Iraq Follow

"Iraq is Vietnam without water."Rick Weidman, executive director for policy and government affairs at Vietnam Veterans of America

"We’ve been here so many times – the capture of Saddam, the transfer of sovereignty, the new government – all marked by euphoria, talk of tipping points, and then dismay as Iraq continues to spiral into oblivion." Dale Davis, a former US intelligence officer, on the killing of Al Qaida’s Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in Iraq

We are reaching a turning point in history. The US is caught in a military stalemate in Iraq and most Americans have turned against the war. The prospect is now opening up that the US may be forced to leave Iraq. And such a political humiliation would have enormous consequences across the world.

Anti-war campaigners in Cardiff staged a "die-in" last Saturday to protest against sending young men and women to fight in Iraq.

A new batch of declassified US army documents has strengthened the case that torture in Iraq and Afghanistan was officially sanctioned, widespread and systematic.

The Iraqi town of Haditha will now forever be linked with the blood and terror of the US occupation. For many it will be Iraq’s equivalent of Vietnam’s My Lai, a symbol of the violence of imperialism.

At least 1,000 British soldiers have deserted from the army since the beginning of the Iraq war in 2003, the BBC reported this week.

The British occupying forces in Basra have all but lost control of the southern Iraqi city. Last weekend saw two more soldiers killed in a roadside bomb attack, bringing the total number of British fatalities in Iraq to 111.

"As far as the size goes, we are committed to rebuilding Iraq and to restoring the economy and to stabilising the security. The size of the embassy is in keeping with the goals we have set ourselves for Iraq."US State Department spokesman Justin Higgins, defending spending $600 million dollars on the new US embassy in Baghdad, the largest embassy ever built in the world

Anger at Britain’s occupation of southern Iraq is growing, with Iraqis demanding that British troops halt all low level flights over neighbourhoods and withdraw all troops from the cities.

Hundreds of thousands marched through New York City (NYC) last Saturday in a demonstration for peace, justice, and democracy. Marchers demanded that the US pull its troops out of Iraq and protested against the possibility of a war in Iran.

"There’s two kinds of Iraqis here, the ones who help us and the ones who shoot us, and there’s an awful lot of ’em doing both."US Staff Sgt Jason Hoover, in Hawijah, Iraq