LRB | Eliot Weinberger : What I heard about Iraq in 2005

This piece from the London Review of Books terrific. It's a month by month compendium on all the contradictory statements made about Iraq. It clearly sets out the lies, the confusion, and the brutality of the entire enterprise. Read the whole thing. 

Eliot Weinberger : What I heard about Iraq in 2005.

I heard that, along with banning photographs of the caskets of American soldiers, the administration was actively preventing photographs being taken of the wounded, who were flown in from Iraq late at night, transferred to military hospitals in unmarked vans, and unloaded at back entrances.

I heard about despair. I heard General John Abizaid, commander of US Central Command, say of the insurgents: ‘I don’t think that they’re growing. I think that they’re desperate.’

I heard about hope. I heard General Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, say: ‘I came away more positive than I’ve ever been. I think we’re getting some momentum built up.’

I heard about happiness. I heard Lieutenant General James Mattis say that ‘it’s a lot of fun to fight’ in Iraq. I heard him say: ‘You know, it’s a hell of a hoot. I like brawling.’

I heard that Donald Rumsfeld had created his own intelligence agency, the Strategic Support Branch, ‘designed to operate without detection and under the defense secretary’s direct control’, without the oversight laws that apply to the CIA, and that it was employing ‘notorious figures’ whose ‘links to the US government would be embarrassing if disclosed’. I heard about the practice of ‘extraordinary rendition’, by which suspected terrorists are kidnapped and flown to countries known to torture prisoners, or to secret US prisons in Thailand, Afghanistan, Poland and Romania.