[lbo-talk] UPDATE on Hostages in Iraq

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Thu Sep 16 10:13:28 PDT 2004


mitchelcohen at mindspring.com wrote:


>Below, I reprint an investigatory article from today's British
>"Guardian" newspaper by Naomi Klein and Jeremy Scahill which
>buttresses the claim I made

That's not an "investigation" - it's a series of propositions and leading questions.

This possibility:


>a revival of Saddam's mukhabarat disappearances

is entirely consistent with a bunch of old Ba'athists doing the deed, not the CIA.

And this:


>What we do know is this: if this hostage-taking ends in bloodshed,
>Washington, Rome and their Iraqi surrogates will be quick to use the
>tragedy to justify the brutal occupation - an occupation that Simona
>Torretta, Simona Pari, Raad Ali Abdul Azziz and Mahnouz Bassam
>risked their lives to oppose. And we will be left wondering whether
>that was the plan all along.

is a rather ambitious conclusion from the evidence, since these kidnappings can hardly be used to justify the occupation. There have been plenty of other kidnappings - and carbombings that have killed scores of civilians, and many other atrocities that don't even go a millimeter of the way towards justifying the occupation. Why would the kidnapping of two female NGO workers do the trick?

Doug



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