"Iraqi Military and Security Services Disbanded" -- The Guardian, 5/23/03:
Iraq's armed forces and the security organisations that supported Saddam Hussein's regime have been dissolved, it was announced today.
L Paul Bremer, the top official in the interim administration that is running the country, said the Iraqi Ministry of Defence, the Republican Guard and "other specified security institutions which constituted and supported the most repressive activities of Saddam Hussein's regime", have been disbanded. . . .
Today's order also ends conscription, turns the property of the dissolved entities over to the new administration and dismissed all employees of the armed forces, Republican Guard and the defence ministry.
It also abolishes the information ministry, which tightly controlled Iraq's media and the work of foreign journalists.
The announcement follows the administration's decree on May 16 abolishing Saddam's Ba'ath party and ordering the dismissal of party officials from the civil service. . . .
The move follows demonstrations in Baghdad on Sunday when former noncommissioned officers and officers from the three services, demanded back pay and other benefits owed to them since the collapse of Saddam's regime on April 9.
"Dividend Voodoo" -- Warren Buffett in The Washington Post, 5/20/03:
The taxes I pay to the federal government, including the payroll tax that is paid for me by my employer, Berkshire Hathaway, are roughly the same proportion of my income -- about 30 percent -- as that paid by the receptionist in our office. My case is not atypical -- my earnings, like those of many rich people, are a mix of capital gains and ordinary income -- nor is it affected by tax shelters (I've never used any). As it works out, I pay a somewhat higher rate for my combination of salary, investment and capital gain income than our receptionist does. But she pays a far higher portion of her income in payroll taxes than I do. . . .
Now the Senate says that dividends should be tax-free to recipients. Suppose this measure goes through and the directors of Berkshire Hathaway (which does not now pay a dividend) therefore decide to pay $1 billion in dividends next year. Owning 31 percent of Berkshire, I would receive $310 million in additional income, owe not another dime in federal tax, and see my tax rate plunge to 3 percent.
And our receptionist? She'd still be paying about 30 percent, which means she would be contributing about 10 times the proportion of her income that I would to such government pursuits as fighting terrorism, waging wars and supporting the elderly. Let me repeat the point: Her overall federal tax rate would be 10 times what my rate would be. . . .
Administration officials say that the $310 million suddenly added to my wallet would stimulate the economy because I would invest it and thereby create jobs. But they conveniently forget that if Berkshire kept the money, it would invest that same amount, creating jobs as well. . . .
Proponents of cutting tax rates on dividends argue that the move will stimulate the economy. A large amount of stimulus, of course, should already be on the way from the huge and growing deficit the government is now running. I have no strong views on whether more action on this front is warranted. But if it is, don't cut the taxes of people with huge portfolios of stocks held directly. (Small investors owning stock held through 401(k)s are already tax-favored.) Instead, give reductions to those who both need and will spend the money gained. Enact a Social Security tax "holiday" or give a flat-sum rebate to people with low incomes. Putting $1,000 in the pockets of 310,000 families with urgent needs is going to provide far more stimulus to the economy than putting the same $310 million in my pockets.
When you listen to tax-cut rhetoric, remember that giving one class of taxpayer a "break" requires -- now or down the line -- that an equivalent burden be imposed on other parties. In other words, if I get a break, someone else pays. Government can't deliver a free lunch to the country as a whole. It can, however, determine who pays for lunch. And last week the Senate handed the bill to the wrong party.
"All Together Now" -- Guardian lead editorial, 5/23/03:
In pressing significant amendments to the new UN security council resolution on Iraq, France and Russia did Britain a favour. The original draft, principally authored by the US, failed to give a central role to the UN and was objectionable in several other respects, not least in its silence on resumed UN weapons inspections. The resolution passed yesterday corrects some of these imbalances.
It is now agreed that the UN's special representative will have an influential, though not decisive, say in Iraq's political rehabilitation; that the occupying powers (the US and Britain) must report regularly to the council; that there will be strengthened international monitoring of the management of Iraq's oil revenues; and that the UN oil-for-food programme - vital while Iraq's humanitarian situation remains so precarious - will continue for at least six months. The resolution is still unsatisfactorily vague about future, "confirmatory" UN inspections, promising only to "revisit" the issue. It sets no timetable for the establishment of a new Iraqi government while giving extraordinary powers to the occupiers. Conversely, they have accepted open-ended financial obligations that may yet prove exceptionally onerous for British taxpayers given the steadily falling estimates of Iraq's oil earnings in the next five years. But overall, this is a better outcome than might have been expected after all the pre-war ructions.Despite the way it was achieved, the lifting of sanctions on Iraq, the cause of so many years of pointless suffering and fruitless argument, is a matter for celebration. So, too, is this symbolic and to a lesser degree practical reassertion of the UN's primacy in conferring both inter national legality and legitimacy. By forcing a softening of the US position, France in particular has helped Britain secure what Tony Blair calls a "solid basis" for future policy in Iraq but one which Mr Blair, despite his much-vaunted influence in Washington, could not by himself achieve. By accepting a text that they regard as less than perfect, France and its anti-war allies have served a larger cause by putting the UN "back in the game", as France's foreign minister, Dominique de Villepin, puts it. After all the calumny unfairly heaped on French heads in recent months, Mr Blair and colleagues would do well to acknowledge this debt.
"CIA to Review Iraq Intelligence" -- Dana Priest and Walter Pincus in The Washington Post, 5/23/03:
The House intelligence committee, expressing concern about the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, asked Director of Central Intelligence George J. Tenet yesterday "to reevaluate U.S. intelligence" used by the Bush administration before the war to describe Iraq's proscribed weapons programs and its links to terrorist organizations such as al Qaeda.
The administration based its argument for going to war against Iraq on the dangers posed by Iraq's chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs and its alleged ties to al Qaeda.
The CIA, at the suggestion of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, has an unusual study underway that will compare intelligence given to President Bush and other policymakers before the war to information now being gathered in Iraq from the ousted Iraqi government's files and interrogations of former Iraqi government personnel, according to senior intelligence officials. . . .
One official who has read a draft of the NIC and CIA prewar studies said, "There is no question there was a lot of pressure on analysts to support preconceived judgments." But, he added, "the analysts' record is not bad when you consider you have strong policymakers pushing analysts for information that supports their specific views."
Neither the agency's study nor the committee's request addresses how accurately top policymakers, in particular Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, portrayed the classified intelligence and advice they received before making their public statements.
"Blix Suspects There Are No Weapons of Mass Destruction" -- Rory McCarthy and Jeevan Vasagar in The Guardian, 5/24/03:
The chief UN weapons inspector, Hans Blix, said yesterday that he suspected that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction,
He added that "in this respect" the war might not have been justified.
"I am obviously very interested in the question of whether or not there were weapons of mass destruction - and I am beginning to suspect there possibly were none," he said in an interview with the Berlin newspaper Der Tagesspiegel. . . .
He referred to Saddam Hussein's chief scientific adviser, Lieutenant General Amer al-Saadi, who surrendered last month and said in an interview: "Nothing else will come out after the end of the war."
"The fact that al-Saadi surrendered and said there were no weapons of mass destruction has led to me to ask myself whether there actually were any," Dr Blix said.
"I don't see why he would still be afraid of the regime. Other leading figures have said the same." . . .
"U.S. Sped Bremer to Iraq Post" -- Karen DeYoung in The Washington Post, 5/24/03:
The appointment of L. Paul Bremer III early this month as the new head of the U.S. reconstruction effort in Iraq, portrayed by the Bush administration as part of a smoothly running postwar plan, was a hastily arrived-at decision by a White House increasingly worried about collapsing civil order in Iraq, according to senior administration officials. . . .
Postwar plans drawn up in January and February included the eventual installation of a senior civilian "of stature" to be in charge of non-military aspects of the occupation during an indefinite period between Garner's early efforts and the election of an Iraqi government. Bush, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Colin L. Powell had interviewed and signed off on Bremer in April, but announcements of his appointment and departure were still seen as weeks, if not months, away.
Powell was "surprised" by the decision to advance Bremer's departure for Iraq, one official said, "but it was a nice surprise" since Bremer is a former Foreign Service officer. Rumsfeld, who was traveling overseas when the news broke here on May 1, approved of Bremer but was said to be irritated that reports portrayed the sudden decision as a victory for Powell. Rumsfeld issued a terse statement praising Garner and saying no decision on any change had been announced.
Garner, who now works for Bremer, originally signed up to stay in Iraq until July 1. It is not clear how long he will remain.
"U.S. May Let Kurds Keep Arms, Angering Shiites" -- Patrick E. Tyler in The New York Times, 5/24/03:
BAGHDAD, Iraq, May 23 -- The American occupation authority in Iraq, apparently preserving the prewar distinction between Kurdish-controlled northern areas and the rest of the country, will allow Kurdish fighters to keep their assault rifles and heavy weapons, but require Shiite Muslim and other militias to surrender theirs, according to a draft directive.
The plan has engendered intense criticism by Shiite leaders involved in negotiations with American and British officials who have met privately with the heavily armed political groups that have moved into the power vacuum here.
"Maybe we didn't fight with the coalition, but we didn't fight against them," said Adel Abdul Mahdi, an official of the largest Shiite group, which is headed by Ayatollah Muhammad Bakr al-Hakim. "We want conditions where all militias are dissolved and we will not accept that other militias will be allowed to stay there with their weapons while we will not be there with ours."
Under the draft order, obtained by The New York Times, "militias that assisted coalition forces who remain under the supervision of coalition forces" will be authorized "to possess automatic or heavy weapons." . . .
Besides the armed Shiite groups, the main militia in Iraq are the Kurds and the Free Iraqi Forces of the Iraqi National Congress under Ahmad Chalabi.
General McKiernan said today that Mr. Chalabi's militia was being "demilitarized."
When Mr. Chalabi's militia first surfaced in Iraq last month, it received training from under the supervision of an American Special Forces officer.
On Thursday night, armed fighters from the Iraqi National Congress engaged in a running gun battle with unknown foes during what was described as a search by Mr. Chalabi's forces for senior Baath Party members in a Baghdad suburb.
After the firefight, American troops raided Mr. Chalabi's headquarters at Baghdad's Hunting Club, arrested 35 of his militiamen and seized their weapons. They were released, Mr. Chalabi's group said in a statement, after an American military officer assigned as a liaison to the group intervened.
Kurdish and Shiite Muslim leaders confirmed in interviews this week that senior military commanders, including Lt. Gen. John Abizaid, the deputy commander of American forces in the region, and General McKiernan had briefed them on the disarmament directive and issued some pointed warnings that they would be disarmed by force if they did not comply.
"Which Democrat Will Speak Fiscal Truth?" -- Roger Altman in The Washington Post, 5/25/03:
Officially, all three Bush tax bills, taken together, are estimated to reduce federal revenue by approximately $1.2 trillion over the next 10 years. But many of the cuts in each bill are disingenuously designed to lapse within this 10-year window. The administration knows that Congress won't likely allow taxes to go back up at those moments. Those cuts will be extended, and the ultimate reduction in federal revenue will approach an astounding $3 trillion. This means an average annual budget deficit of $420 billion over that period. We've never had a deficit that large in any single year, let alone 10 straight.
Juxtaposed against the gargantuan Social Security and Medicare actuarial deficits, this is ruinous fiscal policy and even worse social policy. But in raw political terms, it is brilliant. It paints the Democrats, and particularly their presidential candidates, into a corner. They are forced to support even larger deficits or call for a rollback of certain tax cuts or accept the utter absence of budget resources to pay for any new initiatives, from health care on down. Each of these choices is politically excruciating, just as the White House planned it.
But, perversely, there is a bright side. Problems this big lend themselves to simple approaches, such as these: (1) The Bush tax cuts are excessive and, in part, should be rolled back; and (2) future budget deficits should be smaller than the president is proposing. A Democrat with the courage to adopt these principles and communicate them effectively becomes the truth-teller and could go far. . . .
The task for the Democrats is twofold: first, to help the public understand these choices by explaining them effectively. That's not an impossible task. John F. Kennedy could have done it and so could Bill Clinton. Second, they must take the courageous step of advocating the fiscal policy we require: rolling back some of these Bush tax cuts. Only in this way can we pay for at least the few initiatives this society must have and shrink the future deficits this administration has created. Americans need to be reminded that just a few years ago, the achievement of a balanced budget for the first time in 50 years, and under a Democratic president, led to extraordinary prosperity.
Would this be politically suicidal? No. Just returning the top income tax rate to 39.6 percent (the Clinton rate), retaining the estate tax and leaving dividend taxation where it is saves nearly $1 trillion compared with the Bush plan. And the first step would affect only those with annual incomes over $400,000.
History tells us that Americans always respond to real leadership. We'll see if there is a presidential Democrat with the courage and communication skills to make this case. If there is one, next year's election may be much more competitive than you think.
"Red Cross Denied Access to PoWs" -- Ed Vulliamy in The Observer, 5/25/03:
The United States is illegally holding thousands of Iraqi prisoners of war and other captives without access to human rights officials at compounds close to Baghdad airport, The Observer has learnt.
There have also been reports of a mutiny last week by prisoners at an airport compound, in protest against conditions. The uprising was 'dealt with' by the Americans, according to a US military source.
The International Committee of the Red Cross so far has been denied access to what the organisation believes could be as many as 3,000 prisoners held in searing heat. All other requests to inspect conditions under which prisoners are being held have been met with silence or been turned down. . . .
The ICRC has gained access to prisoners held in camps at Umm Qasr in the south. But with regard to the larger numbers reportedly held in Baghdad, said Doumani, 'we are still waiting for the green light, more than a month after the end of the conflict. This is in breach of the third Geneva Convention.' She said the laws of war should give the ICRC access 'as quickly as possible'. . . .
Witnesses to the camps are few, since no Iraqi prisoners taken to them have been released. But a cameraman for the France 3 television channel, arrested at the Palestine Hotel, did manage a glimpse. Leo Nicolian has documentation signed by a Lieutenant Brad Fisher saying he was wrongly arrested (and beaten, with a black eye to prove it) for the alleged theft of a bag from an American reporter.
He was held at the tennis court compound along with, he said, about 50 other prisoners, and told he was detained 'for investigation'. On his way out, Nicolian said he passed a bigger encampment in which he saw 'hundreds of men' hooded, with their arms tied behind their backs.
"U.S. Eyes Pressing Uprising in Iran" -- Glenn Kessler in The Washington Post, 5/25/03:
The Bush administration, alarmed by intelligence suggesting that al Qaeda operatives in Iran had a role in the May 12 suicide bombings in Saudi Arabia, has suspended once-promising contacts with Iran and appears ready to embrace an aggressive policy of trying to destabilize the Iranian government, administration officials said.
Senior Bush administration officials will meet Tuesday at the White House to discuss the evolving strategy toward the Islamic republic, with Pentagon officials pressing hard for public and private actions that they believe could lead to the toppling of the government through a popular uprising, officials said.
The State Department, which had encouraged some form of engagement with the Iranians, appears inclined to accept such a policy, especially if Iran does not take any visible steps to deal with the suspected al Qaeda operatives before Tuesday, officials said. But State Department officials are concerned that the level of popular discontent there is much lower than Pentagon officials believe, leading to the possibility that U.S. efforts could ultimately discredit reformers in Iran.
In any case, the Saudi Arabia bombings have ended the tentative signs of engagement between Iran and the United States that had emerged during the wars against Afghanistan and Iraq. . . .
Earlier this week, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld accused Iran of harboring al Qaeda members. "There's no question but that there have been and are today senior al Qaeda leaders in Iran, and they are busy," Rumsfeld said. Iranian officials, however, have vehemently denied that they have granted al Qaeda leaders safe haven in the country.
Until the Saudi bombings, some officials said, Iran had been relatively cooperative on al Qaeda. Since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Iran has turned over al Qaeda officials to Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan. In talks, U.S. officials had repeatedly warned Iranian officials that if any al Qaeda operatives in Iran are implicated in attacks against Americans, it would have serious consequences for relations between the two countries.
"UN Chief Warns of Anti-American Backlash in Iraq" -- Rory McCarthy in The Guardian, 5/27/03:
The UN's most senior humanitarian official in Iraq warned yesterday that US attempts to rebuild the country were overly dominated by "ideology" and risked triggering a violent backlash.
Ramiro Lopes da Silva said the sudden decision last week to demobilise 400,000 Iraqi soldiers without any re-employment programme could generate a "low-intensity conflict" in the countryside. . . .
Mr Lopes da Silva said the UN "disagreed" with some of the decisions made by the US-led authority in Baghdad.
He was surprised the decision to disband the Iraqi military had not been accompanied by an attempt to reintegrate soldiers into society.
"The way the decision was taken leaves them in a vacuum," he said. "Our concern is that if there is nothing for them out there soon this will be a potential source of additional destabilisation."
Even US generals admitted at the time they feared the decision could worsen the lawlessness and looting. Mr Lopes da Silva said the demobilisation, along with tightened security in the capital, could force looters into the less well-guarded countryside.
"What you are potentially going to create is more banditry and a low-intensity conflict in the rural areas," he said. "These edicts are seen very much just as ideological statements."
Mr Lopes da Silva also questioned the authority's de-Ba'athification programme, under which up to 30,000 Ba'ath party officials are automatically excluded from office. "Many bureaucrats who have important experience that would help the new government were only Ba'ath party members on paper," he said.
In another step against the Ba'ath party yesterday, US military officials fired the police chief for west Baghdad against the advice of several American soldiers. Abdul Razak al-Abbassi, who for the past three weeks has helped bring hundreds of officers back to work, was dismissed because he had been a senior member of the Ba'ath party under Saddam.
"Are We Safer?" Stephen F. Cohen at The Nation Online, 5/19/03:
Will the Iraq war increase America's national security, as the Bush Administration has always promised and now insists is already the case, or will it undermine and diminish our national security, as thoughtful critics believed?
In the weeks, months and years ahead, we will learn the answer to that fateful question by judging developments by seven essential criteria:
(1) Will the war discourage or encourage other regional "preemptive" military strikes, particularly by nuclear-armed states such as, but not only, India and Pakistan? India has already evoked that newly proclaimed US doctrine in its conflict with Pakistan, as has Russia in its increasingly hostile relations with the former Soviet republic of Georgia.
(2) Indeed, will the Iraq war stop the proliferation of states that possess nuclear weapons or instead incite more governments to acquire them as a deterrent against another US "regime change"? If anything, North Korea and Iran have seemed even more determined to develop such weapons.
(3) Will the war, and the long US occupation that is likely to ensue, reduce the recruitment of young Arabs by terrorist movements or will it inspire many new recruits? The subsequent suicide bombings in Saudi Arabia and Morocco suggest that the latter result will be the case.
(4) With or without more recruits, will the war decrease or increase the number of terrorist plots against the United States, whether at home or abroad? Here too the recent targeting of a US firm in Saudi Arabia and continuing "terrorist" attacks on American troops even in Iraq itself are not good signs.
(5) Will the war help safeguard the vast quantities of nuclear and other materials of mass destruction that exist in the world today, and the expertise needed to operationalize them, or make them more accessible to "evil-doers"? In this exceedingly perilous respect, the war may have aleady made things worse. Not only has the Bush Administration yet to find any weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, its original professed purpose for attacking the country, but the war led directly to the looting of at least seven Iraqi nuclear facilities and thus possibly to a new kind of proliferation.
(6) In that connection, will Russia--which has more ill-secured devices of mass destruction than any other country and which strongly opposed and still resents the US war--now be more, or less, inclined to collaborate with Washington in safeguarding and reducing those weapons and materials? Again, the initial result has been contrary to American national security interests. On May 16, President Vladimir V. Putin announced that the Kremlin, like the White House, is likely to build even more nuclear weapons.
(7) Finally, considering the rampant anti-Americanism it has provoked, will the war result in more or fewer governments willing to cooperate with--individually or in multinational organizations like the United Nations--George W. Bush's stated top priority, the war against global terrorism? During the weeks since the military campaign ended, anti-American sentiments have continued to grow, from the Middle East to Western Europe, and the United Nations remains profoundly divided by the US war and its ugly aftermath in Iraq.
"For Partisan Gain, Republicans Decide Rules Were Meant to Be Broken" -- Adam Cohen in The New York Times, 5/27/03:
Republicans, who now control all three branches of the federal government, are not just pushing through their political agenda. They are increasingly ignoring the rules of government to do it. While the Texas redistricting effort failed, Republicans succeeded in enacting an equally partisan redistricting plan in Colorado. And Republicans in the Senate -- notably those involved in the highly charged issue of judicial confirmations -- have been just as quick to throw out the rulebook.
These partisan attacks on the rules of government may be more harmful, and more destabilizing, than bad policies, like the $320 billion tax cut. Modern states, the German sociologist Max Weber wrote, derive their legitimacy from "rational authority," a system in which rules apply in equal and predictable ways, and even those who lead are reined in by limits on their power. When the rules of government are stripped away, people can begin to regard their government as illegitimate. . . .
Weber, in writing about rules, was concerned about what factors kept governments in power. That is not a concern in the United States -- there is no uprising in the offing. But when Americans see their government flouting the rules, as they did during Watergate, they respond with cynicism.
In these hard times -- with threats from abroad and a sour economy at home -- our leaders should be bringing the nation together not by demonizing foreign countries, but by instilling greater faith in our own. They should be showing greater reverence for the rules of government, and looking for other ways -- like tougher campaign finance laws -- to assure Americans that their government operates evenhandedly.
Harpers Weekly Review, 5/27/03
"We've found the weapons of mass destruction" -- George W. Bush in an interview on Polish television, 5/30/03 (as transcribed at cnn.com):
We've found the weapons of mass destruction. You know, we found biological laboratories. You remember when Colin Powell stood up in front of the world and he said Iraq has got laboratories, mobile labs to build biological weapons. They're illegal. They're against the United Nations' resolutions and we've so far discovered two. And we'll find more weapons as time goes on.
But for those who say we haven't found the banned manufacturing devices or banned weapons, they're wrong. We found them.