Tuesday, April 15, 2003
AVOIDING THE MISTAKES OF SCAP
The first meeting to rebuild the Iraqi civil polity has begun under Coalition auspices. Hopefully, with Iraq there will more care exercised in the selection of personnel and a through dismantling of the fascist Baath than there was during the Occupation of Japan.
Hastiness, confusion and the lack of familiarity with Japanese language and culture of American officers allowed not only politically unacceptable Japanese bureaucrats to retain their posts under SCAP but Class-A war criminals like Colonel Manasobu Tsuji - the architect of the Death March to Bataan- were able to worm their way back into the government. Large numbers of fascist ex-Naimusho ( Home Ministry)and Kempetai ( Military Police) officials found places in Japan's postwar Ministries of Education, Finance and International trade and Industry and ultranationalist gangsters like Yoshio Kodama who had looted Manchuria for the Japanese Imperial Army were left free to build billion dollar Yakuza empires.
In an effort to restore order to Baghdad, the wholesale recall of Iraqi police is worrisome without some kind of vetting procedure to screen out the rank and file uniformed traffic cop from the agents of Saddam's Amn, Mukhabarat and other security agencies. If Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union are any guide, midlevel security officials often wear the hats of several organizations and they will be presenting themselves to Coalition officers in their least sinister roles.
Backgrounds need to be checked.
¶ 10:16 AM
The first meeting to rebuild the Iraqi civil polity has begun under Coalition auspices. Hopefully, with Iraq there will more care exercised in the selection of personnel and a through dismantling of the fascist Baath than there was during the Occupation of Japan.
Hastiness, confusion and the lack of familiarity with Japanese language and culture of American officers allowed not only politically unacceptable Japanese bureaucrats to retain their posts under SCAP but Class-A war criminals like Colonel Manasobu Tsuji - the architect of the Death March to Bataan- were able to worm their way back into the government. Large numbers of fascist ex-Naimusho ( Home Ministry)and Kempetai ( Military Police) officials found places in Japan's postwar Ministries of Education, Finance and International trade and Industry and ultranationalist gangsters like Yoshio Kodama who had looted Manchuria for the Japanese Imperial Army were left free to build billion dollar Yakuza empires.
In an effort to restore order to Baghdad, the wholesale recall of Iraqi police is worrisome without some kind of vetting procedure to screen out the rank and file uniformed traffic cop from the agents of Saddam's Amn, Mukhabarat and other security agencies. If Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union are any guide, midlevel security officials often wear the hats of several organizations and they will be presenting themselves to Coalition officers in their least sinister roles.
Backgrounds need to be checked.
¶ 10:16 AM
