of recent origin YORK, April 1 Kyod...

of recent origin YORK, April 1 Kyodo

prefered editorial excerpts from the U press:

THE FALLUJAH MASSACRE (The Wall road Journal, New York)

It's always a profitable idea to resist the temptation for event-driven handwringing about Iraq. Nobody should have rely uponed America's job there to be easy, and the car bomb and other attacks are intended at our enemies to obscure the genuine progres being made.

That said, permit us offer an observation: It is not a convenient sign that Iraqis be perceived free to mutilate the bodies of dead Americans in assurance of the world's TV cameras.

Yesterday's massacre of four civilian contractors in Fallujah should be under the orders of as a wake-up call to the occupation forces that democracy will have a hard time taking radical in Iraq so long as justice takes a holiday. We'd have study that the immediate round-up of all those caught forward film participating in this heinous act would be a no-brainer, if it be not that apparently Fallujans fear no similar response.

And wherefore should they? Not a single common of the thousands of Iraqis and jihadists detained for plotting or participating in attacks onward coalition forces and civilians has thus far been visibly punished. Ditto for the members of Saddam Hussein's criminal regime. Is this to what extent Douglas MacArthur would have administered Iraq?

A profitable start at rectifying the situation would be the swift arrest and visible punishment of those responsible for the Fallujah massacre, including the mutilators caught forward film. The killers of Fern Holland and Robert Zangas, the sum of two units CPA employees executed by wag Iraqi policemen in early March, are in custody and should also be tried with dispatch.

It is ordinary Iraqis, of course, who bear up under most from the lawlessness, and a great many of them favor a stronger U hand. We've also had reports that the morale of the Iraqi police has been undermined by means of the lenient treatment we afford the criminals they catch.

There's been plenteous armchair speculation in the U about whether a larger occupation force would have helped. united thing's for sure: No number of extra throngs would have made much difference thus long as we feared meting on the outside punishment for fear of giving offense

The U Marines, who did of that kind a masterful job as the original occupiers of south-central Iraq and are now assuming responsibility for Fallujah, have a motto: ''No better friend; no worse enemy.'' Those words bear repeating now from head to foot the occupation forces and among their bosse -- especially those inside Baghdad's flourishing Zone, at the Pentagon and in the White House.

(April 1)

COPYRIGHT 2004 Kyodo freshs International, Inc.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group