Petraeus

By Helen Thomas, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

WASHINGTON - Surprise, surprise. Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, wants to put a halt to any more troop withdrawals for the foreseeable future.

The highly politicized Petraeus seemed to be dutifully following his White House marching orders when he testified before congressional committees earlier this week.

Under his scenario, there will be no drawdown of U.S. forces in that strife-ridden country until President Bush leaves office.

That’s fine with Bush, who obviously has no intention of ending this futile war on his watch. Apparently feeling no responsibility for starting the war, Bush is planning to pass the Iraqi debacle on to his successor.

You can forget accountability for the yet-to-be defined U.S. military mission which has taken more than 4,000 American lives, possibly a million Iraqi lives and destroyed a country.

Woolsey: Gentlemen, polls show that up to 80 percent of the American public supports redeployment of our troops out of Iraq. When that statistic was presented with those staggering numbers, the vice president’s response was “so.” Well, I want to tell you that “so” came from the same administration that got us into Iraq with misleading information in the first place. And I don’t feel that that is where you are coming from. I want to believe that you have more respect for the American people than our vice president.

DEMOCRACY NOW!

The top US military commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, has recommended a suspension of troop withdrawals from Iraq after July. His recommendation would leave just under 140,000 American troops in Iraq well into the fall, more troops deployed in Iraq than before the so-called "surge." Petraeus testified before two Senate committees on Tuesday alongside Ambassador Ryan Crocker. We play highlights of the hearing and host a debate with Arun Gupta of The Indypendent, Eli Lake of the New York Sun and Gareth Porter of Inter Press Service.

Listen/Watch/Read.

This is from the statement of Ryan Crocker, US Ambassador to Iraq, in front of the Foreign Relations Committee yesterday:

One conclusion I draw from these signs of progress is that the strategy that began with the Surge is working. This does not mean, however, that U.S. support should be open-ended or that the level and nature of our engagement should not diminish over time. It is in this context that we have begun negotiating a bilateral relationship between Iraq and the United States...The heart of this relationship will be a legal framework for the presence of American troops similar to that which exists in nearly 80 countries around the world...

By Larry Lipman, Palm Beach Post

When Rep. Robert Wexler gets his chance to question Gen. David Petraeus at the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s hearing Wednesday, he’ll be drawing on the advice of about 1,000 constituents.

Wexler sent an e-mail last week to about 90,000 people on his contact list asking folks what one question they would want to put to Petraeus if they had the chance.

Two related questions stood out in various forms, said Ashley Mushnick, Wexler’s press assistant: “When will this war be over?” and “What is the definition of winning?”

Here are some other versions:

“What is the goal and how do we accomplish the goal?”

“Are we winning and is it worth it?”

“How soon can we get our troops out?”

“Is there an exit plan?”

April 9, 2008—Ivy, VA—In light of the testimonies by Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker before Senate and House leaders, VA-05 congressional candidate Tom Perriello asserted that Americans are being offered a false choice in Iraq, and that the only solution there is a political one.

"Our generals have been winning battles but we are not winning the war because our political leaders have provided no plan for victory and ask the wrong questions. Gen. Petraeus is right that immediate withdrawal would be disastrous. But sticking with the Administration's current policy is just as dangerous. We owe it to our troops to provide a new path to victory, such as the N.E.W. Plan for Iraq I helped launch in 2006. We need to shift the debate from troop levels and timelines to a new political power-sharing arrangement that can anchor a manageable peace without a U.S. troop presence," said Perriello.

Democrats Seek Again to Influence War Policy
By Josh Rogin, CQ

After a day of sobering testimony by the top U.S. military and civilian officials in Iraq, Democrats in Congress are back to where they have been many times before: trying to figure out how to legislate changes to President Bush’s Iraq War policy.

In testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker announced Tuesday that they would recommend an open-ended freeze of U.S. troop drawdowns from Iraq after July to assess the security situation there.

Democratic leaders were troubled by the announcement and said they would find ways to attach policy strings to the upcoming Iraq War supplemental spending bill and the defense authorization bill.

By Ryan Anderson, Win Without War

Yesterday's testimony by General Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker before the Senate Armed Services and Foreign Relations Committees left one vital question unanswered: whether the surge of U.S. forces is making things worse, not better in Iraq both militarily and politically.

With testimony last week by General William Odom (ret.) outlining the very serious danger of renting the loyalty of Sunni strongmen, and the lack of political reconciliation, there is significant evidence that the much touted progress in Iraq is only an illusion.

In a call to greater probity by our elected officials, Tom Andrews has posed these and other questions in an open letter to his former colleagues on the House Armed Services Committee.

Read Tom's letter on Huffington Post to see what questions desperately need to be asked.

By Melina Hussein Ripcoco, Brilliant at Breakfast, AlterNet

UFPJ Talking Points #57
By Phyllis Bennis, Institute for Policy Studies

Even before the House version gets underway on Wednesday, it's clear that Day One of the Petraeus-Crocker show is all about political theater - starring a 4-star general with a chest full of medals and political ambition, and a soft-spoken self-deprecating ambassador, both straight out of central casting.

But this is political theater - with very clear messages.

** Iran is the Problem in Iraq

** The "Surge" Stopped the Violence

** Keep the Troops in Iraq

** Support the $110 billion Supplemental Funding Bill for Iraq War

Iran is the Problem in Iraq

PHOTO GALLERY

[Does someone fear nonviolent protests more than shooting?]

By Reuters

Iraqi Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has threatened to lift a ceasefire of his Mehdi Army militia while indefinitely postponing a mass anti-US demonstration.

Despite the ceasefire which Sadr called last August, his followers have clashed with Iraqi government troops and US forces in the south of the country and Baghdad in recent weeks, leading to Iraq's worst violence since the first half of 2007.

"If it is required to lift the freeze (ceasefire) in order to carry out our goals, objectives, doctrines and religious principles and patriotism, we will do that later and in a separate statement," he said in a statement on his website.

He postponed indefinitely a "million-strong march" called for Wednesday to coincide with the fifth anniversary of the fall of Baghdad, which had raised the prospect of unrest coinciding with testimony in Congress by the top US officials in Iraq.

By Patrick Cockburn, Tom Dispatch

Muqtada al-Sadr is the most important and surprising figure to emerge in Iraq since the U.S. invasion. He is the Messianic leader of the religious and political movement of the impoverished Shia underclass whose lives were ruined by a quarter of a century of war, repression, and sanctions.

From the moment he unexpectedly appeared in the dying days of Saddam Hussein's regime, U.S. emissaries and Iraqi politicians underestimated him. So far from being the "firebrand cleric" as the Western media often described him, he often proved astute and cautious in leading his followers.