Asia Times "Iraq: A Perplexing Predicament"

[BJ]

Iraq: A perplexing predicament

By K Gajendra Singh

Finally, after ignoring the United Nations and diminishing it before the illegal invasion of Iraq in March last year, the United States, faced with the prospect of the unraveling of its ill-planned project in Iraq and the Greater Middle East, has turned to the world body to give its occupation some sense of legality. In the end, the UN Security Council's members obviously acknowledged that the strategic implications of a substantial US failure in Iraq were too serious even to contemplate.
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Despite the handover of sovereignty, through a compliant government the US can be expected in effect still to control Iraq's economy, with its embassy in charge of reconstruction aid, its oil industry and its infrastructure, as well as the courts and the police. Iraq's 25 government ministries and the news media will continue to be run by officials appointed by the new US ambassador to Iraq, John Negroponte. Only Iraq's overcrowded and poorly equipped hospitals etc will be run by Iraqis.
(-snip-)
Coalition forces will remain under the control of the US ambassador, and bases will be granted to US-led coalition. Soon the impossibility of government by dual authority will be repeated, and create once again al-wad' ash-shadh. Except that now, it will most likely be more brutal and deadly.

Link to Asia Times

Lengthly column deals American/Turkish relationship and stress the situation in Iraq places on it. However, the conclusion is dynamite.