RESULTS
At least 2,811 members of the U.S. military now have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. The figure includes seven military civilians. At least 2,254 died as a result of hostile action, according to the military's numbers.
To exchange tyranny for anarchy is merely to move from one circle of hell to another. As one Iraqi recently commented: under Saddam we had a state, a bad state, but to have no state is even worse. Even if the Johns Hopkins University estimate of some 600,000 Iraqi civilian deaths since the invasion is an overestimate, extrapolating from too small a sample, the number of Iraqi civilian deaths is horrendous. The country is already in civil war.
Oh yes, and there's the cost. The Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz has estimated that the total, eventual costs of the Iraq war, "including the budgetary, social and macroeconomic costs, are likely to exceed $2 trillion" - that's $2,000,000,000,000.
It's not too soon to suggest that the American-British invasion and occupation of Iraq has proved to be the greatest strategic blunder of our time. So what can we honestly say to that grieving mother or father? "Your son (or daughter) died in vain"?
"Ужасный век, ужасные серца..."
суббота, октября 28, 2006
понедельник, июня 19, 2006
HARDLY a day goes by without Mikhail Kalashnikov turning on his television set and seeing his lethal invention being brandished somewhere.
It still makes him proud to see the Kalashnikov assault rifle — better known as the AK47 — in the hands of professional soldiers and national liberation movements.
But now, aged 86, he laments that it has become the weapon of choice for terrorists, criminals and child soldiers — and, as such, the most prolific killing machine in history.
General Kalashnikov (retired) began designing his weapon in 1941 while recuperating in hospital from wounds suffered when a German shell hit his tank. He recalls brainstorming one night and scribbling down a design he hoped would improve the Soviet Army’s chances against the better-equipped Nazi forces, who were being issued with automatic rifles. To his frustration, it would not be completed until 1947 — hence the name Avtomat Kalashnikova 47 — but the weapon proved so reliable that it had become standard army issue within two years and was soon being exported to “friendly” governments and revolutionary movements.
Copies and adaptations were also produced in more than a dozen communist countries, including China, North Korea, East Germany and Poland.
As a result, there are an estimated 100 million AK47s in the world today — some ten times more than its American rival, the M16. And almost a billion rifles have been produced based on its design and parts, according to Izhmash, the company that makes the AK47 at its factory in Izhevsk in the Ural mountains.
Even after lying in a swamp you can pick up this rifle, aim it and shoot. That’s the best job description there is for a gun. Real soldiers know that and understand it. Look what’s happening now: every day on television we see that the Americans in Iraq have my machineguns and assault rifles in their armoured vehicles. Even their American rifles don’t work properly.
The rifle is especially effective in jungles and deserts, so much so that the Pentagon bought thousands to equip the new Iraqi armed forces.
GUN LORE
The AK47 fires 600 rounds a minute, is accurate to 300m, deadly at up to 1,500m
Used in 55 armies
Manufactured in 11 countries
Appears on Mozambique and Hezbollah flags
1 billion rifles produced based on its design
1,300 people killed each day worldwide by small arms
It still makes him proud to see the Kalashnikov assault rifle — better known as the AK47 — in the hands of professional soldiers and national liberation movements.
But now, aged 86, he laments that it has become the weapon of choice for terrorists, criminals and child soldiers — and, as such, the most prolific killing machine in history.
General Kalashnikov (retired) began designing his weapon in 1941 while recuperating in hospital from wounds suffered when a German shell hit his tank. He recalls brainstorming one night and scribbling down a design he hoped would improve the Soviet Army’s chances against the better-equipped Nazi forces, who were being issued with automatic rifles. To his frustration, it would not be completed until 1947 — hence the name Avtomat Kalashnikova 47 — but the weapon proved so reliable that it had become standard army issue within two years and was soon being exported to “friendly” governments and revolutionary movements.
Copies and adaptations were also produced in more than a dozen communist countries, including China, North Korea, East Germany and Poland.
As a result, there are an estimated 100 million AK47s in the world today — some ten times more than its American rival, the M16. And almost a billion rifles have been produced based on its design and parts, according to Izhmash, the company that makes the AK47 at its factory in Izhevsk in the Ural mountains.
Even after lying in a swamp you can pick up this rifle, aim it and shoot. That’s the best job description there is for a gun. Real soldiers know that and understand it. Look what’s happening now: every day on television we see that the Americans in Iraq have my machineguns and assault rifles in their armoured vehicles. Even their American rifles don’t work properly.
The rifle is especially effective in jungles and deserts, so much so that the Pentagon bought thousands to equip the new Iraqi armed forces.
GUN LORE
The AK47 fires 600 rounds a minute, is accurate to 300m, deadly at up to 1,500m
Used in 55 armies
Manufactured in 11 countries
Appears on Mozambique and Hezbollah flags
1 billion rifles produced based on its design
1,300 people killed each day worldwide by small arms
суббота, апреля 15, 2006
His name has entered the languages of the planet and his most famous creation has sold 100 million copies but at 86 Mikhail Kalashnikov, father of the assault rifle that bears his name, is still a busy man.
He travels, he sells, and in the face of criticism he sings the praises of the weapon he created.
Blue eyes, grey hair, sprightly, he lives in the Urals town of Izhevsk and arrived Saturday in Moscow to hit back at criticism in the US press of the sale of 100,000 Kalashnikovs to Venezuela.
"It isn't the first time they have tried to sneer at Russian weapons," he said in response to an article on April 10 in the conservative Washington Times which claimed that Caracas had suspended the contract because Moscow was supplying old weapons.
In any case, he said, the rifle named after him "is extremely simply made for a poorly educated soldier."
"During the Vietnam war US soldiers used to abandon their M-16s and take the Kalashnikovs of the Vietnamese troops they had killed.
"Every day in Baghdad the Americans use my weapons because theirs don't work very well there."
Today he regrets that the gun that bears his name is so often used in inter-ethnic conflicts
"I created it to defend my country" he said.
He travels, he sells, and in the face of criticism he sings the praises of the weapon he created.
Blue eyes, grey hair, sprightly, he lives in the Urals town of Izhevsk and arrived Saturday in Moscow to hit back at criticism in the US press of the sale of 100,000 Kalashnikovs to Venezuela.
"It isn't the first time they have tried to sneer at Russian weapons," he said in response to an article on April 10 in the conservative Washington Times which claimed that Caracas had suspended the contract because Moscow was supplying old weapons.
In any case, he said, the rifle named after him "is extremely simply made for a poorly educated soldier."
"During the Vietnam war US soldiers used to abandon their M-16s and take the Kalashnikovs of the Vietnamese troops they had killed.
"Every day in Baghdad the Americans use my weapons because theirs don't work very well there."
Today he regrets that the gun that bears his name is so often used in inter-ethnic conflicts
"I created it to defend my country" he said.
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