John
McCain -  Ron
Paul -  Military
- People
-  Overseas
-  Politics
-  History
- Iraq
-  US
-  2008
Election
"Troops
Deployed Abroad Give 6:1 to Obama." ... "During World
War II, soldiers crouching in foxholes penned letters assuring their sweethearts
that they'd be home soon. Now, between firefights in the Iraqi desert,
some infantrymen have been sending a different kind of mail stateside:
two or three hundred dollars -- or whatever they can spare -- towards a
presidential election that could very well determine just how soon they
come home." ... "According to an analysis of campaign contributions by
the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, [2008 Election Democratic
Presidential Candidate] Democrat Barack
Obama has received nearly six times as much money from troops deployed
overseas at the time of their contributions than has [2008 Election Republican
Presidential Candidate] Republican John
McCain, and the fiercely anti-war [2008 Election Republican Presidential
Candidate] Ron
Paul, though he suspended his campaign for the Republican nomination
months ago, has received more than four times McCain's haul." -By
Luke Rosiak -OpenSecrets.org
|
Recipient
|
Total
|
Obama, Barack
Paul, Ron
McCain, John
Huckabee, Mike
Thompson, Fred
Romney, Mitt
Clinton, Hillary |
$60,642
$45,512
$10,665
$7,950
$6,350
$5,550
$3,240
|
via: OpenSecrets.org
20080806
John
McCain -  Oil
- Politics
- Military
- 2008
Election -  Arizona
-  Calif
-  Fla
- US
- Iraq
- International
"Bundler
Collects From Unlikely Donors." ... "The bundle of
$2,300 and $4,600 checks that poured into [2008 Election Republican Presidential
Candidate and Arizona Senator] Sen. John McCain's presidential campaign
on March 12 came from an unlikely group of California donors: a mechanic
from D&D Auto Repair in Whittier [California], the manager of Rite
Aid Pharmacy No. 5727, the 30-something owners of the Twilight Hookah Lounge
in Fullerton [California]." ... "But the man who gathered checks from them
is no stranger to McCain -- he shuttled the Republican on his private plane
and held a fundraising event for the candidate at his house in Delray Beach,
Fla [Florida]." ... "Harry Sargeant III, a former naval officer and the
owner of an oil-trading company that recently inked defense contracts potentially
worth more than $1 billion, is the archetype of a modern presidential money
man." ... "Some of the most prolific givers in Sargeant's network live
in modest homes in Southern California's Inland Empire. Most had never
given a political contribution before being contacted by Sargeant or his
associates. Most said they have never voiced much interest in politics.
And in several instances, they had never registered to vote. And yet, records
show, some families have ponied up as much as $18,400 for various candidates
between December and March." ... "Both Sargeant and the donors were vague
when asked to explain how Sargeant persuaded them to give away so much
money." ... "His firm, International Oil Trading Co. (IOTC), holds several
lucrative contracts with the Defense Department to carry fuel to the U.S.
military in Iraq." ... "The work has not been without controversy. Last
month, [California Democratic Representative] Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.
[Democratic-California]) initiated a review of IOTC's contract to determine
whether it was overcharging the military for jet fuel, and to learn how
the company, which did not submit the lowest bid, landed the contract to
supply the fuel." (1, 2)
-By Matthew Mosk with contributions by Ashley Surdin,
Lucy Shackelford, Alice Crites and Julie Tate
-WashingtonPost
 Hillary
Rodham Clinton -  Dick
Cheney - Halliburton
KBR -  Blackwater
-  Corporate
-  Government
- Disaster
- Politics
- Military
- Peoples
-  Health
-  Investigators
- Hurricane
Katrina -  Housing
- US
- Iraq
-  Cayman
Islands
"No
Crisis Is Immune From Exploitation Under Bush." ...
[By
HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON:] "Tucked away on the Cayman Islands sits Ugland
House, an unassuming, nondescript building of modest scale and size. However,
according to a recent report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO),
this five-story office building is home to more than 18,000 corporate entities,
nearly half of which have U.S. [United States] ties." ... "In the past
few years, the number of corporations flocking to places like the Cayman
Islands to evade U.S. taxes has exploded. One of these companies, [Republican
Vice President Dick Cheney's] former Halliburton subsidiary KBR, has used
offshore tax havens to avoid paying hundreds of millions of dollars in
federal taxes. To no one's surprise, instead of cracking down on KBR, the
[Republican President] Bush administration has rewarded the company in
April of this year with a 10-year, $150 billion contract in Iraq." ...
"There appears to be no crisis, tragedy or disaster immune from exploitation
under the Bush administration. The examples of the waste, fraud and abuse
are legion -- from KBR performing shoddy electrical work in Iraq that has
resulted in the electrocution of our military personnel according to Pentagon
and Congressional investigators, to the firing of an Army official who
dared to refuse a $1 billion payout for questionable charges to the same
company. In another scam, the Pentagon awarded a $300 million contract
to AEY, Inc. [Incorporated], a company run by a 22-year-old who fulfilled
an ammunition deal in Afghanistan by supplying rotting Chinese-made munitions
to our allies." ... "But the fraud and waste are not limited to the war.
In the weeks after Hurricane Katrina, for example, FEMA [Federal Emergency
Management Agency] awarded a contract worth more than $500 million for
trailers to serve as temporary housing. The contractor, Gulf Stream, collected
all of its money even though they knew at the time that its trailers were
contaminated with formaldehyde." ... "While touting fiscal responsibility,
[Republican] President Bush and his administration have lined the pockets
of political cronies like Halliburton and Blackwater. While calling for
earmark reform, the president has allowed no-bid and questionable contracting
throughout the federal government to dwarf earmark spending by a 10-to-1
ratio." -By Hillary Rodham Clinton
-WSJ.com
20080805
Dick
Cheney - US
- Iraq
- Military
-  Intelligence
-  Terrorism
- Politics
- History
-  Book
"Did
White House fake link between Saddam and Al Qaeda?"
... "First, former CIA [Central Intelligence Agency] Director George Tenet
told the president it was a "slam dunk" that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.
Then came efforts by the [Republican President] Bush White House to discredit
critics, like ambassador Joe Wilson, who questioned the wisdom of going
to war in Iraq." ... "Now comes a new book by author Ron Suskind claiming
that the [Republican President Bush] White House ordered the CIA to forge
and backdate a handwritten letter from the head of Iraqi intelligence to
Saddam Hussein to link the Iraq regime to Al Qaeda. The White House calls
the assertion nonsense." ... "In “The Way of the World,” to be published
today, Suskind writes:"
"The
White House had concocted a fake letter from Habbush to Saddam, backdated
to July 1, 2001. It said that 9/11 ringleader Mohammad Atta had actually
trained for his mission in Iraq –- thus showing, finally, that there was
an operational link between Saddam and al Qaeda, something the vice president’s
office [Republican Dick Cheney] had been pressing CIA to prove since 9/11
as a justification to invade Iraq. There is no link."
"Suskind
says the order to forge such a letter was written on “creamy White House
stationery” but gives no details about how it was created or how it was
delivered to Iraq." -By Johanna Neuman
-LAtimes
Political
- Terrorism
- Intelligence
- Crime
- Noteworthy
- Government
-  Law
- US
- Iraq
- Military
- History
-  Journalist
"Author
claims White House knew Iraq had no WMD: Journalist
Ron Suskind says [Republican President] Bush ordered forgery linking Saddam,
al-Qaeda." ... "President Bush committed an impeachable offense by ordering
the CIA [Central Intelligence Agency] to to manufacture a false pretense
for the Iraq war in the form of a backdated, handwritten document linking
Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda, an explosive new book claims." ... "The charge
is made in “The Way of the World: A Story of Truth and Hope in an Age of
Extremism” by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Ron Suskind, released today."
... "Suskind says he spoke on the record with U.S. [United States] intelligence
officials who stated that Bush was informed unequivocally in January 2003
that Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction. Nonetheless, his book relates,
Bush decided to invade Iraq three months later — with the forged letter
from the head of Iraqi intelligence to Saddam bolstering the U.S. [United
States] rationale to go into war." ... "“It was a dark day for the CIA,”
Suskind told TODAY co-host Meredith Vieira on Tuesday. “It was the kind
of thing where [the CIA] said, ‘Look, this is not our charge. We’re not
here to carry forth a political mandate — which is clearly what this was
— to solve a political problem in America.’ And it was a cause of great
grievance inside of the agency.”" ... "The author writes that Bush’s action
is “one of the greatest lies in modern American political history” and
suggests it is a crime of greater impact than Watergate." ... "The letter"
... "On page 371 of “The Way of the World,” Suskind describes the [Republican
President Bush's] White House’s concoction of a forged letter purportedly
from the hand of [Iraqi intelligence chief Tahir Jalil] Habbush to Saddam
Hussein to justify the United States’ decision to go to war." ... "CIA
officers [Bob] Richer and John Maguire, who oversaw the Iraq Operations
Group, are both on the record in Suskind’s book confirming the existence
of the fake Habbush letter." -By Bob Considine
-MSNBC
 WATCH:
Ron Suskind interview on TODAY show.
Government
- Intelligence
- Secretly
- Marketing
- Media
-  Opinion
- Noteworthy
- Military
- Terrorism
- Political
- History
- Book
- US
- Iraq
"Book
says White House ordered forgery." ... "A new book
by the author Ron Suskind claims that the White House ordered the CIA [Central
Intelligence Agency] to forge a back-dated, handwritten letter from the
head of Iraqi intelligence to Saddam Hussein." ... "Suskind writes in “The
Way of the World,” to be published Tuesday, that the alleged forgery –
adamantly denied by the White House – was designed to portray a false link
between Hussein’s regime and al Qaeda as a justification for the Iraq war."
... "Suskind writes in his new book that the order to create the letter
was written on “creamy White House stationery.” The book suggests that
the letter was subsequently created by the CIA and delivered to Iraq, but
does not say how." ... "The author claims that such an operation, part
of “false pretenses” for war, would apparently constitute illegal White
House use of the CIA to influence a domestic audience, an arguably impeachable
offense." ... "Suskind writes that the White House had “ignored the Iraq
intelligence chief’s accurate disclosure that there were no weapons of
mass destruction in Iraq – intelligence they received in plenty of time
to stop an invasion." ... "“They secretly resettled him in Jordan, paid
him $5 million – which one could argue was hush money – and then used his
captive status to help deceive the world about one of the era’s most crushing
truths: that America had gone to war under false pretenses,” the book says."
... "Suskind writes that the forgery “operation created by the White House
and passed to the CIA seems inconsistent with” a statute saying the CIA
may not conduct covert operations “intended to influence United States
political processes, public opinion, policies or media.”" ... "“It is not
the sort of offense, such as assault or burglary, that carries specific
penalties, for example, a fine or jail time,” Suskind writes. “It is much
broader than that. It pertains to the White House’s knowingly misusing
an arm of government, the sort of thing generally taken up in impeachment
proceedings.”" -By Mike Allen
-Politico.com
20080727
Barack
Obama - John
McCain - Media
- Politics
- Iraq
-  Pakistan
-  Afghanistan
-  Iran
-  Kuwait
-  Britain
- US
-  Nuclear
- Military
- Terrorism
- Gas
- Money
- 2008
Election
"How
Obama Became Acting President." ... "The growing
[2008 Election Democratic Presidential Candidate Barack] Obama clout derives
not from national polls, where his lead is modest. Nor is it a gift from
the press, which still gives free passes to its old bus mate [2008 Election
Republican Presidential Candidate] John McCain. It was laughable to watch
journalists stamp their feet last week to try to push Mr. Obama into saying
he was “wrong” about the surge. More than five years and 4,100 American
fatalities later, they’re still not demanding that Mr. McCain admit
he was wrong when he assured us that our adventure in Iraq would be fast,
produce little American “bloodletting” and “be paid for by the Iraqis.”"
... "Never mind. This election remains about the present and the future,
where Iraq’s $10 billion a month drain on American pocketbooks and military
readiness is just one moving part in a matrix of national crises stretching
from the gas pump to Pakistan." ... "First, on July 7, the Iraqi prime
minister, Nuri al-Maliki, dissed [Republican President] Bush dogma by raising
the prospect of a withdrawal timetable for our troops. Then, on July
15, Mr. McCain suddenly noticed that more
Americans are dying in Afghanistan than Iraq and called for more American
forces to be sent there. It was a long-overdue recognition of the obvious
that he could
no longer avoid: both Robert
Gates, the defense secretary [of Republican President Bush], and [Admiral]
Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, had already
called for_more
American troops to battle the resurgent Taliban, echoing the policy
proposed by Mr. Obama a
year ago." ... "On July 17 we learned
that [Republican] President Bush, who had labeled
direct talks with Iran “appeasement,” would send
the No. 3 official in the State Department to multilateral nuclear talks
with Iran. Lest anyone doubt that the White House had moved away from the
rigid stand endorsed by Mr. McCain and toward Mr. Obama’s, a former Rumsfeld
apparatchik weighed in on The Wall Street Journal’s op-ed page: “Now
Bush Is Appeasing Iran.”" ... "Within 24 hours, the White House did
another U-turn, endorsing
an Iraq withdrawal timetable as long as it was labeled
a “general time horizon.” In a flash, as Mr. Obama touched
down in Kuwait, Mr. Maliki approvingly cited the Democratic candidate
by name while laying out a troop-withdrawal calendar of his own that, like
Mr. Obama’s, would wind down in 2010. On Tuesday, the British prime minister,
Gordon Brown, announced a major drawdown of his nation’s troops by early
2009." -By Frank Rich
-NYTimes
20080719
Barack
Obama - Military
- US
- Iraq
- Politics
- 2008
Election
"Iraqi
PM backs Obama troop exit plan: report." ... "Iraqi
Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki told a German magazine he supported prospective
U.S. [United States 2008 Election] Democratic presidential candidate Barack
Obama's proposal that U.S. troops should leave Iraq within 16 months."
... "In an interview with Der Spiegel released on Saturday, Maliki said
he wanted U.S. troops to withdraw from Iraq as soon as possible." ... ""U.S.
presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about 16 months. That, we think,
would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of
slight changes."" ... ""Whoever is thinking about the shorter term is closer
to reality. Artificially extending the stay of U.S. troops would cause
problems."" ... "The White House said on Friday [Republican] President
George W. Bush and Maliki had agreed that a security deal under negotiation
should set a "time horizon" for meeting "aspirational goals" for reducing
U.S. forces in Iraq." (1, 2)
-By Madeline Chambers with contributions by Jon Boyle
-Reuters
20080714
Barack
Obama - Military
- Police
- US
- Iraq
- Afghanistan
- Iran
- Pakistan
- Terrorism
- Intelligence
- Government
- Money
- Political
- McCain
- Arizona
- 2008
Election
"My
Plan for Iraq." [By 2008 Election Democratic Presidential
Canidate Barack Obama] ... "The call by Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki
for a timetable for the removal of American troops from Iraq presents an
enormous opportunity. We should seize this moment to begin the phased redeployment
of combat troops that I have long advocated, and that is needed for long-term
success in Iraq and the security interests of the United States." ... "The
differences on Iraq in this campaign are deep. Unlike [2008 Election Republican
Senator and Arizona] Senator John McCain, I opposed the war in Iraq before
it began, and would end it as president. I believed it was a grave mistake
to allow ourselves to be distracted from the fight against Al Qaeda and
the Taliban [in Afghanistan] by invading a country [Iraq] that posed no
imminent threat and had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks. Since then,
more than 4,000 Americans have died and we have spent nearly $1 trillion.
Our military is overstretched. Nearly every threat we face — from Afghanistan
to Al Qaeda to Iran — has grown." ... "In the 18 months since [Republican]
President Bush announced the surge, our troops have performed heroically
in bringing down the level of violence. New tactics have protected the
Iraqi population, and the Sunni tribes have rejected Al Qaeda — greatly
weakening its effectiveness." ... "But the same factors that led me to
oppose the surge still hold true. The strain on our military has grown,
the situation in Afghanistan has deteriorated and we’ve spent nearly $200
billion more in Iraq than we had budgeted. Iraq’s leaders have failed to
invest tens of billions of dollars in oil revenues in rebuilding their
own country, and they have not reached the political accommodation that
was the stated purpose of the surge." ... "The good news is that Iraq’s
leaders want to take responsibility for their country by negotiating a
timetable for the removal of American troops. Meanwhile, Lt. Gen. [Lieutenant
General] James Dubik, the American officer in charge of training Iraq’s
security forces, estimates that the Iraqi Army and police will be ready
to assume responsibility for security in 2009." ... "Only by redeploying
our troops can we press the Iraqis to reach comprehensive political accommodation
and achieve a successful transition to Iraqis’ taking responsibility for
the security and stability of their country. Instead of seizing the moment
and encouraging Iraqis to step up, the Bush administration and Senator
McCain are refusing to embrace this transition — despite their previous
commitments to respect the will of Iraq’s sovereign government." ... "Ending
the war is essential to meeting our broader strategic goals, starting in
Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the Taliban is resurgent and Al Qaeda has
a safe haven. Iraq is not the central front in the war on terrorism, and
it never has been. As Adm. [Admiral] Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, recently pointed out, we won’t have sufficient resources
to finish the job in Afghanistan until we reduce our commitment to Iraq."
... "As president, I would pursue a new strategy, and begin by providing
at least two additional combat brigades to support our effort in Afghanistan.
We need more troops, more helicopters, better intelligence-gathering and
more nonmilitary assistance to accomplish the mission there. I would not
hold our military, our resources and our foreign policy hostage to a misguided
desire to maintain permanent bases in Iraq. " -By
Barack Obama -NYTimes
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Jordan
- 
Saudi
Arabia - 
Syria
- 
Turkey
.
Karl Rove -
Massachusetts
Israel -
Germany -
France -
Ireland
