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'' And how many Americans - Bremmer, Abizaid, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Rice, Bush - should on this precedent be charged and hanged? ''

They wont be hung, because they are jewish.(rice and bush are honorary israelies)

2007 the deadliest year for US in Iraq

http://news.smh.com.au/2007-the-deadliest-year-for-us-in-iraq/20071231-1jm8.html

The second half of 2007 saw violence drop dramatically in Iraq, but the progress came at a high price: The year was the deadliest for the US military since the 2003 invasion, with 899 troops killed.

American commanders and diplomats, however, say the battlefield gains against insurgents such as al-Qaeda in Iraq offer only a partial picture of where the country stands as the war moves toward its five-year mark in March.

Two critical shifts that boosted US-led forces in 2007 - a self-imposed ceasefire by a main Shiite militia and a grassroots Sunni revolt against extremists - could still unravel unless serious unity efforts are made by the Iraqi government.

Iran also remains a major wild card. US officials believe the neighbouring country has helped quiet Iraq by reducing its flow of suspected aid to Shiite fighters, including materials needed for deadly roadside bombs.

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The CIA operation that should have prevented the Iraq war

http://news.smh.com.au/the-cia-operation-that-should-have-prevented-the-iraq-war/20080205-1q62.html

When Saad Tawfiq watched Colin Powell's presentation to the United Nations on February 5 2003 he shed bitter tears as he realised he had risked his life and those of his loved ones for nothing.

As one of Saddam Hussein's most gifted engineers, Tawfiq knew that the Iraqi dictator had shut down his nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programmes in 1995 -- and he had told his handlers in US intelligence just that.

And yet here was the then US secretary of state -- Tawfiq's television was able to received international news through a link pirated from Saddam's spies next door -- waving a vial of white powder and telling the UN Security Council a story about Iraqi germ labs.

"When I saw Colin Powell I started crying. Immediately. I knew I had tried and lost," Tawfiq told AFP five years later in the Jordanian capital Amman.

Now in his fifties, a round-faced man with a small moustache and lively eyes behind delicate spectacles, Tawfiq described how the CIA set up an elaborate operation to recruit Iraqi weapons scientists and then ignored the results.

From the end of 2002 the US spy agency had sources inside Iraq's weapons plants telling them clearly what the whole world now knows -- that Saddam had ended efforts to produce weapons of mass destruction.

Nevertheless in March 2003 the United States and Britain invaded Iraq to disarm Saddam of this non-existent arsenal and in the process triggered the effective collapse of the Iraqi state, plunging it into chaos and bringing thousands of deaths.

Tawfiq picked his sister up from Baghdad airport on September 9, 2002. Her homecoming was emotional, but the pair had work to do. They met secretly at night in the family garden and took walks together in the city.

The weapons engineer was astonished by the CIA's questions, which he thought showed the depths of the agency's ignorance about events in his country.

"I went crazy. The questions were dumb. She was telling me: 'They know you have a programme,' and I was saying: 'There is nothing. Tell them there is nothing, absolutely nothing. They have left us with nothing'," Tawfiq said.

"She was taking notes. There were 20 major questions, and to all of them the answer was: 'No, no, no...' I kept swearing on the grave of my mother."

According to Tawfiq, Saddam Hussein gave the order to dismantle Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programmes in 1995, after his brother-in-law and arms chief Hussein Kamel defected and briefed the UN inspectors.

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Iraq violence surges in February

http://news.smh.com.au/iraq-violence-surges-in-february/20080301-1w4x.html

The number of Iraqis killed in February rose by 33 percent over January, reversing a six-month trend of reduced violence, in a setback to the US military plan to curb the bloodshed ravaging the country.

The combined figures obtained by AFP from the interior, defence and health ministries showed that the total number of Iraqis killed in February was 721, including 636 civilians, compared with 541 dead in January.

and who is killing all these iraquis ?

Oh, muzzies

Yes I agree FD.  Iraq has been brought to its knees.  The christians, atheists and muslims are doing the slaughtering because there's no one in control. 

In retrospect Saddam at least maintained some sort of civil order, regardless of the tactics he used.  No doubt there were far less deaths under his regime than the chaos existing there now.

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He would say that - his company Haliburton (of which he is now only a director - although he still maintains a major shareholding) has reaped a fortune from the misfortune of Iraq.  Haliburton & subsidiaries have their fingers in most of the pie by not only supplying all the catering & accommodation to the US marines, but construction & maintenance, oil supply & distribution and arms manufacturing.

UN refugee agency says Iraq fuelling rise in asylum seekers

http://news.smh.com.au/un-refugee-agency-says-iraq-fuelling-rise-in-asylum-seekers/20080318-207z.html

Iraqis are still fleeing their country five years after the US-led invasion and top the list of asylum seekers in the industrialised world, the UN refugee agency said Tuesday.

In 2007, the number of new applications for refugees in 43 industrialised countries rose 10 percent to 338,000 from 306,300 the previous year, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees said in a report.

Iraqis topped the list of asylum seekers in industrialised countries for the second year running, accounting for more than 10 percent of the total with 45,200 applications last year, the UNHCR said.

"It is important to bear in mind, however, that Iraqi asylum seekers in industrialised countries represent only one percent of the estimated 4.5 million Iraqis uprooted by the conflict," the report said.

Two million Iraqis have fled to neighbouring Jordan and Syria, where social and health services are struggling with the influx, while another 2.5 million people are internally displaced.

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Clinton says 'we cannot win' Iraq war

http://news.smh.com.au/clinton-says-we-cannot-win-iraq-war/20080318-204r.html

Hillary Clinton said on Monday the Iraq war may end up costing Americans $1 trillion and further strain the economy, as she made her case for a prompt US troop pullout from a war "we cannot win".

This week marks the fifth anniversary of the US invasion of Iraq, but voters now say the economy is their top issue in the campaign for the November presidential election.

Clinton, the former first lady who is trying to convince voters she has foreign policy gravitas, criticised both her rival for the Democratic presidential nomination Senator Barack Obama, and the Republicans' choice, Senator John McCain.

She said the war has sapped US military and economic strength, damaged US national security, taken the lives of nearly 4,000 Americans and left thousands wounded.

Clinton said that while Obama insists he will withdraw US troops in Iraq within 16 months of taking office, his former foreign policy adviser, Samantha Power, had said he might not follow through on the pledge.

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Nats against laws to abolish single desk

http://news.smh.com.au/nats-against-laws-to-abolish-single-desk/20080318-203v.html

The Nationals will oppose federal government legislation aimed at abolishing the single desk wheat marketing system.

Nationals Leader Warren Truss says his party has been a lifelong supporter of the current system.

"The single desk had served the Australian wheat industry and the nation well for more than 60 years," he said in a statement.

"The majority of wheat growers still support the single desk."

The alllied forces (not christians and athiests) are killing hardly anyone.
The muslim terroritst (muslims) are mass murdering anyone and everyone.

So all those bombs they dropped - they only damaged buildings? If you destabilise a country and create a power vacuum, aren't you at least partly responsible for the inevitable violence that ensues?