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Perino: WH Does 'Not Seek Permanent Bases in Iraq'
General Lute said on Monday we'll negotiate them. Ali al-Dabbagh wouldn't rule them out. But at the White House press gaggle today, Dana Perino denied the Bush administration's interest in long-term U.S. military bases in Iraq. From AFP:
"We do not seek permanent bases in Iraq," spokeswoman Dana Perino told reporters after Lieutenant General Douglas Lute said Monday that the flashpoint issue would be part of negotiations to decide the future of US troops in Iraq.
Yawn. This standard formulation is nothing new for the administration. Zalmay Khalilzad, for instance, used the same words as far back as 2005, and the Iraq Study Group still considered the statement less than categorical. After all: what would we do if Iraq just happened to offer us open-ended access to certain military installations, or access renewable in x-number of years? Very, very rarely will a host country deny the U.S. a re-up on a military base: it took the Philippines nearly 100 years to get us out of Clark Air Base and Subic Bay Naval Base.
There's a sense in which our presence at those bases wasn't "permanent," and another in which we didn't "seek" permanence. But it's one in which the literal meaning has to be interpreted in direct contradiction to the events and issues those words describe. Luckily, the American Philological Society calls that interpretation a "Perino."
Comments (20)
kindness wrote on November 29, 2007 11:41 AM:How about if we just say NO!
ralphbon wrote on November 29, 2007 12:07 PM:As you may recall from statements in 2002 and 2003, the White House also "didn't seek" the Iraq war itself. But they "found" it nonetheless.
vdomeras wrote on November 29, 2007 12:25 PM:The administration is in an interesting spot in that things are going the way they wanted them to, except that they are in the position of defending the Shia majority. There are a lot of Sunni and Baathist former officers, oligarchs and administrators who at once feel threatened and potentially powerless if the Shia come to power. Some are kissing up to the Americans, others are subverting the government or doing both.
In a Sunni Arab dominated region Bush and Co need to determine which side our bread is oiled on. It seems unlikely that a truly inclusive cooperative government is going to happen in Iraq, until the Sunnis, with their traditional network of friends in business and government inside and outside the country come to terms with a new order. Hence the need for permanent bases. If we leave, the Sunnis have a pretty good shot at regaining power and reversing all the nice things that our neocons have accomplished.
EH wrote on November 29, 2007 12:33 PM:Interesting that they're trying to softpedal this. In an administration that has bullied its way through the china shop of the world, this seems to indicate they realize this is a touchy subject and not at all a done deal, especially if there is a hue and a cry about it. They're trying to keep it quiet, which says to me, "weakness."
Gary Freto wrote on November 29, 2007 12:41 PM:We didn't build the largest US Embassy ever for "short term" use. Is anyone else getting tired of all these lies?
TF Sinclair wrote on November 29, 2007 12:45 PM:This is yet one more in the ongoing series of OUTRAGEOUS LIES and distortions that the present administration continually foisters upon the American public. If this is true why is it that my brother (who is a U.S. Serviceman and has just returned from Iraq) states that the U.S. is presently building the largest embassy in the World there?
Mr Blifil wrote on November 29, 2007 12:46 PM:The bases are "permanent" in the same manner that her hair dresser describes her bobbed locks. She's obviously of the impression that bases in Iraq can be removed with the application of a little shampoo and a brisk swipe of leave-in conditioner.
Rob_in_Hawaii wrote on November 29, 2007 1:00 PM:Remember, Gitmo started out like this after our little adventure down in Cuba in 1898. How very nice that these countries we invade "ask" us to stay around for a while until things settle down.
Michael wrote on November 29, 2007 1:12 PM:Man perino is aging really, really fast. By the end of the king's term she's going to look like she's 60. I'd quit now if I were her. She's not a very good liar anyway, unlike snow-job.
MW wrote on November 29, 2007 1:40 PM:Americans do one thing well.
We believe.
We believe in Dorothy's innocence and our own, never really believing there's a man behind the curtain. That would be a "CONSPIRACY."
We believe we don't believe in conspiracy.
We believe in the premise that a dissolute fraternity slacker could rise to the presidency of the United States. We believe he represents our best interests despite his family's political cronies awarding him the office. We believe because no one has told us not to believe.
We believe that freak storms and rising temperatures don't threaten us. We believe that a bunch of evil, sinister terrorists do threaten us. We ignore Katrina and rally around 911 because we believe in good and evil rather than the impersonal forces of nature.
We believe our government had our best interests at heart when they presciently refused to join the ICC.
We believe the nice news anchors and pundits on television because, we believe, they deserve their jobs just like we deserve blessings and goodness. We never wonder why they all say virtually the same thing because that would mean we would challenge our own beliefs.
We believe the US invaded Iraq to do good (by getting rid of a bad). We don't have to think about consequences because we believe that if we have good intentions, those who represent us have good intentions. We don't have to question our beliefs because, "everybody knows ..."
So I say thanks to the Bush regime. Thanks for giving us another obvious lie. Thanks for destroying a wonderful ideal -- America -- in the name of greed and militarism. Thanks for showing us one more example of your reliance upon lies and brute force.
Thanks, again and again, for making it impossible to believe.
We may yet see you and your cronies in the dock at The Hague.
Anonymous wrote on November 29, 2007 1:43 PM:>Gary Freto wrote on November 29, 2007 12:41 PM:
We didn't build the largest US Embassy ever for "short term" use. Is anyone else getting tired of all these lies?
> Don't tell me: probably a camouflaged strip-mall that "looks" like an embassy; the way you can have a McDonald restaurant that disguises itself as a pirate ship, or haunted house.
But I agree, on a whole different order of magnitude. Also, it depends what "short term" means: just enuff time to siphon the oil, and then turn the embassy (whatever this might mean by then) over for private development, etc. The usual corporate development model.
Martyc35 wrote on November 29, 2007 1:45 PM:I kept this DailyKos diary for just this moment. It was written by David Swanson in June 2006, and the claim is that both houses of Congress voted not to fund permanent bases in Iraq, and the conference committee, where differences are resolved, pulled the language from the bill, although there was no difference, only unanimity:
"When the House and the Senate pass similar but not identical bills, they create a conference committee to work out the differences. When they both passed amendments to the "emergency supplemental" spending bill stipulating that none of the money could be used to build permanent bases in Iraq, the conference committee, behind closed doors this week, resolved that non-difference by deleting it."
The diary in its entirety may be found at this address. A person to contact for confirmation is (D) Rep. Barbara Lee. According to Swanson, practically no one heard about this. The traditional media ignored it or buried it.
I gave up on the issue after receiving absolutely no response from anyone. I doubt that Swanson made this up, but I have not confirmed his story. Did anyone else notice it?
Martyc35 wrote on November 29, 2007 1:51 PM:Hmm. I'm used to putting links into HTML, but it didn't work here. The URL for Swanson's diary, described above, is http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/6/9/1714/71904
Back when all this was going on, I looked up several huge Iraq/American airbases on Google Earth, and there they were, some still needing completion. Fascinating and scary. Try it.
Gordon wrote on November 29, 2007 1:56 PM:Ecuador is not following the Phillipine's model.
Quite an amusing story:
http://uk.reuters.com/article/reutersEdge/idUKADD25267520071022
Mark wrote on November 29, 2007 3:04 PM:This is probably a dumb question, but why do people go to these briefings anymore? It is just a concert of evasion, lies, and spin control. Does any actual news ever emerge?
Michael wrote on November 29, 2007 3:27 PM:Mark, I agree 1000 percent. Wouldn't that be funny if one day nobody showed up and there was a picture of her standing there by herself. That would be hilarious. Also, there never is any news, its just lies being repeated by the right-wing mainstream media.
Rodney wrote on November 29, 2007 5:03 PM:"We do not seek permanent bases in Iraq"
translation:
"We already have permanent bases in Iraq"
Grinch60 wrote on November 30, 2007 8:49 PM:Clark AFB's closer was facilitated by a volcanic eruption of Mt. Pinataubo which heavily damaged the base.
Lucius Fieldon wrote on December 1, 2007 12:37 AM:It's amazing how easy it is for the people in this administration to stand in front of a camera and lie to the American people. Maybe we don't have the same definition of permanent that they do.
Pertinax wrote on December 3, 2007 10:42 AM:In response to Martyc35:
The "no permanent bases" provision may very well have been stricken from an earlier piece of legislation, but it has since been included in numerous enacted laws, most recently the defense appropriations act. The House also passed a stand-alone resolution (HR 2929) in July on the same issue. But the actual effect of these provisions is questionable. As many have pointed out, "permanent" is highly subjective in this context and its meaning can be manipulated to serve the Administration's purposes. If anti-war activists truly want to prevent permanent bases from being established in Iraq, they should focus on stopping or minimizing further appropriations for construction when war funding bills come through Congress. That is where the rubber meets the road. So far, there has been very little effort on this front.