April 18, 2004

For the record

Ahmed Chalabi, being interviewed by the Australian Broadcasting Commission, and urging that Australian troops remain in Iraq had this to say (emphasis added).
I think that we wasted a year now. The security plan for Iraq that was put forward by the Coalition has collapsed. We must face this fact and we must involve Iraqis right away in the training and the recruitment of the police. I believe that a year to 18 months of hard work on the right track will be sufficient to train an important and significant security force.
Obviously, this assessment suited Chalabi's argument on the day, but it's closer to the truth than anything anyone else associated with the Administration has been willing to say. Posted by jquiggin at April 18, 2004 11:14 PM | TrackBack
Comments

Fix intro par: "urging that Australian troops remain in Iraq", or something similar.

Posted by: tim at April 19, 2004 06:01 AM

Fixed, thanks

Posted by: John Quiggin at April 19, 2004 08:13 AM

(While we're being pedantic, isn't it the Australian Broadcasting Corporation these days?)

Posted by: Dan at April 19, 2004 05:45 PM

Despite your point Chalabi requested the Aussies remain in Iraq a point that John Howard has seized on in attacking Mark Latham. Given Chalabi's position this is probably understandable but it does provide context for the rest of the statement. The Americans want to exit and would be happy to transfer police power to Iraqis. But this is difficult when Iraqi police refuse to intervene in stopping those intent on obstructing democratic reform in Iraq. I think Mark Latham should look squarely at the difficult situation in Iraq and rethink.

Posted by: Harry Clarke at April 19, 2004 08:39 PM

Speaking of the US exiting, Immanuel Wallerstein's latest commentary is interesting. While he sees the Bushies as continuing to dig themselves even deeper into an already deep hole, he thinks the exit could happen quite suddenly.

Surely Bush will see the hazards of an open season on Americans in the months before the election. And as one expert said recently, they still don't know who they are fighting.

Wallerstein's final warning is that if they decide to go, then whoever is shooting at them may well continue shooting at the departing helicopters, unlike Saigon where the Viet Cong stayed their hand.

Posted by: Brian Bahnisch at April 20, 2004 12:06 AM