Posted on 09/23/2002 7:41:14 AM PDT by Tumbleweed_Connection
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld on Monday criticized the anti-U.S. tone of Germany's elections, saying it had the effect of "poisoning" U.S. relations with a longtime ally. "I have no comment on the German elections outcome, but I would have to say that the way it was conducted was notably unhelpful," Rumsfeld told reporters after meeting with President Aleksander Kwasneiwski in the presidential palace. "And as the White House indicated, has had the effect of poisoning the relationship."
Rumsfeld apparently was referring to comments published Saturday in The Financial Times newspaper by Condoleezza Rice, President Bush's national security adviser. She was quoted as saying that the alleged comment by Germany's minister of justice comparing Bush to Adolf Hitler had created a "poisoned" atmosphere.
U.S. officials also were disturbed by Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's emphatic opposition to American military action to oust Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
Rumsfeld said he had no plan to meet with Germany's defense minister during NATO meetings in Warsaw on Tuesday and Wednesday. Rumsfeld will be meeting with several other NATO counterparts.
In his talks with the Polish president, Rumsfeld said the subject of Iraq came up in the context of pressing the U.N. Security Council to enforce U.N. resolutions on Iraqi disarmament. He said it would be "not on the mark" to suggest the United States was planning to intervene in Iraq by itself.
Appearing with Rumsfeld after his meeting with the president, Marek Siwiec, the minister of the bureau of national security, did not say explicitly whether Poland would support U.S. military action against Iraq.
"We are a very steadfast ally," Siwiec said.
On Sunday, Rumsfeld told reporters that the target of a U.S. military attack on Iraq would be Saddam Hussein's narrow power base, not the country's civilian infrastructure.
Interviewed en route to Poland, Rumsfeld refused to discuss any details of U.S. war planning. He blasted those who have leaked such information as poorly informed people whose talk puts the lives of American troops at risk.
Rumsfeld was meeting on Monday with Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski, Prime Minister Leszek Miller and Defense Minister Jerzy Szmajdzinkski as a prelude to two days of talks with his counterparts from 18 other NATO countries.
Poland joined NATO in 1999 and is playing host to the alliance for the first time.
Rumsfeld's comment about the broad aims of a war against Iraq - which President Bush has not yet approved - suggested that any U.S. military action would look much different that the 1991 Persian Gulf War. The goal then was to expel Iraqi forces from Kuwait rather than break Saddam's grip on power.
"I have said, and the president has said, that the small group of people that run Iraq and have run it for a good many years have repressed the people, and in a very real sense the people of that country are hostages to a small group of dictatorial, repressive government officials," he said.
"The United States hasn't, and never has had, any problem with the Iraqi people."
Referring to news reports that any U.S. military attack on Iraq that is designed to topple Saddam's regime would seek to avoid inflicting extensive damage on the nation's infrastructure, Rumsfeld said:
"They're saying the obvious. Obviously no one would want to harm the people of that country. We favor the people of that country. But what the president will decide to do is entirely in the future."
The White House acknowledged on Saturday that the Pentagon delivered to Bush in early September a detailed set of military options for action against Iraq. Officials said the options would be refined further in the weeks ahead and that Bush had made no decision to go to war.
The NATO meetings Tuesday and Wednesday are to address several institutional matters, including plans for adding new member countries, preparing for a meeting of NATO heads of government in November, streamlining NATO's command structure, improving ties with Russia, and considering a U.S. proposal for creating an always-on-call NATO force for short-notice operations.
Also on the agenda at the NATO meeting Tuesday is the search for a successor to NATO member Turkey as leader of the international security assistance force that is keeping order in Kabul. Turkey's commitment expires in December. Rumsfeld wants another European country, possibly Germany, to take over.
Someone should ask the former Warsaw Pact nations if they still want Germany.
I wouldn't be surprised to find German representatives cooling their heels in the waitingroom of the corridors of power for the next several years.
Also, the German people are really going to miss out on any rebuilding efforts that take place as a result of Saddam leaving power.
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I suspect they have sold billions of dollars worth of chemical and biological weapons to Iraq and would prefer we not make that information public for all the world to see.
Not only that, but the Polish are very warm, genuine and industrious, hard-working people by nature. In those ways, quite similar to our friends in Turkey. OTOH, the German Greens are Schroeder's facilitators. They both seem to have remarkably short memories.
Michael
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