Comming Down with Something

Feel the onslaught of a cold comming on and so I'm back home and preparing for an early beddy time. However, before that I thought I would bash out a few words on cyberspace so that I would get my oppinionated points across in the most hideous of ways.

Anyway, today was fairly productive. Didn't make myself an instant millionaire nor did I become so wonderfully attractive to the opposite sex that I was innundated with indecent proposals for a whole load on unknown women.

Chao Peh of the Edge finally interviewed Howard of 3M on RFID technologies at 3M. Was a good interview and Chao Peh was, as always his usual decent self. He asked the question and got detailed answers, which I hope will make a decent story for the client.

Another Sunday, Quiet Sunday

It's another quiet Sunday, a Sunday that I spent most of the time catching up on some sleep and making a point of trying to get the rest that I usually don't get during the week. It's been something of a non-event in life, one of those signs that I'm turning a little senile, perhaps, perchance something that the rest of the world has wanted for me.

Am now writing a few items for some PR projects. As usual, work is there but cash flow is not happening quite yet. Not something to shout about but at least something is moving along and things will hopefully turn out for the better in the next few days.

Still, the entire day was not wasted in slumber land. I managed to churn out an article for Arab News about the recent annoucement that the USA will be sending some more 20,000 troops. I think its what you call the perpetual American obsession with size and the idea that being bigger is always better.

 Its like men with big slongs who automatically assume that they're going to make good lovers but end up forgetting that being a good lover involves more than just shoving it inside. You could call George Bush that type of man who thinks its all about the size of his schlong and forgets the importance of using the tounge and fingers (Uncle Richard used to tell me that the dick's only function was to ejaculate )  Look at his Iraq policy, all he does is to shove more troops to Iraq in the hope that something will happen. He's forgotten about basic things like trying to win over the local population through hearts and minds. I fear that those poor US troops are going to end up as cannon fodder for the nut bars in Iraq and the world will, instead of being safer from terrorism become even more prone to terrorist attacks as guys like Al-Qaeda and the Mahdi army feed of resentment caused by American bombs.

In the world of click button information and hardware, history is confined to the waste bin of the humanities department tought in schools. That's such a pitty because history actually teaches us alot of things. History provides us with a wealth of information about politics and success in politics.

Take the Invasion of Iraq. Did the  Cheerleading Draft Dodgers think that the rest of the world welcome their boys into their homes with open arms? I think not! It was like just walking into Iraq and expecting everything to be just OK. Oooopppps, the "Rag Heads" thought otherwise and started shooting back at them. A real man in the White House would have understood that military power has to be backed up by something else. - Look at World War II, a situation where American military power saved the world. This was followed up by Marshal Aid to Europe and the rebuilding of Japan. Today, nobody imagines Europe or Japan becomming threats to world peace. Europe and Japan's current economic power is not a threat to America but it helps America maintain economic stability in the world.

Iraq has beed different. From the moment those Draft Dodgers entered Bagdahd, they've made a hash of things and done nothing but rob and steal from Iraqi people. If they've achieved anything, its to make Sadam Hussein look like a dignified leader of men and the Mullah's of Iran look like sensible, rational and reasonable. Seriously, read any interview with Iranian President Ahmadinajad and you have an articulate and intelligent man. Press makes a point of saying that he's the son of a blacksmith. What they forget to point out is that next to George Bush, who is an MBA (I think it was from Harvard Business School ) the Iranian President looks like a fellow at Cambridge. Its no wonder why the Western Media needs to mistranslate the quote and claim that he threatened to "Wipe Israel from the face of the earth." - More accurately he quoted Khomani who argued that Israel would dissapear and he was not reffering to the Jewish people but to the Zionist and Anti-Semitic lot that run Israel. But hey, that's ok for them. I suppose there's nothing else to do except slander and twist the other guys words to suit you, especially when your guy has the intelligence level of a two-year old donkey. - Its a crazy world that's for sure!    

 

THE REAL REASON THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION WON'T BACK DOWN ON GUANTANAMO.

Another Excellent article from the guys at Slate. It really outlines how the war on terror has in reality been more about a grab for power than actually stoping terror. .

By Dahlia Lithwick
Posted Saturday, Jan. 13, 2007, at 6:52 AM ET

Why is the United States poised to try Jose Padilla as a dangerous terrorist, long after it has become perfectly clear that he was just the wrong Muslim in the wrong airport on the wrong day?

Why is the United States still holding hundreds of detainees at Guantanamo Bay, long after years of interrogation and abuse have established that few, if any, of them are the deadly terrorists they have been held out to be?

And why is President Bush still issuing grandiose and provocative signing statements, the latest of which claims that the executive branch holds the power to open mail as it sees fit?

Willing to give the benefit of the doubt, I once believed the common thread here was presidential blindness—an extreme executive-branch myopia that leads the president to believe that these futile little measures are somehow integral to combating terrorism. That this is some piece of self-delusion that precludes Bush and his advisers from recognizing that Padilla is just a chump and Guantanamo merely a holding pen for a jumble of innocent and half-guilty wretches.

But it has finally become clear that the goal of these foolish efforts isn't really to win the war against terrorism; indeed, nothing about Padilla, Guantanamo, or signing statements moves the country an inch closer to eradicating terror. The object is a larger one, and the original overarching goal of this administration: expanding executive power, for its own sake.

Two scrupulously reported pieces on the Padilla case are illuminating. On Jan. 3, Nina Totenberg of National Public Radio interviewed Mark Corallo, spokesman for then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, about the behind-the-scenes decision-making in the Padilla case—a case that's lolled through the federal courts for years. According to Totenberg, when the Supreme Court sent Padilla's case back to the lower federal courts on technical grounds in 2004, the Bush administration's sole concern was preserving its constitutional claim that it could hold citizens as enemy combatants. "Justice Department officials warned that if the case went back to the Supreme Court, the administration would almost certainly lose," she reports, which is why Padilla was hauled back to the lower courts. Her sources further confirmed that "key players in the Defense Department and Vice President Cheney's office insisted that the power to detain Americans as enemy combatants had to be preserved."

Deborah Sontag's excellent New York Times story on Padilla on Jan. 4 makes the same point: He was moved from military custody to criminal court only as "a legal maneuver that kept the issue of his detention without charges out of the Supreme Court." So this is why the White House yanked Padilla from the brig to the high court to the federal courts and back to a Florida trial court: They were only forum shopping for the best place to enshrine the right to detain him indefinitely. Their claims about Padilla's dirty bomb, known to be false, were a means of advancing their larger claims about executive power. And when confronted with the possibility of losing on those claims, they yanked him back to the criminal courts as a way to avoid losing powers they'd already won.

This need to preserve newly won legal ground also explains the continued operation of the detention center at Guantanamo Bay. Last week marked the fifth anniversary of the camp that—according to Donald Rumsfeld in 2002—houses only "the worst of the worst." Now that over half of them have been released (apparently, the best of the worst) and even though only about 80 of the rest will ever see trials, the camp remains open. Why? Civil-rights groups worldwide and even close U.S. allies like Germany, Denmark, and England clamor for its closure. And as the ever-vigilant Nat Hentoff points out, new studies reveal that only a small fraction of the detainees there are even connected to al-Qaida—according to the Defense Department's own best data.

But Guantanamo stays open for the same reason Padilla stays on trial. Having claimed the right to label enemy combatants and detain them indefinitely without charges, the Bush administration is unable to retreat from that position without ceding ground. In some sense, the president is now as much a prisoner of Guantanamo as the detainees. And having gone nose-to-nose with the Congress over his authority to craft stripped-down courts for these "enemies," courts guaranteed to produce guilty verdicts, Bush cannot just call off the trials.

The endgame in the war on terror isn't holding the line against terrorists. It's holding the line on hard-fought claims to absolutely limitless presidential authority.

Enter these signing statements. The most recent of the all-but-meaningless postscripts Bush tacks onto legislation gives him the power to "authorize a search of mail in an emergency" to ''protect human life and safety" and "for foreign intelligence collection." There is some debate about whether the president has that power already, but it misses the point. The purpose of these signing statements is simply to plant a flag on the moon—one more way for the president to stake out the furthest corners in his field of constitutional dreams.

Last spring, The New Yorker's Jane Mayer profiled David Addington, Vice President Richard Cheney's chief of staff and legal adviser. Addington's worldview in brief: A single-minded devotion to something called the New Paradigm, a constitutional theory of virtually limitless executive power, wherein "the President, as Commander-in-Chief, has the authority to disregard virtually all previously known legal boundaries, if national security demands it," Mayer describes.

Insiders in the Bush administration told Mayer that Addington and Cheney had been "laying the groundwork" for a vast expansion of presidential power long before 9/11. In 2002, the vice president told ABC News that the presidency was "weaker today as an institution because of the unwise compromises that have been made over the last 30 to 35 years." Rebuilding that presidency has been their sole goal for decades.

The image of Addington scrutinizing "every bill before President Bush signs it, searching for any language that might impinge on Presidential power," as Mayer puts it, can be amusing—like the mother of the bride obsessing over a tricky seating chart. But this zeal to restore an all-powerful presidency traps the Bush administration in its own worst legal sinkholes. This newfound authority—to maintain a disastrous Guantanamo, to stage rights-free tribunals and hold detainees forever—is the kind of power Nixon only dreamed about. It cannot be let go.

In a heartbreaking letter from Guantanamo this week, published in the Los Angeles Times, prisoner Jumah Al Dossari writes: "The purpose of Guantanamo is to destroy people, and I have been destroyed." I fear he is wrong. The destruction of Al Dossari, Jose Padilla, Zacarias Moussaoui, and some of our most basic civil liberties was never a purpose or a goal—it was a mere byproduct. The true purpose is more abstract and more tragic: To establish a clunky post-Watergate dream of an imperial presidency, whatever the human cost may be.
A version of this piece appeared in the Washington Post Outlook section.

 

 

Something to say for saying it out loud

It was what you could call a rather quiet day. Woke up late. Had a bite to eat. Went down town to meet with Allan. Helped him to buy a new phone. Helped Luke finish some wine. Went to Azmi's wedding with the Finns and had more to drink, including a traditional Finnish Wedding drink and then sent the boys to the airport where we finished a bottle of wine between us and they had a beer before getting onto the plane back to the land of the never rising sun.

In short, you could say that it was a day where nothing much happened. A day of utter nothing with the exception of having a bit more wine than usual. It's got me wondering, has life become more usual than usual? In my efforts to become a simple person, life's become more complicated and the mind is usually in a twirl of what nots?

Wedding was good. Food was really good. Had spectacular roast beef, scalop salad and a load of cream puffs. My body is not going to like this as it puts on the extra padding. But it did help me to withstand the larger than usual ammounts of alcohol that I was consuming.

Anyway, it seems that US President George Bush's favourite actor is Chuck Noris and his second favourite is Sylvestor Stallone. No wonder why his foreign policy is the way it is, ex-wimp trying to make up his "tough guy" times. OK, Chuck Noris is a genuine martial arts champion, but he's an awful actor, totally wodden and brings the - "Let's go in and kick their asses" persona to the screen in the most corny of ways. - Bush must have been having a fantasy that his decision to invade Iraq would work out like "Walker - Texas Ranger." - Well-it obviously ain't working out like he thought it would have.

It's quite funny how this US Administration has billed itself as a "War Administration." They're all trying to live a fantasy of being able to project power abroad, showing the world that if you don't fall into their line of thinking you will get squashed by their military might. - The funny thing is - NOBODY, in the Bush Administration has actually never seen combat of any form. These guys billed their predecessor as a "Draft Dodger" but at least Bill Clinton opposed the Vietnam War in a somewhat honourable fashion. Bush on the other hand was not just a NATIONAL GUARD's Man but in the AIR NATIONAL GUARD and couldn't even attend those seriously because he was AWOL most of the time. - Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfwitz at al were also draft dodgers who didn't have the guts to serve their country as young men but now spew crap about serving your nation when neither they nor thier children will see military action.

In the 6-years that this administration has been around, I've come to think that it's such a pitty that military people have been trained to become subordinate to civilians. There is, I believe a case where Generals should have the right to refuse certain courses demanded of them by their civilian supperiors - particularly those who avoided going into the military when they were required to.

Rain Rain Please

Saturday, its raining and I've got to go out for a wedding, which means I'm in the penguin suit and in my attempts to look vaguely elegant, I'll end up looking wet, silly and rather comical and unlike Richard Pryor, Gene Wilder et al, I won't get paid to look like a clown on a lolly pop. So this is a case of rain-rain please bugger off for the next few hours.

Anyway, had dinner with the Finns and Azmi last night. Had Naan at the Pakistani place on the junction of Deskar and Serangoon Rd. The guys were really thrilled to try the Naan, I think this is the first time in a while that they've sat down and had a meal like this. Then they ran into Bijay who was on his way home after a day at work and in his shop. Now, we all have a plan to sell Bijay in Finland to chubby Finnish girls (We're talking about a man, the only man I know who gets very excited by Flesh Ball) and to set up a Naan shop in the centre of Helsinki.

Decided to avoid drinking with the guys last night. Something about age but my little Chinese body does not respond to the copious ammounts of alcohol that the Finns are prone to consuming nor does my pocket book allow me to indulge in that habit. Very strong tequilla was supposed to be the attraction of the evening. Thanks but this little body and pocket book ain't what it used to be made off.

Twitchy Witchy Pooie Woopie 2

Back from a late lunch and paying the phone bill. Lunch, how can I describe lunch at 2pm on a Friday on a rainy day? I think the only thing to say was that my earlier pronouncements about the Almighty being mighty upset about something was pretty darn true. Had grand plans for a great duck noodle. Instead, I managed to get one tasteless dumpling noodle, watery coffee and dissapointing fish soup. I think the Hokkien word that describes lunch is - Sway

Well, so there it is! My life ruined because of three lousy food dishes. Imagine how much nicer life would be if the belly was full, so full that I could end up being bounced up and down and up and down and up and down. It would be quite a funny sight wouldn't it. Actually its not so much the sensation of the belly getting full but the flavours that food has to offer. Give me a ripe blue cheese any day and I'll be able to sit there and be happier than a hamburger being gobbled by Wimpy at his best.

Anyway, just secured an interview with the Edge for one of 3M's men. Hopefully once this is done, there will be a story and billing and sixty days latter there will be cash in the bank. This really is working for tomorrow's money taken at an interesting level. Sixy-days! Ah well, this is, I suppose the joy of being self-employed and living in the age of "Credit Terms." I've been quite a spoilt little bugger, getting used to working with people who pay - cash! One of the best guys was Raymond, when he was at Polaris. - Everything revoved around "Come back at 4pm" and lo and behold - the cheque would be ready. I like Raymond's philosophy "We ask for things in a hurry and so we will pay in a hurry."

Paid of the usual big bill - The Phone Bill. Managed to accumiliate enough points to off set against the monthly subscription of two of my lines. Cash should, God Willing, flow a little bit easier in the months to come.

Twitchy Witchy Pooie Woopie

It's the second Friday of the year and I'm in my usual groggy state. Call it an access of staying up to watch ER at 2 plus in the morning and internet surfing to keep the mind active for something or other.

Anyway, its one of those times of the year when cash flow is tight (knew I should have become a hooker) and there's lots of obligations - a case of after Christmas there's Chinese New Year (which was decidedly more fun when I was a reciever of Ang Pao's rather than a giver). Somehow, festivals lose their kick as you get older. Perhaps I'm just a little bit insane but I like being in front of a screen looking for something or cuddled up in bed (something or someone in it is actually optional) than sitting around a family gathering and trying to get excited over something or other.

It's been raining quite heavily. I think the Lord must be quite upset about something or other. Ah well, the temperature has become cooler and at least there won't be worries about the water supply.

The Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority (SAGIA) and the New Face of Saudi Arabia

I met with Mr Meshari S. Al Khaled, Director-General of SAGIA Singapore yesterday. I had hopped to explore the possibilities of working with Mr Meshari in his mission to promote foreign investment in Saudi Arabia and I was optimistic about my chances of being able to get a foothold in developing a good working relationship with someone I had only met very briefly at embassy functions.

As things would have it, I was exceptionally lucky in the fact that I didn't just have a face-to-face meeting with a man who could be a business partner but I meet what is hopefully the new face of Saudi Arabia and its intentions to engage the world.

The Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority (SAGIA) was created in 2000 with the sole purpose of encouraging foreign investment in Saudi Arabia. It's hard for us who have not grown up in the Middle East to accept the idea that Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil producer would ever need foreign investment. However, when you speak to the people at SAGIA, you realise that the Saudi's are very aware that their prosperity will not be secured on oil alone and they also understand the fact that there is a real need to engage the world.

By their own admission, Saudi's admit that Saudi Arabia is a "Closed" society. Ali Baksh, Saudi Petroleum's former Regional VP, admited, "We are a shy people." However, that's changing quite rapidly. If you meet some of the key members of the Saudi Community in Singapore, you'll realise that there are quite a few Saudi's who are cosmopolitan and very keen to engage the world. Dr Kurdi, the Ambassador is a Berkley Graduate. Mr Meshari studied in the Netherlands and worked in ABN Amro in the Netherlands for a good part of a decade.

Mr Meshari is young. I think he's somewhere in his mid-thirties. He's very dynamic, very down to earth. Came into the embassy and invited us to his office, which is conveniently located in a corner in the embassy. Throughout the hour that he accorded me, he was open with information, even volunteering information such as his education and his experiences of transfering from the commercial world to the government. The man was exceptionally curteous and left me feeling with a sense of excitement about what can and cannot be done.

The man seems to represent his organisations culture very well. His big boss, the Governor (equivalent to a Minister), HE Amr Al Dabbagh is a former businessman (Incidentally I was supposed to interview him when I was in Saudi last year but Minister Mentor's visit took priority) and it seems that many of the main people at SAGIA are business people on a second career - "National Service"

What's particularly unusual about SAGIA is the fact that two of its overseas offices in Europe are run by Muslim women. This is from a country that's supposedly a hell hole for women's rights.

It may not be a grand revolution but it does say alot about Saudi Arabia that it's suddenly allowing women to have an open position of responsbility in key government bodies, in key positions. It may not be a colourful example of women's lib - but its progress and something that should be looked forward.  

Mission Impossible

Saw this on Slate magazine. Good stuff, it's a shame the Americans have never been interested in the idea of "Hea.) Is such a strategy feasible in a city of 6 million, as opposed to a town of 60,000 like Tal Afar? Moving in the bulldozers and the berms may be a dramatic first step. But then what?

Mission ImpossibleBush's smart new general can't save Iraq.

By Fred Kaplan
Posted Monday, Jan. 8, 2007, at 7:04 PM ET

 

George W. Bush has named a new man to take charge in Iraq as a prelude to his announcement of (allegedly) a new strategy. Will either make any difference?

The new commander, Lt. Gen. (soon to be promoted to simply Gen.) David Petraeus, is probably the smartest active-duty general in the U.S. Army today. Late last year, he co-authored the Army's field manual on counterinsurgency—its first in over 20 years. During the early phase of the Iraq occupation, as commander of the 101^st Airborne Division, he was one of the very few American officers who understood how to win over the populace, not just bash down their doors. In those halcyon days of the summer of '03, commanders had free access to Saddam Hussein's captured slush funds, and Petraeus used the money shrewdly to build local projects and to build trust with local leaders. It may be no coincidence that things started going to hell in northern Iraq, the 101^st Airborne's area of operation, when the commanders' fund dried up—and no further funds poured in.

Alas, Petraeus is in much the same situation he found himself back then—loaded with enormous responsibility, the right skills, but not enough resources, either in money or, especially, in troops.

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The big talk this past week, and probably the centerpiece of Bush's announcement (to take place Wednesday night), is the "surge"—20,000 additional U.S. combat troops to be deployed to Baghdad, as part of a classic strategy of "clear, hold, and build." This means swooping a lot of troops into a particular area (a town, a village, a neighborhood, whatever), clearing it of insurgents (i.e., killing or capturing them), and leaving behind enough troops or police to maintain order so that reconstruction can take place—while other troops move on to clear, hold, and build in the next troubled area on the list.

Petraeus and his co-authors discussed this strategy at great length in the Army's counterinsurgency field manual. One point they made is that it requires a lot of manpower—at minimum, 20 combat troops for every 1,000 people in the area's population. Baghdad has about 6 million people; so clearing, holding, and building it will require about 120,000 combat troops.

Right now, the United States has about 70,000 combat troops in all of Iraq (another 60,000 or so are support troops or headquarters personnel). Even an extra 20,000 would leave the force well short of the minimum required—and that's with every soldier and Marine in Iraq moved to Baghdad. Iraqi security forces would have to make up the deficit.

In the short term, then, say for a year or so, enough troops might be concentrated in Baghdad if troops now deployed in Iraq have their tours of duty extended, troops due for redeployment to Iraq are mobilized several months ahead of schedule, nearly all these troops are transferred to Baghdad, and enough Iraqi troops can be mobilized to make up the remaining slack.

Meanwhile, how will Petraeus be able to keep Baghdad's insurgents from simply slipping out of town and wreaking havoc elsewhere? This is what happened in Fallujah when U.S. troops tried to destroy the insurgents' stronghold in that city.

In the one successful counterinsurgency campaign, in the northern town of Tal Afar, the 3^rd Armored Cavalry Regiment surrounded the town with a 9-foot-high wall to isolate the city. This was in addition to other counterinsurgency techniques—maintaining a high troop-to-population ratio, dealing in a civilized manner with local authorities, and so forth. (Tal Afar slid back into chaos when the 3^rd A.C.R. was redeployed to another hot spot—another indication that clear and hold, much less clear, hold, and build, requires a lot more troops than the United States has ever had in Iraq.)

Will Petraeus wall off neighborhoods in Baghdad? (The U.S. Army in Iraq does have a lot of concrete.) Is such a strategy feasible in a city of 6 million, as opposed to a town of 60,000 like Tal Afar? Moving in the bulldozers and the berms may be a dramatic first step. But then what?

Even on the level of troop deployments, the issue is as much quality as quantity. Petraeus' field manual notes that counterinsurgency is very different from normal combat and that successful operations "require soldiers and marines at every echelon" to possess a daunting set of traits, among them a "clear, nuanced, and empathetic appreciation of the essential nature of the conflict … an understanding of the motivation, strengths, and weaknesses of the insurgent," and a knowledge of local culture. [Italics added.] Are there enough such soldiers and Marines at every echelon who have these traits? If there were, this field manual would not have been necessary. Beyond this, the field manual notes that combat leaders, down to the company level, must be "adaptive, self-aware, and intelligent."

 

The purpose of an Army field manual is to lay down the requirements of combat—in the case of this field manual, a type of combat that the U.S. Army hasn't focused on for decades. It generally takes years, if not decades, for a new culture—which this field manual calls for and outlines—to take hold of any military. Petraeus is a brilliant officer, but it's questionable whether even he can force-feed a new culture in just a matter of months.

 

If he manages to succeed in Baghdad, how will he be able to "hold" it while proceeding on to Iraq's other troubled cities? (Frederick Kagan of the American Enterprise Institute, who came up with the "surge" strategy, proposes expanding the Army's ranks by 30,000 combat soldiers over the next two years. The problem is, well-placed officers calculate that, even if enough recruits can be found, the Army could support an expansion of just 7,000 combatants per year.)

---

Then there are the more political considerations. Nothing will work, even under otherwise ideal circumstances, unless the Iraqi government supports the effort, orders Iraqi battalions to take part, and agrees to let the counterinsurgents go after all militias, including the Mahdi Army controlled by Muqtada Sadr, a key faction of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's power base. The Iraqi government would also have to devise some power-sharing arrangement—for instance, a formula to share oil revenues with Sunni regions—to deal with the causes of insurgency (or at least the causes of the insurgents' popular support or tolerance). While an area is being secured, the U.S. and other governments would also have to pour in massive funding for reconstruction projects, well beyond the $1 billion that President Bush is expected to request for urban job creation. In other words, a surge—even if it proves successful on its own terms—will mean nothing, in the medium to long term, unless it is part of a broader political and economic strategy. Does Bush have such a strategy in mind? We'll see on Wednesday. If he does, will the Iraqi government be willing or able to go along? We'll see in the next few months.

 

But security is the prerequisite, and to achieve enduring security, the hard arithmetic indicates that Bush needs to send in a lot more troops than 20,000. The problem is, he doesn't have them, and he won't be able to get them for many years, under the best of circumstances. (Even if he reimposed the draft—a sure way to convert popular disenchantment with the war to rioting-in-the-streets opposition—it would take a few years to get the Selective Service System running and to mobilize, train, and equip the draftees.)

 

One widespread, and plausible, theory is that the surge constitutes a last-ditch effort at success. The thinking goes like this: Maybe this will work; and if it doesn't work, the United States can cut its losses and pull back without making the retreat seem like too disastrous a debacle. "We gave it our all," the president could say; "don't blame us that it fell apart." And, since Kagan and other surge-advocates are saying the plan would take about two years to succeed or fail, the next president—not Bush—would be the one who orders, and takes all the heat for, the retreat.

 

I am not one who likens the Iraq war to Vietnam, but there is an eerie parallel to a memo that John McNaughton, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara's closest aide, sent to him on March 24, 1965, after it seemed clear that the Rolling Thunder bombing campaign was producing scant results. "The situation in Vietnam is bad and deteriorating," McNaughton wrote. The important aim now is to "avoid a humiliating U.S. defeat (to our reputation as a guarantor)." Therefore, it is essential "that the U.S. emerge as a 'good doctor.' We must have kept promises, been tough, taken risks, gotten bloodied, and hurt the enemy very badly."

 

One month later, on April 21, McNamara and McNaughton met in Honolulu with the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other top leaders. They concluded, as McNamara summed up in a memo, "that it will take more than six months, perhaps a year or two, to demonstrate VC [Viet Cong] failure in the South." (Both documents are reproduced in Volume 3 of The Pentagon Papers.)

 

It took another decade and 50,000 American lives to concede what McNaughton (who, soon after that meeting, died in an airplane crash) had realized just one year into the fighting. In the quite likely, lamentable event that Bush's surge doesn't work, let's hope that today's leaders accept the reality more quickly.

 

Farewell to the Troll and Hello to the Sudanese

Here we are again on a Monday morning. Everything went according to plan, just like any other Monday morning. Things moved on a slow and groggy state of affairs.

Thank goodness for good food though. Had Mee Rubus at Haig Rd Hawker Centre. Excellent stuff, full of meat. Long Live Carnivorism.

Went to Saudi Trade Office to pass on Eid Greetings. Caught up with Said, who is one of the naturalised Sudanese. Was good to see him, Said and Mohammed Barkia, the two naturalised Sudanese guys in the Saudi Diplomatic Community were two gems whom I got to know during the Crown Princes visit.

However, it was a little sad to find out that the trade attache, Abdul Hadi (Hadi enjoys the fact that there is a Saudi Abdul Hadi), has gone back. Would have been nice to say goodbye to a big friendly troll (Saudi Abdul Hadi is huge - he towers over most men) of a character. I hope his replacement will be as friendly as him.

 

Week ended - Long Live the rest of the next 52 weeks

The first working week of 2007 has come and gone. Hopefully, people will be comming out of their leave mentality and things will be able to get moving. The Year has the potential to be good but things have to get going in order for things to happen.

Anyway, last week was fairly simple. Touched base with HE Kurdi to wish him Happy Eid and also managed to touch base with SAGIA's Director-General, Mr Meshari S Al Khaled. It was good to catch up with both of them and hopefully I'll be able to strengthen the relationship with both the embassy and SAGIA in the comming year.

It was also a week to clean up proposals. Worked with Allan on a proposal for Jim Beam and also for Marina Square. Somehow, God Willing, there will be a better cash flow for the year. I think cash flow management has to be one of the key areas that I hope to improve on.

Caught up with Han Li today. Was good to catch up and spend time together. I am actually looking forward to the possibility of making a visit to Hanoi this year. I'm often puzzled by the way life has turned out. I was always a kid who spent his time traveling from one place to another. Suddenly, I've become an adult who has not traveled much within the past few years. Last year was good in as much as Mum subsidised the trip to Hamburg, while the Saudi Embassy paid for the trip to Riyad and Mandate paid for a day trip up to Malacca. Somehow, I'd like to have a bit more travel this year. Can't spend all my waking hours on this little Island.

Successful Confessions of a Total Looser

I've become something of an advisor to a 16-year old with high-political ambitions in recent days and my discussions with him have lead me to ponder about the meaning of "success," and the question of what price are we willing to pay to reach our definition of success.

Life in Singapore, and in fact much of the capitalist world, success is defined by material wealth. In Singapore we called them the 5c's - I think they were Condominium, Cash, Car, Credit Card and Career. In the USA, they talk about the "American Dream." Everyday we are bombarded with subliminal messages about having to buy this and that to make us feel better about ourselves - if you drive a Honda you'll definately be the target market for those making Mercedes Ads (Never mind if you can't afford the Merce, we'll sell you a loan at outrageous prices too).

And even if I'm lampooning the system of encouraging people to buy things they don't need, I have to take some responsability for this. I've worked in an industry that thrives on encouraging companies to sell more by planting the message into people's minds that they need to buy more without really thinking if they need more. Paulo, the man who relieved me of Adelene said it best, "If Engineers ran the world, the capitalist economic system would collapse because we'd build every product to fit all your needs. Marketing people on the other hand give you things that only satisfy a third of your needs so that they can sell you more needs later on." - If only Adelene never existed, I would have had access to a font of common sense.

So we have it! This is a world that depends on having more and being able to aquire more. Somehow, if you don't have more, you're judged as an abolute failure who should kill himself. Girls, as every guide book to the pick-up reminds us, like a guy to have a little bit of cash to splash on them and if you as a man can't pick-up chicks and get married and thus procreate, what use are you to society.

By all definitions, I'm a miserable failure. At the age of 32, I've failed to work in any organisation for more than a year. I'm making a mountain out of a molehill because in 8-years of being a dependeable adult, I've finally saved more than 2 cents within a fiscal year. Needless to say I'm nowhere near being able to have a hovel of my own or a old banger to get me from one end of the block to another. - With all this against me, I'm destined to die a sad and lonely loser. My best friends in the mean time have run past me in the stakes of success and sometimes take a little bit of pitty on me whenever we're out together.

Funnily enough, in the face of all this failure, I don't feel like I should just end it now because I'm a miserable failure. In fact, I'm actually afraid that I'll end up owning alot of things that normal people have. Perhaps you could call it a case of being riddiculously bloody minded and having this secret desire to stick my middle finger up at everything we all hold dear.

I've never had a desire to own things. I try my best to remove my self-esteem from what I own or where I live. I remember a friend who was trying to persuade me to take out a car loan under my name for him. The man was persistent. He even went as far as to tell me that, "My daughters feel shy when their school friends ask them why their Daddy does not have a car." Blame my mother for this, but my first thought was - "Doesn't that speak volumns about the way you raised your daughters."

Some people are darn good at the "Buy-Buy-Buy" game. It really makes them happy that they can go out and own all sorts of gadgets. My Dad is one of those people. He complained that I was more into money for its own sake rather than in owning beautiful things. He told me that it was the love of beautiful things that kept him motivated to find money.

Some people are not into things. I know I'm not one of them and as I age, I'm realising that success is a very personal thing and being able to define ones personal meaning of success leads one to greater personal happiness. I refer people to my previous entry on Zen, the world's chubbiest flesh ball. Here is someone who has everything going against her and yet she finds pride and happiness in what she does.

I remember my Dad telling me that he would have been very happy for me if I converted to Islam and married a Malay girl. He noticed that, "We, Chinese, are actually very unhappy even though we've got quite alot. The Malays don't have much money but they're happy." And he's right. Stroll down Shenton way and you have busy Chinese faces chasing I don't know what. The Malays on the other hand are busy being with their families, making their homes more pleasent and welcomming strangers towards their culture.  

As Vinod used to say, "I love having money." Having money is fun and being broke is a rather crappy experience. On the other hand, chasing money and power for the sake of it often has a way of backfiring in rather painful matters. Somehow money and respect have a way of not being there when you're looking for them most earnestly. I've found that I've done best when I've been concentrating on the work at hand rather than worrying about money. Life is indeed funny.

First Business Day of the Year

It was the first business day of the year and a fairly quiet one today. Looks like I'm gonna be living off my savings for the moment but I did do a few bits and pieces of pitching for stories and should hopefully be collecting cheques within a matter of days. This week is notoriously short and there's not much that can actually be done but I'll see what there is to do and do it. It is I guess a case of bashing out things and making sure that they get done.

Economic news is out. It seems that the Singapore economy grew by some 5.9% in Q4 from the year before. It's not a bad number - not as great as it used to be in the rather heady days of the early economic boom but for a maturing economy, I think the growth rate is fairly respectable. However, as Benjamin Disraeli used to say - "There are lies, damnd lies and statistics," so the question for us is - what do all these economic figures really mean for the man on the ground. What differences does it really make if the economy grows by 5% or 500%.

One positive sign for the economy - which is a big pain in the butt is - traffic jams. Somehow, when traffic is crap, it seems that the economy is doing OK. Seems people have enough time to drive about. Took hours to get from Geylang Area to Bukit Timah. - Bukit Timah area was jammed packed with cars at about 6ish. Not sure where everyone got the energy to drive about at that time of the day.

Anyway, it's late, so I shall have to do what pretentious people do and actually go to sleep

Till the next time, take care of yourselves and each other

The Outspoken Archbishop of Canterbury

Somehow - in spite of being brought up in a Western Liberal Democracy, I find myself feeling more sympathy with people like unelected monarchs, judges, military men, churchmen and other religious leaders whenever they put down an elected politician.

Sir Cyril Townsend, Arab News

The Most Reverend and Right Honorable Dr. Rowan Williams, who has been the Archbishop of Canterbury since 2002, is a forthright intellectual of great distinction. A previous Archbishop of Wales, he has not been afraid to challenge the government of Prime Minister Tony Blair on the moral and religious questions of the day, and he has the ability to do so diplomatically, and yet with considerable force and effectiveness. His timing tends to be good, and a great swathe of the population would find he talks much good sense. Just before Christmas he visited Israel with Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Westminster. From Bethlehem, a shattered and depressed town on the West Bank, where the Christian community has fallen to a quarter of what it once was, he dispatched an article to The Times which was published on Dec. 23 under the title “We mustn’t forget the plight of Arab Christians.” He wrote: “This Christmas, pray for the little town of Bethlehem, and spare a thought for those who have been put at risk by our short-sightedness and ignorance...” He believed that: “One warning often made and systematically ignored in the hectic days before the Iraq war was that Western military action — at that time and in that way — would put Christians in the whole Middle East at risk. They would be seen as supporters of the crusading West. At the very least, some were asking, shouldn’t we have a strategy about how to handle this?” He went on: “Well, we didn’t have one. And the results are now painfully adding to what was already a difficult situation for Christian communities across the region. Iraq’s Christian population is dropping by thousands every couple of months and some of their most effective leaders have been forced to emigrate. In Istanbul, the Orthodox population is a tiny remnant, and their Patriarch is told by some of the Turkish press that it’s time he left.” He wrote that it was not unknown for Arab Christian families fleeing to the United Kingdom to find that their children are told in school that “they must be Muslims really” and so are put with Muslim children for special activities. The Archbishop told his readers: “The first Christian believers were Middle Easterners. It’s a sobering thought that we might live to see the last native Christian believers in the region.” This last remark reminded me of a speech in the House of Lords delivered by his predecessor, Dr. George Carey, in 1992, which caught the attention of the public: “Jerusalem and Bethlehem could become Christian theme parks. They would cater merely for Christian pilgrims and tourists — bereft of the Arab-Christian communities which have been in the land since Our Lord walked it. As one layman put it so movingly to me ‘Will Christians be made strangers in the land of Christ?’” Dr. Williams has been a clear and consistent critic of the Iraq war, which has embarrassed, and no doubt irritated, Tony Blair who is an active Christian and once considered becoming a Church of England priest. The Foreign Office in London rejected the Archbishop’s remarks, and claimed that it was the extremists in Iraq who should be blamed, rather than British policies, for the suffering of Christians. In his excellent book “Dispossessed. The Ordeal of the Palestinians 1917-1980” David Gilmour wrote that before 1948 in Palestine: “The largest and most important minority was the Christian. Estimated by the British authorities at 135,000 in 1944, it has consistently formed slightly more than a tenth of the Arabic-speaking population.” The largest Christian populations in Palestine were found in Jerusalem, Jaffa and Haifa. As one might have expected the Christians once formed a majority in Nazareth and Bethlehem. In the middle of the 19th century Christian foreign missions opened up schools for them such as the famous St George’s in Jerusalem. As a result of enjoying higher standards of education than the Muslims, the Christians traditionally made up the professional elite of Palestinian society. They made a major contribution to its political life over many decades and have frequently represented the Palestinians abroad. They owned many of the Palestinian newspapers. When the Zionists arrived and began acquiring land, Galilee was one of the main areas to be threatened. I was not surprised that the Archbishop of Canterbury was accompanied by Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor as the Church of England and the Catholic Church see eye to eye on Arab-Israeli conflict. There is close coordination on the Middle East between Lambeth Palace and the Vatican. During his visit to Bethlehem Dr. Williams said that the Israeli Wall, which is close to that town, was: “deeply wrong in the human heart.” I like to think all religions can agree with that comment.

Fishy Day

It's the first day of the year 2007 and life started on a fishy tone. Nope, I don't mean something fishy happened, I just happened to have some decent meals that were centred around fish - which is significant in as much that fish, according to Chinese tradition symbolises luck.

I don't want to go into supersitition here but my first stroke of luck was to discover that Dad is in Hong Kong until the third and he avoided feeling anything from the bomb attacks in Bangkok. Discovering he was away from the danger and the national tragedy set the tone for the rest of the day.

First step of the day was fish ball noodles at Toa Payoh Lorong 5's food court. Lorong 5 is near the industrial part of Toa Payoh and the food is by and large excellent. The fish ball noodles in particular are well known - there's usually a long que of people and they are there for a darn good reason - the food is darn good. Today, Public Holiday and All was no exception.

The Second step was a champagne and cheese session with Luke. Won this huge bottle of champagne two-years ago and left it with Luke for safe keeping as I moved from place-to-place, looking for somewhere to live. Today, we decided that it was time to crack open the bottle and as things would have it, Sean, Luke's oldest son who represents the State of Washington in Taiwan had given his Dad some smoked salmon. The smoked salmon was to die for, as good as what I remember from the days of visiting Sequim and the Pacific North-West. It was good to sit down over good food and excellent champagne, talking about all sorts of things with good company,

Finally, it was dinner in Geylang, Lorong 20. Had fish-soup. Excellent stuff. You can always rely of red-light districts to produce some of the best foods.

Anyway, it is, as Andy Mukherjee says, "The Year of Bond" and this will, I hope be a good year for each and everyone who reads this entry.

It's the End of the Year as we know it, and I feel fine

New Year's Eve is going to take place in a matter of hours and so I thought I would invest the time in bashing out a blog entry to talk about the year that's going and the year that we will be entering. Sort of a year-end review that listed companies are so fond of sending out to their stake holders.

One the whole, the year 2006 was a good one for me. Even the death of my Grandmother could not tarnish the positive note that the year had. Although it was sad to lose a much loved Grandma, she was old and sick and her death was something that she was prepared for and as a grandson, I could not have asked for more for her. The family was prepared for her demise, I think when a person reaches 85, death becomes something that you accept and you start to look towards leaving the stage with a graceful curtain call and that's what happened.

In the process of losing my grandmother, my mother's family gained unity. Mum, Aunti Frieda and Uncle Soon got togeher, something which they had not done for quite sometime. We found relatives we never realised that we had. And yes, those at the PUB who remembered my Grandfather attened her funeral, showing that in spite of his repuation for being 'hot tempered' grandfather was so highly regarded for his integrity that the good will his actions generated would survive him and be there at Grandma's funeral. If there was anything that was lost with Grandmother's death was the fact that we lost a moment of great family unity.

On the financial front things were good. No, I did not strike the grand lottery and retire. I even failed to reach my savings target but at least I end the year with cash in the bank. It's especially satisfying to do this because I free-lanced, an activity that often associated with dire poverty. I hope that I'll be disciplined enough to continue saving cash and hopefully I'll be better at paying my bills.

My good fortune this year can be attributed to one community, the Saudi Arabian community. It was by chance that I learnt about HRH Prince Sultan Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud's trip for Ali Baksh. It was God willing that the Ambassador Dr Amin Kurdi, decided that I had something to add to his preparations for the visit. The financial rewards for me were good and working on the project allowed me to deal with the higer echelons of society.

There were undoubtedly stressful moments. The energy I ended up investing into the project drained me and at times I was very angry at the way things looked like they were turning out.

However, the Crown Princes visit was on the whole, a defining moment for me. It gave me the confidence that I could do things that are normally handled by a team of officials. More importantly, it enabled me to look forward to building relationships with people from another culture, which is in many ways very special. I saw Saudi Arabia and I think its a place worth discovering.

I'm greatful to His Excellency for giving me the opportunity to work on this project. I'm greatful to His Excellency for showing me what "My Word is my Bond" really means.

I'm glad that I had the opportunity to develop my relationship with Khaled Maeena and the team at Arab News. The articles that I wrote for them during the IMF peroid was also an opportunity for me to discover the pleasure of writing serious news articles and it was also a pleasure to have people from different parts of the world to engage me in discussion.

On a more personal level, I'm glad that I meet people like His Excellency, Dr Abubakar Bin Bagader, Deputy Minister of Information and Communications and I hope that my friendship with Khalid Mussa from that Ministry will be able to grow.

I also worked for Aramco this year. The experience of working with the Embassy put me in a decent position to have a better understanding of Arab culture, and I'm glad that I met Munira Ashgar, an extraordinary lady with a passion for her own culture. Unfortunately the Aramco project was Ali Bakhsh's farewell in Singapore and I wish him well for the opportunities he presented me to work with his community. I hope, Inshallah that I will have more opportunities to build a good relationship with Mohammed Bassurah who succeeeds him.

Ironically a good porition of my good fortune with the Saudi Community came from PN Balji rejecting their business. Balji helped to guide me into a better writer and it was he who helped me to develop a better understanding of what is News. In 2005,  he helped me stay alive, both as a full time employee at BANG Pr and as a free-lance project worker. In 2006, it was he who made me discover myself by not being a backup. The sign of a good mentor is one who encourages you to flourish on your own. Although he did not get the business, he encouraged me to make the business mine. That is surely as sign of a good leader.

Polaris was the other highlight of the year and I'm greatful that my relationship with the company went beyond my relationship with Raymond. We had fun working on the ad for South China Morning Post and I'm glad that he and I still make lunch a regular activity.

Supriyo Sircar and I have started our working relationship on a decent note. The PR project with ARUP Gupta was a success and it looks like Polaris will continue to use my services. I felt that Arun Jain's company had something special to contribute to the world and it's my privillege to help them to just that.

Business cannot survive on grand projects alone. Its the small bread and butter projects that enable one to survive and to this end, I am greatful to Allan Fong at L'eap Communications for allowing me to work on decent small projects like Nescafe Gold and Alcon. I'm especially greatful to the work at Alcon, medical science is advancing and being able to help those with visual impairments.

I'm also greatful to my partners in my other consortium, Loh Mun Loong, Adrian Chiam and Jane Tan. Thanks to their support, I've had the opportunity to work with 3M and to discover the joys of working with SME's like Telcom United and Fabulous Tan.

On the media front, my relationship with Today continued to work at a prominent pace and hopefully I'll be able to do something with the radio in the comming year. It's about experiences, experience and experiences and I've been all the richer for it.

While things were good on the professional and financial front, the highlight of the year undoubtedly took the shape of a 7-year old girl. I never expected that I would find so much joy in being involved in the life of another person but the days that I spent taking the little girl to school, watching her smile and listening to her show off her ability to recite the alphabet made me feel that I had something really worth looking forward to on a daily basis. Suddenly, I realised that it was not a bad thing to be able to want to live your life beyond yourself.

I'd like to end this note by saying thank you to all of my good friends who have helped me become who I am today. Each of you has played a role in helping me to grow and I look forward to another year of growing our friendship.

Happy 2007 and to all Muslim Readers, have a good Eid Al Adha

Outrage at Timing of Execution

Ebtihal Mubarak, Arab News

JEDDAH, 31 December 2006 — The Saudi Press Agency (SPA) yesterday criticized the timing of the execution of Saddam Hussein. An analyst with the official SPA said the execution has drawn strong disapproval of observers because it took place during the holy month of Dul Hijjah, besides being on the first day of Eid Al-Adha. “It is an occasion which is respected by the entire Muslim population,” the analyst said. He also found fault with the trial as its procedures underwent several replacement of judges and because it took place while the country was under a state of occupation and under the shadow of the ongoing sectarian violence and political strife. “Observers had expected that the trial of the former head of the Iraqi government who ruled for a considerable length of time would last longer with sophisticated legal and court procedures without politicization of the affair,” the analyst said. Saddam’s execution struck a chord of sympathy in many Saudis, although they did not deny the crimes he committed. “We all know that Saddam was a dictator who led his country to one disaster after another,” said 47-year-old Saudi businessman Mohammad Al-Rashed, “but still his trial was illegal. What we saw on TV were more scenes of black comedy rather than objective trial.” He said that the trial was based on the Dujail incident, in which Shiite villagers were executed for plotting against Saddam, and that it was neither enough nor convincing, as Saddam was not dealing with entirely innocent citizens. “What would any Arab leader do if he knew of an assassination plot? They would all do exactly what Saddam did, maybe more.” Al-Rashed thought that Saddam’s war against Iran would have been a more convincing case for trial than Dujail. He said it was a crime against not only Iranians but also Iraqis. “He was merely a tool in the hands of Americans and when his role was done they sacrificed him on the Eid day. The choice of the execution day is no mistake and it surely is an American message that mocks our defeat and surrender,” he added. Other Saudis felt sympathy for Saddam. “We prayed for Saddam’s soul in Madinah with my family today,” said Mariam Saleh, a 29-year-old teacher. She felt that Saddam was humiliated in his last days by the Americans. Regardless of what he did before, “he is still a Muslim and thus deserves our mercy,” said Mariam. Mohammad Al-Assaf, 33, had different opinion of Saddam’s execution on the Eid Al-Adha day. “Now they made him a martyr,” he said. He said the Americans are not naïve and they chose the day on purpose. “They wanted to implant in the minds of Muslims that the Shiites of Iraq chose the sacrifice day to kill Saddam as a challenge to Iraqi Sunnis.” Al-Assaf said the sentence of death was passed 55 days ago and the Americans knew that by choosing the morning of Eid Al-Adha to execute him would upset all Muslims, even those who acknowledge Saddam’s cruelty. “America’s claims of restoring peace in Iraq proved to be nonsense today. They only make things worse by inciting Sunnis against Shiites and fueling the division,” he said. Others expressed sentiments that ranged from outrage over the continued state of insecurity and lack of sufficient infrastructure in Iraq to utter contempt for the US occupation and its past military support of the strongman from Tikrit. “Saddam is dead, let’s close this chapter forever,” said Sultan Al-Otaibi, a resident of Jeddah. “The next chapter that we need to close now is who supported Saddam and gave him weapons. Donald Rumsfeld was hugging Saddam and the US supported him and provided biological weapons and delivery equipment.” Imran Waheed, spokesman for the British affiliate of the Muslim political party Hizb ut-Tahrir, agrees. “Saddam’s trial conveniently ignored his close ties with Western governments and corporations throughout his years of brutality, the weapons bought from Western corporations, the support given to him in the war with Iran,” he said. “Bush and Blair, like previous leaders of the US and Britain, continue their close relationships with brutal dictators in the Muslim world when it suits their interests, and will surely discard them when it suits their interests.” Muhammad Mardi Al-Tayeb, a Sudanese resident in Jeddah, asked what difference Saddam’s death had made to Iraq. “The very same day he was executed, Iraqis woke up to more bombs, shooting and people dying,” he said. People like Saddam get what they deserve. However, Muhsin Ali, an Egyptian worker in Jeddah, said that he wished justice was carried out by the people of Iraq themselves rather than with the Americans orchestrating everything covertly. “I never loved Saddam, but as an Arab I felt it was insulting that a former president, even though he was bad, was executed with the help of the US,” explained Ali. Saudi student Hashem Al-Imam said that Saddam got what he deserved. “This is the appropriate end for a dictator that ruled Iraq with an iron fist and killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and forced many Iraqis to become refugees,” he said. “Today is a celebration of two happy occasions, Eid Al-Adha and the execution of Saddam.” However, Muhammad Abdul Bari, secretary general of the Muslim Council of Britain, said executing Saddam at the beginning of Eid was an “insensitive and provocative act by the US-backed Iraqi government.” “No one can deny that Saddam should have faced justice for his crimes against the people of Iraq and also his invasion of Iran and Kuwait,” said Abdul Bari. “Far from contributing to a so-called healing process, it may serve to further intensify the sectarian divisions in Iraq.” — Additional input from Mahmoud Ahmad and Ismail Nakhuda

The Tyrant is Dead: Long Live Tyranny.

Saddam Hussein, Iraq’s former President was by all accounts not a figure that inspired sympathy. In the years that he ruled Iraq, ordinary Iraqi people were forced to live with arbitrary arrest, regular tortures and other forms of human-rights abuses. The man had no qualms in using banned chemical weapons against civilians and while his people starved during the years of international sanctions, one of the Arab World’s most learned people ended up living in wretched poverty, while he and his ilk lived in luxury.

However, his execution by hanging was a tragedy and I believe that instead of marking the “Dawn of a New Era,” in a “New Democratic and Stable” Iraq, will only lead more violence within Iraq and greater instability in the Middle East and beyond.

Although Saddam Hussein was nobody’s angel, his removal from power by the 2003, US lead invasion was illegal under International Law. The UN was presented with no evidence that he possessed “Weapons of Mass Destruction” (WMD) and the UN Inspectors found none. However, instead of working to secure real evidence to justify the invasion under the UN’s Sanctions, the USA and UK decided to invade Iraq to “Liberate” the Iraqi people.

Having removed him from power, the Western World chose not to offer the Iraqi people what they had been promised – a free, fair and prosperous society. Iraq’s oil wealth was supposed to be released to build a “New” Iraq, which would be run by a democratically elected executive, reporting to a democratically elected and multicultural legislature and an independent and impartial judiciary. There were some hiccups but when Saddam was captured and paraded in front of the cameras, it looked like Iraqi’s would get the chance to live a decent life in a decent society.

Three-years on, Iraq is on the verge of what incoming US Defence Secretary, Robert Gates calls a “Civil War.” Everyday, ordinary Iraqi’s who used to be united under Saddam’s tyranny had the choice of being shot at by various militias on a daily basis. The USA, the world’s most powerful armed force is seemingly powerless to help Iraqi people, unless they happen to be driving a Haliburton Executive to work on an overpriced contract. The release of oil wealth that was supposed to take place has not gone into the Iraqi economy, unless you count the diversion from building a palace for Saddam Hussein to driving Haliburton Executives as major economic progress.

However, the Western Occupation of Iraq has yielded one or two positive results. Democracy – Iraq has a democratically elected government, which was only elected by Iraqi people because Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani thought it was a good idea. The Judiciary has also proved to be so independent and impartial that Saddam Hussein was denied access to defence lawyers (of which a few were shot, gangland style) and a judge who voiced the opinion that Saddam Hussein was not the “Evil” dictator who messed-up Iraq was removed. Saddam Hussein was actually very lucky, he was allowed to shave, trim down and stay alive for three-years, and even if some of his prison guards liked video taping him, he didn’t have Pte Lyndie England looking after him at Abu Gharib.

Perhaps a few people could argue that Saddam got off very lightly compared to what he did to others. Saddam was not known for his gentle approach to dealing with his opponents, but wasn’t that supposed to stop when he was toppled. Wasn’t the trial of Saddam Hussein supposed to be about showing Iraqi people a fairer form of justice than what they were used to?

Iraqi’s have also been robbed of the chance to discover their history through the trial of Saddam Hussein. Why was he allowed to do what he did? South Africa “Healed” from Apartheid by having a “Truth and Reconciliation” committee that either forgave or punished perpetrators of a regime that abused human rights longer than Saddam Hussein existed. Iraq will never get anything resembling that.

And perhaps that’s what the Western powers want. Saddam, a former US ally (Guess who provided him with those chemical weapons he was supposed to have used against Kurds, Marsh Arabs and others?) had been removed because the person in the White House decided he was no longer fun as the villain to centre foreign policy around. Imagine what other ‘Western Backed’ Arab Governments would do if they realised how supportive the West actually was towards those they backed. To hell with justice, to hell with fairness and to hell due process and national reconciliation, a corpse wouldn’t be able to put a damper on the joys of being ‘Western Backed.’

Iraqi’s have been stoic. They think they’ve merely replaced one lot of thugs for another. Only this time, they’re less patient, particularly with the thugs from outside telling them that being violated is part of the act of being “Liberated” and “Defended.”

So, for Saddam Hussein and Iraq, it’s a case of – The Tyrant is Dead: Long Live Tyranny.

Good Dudes Parade

It did occur to me that I was being exceedingly sexist by having a section for guys to drool over and nothing for girls at all. So, I decided that I would put the guys on parade.

However, since I don't make it a habit of capturing the hunky chunky form on my trusty phone camera the ladies will have to be content with looking at my guy friends. Some of my friends can be described as hunky, some are cute, some a handsomely boyish and some are cute in a different sort of way. What all the guys that I've posted up do have in common is the fact that I've always been able to have a good laugh with them and they've helped me in their own peculiar ways to get by life as all good friends, colleagues and aquaintainces so often to.

Ladies, I hope this does a little bit to make up for having to look at blokes eye candy.

Four Public Holidays

It was the last working day of the year 2006 and I spent a good part of it trying to relax and to get to know what the heck I'll be aiming for in the year 2007. The year is supposed to be the Year of the Pig, another good year for me and somehow I have to make the most of what's in it for me.

The year will unfortunately end with me not making my savings target. In fact I ended up having to dip into savings yet again. Unfortunately for me, I did not have cheques comming in this week and somehow I'll have to make it to the next one, which if as expected won't come in until late next week. And thanks to Tuesday being a make up holiday for Eid Al Adha or Hari Raya, it's going to be four days of no cash comming in until next Thursday - a case of - oh heck. I guess that's part and parcel of being self-employed, when the cash is not flowing in the way you like it to, public holidays become something of a pain in the butt.

However, projects are in the pipeline and somehow or other, I think its possible that this year won't be like the last one when I came home from Germany, worried that it would be bankrupted with each impending day. There are things to do and I can do them and somehow, in the early months of the next year, I'll be able to sort out the rougher parts of this year that I did not and cannot do within the next couple of days.

Today was Han Li's birthday. Spent about half an hour with her over a cup of coffee. I'm seroiusly thinking of spending a few days with her in Hanoi before I try and go to Hamburg. At the very least, it will be a new experience, and I'm told that I would be delighted with the array of beauties . I'm reminded of PJ O'Rouke who described Vietnamese beauties as making Cindy Crawford look like Ross Perot (You'd think that with all that money, Ross could have made himself look a bit more like Cindy )  Anyway, the crazy one tells me that hotels in Hanoi are decent and I should not worry as long as she's with me - which is probably a sign that I should be publically wetting myself with worry

Still trying to make New Year's resolutions. Not sure why one bothers, most of them are broken at the very first opportunity. For some reason, I decided that I would try and make the effort to get fit - I went running for a grand total of two occasions and that idea died along with the dinosaurs . Running, its supposed to be ultimate cardiovascular work-out, a time good enough for the body to convince the natural storage system that it's time to let go of things and reduce one to a hardened washbord of someone elses fantasy. Really, I don't know why I've been so bad at keeping up the running, I live in the East and near the beach where things are good and glorious for outdoor pursuits

Geetha will be having a small gathering at her place on New Year's Eve and I've been invited to join her. I think that's something I'd like to do very much. This is a special year for the lady , she reached the big Four-Zero  but for once, since I've known her, I was late in sending the good birthday greetings . Hopefully, New Year's Eve with her will be well spent. Geetha is just one of those people whom I can spend alot of time with. I've said to her on many occasions that she's the first person that I've met since I moved back here who provided me with anything resembling a WOW  feeling and even though we've somehow never got round to do anything, she's someone who remains special  - each and every meeting with her is something that I look forward to.

Wei, a former business partner once made the remark that I had a way with Indians and Arabs. He said that he didn't mind as long as my affinity with these two groups helped to pay the bills. Capitalism, as they say, is colour blind . I have been blessed this year by old relationships between these two communities. The Saudi Embassy, Aramco and Polaris were clients that made me feel that I had achieved something. I also enjoyed writing for Arab News this year. It felt good to write about issues that I felt I needed to comment on. I hope that I'll be blessed with the good fortune but more importantly the common sense to build on my relationship with these organisations and communities in 2007.