FIRE WITH FIRE

No wonder the Iraqi government is failing. As fast as citizens step up to the plate, al-Qaida strikes them out -- permanently!

An Iraqi oil minister was kidnapped today by terrorists. (Click here to read the story.) Two more Sunni leaders were killed this week for taking a public stand against al-Qaida. A southern governor and police chief were killed by a roadside bomb. All this in just two days! There are continuing reports of Iraqi political leaders being killed, police recruits mowed down, police barracks bombed, Iraqi soldiers targeted.

Al-Qaida, Shiite and Sunni insurgents and other terrorist groups operating in Iraq have found an effective way to maintain chaos. Every time Iraq begins to grow the head of leadership, they lop it off, leaving the limbs of the beast to flail away ineffectively. Messy but highly effective. No wonder the Iraqi government is in such disarray. Volunteering to serve is tantamount to a death wish.

Labels: al-Qaida, bomb, dissidents, hostages, Iraq, Sunni, violence

Posted by The Watcher at Tuesday, August 14, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

President Bush warned off Iran -- again. At a news conference the President again charged Iran with training and arming Iraqi insurgents bent on killing US soldiers. He, again, threatened nebulous "consequences" if Iran does not cease and desist immediately.

Though the news media is treating this as news, it is not. We've heard this song and dance routine before. The US accuses. Iran hotly denies. The US threatens. Iran blusters. The cycle repeats. It's an international pas de deux in which both dancers are out of step.

How many times will US forces have to find active Quds units (Iranian special forces) operating in Iraq before we do something to stop it? Obviously political chit chat isn't going to solve the problem. Iran has shown time and again that it will say anything to appease international censure, then go blithely on its way and do whatever it wants to. And what it wants to do is reestablish the Persian empire in all its glory and might with Iran at the helm. Iraq is the first stepping stone toward the realization of future Iranian might; Afghanistan, the second.

If Iran truly sought peace in the Middle East, it would back its high level meeting palaver with action. Instead of arming Shiites and setting them against Sunnis and US soldiers, Iran would be leading them to the bargaining table, bringing its considerable pressure to bear to force Iraqis to peace. How can America fail to notice that this is not what Iran is doing. Iran continues to foment rebellion in Iraq.

Iran actively encourages attacks against Sunnis and Americans because Iran wants peace in Iraq to fail. Iran is making every effort to force Iraq further into civil war. Only when Iraq is in total chaos (and it doesn't seem like that will take long), can Iran race in, the conquering hero, and restore peace in the guise of protecting its own borders and helping its neighbor. Unfortunately for Iraq and the rest of the Middle East, Iran seems to define peace like Saddam Hussein, not George Bush.

Labels: dissidents, foreign policy, Iran, Iraq

Posted by The Watcher at Friday, August 10, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Is US intelligence a joke or are Bush and his cronies really that obtuse? Two headlines caught my eye this week:

Labels: dissidents, foreign policy, Iraq, Kurds, President Bush, Shiite, Sunni

Posted by The Watcher at Thursday, August 02, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Are educated Iranians finally getting fed up with President Ahmadinejad's inflammatory, emotional rhetoric and near total avoidance of fact? In an unprecedented move, more than 50 Iranian economists met with the president to tell him his economic policies are "inexpert" and lacked "any basis in science." Read the full story here.

Condemning the president's economic policies, the economists told Ahmadinejad,
"In your government, economic policies are adopted without any basis in science
or the directives of the fourth development plan."

Iran's leading economists and financial leaders bluntly criticized Ahmadinejad for mismanaging Iran's oil wealth and failing to reign in the rampant inflation that has proved devastating to Iran's poor. In 2005 Ahmadinejad was elected largely on the strength of his promise to spread Iran's oil wealth to the country's poor, but it is the poor who have been most hurt by his capricious economic policies. In OPEC's second largest oil producer the rate of inflation is expected to rise to 17% by next March. The price of basic foods and services has risen sharply over the past few months.

With money supply growth running at a whopping 40%, economists charged that Ahmadinejad is emptying Iran's coffers without regard for the needs of future generations. Fulfilling rashly made campaign promises, the president is using Iran's wealth to fund a flood of infrastructure projects in the country's 30 provinces.

Seen as particularly dangerous by the country's economists was Ahmadinejad's decision made earlier this year to lower interest rates. Financial leaders lambasted the president for failing to consult either the central bank chief or economy minister.

"Such decisions are harmful and inexpert. The most sensitive financial institutions of the country will be weakened and in the not too distant future we will see the negative outcomes of these decisions," the economists said.

In past encounters, President Ahmadinejad has vehemently rejected criticism of his economic policies, denying charges that inflation is out of control and pointing to his pet building projects as evidence of Iran's technological progress. It will be interesting to see if the combined weight of the country's top economists and financial leaders can reign in the president or whether he will continue to plunder Iran's wealth for his own political gain.

Labels: banks, dissidents, economy, inflation, infrastructure, Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

Posted by The Watcher at Saturday, July 14, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Despite President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's claims that reformists are free to speak their mind in Iran, students who protested against his visit to their university this spring are being quietly arrested.

At least eight of Amir Kabir University's leading reformists have been arrested since May, according to their lawyers and activists inside and outside Iran. Hundred more have been rounded up and questioned. Read the full article here.

Reformists have been increasingly targeted during Ahmadinejad's regime. Within the President's circle, there is growing concern that reformists will exploit US-Iran tensions, using them as a catalyst for revolt.

Teachers, feminists, union leaders, journalists, students and Iranian-Americans are being targeted and increasingly arrested over the past six months. While most have been freed, they have often spent weeks or months behind bars with no outside contact and no recourse to the courts.

"The new government has increased pressures on the nation -- students, laborers, intellectuals," said Ebrahim Yazdi, foreign minister after Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's 1979 revolution and now leader of the banned but tolerated Freedom Movement of Iran. "When laborers stage protest rallies, the government, instead of talking to them, takes them to jail. Women are jailed just for collecting signatures in support of women's rights."

Iran's ruling party is slowly but steadily eating away at the rights of its citizens. Books are being censored, newspaper editors told what to write, university activities abolished. Seems like the "new" regime has turned into the "old," and that Ahmadinejad's promises of freedom are as hollow as those of his predecessors.

Labels: dissidents, Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, students

Posted by The Watcher at Saturday, June 23, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post