Audacity posted by lenin

General Sir Richard Dannatt's remarks about the resistance in both Iraq and Afghanistan must have embarrassed someone with a Brown-nose. As you already know, hardly a newspaper or television show in the English-speaking world touched the story, conveniently averting their gaze to other aspects of the speech. The BBC was one such example. So, someone decided to e-mail Helen Boaden - head of BBC News - about this shocking ommission of what was surely one of the most surprising parts of the General's speech, and got the following reply:

Thank you for your recent email. Having looked at the whole of General Dannatt's speech, I think the online report did a good job of summarizing the main news points. If you look at what the general said in context, he does not suggest that the British army is fighting people who only want "jobs, money, security and hope" but a hard core of people who "offer violence against each other".

From the portion of Dannatt's speech that Boaden then goes on to cite:

So, because as an Army we are enemy focussed, some words on our adversaries in southern Iraq. The militants (and I use the word deliberately because not all are insurgents, or terrorists, or criminals; they are a mixture of them all) are well armed - certainly with outside help, and probably from Iran. By motivation, essentially, and with the exception of the Al Qaeda in Iraq element who have endeavoured to exploit the situation for their own ends, our opponents are Iraqi Nationalists, and are most concerned with their own needs - jobs, money, security - and the majority are not bad people.

Did you see that? Dannatt clearly suggesting that the British army's foes in Iraq are "essentially", with exception of the tiny 'Al Qaeda' element, "Iraqi Nationalists" who are "most concerned with their own needs"; and that "the majority are not bad people". Did you notice that? So, Dannatt didn't in fact say what he did in fact say, and the BBC did a "good job of summarizing the main news points" by ommitting one of the main news points. There must be something behind such a transparent refusal to face reality, and I'm sure that whatever it is, it reeks of the tedious authority of a Ministry of Defense mandarin.

Labels: bbc, general richard dannatt, iraq, iraqi resistance

Official: Iraqi resistance is 'decent' posted by lenin

Never mind General Dannatt's plea for us to rally round the troops despite the unpopularity of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. His comments about the Iraqi resistance are not well-reported online, but he was shown on Channel Four news describing them as "Iraqi nationalists", concerned about the well-being of the country and therefore "not bad people". It doesn't appear to be on any news site at all so far as I can tell, and his speech has not been transcribed on the Ministry of Defence website (which seems a bit strange). This is obviously an embarrassment since it completely undermines everything that Blair and Brown have said about it, and what the Bush administration continue to insist upon despite their own very comprehensive reports on the matter.

If anyone finds a transcript, or a single online report of these remarks, please post it in the comments box.

Update. Thanks to 'Dave S' in the comments box:

Labels: afghanistan, anti-war, army, general richard dannatt, iraq, war