Posted on 02/23/2007 4:17:08 AM PST by shrinkermd
In his latest remarkable political reincarnation, onetime U.S. favorite Ahmed Chalabi has secured a position inside the Iraqi government that could help determine whether the Bush administration's new push to secure Baghdad succeeds.
In a new post created earlier this year, Mr. Chalabi will serve as an intermediary between Baghdad residents and the Iraqi and U.S. security forces mounting an aggressive counterinsurgency campaign across the city. The position is meant to help Iraqis arrange reimbursement for damage to their cars and homes caused by the security sweeps in the hope of maintaining public support for the strategy.
Mr. Chalabi's writ is supposed to be limited mainly to security, according to aides to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, but he is already speaking ambitiously about playing a larger role in economic, health and reconstruction efforts as well. In his new capacity, Mr. Chalabi answers directly to Mr. Maliki and is already taking part in weekly planning meetings with senior American officials such as Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad and Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. military commander in Iraq.
Mr. Chalabi's position was created as part of a broad push by Mr. Maliki's government to capitalize on any positive momentum created by the addition of 21,500 additional American forces to Iraq, of which some 3,000 have arrived so far. In the weeks after President Bush disclosed his plans to "surge" additional forces to Iraq, Mr. Maliki created five new government committees charged with making the plan work on the ground. They include panels focused on economic development, the restoration of basic services such as electricity, and, in Mr. Chalabi's case, the critical task of maintaining public backing for the initiative.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
It's back...blech!
Still have the old Chalabi ping list?
J
He is like a cockroach, he just won't stay dead.
Had we followed some of his advice during the Bremer era, we would be farther ahead.
I thought he was left for (politicially) dead at least twice already.
Had we not put him as the head of the de-Baathification commission, we would have been further ahead. That isn't my problem with him. My problem with him is that he will do anything and get in bed with anyone for money and political power.
Isn't that the problem with almost all muslims?
LOL. That's what you call a politician. I actually think de-baathafication, in the long run was a good thing. Not necessarily at the Janitor/clerk level, but certainly at the military level. The Kurds and Shia would not accept anything less. And when we leave, they will have the best army in the ME.
The Maliki government is undoing de-Baathification and will let everyone back from Iraqi Army generals to Saddam's secret police. The US is offering huge signing bonuses to ex-Army officers that sign up.
http://www.azzaman.com/english/index.asp?fname=news%5C2007-02-22%5Ckurd1.htm
http://www.iraqslogger.com/index.php/post/1517/UnDeBaathification
Last I heard, he was in London.
They are eligible for rehire. But they had to be purged. I'm unwavering in the belief that you had to start from scratch. Like I said, no way the Kurds or the Shia would have had it any other way
I don't believe that at all. The US when it came it could have done whatever it wanted. Kept the Iraqi Army and police in place and given over the country to a secular Shia Army officer or a secular Shia strongman in exile like Allawi and the average Kurd or Shia would have been happy.
The religious leadership in Najaf can go sit on a nail.
That said it is water under the bridge at this point.
That's good. You think bad guys infiltrating the police and army has been bad these past couple of years? Sorry, that would not have worked. The trust would have been absolutely zero after the first baathist officer assisinated someone.
Yes. under the bridge.
Chalabi is a top notch shyster. I'm not suprised that he's finally oozed out from whichever rock he was under, and slithered back into the limelight.
No more or less a "shyster" than al-maliki or half the other politicians there. And someone who had Al-sitani's ear, BTW.
Four years too late.
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