Polish Major killed in Iraq, Bush democracy call ( 2003-11-07 09:17) (Agencies)
Guerrillas shot and killed a Polish army officer
south of Baghdad on Thursday, the first soldier to die from a multi-national
division set up to relieve the pressure on U.S. forces trying to stabilize Iraq.
In Washington, U.S. President Bush demanded democracy and liberty in the
Middle East -- naming even close ally Egypt -- in his latest bid to justify the
war in Iraq which ousted Saddam Hussein as necessary to foster democracy.
Echoing Bush's theme, influential Pentagon adviser Richard Perle, an
architect of the Iraq war, blasted Iran as "up to its eyeballs in terrorism" and
said it was no surprise that what he called foreign terrorists were crossing
into Iraq to fight U.S.-led forces.
"Success in Iraq is a threat to every tyrannical regime in the region, and
they understand that," Perle said in a speech in Berlin.
Bush's call for greater Middle East democracy was met with scorn by some Arab
commentators, however. They accused him of ignoring Israel's control of
Palestinian territory, as well as launching war against Iraq.
The death of the Polish officer in Iraq came as Britain's top envoy to
Baghdad warned of a "rough winter" ahead in the face of increasingly bold
guerrilla violence.
The Pentagon began alerting tens of thousands of U.S. troops for Iraq duty
next year, although officers hope to cut the total number of U.S. soldiers in
the country by May.
The American military, which has borne the lion's share of casualties in the
task force it leads in Iraq, said on Thursday two more of its soldiers had been
killed.
Attackers firing guns and rocket-propelled grenades killed one U.S. soldier
and wounded two others in an ambush south of Baghdad on Wednesday evening, U.S.
Central Command said.
That attack brought to 139 the number of U.S. soldiers killed in action since
Washington declared on May 1 that major combat was over in the war that ousted
Saddam.
U.S. SOLDIER KILLED IN MINE BLAST
Another U.S. soldier was killed on Thursday morning when his truck struck a
land mine near the border with Syria, the Army said. It was not clear whether
the mine was placed there by guerrillas or was part of security measures at the
border.
The Polish major was killed after assailants opened fire on his convoy on
Thursday morning and shot him in the neck as he traveled between two military
camps, the Defense Ministry in Warsaw said. He died later from his wound.
In his foreign policy address to the National Endowment for Democracy, Bush
challenged Iran and Syria by name as well as Egypt to adopt democracy, and vowed
Washington would not support Arab states that rejected liberty.
The United States has accused both Syria and Iran of not doing enough to
close their borders to what Washington calls terrorists crossing into Iraq to
join the anti-U.S. fight.
Bush also declared a failure of past U.S. policy spanning 60 years in support
of Middle East governments mot devoted to political freedom.
Khaled al-Maeena, editor-in-chief of the English-language Arab News daily in
Saudi Arabia, asked how Bush could call for greater freedom while ignoring
Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories.
Shibley Telhami, a Middle East expert at the University of Maryland in the
United States, said Bush's biggest problem was that three years into his term of
office Arabs simply did not trust him.
"When you don't trust the salesman, you don't trust the product, even if it's
a good one," Telhami said.
Suicide bombings in Baghdad, rocket attacks on its headquarters and daily
ambushes on its troops have made the past few weeks particularly tough for
Iraq's occupying coalition.
"I believe we are in for a rough winter," Sir Jeremy Greenstock, Britain's
Special Representative to Iraq, was quoted as saying in Britain's Times
newspaper on Thursday.
He said insurgents "want to try and close Baghdad down and make it look as
though Iraq can't work with coalition forces," and added that British troops
could still be in Iraq in 2005.
PRESSURE ON BUSH
The mounting U.S. death toll and failure to find any weapons of mass
destruction have put pressure on Bush, who will seek re-election next year.
The United Nations announced on Thursday it had withdrawn the last of its 20
foreign staff from Baghdad, but about 40 international employees still remained
in northern Iraq.
The move followed the suicide bombing last week of Red Cross headquarters and
three police stations in the capital in which at least 34 people died, and the
devastating attack on the U.N. Baghdad headquarters on August 19 in which 22
people were killed.
Defense officials in Washington said on Thursday the Pentagon had begun to
alert 43,000 U.S. Reserve and National Guard troops and around 20,000 Marines to
prepare for duty in Iraq next year as part of a force rotation.
They said the Pentagon expected to cut the U.S. military presence in Iraq to
about 105,000 by spring from the current 132,000 level.
A spokesman for Paul Bremer, head of Iraq's U.S.-led administration, said he
was open to the creation of a new Iraqi force to help root out guerrillas and
foreign militants.
But Bremer wanted to ensure such a force was not controlled by Iraqi
political factions, was integrated into existing command structures and worked
in coordination with U.S.-led troops, the spokesman said.
