Target Centermass

Day: September 22, 2004

  • NATO to Expand Iraq Training Mission

    After much wrangling, NATO has checked in on the idea of contributing to the now-free nation of Iraq.

    The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) has agreed to create a military training academy in Iraq, expanding the alliance’s small presence in the country after two years of feuding over the US-led war.

    Ambassadors at NATO’s headquarters in Brussels reached the accord after resolving questions raised last week by France and Belgium over the mission’s financing and its relationship to the US-led multinational force.

    “Today NATO ambassadors agreed on the political directions to the military to enhance NATO assistance to the Government of Iraq in the training of its security forces,” NATO spokesman James Appathurai told reporters.

    ….

    France and others that opposed the war fear it could be tantamount to inserting NATO into the Iraqi battlefield through a back door.

    The alliance currently has a 40-strong operation performing training services in Iraq and the new accord is seen as expanding its presence to some 300.

    France, Germany and other opponents of the US-led war have said they will not have a presence in the country themselves.

    Yeah, NATO in da house.

    Except France, Germany, Belgium and Spain. Those four bastard countries are too scared to even involve themselves in freakin’ training a country to support itself.

    I’m tired of the worthlessness that is the UN. I’m quickly growing tired of the anachronism that is NATO (as it is currently structured). Perhaps it’s time we move forward and negotiate a new alliance. I’ll have to give thought to membership and acronym, but it would certainly exclude countries with no sack at all, specifically France. Hell, the cowards militarily withdrew from NATO decades ago, hoping we’d hold back the Red horde while they swept the streets of Paris for Russians on parade.

  • South Korea Moves into Third Place in Iraq

    For at least a few months.

    The much-delayed deployment of South Korea’s brigade to Iraq has gone ahead, the Defense Ministry announced Wednesday in a move that is expected to improve ties with the United States. The unit needs its mandate renewed by the National Assembly, however, to stay beyond December.

    South Korea has deployed 2,800 troops and will add 800 once the brigade has expanded its base in Erbil, in northern Iraq, the ministry said. Battalion-sized South Korean forces previously deployed in southern Iraq were absorbed into the brigade. The unit is the third-largest foreign force in the country, after the contingents from the United States and Britain.

    Look, we stood firm with South Korea for a little while, roughly over half a century and counting. They had better give us a little more of a time commitment. It’s not like we’re asking their troops to wear orange and patrol barefoot in the Sunni Triangle.

  • Website Claims Italian Women Executed in Iraq

    An Islamist website has posted a claim that the two female Italian aid workers kidnapped on Sept. 7 have been executed.

    A group calling itself the Jihad Organization says it has executed two Italian female hostages in Iraq.

    The organisation has reportedly issued a statement on an Islamist website, but the authenticity of the claim can not be confirmed.

    Referring to aid workers Simona Pari and Simona Torretta, without naming them, it says the pair were executed after the Italian government failed to pull out of Iraq.

    I posted my thoughts on how dangerous this particular kidnapping was to all involved parties. My newest prediction: do not expect videos of this terroristic barbarism to be posted anytime soon, if ever. There is absolutely no benefit to the Islamist bastards in doing so. If a video does surface, it will only confirm that we are not fighting sick, twisted wackos, but rather sick, twisted wacko morons.

    If the story of these murders is true, it will be interesting to watch Italy’s reaction, as well as that of the muslim world.

  • Why I’ll Never Be Allowed to Ask Kerry Questions

    Now that Kerry has once again recast himself as the doubting, wrong-war-wrong-place candidate, blaming Bush for his statements on the progress of the war, here are the questions to which would I demand answers:

    • Are we at war?

      • If the answer was “no,” I would cut off the interview and call him an idiot. If yes, I would proceed.

    • Of our past wartime presidents, whom do you view as successful?
    • Of these successful wartime presidents, how many accurately and immediately reported to the American people every difficulty and setback, as you currently seem to expect of the Bush administration?
    • Of these same administrations, how many accurately foretold and dealt with every danger and complexity of their wartime and postwar situations, as you currently seem to expect of the Bush administration?
    • Other than bailing out of the current war, how can you assure the American public that every wartime decision you make will be above reproach, as you currently seem to expect of the Bush administration?
    • If you do bail out of the current war, how can you assure the American public that the dangers of expansionistic Islamic terrorism will not have a greater impact on their children and grandchildren than would’ve been the case had we fought the good fight now? Other than the fact you were in Viet Nam?
    • Do you plan to utilize the fact that you were on the wrong side of history in the Cold War, advocating a unilateral freeze instead of Reagan’s military build-up, during the last portion of your campaign?
    • What will you do if, after all of your diplomacy, negotiation and nuance to get your planned international assistance, our alleged “allies” still say no? What if, no matter what you do, they freakin’ still say no?

      • And finally,

    • How long until you, the defeatist, repeat the last-man-to-die-for-a-mistake line? You do realize early voting opens soon in some states, right?

    Please, some journalist of importance or access, pretty please follow this line of questioning. If you need help for potential follow-up questions, let me know at gunner-at-targetcentermass-dot-com. I’ll help you, if only to salvage the concepts of journalistic integrity that Rather,et al., have thoroughly shamed.