Old for New:
The Lies of the UN, doing the bidding of America & Britian.

The Reality on the Ground!

Every now and then the manufacturers of products such as washing powder and toothpaste proclaim that they have produced a new formula. We have become used to being bombarded with words such as, “bigger and better”, “fresher and cleaner”, even “new - traditional” and of course “new and improved”. However most of us still remain sceptical as to whether the new products really do wash whiter or really do taste minty-er and fresher. In actuality we have very little choice in the matter. New has come to mean merely more of the same. So does the Head-n-Shoulders approach to politics produce the same sentiment? Is there really a bigger and better, new and improved Iraq in the offing?

As America replaces one ruler with another (Retired General Jay Garner for Saddam) and yet another (L. Paul Bremer III for Garner) all within the space of a few weeks (days in fact), it is now clear that there will be no Iraqi leadership for many months if not years.

US and British plans for re-building Iraq this past week descended into chaos as officials admitted they had indefinitely scrapped plans for a transitional government. At the same time that the British were trumpeting the “handover” of a few administrative chores to a civil authority in Umm Qasr it became clear that there would be no national assembly, no transitional government and no Iraqi leadership either directly imposed from the exiles cueing up for the job, or any other Iraqi. Instead they announced that US and British diplomats would remain in charge for an “undisclosed period”.

All the while the bill for reconstruction, establishing basic services and civil order is ballooning. Recent figures suggest a figure of $41bn is needed over the next 2 years to get the “shattered nation on its feet again”, and some are predicting that figure will double in the next 10 years. Aid agencies are forecasting the need for $250bn over the next 10 years. Then there is the small matter of some $400bn in outstanding reparations due from the last war, and outstanding loans and agreements from Saddam’s time. Little wonder that the US/UK were keen to pass their latest resolution through the United Nations which in turn scrapped the Oil for food programme (under UN supervision), ended the UN sanctions (opening up a flood of lucrative contracts) and put the control of the oil fully under US/UK control. This resolution de-facto establishes the legitimacy of all that the occupiers have done and plan to do. UN conventions forbid the placing of oil revenues into the hands of an occupying power, yet this seems to count for little.

We are told that the delay in repatriating many thousands of US troops back to the US is because of the still “bad” security situation in much of Iraq, the delays are pending a “high-level review of security in Baghdad and elsewhere in the country”. This ongoing inability to establish order provides a convenient cover for delays in providing humanitarian aid (which is an obligation on the occupying forces) and for the continued management of Iraq by the occupiers. These tactics are failing to fool anyone and there is growing local opposition to the occupation forces. The fact that the US can change tacks at whim in terms of the rulers they use, contradicts the weak argument that it will take months or years for the people to establish a ruler. The reality of course is that it will take the occupiers that time to establish a “suitable” ruler and infrastructure for their purposes.

The persistent denial of the war objectives being to steal the oil of Iraq has been amended slightly with the colonisation of Iraq. The world community is being fed with a simplistic argument about the urgency of establishing order and infrastructure while the occupiers plan for a long term occupation in which the oil will be sold on the world markets at rock bottom prices and the proceeds will be used to “help” the Iraqis rebuild their country at sky-rocket prices.

As has already been seen with the establishing of a lucrative port contract for Dick Cheney’s Halliburton group there is little evidence of competitive tendering or the agreement of the “occupied” peoples to any of these contracts.

The new global judge, jury and executioner now has the cheque book in her grasp as well.

Source:
Jamal Harwood
Khilafah.com Journal
23 Rabee Al-Awwal 1424 Hijri
24 May 2003 Comment: