Schroeder should quit to heal ties - U.S. adviser

Reuters ^ | October 01, 2002

[eabinga]

BERLIN, Oct 1 (Reuters) - A Pentagon adviser was quoted as saying on Tuesday that the best thing German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder could do to ease strained relations with Washington over Iraq would be to quit.

"It would be best if he (Schroeder) resigned. But he's obviously not going to do that," Pentagon adviser Richard Perle said in an interview with Wednesday's Handelsblatt daily, released ahead of publication.

U.S. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has said relations have been poisoned by strident German criticism of U.S. policy towards Iraq during the recent election campaign. Schroeder's anti-war rhetoric is credited with helping him win re-election.

Perle, a leading voice in U.S. efforts to oust Saddam Hussein, told Handelsblatt that Schroeder's stance on Iraq would set back Berlin's desire to win a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council "for a generation".

"I have never seen a relationship between two close partners be so quickly and so badly damaged as it has been by Schroeder's election campaign," said Perle, chairman of the Pentagon's Defense Policy Board, an advisory panel.

Perle told Handelsblatt that he was expressing his private opinion. His comments contrast with recent statements from the White House indicating a thaw in relations with Berlin.

President George W. Bush is lobbying for an international green light to attack Iraq, saying Iraqi President Saddam Hussein should be removed because he is trying to build an arsenal of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons.

Germany's relations with Washington were strained further at the end of the election campaign when then-Justice Minister Herta Daeubler-Gmelin allegedly linked Bush to Hitler. She subsequently resigned.

[Catspaw]

Gee, Richard, tell us how you really feel.

[Cacophonous]

Geez...I would hate to think that the people that lead us would have thicker skins than this. So some Kraut said some nasty things...instead of whining and throwing a fit, Bush's handlers/advisors (note I'm specifically not including Bush in this, because I haven't heard him say anything on the topic) should just shrug and ignore it. Crying about it only makes it worse.

[glorgau]

If schroeder doesn't quit, is the CIA going to change his name to Salvador Allende?

How arrogant of anyone in the goverment to even sugest that the head of state of a friend resign. the Bush administration is getting awful thin skinned about this stuff. Its all just sticks and stones.

[section9]

Oh, come on. Schroeder came in last April and told Bush that he'd back him on Iraq, but not publicly. He couldn't afford to. He had a tough campaign coming up and he needed to keep the Greens happy and his own left wing. Then, when he got in trouble, the sumbitch turned out to be a liar and started hammering the United States, claiming that Germany would not "click its heels" and obey.

The problem with your analysis, such as it is, is that we never asked the Germans for anything. We are pissed, and justifiably so, that Schroeder played the anti-American card.

Now Perle is a private citizen. He has just as much right to ask for Schroeder to resign as any ass-clown on DU has to demand Bush's resignation. It's a free country.

And Salvador Allende is still dead as a doornail.

Be Seeing You,

Chris