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Washington is losing in Iraq,
Colin Powell affirms
WASHINGTON, Dec. 18.— The
situation is “grave and deteriorating” and “we are
not winning, we are losing,” affirmed Colin Powell,
former secretary of state and former head of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff, referring to the war in Iraq
begun in March 2003, in statements to the CBS
television network.
 According
to Prensa Latina, Powell, who was secretary of state
under the Bush administration from 2001 to 2005,
used the word “grave” to describe the situation in
Iraq, where the Pentagon has about 150,000 troops
stationed, and stated, “I am not persuaded that
another surge of troops into Baghdad for the
purposes of suppressing this communitarian violence,
this civil war, will work.”
In line with Powell’s statements,
Democratic Senators Harry Reid and Edward Kenne
rejected any increase in soldiers in Iraq, and
advocated a new strategy for bringing the troops
home.
For its part, according to EFE,
the Pentagon acknowledged that attacks on U.S.
soldiers, security forces and Iraqi civilians
registered a brusque increase over the last three
months compared to the previous quarter.
Meanwhile, in a private White
House ceremony, former CIA director Robert Gates was
sworn in today as the new Secretary of Defense of
the United States, replacing Donald Rumsfeld, who
resigned from that post in the midst of an onslaught
of criticism.
(Translated by Granma
International) |
