Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)

DATE=05/13/03

TYPE=U-S OPINION ROUNDUP

TITLE=IRAQI PROBLEMS MOUNT

NUMBER=6-12926

BYLINE=ANDREW GUTHRIE

DATELINE=WASHINGTON

EDITOR=ASSIGNMENTS

TELEPHONE=619-3335

CONTENT=

INTRO: With basic services still unavailable in Baghdad and presumably worse situations in the rest of the nation, editorial writers' criticism of U-S post-war planning is becoming increasingly caustic. We get a sampling now from V-O-A's ______________ in today's U-S Opinion Roundup.

TEXT: Retired diplomat L. Paul Bremer, The Third, replaces retired General Jay Garner who, though popular with Kurdish leaders, appeared to falter in rapidly stabilizing the rest of the nation. U-S diplomat Barbara Bodine, who was functioning as the de facto mayor of greater Baghdad, is also leaving.

The U-S needs to "turn things around fast," in the opinion of Minnesota's [Minneapolis] Star Tribune.

VOICE: It's still early days in Iraq, but things are not going well at the moment. And they do need to go well, for the benefit of the Iraqi people and to safeguard the stature and safety of the United States. If Iraq goes completely sour, Washington will end up with a hugely debilitating, and self-inflicted, wound. Satisfying, as that prospect might seem to many, it wouldn't be good for anyone.

Consider these developments: Conditions in Baghdad are getting worse, not getter. Gunfights are commonplace . there is no effective police force; no one appears in charge . Getting the oil pumping again also hasn't happened. . The search for the weapons of mass destruction that Washington said were in Iraq also goes badly. . it turns out . the U-S intelligence on those weapons - - developed by the Pentagon - - wasn't any good.

TEXT: Things do not look any better from a Nashville vantage point, according to The Tennessean.

VOICE: With lawlessness and violence on the rise in Baghdad, L. Paul Bremer may have arrived just in time . to assume his job as the new U-S . administrator . The appointment of the counter-terrorism expert is a very public reminder that the United States so far has not handled peace in Iraq with quite the same skill the military demonstrated during the war. . To its credit, the administration now concedes the task of restoring order is far more difficult than officials envisioned.

TEXT: In the Pacific Northwest, Portland's Oregonian agrees.

VOICE: The United States didn't want to occupy Iraq. The optimistic plan was to liberate, not occupy; to overthrow a government without conquering the Iraqis. But under that plan . Iraqis haven't been safe. Civil disorder and crime govern . Baghdad. The Iraqi people are learning to associate Western liberation with personal danger and social chaos. . Every day that chaos rules, the price tag for rebuilding goes up.

TEXT: Wisconsin's Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel has this criticism of the outgoing overseer's style.

VOICE: Although he used to be an Army general, [Mr.] Garner spent much of his time in a virtual foxhole in Baghdad. He and his staff have lived behind razor wire and machine gun nests in one of Saddam Hussein's palaces, isolated from and arguably out of touch with the Iraqi people they were supposed to be preparing for self-rule. .American civilian and military officials seem to have planned for Hussein's ouster more carefully and expertly than for governing the country after his fall.

TEXT: In Georgia, Atlanta's big Journal-Constitution has similar words for what it sees as the embarrassing, post-combat failure, suggesting:

VOICE: . a simple change of leadership, while important, will not be sufficient. The professional and well-planned invasion of Iraq has been followed by a halfhearted, timid and terribly planned occupation. . U-S military teams searching for evidence of weapons of mass destruction have encountered almost no site that hadn't already been ransacked or looted . At the Al Tuwaitha Nuclear Research Center - - a site the United States knew well - - looters for weeks had unlimited access to almost two tons of radioactive material, some of which is now missing [and] . might now be in other hands.

TEXT: With those ominous words, we conclude this sampling of the latest editorial criticism of how the U-S is administering Iraq.

NEB/ANG/MAR