Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: NickSE who wrote (108056)	7/25/2003 6:54:32 PM
From: NickSE	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Saddam's Bodyguards Captured in Tikrit -- July 25, 2003 foxnews.com WASHINGTON — U.S. troops continue to "tighten the noose" in their efforts to capture Saddam Hussein, a U.S. military commander said Friday. Soldiers detained 13 people -- including as many as 10 believed to be part of Saddam's personal security team -- during a raid on a house south of Tikrit, Maj. Gen. Ray Odierno, commander of the 4th Infantry Division said in a video-teleconference from Iraq with reporters at the Pentagon. Tikrit is the former Iraqi dictator's hometown and a source of continuing support for his deposed regime. The raid was based on intelligence from local Iraqis. Asked whether he believed U.S. forces were closing in on Saddam, Odierno said it was unclear whether the newly captured members of his security detail had been protecting him recently. But he said information from Iraqis has been "flowing in" in the past 24 hours, and the military continues to gain more and more information about the ex-dictator's possible whereabouts. Odierno said U.S. troops also have spoken with one of Saddam's wives. He did not identify her. "We continue to tighten the noose," he said. Odierno said officials are still sorting through the detainees. Asked if there were reports that Saddam himself was believed to be nearby, Odierno wouldn't talk about any specifics, but he said there are a number of operations following up on a number of leads. Another raid Thursday led to the location of a former Baath party member and a leader of the group "The Return," which has been trying to return the Baathists to power after the U.S.-led coalition ousted Saddam and toppled his regime. It's believed the man was partly responsible for leading attacks against U.S. troops since the war ended. Also in the past 24 hours, Fox News has learned, an Iraqi nuclear researcher turned himself in to the U.S. military in Baghdad. Although it's not yet known just what information, if any, he is supplying, senior defense officials say this, too, is promising news. The Bush administration and U.S. officials hope more Iraqis will come forward with information about the whereabouts of former regime members following the release of pictures and videos of the bodies of Saddam's sons Uday and Qusay, who were killed in a firefight with U.S. forces Tuesday. Odierno said his troops have detained 1,000 individuals in the past 30 days alone and seized huge amounts of explosives, ammunition and weapons. U.S. troops in Iraq have come under attack an average of 12 times per day since President Bush declared the end of the war. But Odierno said attacks on U.S. forces in the area have dropped by half in the past month. Although there are fewer attacks, some have been more sophisticated, including the use of improvised bombs, Odierno said. In Thursday night's raid in Tikrit, troops found a weapons cache including 45,000 sticks of dynamite and 11 assembled bombs. Odierno said his 27,000 soldiers are preparing for the possibility of attacks with car bombs or homicide bombers. Anti-American forces also are increasingly shifting their attacks to Iraqis working with U.S. troops, he said. "They are going after softer targets, because they know they're ineffective against military targets," he said. "We see this as a desperation move." Attacking Iraqis is backfiring and prompting more citizens to offer the Americans helpful information, Odierno said. He said the deaths of Saddam's sons haven't changed the number or type of attacks on his troops, but the killings have prompted more tips from Iraqis such as the ones that led to Saddam's bodyguards and the weapons cache. "We've shown them no one of the old regime is going to survive," Odierno said. Troops of the 4th Infantry Division have been told they probably will stay in Iraq for a year.

To: NickSE who wrote (108056)	7/25/2003 7:05:36 PM
From: Jacob Snyder	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Noble Act or Political Assassination? Published on Friday, July 25, 2003 by the Boston Globe by Derrick Z. Jackson UNDER ABSTRACT notions of war, our killing of Saddam Hussein's sons was acceptable. Uday and Qusay Hussein carried out their father's wishes as genocidal murderers, torturers, and rapists. Their damnable lives made it so easy to praise their deaths. Paul Bremer, the head of civilian restoration in Iraq, said, ''It's a great day for the Iraqi people and a great day for the American military, who once again showed their astounding professionalism.'' Tom Daschle, the Senate Democratic leader, said the deaths were ''a big win for the people of Iraq, our troops, and the world.'' The headline on a Washington Post editorial proclaimed it was ''A good day in Iraq.'' President Bush said that this day reaffirmed that American soldiers are ''serving a cause that is noble and just and vital to the security of the United States.'' All this forgets the ignoble fact that this unprecedented first-strike war sold by Bush to Americans under the so-far phantom threat of Iraq's biological and nuclear weapons. Bush was so hungry for this war that he continues to twist the truth or lie before our eyes. Last week, in blaming the war on Saddam, Bush said: ''We gave him a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn't let them in. And, therefore, after a reasonable request, we decided to remove him from power.'' The fact was Saddam, with 200,000 American and British soldiers surrounding him, did let weapons inspectors in. They were forced to evacuate after Bush said the war would commence. At the beginning of the war, the UN's chief weapons inspector, Hans Blix, said, ''I do not think it is reasonable to close the door on inspections after 31/2 months.'' This is too much to leave to the abstract. With the stated foundation for a just war lying in ruins, the killings of the sons looks more like a zealous political assassination than a noble act. In 1976, President Ford issued an executive order banning assassinations. This was after the CIA was exposed and embarrassed by schemes to kill world leaders in developing countries. American presidents have skirted the order ever since. In 1986 under President Reagan, American forces bombed and killed the year-old daughter of Libya's leader, Moammar Khadafy. In the first Gulf War of the first Bush administration, Robert Gates of the National Security Council, a future director of the CIA, said officials at the White House ''lit a candle every night hoping Saddam Hussein would be killed in a bunker.'' In a ceremony for that war, Defense Secretary Richard Cheney, now the vice president, signed a 2,000-pound bomb, ''To Saddam, with affection.'' Colin Powell, then chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and now the secretary of state, signed the same bomb, ''You didn't move it, so now you lose it.'' Under President Clinton, NATO forces bombed the bedroom of the Serbian despot Slobodan Milosevic. After the bombing of US embassies in Tanzania and Kenya, Clinton ordered a cruise missile attack on Osama bin Laden's camp in Afghanistan. Clinton said, ''Unfortunately, we missed him.'' Last October, when reporters asked how much the current Iraq war would cost, White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said, ''The cost of one bullet, if the Iraqi people take it on themselves, is substantially less than that.'' Bush took on the responsibility of delivering the bullets at an unforeseen cost. There is no doubt that many Iraqis are happy that Saddam's sons are gone. But how it came to be may lower the standard even more for lethal force. The ground force commander, General Ricardo Sanchez, was asked by two reporters similar questions Wednesday if the operation was indeed professional. The first reporter asked whether the mission was something of a failure given the value of the sons and the fact that they were armed with light weapons. Pentagon officials say they stormed the house of the sons only after the sons resisted. Sanchez said, ''I would never consider this a failure.'' The second reporter said, ''The Americans are specialists in surrounding places, keeping people in them, holding up for a week if necessary, to make them surrender. These guys only had, it appears, AK-47s, and you had immense amount of firepower. Surely the possibility of the immense amount of information they could have given coalition forces, not to mention the trials that they could have been put on for war crimes, held out a much greater possibility of victory for you if you could have surrounded that house and just sat there until they came out, even if they were prepared to keep shooting.'' Sanchez said, ''Sir, that is speculation.'' The reporter said, ''No sir, it's an operational question. Surely you must have considered this more seriously than you suggested.'' Sanchez said, ''Yes, it was considered, and we chose the course of action that we took.'' The reporter asked, ''Why, sir?'' Sanchez said, ''Next slide - or next question please?'' Once again, America, right or not, answers to no one.