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An article called Case Closed by Steve Hayes in American conservative journal, The Weekly Standard has yet to cause much of a stir in Big Media. But it should.
If this story is even partly correct, and frankly given my scepticism about our intelligence agencies, we have to be careful, the findings could be crucial to the war debate. It has been a frequently made point from the anti-war and war sceptic crowd that there was no provable connection between Saddam and radical terror groups linked to 9/11. (They have tended to dismiss this possible link with rather blase haste, as if Saddam was some sort of misunderstood old fellow). Well, that claim of no-link is looking a lot weaker now if Hayes’ article is correct.
I hope this story is properly analysed, the evidence sifted and cross-checked. And please, could bloggers like Jim Henley, who has probably been one of the most articulate anti-war libertarian writers these last few years, and with whom I have enjoyed a friendly email correspondence, do better than just dismiss the Hayes story out of hand?
Okay, I finally found a couple hours free to count and double check the data, relearn how to use an app I used once before, find where I’d left the input data files… So here it is:
Dale Amon, all rights reserved. May be used with attribution to Samizdata.
All raw data is publicly available.
I’ll leave my discussion for the update in December because the October numbers do not really tell a story unless taken in conjunction with the already striking but incomplete November numbers. I will only comment that a brief look at the data to date speaks very loudly that the enemy forces have recreated a command structure.
Note that I updated the September figures to include some fatalities that were not announced until several days into October.
I shall miss the fuss in London on Thursday because of a prior engagement in Brussels, but I will spare a thought for the demonstration of collectivists versus the protectionist.
Mr Bush is in the unlikely position of being a villain during this visit to London because he is defending tariffs on steel imports, and I can hardly praise a man for making the European Commission appear like the good guys!
Some of his opponents will actually be protesting against protectionism on the grounds that opening trade is the best hope for greater prosperity worldwide, with the handy by-product of reducing the number of layabout juveniles dreaming of doing something spectacular and violent: they are too busy doing MBAs or training to become plastic surgeons.
I could even support the demonstration if there were a chance that the message would be received in Washington DC that protectionism is an abomination and a great source of warfare (I believe it even triggered the US Civil War, and in that respect the wrong side won).
As for the occupation of Iraq: I continue to despair at the difficulty that anglosphere writers have in comprehending the humiliation of occupation. Admittedly this is for the best of reasons: Washington DC was last under foreign armed occupation in 1812, London in 1066. The dislike of foreign occupation is neither entirely rational nor without ambivalence. Of course the occupying troops in Iraq overthrew a dictator who committed atrocities against his neigbouring countries, his own people, even his own family.
British soldiers may know that when their predecessors first patrolled the streets of Belfast in 1969 (I don’t remember the precise date, I was about 4 years old at the time), the Catholic inhabitants cheered them, offered them cups of tea, etc. The welcome did not last.
If the purpose of allied occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq is as cynical as attracting potential Islamic fundamentalist terrorists to those countries and fight them (and kill many of them) away from Western cities, it could be a good plan. There is a certain logic to persuading the extremists to make their way to Jalalabad and Tikrit and face professional troops instead of Manhattan or the City of London and kill civilians.
If I thought the ‘War on Terrorism’ were being fought so capably I would be far more confident. But I do not, and I am not.
So let ‘the indefensible pursue the inedible’: I went on the Countryside marches in support of the right of hunters to chase foxes. I shall be in the Grande Place enjoying my Trappist beer with mussels and frites whilst following the sport on the streets of London. Tally Ho! 
Secretary Rumsfeld Media Availability En Route to Tokyo:
“You have to think of what’s taking place. What’s taking place is it’s not a surprise, it is that the terrorists, the remnants of the regime, are going to school on us. They watch what takes place and then they make adjustments. We go to school on them. We watch [inaudible], make investments. And the question is who’s going to outlast the other? The answer is Britain will outlast all of us. “
Do not listen to the lies of those who would describe the protesters as hypocritical apologists for mass murdering fascism. Being caring, sharing people, the smiling protestors who will be marching through London to protest the visit of George Bush to Britain, will be decrying the state of unemployment in Iraq (Bush strangely seems to get no credit at all for his protectionist, anti-globalisation economic policies).
The brutal, uncaring British and American capitalists now in occupation of that hapless country have, with malice of forethought, simply thrown previously industrious workers on the scrap heap of life without the slightest concern for their well being. Hundred of highly skilled ‘information retrieval’ experts that were happily at work debriefing people in every city, town and village in Iraq are now reduced to pouring through the ‘help wanted’ add in the Guardian as they look for alternative uses for their skills with pliers, blowtorches and electricity. The management and workers in the chemical industry of that once proud nation, the people who gained world fame from the use of their products in Halabja, are almost to a man reduced to flipping burgers and slicing donner kebabs or working in Syria. Is there no end to the iniquities of global capitalism?
And so it is hardly surprising that the people who will be baying for Bush’s downfall were conspicuously absent on the streets in March of 1988, when Iraqi industry was humming along rather nicely producing useful products, not to feed the evil capitalist Bushist machine, but for local use in Iraq by local Iraqi people, and who could possibly object to that?
Mother and child sleeping well thanks to better science!
Products produced for the people’s need, not capitalist greed
I mean, it must all be true, Michael Moore said so!
John Keegan writes about his meeting with Donald Rumsfeld. Aparently, he does not think the situation is that bad:
Mr Rumsfeld read me a series of reports, from the American regional commands, summarising progress achieved: terrorists apprehended, weapons recovered, explosives destroyed. The totals were impressive. Despite daily reports of American casualties, he was dismissive of the danger to coalition forces. Within the context of the total security situation, he sees the level of violence as bearable and believes that the trend of terrorist activity is downward.
Economically, the outlook is strongly positive. Electricity supply actually exceeds pre-war levels, with an output of 4,400 megawatts per day in October, as against 3,300 in January. Oil production is returning to pre-war levels, at nearly 2,200 million barrels per day in October, as against 2,500 million barrels before the war.
Socially, the country has returned to normal. More than 3.6 million children are in primary school and 1.5 million in secondary school. University registrations have increased from 63,000 before the war to 97,000. Healthcare is at pre-war levels and is improving rapidly, because of greatly increased spending, estimated to be at 26 times pre-war levels. Doctors’ salaries are eight times higher and vaccination and drug distribution programmes have also been greatly increased.
Mr Keegan was frequently asked why there is so much less trouble in the British than the American area of occupation. He conceded that America, the Great Satan is target of greater hatred and Britain as the ‘lesser’ Satan does not attract the same degree of hostility. Further he acknowledged that the southern Shia area, where the British are operating, has always been anti-Saddam and therefore their task is easier compared with the American policing of the Sunni area. Also, Basra has a long history of dealing with Britain going back to the days of the East India Company. However, he insisted that there is a fundamental difference between the British and the American approach.
While the Americans, for reasons connected with their own past, seek to solve the Iraqi problem by encouraging the development of democracy, the British, with their long experience of colonial campaigning and their recent exposure to Irish terrorism, take a more pragmatic attitude.
They recognise that Iraq is still a tribal society and that the key to pacification lies in identifying tribal leaders and other big men, in recognising social divisions that can be exploited, and in using a mixture of stick and carrot to restore and maintain order.
The conclusion is unexpected and I expected will be resisted by those who think the United States’ exceptional history and status is as a result of the country’s banishment of European political practices, especially its opposition to imperialism.
Forcibly, America is becoming an imperial if not an imperialist country. The attitude was exemplified by an encounter I had with a tall, lean, crew-cut young man I met in Washington. Our conversation went as follows: “Marine?” I asked. “Yes,” he answered. “Have you been in Iraq?” “Afghanistan. Just got back.” The exchange was straight out of Kipling. There is a lot more of that to come.
There seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding of the British Empire by the Americans and by most marxist and statist continentals, namely that it was driven economically, not politically, and maintained defensively for the most part. The British merchants explored the world for new markets and the British state defended territories where trade with Britain took hold. British imperialism was not the sort the Romans would recognise. We do not need to look that far back, comparisons with Austro-Hungarian Empire or the Soviet Empire would highlight the different nature of the beast. So being imperial may not be so bad, provided you stop short of being imperialist.
What would happen if the Sahara Desert went communist? – For fifty years nothing, then a shortage of sand. Remember that old joke? Well, have a read of this, from the BBC earlier in the week:
Saudi Arabia has reportedly imposed strict border checks to enforce a ban on the export of sand.
There are fears that the growing demands of the construction industry could lead to a shortage in the desert kingdom.
The Arab News newspaper reports that neighbouring Bahrain needs to import large quantities of sand for reclaiming land from the sea.
Demand is also expected to grow as the process of reconstruction in Iraq gathers pace.
Although sand remains plentiful in Saudi Arabia, construction experts say the high costs of bagging and transporting make exploiting it difficult.
Experts have told the newspaper that if a mechanism could be devised to move sand from the vast desert region known as the Empty Quarter, it could be a very profitable proposition.
As the paper points out, there is more sand in the kingdom than oil.
Cement is also in high demand, the report says, with many cement factories having to expand their production capabilities to meet domestic demand.
We speculated here that if the Americans went into Iraq they could then put pressure on Saudi Arabia. Now the American plan is revealing itself. “I know it sounds crazy, but guys, here’s the plan. We’re going to suck all the sand out of the place. We’ll have them over a barrel.”
To be more serious, I guess the thing about about sand, compared to oil, is that sand can’t, unlike oil, be controlled. Oil extraction requires expensive infrastructure manned by a highly skilled workforce. Once it’s out of the ground, it can still then be stolen and smuggled, but until then, it’s the possession of the resident power structure. But sand “extraction”? Anyone can do that.
I doubt the BBC particularly wants my off-the-cuff attempt to pee in their iCan pool and I really look forward to goading Johnathan Miller into setting up an anti-TV licence campaign on iCan. However with the Cambridge Women in Black we see an example of exactly the sort of campaign the BBC had in mind when it set up its strange vaguely bloggish monstrosity. They state:
Cambridge Women in Black are holding silent vigils to protest against the ‘war on terror’. We are women of all ages and from all walks of life who oppose the use of violence. We are wearing black to show that we mourn all victims of terrorism and war.
In March 2003 the UK and US governments again attacked the people of Iraq, who have already suffered extensively from war and more than a decade of devastating sanctions. Cambridge Women in Black are here to show that we believe that more violence will not bring security and peace. We call on our government to stop creating yet more misery and hatred.
Note that the woes of the Iraqi people are not due to decades of Ba’athist mass murder and repression but are from the war and sanctions… sanctions during which large palaces and grandiose mosques were constructed in Iraq. Still, I do not suppose I should hold that against the ‘Cambridge Women in Black’ because after all, they state they are mourning “all victims of terrorism and war”… and never said anything about the victims of national socialist tyranny.
story via The Daily Ablution
Finally, a decent update on how the reconstruction is going in Iraq. It is astonishing that all the thousands of words that spew forth on a daily basis concerning the Iraqi situation manage to impart virtually no useful information. The Economist has a very nice overview of the reconstruction work in Iraq that paints a realistic and encouraging picture.
For many Iraqis, living standards have already risen a lot. Boosted by government make-work programmes, day labourers are getting double their pre-war wages. A university dean’s pay has gone up fourfold, a policeman’s by a factor of ten.
Stacks of such goods now crowd the pavements of Baghdad’s main shopping streets, shaded by ranks of bright new billboards. Prime commercial property, says a real estate broker in the Karada district, easily fetches $1,000 a square metre, four times the level this time last year.
The southern capital, Basra, for example, got only two-to-four hours of electricity a day before the war—and now has a power surplus. Baghdad still works to a regime of three-hours-on/three-hours-off, but the country as a whole is producing as much power as before the war. By spring it will be up by 25%. Within three years, if America sticks to its plan of sinking $5 billion-plus into the sector, power output should have more than doubled.
→ Continue reading: Iraq update
Another group of members of Congress have had a press conference after their return from Iraq. It seems quite telling how nearly every US politician, Republican or Democrat, find the ‘ground truth’ different from what they are hearing day after day from the Palestine Hotel bar.
If even a politician can see what is going on, what does this say about the intelligence of journalists?
Most Arab media on Tuesday blamed the U.S. failure to provide security in Baghdad for the latest suicide bombings in the Iraqi capital. They agreed that Washington had only itself to blame for the chaos and said the United States had failed Iraqis by not providing enough security to prevent the devastating attacks that killed 35 people on Monday, the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
I think my personal favourite is from the daily al-Khaleej, published in the United Arab Emirates:
Iraq, on the first day of Ramadan, was the scene of a bloodbath and occupation forces are directly responsible for this because of the instability they created in Iraq.
I suppose knowing where you stand with your torturers is stability of sorts but somehow I do not think that the victims of Saddam’s regime see it that way.
Saudi Arabia’s leading al-Riyadh newspaper opines:
The political bubble has burst in Baghdad. Will it be followed by other explosions or will the voice of reason prevail over the American dream of hegemony?
Disasters and conflicts notwithstanding there has never been a shortage of rhetorics in the Arabian Penninsula. There is only one voice that sounds half-reasonable although based on where it originated I would not want to look too close at the context of the quote. In non-Arab Iran, reformist parliamentarian Reza Yousefian said:
It is unjustifiable to kill ordinary people in the name of an anti-American campaign. On the contrary, the more insecurity prevails in Iraq, the longer Americans will stay.
Others, although outspoken against those who carried out the attacks, cannot help but add a sting in the tail. Lebanon’s as-Safir daily writes:
What happened yesterday in Baghdad is a crime by all measures, but it is more disgraceful than a crime: it is a deadly political mistake… Such political mistakes help the occupation to justify its horrible crimes.
Such outrage was lacking when it came to commenting on Saddam’s horrible crimes. I wish the Iraqis realised who their real enemies are.
I’ve lately been following the writing of the new kid on the Baghdad block.
Good stuff, well worth a regular read.
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