The following is a compilation of Wednesday's newspaper reports about the Iraq crisis from around the country and around the world. It is just a sampling of different perspectives, designed to offer additional context into the conflict. Compiled by CBSNews.com's Andrew Cohen.
From around the country:
The Chicago Tribune's Deborah Horan offers the following about Iraqi ex-patriates: "If Aleem al-Nasiry takes the job the Pentagon is offering him, the Chicago limousine owner will return to his native Iraq with dozens of other exiles to help run one of the country's 17 provinces — if and when Saddam Hussein's regime is removed from power. His objective would be to coordinate the rebuilding in the province around Nasiriyeh in the Euphrates River valley — overseeing everything from road construction to demining fields — as part of a Defense Department plan under the ultimate authority of Gen. Tommy Franks. But like several of his compatriots being interviewed for the positions this week in Washington, al-Nasiry is not sure he wants to participate in a plan that would put him on the Pentagon's payroll during an American-led military occupation of Iraq. He flew to Washington on Monday to meet with defense officials to learn more about the project. But he is wary. 'Maybe there will be U.S. soldiers in the street, and they will say these are new occupiers,' he said. "Then they will look at you like you are a traitor.'"The Houston Chronicle offers this domestic security piece by Rachel Graves: "Lined by vulnerable refineries and petrochemical plants, the Houston Ship Channel was the epicenter of stepped up local security efforts Tuesday as the United States headed toward war. The increased patrols and restricted access extend from Houston's three airports to Austin, where metal detectors were installed in the state capitol, a building the public could once wander through virtually unfettered. In the Houston area, water plants, major medical facilities, government buildings and skyscrapers are all under closer scrutiny from dozens of local, state and federal agencies. 'We have to be prepared,' said Rusty Cornelius, community liaison for Harris County's Office of Emergency Management. 'We are the second-largest port in the country, and we are a major worldwide player in the petrochemical and gasoline industries.'"In the Los Angeles Times, correspondent John Daniszewski offers this view of Baghdad: "It was a day everyone knew would come, yet somehow it fell with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. With President Bush's ultimatum to Saddam Hussein to leave Iraq within 48 hours, the uneasy normality that had prevailed in this capital disappeared Tuesday, as if swept away by the fierce windstorm that howled through the city. Ashen-faced and on the edge of frantic, the men and women of Baghdad looked to the days ahead with dread, wondering how — and if — they will come out of a war. 'The Americans lay down such ridiculous conditions,' said 39-year-old Ahmad Hassan, who was taking a break from emptying the tire store he manages, in an attempt to prevent looting during the war. 'They know such demands cannot be fulfilled. They simply want to have their war by any means possible.'"In The New York Times, correspondent Patrick Tyler brings this view of the hardships facing U.S. troops: "A blinding desert sandstorm today enveloped American and British armies as they struggled to wheel into final position on the Iraqi frontier to await the order to wage a war intended to topple Saddam Hussein's government in Baghdad. Across 5,000 square miles of Kuwaiti desert, the wind whipped up a huge yellow nimbus of dust and sand that raked the convoys of tanks, troop transports and huddled infantry after a night in which artillery fire echoed through the border region near southern Iraq. Military officials said a series of naval clashes around the Iraqi port of Basra during the night were the result of an attempt by Iraqi military forces to send a small armada of wooden fishing vessels into the Persian Gulf, where American commanders feared they could be used in suicide strikes on allied warships assembled there."The Orlando Sentinel editorializes: "It's encouraging that more countries are joining the coalition to disarm Iraq. After this week's disappointing diplomatic meltdown at the United Nations, it's reassuring to see countries lining up to support the United States in disarming Iraq. Secretary of State Colin Powell said Tuesday that 30 countries are publicly backing — and 15 others are privately supporting — a U.S.-led invasion. As soon as today, Turkey's parliament could reconsider its rejection of a plan to accept U.S. troops and planes. A change of heart from the Turks would be especially welcome. Turkey is a longtime strategic partner of the United States and the only Muslim-majority country in NATO. A U.S. presence there could shorten the war and reduce casualties. Whatever the Turks decide, it's already clear that America will not be going it alone in Iraq." The Portland Press-Herald (Maine) has this local perspective: "As travelers pass time in the airport lounge, watching television news reports of the impending war in Iraq, Diane Dube talks about all the soldiers she's met here in the past several months on their way overseas. 'I love them,' she said. 'They are so nice.' For hundreds of servicemen and servicewomen from all over the country, Bangor International Airport has been the last stop in the United States on the way to Iraq. For those troops who are allowed to step off their transport planes during the refueling stops, Bangor represents a final, brief liberty stateside and a chance to eat a cheeseburger, pick up a magazine or smoke a cigarette at the Red Baron lounge, where Dube serves food and drinks. Troops flow through the airport nearly every day, though the pace has slowed and many of the soldiers are not allowed to leave their planes and enter the terminal. Now that war is imminent, Dube and other employees are already looking forward to seeing them on their way home."And from around the world:
Dawn, published in Karachi, Pakistan, offers this: "Pakistan is against war as it would bring nothing but misery to the people of Iraq, said Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali here on Tuesday. He told a group of reporters at Balochistan House that his government would never endorse an attack on Iraq. 'I don't know whether President Bush's ultimatum to Saddam Hussain is legal or illegal and I leave this issue to them,' he added. Responding to a question, the prime minister said that he was visiting the United States on March 26 at the invitation of the U.S. government. 'So far there is no change in my schedule but if war erupts then we will look into it,' he added."Israel's Ha-aretz predicts a quick start to the war: "Military intelligence chief Maj. Gen. Aharon Ze'evi predicted Wednesday that the American-led offensive against Saddam Hussein's Iraq will be launched shortly after President George Bush's ultimatum expires at 8 p.m. Washington time Thursday, or 3 a.m. Israel time. Ze'evi also said that the chances that Iraq would be able to launch Scud missiles at Israel from west Iraq were very low. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Wednesday that there was a 1 percent risk that the Jewish state would be the target of Iraqi retaliation for a U.S. offensive, but that Israel's preparations for such an attack would 'provide the answer to 100 percent of the dangers.'"The Jordan Times provides this view from Iraq's neighbor: "A U.S. ultimatum telling Iraqi president Saddam Hussein to quit now or face war is a throwback to the Wild West where might made right, Arabs said on Tuesday. But some hoped the Iraqi leader would bite the bullet and spare his people a third war in two decades. 'It's unbelievable how Bush is ignoring the international community and all his citizens who oppose war. It's the era of the cowboys, but at least they had a code of ethics,' said Nadia, an Egyptian professional. Qatar University professor Mohammad Saleh Al Musfir said a speech by U.S. President George W. Bush late on Monday giving Saddam 48 hours to leave Iraq showed Americans had become 'blind' with power, adding that suddenly ending U.N. arms inspections to wage war was both illegal and unjustified. In the Gulf, where many states host U.S. troops and some have suggested President Saddam should accept exile, some officials and analysts said his resignation might be the only way out. 'Either the Arab countries have to go and defend Iraq militarily, which is not possible, or to force the leadership to quit in order to save Iraq,' a senior Gulf Arab official said."Le Monde (Paris) editorializes about the "failure" of British Prime Minister Tony Blair and how it is proof of the paucity of President Bush's arguments.The Times of London offered this piece on Prime Minister Tony Blair's speech to the British Parliament: "Tony Blair has never made a more difficult speech, or a more important one, or a better one. Its power lay not in oratorical flourish, or wit, or calculated emotional appeal; it was not smooth, or clever, or contemptuous. It did not hammer home the history and histrionics, or invoke the cadence of the pulpit. The shrugs, the headshakes and the sneer had gone. Instead it was raw, simple, dignified, and bleak: a promise, a plea, and a warning. It was made by a man armed with words of war, in the certain knowledge that once deployed, they could not be pulled back. It was a speech quite unlike any that Blair has made before. The Prime Minister is not, by instinct, a gambler, but yesterday he gravely totted up the stakes, the highest he has ever played for. 'We have the Government with its most serious test, its majority at risk, the first Cabinet resignation over an issue of policy.' The outcome, he said, would 'determine the pattern of international politics for the next generation.' And the fate of Tony Blair."
Russia's Tass has this view of a post-Saddam Iraq: "A choice for a military action against Iraq in the absence of consent from the U.N. Security Council makes the U.S. fully responsible for its aftermath, Russia's Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said Tuesday as he was preparing to leave Moscow for a session of the UN Security Council. 'It is quite obvious that the military operation stands outside the format of law," Ivanov said. "The question we are asking in this situation is whether or not the risks and the aftermath [of a war] are justified when peaceful options still exist. Solutions on the basis of the U.N. Security Council Resolution are the handiest ones and Russia abides by them,' Ivanov said. When a reporter asked him whether there were chances left to avoid a war, Ivanov admitted that the hopes for it were slim, but said there was a hope that the process would eventually return to the U.N. format even in case of the U.S. hostilities against the Saddam government."Compiled by Andrew Cohen