Tuesday, July 6, 2004
By God, the media will find a way to question the legitimacy of Iraq's government if it's the last thing they do.
CNN.com - Allawi rejects charge that he's U.S. puppet
Allawi said he was fighting former dictator Saddam Hussein "when America was with him, when Britain was with him, when the world was with him."
"I thought he was a man who was committing crimes against the people of Iraq," Allawi said on ABC's "This Week."
"I stood against him. I fought bravely against him. I fought with honor against him. And this is not only me, but other political forces in Iraq. We earned [the right] to come back to Iraq to serve our people."...
...Allawi's Iraqi National Accord party was backed by U.S. and British intelligence agencies, but he insisted that neither he nor other members of the interim government -- many of whom are returned exiles like Allawi -- are puppets.
"We respect our relationship to the United States, but we are puppets to nobody," he said. "We are only answerable to the Iraqi people and to the interests of the Iraqis."
Maybe he used to be a marionette, but an Iraqi agent cut the strings for him when he attacked Allawi with an axe:
In one incident, Allawi suffered severe wounds when an Iraqi agent attacked him with an ax in his London bedroom.
You would think that that and the fact that he's literally putting his life on the line for Iraq today would earn him a modicum of respect.
