What Others Say

From Britain:
So into the graveyard of Iraq, George Bush, commander-in-chief, is to send another 21,000 of his soldiers. The march of folly is to continue... There will be timetables, deadlines, benchmarks, goals for both America and its Iraqi satraps. But the war against terror can still be won. We shall prevail. Victory or death. And it shall be death.

President Bush's announcement early this morning tolled every bell. A billion dollars of extra aid for Iraq, a diary of future success as the Shia powers of Iraq - still to be referred to as the "democratically elected government" - march in lockstep with America's best men and women to restore order and strike fear into the hearts of al-Qa'ida. It will take time - oh, yes, it will take years, at least three...... but the mission will be accomplished.
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And so more US troops must die, sacrificed for those who have already died. We cannot betray those who have been killed. It is a lie, of course. Every desperate man keeps gambling, preferably with other men's lives.

From Brazil:
The president of the United States, George W. Bush, is facing the classic dilemma of all military commanders: Will sending more troops into the bonfire of Iraq help me win the war? Bankers tend to be more cynical when confronted with the same situation. They dislike, as they say, to "throw good money after bad," or in other words, to lend even more when the creditor threatens not to pay....... There are too few American troops to police the country; the number of Iraqi troops are also insufficient and cannot be trusted; and the more violence and ethnic cleansing increases, the more vulnerable and impotent the Americans - and the government in Baghdad - seem to be.

But putting more soldiers into the fire will only make the situation worse, create more targets for the insurgency and, in the end, only increase Iraqi government dependence on the Americans.......

From Austria:
The execution of Saddam Hussein will not strengthen America's chances of success in the Iraq.

Saddam Hussein's predications may be proven deadly correct: With his execution, he will sooner or later become a martyr.......

For this is one "martyr" that has a high degree of potential to mobilize those who regard him as such. One would like to hope that Iraq's Baathist-Sunni insurgency is already operating at full tilt and won't manage to find the means to escalate the violence still further. For at the moment, it isn't only a further deterioration of the security situation that we have to fear, but rather the loss – perhaps through self-sabotage – to grasp perhaps the last opportunity to get a handle on the situation.

From Pakistan:
President Saddam Hussein's hanging on Saturday has evoked a mixed global reaction. Predictably, President Bush called it "an important milestone on Iraq's course to becoming a democracy that can govern, sustain, and defend itself." He deserves congratulations for his restraint in not gloating, as some other states unfortunately have done.

The execution, though, has reinforced the sense of foreboding for Iraq. The democracy Mr. Bush pretends to deceive the world with is nowhere to be seen. Rather, there is the fear is that the post-Saddam era will see greater bloodshed, deeper sectarian and ethnic divisions and increasing momentum toward the disintegration of the country. The U.S. will now find it harder to stage an "honorable" exit, but the Bush administration doesn't intend to leave yet anyway.......
Posted on The Human stain