Is Gates Channeling Cheney on Iraq with “Last Gasp” Remark?
Friday, 10 April 2009 by Nancy A. Youssef | McClatchy Newspapers http://www.truthout.org/041209C Midway through a week of mayhem in Iraq, Defense Secretary Robert Gates raised eyebrows when he said the recent resurgence of violence in Baghdad was “a last gasp” of Islamic extremists. It was an echo of former Vice President Dick Cheney, who in 2005 said the insurgency was “in the last throes.” The following two years were the deadliest period of the war. Today, as in 2005, other top U.S. military and intelligence officials worry that escalating tensions could threaten the administration’s plans to draw down American forces in Iraq. A truck bomb Friday in the northern city of Mosul killed five U.S. soldiers in the deadliest attack on U.S. forces in 13 months. Since Monday, a series of explosions around the country has killed at least 60 Iraqis and injured 200. Speaking Tuesday on “The News Hour” on PBS, Gates said that recent violence in Baghdad was an attempt by “al Qaida, trying sort of
