The Italian prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, said today the driver of the car in which an Italian agent was killed by US forces in Iraq last week had obeyed orders to stop.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/italy/story/0,12576,1433938,00.html

by: Jack Dalton

When was it the state gained the power to dictate to any of us when, where, how and if, we will participate in the killing of other human beings? When was it the state gained the power over us to tell anyone of us we will go to jail if we are not willing to participate in the mass murder that is war, let alone one launched behind deliberate lies and disinformation as this one in Iraq?

http://207.44.245.159/article7226.htm

by Don Mills

Courier-Journal

03/09/05

Italy, a staunch U.S. ally in Iraq despite strong domestic opposition to the war, has provided 3,000 troops and resisted growing pressure to pull them out. A clerk at the Morgana Hotel, where we stayed, declared: 'I am still trying to figure out why we are there in the first place. It is not our war.' A lot of Americans are trying to figure that out, too. This incident is just one more of the many horrible tragedies that have taken place in this war. Some 1,500 American soldiers have died, some 10,000 wounded or with limbs amputated, and more than 100,000 Iraqi civilians are dead. The costs to U.S. taxpayers continue to grow beyond $200 billion. The bombings, the killings, the kidnappings, the beheadings, the costs -- there seems to be no end...

http://tinyurl.com/65hzt


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

WHAM-TV News

03/09/05

A former U.S. Marine who participated in capturing ousted Iraqi President Saddam Hussein said the public version of his capture was fabricated. Ex-Sgt. Nadim Abou Rabeh, of Lebanese descent, was quoted in the Saudi daily al-Medina Wednesday as saying Saddam was actually captured Friday, Dec. 12, 2003, and not the day after, as announced by the U.S. Army. 'I was among the 20-man unit, including eight of Arab descent, who searched for Saddam for three days in the area of Dour near Tikrit, and we found him in a modest home in a small village and not in a hole as announced,' Abou Rabeh said. ... 'Later on, a military production team fabricated the film of Saddam's capture in a hole, which was in fact a deserted well,' Abou Rabeh said...

http://tinyurl.com/6mnf9


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Christian Science Monitor

03/09/05

A study conducted by the Army last year and posted recently on a Defense Contracting Command website (but since removed after news stories discussed the study) indicates that women and young black men are increasingly staying away from the Army. The poll, based on interviews with 3,236 youth ages 16 to 24, showed that 'recruiting an all-volunteer Army in times of war is getting increasingly difficult.' Associated Press reports that these trends, combined with 'the negative effects of the Army's image as a last-resort career choice for what one study called the 'average Joe,'' mean the military, and the Army in particular, could be entering a 'prolonged recruting slump' just at the time when the US government wants to increase the Army's numbers...

http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0309/dailyUpdate.html


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

USA Today

03/09/05

The Italian agent killed by American forces in Iraq had U.S. military authorization for his operation to win the release of a hostage, Premier Silvio Berlusconi said Wednesday. In his first major address since Friday's shooting strained relations between Washington and one of its biggest allies, Berlusconi told Italy's Senate that the car carrying agent Nicola Calipari and hostage Giuliana Sgrena stopped immediately when a light was flashed. The U.S. military has said the Americans used hand and arm signals, flashing white lights, and firing warning shots to try to get the car to stop...

http://tinyurl.com/6o7t9


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

http://www.newsdissector.org/blog/2005/03/07/was-giuliana-targeted/


Informant: Charles Bremer

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/2FEB8844-A37E-4463-BFCB-5F58EDF946E6.htm


Informant: Charles Bremer