see the actual memo here
Leaked US memo paints grim picture of life in Iraq
http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0620/dailyUpdate.html
US embassy cable says Iraqi staffers live in constant fear for their lives.
By Tom Regan
In a leaked memo from the US embassy in Baghdad, sent to the US State Department earlier this month, embassy employees present a much different assessment than the one put forward by the Bush administration in the past two weeks.
The memo, which was obtained by The Washington Post and reported on Sunday, "painted a starkly different portrait of increasing danger and hardship faced by its Iraqi employees."
This cable, marked "sensitive" and obtained by The Washington Post, outlines in spare prose the daily-worsening conditions for those who live outside the heavily guarded international zone: harassment, threats and the employees' constant fears that their neighbors will discover they work for the US government.
The memo, dated June 6 (one week before President Bush made his unannounced trip to Iraq) and with the name of US Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad at the bottom, includes references to ethnic cleansing, threats to women's rights and abductions. The subject of the memo is: "Snapshots from the Office – Public Affairs Staff Show Strains of Social Discord," and details the experiences of the nine-member Iraqi staff of the public affairs press office in the US embassy. Among some of the topics discussed in the memo:
Iraqi staff at the embassy report "pervasive" harassment from Islamist and/or militia groups beginning in March and picking up in May. Cuts in power and rising fuel prices "have diminished the quality of life." Conditions vary but even upscale neighborhoods "have visibly deteriorated" and one of them is now described as a "ghost town."
Two of the three female Iraqis in the public affairs office reported stepped-up harassment since mid-May. "...Some groups are pushing women to cover even their face, a step not taken in Iran even at its most conservative." One of the women is now wearing a full abaya after receiving direct threats.
It has also become "dangerous" for men to wear shorts in public and "they no longer allow their children to play outside in shorts." People who wear jeans in public have also come under attack.
Other problems faced by the staff include the necessity to talk in Arabic, rather than English, whenever called at home, and they can't be called on holidays or weekends for fear of "blowing their cover." Other employees don't use American cellphones for the same reason. Nor can the embassy use its own local press relations staff in on-camera interviews because of fears for their safety. Most of the staff, in case they are abducted, have taken precautions to protect family and friends.
One employee said criticism of the US had grown so severe that most of her family believes the US "is punishing populations as Saddam [Hussein] did (but with Sunnis and very poor Shiites now at the bottom of the list)."
The memo also notes that "the demeanor of the [local] guards" in the Green Zone has become more "militia-like" since April. Iraqi military soldiers now frequently taunt embassy employees or hold up their credentials and say loudly that they work in the embassy. Employees now ask for press credentials instead of embassy credentials. The Independent of London says that the experiences of the staffers reflected in the details of the cable "portrays a society in a state of collapse."
When asked about the leaked memo on CNN's Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer, White House press secretary Tony Snow did not deny its authenticity, calling it "an accurate reflection of the realities there." But he also said that conditions had changed since the memo was written a few weeks ago.
Here we are, we are a month later, and I just told you, you've got 50,000 Iraqi troops that are now focusing on those problem areas in Baghdad. The president didn't go there with rose-colored glasses, Wolf. We've been at Camp David the day before and received briefings from Generals Casey and Abizaid and from Ambassador Khalilzad. He had talked with scholars, some of whom have somewhat bleak views of what's going on.
And again, whatever the bleakness is, whatever the facts may be on the ground, the most important thing is you figure out how to win. And that has been the focus of the president's efforts. You can't do that by reading polls. What you have to do – and cables like this help add context and texture to the overall picture – but this is not a president who's looking with rose-colored glasses.
In a comment about the story on his website, Rush Limbaugh said this is exactly what he expected to happen.
We nail Zarqawi; it's the epitome of good news. Bush has one of the best weeks of his presidency last week and a couple of days prior to that, and so what do the Democrats do? Redouble their effort to paint this whole thing as a lost cause, and they get of course their willing accomplices in the Drive-By Media to go right along with it. In fact, the Washington Post citing a 30-day-old story preceding any of the good news of the last week.
But in an editorial about the leaked memo, USA Today says that this view of the lives of several of the embassy's Iraqi employees is telling and underscores "the uphill battle faced by the fledgling Iraqi government and US forces, the limited time they have to assert control, and even whether that is still possible."
Quite apart from their bravery – just disclosing that they work for the Americans can be a death sentence, and most don't even tell relatives – their descriptions of life at neighborhood level suggest fundamentalists and militias are fast obtaining the kind of power that destroys governments. To whit: "The central government, our staff says, is not relevant; even local mukhtars (leaders) have been displaced or coopted by militias." ...
Nine lives do not tell the story of an entire country, nor is the cable reason to bring troops home. Other measures paint a brighter picture. Nevertheless, for those who wonder whom to believe in Iraq, the US ambassador reporting privately about the lives of the Iraqis closest to him is a source that can hardly be ignored.
Leaked US memo paints grim picture of life in Iraq
http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0620/dailyUpdate.html
US embassy cable says Iraqi staffers live in constant fear for their lives.
By Tom Regan
In a leaked memo from the US embassy in Baghdad, sent to the US State Department earlier this month, embassy employees present a much different assessment than the one put forward by the Bush administration in the past two weeks.
The memo, which was obtained by The Washington Post and reported on Sunday, "painted a starkly different portrait of increasing danger and hardship faced by its Iraqi employees."
This cable, marked "sensitive" and obtained by The Washington Post, outlines in spare prose the daily-worsening conditions for those who live outside the heavily guarded international zone: harassment, threats and the employees' constant fears that their neighbors will discover they work for the US government.
The memo, dated June 6 (one week before President Bush made his unannounced trip to Iraq) and with the name of US Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad at the bottom, includes references to ethnic cleansing, threats to women's rights and abductions. The subject of the memo is: "Snapshots from the Office – Public Affairs Staff Show Strains of Social Discord," and details the experiences of the nine-member Iraqi staff of the public affairs press office in the US embassy. Among some of the topics discussed in the memo:
Iraqi staff at the embassy report "pervasive" harassment from Islamist and/or militia groups beginning in March and picking up in May. Cuts in power and rising fuel prices "have diminished the quality of life." Conditions vary but even upscale neighborhoods "have visibly deteriorated" and one of them is now described as a "ghost town."
Two of the three female Iraqis in the public affairs office reported stepped-up harassment since mid-May. "...Some groups are pushing women to cover even their face, a step not taken in Iran even at its most conservative." One of the women is now wearing a full abaya after receiving direct threats.
It has also become "dangerous" for men to wear shorts in public and "they no longer allow their children to play outside in shorts." People who wear jeans in public have also come under attack.
Other problems faced by the staff include the necessity to talk in Arabic, rather than English, whenever called at home, and they can't be called on holidays or weekends for fear of "blowing their cover." Other employees don't use American cellphones for the same reason. Nor can the embassy use its own local press relations staff in on-camera interviews because of fears for their safety. Most of the staff, in case they are abducted, have taken precautions to protect family and friends.
One employee said criticism of the US had grown so severe that most of her family believes the US "is punishing populations as Saddam [Hussein] did (but with Sunnis and very poor Shiites now at the bottom of the list)."
The memo also notes that "the demeanor of the [local] guards" in the Green Zone has become more "militia-like" since April. Iraqi military soldiers now frequently taunt embassy employees or hold up their credentials and say loudly that they work in the embassy. Employees now ask for press credentials instead of embassy credentials. The Independent of London says that the experiences of the staffers reflected in the details of the cable "portrays a society in a state of collapse."
When asked about the leaked memo on CNN's Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer, White House press secretary Tony Snow did not deny its authenticity, calling it "an accurate reflection of the realities there." But he also said that conditions had changed since the memo was written a few weeks ago.
Here we are, we are a month later, and I just told you, you've got 50,000 Iraqi troops that are now focusing on those problem areas in Baghdad. The president didn't go there with rose-colored glasses, Wolf. We've been at Camp David the day before and received briefings from Generals Casey and Abizaid and from Ambassador Khalilzad. He had talked with scholars, some of whom have somewhat bleak views of what's going on.
And again, whatever the bleakness is, whatever the facts may be on the ground, the most important thing is you figure out how to win. And that has been the focus of the president's efforts. You can't do that by reading polls. What you have to do – and cables like this help add context and texture to the overall picture – but this is not a president who's looking with rose-colored glasses.
In a comment about the story on his website, Rush Limbaugh said this is exactly what he expected to happen.
We nail Zarqawi; it's the epitome of good news. Bush has one of the best weeks of his presidency last week and a couple of days prior to that, and so what do the Democrats do? Redouble their effort to paint this whole thing as a lost cause, and they get of course their willing accomplices in the Drive-By Media to go right along with it. In fact, the Washington Post citing a 30-day-old story preceding any of the good news of the last week.
But in an editorial about the leaked memo, USA Today says that this view of the lives of several of the embassy's Iraqi employees is telling and underscores "the uphill battle faced by the fledgling Iraqi government and US forces, the limited time they have to assert control, and even whether that is still possible."
Quite apart from their bravery – just disclosing that they work for the Americans can be a death sentence, and most don't even tell relatives – their descriptions of life at neighborhood level suggest fundamentalists and militias are fast obtaining the kind of power that destroys governments. To whit: "The central government, our staff says, is not relevant; even local mukhtars (leaders) have been displaced or coopted by militias." ...
Nine lives do not tell the story of an entire country, nor is the cable reason to bring troops home. Other measures paint a brighter picture. Nevertheless, for those who wonder whom to believe in Iraq, the US ambassador reporting privately about the lives of the Iraqis closest to him is a source that can hardly be ignored.