- WASHINGTON -- Two leading
Republican legislators yesterday attacked the Bush administration's approach
to rebuilding Iraq, in one of the strongest indictments of the administration's
Iraq policy from members of President Bush's party.
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- The Senate Foreign Relations Committee heard testimony
from State Department officials seeking to divert almost 20 percent of
the $18.4 billion in US reconstruction funds to security operations instead
of public works projects and economic development.
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- But the hearing quickly became a forum for attacking
what the Republican committee chairman, Senator Richard G. Lugar of Indiana,
referred to as the ''dancing-in-the-street crowd" that wrongly predicted
that Iraqis would be celebrating after the fall of Saddam Hussein a year
and a half ago. He said the same White House officials have repeatedly
failed to make necessary course changes.
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- ''Now, the nonsense of all [the predictions] is apparent;
the lack of planning is apparent," he said.
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- Senator Chuck Hagel, Republican of Nebraska, addressing
two of the State Department's point men on Iraq, said the pace of reconstruction
has been ''beyond pitiful. It's embarrassing. It is now in the zone of
dangerous."
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- ''You don't win the hearts and minds of the people at
the end of a barrel of a gun," Hagel, a Vietnam War veteran, said.
''You do that through the process that we started here in the Congress
appropriating $18.4 billion."
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- As for the original architects of the Iraq war, he added:
''Maybe we ought to have a hearing with the inventors of this, have them
come back up, all these smart guys that got us in there and said, 'Don't
worry.' "
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- The criticism signaled the growing worries in both parties
that Iraq is slipping out of control, with large areas of country under
guerrilla control and rising attacks on troops and Iraqi civilians. It
also sent a clear signal to the White House that some Republican supporters
of Bush's decision to invade Iraq last year are worried that the administration's
Iraq policy is veering off-track.
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- To try to beef up security, the Bush administration Tuesday
announced it was asking Congress for permission to reallocate about $3.5
billion of the $18.4 billion in reconstruction funds Congress approved
last November.
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- Most of the money would finance more training for Iraqi
police. A smaller portion would be used to establish a nationwide work
program to combat the estimated 50 percent unemployment rate in Iraq and
deter young people from joining the insurgency.
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- US rebuilding funds have created 111,000 new Iraqi jobs,
according to State Department figures, far below what specialists agree
is necessary to prevent defections to the insurgents.
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- Administration officials told the Senate panel yesterday
that the proposed funding shift is part of a new strategy by the State
Department, which took over responsibility for Iraqi reconstruction from
the Defense Department in June.
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- ''An uncertain security situation affects all potential
economic and political development," said Joseph Bowab, deputy assistant
secretary of state for foreign assistance programs.
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- As of last week, only $1.14 billion out of the $18.4
billion pot that was approved on an emergency basis last year has been
spent because of contract delays and the growing attacks on public infrastructure
by guerrillas and Islamic extremists.
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- Most of the frustrations expressed by the senators centered
on the slow pace of reconstruction.
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- ''This is an extraordinarily ineffective administration
procedure," Lugar said of the reconstruction. ''It is exasperating
for anybody looking at this from any vantage point. We're in favor of the
security aspect, but we're still also in favor of getting money out to
these towns and villages.
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- ''Although we recognize these funds must not be spent
unwisely, the slow pace of reconstruction spending means that we are failing
to fully take advantage of one of our most potent tools to influence the
direction of Iraq."
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- © Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.
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- http://www.boston.com/news/world/articles/
2004/09/16/two_gop_leaders_attack_iraq_policy/
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