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From the Los Angeles Times

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Obama looks beyond Iraq

Declaring an end to the combat mission, he says the U.S. must now focus its shrunken resources on rebuilding its ailing economy.

By Christi Parsons and Paul Richter, Los Angeles Times

August 31, 2010

Reporting from Washington

President Obama marked the end of the U.S. combat mission in Iraq on Tuesday by declaring that after more than seven years, vast expenditures and thousands of casualties, the nation must focus its shrunken resources on rebuilding the ailing domestic economy.

Addressing the nation for only the second time from the Oval Office, the president appealed for support from a country impatient for progress on unemployment and other economic woes and increasingly weary of wars, including the one in Afghanistan, which Obama has chosen to escalate.

As he has done several times recently, Obama made note of his campaign pledge to wind down the war in Iraq, which he opposed from the outset. "That is what we have done," he said. "We have removed nearly 100,000 U.S. troops from Iraq."

"Now it is time to turn the page," he said.

While acknowledging President George W. Bush's commitment to U.S. security and support for American troops, Obama sketched a damning picture of the conflict's effect on the economy.

"We have spent over a trillion dollars at war, often financed by borrowing from overseas. This, in turn, has shortchanged investments in our own people and contributed to record deficits. For too long, we have put off tough decisions on everything from our manufacturing base to our energy policy to education reform. As a result, too many middle-class families find themselves working harder for less, while our nation's long-term competitiveness is put at risk."

He offered no new proposals to address those woes. "But in the days to come," he said, "it must be our central mission as a people, and my central responsibility as president."

Obama tightly linked the move to wind down the Iraq war with the steps he has taken to significantly increase troop strength in Afghanistan. After nearly nine years of combat in Afghanistan, he acknowledged "tough questions about our mission there."

The U.S. troop increase in Afghanistan is scheduled to begin winding down in July. However, Obama left the pace of troop reductions unclear, saying they would depend on "conditions on the ground" as U.S. officials prepare Afghan forces to take on more responsibility.

As with the troop increase in 2007 that calmed sectarian conflict in Iraq, Obama said the U.S. troops in Afghanistan "will be in place for a limited time to provide space for the Afghans to build their capacity and secure their own future."

About 50,000 U.S. troops remain in Iraq, and under terms of an agreement between the Bush administration and the Iraqi government, they are scheduled to leave by the end of 2011. Their role is limited to training and assisting Iraqi forces.

Though Iraq's police and army have made big strides, many Iraqis fear for their country's future. Bickering politicians have not been able to put together a government in the nearly six months since national elections, leaving an opening for insurgents to launch bomb attacks and assassins to settle scores. Aggrieved parties may return to violence if they feel frozen out of the government. Absent a working government, no long-term decisions are being made.

Vice President Joe Biden was in Iraq on Tuesday to assure the nation's leaders that the U.S. was not turning its back on them as Operation Iraqi Freedom officially ends, giving way to Operation New Dawn. Biden is to preside over a formal change-of-command ceremony Wednesday.

More than 4,400 U.S. troops died and more than 31,000 were wounded. More than 100,000 Iraqi troops and civilians were killed in the last seven years.

Despite the uncertainty about whether Iraq can build a stable, democratic society, Obama seemed to rule out chances of extending the U.S. stay.

His focus on the U.S. economy was a noteworthy concession to his domestic political predicament. Polls show that the 9.5% unemployment rate far outweighs the Iraq war as a source of concern for Americans. Surveys also show widespread dissatisfaction with Obama's handling of the economy.

With midterm elections approaching and voters restive, White House advisors concluded that Obama could not ignore the economy, even in a speech devoted to such a milestone in Iraq.

On his way to a meeting with U.S. troops at Ft. Bliss, Texas, earlier in the day, Obama spoke with Bush on the telephone, but White House officials would not say what the two discussed.

At Ft. Bliss, Obama praised the 1 million American troops who have served in Iraq during the war and promised to support Afghan security forces as they begin to take responsibility for securing their own country.

Many experts and former officials who served under Bush have warned Obama against quickly scaling back U.S. commitments.

"We could end up with a situation where Iraq is a mess," said Steven Cook, a Mideast specialist at the Council on Foreign Relations. But he also noted a broad U.S. consensus that it was time for Iraqis to handle their own affairs.

Ryan Crocker, the former U.S. ambassador to Iraq, and former Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, who was widely considered a prime architect of the 2003 invasion, stepped forward this week in published opinion pieces to argue against too rapid a disengagement.

Tuesday's milestone also met with partisan criticism, with Republicans questioning whether now is the time to declare the end of combat operations.

House Republican leader John A. Boehner of Ohio called on Obama to detail how the U.S. would respond should Iraq spiral into chaos.

"The hard truth is that Iraq will continue to remain a target for those who hope to destroy freedom and democracy," Boehner said, speaking to the American Legion in Milwaukee. "The people of that nation — and this nation — deserve to know what America is prepared to do if the cause for which our troops sacrificed their lives in Iraq is threatened."

For weeks, Republicans had been criticizing Obama for claiming credit for ending combat operations in Iraq when he opposed the 2007 troop surge that many believe made this summer's withdrawal possible.

At Ft. Bliss, home to troops who soon will be deployed in the new support mission in Iraq, Obama promised that he would not be taking any kind of "victory lap" over the withdrawal, an allusion to Bush's 2003 declaration of "mission accomplished."

Despite calls for Obama to give credit to his predecessor, he didn't do that. He did, however, mention his phone call with Bush, with whom he has disagreed bitterly over the U.S. response to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

"It's well known that he and I disagreed about the war from its outset," Obama said. "Yet no one could doubt President Bush's support for our troops, or his love of country and commitment to our security.

"As I have said, there were patriots who supported this war and patriots who opposed it," he said. "And all of us are united in appreciation for our service men and women, and our hope for Iraq's future."

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-fg-obama-iraq-20100901,0,2473297,print.story

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Iraqis are conflicted as U.S. combat mission ends

Many blame the Americans for the years of violence after the invasion, but they also fear what may lie ahead.

By Liz Sly, Los Angeles Times

August 31, 2010

Reporting from Baghdad

Muwafak Ali's downtown Baghdad music store is still pockmarked by the American rocket that whizzed through the door on one of the first days of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

He has since reopened, but business is bad. So are many of his memories concerning the seven-plus years of American combat operations that officially came to an end Tuesday.

"It would have been better if they didn't come, but now that they're here, they should stay," said Ali, 44, a wedding musician who hated Saddam Hussein, yet fondly remembers the days when the dictator was in control, the days before the chaos set in.

It's a view shared by many Iraqis as the American presence winds down to 50,000 troops serving in an advisory role.

Seven and a half years after then- President George W. Bush attacked Iraq, Baghdad is a battered and weary city whose streets still bear the scars of a still inconclusive war, and whose residents are still groping to comprehend the magnitude of the changes that turned their lives upside down.

For more than 20 years they endured a dictatorship whose rules most didn't like, but easily understood. Then came the invasion, which many at first welcomed, followed by days of looting, years of insurgency, four governments and a sectarian war, transforming their country in ways that may not be fully resolved for many years, after the dust has settled on the huge uncertainties that still linger. Will Iraqi politicians reach agreement on a new government? Will the insurgency succeed in its efforts to make a comeback? Can the nation's security forces stand alone?

"How can the Americans leave when we don't have a government, don't have a state?" asked Hafedh Zubaidi, 39, who sells mattresses in Baghdad's middle-class Karada district and is deeply anxious about the future given the political stalemate over the formation of a government six months after national elections.

"We thought things were really going to be better when the Americans came, and instead they brought us only sorrow," he said. "But if they leave now, there will be no Iraq."

Over the years, the role of the Americans has shifted for most Iraqis from liberators to hated occupiers, from colonizers to peacekeepers in a civil war. And now, the ending of the combat mission, decreed by President Obama in fulfillment of an election campaign pledge, comes as just one more event over which Iraqis have no control, and which they worry will disrupt their lives yet again.

In an address to the nation Tuesday, Prime Minister Nouri Maliki hailed the moment as "a landmark in the Iraqi people's long hard struggle for freedom and dignity."

Iraq "today is independent," he said, without mentioning that it was Obama who set the deadline, and not the Iraqi government.

Maliki had warned of the likelihood of major attacks to mark the day, and placed the security forces on high alert. There were none. Three people were killed when a rocket struck their home in a south Baghdad neighborhood, police said, but otherwise the city was unusually calm, a relatively auspicious start for a new era.

The Iraqi army was out in force, stopping and searching cars at checkpoints and patrolling the streets in its U.S.-supplied Humvees. "We deserve the future," proclaimed signs on the backs of the camouflage-painted vehicles, portraying smiling children holding hands.

In the fortified Green Zone, now under Iraqi control but just as off-limits to ordinary Iraqis as it was when Americans were in charge, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden shuttled between Iraqi leaders, pressing them to hurry up and form a new government. He disputed recent reports that violence has increased.

Indeed, things are much different from how they were a little over three years ago, when violence raged between Shiite Muslims and minority Sunni Arabs, who had controlled Iraq during the Hussein era, and U.S. troops were building up their presence to help tamp it down. There are signs of renewal, intermingled with the debris of war. New stores and restaurants have opened beside the collapsed wrecks of those that have been bombed. Shrubs have been planted along major highways, adding splashes of green to the drab gray landscape.

But much uncertainty, and bitterness, remain.

Mutanabi Street is one of the few places in Baghdad to have received a complete makeover; the legendary block of booksellers was destroyed in a 2007 bombing. Its crisp new pavement and renovated storefronts thrum with shoppers and cart-pushers hauling stacks of paper and piles of books.

But urban renewal can't erase the lingering anger of those who lost loved ones to violence.

"It was a total collapse," said Fahim Mohammed, 48, who lost four brothers and a nephew in the bombing. He had stepped around the corner to buy supplies when the bomb exploded, and rushed back to drag their bodies from the rubble.

Mohammed says he welcomes the departure of the American combat troops because he blames them for the violence that over the years resulted in the deaths of killed an estimated 100,000 Iraqis, including his relatives. "For that, they don't deserve to stay," he said. But he also doesn't believe anything good will come from their departure.

"Iraq is destroyed. It doesn't have a past, it doesn't have a present and it will not have a future."

Najah Abdul Rahman, 64, agrees. "If they leave, of course things will get worse," said Rahman, who lost a brother and nephew in the bombing. "But still I'm glad because the cause of all our tragedies is America."

There's much that hasn't changed since the days of full combat operations, such as the concrete blast walls that still run for miles around Baghdad's neighborhoods, giving the city a militarized feel. They played a key role in subduing the sectarian violence, by separating Sunni and Shiite neighborhoods. Now, they continue to separate communities, suppressing commerce, and, despite repeated promises by the Iraqi government, no one has yet dared tear them down.

Ahmed Saad, 36, hasn't dared venture beyond the wall encircling the Sunni neighborhood of Adhamiya since he fled there to escape Shiite militias that overran his mixed-sect neighborhood in 2006, killing his father and forcing his family out. He's considered venturing past the first Iraqi army checkpoint guarding the neighborhood.

"But to tell you the truth, I'm too scared," he said. "I always remember the bad things that happened, and then I turn back."

Saad fought with the Americans against the Sunni insurgent group Al Qaeda in Iraq, and now runs a tea shop a stone's throw from the makeshift cemetery where Sunni residents of the enclave buried their dead from sectarian fighting with Shiites from 2005 to 2007.

"The Americans came here and did all of this," he said, a question mark rising in his voice. "And now they are leaving?"

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-baghdad-scene-20100901,0,6718190,print.story

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Obama speaks to troops at Fort Bliss [Transcript]

THE WHITE HOUSE, Office of the Press Secretary

REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT DURING FORT BLISS ARMY BASE VISIT

Fort Bliss Army Base

El Paso, Texas

THE PRESIDENT:  Hello, everybody.  (Applause.)  Everybody have a seat.  Well, listen, I am extraordinarily honored to be with all of you today, and I want to thank General Pittard, I want to thank Command Sergeant Major Dave Davenport, who have shown such extraordinary leadership here.

I wanted to come down to Fort Bliss mainly to say thank you and to say welcome home.

Now, I just met with some Gold Star families, and yesterday I was at Walter Reed.  And there are no moments when I feel more keenly and more deeply my responsibilities as Commander-in-Chief than during those moments.  I know we lost 51 fellow soldiers from here in Fort Bliss.  A lot more than that were injured, some of them very severely.  A million men and women in uniform have now served in Iraq.  And this has been one of our longest wars.

But the fact of the matter is that there has not been a single mission that has been assigned to all of you in which you have not performed with gallantry, with courage, with excellence.  And that is something that the entire country understands.

There are times where, in our country, we've got political disagreements.  And appropriately we have big debates about war and peace.  But the one thing we don't argue about is the fact that we've got the finest fighting force in the history of the world.  (Applause.)

And the reason we have it is because of the men and women in uniform, in every branch of service, who make so many sacrifices, and their families make those sacrifices alongside them.

And so the main message I have tonight and the main message I have to you is congratulations on a job well done.  The country appreciates you.  I appreciate you.  And the most pride I take in my job is being your Commander-in-Chief.

It also means that as we transition in Iraq, that the one thing I will insist upon for however long I remain President of the United States is that we serve you and your families as well as you served us.

So we spent a lot of time over the last couple of years making sure that we're increasing our support of veterans:  that we are making sure that our wounded warriors are cared for; that some of the signature injuries of our war, like post-traumatic stress disorder, traumatic brain injury, that we are devoting special services there; that we've got a post-9/11 GI bill that ensures that you and your family members are able to come back and fully contribute and participate in our economy; that our veterans are constantly getting the care and honor that they have earned.

So that's part of my message to the country.  And one of the great things about the last several years has been to see how unified the country is around support of our veterans and of our men and women who are currently serving.

Now, I know that, as I said at the beginning, our task in Iraq is not yet completed.  Our combat phase is over, but we've worked too hard to neglect the continuing work that has to be done by our civilians and by those transitional forces, including some folks who are going to be deploying I understand today.  And I'm going to be talking to them later.

The work that continues is absolutely critical: providing training and assistance to Iraqi security forces because there's still violence in Iraq, and they're still learning how to secure their country the way they need to.  And they've made enormous strides thanks to the training that they've already received.  But there's still more work to do there.

We're going to have to protect our civilians, our aid workers and our diplomats who are over there, who are still trying to expand and help what's going to be a long road ahead for the Iraqi people in terms of rebuilding their country.

We're still going to be going after terrorists in those areas.  And so our counterterrorism operations are still going to be conducted jointly.  But the bottom line is, is that our combat phase is now over.  We are in transition.  And that could not have been accomplished had it not been for the men and women here at Fort Bliss and across the country.

The other thing that I'm going to talk about this evening is the fact that we obviously still have a very tough fight in Afghanistan.  And a lot of families have been touched by the way in Iraq.  A lot of families are now being touched in Afghanistan.  We've seen casualties go up because we're taking the fight to al Qaeda and the Taliban and their allies.

It is going to be a tough slog, but what I know is that after 9/11, this country was unified in saying we are not going to let something like that happen again.  And we are going to go after those who perpetrated that crime, and we are going to make sure that they do not have safe haven.

And now under the command of General Petraeus, we have the troops who are there in a position to start taking the fight to the terrorists.  And that's going to mean some casualties and it's going to mean some heartbreak.  But the one thing that I know from all of you is that when we put our minds to it, we get things done.  And we're willing to make some sacrifices on behalf of our security here at home.

So to all of you, and to your families, I want to express my deepest gratitude, the gratitude of Michelle, the First Lady, and our entire family.  But also I just want to say thank you on behalf of the country, because without you we couldn't enjoy the freedoms and the security that are so precious.  And all of you represent that long line of heroes that have served us so well generation after generation.

You know, when I was talking to the Gold Star families there, there were some widows dating back to World War II, and then there was a young woman who had just had a baby and had just lost her husband.  And that describes the arc of heroism and sacrifice that's been made by the men and women in uniform for so many generations.  You're part of that line, part of that tradition, part of that heroism.

So what I'd like to do is just to come around and shake all of your hands personally, to say thank you to all of you, to say thank you for a job well done, and to know that you are welcome home with open arms from every corner of this country.  People could not be prouder of you, and we are grateful.

Thank you very much, everybody.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/dcnow/2010/08/text-of-obama-comment-on-iraq-to-troops-at-fort-bliss.html

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Ft. Bragg investigates infant deaths

Ten babies have died suddenly since January 2007 while living in base housing. All were younger than 8 months, and no sign of foul play was found in any of the deaths.

By David Zucchino, Los Angeles Times

August 31, 2010

Reporting from Ft. Bragg

On April 15, 2009, Melissa Pollard's two-month-old son, Jay'Vair, stopped breathing and died inside military housing on this sprawling Army base.

Three months later, on July 23, seven-month-old Ka'Mya Frey died suddenly while taking a nap in the same house. The baby was the daughter of Pollard's brother and his fiancee, Bianca Outlaw, who were living temporarily with Pollard and her soldier husband.

Only later did Pollard and Outlaw learn from neighbors that another infant who had lived in the same house in 2007 died that year of an undetermined cause while with a babysitter in nearby Fayetteville, N.C.

"Unfortunately, our kids died before we had any idea what was going on with them," Outlaw, 20, said Tuesday. "I mean, there has to be something in that house that's causing healthy babies to get sick and die."

According to Ft. Bragg officials, 10 infants have died suddenly while living in base housing since January 2007, including Jay'Vair and Ka'Mya. Autopsies were performed by the military for all 10, with the manner of death ruled "undetermined" in seven cases.

One death was attributed to sudden infant death syndrome, or SIDS. The deaths of Jay'Vair and Ka'Mya are still under investigation. Officials stressed that they had found no signs of foul play in any of the deaths, which involved infants aged two weeks to eight months.

Ft. Bragg authorities announced Tuesday that all 10 deaths were being reviewed to determine whether they are connected. The investigations are looking into environmental conditions, structural factors and hazardous materials.

Calling the deaths "a serious matter," Brig. Gen. Michael X. Garrett, Ft. Bragg chief of staff, said Army investigators began reviewing them earlier this summer.

"What got my attention was … multiple deaths associated with one set of quarters," Garrett said at a news conference, referring to the house where Jay'Vair and Ka'Mya died.

Chris Grey, a spokesman for the Army's Criminal Investigation Command, said investigators had found no common link among the 10 deaths, which occurred in different base neighborhoods.

"At the end of the day, all these deaths, tragic as they are, could be attributed to sudden infant death syndrome" when the investigations are completed, Grey said. SIDS, is the unexplained death of a child under 1 year old.

Grey declined to provide details, saying he did not want to compromise investigations or unduly alarm military families.

Two of the 10 deaths occurred this year, Grey said. Three happened in 2009, three in 2008 and two in 2007. Three of the houses where infants died were new, three had been renovated and three had undergone minor renovations, said John Shay, the base housing manager.

The house where Jay'Vair and Ka'Mya died and the two houses where the two infants died this year are not occupied and will remain closed, officials said.

Other families live in the homes where other infants died, Shay said.

Officials said the air, building materials and other items were being tested at the units. Toxic black mold and contaminated drywall from China have been ruled out, they said.

"We cannot explain two deaths of children at one address, and that's really the problem we're trying to solve," Garrett said.

Shay said he was not aware of a similar cluster of infant deaths at any other U.S. base.

More babies are born at Womack Army Medical Center at Ft. Bragg than on any other U.S. Army base — about 10,000 since Jan. 2007, officials said. With 10 known cases of SIDS over that period, base rates are probably "quite low," said Col. Stephen Sicinski, the garrison commander.

But because many military babies are born off base and then move onto Ft. Bragg, computing accurate SIDS rates is difficult, he said. Nationally, the rate is about 0.5 SIDS deaths per 1,000 live births, according to the American SIDS Institute.

Ft. Bragg is home to about 6,200 families, with a total population of about 45,000, Sicinski said.

Col. Jeffrey Kingsbury, a physician who is chief of preventive medicine at Womack Army Medical Center, said possible SIDS factors include letting babies sleep on their stomachs, smoking in the home, objects left in cribs, extremely soft mattresses and metabolic disorders. About 2,500 U.S. deaths a year are attributed to SIDS, according to the American SIDS Institute.

Investigators are reviewing the infants' medical histories, blood samples, autopsy reports and other evidence, Kingsbury said.

Outlaw said she and Pollard tried without success for more than a year to get information from military authorities about their babies' deaths.

"Every time I'd talk to somebody, they'd tell me they didn't know or they couldn't tell me," she said.

She said Ka'Mya was "healthy as a horse" until the family moved in with Pollard in late June 2009, two months after Pollard's infant son died in the house. After a few weeks, Ka'Mya developed congestion, a runny nose and nagging cough.

When she went to awaken the infant from an afternoon nap, Ka'Mya was blue and unresponsive, Outlaw said.

Jamie B. Hernan, an attorney who represents Outlaw and Pollard, said the military should have been more forthcoming Tuesday about the investigations in order to reassure families with small children living at Ft. Bragg.

Hernan said Outlaw and Pollard wanted to know not only why their babies died, but whether other infants living in base housing are at risk.

"They appeared to suggest that it's just that one housing unit that they can't explain," Hernan said of the military. "It's more than that. There are just too many other deaths in other units."

Garrett, who said he lived in base housing, told reporters that officials would inspect the house of any family that requested it. He promised to keep families informed.

"We're going to get to the bottom of it," he said.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-bragg-child-deaths-20100901,0,4772671,print.story

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New Yorkers strongly oppose mosque near ground zero, poll shows

More than seven out of 10 New Yorkers want the developers of a proposed Islamic community center, which contains a prayer room, near the scene of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center to move the project, according to a poll released Tuesday.

According to the Quinnipiac University poll, New Yorkers by 71% to 21% said the that a Muslim group should move its planned center somewhere away from near the site of the former World Trade Center, which along with the Pentagon was attacked by airplanes hijacked by Islamic fundamentalists on Sept. 11, 2001.

The poll found that by 54% to 40%, surveyed New Yorkers agreed that the Islamic group has a right to build the mosque, but by 53% to 39%, those surveyed said that the mosque should not be at the site “because of the sensitivities of 9/11 relatives.”

“The heated, sometimes angry, debate over the proposal to build a mosque two blocks from ground zero has New York State voters twisted in knots, with some of them taking contradictory positions depending on how the question is asked,” said Maurice Carroll, director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute.

“Overwhelmingly, across all party and regional lines, New Yorkers say the sponsors ought to voluntarily move the proposed mosque to another location,” Carroll said.

Quinnipiac questioned 1,497 registered voters from Aug. 23-29. The poll, which is similar to other recent polls, has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.

The mosque issue has politically divided Americans, with the overwhelming majority seeing the construction as near the World Trade Center as a poor choice. Conservatives and Republicans have been especially vocal in their opposition while President Obama and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg are supporting the construction.

By 71% to 22%, New York voters said that the state attorney general should investigate the financing of the mosque project, according to the poll.

The poll also found that New Yorkers approve of Obama's performance as president by 51% to 41%, his lowest score ever in the state.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/dcnow/2010/08/new-yorkers-strongly-oppose-mosque-near-ground-zero-according-to-a-quinnipiac-university-poll.html

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From the New York Times

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Blair's Memoirs Reveal ‘Tears' but No Regrets on Iraq

As the United States ends it combat mission in Iraq, Tony Blair , the former British prime minister who deployed troops alongside American forces in the 2003 invasion, said Wednesday that, while there had been many tears over the loss of life, he could not regard the war as a mistake.

Mr. Blair's latest iteration of his attitude to the conflict — echoing similar arguments during a public inquiry into the war earlier this year — came with the publication of his memoirs, “A Journey.” The book went on sale in Britain the morning after President Obama said in a televised speech Tuesday night from the Oval Office that, with United States forces assuming a support and training mission in Iraq, it was “time to turn the page” after seven years of combat.

Separately, Mr. Blair, in a BBC interview to mark the book's publication, urged a tough Western approach to Iran's nuclear program , including possible military intervention, saying it was “wholly unacceptable” for Tehran to seek a nuclear weapons capacity. Iran says its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes, but many outsiders believe its leaders want to build a nuclear bomb.

“I am saying I think it is wholly unacceptable for Iran to have a nuclear weapons capability and I think we have got to be prepared to confront them, if necessary, militarily,” he said. The interview is to be broadcast later on Wednesday, but the BBC released segments of it earlier.

“I think there is no alternative to that if they continue to develop nuclear weapons,” Mr. Blair said. “They need to get that message loud and clear.”

Since he left office, Mr. Blair has been the representative of the so-called Quartet seeking a Middle East peace. But he has long embraced the notion of muscular action to secure foreign policy goals, as in Iraq.

British troops, far fewer than the American contingent, completed their withdrawal from combat operations in the south of Iraq last year. But in the invasion in March 2003, Mr. Blair assumed the mantle of America's staunchest ally, sending a British force of more than 46,000 military personnel members in support of the overthrow of Saddam Hussein , even as hundreds of thousands Britons protested against the war on the streets of London and other cities.

As the occupation progressed, the conflict became ever more unpopular; Britons openly derided Mr. Blair's rationale for going to war, ostensibly to strip Saddam Hussein of unconventional weapons that were never found; and the conflict, in which 179 British military personnel died, became the centerpiece of Mr. Blair's troubled legacy.

But he has always resisted demands from the families of the dead and from antiwar groups for an apology.

In his 624-page memoir, which is to be published in the United States on Thursday, Mr. Blair said that he regretted “with ever fiber of my being the loss of those who died.”

“Tears, though there have been many, do not encompass it,” he wrote, evoking the suffering of the relatives of the dead. “I feel desperately sorry for them, sorry for the lives cut short, sorry for the families whose bereavement is made worse by the controversy over why their loved ones died, sorry for the utterly unfair selection that the loss should be theirs.”

But he insisted that he had been right to join the invasion.

“I am unable to satisfy the desire even of some of my supporters, who would like me to say, ‘It was a mistake but one made in good faith.' Friends opposed to the war think I'm being obstinate; others, less friendly, think I'm delusional. To both I may say: keep an open mind.”

He continued: “On the basis of what we do know now, I still believe that leaving Saddam in power was a bigger risk to our security than removing him and that, terrible though the aftermath was, the reality of Saddam and his sons in charge of Iraq would at least arguably be much worse.”

So contentious is Mr. Blair's role in the war that he has said he will donate the proceeds of his memoirs — including a reported $7 million advance — to a British war veterans charity.

The book had long been awaited by those who scrutinize British politics for any likely disclosures about Mr. Blair's relationship with his successor and rival, Gordon Brown , who lost the May election this year to the opposition Conservatives and Liberal Democrats. Mr. Blair left office in 2007 under pressure from Mr. Brown and his allies.

The book was published weeks after another volume of political memoirs from Lord Peter Mandelson , who, along with Mr. Blair and Mr. Brown, was regarded as one of the principal architects of the sweeping reforms within the Labour Party that created a slicker, more entrepreneurial, movement called New Labour, helping Mr. Blair sweep to power in 1997.

But the divisions between old-style socialism and New Labour still hang over the party as it looks to choose a new leader to replace Mr. Brown, who resigned after the May elections. Indeed, the leadership fight has been described as a battle between two brothers — David and Ed Miliband — cast as heirs to the Blairite and Brownite wings of the party respectively.

The publication of the book in Britain reignited the debate over the course Labour should take if it is to dislodge the coalition of Conservatives and Liberal Democrats. But Labour's ideological introspection — and its preoccupation with its divisions — could also diminish broader support. “I think it is time to move on from Tony Blair and Gordon Brown and Peter Mandelson and to move on from the New Labour establishment,” said Ed Miliband, one of the contenders for the leadership. “I think frankly most members of the public will want us to turn the page.”

In the book, Mr. Blair used somewhat less diplomatic language than in the past to criticize Mr. Brown, said he had “zero” emotional intelligence. He described Mr. Brown as “difficult, at times maddening,” but also “strong, capable and brilliant.”

“Analytical intelligence, absolutely. Emotional intelligence, zero,” Mr. Blair said.

He also disclosed that, during his tenure, alcohol became a “prop” and he would drink a pre-dinner cocktail and one or two glasses of wine with his meal.

“By the standards of days gone by I was not even remotely a toper,” he wrote, using a British colloquialism for a heavy drinker.

But he continued: “Stiff whisky or G&T before dinner, couple of glasses of wine or even half a bottle with it. So not excessively excessive. I had a limit. But I was aware that it had become a prop.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/02/world/europe/02blair.html?_r=1&ref=world&pagewanted=print

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Terrorist Ties Doubted in Amsterdam Arrests

WASHINGTON — American law enforcement officials said Tuesday that they believed that two Yemeni men detained in Amsterdam after unusual items were found in their luggage had no connection to terrorism, though they remained in Dutch custody and investigators continued to review the case.

The two men, United States residents identified by Dutch authorities as Ahmad Mohamed Nasser al-Soofi, 48, of Tuscaloosa, Ala., and Hezem al-Murisi, 37, of Memphis, missed their flight on Sunday at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago after the gate was changed, according to federal officials.

They caught a different flight, but some of their baggage had already been loaded on the flight they missed, including items that had been taped together and attracted attention from airport screeners. Though no explosives were found, investigators considered the possibility that the men might be conducting a test run for a terrorist attack, officials said.

By Tuesday, that possibility was all but ruled out. Neither man was on any terror watch list or had any known history of militancy.

“The F.B.I. looked into this and found no reason to suspect terrorism,” said one law enforcement official, speaking of the investigation on the condition of anonymity. He said news accounts of the episode, set off by a report by ABC News on Monday night, had made a media sensation of what was really routine checking by counterterrorism investigators.

An American intelligence official said: “In the end, I think you'll find this is odd and unusual, but that it's not related to terrorism. At this point, we don't see any nexus between them and terrorist networks.”

Dutch prosecutors said Mr. Soofi and Mr. Murisi were still being questioned on Tuesday. But a Dutch official said late Tuesday that investigators in Amsterdam had found no evidence of wrongdoing and that the men could be freed as early as Wednesday.

A search of Mr. Soofi by airport security screeners in Birmingham, Ala., as he waited to board a flight to Chicago on Sunday found that he was carrying $7,000 in cash and that his luggage contained a cellphone taped to a bottle of Pepto-Bismol, three cellphones taped together and several watches taped together, officials said. The bag also contained pill bottles, a box cutter and three large knives, according to an internal Transportation Security Administration report.

None of the items violated the restrictions for checked luggage, and Mr. Soofi was allowed to fly to Chicago. But the unusual taping of items led to the later inquiry, officials said.

After missing their connection in Chicago, both Mr. Soofi and Mr. Murisi were rebooked on United Airlines Flight 908 to Amsterdam. They evidently intended to fly on to Yemen but were removed from the plane by Dutch security officers, who had been alerted by their American counterparts to the possibility that the men were testing the aviation security system.

Meanwhile, the unaccompanied luggage flew without its owners from Chicago to Dulles International Airport outside Washington, which is not a violation of aviation rules on a domestic flight, Homeland Security Department officials said. The luggage was removed from the connecting flight to Dubai after the plane was pulled back to the gate at Dulles — not at O'Hare, as officials had said Monday night. It underwent further inspection and testing at Dulles, according to T.S.A. documents.

Imad Hamad, Michigan director for the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, said he had spoken with several relatives and friends of the detained men and believed that they would be proved innocent. He said many Yemenis living in the United States travel home at this time of year to stay with relatives and celebrate the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

“People tend to take lots of gifts — cellphones, cameras, even basic medications,” Mr. Hamad said. “Different people have different ways of packaging or grouping their gifts together.”

He said he did not fault security officials for scrutinizing the men or their luggage. “The last thing we want to do is block the ability of law enforcement to do its job,” Mr. Hamad said. But he added that he wished the investigation could have been handled quietly, out of view of the news media.

Amy Kudwa, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, said the episode showed that the aviation security system, on higher alert since the attempted bombing of a Detroit-bound airliner on Dec. 25, was working properly.

“In this instance, sound judgment led to suspicious items being identified, which triggered automatic security responses by U.S. security personnel,” Ms. Kudwa said. Dutch authorities and federal air marshals aboard the flight to Amsterdam were informed in advance of concerns about the two men, she said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/01/world/europe/01plane.html?ref=world&pagewanted=print

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Deal Would Provide Dialysis to Illegal Immigrants in Atlanta

ATLANTA — Thirty-eight end-stage renal patients, most of them illegal immigrants, would receive the dialysis they need to stay alive at no cost under a rough agreement brokered Tuesday among local dialysis providers and Atlanta's safety-net hospital, Grady Memorial.

The deal, if completed, would end a yearlong impasse that has come to symbolize the health care plight of the country's uninsured immigrants and the taxpayer-supported hospitals that end up caring for them. The problem remains unaddressed by the new health care law, which maintains the federal ban on government health insurance for illegal immigrants.

Grady, which receives direct appropriations from Fulton and DeKalb Counties, ultimately agreed on Tuesday to help pay for continuing dialysis for most of the immigrants. Others would be distributed among local dialysis providers as charity cases.

Last fall, Grady's new management closed its money-losing outpatient dialysis clinic in a move intended to demonstrate fiscal toughness to the city's philanthropic community. The closing displaced about 60 uninsured illegal immigrants who depended on free thrice-weekly treatments at the clinic to survive.

Illegal immigrants, and legal immigrants newly in the country, are not eligible for Medicare , the federal program that covers most dialysis costs for American citizens with end-stage renal disease.

Grady volunteered to transport the patients to other states or their home countries and pay for three months of treatment. Thirteen accepted the offer. But in response to a patient lawsuit and news media scrutiny, the hospital eventually contracted with a commercial dialysis provider to treat the others in Atlanta for one transitional year.

That contract, with Fresenius Medical Services, expired on Tuesday.

Vital details of the agreement remain to be negotiated, including precisely how the patients will be distributed, how much Grady will pay and whether the arrangement will extend for patients' lifetimes. But all parties said after meeting Tuesday morning that they were optimistic that they would reach an understanding and that patients would see no lapse in treatment.

“That would make me feel real happy because continuing with my dialysis, I need it to live,” said Ignacio Godinez Lopez, 24, who crossed into the United States illegally as a teenager and has been treated at Grady's expense for four years. “I'm young, and without dialysis it would be taking my life.”

The patients in Atlanta have gambled that American generosity, even at a time of hostility toward illegal immigrants, would prove a surer bet than uncertain care in their home countries. Several said that the fates of those who returned home had reinforced their fears about leaving Atlanta.

Five of the 13 patients who left for Mexico with assistance from Grady or the Mexican government have died, according to Matt Gove, a Grady senior vice president. Most died while still receiving dialysis, although not always as regularly as recommended.

One patient, Fidelia Perez Garcia, 32, apparently succumbed in April to complications from renal failure after running out of Grady-sponsored treatments in Mexico. Patients with end-stage renal disease can die in as little as two weeks without dialysis, which filters toxins from their blood.

Ms. Perez's mother, Graciela Garcia Padilla, said by telephone that her family was able to raise money for three additional dialysis sessions, at a cost of about $100 each. Ms. Perez then went 12 days without dialysis and persuaded a hospital to treat her only when she was close to death, Ms. Garcia said.

“They sent her to me just to die,” Ms. Garcia said. “Here, they let people die.”

At the same time, regular treatment in Atlanta has not guaranteed survival. Four of the 45 patients who were receiving dialysis at Fresenius clinics have also died, Mr. Gove said.

Nationally, about one in five dialysis patients die within a year of starting treatment, and about two in three die within five years, according to government figures.

The hospital, which has recently begun a financial turnaround after years of multimillion-dollar losses, has spent more than $2 million on repatriation and dialysis since closing its clinic, Mr. Gove said. As the expiration of Grady's contract with Fresenius loomed, each sought to shift responsibility to the other. Larry L. Johnson, a DeKalb County commissioner who prodded and mediated the negotiations, said there was movement only when Grady agreed to contribute financially to the patients' care.

Under the broad outlines of the agreement provided by Mr. Johnson and other participants, Fresenius, DaVita Inc. and Emory University 's health system would each treat a small number of patients — most likely three to five — as charity cases. Fresenius would care for the rest with financial assistance from Grady.

Fresenius and DaVita are the country's largest commercial dialysis providers, with combined net income of more than $1.3 billion last year.

The agreement would not address the broader concern of how to care for illegal immigrants in the region who have developed renal disease since the Grady clinic's closing, or those who will do so in the future. At the moment, their only option may be to wait until they are in distress and then visit hospital emergency rooms, which are required by law to provide dialysis to patients who are deemed in serious jeopardy.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/01/health/policy/01grady.html?ref=us&pagewanted=print

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The War in Iraq

We were glad to see President Obama go to Fort Bliss on Tuesday before his Oval Office speech on Iraq, to thank those Americans who most shouldered the burdens of a tragic, pointless war. One of the few rays of light in the conflict has been the distance America has come since Vietnam, when blameless soldiers were scorned for decisions made by politicians.

President George W. Bush tried to make Iraq an invisible, seemingly cost-free war. He refused to attend soldiers' funerals and hid their returning coffins from the public. So it was fitting that Mr. Obama, who has improved veterans' health care and made the Pentagon budget more rational, paid tribute to them.

“At every turn, America's men and women in uniform have served with courage and resolve,” he said on Tuesday night. He added: “There were patriots who supported this war, and patriots who opposed it. And all of us are united in appreciation for our servicemen and women, and our hope for Iraq's future.”

The speech also made us reflect on how little Mr. Bush accomplished by needlessly invading Iraq in March 2003 — and then ludicrously declaring victory two months later.

Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction proved to be Bush administration propaganda. The war has not created a new era of democracy in the Middle East — or in Iraq for that matter. There are stirrings of democratic politics in Iraq that give us hope. But there is no government six months after national elections.

In many ways, the war made Americans less safe, creating a new organization of terrorists and diverting the nation's military resources and political will from Afghanistan. Deprived of its main adversary, a strong Iraq, Iran was left freer to pursue its nuclear program, to direct and finance extremist groups and to meddle in Iraq.

Mr. Obama graciously said it was time to put disagreements over Iraq behind us, but it is important not to forget how much damage Mr. Bush caused by misleading Americans about exotic weapons, about American troops being greeted with open arms, about creating a model democracy in Baghdad.

That is why it was so important that Mr. Obama candidly said the United States is not free of this conflict; American troops will see more bloodshed. We hope he follows through on his vow to work with Iraq's government after the withdrawal of combat troops.

There was no victory to declare last night, and Mr. Obama was right not to try. If victory was ever possible in this war, it has not been won, and America still faces the daunting challenges of the other war, in Afghanistan.

Mr. Obama, addressing those who either believe that he is not committed to the fight in Afghanistan or believe that he will not leave, said Americans should “make no mistake” — he will stick to his plan to begin withdrawing troops next August. He still needs to clearly explain, and soon, how he will “disrupt, dismantle and defeat Al Qaeda” and meet that timetable.

As we heard Mr. Obama speak from his desk with his usual calm clarity and eloquence, it made us wish we heard more from him on many issues. We are puzzled about why he talks to Americans directly so rarely and with seeming reluctance. This was only his second Oval Office address in more than 19 months of crisis upon crisis. The country particularly needs to hear more from Mr. Obama about what he rightly called the most urgent task — “to restore our economy and put the millions of Americans who have lost their jobs back to work.”

For this day, it was worth dwelling on this milestone in Iraq and on some grim numbers: more than 4,400 Americans dead and some 35,000 wounded, many with lost limbs. And on one number that American politicians are loath to mention: at least 100,000 Iraqis dead.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/01/opinion/01wed1.html?ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

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We've Seen This Movie Before

In the first column I ever wrote for this newspaper (“How the Right Hijacked the Magic Words”), I analyzed the shift in the rhetoric surrounding the Oklahoma City bombing once it became clear that the perpetrator was Timothy McVeigh, who at one point acknowledged that “The Turner Diaries,” a racist anti-government tract popular in Christian Identity circles, was his bible .

In the brief period between the bombing and the emergence of McVeigh, speculation had centered on Arab terrorists and the culture of violence that was said to be woven into the fabric of the religion of Islam.

But when it turned out that a white guy (with the help of a few of his friends) had done it, talk of “culture” suddenly ceased and was replaced by the vocabulary and mantras of individualism: each of us is a single, free agent; blaming something called “culture” was just a way of off-loading responsibility for the deeds we commit; in America, individuals, not groups, act; and individuals, not groups, should be held accountable. McVeigh may have looked like a whole lot of other guys who dressed up in camouflage and carried guns and marched in the woods, but, we were told by the same people who had been mouthing off about Islam earlier, he was just a lone nut, a kook, and generalizations about some “militia” culture alive and flourishing in the heartland were entirely unwarranted.

This switch from “malign culture” talk to “individual choice” talk was instantaneous and no one felt obliged to explain it. Now, in 2010, it's happening again around the intersection of what the right wing calls the “Ground Zero mosque” (a geographical exaggeration if there ever is one) and the attack last week on a Muslim cab driver by (it is alleged) 21-year-old knife-wielding Michael Enright.

First the mosque. It is wrong, we hear, to regard the proposed mosque or community center as an ordinary exercise of free enterprise and freedom of religion by the private owners of a piece of property. It is, rather, a thumb in the eye or a slap in the face of the 9/11 victims and their families, a potential clearinghouse for international terrorist activities, a “victory mosque” memorializing a great triumph of jihad and a monument to the religion in whose name and by whose adherents the dreadful deed was done.

But according to the same folks who oppose the mosque because of what it stands for, Michael Enright's act doesn't stand for anything and is certainly not the product of what Time magazine calls a growing “American strain of Islamophobia.” Instead, The New York Post declares, the stabbing is “the act of a disturbed individual who is now in custody,” and across the fold of the page columnist Jonah Goldberg says that “one assault doesn't a national trend make” and insists that “we shouldn't let anyone suggest that this criminal reflects anybody but himself.”

The formula is simple and foolproof (although those who deploy it so facilely seem to think we are all fools): If the bad act is committed by a member of a group you wish to demonize, attribute it to a community or a religion and not to the individual. But if the bad act is committed by someone whose profile, interests and agendas are uncomfortably close to your own, detach the malefactor from everything that is going on or is in the air (he came from nowhere) and characterize him as a one-off, non-generalizable, sui generis phenomenon.

The only thing more breathtaking than the effrontery of the move is the ease with which so many fall in with it. I guess it's because both those who perform it and those who eagerly consume it save themselves the trouble of serious thought.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/08/30/weve-seen-this-movie-before/?pagemode=print

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