by eeyore
Tuesday, Apr. 01, 2003 at 12:53 AM
nbc's peter arnett says u.s. warplan is a "failure"
Peter Arnett: U.S. war plan has 'failed'
Sunday, March 30, 2003 Posted: 10:11 PM EST (0311 GMT)
Peter Arnett
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• Transcript: Peter Arnett interview on Iraqi TV
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- The U.S. war plan has "failed," veteran war correspondent Peter Arnett told Iraqi TV in an interview that aired Sunday.
"The first war plan has failed because of Iraqi resistance. Now they are trying to write another war plan," Arnett said. "Clearly, the American war planners misjudged the determination of the Iraqi forces."
Arnett -- who is reporting for National Geographic Television and NBC News -- also said Iraq has given him and other reporters a "degree of freedom which we appreciate," this despite the fact that Iraq has expelled several journalists, including CNN's Baghdad team, and apparently has imprisoned two journalists from the New York newspaper Newsday.
Arnett is a member of the Board of Directors of the Committee to Protect Journalists, which is trying to locate the missing journalists.
"I'd like to say from the beginning that the 12 years I've been coming here," Arnett said, "I've met unfailing courtesy and cooperation, courtesy from your people and cooperation from the Ministry of Information."
Arnett told the Iraqi TV interviewer, who was dressed in an Iraqi Army uniform, that President Bush is facing a "growing challenge" about the "conduct of the war" within the United States.
"President Bush says he is concerned about the Iraqi people, but if Iraqi people are dying in numbers, then American policy will be challenged very strongly," he said. In the interview, Arnett said reports from Baghdad on civilians being killed are being shown in the United States, and "it helps those who oppose the war when you challenge the policy to develop their arguments."
He pointed out U.S. claims that civilians killed in an explosion at a downtown Baghdad market were the victims of Iraqi missiles, and that Iraq had said the missiles were definitely incoming coalition fire.
Arnett's Iraqi interviewer
NBC News issued a statement supporting Arnett, saying that Arnett gave the interview to Iraqi TV as a "professional courtesy" and that his remarks "were analytical in nature and were not intended to be anything more."
Arnett also said "clearly this is a city that is disciplined, the population is responsive to the government's requirements of discipline," and "Iraqi friends tell me there is a growing sense of nationalism and resistance to what the United States and Britain is doing."
The longtime war correspondent, who reported on the Persian Gulf War for CNN in 1991, said U.S. war planners miscalculated the will of Iraqis and he does "not understand how that happened."
He said his reports "would tell the Americans about the determination of the Iraqi forces, the determination of the government and the willingness to fight for their country."