The inside story of Iraq

After several years of experience as former Senior Counselor to Ambassador L. Paul Bremer, Administrator, Office of Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) in Baghdad and in the Defense Department, Washington, DC, Ambassador Tom C. Korologos today shared his experience and views related to the war in Iraq. In his opening statements Korologos outlined the United States previous objective in Iraq by the Bush administration. “President Bush’s first objective after 9/11, was to establish what could be done to prevent the next attack,” said Korologos.

Korologos spoke of what he had seen during his travels to areas in Iraq effected by the war, describing horrific stories from specialized rape rooms to human shuddering machines operated by Saddam Hussein and his regime. “There were more than 300,000 mass-grave sites found so far in Iraq and they’re still looking,” Korologos said. According to Korologos, Saddam have had close ties to al-Qaida and been a supporter of terrorism long before the Iraq war started and 9/11 occurred. “Every Iraqi I spoke with as I traveled the country had suffered at least one loss in the family to Saddam’s brutality,” said Korologos. According to Korologos, the United States need to be patient in order to prevail against terror-extremists such as al-Qaida.

According to Korologos, President Bush came up with new reasons to stay in Iraq after Saddam’s fall. “They had the troops that they needed to take the country, just not to hold it, and certainly not to rebuild it,” Korologos said.