................................................................................................................

http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0417/p01s03-woiq.html

The night after Baghdad fell, three Bradley Fighting Vehicles, fresh from battle, came across some Iraqi military trucks loaded with ordnance in residential District 405... After warning the residents along Street No. 2 to stay in their homes, the lead US vehicle fired explosive rounds into the parked trucks. The resulting fireball destroyed four houses, broke windows up to six blocks away - and killed the Bradley commander.

...Events like these are complicating the postwar campaign to win Iraqi hearts and minds.

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http://www.latimes.com/la-war-rebuild16apr16,0,325044.story

Fighting the war in Iraq turned out to be easier than expected. Getting peace off the ground has proven a bit harder.

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http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=397930

Allied forces were accused by human rights organisations yesterday of using cluster bombs in populated areas of Baghdad... The US magazine Newsday said several children were killed or injured.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/16/international/worldspecial/16SEAR.html?ex=1051533537&ei=1&en=7bacc032aa16bed3

An American team hunting for unconventional Iraqi weapons at an ammunition manufacturing and storage plant near Karbala... said the nature and specific purpose of parts of this giant installation remained a mystery... [and that] the survey had shown only how difficult it is likely to be to discover hard evidence of production of prohibited weapons.

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http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/Primetime/iraq_WMD030416.html

U.S. officials hope a paper trail will lead them to Iraq's elusive weapons of mass destruction, but... coalition airstrikes and newly liberated, vengeance-minded looters... targeted government buildings that may have held records the U.S. military is trying to find.

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http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/04/17/1050172709687.html

Hundreds of tonnes of depleted uranium used by Britain and the United States in Iraq should be removed to protect the civilian population, said the Royal Society, Britain's premier scientific institution.

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http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/04/17/1050172711519.html

A British soldier serving with coalition forces in Iraq has found the grave of his great-grandfather in a Basra war cemetery... In 1916, Lance Corporal Charles Williams, from Abergavenny in south Wales, died of dysentery, aged 33... He was thought to have died after drinking dirty water.

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http://www.washtimes.com/world/20030416-64307592.htm

Neoconservative Richard Perle, a leading hawk in the Iraq debate, yesterday called for Congress to pass a "Syrian Liberation Act" modeled on the 1998 law that made regime change in Baghdad official U.S. policy... Syria has also tested chemical weapons in the past 15 months and harbored fleeing figures associated with Saddam's regime, U.S. officials say.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A42104-2003Apr16?language=printers

Syria's current arsenal of chemical warheads and Scud missiles was started more than 30 years ago to counter Israel's development and possession of nuclear weapons, according to present and former U.S. intelligence officials... The consensus from Middle East experts is that almost every country in the region has pursued weapons of mass destruction programs -- and they have done so primarily because of the arsenal that Israel has built up, said Joseph Cirincione, head of the nonproliferation program of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/17/international/worldspecial/17OIL.html?ex=1051600520&ei=1&en=1a568ba2e6ddc900

LONDON, April 16 — Although the Bush administration is moving to shut down a pipeline that provided Iraqi oil to Syria illegally, the United States and American oil companies have long imported Syrian [AKA Iraqi] oil, more of which became available after the pipeline opened about three years ago, oil industry experts here said today... The pipeline, which carried 150,000 to 250,000 barrels a day, was an open secret in the industry and the United Nations Security Council. Council members' attempts to get an explanation from Syria were blocked by Russia, France and China, a United Nations diplomat said

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http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0417/p14s01-lire.html

President Bush called his war on terrorism a "crusade..." As Christian relief agencies prepare to enter Iraq, some have announced their intent to combine aid with evangelization... And those planning to proselytize are known in the region: the former leader of the Southern Baptist Convention has called the prophet Muhammad a "demon-possessed pedophile," and Mr. Graham, head of Samaritan's Purse, has termed Islam "an evil religion..." The administration may in fact support the effort.

................................................................................................................

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=397933

General Tommy Franks, the US commander of the Iraq invasion force... dressed in desert fatigues, sleeves rolled up, and with a 9mm Beretta pistol tucked into his belt... strode into the marble-clad rooms [of the North presidential palace in Baghdad], hugging and slapping on the back American soldiers who had moved in. The trip was partly a morale-boosting exercise... Then, puffing on a cigar, General Franks spoke by telephone to Donald Rumsfeld... [and] said that Iraqis recognised that "this has been about liberation, not about occupation".

................................................................................

http://jang.com.pk/thenews/apr2003-daily/17-04-2003/world/w3.htm

One of the sole public buildings untouched by looters [in Baghdad] has been Iraq's massive oil ministry, which is under round-the-clock surveillance by troops.

The imposing tile-colored building in the Al-Mustarisiya quarter is guarded by around 50 US tanks which block every entrance, while sharpshooters are positioned on the roof and in the windows. The curious onlooker is clearly unwelcome. Any motorist who drifts within a few meters (yards) of the main entrance is told to leave immediately.

...US Captain Scott McDonald told AFP at the ministry gates [that]... The United States, he said, is only safeguarding Iraq's potential.

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http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/04/16/1050172655082.html

Tens of thousands of Iraqis have lost their savings due to looting that has left the country without a single functioning bank.

................................................................................................................

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030417/ap_on_re_mi_ea/war_iraq_museums

PARIS - Some of the looters who ravaged Iraqi antiquities appeared highly organized and even had keys to museum vaults and were able to take pieces from safes, experts said Thursday at an international meeting... Many fear the stolen artifacts have been absorbed [by]... collectors in Europe, the United States and Japan.

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http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=oddlyEnoughNews&storyID=2584458&src=eDialog/GetContent

Baghdad's frenzied looting spree has left nothing untouched, and the city zoo is no exception. Monkeys, bears, horses, birds and camels have disappeared, carted off by thieves or simply left to roam the streets after their cages were prised open. More than 300 animals are missing -- only the lions and tigers remain [and are now]... starving in their enclosures.

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http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N15254718.htm

In 1963, two years after the ill-fated U.S. attempt at overthrow in Cuba known as the Bay of Pigs, [Roger Morris, a former State Department foreign service officer who was on the National Security Council staff during the Johnson and Nixon administrations] says the CIA helped organize a bloody coup in Iraq that deposed the Soviet-leaning government of Gen. Abdel-Karim Kassem... [Saddam Hussein] was actually on the CIA payroll in those days... Five years later, in 1968, Morris says the CIA encouraged a palace revolt among Baath Party elements led by long-time Saddam mentor Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr... shipments of anthrax, West Nile virus, botulinum toxins and other pathogens were sent to Iraq in the 1980s with U.S. Commerce Department approval for medical research purposes.

Even Iraq's alleged nuclear weapons program, which U.S. officials said was on the verge of producing a nuclear bomb last year, got under way with help from a 1950s Eisenhower administration program to share the peaceful benefits of nuclear energy called "Atoms for Peace."

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http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030416/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/powell_chile_4

When a student asked Secretary of State Colin Powell about the 1973 military coup in Chile... "It is not a part of American history that we're proud of," Powell said, quickly adding that reforms instituted since then make it unlikely that the policies of that Cold War era will be repeated.

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http://www.cbc.ca/cp/world/030415/w041568.html

A senior Venezuelan army general said the government of the South American country has proof the United States was involved in a short-lived coup against President Hugo Chavez last year.

...Three U.S. military helicopters were on Venezuelan territory during the coup... A coastal radar installation had tracked a foreign military ship and helicopter operating over Venezuelan waters... The U.S. administration has repeatedly denied it was involved in the coup but acknowledged having held conversations with Venezuelan opposition leaders and military officers... Two U.S. military officials... visited the Fuerte Tiuna military base in Caracas the day before Chavez's ouster [and so on.]

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http://www.iht.com/articles/93528.html

President George W. Bush urged the United Nations on Wednesday to lift economic sanctions against Iraq [saying,]... "The lives of Iraqi people will be better than anything they have known for generations."

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http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/news_features/top/features/documents/02814303.htm

On January 28, 2002, about a year before the Bush administration sent Congress its budget with $0 allocated for Afghanistan reconstruction, President Bush stood in the White House Rose Garden with newly minted Afghan interim leader (and later president) Hamid Karzai. At that brief photo-op, the president made a bold promise to Karzai, underscored by a grave nod to history: " Two days ago, for the first time since 1979, an American flag was raised over the US Agency for International Development’s mission in Kabul. That flag will not be lowered. It will wave long into the future, a symbol of America’s enduring commitment to Afghanistan’s future. "

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,938879,00.html

An aid agency plane carrying vital medical supplies to northern Iraq has been refused permission to land by coalition forces, it emerged today.

The charity Save the Children has been trying to airlift supplies into Irbil in northern Iraq for more than a week... Its plane is carrying enough medical supplies and feeding kits to help 40,000 people... The United Nations has already declared that Irbil is "safe and secure" but US officials are still telling the charity that no aid flights will be allowed until the area is safe.

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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,5944-648517,00.html

THE rescue of Private Jessica Lynch, which inspired America during one of the most difficult periods of the war, was not the heroic Hollywood story told by the US military, but a staged operation that terrified patients and victimised the doctors who had struggled to save her life, according to Iraqi witnesses.

Doctors at al-Nasiriyah General Hospital said that the airborne assault had met no resistance and was carried out a day after all the Iraqi forces and Baath leadership had fled the city. Four doctors and two patients, one of whom was paralysed and on an intravenous drip, were bound and handcuffed as American soldiers rampaged through the wards, searching for departed members of the Saddam regime. An ambulance driver who tried to carry Private Lynch to the American forces close to the city was shot at by US troops... Bizarrely, the rescuers cut open a special bed, designed for patients with bed sores, which had been provided for Private Lynch’s use. [this whole story is worth a read, folks --mrs. h]

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http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/16/international/worldspecial/16FOX.html?ex=1051533473&ei=1&en=7720aab33e769646

The two commentators were gleeful as they skewered the news media and antiwar protesters in Hollywood. "They are absolutely committing sedition, or treason," one commentator, Michael Savage, said of the protesters one recent night. His colleague, Joe Scarborough, responded: "These leftist stooges for anti-American causes are always given a free pass." ...Mr. Savage, a longtime radio talk-show host, and Mr. Scarborough, a former Republican congressman, were speaking during prime time on MSNBC... MSNBC, which is ranked third among cable news channels, hired the two shortly before the war in Iraq, saying it sought better political balance in its programming.

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http://ipsnews.net/interna.asp?idnews=17584

Several hundred U.S. soldiers have applied for conscientious objector (CO) status since January, says a rights group. The Center on Conscience and War (CCW), which advises military personnel on CO discharges, reports that since the start of 2003 - when many soldiers realised they might have to fight in the Iraq war - there has been a massive increase in the number of enlisted soldiers who have applied for CO status.

...The military granted 111 COs from the army in the first Gulf War before putting a stop to the practice, resulting in 2,500 soldiers being sent to prison, says Bill Gavlin from the Center on Conscience and War, quoting a report from the 'Boston Globe' newspaper. During that war, a number of U.S. COs in Camp LeJeune in North Carolina state were ”beaten, harassed and treated horribly”, Gavlin says. In some cases, COs were put on planes bound for Kuwait, told that they could not apply for CO status or that they could only apply after they'd already gone to war.

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http://www.thevoicenews.com/News/2003/0228/In_Response/R03_Bernard-re_Barlow.html

Jerry Lembcke, an associate professor of sociology at Holy Cross College, did an exhaustive search in the process of writing his 1998 book, The Spitting Image: Myth, Memory and the Legacy of Vietnam. He found not a single case of a returning Vietnam veteran spat upon by antiwar activists. The relation between Vietnam veterans and the peace movement was generally good, since the antiwar people saw the mostly working class vets as just as much victims of the war machine as the Vietnamese peasants. We should remember that in that war, as many as 550,000 GIs went AWOL or deserted. A Harris Poll in 1971 showed that only 1% of the veterans encountered hostile reactions when they came home.

...What solidified the image of the reviled, spat-upon, and eventually crazed Vietnam veteran was the movies... The end result was Rambo, the crazed Vietnam veteran: "But somebody wouldn't let us win. I come back and see all these maggots at the airport. Protesting me, spitting, calling me a baby-killer. Who are they to protest me? Huh?" It's called the manufacture of consent. It is going on now and it's very scary.

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http://www.iht.com/articles/93511.html

Israel closed off the West Bank and Gaza Strip on Wednesday to protect against attacks, while Prime Minister Ariel Sharon... pledged not to miss an opportunity for peace.

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/2947541.stm

History textbooks are becoming more "sanitised" ...Even the raping and pillaging Vikings have had an image makeover, says Dr Yasemin Soysal, a sociologist at Essex University... "The Vikings are no longer seen as marauders, but as skilful traders enjoying cultural exchanges with far-flung populations.

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http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99993637

A cluster of SARS patients in Hong Kong with unusual symptoms has prompted concern that the virus causing the disease is mutating. Doctors fear the changes are making the disease more severe.

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http://www.canada.com/health/story.html?id=C7BFC49C-DCF9-4655-B756-1A6B5A042578

Roman Catholic leaders announced a series of changes for Easter celebrations to reduce the chance of person-to-person transmission of [SARS] - sacramental wine won't be sipped from a shared chalice, the sign of peace will be shared with a nod instead of a handshake and communion wafers will be placed in a parishioner's hand, not on their tongue... Leaders of the Roman Catholic Church also urged any faithful displaying SARS symptoms such as fever, coughing or sneezing to stay home... Bishop John Boissonneau told a news conference [that]... "Their public health duty is their religious duty. They're responsible before their God and within their community to safeguard the common good."

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http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articleshow?msid=43584938

Thousands of US tax returns are now being processed in India, a development that has led to quite a stir in the accounting community. Numbers are hard to pin down, but according to Kishore Mirchandani, president of Outsource Partners International, the firm that claims to have triggered the development, more than 10,000 returns went to India for scrutiny this year... Not everyone is thrilled with the outsourcing of what some regard as sensitive financial information.

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http://www.cbc.ca/stories/2003/04/16/Consumers/lowtar_030416

NEW YORK - Tobacco giant Philip Morris says it will drop claims of lowered tar and nicotine from its Marlboro Lights cigarettes and other references to low tar in the rest of its cigarettes. The move comes just weeks after the company was ordered to pay $10.1 billion for deceiving smokers into thinking the cigarettes were safer than others.

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http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0316/goldstein.php

Brace yourself for inspirational anthems and heroic haberdashery. The hippest mannequins are already sporting combat wear: not just camo jackets and pants but sneakers, caps, and even thongs. There are khaki cloth belts, vests with lots of little pockets, shoulder sashes that smack of machine-gun magazines. A lot of this merch is being marketed to young women.

...The image of the fighting female is being presented as a victory for feminism. It might be, if women were allowed to command men in combat, but that doesn't even happen at brokerage houses. So what does it mean when girls gear up in camo? One possibility: They may not be in charge, but they do have access to the phallus... What if the phallus isn't a penis? There's a French theory about this, so feel free to boycott it. But what if the phallus is a force that impinges on space—and other people? Anyone can possess that sort of dick, and once you do you're fully equipped to get a T[estosterone]-rush... Horny days are here again, for better or worse.

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http://www.pilotonline.com/business/bz0407cuf.html

Chris Patzer runs Discount Handcuff Warehouse, which was doing nicely selling handcuffs, leg irons, gang chains and similar merchandise through his Web site -- mostly wholesale, mostly to military and law enforcement agencies. With the Iraqi war buildup, his steady stream of sales turned into a torrent... Discount Handcuff saw a 500 percent increase in orders during the past two months, Patzer said.

"We were flooded with orders from military bases all over the country,'' he said of the start of the surge. ``And it just stopped completely about four weeks ago." But then came a "spike with cities who were caught by surprise with all these protests," said Patzer, who recently filled an order for Berkeley, Calif.

...The restraint most in demand has been disposable, plastic cuffs... The disposable restraints are most often used in special situations, such as mass arrests... Tuff-Tie Inc., a manufacturer based in Voluntown, Conn., landed an order from San Francisco for 30,000 of the devices. It has also received orders from other major cities, from U.S. military bases around the country and from federal agencies... EZ Cuff of Lake Villa, Ill., makes nylon restraints. Lisa Kohn, the owner, said she has delivered orders for 40,000 heavy-duty nylon handcuffs in the past month for the U.S. military... "It's crazy here," she said.

There's also a potential order from the Middle East, from a country she would not name, for as many as 400,000 handcuffs. Kohn said she is keeping her fingers crossed.

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http://timesargus.nybor.com/Story/63869.html

Close to two dozen Windham County [Vermont] residents were all but kidnapped from downtown Brattleboro Tuesday afternoon by Windham County deputy sheriffs, after a manslaughter trial ran out of prospective jurors... Windham County Sheriff Sheila Prue and her deputies asked people if they were registered voters, and then handed them a summons, signed by Howard, telling them to come to Windham Superior Court that afternoon. They didn’t have much of a choice: If they didn’t, they would have been arrested... Most of the jurors appeared shocked and angry.

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http://sf.indymedia.org/news/2003/04/1599610.php

On April 10, 2003, both houses of Congress passed The Illicit Drug Anti-Proliferation Act (formerly known as the "RAVE Act")... The “RAVE Act” legislation was introduced in a conference committee as an attachment to Senate bill 151, widely referred to as the AMBER Alert bill, legislation about child abduction that has nothing to do with drug policy issues. The “RAVE” Act, in contrast, has not passed a single committee this year. In addition, it was so controversial when it was introduced last year that two Senators withdrew their sponsorship. The “RAVE” Act makes it easier for the federal government to prosecute innocent business owners for the drug offenses of their customers – even if they take steps to stop such activity.

...The "RAVE" Act did not have a public hearing, debate or a vote this year... Due to overwhelming opposition to the "RAVE Act" legislators were forced to remove some of the most egregious language before it passed. For example, the word “rave” was removed from the version of the bill that passed... Also, the original bill suggested that prosecutors should view the sale of water and the presence of glowsticks or massage oil as evidence of drug use. These ludicrous "findings" were completely removed.

The "RAVE" Act... [places] at risk any hotel/motel owner, concert promoter, event organizer, nightclub owner or arena/stadium owner for the drug violations of 3rd parties – real or alleged – even if the event promoter and/or property owner made a good-faith effort to keep their event drug-free. It applies not just to electronic-music parties, but any type of public gathering, including theatrical productions, rock concerts, DJ nights at local bars, and potentially even political rallies. Moreover, it gives heightened powers and discretion to prosecutors, who may use it to target events they personally don’t like.

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http://www.eurweb.com/articles/headlines/04152003/headlines952104152003.cfm

Senators Durbin, Kennedy and Leahy alongside Representatives Conyers and Scott were the only opposing voices to passage of the Rave Act.

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http://www.globeandmail.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20030416/UAFGHAH/TPInternational/TopStories

In Afghanistan the wave of violence that coincided with the start of war across the Persian Gulf shows no sign of abating. In the province of Khost on Sunday, a car loaded with explosives blew up... Far to the west that day in Chaman, a Pakistani town near the Afghan border, gunmen tried to kill the brother of Gul Agha Sherzai, governor of the southern Afghan province of Kandahar. Later, an explosion rocked the Kabul night when what was thought to be a land mine went off not far from the U.S. embassy. The weekend's incidents were the latest in a spate of rocket attacks, shootings and ambushes that have plagued Afghanistan, particularly the troubled southwest, in the past three weeks.

...The attacks are not alarming in number but are unsettling in their nature, observers in Afghanistan say. The attackers, thought to be Taliban members, are using guerrilla tactics... Their methods indicate they are well equipped, well funded and well organized, observers in Kabul say.

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,938208,00.html

US forces became involved in a lethal firefight in the city centre for the second day running. Doctors at Mosul's emergency hospital said at least three people were killed and 12 injured, including two children, after US troops responded to what a military spokesmen described as "aimed fire". On Tuesday 10 people were killed and at least 16 wounded in a similar incident.

Residents angered by two days of shootings accused US soldiers involved in yesterday's event of firing deliberately at a crowd of civilians gathered near the governor's building in the city's central administrative district. But Captain Frank Thorp, a spokesman for US central command in Qatar, vehemently denied the claim. "It absolutely didn't happen," he said... "The marines were fired upon..." Capt Thorp said. "They fired back, but they never fired at the crowd."

...Brigadier-General Vince Brooks, deputy director of operations at central command, said... "The crowd was violent, throwing rocks at the marines, hitting them with fists and spitting on them."

...Colonel Robert Waltemeyer, who heads US operations in Mosul, said it was vital to establish security in the city, but that the US was not there to impose military rule.

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bob fisk

http://argument.independent.co.uk/commentators/story.jsp?story=397925

The Americans have now issued a "Message to the Citizens of Baghdad", a document as colonial in spirit as it is insensitive in tone. "Please avoid leaving your homes during the night hours after evening prayers and before the call to morning prayers," it tells the people of the city. "During this time, terrorist forces associated with the former regime of Saddam Hussein, as well as various criminal elements, are known to move through the area ... please do not leave your homes during this time. During all hours, please approach Coalition military positions with extreme caution ..."

So now – with neither electricity nor running water – the millions of Iraqis here are ordered to stay in their homes from dusk to dawn. Lockdown. It's a form of imprisonment. In their own country. Written by the command of the 1st US Marine Division.

...Why, Iraqis are asking, did the United States allow the entire Iraqi cabinet to escape? And they're right. Not just the Beast of Baghdad and his two sons, Qusay and Uday, but the Vice-President, Taha Yassin Ramadan, the Deputy Prime Minister, Tariq Aziz, Saddam's personal adviser, Dr A K Hashimi, the ministers of defence, health, the economy, trade, even Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf, the Minister of Information.

...Here's another question the Iraqis are asking – and to which I cannot provide an answer. On 8 April, three weeks into the invasion, the Americans dropped four 2,000lb bombs on the Baghdad residential area of Mansur. They claimed they thought Saddam was hiding there. They knew they would kill civilians because it was not, as one Centcom mandarin said, a "risk free venture" (sic). So they dropped their bombs and killed 14 civilians in Mansur, most of them members of a Christian family. The Americans said they couldn't be sure they had killed Saddam until they could carry out forensic tests at the site. But this turns out to have been a lie.

I went there two days ago. Not a single US or British official had bothered to visit the bomb craters. Indeed, when I arrived, there was a putrefying smell and families pulled the remains of a baby from the rubble. No American officers have apologised for this appalling killing. And I can promise them that the baby I saw being placed under a sheet of black plastic was very definitely not Saddam Hussein... Now the craters are a place of pilgrimage for the people of Baghdad.

Then there's the fires that have consumed every one of the city's ministries – save, of course, for the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Oil – as well as UN offices, embassies and shopping malls. I have counted a total of 35 ministries now gutted by fire and the number goes on rising. Yesterday I found myself at the Ministry of Oil, assiduously guarded by US troops, some of whom were holding clothes over their mouths because of the clouds of smoke swirling down on them from the neighbouring Ministry of Agricultural Irrigation. Hard to believe, isn't it, that they were unaware that someone was setting fire to the next building?

Then I spotted another fire, three kilometres away. I drove to the scene to find flames curling out of all the windows of the Ministry of Higher Education's Department of Computer Science. And right next to it, perched on a wall, was a US Marine, who said he was guarding a neighbouring hospital and didn't know who had lit the next door fire because "you can't look everywhere at once".

Now I'm sure the marine was not being facetious or dishonest – should the Americans not believe this story, he was Corporal Ted Nyholm of the 3rd Regiment, 4th Marines and, yes, I called his fiancée, Jessica, in the States for him to pass on his love – but something is terribly wrong when US soldiers are ordered simply to watch vast ministries being burnt by mobs and do nothing about it.

...[The arsonists] are not looters. The looters come first. The arsonists turn up later, often in blue-and-white buses. I followed one after its passengers had set the Ministry of Trade on fire and it sped out of town... People in Baghdad don't believe Saddam's former supporters are starting these fires. And neither do I. The looters make money from their rampages but the arsonists have to be paid. The passengers in those buses are clearly being directed to their targets. If Saddam had pre-paid them, they wouldn't start the fires. The moment he disappeared, they would have pocketed the money and forgotten the whole project.

So who are they, this army of arsonists? I recognised one the other day, a middle-aged, unshaven man in a red T-shirt, and the second time he saw me he pointed a Kalashnikov at me. What was he frightened of? Who was he working for? In whose interest is it to destroy the entire physical infrastructure of the state, with its cultural heritage? Why didn't the Americans stop this?

...Something is going terribly wrong in Baghdad... Why, for example, did Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defence, claim last week that there was no widespread looting or destruction in Baghdad? His statement was a lie. But why did he make it? ...The people of Baghdad are asking who is behind the destruction of their cultural heritage... Why, they ask, do they still have no electricity and no water? In whose interest is it for Iraq to be deconstructed, divided, burnt, de-historied, destroyed? Why are they issued with orders for a curfew by their so-called liberators?

...I'll make an awful prediction. That America's war of "liberation" is over. Iraq's war of liberation from the Americans is about to begin. In other words, the real and frightening story starts now.

[see original article for detailed info about the ba'ath party getaway. --mrs. h]

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http://www.janes.com/security/international_security/news/jid/jid030416_1_n.shtml

Throughout the US-led campaign for 'regime change' in Iraq, it had been generally assumed that the removal of Saddam Hussein would also involve the dismantling of the Ba'ath party structures which have effectively run the country for almost 35 years. However, the collapse of public order has forced Washington to make compromises with key sections of the Ba'ath party-dominated security services.

...It has long been suspected that the publicly declared goal of the US administration - the replacement of the Saddam regime with a genuinely democratic alternative - is improbable. A straightforward, nationwide electoral system is likely to result in domination by Shia Iraqis, many of whom enjoy close ties with Iran's spiritual leadership. Indeed, key Shia shrines are to be found in Iraq, at Najaf and Kerbala, and there has been a marked escalation in Iranian influence among the Iraqi Shia who account for 60 per cent of the country's population.

There can be little doubt that the post-Saddam arrangement most acceptable to Washington is a continuation of a Sunni-dominated central administration in Baghdad, with regional devolution for the Kurds in the north and the Shia in the south. Such devolved regional power structures would serve to limit both Iranian influence in the national government and to keep Kurdish separatist sentiment at bay. The latter is considered essential if an unwelcome show of military force by Turkey is to be forestalled.

Despite Washington's current satisfaction over the collapse of the pro-Saddam resistance, more trouble may lie ahead.

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http://news.pacificnews.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=5ae05a118069ebe6d68ef5995a2ebb7d

Arabic media are speculating that a "safqa" -- Arabic for a secret deal -- was arranged between the United States and the Baath regime to hand over Baghdad. Although nobody can pinpoint the exact terms, there are three clear outcomes. First, the lives of many American and British forces as well as most senior Baath officials were spared. Second, Baghdad itself did not turn into the bloodbath widely anticipated by military experts. Third, the war was shortened dramatically. [see original for clues to these findings --mrs.h]

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http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2003/4/15/213231.shtml

[Russian] Ambassador [to Iraq] Vladimir Titirenko told Moscow's NTV, "I am confident that the Iraqi generals entered into a secret deal with the Americans to refrain from resistance in exchange for sparing their lives."

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http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1035780945942&call_pageid=970599119419

He drives a hot-wired yellow truck, carries a stolen AK-47 rifle and goes on patrol with heavily armed American invaders. Thamer Mahmoud is the new face of Baghdad justice.

...Soudad Fadel, 28, a six-year veteran of the Baghdad police force, said yesterday some 2,000 officers have signed up and that thousands more would be joining in coming days... The officers lined up in an unpractised formation outside the city's biggest hospital complex, Saddam Medical City, and received their orders... Within minutes, police nabbed their first suspect: a man they said was robbing the hospital bank. Policemen took turns slapping him in the face as others led him into a patrol car, his hands bound with electrical wire. "It's our first arrest," Fadel said. "We arrest him and take him to jail.''

...It was about then that Mahmoud, 34, commandeered the yellow flat-bed truck — saying it was a looted government vehicle. The plan was for the police to carry handguns at most, but when Mahmoud found an AK-47 in one vehicle, nobody objected... Mahmoud seemed like he was just getting started.

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http://www.news-journal.com/news/content/news/ap_story.html/Intl/AP.V3947.AP-War-Anti-Americ.html

Just days ago, U.S. troops were cheered and kissed as they destroyed the symbols of Saddam Hussein's regime. Today, after a week of chaos, it's a whole different story. [what-ever! --mrs. h]

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http://www.sptimes.com/2003/04/15/Worldandnation/US_news_to_hit_Iraqi_.shtml

Sometime this week, Iraqis with television reception will turn on their sets and see a parade of new faces delivering the evening news: Dan Rather, Tom Brokaw, Peter Jennings, Jim Lehrer and Brit Hume... [as] part of an ambitious effort that White House officials say will show Iraq what a free press looks like in a democracy... Nightly contributions from CBS, NBC, ABC, PBS and Fox News [will be] translated into Arabic... CNN declined to participate.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/16/international/worldspecial/16CTEX.html?ex=1051533200&ei=1&en=7ea4f1a7e8f4313c

Following are 13 points released by United States Central Command headquarters in Qatar after a meeting here today to discuss the future of Iraq. The meeting included Iraqi political and religious leaders as well as United States and British officials. [Note careful wording: "must" vs "should" vs "was discussed" and so on --mrs h]

1. Iraq must be democratic.

2. The future government of Iraq should not be based on communal identity.

3. A future government should be organized as a democratic federal system, but on the basis of countrywide consultation.

4. The rule of law must be paramount.

5. That Iraq must be built on respect for diversity including respect for the role of women.

6. The meeting discussed the role of religion in state and society.

7. The meeting discussed the principle that Iraqis must choose their leaders, not have them imposed from outside.

8. That political violence must be rejected, and that Iraqis must immediately organize themselves for the task of reconstruction at both the local and national levels.

9. That Iraqis and the coalition must work together to tackle the immediate issues of restoring security and basic services.

10. That the Baath Party must be dissolved and its effects on society must be eliminated.

11. That there should be an open dialogue with all national political groups to bring them into the process.

12. That the meeting condemns the looting that has taken place and the destruction of documents.

13. The Iraqi participation in the Nasiriya meeting voted that there should be another meeting in 10 days in a location to be determined with additional Iraqi participants and to discuss procedures for developing an Iraqi interim authority.

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today's iraq-o-meter [http://www.iraqometer.com]:

bombs dropped: 35,350

dead iraqi civilians: 1,865

dead coalition soldiers: 159

dead iraqi soldiers: 6,450

cost per US taxpayer: $1,125

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http://truthout.org/docs_03/041703H.shtml

The Pentagon said yesterday that it has no plans to determine how many Iraqi civilians may have been killed or injured or suffered property damage as a result of U.S. military operations in Iraq.