UPDATED BELOW
Nouri al-Maliki continues to criticize the U.S. and to talk about a withdrawal of U.S. troops in Iraq:
America’s refusal to give Baghdad’s security forces sufficient guns and equipment has cost a great number of lives, the Iraqi Prime Minister said yesterday.
Nouri al-Maliki said the insurgency had been bloodier and prolonged because Washington had refused to part with equipment. If it released the necessary arms, US forces could “dramatically� cut their numbers in three to six months, he told The Times.
In a sign of the tense relations with Washington, he chided the US for suggesting his Government was living on “borrowed time�. Such criticism boosted Iraq’s extremists, he said, and was more a reflection of “some kind of crisis situation� in Washington after the Republicans’ midterm election losses. Mr al-Maliki conceded that his administration had made mistakes over the hanging of Saddam Hussein. But he refused to accept all criticism over the execution. When asked about the Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi’s attack on Iraq’s capital punishment laws, Mr al-Maliki cited the Italians’ summary killing of Benito Mussolini and his stringing-up from a lamppost.
Asked how long Iraq would require US troops, Mr al-Maliki said: “If we succeed in implementing the agreement between us to speed up the equipping and providing weapons to our military forces, I think that within three to six months our need for American troops will dramatically go down. That is on condition that there are real, strong efforts to support our military forces and equipping and arming them.�
More:
Gordon Johndroe, the White House national security spokesman, conceded that some of Mr al-Maliki’s criticism was “valid�. The training and equipping of Iraqi troops would be speeded up, he said, adding that by “self-admission we have had to redo our training and equipment programme�.
Although Mr al-Maliki’s tone was measured throughout, he is clearly irritated at US criticism that he has failed to curb Shia militias. Robert Gates, the new US Defence Secretary, said that Mr al-Maliki could lose his job if he failed to stop communal bloodshed and Condoleezza Rice, the Secretary of State, gave a warning that he was living on “borrowed time� and that American patience was running out.
Challenged on the point, Mr al-Maliki remarked acidly: “Certain officials are going through a crisis. Secretary Rice is expressing her own point of view if she thinks that the Government is on borrowed time, whether it is borrowed time for the Iraqi Government or American Administration. I don’t think we are on borrowed time.�
He also said that the criticism from White House officials will ’embold’ the terrorists in Iraq and that the terrorists have not yet beaten the Iraqi government. He still believes, so he says, that the Iraqi government will be able to put the sectarian violence to a halt. He also denied having sympathy for the Shia militias. Lastly he denied that there is a civil war going on and he said that there will be no civil war in the (near) future either because “Sunni and Shia had lived in peace for many years.”
Whatever one thinks of his arguments one thing seems to be clear: the Iraqi government and the U.S. government strongly disagree on Iraq. That is – whether one supports the surge for instance or not – an incredibly bad sign. The U.S. is – rightfully – criticizing al-Maliki. Al-Maliki is – also rightfully – criticizing Bush, Rice, Gates, etc. In the meantime, both seem to refuse to take (full) responsibility for the chaos in Iraq.
Lastly, if al-Maliki wants the U.S. forces out… They have to go. No matter what Bush thinks about it. al-Maliki is the leader of a (somewhat) sovereign nation.
UPDATE
Bloomberg reports:
President George W. Bush failed to rally public support with his nationally televised speech announcing plans to send more soldiers to Iraq, as most Americans say they want Congress to find a way to stop the troop increase.
A new Bloomberg/Los Angeles Times poll shows the public opposes Bush’s decision to dispatch 21,500 additional troops by a margin of 60 percent to 36 percent. Even so, there was little appetite for directly cutting funds for the buildup of forces as a means of thwarting the president’s plan.
And what about those who support Bush’s plans?
The poll also shows the potential saliency of the war in the 2008 presidential elections, especially for Senator John McCain of Arizona, a frontrunner for the Republican nomination. A plurality of self-defined moderates and independents, a key McCain constituency, said his advocacy of a troop escalation even larger than the one Bush has announced makes them less likely to support him if he runs for the White House.
Political suicide?
Some results:
Some two-thirds of Americans disapprove of Bush’s management of the Iraq situation, and the percentage of those who said the war hasn’t been worth it also rose to a high of 62 percent. Fifty-eight percent gave negative reviews to his handling of the fight against terrorists, an 8-point increase from last month.
While about two-thirds of respondents also said all American troops should be brought home immediately or within the next year, about the same number said a premature withdrawal would turn Iraq into a haven for terrorists.
Swelling opposition to the war has driven the president’s overall approval rating down to 39 percent, from 42 percent last month.
By a 51 percent to 41 percent margin, Americans want Congress to prevent Bush from sending more troops, though they are divided about how the lawmakers should exercise their authority. Just 25 percent said Congress should deny the president funding for the deployment. Twenty-six percent said the lawmakers should block Bush “through other legislative measures.”
Down, down, down the numbers go.
Also read Jules Crittenden’s take on al-Maliki.
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