Powell 'surprised' by intensity of Iraqi resistance

[Barrett808]

WASHINGTON (AFP) - US Secretary of State Colin Powell said he was "surprised" with the intensity of the Iraqi resistance to the American occupation.

"I'm surprised. But it is more resistance than we expected to see at this time," the chief US diplomat said in an interview with CNN.

He said the US military had responded accordingly by sending more troops into Iraq.

"We will have to be there for a considerable period of time in the future in order to provide the security that they're not able yet to provide for themselves," Powell explained.

"And I think if we were on top of this security problem, if we didn't have these terrorists and thugs of the previous regime challenging us, people would be throwing roses at us for all we're doing to help with the country and to reconstruct the country," he said.

Asked if the Iraq war that ousted former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was a war of choice or necessity, Powell replied:"It was a war both of choice and necessity."

(more)

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/20040505/pl_afp/us_iraq_powell&cid=1521&ncid=1480

[argonne]

1. I'm surprised he can

look in a mirror and see his shadow.

[saigon68]

15. The intensity of My resistance to the occupier

Would increase Exponentially if I found out

MY 16 YEAR OLD SON WAS ANALLY RAPED BY SOME CIVILIAN EMPLOYEE OF A MERCENARY COMPANY WHILE 10 U.S. SOLDIERS STOOD AROUND AND WATCHED AND DID NOTHING.

Sorry for the caps-- but where in the world is COLON's mind . Is he smoking CRACK to ignore reality.

[calimary]

21. Well, let's see...

Could be his mind is in the same netherworld as Joint Chiefs chief Richard Myers' mind - getting that report back in - when? February? January? And NOT BOTHERING TO READ IT?

In the same netherworld as dick cheney - getting all that bogus intel from Ahmed Chalabi and his pals - and giving it more value than the intel from all the king's horses and all the king's men?

In the same netherworld as Rummy and Wolfie and Perlie and Scootie and Kenneth Adelman and the rest of the dancing "Cakewalk Cabal" who spoke glowingly of the locals throwing flowers at our troops?

In the same netherworld as Contradicta - who the fuck knows WHERE her brains are, anymore? Except maybe on some Disney ride in Fantasy Land? That is, WHEN she's awake and even remotely near "the switch"?

In the same netherworld as most of Congress, whose favorite song now is that Fleetwood Mac number whose refrain is "...tell me lies, tell me sweet little lies..."?

In the same netherworld as bush himself - where he is lord of all he surveys and the personally-anointed messenger of God?

Shoot, I could go on and on...

Their minds are all somewhere (assuming they have any) - maybe up their own backsides. But they aren't grounded in reality. They must all have the same kind of "beautiful mind" that the Wicket Witch of the East, barbara bush, has (and YES, SHE no longer deserves to have her name capitalized, either).

And most of the voters? Well, I just recently saw the animated "Alice in Wonderland" Disney classic with my kids, again, and the sequence with the Walrus and the oysters comes to MY mind.

[saigon68]

23. Beautifully done calimary

It is a combination of all your observations and more.

The people who should know better, or should notice, are in a deep sound slumber and a perpetual state of denial

Good Post:

[Carolina]

25. I am saving your post

So well put; one of the many things I love about DU is the talent of its members.

Good one, calimary :yourock:

[JohnOneillsMemory]

26. Well put. And here's the warning from Aug. 2, 1920 by 'Lawrence of Arabia'

"The people of England have been led in Mesopotamia into a trap from which it will be hard to escape with dignity and honour. They have been tricked into it by a steady withholding of information. The Baghdad communiques are belated, insincere, incomplete. Things have been far worse than we have been told, our administration more bloody and inefficient than the public knows. It is a disgrace to our imperial record, and may soon be too inflamed for any ordinary cure. We are to-day not far from a disaster.

>snip<

We have not reached the limit of our military commitments. Four weeks ago the staff in Mesopotamia drew up a memorandum asking for four more divisions.

>snip<

How long will we permit millions of pounds, thousands of Imperial troops, and tens of thousands of Arabs to be sacrificed on behalf of colonial administration which can benefit nobody but its administrators?"


source-
http://www.antiwar.com/orig/lawrence.php
----------------------------------------
This is some really really really old news, Powell. Remember Vietnam? I think you do.

[keithyboy]

19. The entire Bush administration is 'surprised' That's because they

chose to ignore the warnings from the Iraqis and the rest of us who opposed this invasion. Even Saddam warned the US that we would see our soldiers burned in the streets of Baghdad if we invaded. WTF did we expect. This administration is a victim of its own lies and decption.

[wtmusic]

2. 'A war both of choice and necessity'

They are mutually exclusive. If something is necessary, choice is taken completely out of the picture.

[Ironpost]

3. choice and necessity

It was a WAR of choice necessary for the enactment of the PNAC agenda... no

[maddezmom]

4. so was rummy...two peas in a pod n/t

[displacedtexan]

5. Powell surprise, meet Rumsfeld surprise.

You two need to be fired.

[hadrons]

6. "....more resistance than we expected to see at this time."

oh, so Colin Bowell was expecting this, but at a much later date ... dickhead

[MadHound]

7. Geez, has this administration lost all of its collective marbles?

And yes, I do know the answer to my own question, I just hate seeing it repeating on a daily basis.

Really, Powell was in Vietnam. He saw how a country of poor, non-technological people went from using punji sticks and muzzle loaders to sophisticated Russian, Chinese and American armaments. He saw the will and determination of the people of that small country to push out the US and French occupying forces, no matter the cost. He saw the quagmire that such a war of occupation becomes. And yet now he is "suprised". :wtf:What was he thinking, we would be greeted with wine and roses?

Damn, what is being put in these people's coffee? Their grip on reality is getting shakier everyday. And that in and of itself is a scary thought.

[jmcgowanjm]

14. Flashback: Powell begins career covering up MyLai

Sound familiar?

Powell not only developed as a skilled cover-up artist, he
would eventually incorporate this ability to manage
public perception about war as a key element in the
"Powell Doctrine," which he imposed on the military and
the press. He never forgot My Lai, and he has always
believed that exposure of My Lai and other atrocities
were responsible for the US defeat in Vietnam.

Donald Rumsfeld shares these beliefs with Colin Powell.
They are both wrong. The two phenomena that collide with
this Powell-Rumsfeld orientation were and are (1) the
decision of their 'enemy' never to quit, and (2) the inevitability
that someone who is part of the occupation force will
be confronted with these contradictions between "the
exalted image and the pseudo-event" and the real character
of war--and that this someone will expose it in an attempt
to rescue his or her own humanity.

http://www.counterpunch.com/

[ozymandius]

8. Why should we believe that this is not like Vietnam?

How many generals (retired) have been in the papers and on the Sunday talkies over the past week telling how 'we have lost this war'? The Marines were defeated at Falluja, they say, and this spells the end of the conflict. The 'final' solution for quelling the Falluja insurgency would have violated every letter and spirit of international law governing warfare. The world would have hated us (more) for rooting out the Falluja mujahedeen because that would potentially have killed tens of thousands of people. Now we are backing away from Najaf.

We have lost. Yet we send more soldiers. Vietnam was known to be unwinnable for years. Yet the U.S. government's stupid white men sent more soldiers. And for what?

To lose more.

[jmcgowanjm]

17. Gwynne Dyer: Siege spells beginning of end for US in Iraq

So the entire US neo-conservative adventure in the Middle
East, never very plausible, is now doomed. Even the option
of handing Iraq over to the United Nations and
replacing American troops with Muslim troops under
UN command, still viable a month ago, will soon be
foreclosed unless UN officials take a firmer stand against
the occupation regime.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay.cfm?storyID=3564247&thesection=news&thesubsection=dialogue

[saigon68]

20. It's IRAQ-NAM

ITS IRAQ-NAM-- DEATH SHOWS NO FAVORITES


A place where Death rides a Pale Horse

Sometimes Death travels beyond the boundaries of the combat zone and wreaks havoc on mere
bystanders.

Death inflicts the ultimate penalty in no particular order.


The Innocent, The Guilty, The Careless and The Unlucky-- are all targets.


ITS IRAQ-NAM-- TORTURE SHOWS NO FAVORITES

The US military can now be compared as being capable of the most bizarre form of torture since
Bergen Belsen

[lumpy]

27. The military heads with their pretty ribbons

are not doing a hands-on job, the result, failure. The Secretary of State has failed badly because of self-inflicted vainglory.

[rocktivity]

9. I call it The Smurf Syndrome

The U.S. military was surprised by the Vietnamese resistance, too--defeating a handful of yellow gook rice chewers armed with not much more than sharp sticks was supposed to have been child's play. But for the better part of ten years, U.S. forces were held off until they "withdrew with honor."

All the U.S. had to do this time around was fly-swat a handful of brown ragheaded camel jockeys armed with not much more than BB guns, and with the assistance of a grateful, liberated Iraqi citizenry. But between destroying Fallujah in order to save it and the prisoner abuse scandal, the Bush regime has not only lost its mandate to win this conflict but to wage it.

The common denominator, of course, is the underestimation of the enemy on the grounds that they're not white and not Western. They're "little" people--negligible, inherently inferior, part of the white man's burden, one-dimensional. They're modern day Smurfs, not worth the time takes to take seriously.

I must say that I'm surprised that a black ex-military officer is surprised, though. Colin Powell of all people should know what it means to be a member of a resistance force.

:headbang:
rocknation

[yellowcanine]

10. "if we were on top of this security,....people would be throwing roses"

The ability to rationalize and delude oneself knows no bounds in this maladministration. The inability to get "on top" of the security problems wouldn't have a thing to do with all of those "isolated incidents" of abuse, torture and unjustified killings of innocents, would it, Mr. Secretary?

[Just Me]

11. Surprised,....that people resist occupation,...geez,...

,...you look so stupid when you say crap like that, Powell,...

[Mandate My Ass]

16. Iraqis throwing roses? After shock and awe?

It appears Powell drank Rummy's kool-aid. :crazy:

[diamond14]

12. it's all part of bush*s GREAT STUPID WAR !.....seems that a lot

of Americans love it too....and are cheering bush* onward, like good christian soldiers in a crusade....


as Pat Tillman's brother spoke at the funeral:

"Pat isn't with God. He's fucking dead. He wasn't religious. So thank you for your thoughts but he's fucking dead."


and the old Vietnam war song....banned on many stations, and also banned again by bush* at the beginning of his GREAT STUPID WAR....

"Be the first one on your block to have your boy come home in a box"

[samsingh]

13. powell is a liar or stupid

the rest of us knew there would be problems. we were all muzzled, ignored, or ridiculed. these people have sent our soldiers into a nightmare over a lie and for their own greed.

[calimary]

18. Yep, that's why we pay guys like this the big bucks -

So they can be REPEATEDLY caught completely flat-footed on shit like this. Yep, Colin, that's right. SURPRISE!

And yeah, samsingh, many of us DID know what was coming, or at least had a strong suspicion, or were able to put two and two together and get - HEY! gues what? FOUR!

I remember when I was at the protests in and around the westside of L.A., and people were speaking - either as official speakers at the events, or just among ourselves in the crowd - about how we were afraid this is gonna go. Frankly, some of us were sure we were being a little draconian about our fears. But the worst fears (short of all-out nuclear war or something) have all been realized. And, I mean, WE'RE a bunch of bloomin' civilians here, completely out of the power circles, with nothing on which to base our conclusions but our own reading and research. SHEESH, if WE could come up with legitimate, and subsequently-proven reasons not to do this, what the f--- were people like Colin Powell thinking?!?!?!??!

And okay, so, fine, maybe he was dragged kicking and screaming into this. Or maybe more like whining and foot-dragging. He could have stood on principle and resigned. He could have refused to have his (then-still-good) name attached to this. But noooooooooooooooooo...

[sushi]

22. What is wrong with Colin Powell?

Nobody likes to be occupied by foreigners. Iraqis must be happy Saddam Hussein is gone and now it sure looks like more and more of them would like the foreign occupiers to leave too. If this war really was about bringing freedom and democracy to Iraq, then whether the coalition stays or not and for how long should be the decision of an elected Iraqi government, not the US government! An elected Iraqi government might prefer the help of troops from other Muslim countries.

[Az_lefty]

24. I can't believe these people are so stupid

Their surprised? Did they really think this operation would be like the liberation of Kuwait? We had 500,000 coalition troops on the ground to oust the REPUBLICAN guard. This time we had 135,000 to invade a country and little more to try and secure it. Colin knows better.