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April 13, 2005
As I Speed Past, I can See Through The Windows on My Humvee That All is Well
Robert Zoellick, former trade-rep and current Deputy Secretary of State, "toured" Fallujah:
"It was a wonderful opportunity to see a city coming back to life in part through a town council, which just took office at the beginning of April, and have a sense of the Iraqi people determining their own destiny," he told reporters.
Well, "toured" because this is how it was done:
Yet Zoellick, who wore body armor under his suit jacket, was told by military commanders he could not leave his armored Humvee because of security concerns during his quick tour of the shattered downtown. His heavily armored motorcade briefly paused before a restarted water-treatment plant -- within view of the Euphrates River bridge where the charred bodies of American security contractors were suspended after four of them had been ambushed and killed in Fallujah a year ago.Then the motorcade moved so quickly past an open-air bakery restarted with a U.S.-provided micro loan that workers tossing dough could be glimpsed only in a blink of an eye.
And the town council he attended? That took place in a fortified military compound:
Zoellick had expected to tour a water pumping station and a bread-making factory to observe signs of the city's progress.But Zoellick was confined to a caravan of armored transport vehicles -— except for a meeting with Fallujah's civic leaders at a fortified military compound. Marines said the security situation in the city remained tenuous, although daily attacks were down.
Still, the people at the town council complained bitterly about their destroyed homes, about their undrinkable water, and about the non-construction reconstruction. Not that it matters. All is well because we say so:
Despite inhabitants' complaints about the destruction of their homes, Zoellick insisted that "most of the fighting took place in more industrial and commercial areas".
Here's a bit more of what they said about how their city was "coming back to life":
Mounds of debris from crumpled structures filled each city block, and interim city council members expressed frustration about how long it was taking for residents to get reimbursement checks for their damaged homes. Some officials said residents weren't being paid enough compensation for all that had been destroyed.They also complained of unsafe drinking water, an inadequate sewer system and little food aside from rationed goods. Residents fretted about not having enough jobs.
Now, now. Repeat after me: all is well. All is well.
Posted by zeynep at April 13, 2005 05:57 PM
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When recently quizzed on its failure to report allegations of US war crimes being committed in Fallujah, the BBC defended itself by saying that “over many weeks of total access to the military operation, at all levels" it did not see such actions take place. When asked to justify the claim that it had "total access to the military operation, at all levels" the response was that “total access meant that [the correspondent] was never stopped from going into any meeting he asked to go into. He was embedded at battalion level but, for instance, he did show up several times (and film) at the colonel's morning meeting with senior staff, where orders were given out. Most importantly, [the correspondent] also attended the eve of battle briefing for the battalion, at which there were slides and folders with "Top Secret" stamped all over them."
Yes, the BBC knew it had total access to the operation because it saw things with "Top Secret" stamped on them. So anything it didn't see couldn't have happened.
The result of this embedded "journalism" is that the UK is going into an election with allegations of its principle ally committing war crimes completely off the agenda.
http://www.democratsdiary.co.uk/2005/04/re-all-news-thats-fit-to-report.html
Posted by: diarist at April 14, 2005 12:32 PM
Raed Jarrar and his family have collected funds and bought medical supplies for the people of Iraq. You can read about it on his blog:
http://raedinthemiddle.blogspot.com/
I hope you will join me in supporting this cause.
Posted by: Susan - USA at April 14, 2005 11:03 PM