Posted on 03/15/2004 10:11:14 AM PST by Liz
Spain's prime minister-elect, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, vowed to withdraw troops from Iraq and criticised US President George W. Bush after Spanish voters ousted the government that dragged their country into the controversial war.
"The war in Iraq was a disaster, the occupation of Iraq is a disaster," Zapatero, 43, told Cadena Ser radio Monday.
His Socialist Party on Sunday dealt the conservative Popular Party (PP) of outgoing Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar a surprise defeat in general elections coloured by last Thursday's bombings of crowded Madrid commuter trains that killed 200 people and wounded 1,500.
An ongoing investigation into the attacks has found growing evidence they were carried out by Islamic extremists linked to Al-Qaeda as punishment for Spain's help in the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
An undersecretary in the US Department of Homeland Security, Asa Hutchinson, told NBC television Monday: "I'm satisfied that there is an Al-Qaeda connection."
Spain's Socialists won 43 percent of the ballots to 38 percent for the PP, largely because of the near-total public opposition to the war, Zapatero said.
Turnout was a high 77 percent, reflecting the strong emotions in the aftermath of the attacks.
Many voters had expressed anger at Aznar, who had previously announced he was retiring after the elections. He was jostled and booed at Sunday while some protesters shouted "Aznar: your war, our dead."
Zapatero, making good on an pre-election pledge, said that barring new developments in Iraq before June 30 -- the date the United States has promised to hand power over to an Iraqi provisional government -- Spain's 1,300 troops in Iraq "will return home".
The other occupying states will be contacted for consultations on withdrawing the soldiers, he said.
The announcement sparked alarm among other countries which had contributed troops to the US occupation.
A spokesman for British Prime Minister Tony Blair said in London Blair had phoned Zapatero for a "warm and friendly" chat that covered "a wide range of topics". The two agreed to meet in about six weeks' time, when Zapatero takes office.
Blair, like Aznar, saw public support evaporate after he committed his country to the US war on Iraq in defiance of widespread public opposition.
US President George W. Bush also made a congratulatory phone call.
An analyst at London's Royal Institute of International Affairs, Chris Wright, said that, though Spain's contingent was only a fraction of the occupying forces, the pressure would now be on other contributing nations.
The pull-out could be "an indication perhaps that the coalition is beginning to weaken, possibly unravel."
Zapatero firmly aligned himself with France and Germany, which opposed the war from the start, in calling the invasion an "error".
Spain's contingent, the sixth-largest in Iraq, has suffered 11 deaths, including those of seven intelligence agents ambushed in November.
Bush and Blair, both of whom are facing elections in coming months, need to engage in "self-criticism," Zapatero said.
"You can't bomb a people" over a perceived threat, Zapatero said in comments coming five days before the first anniversary of the March 20 start of the war.
"You can't organise a war on the basis of lies," he said, alluding to Bush's and Blair's insistence the war was justified by their belief -- so far unfounded -- that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction that posed an imminent threat.
"Wars such as that which has occurred in Iraq only allow hatred, violence and terror to proliferate," he said.
The head of the EU executive arm, European Commission chief Romano Prodi, agreed, in an interview published by Italy's La Stampa newspaper Monday.
"It is clear that using force is not the answer to resolving the conflict with terrorists," Prodi said. "Terrorism is infinitely more powerful than a year ago," and all of Europe now feels threatened, he told the paper.
The investigation into the Madrid blasts suggested Al-Qaeda may have made good on a threat issued October 18 by Osama bin Laden that Spain, Australia, Britain, Italy and other US allies would be targeted for attacks.
Spanish authorities were working to authenticate a video found in a Madrid rubbish bin late Saturday in which a man claiming to be Al-Qaeda's spokesman in Europe said the Islamic radical network was responsible.
"We claim responsibility for what happened in Madrid exactly two and a half years after the attacks in New York and Washington," said the man, speaking Arabic with a Moroccan accent.
"This is an answer to your cooperation with the Bush criminals and their allies," he said, threatening more attacks.
Five suspects -- three Moroccans and two Indians -- were being held in connection to the bombings. One of the Moroccans figured on a list of suspected members of an Al-Qaeda cell in Spain.
Stock markets in Europe fell back on the spectre of Al-Qaeda involvement, and the dollar slipped.
France has proposed an emergency meeting of EU foreign ministers to coordinate Europe's response to terrorism, while Germany has suggested a meeting of EU security officials to draft a "common assessment" of terrorism risks.
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About 600 Coalition dead vs. 6,500 Iraqi dead. Saddam Hussein captured. 45 out of 55 of the Iraq Government captured or killed (including all 4 'aces'). 22 million people now free from a tyrannical government. "UN Oil-for-Food Program" exposed for the giant embezzlement and money laundering scheme that it was.
He's right... it was a disaster... for the Hussein regime and his UN appeasers.
Reality sucks.
This is the Eurosnot response to terrorism: "Please please please don't hurt us. We promise we won't ally ourselves with the US."
No, Mr. Zapatero, YOU'RE the disaster! The Spanish people do not know that yet but they will shortly!
Sadly, even if Spain does turn about face the damage is done. The terrorists have been handed what they can, regardless of future events, consider and trumpet as a victory. Even if not one Spanish soldier leaves Iraq a day earlier than he would had the government not changed hands, the actions of Spanish voters have virtually guaranteed more bombings in the not to distant future.
Belmont Club
History and history in the making
Monday, March 15, 2004
Dark Night of Spirit 2
There's an old saying that one should be careful of wishes because they might come true. The capitulation of Spain to Al Qaeda's terrorist offensive may momentarily gladden the Eurosocialists -- but only momentarily. Eurosocialism is ironically premised on a wall of free security, traditionally provided by the United States, behind which they can pursue utopianism. But the practical effect of the Socialist victory will be to open Europe's southern borders to more terrorist infiltration. First, the Socialist leader Zapatero is unlikely to pursue an agressive anti-terrorist policy. He will begin by withdrawing Spanish forces from Iraq. Second, the events of March 3 and the subsequent election have divided Spain as no other event in recent history and has created all manner of political cracks through which an ill-wind may whistle. Third, Spanish access to US intelligence will inevitably be degraded. It will not be cut off, but it will not be what it was.
These circumstances create an objective weakening in the Continental defensive structure. France, already at a heightened state of alert, now faces the prospect that its southern neighbor will make a separate peace with the jihadis. For while Aznar's party might have withstood another bombing, Zapatero's, after all their promises, cannot. If the Socialists cannot take their program of appeasement to its logical conclusion then they must face the very Islamic bombings which they told the electorate their election would prevent.
The appeasement which so amuses the French may not be so funny when played by the Spaniards. For Spain, in concert with America and France, shared the watch of North Africa. And since that is where many Al Qaeda have moved, as the Madrid train bombing carried out by North Africans proves, Europe will find their relative danger increased far more greatly than the Americans, who can comfortably lose the Spanish contingent in Iraq. The loss of a solid Spain, while an annoyance to America is a catastrophe for Europe. Iraq is far from America but Spain is close to France.
In the end, the very nature of the War on Terror ultimately means that Europe needs America more than America needs Europe. The global jihad means that attacks on Europe can be planned and launched from geographical locations far beyond the reach of their defense forces. That could be ignored while Europe remained convinced that it would not be targeted. But now the doubt grows. And if the contingency eventuates, neither France nor Spain have the mobility or the means to pursue their foes into the uttermost reaches of Central Asia, the deserts of Africa or the teeming stews of the Southwest Asia. That deficiency can only be addressed by a sustained program of European defense spending --- and it will not. Zapatero has cast away the very thing that he may need and which he can neither afford nor beg.
Eurosocialism, by hitching its wagon to the fortunes of militant Islam has put itself at it's mercy. That is the definition of surrender, whose fine print the Continent will soon be familiar with. A disarmed, politically correct and supine Eurosocialist society can only exist where other free men guard their borders. By dismissing the guardians and capitulating to the jihadis the Eurosocialists have struck at the very root of their own existence. Lenin once remarked that capitalists would sell him the noose he would use to hang them. But that was before Stalin poisoned him.
posted by wretchard | Permalink: 1:56 PM Zulu
Here's blogspot vitals and well worth the visit: http://belmontclub.blogspot.com/2004_03_01_belmontclub_archive.html#107908340456642781
Bush is going to get a lot of this. Maybe he should spend less time promoting outsourcing and explaining the realities of French and German actions. The Sheeple left is in full robot mode of control of French, German and Euralist economic interests.
It is clear that using force is not the answer to resolving the conflict with terrorists," Prodi said. "Terrorism is infinitely more powerful than a year ago," and all of Europe now feels threatened, he told the paper.
It is not more powerful, or less. The subjugation and liberation of Iraq is a core point for the Eurocentrics like Prodi. These are quite corrupt people, and will use any scare tactic to scare up Eurocentric sentiments. The press will continually report EU folks like Prodi as legitimately speaking for Europe. They do not care if it encourages terrorism in their enterprise. Like the left here, they are supressing understanding of the Madrid bombing to fit their pernicious purposes. (Though Chirac has chimed in, I think he understands world politics better than the lefty Cold War artefacts.)
"Europe" blinked. As with 9/11, the lefties are defining the attack to Iraq, though "AQ" says it was about Afghanistan too.
Absolutely gutless.
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