REVIEW & OUTLOOK (Editorial)
State of Denial
September 9, 2003
The Wall Street Journal

The Pentagon is getting blamed for every problem in Iraq, but any honest
post mortem should also focus on the State Department's hostility to
enlisting Iraqis as our allies. Even now, at this crucial stage in Iraq's
transition to democracy, Foggy Bottom has chosen to discontinue all funding
to the Iraqi National Congress under the 1998 Iraq Liberation Act. The
withheld money will apparently include $5.1 million that should have been
disbursed in 2001, much of it for INC radio and TV.

This is hardly the policy Congress intended. The Act specifically states
that "once Saddam Hussein is removed from power in Iraq, the United States
should [provide] democracy transition assistance to Iraqi parties and
movements with democratic goals." The INC is just that: ardently
pro-American, and the only major non-ethnic, non-sectarian movement in the
country today.

Yet State continues to pursue what can only be described as a bureaucratic
vendetta against Ahmed Chalabi, who this month sits as the rotating
president of the new Iraq Governing Council. Among State's excuses is that
it can no longer favor any one Iraqi group. But the U.S. should be helping
any group that wants to assist in democratic reconstruction, if only to
counter the foreign money flowing in to other, less savory groups.

INC broadcasting would be a special help right now. The American-backed
revival of official Iraqi television has gone so poorly that the station's
first director quit early last month, saying he lacked the resources to
compete with the likes of al Jazeera and al Arabiya. Meanwhile, those
stations, along with others sponsored by Iran and Syria, continue to spew
anti-American propaganda. The restoration of INC money is urgently needed,
and it appears that may require a Presidential word with Secretary Colin
Powell.

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